SIXTEEN

They had laid their dead near the hull portal, in the room where first these met. Yvonne, clinging to Skip's arm, said through tears, 'We can't just launch them.'

'Nor turn Ahasuerus over for dissection,' he agreed. "They rate a service, yes.'

'Can we give them any? I mean… do you know how…in any faith, any tradition? I don't. A few bits and pieces of Kaddish, of the Christian ceremony, vaguely remembered from funerals—and when neither we nor they believed— What have we to offer except pompous made-up sentences?' She stared before her.

'Nothing. It's emptier in us than out yonder.'

'I think they'd have liked the Wayfaring,' he said.

'What?' She cast a blurry, bewildered look upon him.

'How my folk bury a friend. Nobody knows who wrote the words, but most of us have learned them.

"Wayfarer, farewell. For the gift of your love we thank you; and your gift shall be cherished within us on every road we may wander, and live between us in every camp where we meet, and be given again when we likewise enter your quietness. Until then we shall rejoice at sky, wind, water, and wide lands, in your name and memory—"' Skip let his voice trail off. 'It goes on a short while longer,' he said shyly, 'and we've got a particular way of setting down wildflowers or what else can be had, and other such customs.

Do you think that'd be right?'

'Oh, yes, oh, yes,' she said, and he could hear how her misery was lifting. 'We can take them to us, make them belong— In the Byworld is our hope.'

They stood on the observation bridge and watched man's mother grow near. She shone cool blue amidst night and stars. Clouds swirled white where rain went walking. An ocean bore one incandescent point of sunlight. Offside lay her moon, and lifeless as if long ago it had felt the wrath of bombs; but men were there now, and in a few of their shelters grew roses.

'Ahasuerus loved Earth,' Skip said.

'Wang Li did too,' Yvonne answered.

He nodded. 'We'll see if we can keep it for them.' And then: 'No. I shouldn't've spoken like that. The world's had overmany saviours and guardians.'

Because of whom, his thought said, two that we travelled with are on a straight-line orbit into the sun.

But grief had faded, as it must and should, in those days he and Yvonne had added to their journey, laying their plans and making certain they could handle the ship.

The room was still. They had turned off the murmurous background, which was too reminding. Gradually they would learn how to make the ship sing of Earth. The atmosphere remained thick, warm, wet, and odorous, for they did not want to risk destroying their gardens. But they meant to move these into special places, and create through most of the hull an air better suited to them and to blossoms more familiar.

'Are you sure we'll able to control events that well?' she had asked when first they talked about the future.

'No,' he said. 'In fact, I doubt it. However, I am sure we've seen an end to grabbing and tearing after this power that ought to be only for—for—'

'For enlarging the spirit.'

'Okay.' He ran fingers through his hair while pacing before her. 'It's ours. Yours and mine. We'll never give it to the Ortho. Anybody's Ortho. They had their chance and proved they aren't fit. Now let them whistle. We can't be touched. If necessary, we'll head outward. I know about a planet or two we could homestead. But I reckon we'd rather stay. And I'm fairly confident we can strike a bargain. Even one that'll let us visit Earth, immune from reprisals. Don't forget, we're uncatchable also in a tender. And we do have a lot to dicker with, like being able to ferry scientists. Of course, we'd better keep our people always in the majority aboard.'

'Who are they?'

'Byworlders. Those I know personally, the right kind, gentle adventurers who've got no interest in running anybody else's life.' He halted, squeezed her shoulder, and smiled down at her where she sat. 'Maybe you'll pick a few Orthians like yourself. Fine. The point is, after they sign on with us, they're of the Byworld too.'

The talk had been in their cabin, so his sweeping gesture had been at walls. But he meant the cosmos beyond. «

The vision glowed from her. 'And we'll keep the peace,' she said.

'No!' he replied. 'Don't you see, darling, that's been the whole trouble? That people have power over other people, or want it, or are afraid others want it? Ahasuerus didn't come here to put a new yoke on human necks.'

'I'll have to learn your way of thinking,' she said humbly. 'To me it seems impossible that someone, someday, after we are gone, won't use the strength he'll have— for the highest purposes, with the best of intentions—'

His ardour waned. A chance we can't escape taking. I'd sort of hoped that by then the race 'ud be spread far enough that nobody could rule it. But the more I think about duplicating this ship inside a thousand years, the crazier the idea looks.'

Her turn came. She sprang to her feet and embraced him. 'No, of course, dearest I I was being stupid. I ought to have realized immediately, considering how many technologists I've met— Listen, there're no secrets in nature. The question is simply whether or not a job can be done.

If they know it can, that's clue enough. They'll find a way. And don't you think they'll put everything they have into it on Earth—when we are aloft to lure them? We can let trustworthy scientists make studies too. Skip, you like to bet. Will you bet me we won't live to see the first human starcraft—crude, maybe, but starcraft—depart for Sigma Draconis?'

He had gusted out a small, shaky laugh. 'No, the odds look too long against me.' At ease once more:

'Unless the stakes are something I won't mind paying?'

—Now she spoke aloud, as if already her kindred could hear: 'You'll get your chance. You'll go your thousandfold ways, finding a hundred that are new and good, because we have the wisdom to see that nobody has the wisdom to tell the whole world what it must do.'

'Awe, don't preach at them,' Skip said. 'Me, I lay no claim to a noble soul. I only figure to spend the rest of my life among the planets and maybe the stars, having an absolute ball.'

Yvonne flushed. 'That was sententious, wasn't it? I still haven't properly learned to be just myself. Will you keep showing me?'

He hugged her, between Earth and the Magellanic Clouds. 'You know,' he said, 'that problem of ours, how we could stay together, we haven't found a solution and we never will. We'll never need to.'

A while later he said, 'I'd better stroll aft and conn us into orbit. Remember, in spite of criticism, I'm holding you to your promise that you'll compose our message to the people.'

[VERSION INFORMATION]

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