Christopher Priest - The Watched

“Yes… but not your specialized knowledge.” “What do you want to know?” Ordier said resignedly. “Everything you can tell me.” “Parren, you’ve been misinformed. I’ve retired.” “Then that wasn’t a scintilla detector I noticed in your house.” “Look, I don’t see why you’re interested.” Parren was sitting forward, away from the rock, and his manner had changed. “Let’s not prevaricate, Ordier. I need some information from you. I want to know if there is any law in the Archipelago prohibiting the use of scintillas. I want to know if scintillas could be used to observe the Qataari. And lastly, if you think the Qataari would have any way of detecting or jamming scintillas.” “Is that all?” “Yes.” “There’s no law against using them. I can tell you that much. Only the Covenant of Neutrality, but it’s never enforced.” “And the rest?” Parren said. Ordier sighed. “The scintillas could obviously be used against the Qataari, if you could think of some way of planting them without them knowing.” “That’s easy. They can be sown from an aircraft at night.” “I see you’ve worked it out. But your last question interests me. Why do you think the Qataari would be able to jam scintillas?” “They’ve had plenty of experience of them.” “How do you mean?” Ordier said.

“Both sides were using them during the invasion of the peninsula. The military work on saturation principles… scintillas must have been ankle-deep. A race who so obviously dislike being watched would have realized what they were for.” “I was under the impression you thought the Qataari were primitive.” Parren said: “Not primitive… decivilized. Their science is a match for anything we’ve got.” “How do you know that?” “An intelligent guess. But what’s your opinion, Ordier? Do you think they could jam scintillas?” “No one else can, so far as I know. But technology is always advancing.” “Qataari technology?” “I don’t know, Parren.” “Look at this.” Parren reached into a pocket, and pulled out a small box. Ordier recognized it at once: it was a scintilla quiet-case, identical to his own. Parren opened the lid, reached inside with a pair of tweezers he took from a mounting in the lid. “Have you seen one of these before?” He dropped a scintilla into the palm of Ordier’s hand. Ordier, guessing, said: “It hasn’t got a serial number.” “Right. Do you know why?” “Do you?” “I’ve never encountered it before.” “Neither have I,” Ordier said. “Except here on Tumo. My guess is that they’re military.” “No, I’ve checked. They’re required by the Yenna Convention to mark them. Both sides abide.” “Then a bootleg?” “They’re usually marked too. A few of the pirates might leave them blank, but these little devils are all over the place. I’ve seen hundreds since I’ve been on Tumo.” “You’ve checked them all?” Ordier said. “No, but every one I have checked has been blank.” Parren picked up the scintilla with the tweezers, and returned it to the quiet-case. “Then whose are they?” “I was hoping you’d tell me, Ordier.” “You’ve already revealed that you’re better informed than I am.” “Then I’ll tell you what I think. They’re connected with the Qataari.” Ordier waited, expecting more to follow, but the other man was looking at him in a significant way as if waiting for a response. He said in the end: “So…?” “Someone,” Parren said with ponderous emphasis, “is spying on the Qataari.” “With what purpose?” “The same as mine.” And Ordier heard again the edge to Parren’s voice he had heard at Jenessa’s dinner party. Personal ambition was strong in the man. For a moment Ordier had felt a guilty suspicion growing in him, that Parren had somehow guessed that he had been spying on the Qataari from the folly, and that he was about to accuse him. But Ordier’s own guilt was as nothing beside Parren’s ambition, which was so bright it blinded him.

“Then you must clearly join forces with whoever it is, or compete.” “I intend to compete.” “You have your own scintillas?” Ordier had intended his question sarcastically, but Parren said at once: “Yes, a new version. They’re a quarter the size of existing scintillas, and to all intents and purposes are invisible.” “Then there’s your answer. You would clearly have the edge.” Ordier’s urbane reply gave no clue to his thoughts. He had not known that scintilla technology had advanced so much. “That’s not my answer, Ordier. Do you think the Qataari could either detect or jam my scintillas?” Ordier smiled grimly. “I’ve told you I don’t know. You’ve seen how sensitive they are to being watched. It’s like a sixth sense. They might or might not have the electronic means of detection, but my guess is that they’d sense your scintillas somehow.” “Do you really think so?” “Your guess is as good as mine,” Ordier said. “Probably better. Look, I’m thirsty. Why don’t we talk about this back at the house? It’s too hot out here.” Parren agreed, reluctantly it seemed to Ordier, and they continued their clumsy descent of the rocks. When they reached the house half an hour later, they found the place empty. Ordier fixed some cold drinks for them both. He left Parren on the patio, and went in search of the women. A few moments later he saw them in the rough ground behind the house, walking from the direction of the gate in the courtyard wall. He waited impatiently until they reached him.

“Where have you been?” he said to Jenessa. “You were gone so long, I took Luovi to see your folly. The gate was unlocked, so we assumed it would be all right.” “You know it’s not safe up there!” Ordier said. “What an interesting building it is,” Luovi said to him. “Such eccentric architecture. All those concealed faults in the walls. And what a view there is higher up!” She smiled at him patronizingly, then shifted the strap of her large leather bag on her shoulder, and walked past him toward the house. Ordier looked at Jenessa, hoping for some explanatory expression, but she would not meet his eyes.

Parren and his wife stayed at the house for the rest of the day. Ordier was a passive listener to most of the conversation, feeling excluded from it. He wished he could involve himself in Jenessa’s work to the same degree that Luovi seemed to be involved with Parren, but whenever he ventured an opinion or an idea into the discussion of the Qataari, he was either ignored or tacitly dismissed. The result was that while Jacj Parren outlined his elaborate scheme—there was an aircraft to be hired, and a place found to erect the scintilla monitoring and decoding equipment—Ordier fell into an introspective mood, and grew increasingly preoccupied with his secret one-sided relationship with the Qataari girl. From the summit of the ridge it had been impossible to see whether there was a ritual taking place, and in any event the fact that he and Parren had been noticed would have put an immediate halt to it, but just the sight of the placid, colorful valley had been enough to remind him of the girl, and the ambiguity of the part she took in the ritual. And there was the uncertainty of what Jenessa and Luovi had seen or done while they were in the folly. Guilt and curiosity, the conflicting motives of the voyeur, were rising in Ordier again. Shortly before sunset, Parren suddenly announced that he and Luovi had another appointment in the evening, and Jenessa offered to drive them back to Tumo Town. Ordier, uttering the platitudes of host to departing guests, saw this as a brief chance to satisfy his curiosity. He walked down with the others to Jenessa’s car, and watched as they drove away. The sun was already behind the Tumoit Mountains, and the distant town was glittering with lights. When the car was out of sight, Ordier hurried back to the house, collected his binoculars, and set off for the folly. As Jenessa had said, the padlock on the gate was open; he must have forgotten to close it the last time he left the folly. As he went through he made sure of locking it, as usual, on the inside. Twilight on Tumo was short, a combination of the latitude and the western mountain heights, and as Ordier went up the slope towards the folly wall it was difficult to see his way. Once inside the hidden cell, Ordier wasted no time and put his eyes directly to the slit. Beyond, the valley was dark under the evening sky. He could see no one about; the alarm that their intrusion had caused seemed to have passed, for those Qataari in the valley during the day were nowhere about. The rose plantation was deserted, and the blooms moved to and fro in the breeze. Unaccountably relieved, Ordier returned to the house. He was washing up the plates and cups when Jenessa returned. She was looking excited and beautiful, and she kissed Ordier when she came in. “I’m going to work with Jacj!” she said. “He wants me to advise him. Isn’t that marvelous?” “Advise him? How?” “On the Qataari. He’ll pay me, and he says that when he returns to the north I can go with him.” Ordier nodded, and turned away. “Aren’t you pleased for me?” “How much is he going to pay you?” Jenessa had followed him as he walked out onto the patio, and from the doorway she turned on the colored lights concealed amongst the grapevines hanging from the overhead trellis. “Does it matter how much it is, Yvann?” Looking back at her he saw the multicolored light on the olive skin of her face, like the reflection from sun on flower petals. “It’s not the amount that matters,” he said. “It’s what you would have to do to earn it.” “Nothing more than I’m doing now. It will double my income, Yvann. You should be pleased! Now I can buy a house for myself.” “And what’s this about going north with him? You know you can’t leave the Archipelago.” “Jacj has a way.” “He has a way with everything, hasn’t he? I suppose his university can interpret the Covenant to suit itself.” “Something like that. He hasn’t told me.” Ordier turned away irritably, staring out at the still blue water of the pool. Jenessa went across to him. “There isn’t anything going on between us,” she said. “What do you mean?” “You know, Yvann. It’s not sex, or anything.” He laughed, suddenly and shortly. “Why on earth do you bring that into it?” “You’re behaving as if I’m having an affair with him. It’s just a job, just the work I’ve always done.” “I never said it wasn’t.” “I know I’ve spent a lot of time with him and Luovi,” Jenessa said. “I can’t help it. It’s, well…” “The bloody Qataari. That’s it, isn’t it?” “You know it is.” She took his arm then, and for several minutes they said nothing. Ordier was angry, and it always took some time for his moods to subside. It was irrational, of course, these things always were. Parren and his wife, since their arrival, had seemed set on changing the placid way of life he enjoyed, guilty conscience and all. The thought of Jenessa going over to them, collaborating with them, was just one more intrusion, and Ordier was incapable of dealing with it any other way than emotionally. Later, when they had made some supper and were drinking wine together on the patio, enjoying the warm night, Jenessa said: “Jacj wants you to join his work too.” “Me?” Ordier had mellowed as the evening progressed, and his laugh this time was not sardonic. “There’s not much I can do for him.” “He says there’s a lot you can do. He wants to rent your folly.”