Stanislaw Lem - Return from the Stars

Then I listened. The house was dark. Everything was still. The great silence of the night reached up to the stars. I did not want to return to the house. I walked away from the battered car, and when the grass — the tall, damp grass — touched my knees, I fell into it and lay thus until my eyes closed and I slept.

I was wakened by a laugh. I recognized it. I knew who it was before I opened my eyes, instantly awake. I was soaked, everything dripped with dew — the sun was still low. The sky, tufts of white clouds. And opposite me, on a small suitcase, sat Olaf, laughing. We leapt to our feet at the same time. His hand was like mine — as large and as hard.

“When did you get here?”

“A moment ago.”

“By ulder?”

“Yes. I slept like that, too, the first two nights.”

“Yes?”

He stopped smiling. So did I. As though something stood between us. We studied each other.

He was my height, perhaps even a bit taller, but more slender. In the strong light his hair, though dark, betrayed his Scandinavian origin, and his stubble was completely blond. A bent nose, full of character, and a short upper lip that revealed his teeth; his eyes smiled easily, pale blue, darkening with merriment; thin lips, with a perpetual, slight curl to them, as if he received everything with skepticism — perhaps it was that expression of his that made us keep our distance from each other. Olaf was two years older than I; his best friend had been Arder. Only when Arder died did we become close. For good, now.

“Olaf,” I said, “you must be hungry. Let’s get something to eat.”

“Wait,” he said. “What is that?”

I followed his gaze.

“Ah, that… nothing. A car. I bought it — to remind myself.”

“You had an accident?”

“Yes. I was driving at night, you see…”

“You, an accident?” he repeated.

“Well, yes. But it’s not important. Anyway, nothing happened. Come on, you’re not going to… with that suitcase…”

He picked it up. Said nothing. He did not look at me. The muscles of his jaw worked.

He senses something, I thought. He doesn’t know what caused the accident, but he guesses.

Upstairs, I told him to choose one of the four vacant rooms. He took the one with the view of the mountains.

“Why didn’t you want it? Ah, I know,” he smiled. “The gold, right?”

“Yes.”

He touched the wall with his hand.

“Ordinary, I hope? No pictures, television?”

“Rest assured.” It was my turn to smile. “Its a proper wall.”

I phoned down for breakfast. I wanted us to eat alone. The white robot brought in coffee. And a full tray, an ample breakfast. I watched with pleasure how he chewed, he chewed so that a tuft of hair above one ear moved. Finished, Olaf said:

“You still smoke?”

“I do. I brought two packs with me. What happens after that, I don’t know. At present, I smoke. You want one?”

“One.”

We smoked.

“How is it to be? Cards on the table?” he asked after a long pause.

“Yes. I’ll tell you everything. And you me?”

“Always. But, Hal, I don’t know if it’s worth it.”

“Tell me one thing: do you know what the worst of it is?”

“Women.”

“Yes.”

Again we were silent.

“It’s on account of that?” he asked.

“Yes. You’ll see at dinner. Downstairs. They are renting half of the villa.”

“They?”

“A young couple.”

The muscles of his jaw again moved under the freckled skin.

“That’s worse,” he said.

“Yes. I’ve been here two days. I don’t know how it could be, but… at the first conversation. Without any reason, without any… nothing, nothing. Nothing at all.”

“Curious,” he said.

“What is?”

“I did the same.”

“Then why did you come here?”

“Hal, you’ve done a good deed. Do you understand?”

“For you?”

“No. For someone else. Because it would have ended badly.”

“Why?”

“Either you know, or you won’t understand.”

“I do know. Olaf, what is this? Are we actually savages?”

“I don’t know. We’ve been without women for ten years. Don’t forget that.”

“That doesn’t explain everything. There is a kind of ruthlessness in me, I consider no one, you understand?”

“You still do, my friend,” he said. “You still do.”

“Well, yes; but you know what I mean.”

“I know.”

Again we were silent.

“Do you want to talk some more, or box?” he asked.

I laughed.

“Where did you get the gloves?”

“Hal, you would never guess.”

“You had them made?”

“I stole them.”

“No!”

“So help me. From a museum. I had to fly to Stockholm especially for them.”

“Let’s go, then.”

He unpacked his modest belongings and changed. We both put on bathrobes and went downstairs. It was still early. Normally breakfast would not have been served for half an hour.

“We’d better go out to the back of the house,” I said. “No one will see us there.”

We stopped in a circle of tall bushes. First we stamped down the grass, which was fairly short anyway.

“It’ll be slippery,” said Olaf, sliding his foot around the improvised ring.

“That’s all right. It’ll be harder.”

We put on the gloves. We had a little trouble, because there was no one to tie them for us and I did not to want to call a robot.

He faced me. His body was completely white.

“You haven’t got a tan yet,” I said.

“Later I’ll tell you what’s been happening to me. I’ve had no time for the beach. Gong.”

“Gong.”

We began easily. A feint. Duck. Duck. I warmed up. I tapped, rather than punched. I did not really want to hit him. I was a good fifteen kilograms heavier, and his slightly longer reach did not offset my advantage, especially since I was also the better boxer. For that reason I gave him an opening several times, although I didn’t have to. Suddenly he lowered his gloves. His face hardened. He was angry.

“Not this way,” he said.

“What’s wrong?”

“No games, Hal. Either we box or we don’t.”

“OK,” I said, clenching my teeth, “we box!”

I began to move in. Glove hit glove with a sharp slap. He sensed that I meant business and put up his guard. The pace quickened. I feinted to the left and to the right, in succession, the last blow almost always landed on his chest — he was not fast enough. Unexpectedly he took the offensive, got in a nice right, I was knocked back a couple of steps. I recovered immediately. We circled, he swung, I ducked beneath the glove, backed off, and at half-distance landed a straight right. I put my weight behind it. Olaf went soft, for a moment loosened his guard, but then came back carefully, crouching. For the next minute he bombarded me with blows. The gloves struck my forearms with an appalling sound, but harmlessly. Once I barely dodged in time, his glove grazed my ear, and it was a roundhouse that would have decked me. Again we circled. He took a blow on the chest, a hard one, and his guard fell, I could have nailed him, but I did nothing, I stood as if paralyzed — she was at one of the windows, her face as white as the material covering her shoulders. A fraction of a second passed. The next instant, I was stunned by a powerful impact; I fell to my knees.

“Sorry!” I heard Olaf shout.

“Nothing to be sorry about… That was a good one,” I mumbled, getting up.

The window was closed now. We fought for perhaps half a minute; suddenly Olaf drew back.

“What’s the matter with you?”

“Nothing.”

“Not true.”

“All right. I’ve had enough. You aren’t angry?”