Jack Vance - The Houses of Iszm

Farr ordered more beer. The bartender, a sturdy apple-cheeked little man with pop-eyes and a fine mustache, obliged. Farr returned to his thinking. It was an interesting psychological problem, one that Farr might have relished in different circumstances. Right now it was too close to home. He tried to reason with the compulsion. What do I gain by seeing Penche? Penche had hinted of profit. He clearly thought that Farr had something he wanted.

It could only be a female house.

Farr had no female house, therefore—it was as simple as that—he would gain nothing by going to Penche.

But Farr was dissatisfied. The syllogism was too pat; he suspected that he had oversimplified. The Iszic were also involved. They must also believe that he had a female house. Since they had attempted to follow him, they were ignorant of where he would deliver this hypothetical house.

Penche naturally would not want them to know. If the Iszic learned of Penche’s involvement, breaking the franchise was the least they would do. They might well kill him.

K. Penche was playing for high stakes. On the one hand he could grow his own houses. They would cost him twenty or thirty dollars apiece. He could sell as many as he liked at two thousand. He would become the richest man in the universe, the richest man in the history of the Earth. The moguls of ancient India, the Victorian tycoons, the oil-barons, the Pan-Eurasion syndics: they would dwindle to paupers in comparison.

That was on the one hand. On the other—Penche at the very least would lose his monopoly. Recalling Penche’s face the cartilaginous bar of his mouth, the prow of his nose, the eyes liked smoked glass in front of a furnace, Farr instinctively knew Penche’s position.

It would be an interesting struggle. Penche probably discounted the subtle Iszic brain, the fanatic zeal with which they defended their property. The Iszic possibly underestimated Penche’s massive wealth and Earth’s technical genius. It was the situation of the ancient paradox: the irresistible force and the immovable object. And I, thought Farr, am in the middle. Unless I extricate myself, I will very likely be crushed… He took a thoughtful pull at his beer. If I knew more accurately what was happening, how I happened to become involved, why they picked on me, I’d know which way to jump. Yet—what power I wield! Or so it seems.

Farr ordered another beer. On sudden thought he looked up sharply and glanced around the bar. No one appeared to be watching him. Farr took the container and went to a table in a dark corner.

The affair—at least his personal participation in it had stemmed from the Thord raid on Tjiere. Farr had aroused Iszic suspicion; they had imprisoned him. He had been alone with a surviving Thord. The Iszic had released hypnotic gas through a root-tubule. The Thord and Farr had been stupefied.

The Iszic had certainly searched him unit by unit, inside and out, mind and body. If he were guilty of complicity, they would know it. If he had seed or seedling on his person, they would know it.

What had they actually done?

They had released him; they had facilitated, in fact they had prompted, his return to Earth. He was a decoy, a bait.

Aboard the Andrei Sitnic— what of all that? Suppose the Anderviews were Penche’s agents. Suppose they had apprehended the danger that Farr represented and sought to kill him? What about Paul Bengston? His function might have been to spy on the first two. He had killed the Anderviews either to protect Penche’s interests, or cut himself a larger slice of the profits. He had failed. He was now in custody of the Special Squad.

The whole thing added up to a tentative, speculative, but apparently logical conclusion: K. Penche had organized the raid on Tjiere. It was Penche’s metal mole that the wasp-ship had destroyed eleven hundred feet underground. The raid had nearly been successful. The Iszic must have writhed in terror. They would trace the source, the organization of the raid, without qualm or restraint. A few deaths meant nothing. Money meant nothing. Aile Farr meant nothing.

And small cold chills played up Farr’s back.

A pretty blonde girl in gray sheen-skin paused beside his table. “Hi, Cholly.” She tossed her hair roguishly over her shoulder. “You look lonesome.” And she dropped into a seat beside him.

Farr’s thoughts had taken him into nervous territory; the girl startled him. He stared at her without moving a muscle, five seconds—ten seconds.

She forced an uneasy laugh and moved in her chair. “You look like you got the cares of the world on your head.”

Farr put his beer gently to the table. “I’m trying to pick a horse.”

“Out of the air?” Pushing a cigarette in her mouth, she archly moved her lips toward him. “Give me a light.”

Farr lit the cigarette, studying her from behind his eyelids, weighing her, probing for the false note, the nontypical reaction. He had not noticed her come in; he had seen her promoting drinks nowhere else around the bar.

“I could be talked into taking a drink,” she said carelessly.

“After I buy you a drink—then what?”

She looked away, refusing to meet his eyes. “I guess— I guess that’s up to you.”

Farr asked her how much, in rather blunt terms. She blushed, still looking across the bar, suddenly flustered. “I guess you made a mistake… I guess I made a mistake… I thought you’d be good for a drink.”

Farr asked in an easy voice, “You work for the bar, on commission?”

“Sure,” she said, half-defiantly. “What about it? It’s a nice way to pass the evening. Sometimes you meet a nice guy. Whatcha do to your head?” She leaned forward, looked. “Somebody hit you?”

“If I told you how I got that scab,” said Farr, “you’d call me a liar.”

“Go ahead, try me.”

“Some people were mad at me. They took me to a tree, pushed me inside. I fell down into a root, two or three hundred feet. On the way down I hit my head.”

The girl looked at him sidelong. Her mouth twisted into a wry grimace. “And at the bottom you saw little pink men carrying green lanterns. And a big white fluffy rabbit.”

“I told you,” said Farr.

She reached up toward his temple. “You’ve got a funny long gray hair.”

Farr moved his head back. “I’m going to keep it.”

“Suit yourself.” She eyed him coldly. “Are you gonna spring, or do I gotta tell you the story of my life?”

“Just a minute,” said Farr. He rose to his feet and crossed the room to the bar. He motioned to the bartender. “That blonde at my table, see her?”

The bartender looked. “What about her?”

“She usually hang out here?”

“Never saw her before in my life.”

“She doesn’t work for you on commission?”

“Brother, I just told you. I never seen her before in my life.”

“Thanks.”

Farr returned to the table. The girl was sullenly rapping her fingers on the table. Farr looked at her a long moment.

“Well?” she growled.

“Who are you working for?”

“I told you.”

“Who sent you in here after me?”

“Don’t be silly.” She started to rise. Farr caught her wrist.

“Let go! I’ll yell.”

“That’s what I’m hoping,” said Farr. “I’d like to see some police. Sit down—or I’ll call them myself.”

She sank slowly back into the chair, then turned and flung herself against him, putting her face up and her arms around his neck. “I’m so lonesome. Really, I mean it. I got in from Seattle yesterday. I don’t know a soul— now don’t be so hard to get alone with. We can be nice to each other… can’t we?”

Farr grinned. “First we talk, then we can be nice.”

Something was hurting him, something at the back of his neck, where her hand touched. He blinked and grabbed her arm. She jumped up, tore herself loose, her eyes shining with glee. “Now what, now what’ll you do?”