Дэймон Найт - Orbit 10

By then Al had lent his name to our town’s most prestigious art gallery. We had quoted him often in our programs. I had dis­cussed with him the use of public or private funds for art. I had also discussed, needless to say, the problem of legalized abortion and whether the state should give aid to parochial schools. Also the new high-yield rice. I mentioned our peace groups including our Women’s March for Peace. I also tried to tell him Miss Haertzler’s real age and I said that, in spite of her looks, it would be very unlikely that she could ever have any children, whereas I, though not particularly young anymore, could at least do that, I’m (fairly) sure.

And then, all too soon, came the day of the dismantling of the Annual Fall Festival tent and the painting over of our bill­board, which Al did (in grays, browns, purples and blacks), mak­ing it into an ad for the most prestigious art gallery, and I, I was no longer a director of anything at all. The audience, which had grown fat and satiated on our sounds, now walked in town as separate entities . . . factions . . . fragments . . . will-o’-the-wisps . . . meaningless individuals with their separate reactions. Al walked with them, wearing his same old oddly cut clothes as unselfconsciously as ever, and, as ever, with them, but not of them. He had worked for us until the very last moment, but now I had no more jobs to give. Tom Disch had had a job as a copy­writer for a while and made quite a bit of money, but he gave it all up for the sake of literature and I expected Al to give up these little jobs for the sake of his art as soon as he had some money. The trouble was, he couldn’t find another little job to tide him over and while the critics and many others, too, liked his paint­ings, no one wanted to buy them. They were fairly expensive and the colors were too somber. I helped him look into getting a grant, but in the end it went to a younger man (which I should have anticipated). I gave him, at about that time, all my cans of corned-beef hash even though I knew he still spent some time in Miss Haertzler’s guest room, though, by then, a commune (consisting of six young people of both sexes in a three-room apartment) had accepted him as one of them. (I wonder some­times that he never asked Miss Haertzler to marry him, but he may have been unfamiliar with marriage as we know it. We never discussed it that I remember and not too many people in his circle of friends were actually married to each other.)

Ralph had established himself as the local college musical figure, musician in residence, really, and began to walk with a stoop and a slight limp and to have a funny way of clearing his throat every third or fourth word. I asked him to look into a similar job for Al, but they already had an artist in residence, a man in his sixties said to have a fairly original eye and to be profoundly con­cerned with the disaffection of the young, so they couldn’t do a thing for Al for at least a year, they said, aside from having him give a lecture or two, but even that wouldn’t be possible until the second semester.

Those days I frequently saw Al riding around on a borrowed motor scooter (sometimes not even waving), Miss Haertzler on the back with her skirts pulled up. He still painted. The critics have referred to this time in his life as one of hardship and self-denial while trying to get established.

Meanwhile it grew colder.

Miss Haertzler bought him a shearling lamb jacket. Also one for herself. I should have suspected something then, but I knew it was the wrong time of year for a climb. There was already a little bit of snow on the top of the highest of our mountains and the weatherman had forecast a storm front on the way that was or was not to be there by that night or the next afternoon. We all thought it was too early for a blizzard.

I was to find Miss (Vivienne) Haertzler an excellent trav­eling companion. Actually a better climber than I was myself in many ways and yet, for all that vigor, preserving an es­sential femininity. Like many others of her race, she had small hands and feet and a fair-skinned look of transpar­ency and yet an endurance that matched my own. But I did notice about her that day an extraordinary anxiety that wasn’t in keeping with her nature at all (nor of the natives in general). I didn’t give a second thought, however, to any of the unlikely rumors I had heard, but 1 assumed it was due to the impending storm that we hoped would hide all traces of our ascent.

A half a day later a good-sized group of our more creative people were going after one of the most exciting minds in the arts with bloodhounds. A good thing for Miss Haertzler, too, since the two of them never even got halfway. I saw them back in town a few days afterward still looking frostbitten and it wasn’t long after that that I had a very pleasant discussion with Al. I had asked him out to our town’s finest Continental restaurant. We talked, among other things, about alienation in our society, popu­lation control, impending world famine and other things of inter­national concern including the anxiety prevalent among our people of impending atomic doom. In passing I mentioned a psychologist I had once gone to for certain anxieties of my own of a more private nature. Soon after that I heard that Al was in therapy himself and had nearly conquered his perennial urge to cross the mountains and, as the psychologist put it, leave our happy valley in his efforts to escape from something in himself. It would be a significant moment in both modern painting and modern music (and perhaps in literature, too, Tom Disch might say) when Al would finally be content to remain in his new-found artistic milieu. I can’t help but feel that the real beginning of Al’s partici­pation (sponsored) within our culture as a whole was right here on my couch in front of the fireplace with a cup of hot coffee and a promise of financial assistance from two of our better-known art patrons. It was right here that he began living out some sort of universal human drama of life and death in keeping with his special talents.

NOW I’M watching Roger. Roger is hanging face-down in his ropes overhead and looking at me. He isn’t saying anything and I’m not speaking.

I wish I had the time to spare in relaxation that he does, but I’m kept constantly busy. There are a million things here to do. If I had Roger’s free time, I’d know how to put it to good use. I wouldn’t idle.

I wonder about Roger’s experiments. The only time he ever seems to work on them is during our regular telecast to Earth. I asked him about his experiments once, but he didn’t take notice. He jumped up into his ropes. He’s very well practiced at it now. If I had more time perhaps I could make flying leaps to the top of the dome, too.

Roger is too silent. He never speaks up when Jack does some­thing to annoy me, and this encourages Jack to take more ad­vantage. Roger will never settle anything, and I’ve saved him from Jack I don’t know how many times. But how do you ask a man to back you? He either sees the need or he doesn’t. It isn’t proper to ask, so I don’t.

On the other hand, if he’s going to play the silent game, there’s no reason why I shouldn’t play it, too. The only time I’ll speak is when I stir from my silent work to drag Jack off his back. But I don’t expect he will notice.

To taunt me, Jack takes off his black hat during our telecasts. He’s charming and plausible. If you believe him, we would be happy to stay another eight months on the moon. I’m not sure I could juggle things that long, though I’ll grant that Jack might.

When it is my turn, I nod and wave to Earth. I tell them we’re keeping busy. Roger works away at his experiments in the back­ground. He waves to the camera but he doesn’t say anything.