Someone was coming. Ted heard them now, too.
The islanders! And they were singing. A soft, happy song, filled with humor and expectation, that was often sung before a celebration. It served to remind Ted of a question. “By the way, I suppose not even their music is theirs?”
Without looking away from the oncoming crowd, Eren Tu admitted that an early visitor had carelessly underestimated the islanders’ hearing ability, and had allowed his craft’s communication set to play too loudly. “That song they’re doing now is based on a melody popular twenty years ago in my star system. It’s a distinct improvement on the original, though.”
They were closer now, and Ted could see that in keeping with their song, they had bedecked themselves with gay garlands of flowers. Even the vanguard of scampering children wore blossoms of jasmine in their hair. He began to recognize individual members of the party: “old” Emo, with the coral scars about his rugged shoulders. Nea, the girl he had watched when he came on duty. The small blond lad who had given the first warning of the meteorite. Crippled Tumo, the young spear maker. And over three hundred others in a long singing, laughing file that wound down and out of sight into the darkness of the valley.
Quite a turnout for a couple of hours before dawn.
Why?
Doc Finley and the techs on duty in the View Room must be having fits, Ted imagined. Probably think the islanders have come to greet me. Surreptitiously he checked the screen on the two-way. Still dark.
He hoped someone would have guts and presence of mind enough to sneak a cameraman out and up into the hilltop nearby. If the world had proof of Emil Tu’s visit—
But then what? A soul-corroding frustration at being left out, unwanted?
The first of the children came up to them now. They formed a ragged ring about the two men; shy, giggling, or wide-eyed, according to their natures. Ted’s gaze sought out the little blond youngster who had starred in the lagoon episode. “Hello, son,” he smiled. “I’m Ted. I’ve forgotten your name.”
“Lute. What’s the matter in your head?”
“Huh?” Ted’s hand went to his hair. “In? Or on?”
The child made a disapproving sound. “You sit wrong.” Leaving Ted to chew this over, he turned to watch his elders arrive. A tall Latinish man, one of the original “children,” Ted recalled, greeted Eren Tu cordially.
“Your happiness is mine,” Eren Tu observed, taking in the growing crowd with his eyes. “This is the important happening that was foretold?”
“Yes.” The dark islander walked abruptly over to Ted. “We will become good friends,” he said. It was not a question, nor a command. Simply a statement. He looked earnestly across at Eren Tu. “He sits in the wrong place, doesn’t he.”
Ted’s head began to ache. “That’s the second time it’s been mentioned. Explain, please.” He pressed his temples.
“Ted Jepson,” called the man from the stars excitedly. “They tell me your men from below will be coming out of the hilltop.”
“That’s right,” added the tall islander. “I have seen only a little of it, and I could not tell when it would take place, but Lute and Nea and others of the young ones say it will be very soon. It will be after you have taken up that object”—he pointed at the two-way—”and speak into it.”
“But he can’t do that,” protested Eren Tu. “I have something in my ship that prevents it.”
“You will soon turn it off.”
“Why?” The alien’s gravity and composure was wearing a bit thin.
“Because he—” the islander gestured to Ted—”will soon learn something.”
Never had Ted had such a headache. And as with most extremely healthy people, the minor ailment was worrying him. With only part of his attention had he been following the bewildering conversation about him. Most of his concern was centered on the fingers of fire that were darting between his temples. He wondered if it could be a pressure-head from the underwater swim. Or maybe a nasty fungus from the ship, despite its owner’s assurances? Through eyes that were beginning to water he made out the boy, Lute, confronting him. “My father,” he announced gravely, “wants us to talk.”
“Sure, boy.” Ted massaged the back of his neck.
“I told him how it was that I saw you sitting wrong, and he said for me to have you sit better. It is part of what will happen, I can see now.”
Ted was quiet, baffled, and more than a little frightened. He dimly noticed that late arrivals to the scene were hoisting up their children so that they might not miss anything.
“Maybe I’m beginning to understand.” Eren Tu had come over. “They have been telling me you do not think correctly. They say you operate your thoughts from the wrong place. There is an asleep area to your mind that, apparently, they can see. Does it mean anything to you?”
Ted struggled: They knew of the emergency exit that could be blasted open atop the island’s highest hill. They were expecting him to make a call to Finley with the two-way. How did that tie in with his headache, with an “asleep” area of his mind?
“Let the boy, Lute, do what he wants,” said Eren Tu.
Ted dug at his temples with his knuckles. “All right, kid, it’s your show.”
“I’m sorry it aches,” said the boy. “That’s because it was asleep and we all looked at it. But it will be over in a moment.” A serious frown of concentration tugged at his brows. He gazed up into Ted’s eyes and began giving him certain curious instructions, the very formulation and expression of which were possible only because of the fluidity and precision of the island language. Ted was made to blank his mind partially and to let the sensation of pain settle into a particular area. When it had coalesced and steadied down, Lute gave him what amounted to the form and dimensions of his identity extensions. A corner of his thoughts found time to rebel in admiration: Orthodox mind science would probably have gone on missing the simplicity that was the essence of individual identity for a thousand years.
Ted moved this concept of his identity into the spot designated by the pain. He settled himself there and withdrew utterly from the old seat of operations.
The pain vanished. And with his smile of pleasure came an indescribable mixture of emotions; peace was there, but it was a thrilling and dynamic thing, not placidity. A strength and courage such as he had never before known seemed his now, and a burning desire to use this vigor to live and to experience and to be.
He was in love. With everything.
“Don’t you see,” he shouted at the bewildered Eren Tu, “I’m whole, I’m well, I’m as I was probably intended to be. I’m like the islanders!” Song broke out around him as he told what had happened. “This is what my planet’s religious men have been trying to speak of. But without knowing it for themselves, and without a language to teach it, they made it into a soggy, revolting piety. This is love, and I’m operating from it!”
“Can others of you make the change-over?”
“Why not?” Ted grabbed the grinning blond lad to him and tousled his hair. “Certainly. Anyone that speaks island tongue. There are thousands of us. More every month. Tell him, Lute.”
Nea came up and gave him flowers for his hair. A mighty, grinning Chinese put a garland around his neck. Each peered intently at Ted, then nodded reassurance at Eren Tu.
The man from the stars had allowed blossoms to be thrust over each car. His holiday appearance contrasted comically to Ted with his dubious and uncertain air. He shook his head. “Apparently there’s only one way of finding out for sure. If they make the change—” He turned for the ship, muttering something about unprecedented procedure.
The sky was lighter now, and the night wind was softening into a fragrant breeze. Ted faced into it and looked up at the morning stars. He was smiling at a particularly bright one when the set came alive.
“Hello, Project,” he said. “This is Jepson. Come on up, all of you. There’s going to be the damndest sunrise you ever saw.”
&nbs
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Kingsley Amis, Spectrum 5 - [Anthology]
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