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"There. You see? And yet, it was these Laagi friends of yours you were
suggesting we allow in here to settle on some of the planets of our space!"
"It just might be a good way to keep them under control," said Jim.
"Keep them under control? But how?"
"Well, of course," said Jim, "I'm assuming, as I said, that we also had some
of our own people also settling on planets here at the same time. I'm not
sure, mind you, that there are some of our people who'd be willing to do this.
But if there were, and once we got able to talk to the Laagi, using the method
they use to converse since they can't converse our way, those of us who were
here could watch the Laagi settlers and point out to them that what they were
doing was wrong, if it turned out to be something that might be undesirable to
you."
"You say," said ?1, "you don't know if your people might want to come here?
But as I remember, you earlier suggested that they would be eager to settle on
some of our planets."
"Did I use the concept 'eager'? Forgive me. I was actually just exploring
the possibility with you first, before we go back and suggest it to them,"
said Jim. "I think you and I got off on other topics and I never did get
around to explaining that I'd have to ask them, first. You see, the rest of
our people don't know that we've found livable worlds here. Oh, they know it's
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possible we might, and if by some strange chance we never went back to them,
they'd eventually get around to sending other individuals to see what the
situation is as regards livable holes, here; but at the moment they don't know
definitely about these planets, and they most definitely do not know what a
wonderful people you all are. I'm sure they'll take to you at once, from what
we'll be able to tell them, and want to come. I just don't have the right to
say certainly that they will come when I haven't yet talked to them."
"But you would talk to them?"
"It'd be the first thing we'd do, on getting home."
There was a silence on ?1's part that extended for some seconds at least.
"Jim," said Mary softly, in this moment, "have you any idea what kind of
forces would need to be involved in moving a star out of its orbit?"
"Shh," said Jim. "Little pitchers... "
"What?"
"Small fireflies have long antennae."
"But he said they wouldn't... oh!"
"Exactly."
"I understand. A verbal promise only..." said Mary. "You're right. But, by
the way, you called them butterflies last time you described them."
"Did I? 'Fireflies' is better."
"Actually," said Mary, "I think you're right about that, too."
"We must, I believe," said ?1, breaking in on them, "think this matter over.
Meanwhile, will you dance with us?"
"Dance?" said Mary and Jim together.
"You hesitate? In all our memory, out of the millions of dances we have
done, there are five we remember as classic. We will do one of those,
together."
"Forgive us," said Jim. "But we aren't hesitating because we don't want to
dance with you. But you should be told that I, at least, don't really know
what you mean by 'dancing."'
"I'd realized there was somewhat of an ignorance on your part where dancing
was concerned," said ?1. "But I did not understand it could be so complete.
You really are not aware of what dancing is? I told you, it is a weaving of
patterns around the threads of force set up by holes in their movements
through the universe."
"Yes, but that only defines it," said Mary. "What Jim means is we've got no
conception of how you weave such patterns, let alone an appreciation of them.
We've never seen such things in all our experience."
"You really have not? It's incredible!" said ?1. "And yet you seem like such
dear friends and nice people. Tell me, aren't you aware at this moment of the
skein of developing and shifting forces about and through us, at this moment?"
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"No," said Mary. "Jim?"
"Neither am I," said Jim. "I'm sorry."
"Unbelievable! But it's so hard for me to grasp that you're basically holes,
in nature. You seem so rational, so intelligent, so nice, that I fail to keep
your limitations sharply in perspective. Do you really feel nothing of the
forces? Look at that white star over there. Don't you feel the powerful,
moving pull of it like a great arm sweeping through all of the universe?"
"Hold on," said Jim. "Let me concentrate. Maybe I can feel it."
"I'll try, too," said Mary.
Jim honestly tried. He was a competitor by nature, and his first reaction to
this sort of situation was that if someone else could do something, he could
do it, too. Feel... he told himself, concentrating on the pinpoint of light
that was the white star, feel...
"Yes!" he said finally. "There's something there, a sort of soft
pressure-Mary, you know how it feels when you've been in the shadow of a cloud
and it passes away from the sun, and you feel the warmth of the sunlight as it
creeps across you?"
"Yes. I've got it myself, now," answered Mary. "Just a touch, though. And if
I tried to do anything else but concentrate on it, let alone whatever you call
dancing, ?1, I'd lose it."
"Quite incredible," said ?1. "It's obvious one of our great dances would be
entirely wasted on you. Five of them, can you understand that tremendous fact?
Five great dances winnowed out of millions, over a time equal to all the
memory we as a people share between us? These five great patterns of movement
that reflect the greatness of accomplishment of our race! You must understand
at least a little of what that means."
"I think we do," said Mary seriously.
"In any case, as I say," said ?1, "any of those five would be wasted on you.
But we can carry you, as we carried you to look at the places that Raoul saw
differently and loved, through one of our simple little dances that we have
for the new-budded minds among us that have everything yet to learn. Will you
come? Are you ready?"
"Why not?" said Jim to Mary. "Shall we dance?"
"I'd love to, thank you," said Mary.
Chapter 26.
"...But it's like skating!" said Mary," like skating at a billion miles a
second!"
"Like riding a bobsled down a bobsled run!" shouted Jim. He had no need to
shout. It was the excitement in him making him do it.
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"Like skating down a bobsled run, then," Mary shouted back, "without having
to worry about hurting yourself!"
A yellow point of light in the far distance grew almost instantly into a
huge golden sun as they dived toward it, then swept past, with the galaxy full
of stars pinwheeling around them, toward a white giant of a sun past which
they curved in turn. It was indeed like traveling at unimaginable speeds, for
they were literally in motion. It was not like phase-shifting where you ceased
to be at one point, were spread out throughout the universe and reassembled at
a different place, all in literally no time at all... but it was fast, faster
than imagination could believe.
And it was in fact a dance, all graceful swirls and turns across enormous
spaces, as if they actually danced in a mighty ballroom where the stars were
lamps. But it was more than just a dance. The creativity of it reached into
Jim and woke all sorts of emotions and yearnings in him, building him inwardly
toward an understanding of he knew not what. Also, he was actually beginning
to feel the skeins of gravitic forces reaching out through space, the natural
forces about which the dance was woven; like a piece of silk with threads so
fine as to be invisible, woven on a magical loom that could be known, but
neither viewed nor touched.
I'm skating out here with the stars,
In space with the stars, with the stars... sang Mary.
"Jim!" she cried. "I'm making my own music to go with it. Are you doing
that, too?"
"I'm doing something-or it's doing something to me!" Jim shouted back. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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