"Good," he said. "Let's go there."
They took another glance at the metal globe and the green fire, which
by now had died to a fitful glimmer. Then the stranger and the girl
started toward the jungle, where the litter-bearers awaited them.
* * * * *
As the party was struggling through the prairie's tall grass, the man
said to Koroby, "I realize from the pictures in your mind that there
is no means in your city of communicating directly with my people. But
it seems that there are materials which I can utilize in building a
signal--"
He was walking along, head erect, apparently quite at ease, while the
litter bearers and Koroby could barely drag themselves with him. The
girl's garment was a tattered ruin. Her skin was gritty with dust, and
she was bleeding from many scratches. She tripped over tangled roots
and exclaimed in pain. Then the man took one of the strange implements
from his belt, pressed a knob on it, and light appeared as if by magic!
He handed the stick to Koroby, but she was afraid to touch it. This was
a strange light that gave no heat, nor flickered in the breeze. Finally
she accepted it from him, but carried it gingerly at arm's length.
She refused to believe that he had no name, and so he named himself.
"Call me Robert. It is an ancient name on Terra."
"Robert," she said, and, "Robert."
But at last she could go no farther. She had forced herself along
because she wanted to impress this indifferent man that she was not as
inferior as he might think--but now she could not go on. With a little
cry almost of relief, she sank to the ground and lay semi-conscious, so
weary that the very pain of it seemed on the point of pleasure.
Robert dipped down, scooped her up, and carried her.
Lights glimmered ahead; shouts reached them. It was a searching party,
Yasak in it. The litter-carriers who could still speak blurted out what
had happened. "A green light--loud sounds--fire--this man there--" and
then dropped into sleep.
"Someone carry these men," Yasak ordered. To Robert he said, "We're not
very far from the path to the City now. Shall I carry the girl?"
"It makes no difference," Robert said.
"You will stay with me while you are in the City, of course," Yasak
said, as they walked. He eyed this handsome stranger speculatively, and
then turned to shout an necessary order. "You, there, keep in line!" He
glanced at Robert furtively to see if this had impressed him at all.
* * * * *
It was day. Koroby sat up in bed and scanned her surroundings. She was
in Yasak's house. The bed was very soft, the coverlets of the finest
weave. The furniture was elegantly carved and painted; there were even
paintings on the walls.
A woman came to the bed. She was stocky and wore drab grey: the blue
circles tattooed on her cheeks proclaimed her a slave. "How do you
feel?" she asked.
"Fairly well. How long have I been ill?" Koroby asked, sweetly weak.
"You haven't been ill. They brought you in last night."
"Oh," Koroby said disappointedly, and sat upright. "I feel as if I'd
been lying here for weeks. Where's Yasak? Where's the strange man in
armor?"
"Yasak's out somewhere. The stranger man is in the room at the end of
the hall."
"Fetch me something to wear--that's good enough," the girl accepted the
mantle offered by the slave. "Quick, some water--I must wash."
In a few minutes she was lightly running down the hall; she knocked on
the door of Robert's room. "May I come in?"
He did not answer. She waited a little and went in. He was seated on
one of the carved chairs, fussing over some scraps of metal on the
table. He did not look up.
"Thank you for carrying me, Robert." He did not reply. "Robert--I
dreamed of you last night. I dreamed you built another round house and
that we both flew away in it. Yasak had to stay behind, and he was
furious. Robert! Aren't you listening?"
"I hear you."
"Don't you think it was an exciting dream?" He shook his head. "But
why? Robert"--she laid longing hands on his shoulders--"can't you see
that I'm in love with you?" He shrugged. "I believe you don't know what
love is!"
"I had a faint idea of it when I looked into your mind," he said. "I'm
afraid I haven't any use for it. Where I come from there is no love,
and there shouldn't be here, either. It's a waste of time."
"Robert--I'm mad about you! I've dreamed of your coming--all my life!
Don't be so cruel--so cold to me! You mock me, say that I'm nothing,
that I'm not worthy of you--"
She stepped back from him, clenching her hands. "Oh, I hate you--hate
you! You don't care the least bit about me--and I've shamed myself in
front of you--I, supposed to be Yasak's wife by now!" She began to
cry, hid her face in suddenly lax fingers. She looked up fiercely. "I
could kill you!" Robert stood immobile, no trace of feeling marring the
perfection of his face. "I could kill you, and I will kill you!" she
sprang at him.
"You'll hurt yourself," he admonished kindly, and after she had
pummeled his chest, bruising her fingers on his armor, she turned away.
"And now if you're through playing your incomprehensible little scene,"
Robert said, "I hope you will excuse me. I regret that I have no
emotions--I was never allowed them. But it is an esthetic regret.... I
must go back to my wrecked ship now and arrange the signals there." He
did not wait for her leave, but strode out of the room.
Koroby huddled on a chair, sobbing. Then she dried her eyes on the
backs of her hands. She went to the narrow slits that served as windows
and unfastened the translucent shutter of one. Down in the City street,
Robert was walking away. Her eyes hardened, and her fingers spread
into ugly claws. Without bothering to pull the shutter in place she
hurried out of the room, ran eagerly down the hall. She stopped at
the armor-rack at the main hall on her way outside, and snatched up a
_siatcha_--a firestone. Then she slipped outside and down the street.
* * * * *
The City's wall was not far behind. Robert was visible in the distance,
striding toward his sky-ship, a widening cloud of dust rising behind
him like the spreading wake of a boat. Koroby stood on tip-toe, waving
and calling after him, "Robert! Robert! Come back!" but he did not seem
to hear.
She watched him a little longer. Then she deliberately stooped and drew
the firestone out of its sheath. She touched it to a blade of the tall
grass. A little orange flame licked up, slowly quested along the blade,
down to the ground and up another stem. It slipped over to another
stem, and another, growing larger, hotter--Koroby stepped back from the
writhing fire, her hand protectively over her face.
The flames crackled at first--like the crumpling of thin paper. Then,
as they widened and began climbing hand over hand up an invisible
ladder, they roared. Koroby was running back toward the City now, away
from the heat. The fire spread in a long line over the prairie. Above
its roar came shouts from the City. The flames rose in a monstrous
twisting pillar, brighter than even the dust-palled sky, lighting the
buildings and the prairie. The heat was dreadful.
Koroby reached the City wall, panted through the gate into a shrieking
crowd. Someone grasped her roughly--she was too breathless to do more
than gasp for air--and shook her violently. "You fool, you utter
fool! What did you think you were doing?" Others clamored around her,
reaching for her. Then she heard Yasak's voice. Face stern, he pushed
through the crowd, pressed her to him. "Let her alone--Let her alone, I
say!"
They watched the conflagration, Yasak and Koroby, from a higher part of
the wall than where the others were gathered. They could glimpse Robert
now and then. He was running, trying to outrace the flames. Then they
swept around him, circling him--his arms flailed frantically.
* * * * *
The fire had passed over the horizon. The air was blue with smoke,
difficult to breathe, and ashes were drifting lightly down like
dove-colored snow. Yasak, watery eyed, a cloth pressed to his nose, was
walking with several others over the smoking earth and still warm ashes
up to his knees. In one hand he held a stick. He stopped and pointed.
"He fell about here," he said, and began to probe the ashes with the
stick.
He struck something. "Here he is!" he cried. The others hurried to the
spot and scooped ashes away, dog-fashion, until Robert's remains were
laid clear. There were exclamations of amazement and perplexity from
the people.
It was a metal skeleton, and the fragments of complicated machinery,
caked with soot.
"He wasn't human at all!" Yasak marvelled. "He was some kind of a toy
made to look like a man--that's why he wore armor, and his face never
changed expression--"
"Magic!" someone cried, and backed away.
"Magic!" the others repeated, and edged back ... and that was the
end of one of those robots which had been fashioned as servants for
Terrestial men, made in Man's likeness to appease Man's vanity, then
conquered him.