Forward the Foundation f-2 Page 7

  In fact, the gaps in his memory were enormous. It was not that eight years was such a long time, but it was two-fifths of the lifetime of a twenty-year-old and his life since leaving Billibotton had been so different that all before it had faded like a misty dream.

  But the smells were there. He stopped outside a bakery, low and dingy, and smelled the coconut icing that reeked through the air—that he had never quite smelled elsewhere. Even when he had stopped to buy tarts with coconut icing, even when they were advertised as “Dahl-style,” they had been faint imitations—no more.

  He felt strongly tempted. Well, why not? He had the credits and Dors was not there to wrinkle her nose and wonder aloud how clean—or, more likely, not clean—the place might be. Who worried about clean in the old days?

  The shop was dim and it took a while for Raych’s eyes to acclimate. There were a few low tables in the place, with a couple of rather insubstantial chairs at each, undoubtedly where people might have a light repast, the equivalent of moka and tarts. A young man sat at one of the tables, an empty cup before him, wearing a once-white T-shirt that probably would have looked even dirtier in a better light.

  The baker or, in any case, a server stepped out from a room in the rear and said in a rather surly fashion, “What’ll ya have?”

  “A coke-icer,” said Raych in just as surly a fashion (he would not be a Billibottoner if he displayed courtesy), using the slang term he remembered well from the old days.

  The term was still current, for the server handed him the correct item, using his bare fingers. The boy, Raych, would have taken that for granted, but now the man, Raych, felt taken slightly aback.

  “You want a bag?”

  “No,” said Raych, “I’ll eat it here.” He paid the server and took the coke-icer from the other’s hand and bit into its richness, his eyes half-closing as he did so. It had been a rare treat in his boyhood—sometimes when he had scrounged the necessary credit to buy one with, sometimes when he had received a bite from a temporarily wealthy friend, most often when he had lifted one when nobody was watching. Now he could buy as many as he wished.

  “Hey,” said a voice.

  Raych opened his eyes. It was the man at the table, scowling at him.

  Raych said gently, “Are you speaking to me, bub?”

  “Yeah. What’chuh doin’?”

  “Eatin’ a coke-icer. What’s it to ya?” Automatically he had assumed the Billibotton way of talking. It was no strain at all.

  “What’chuh doin’ in Billibotton?”

  “Born here. Raised here. In a bed. Not in a street, like you.” The insult came easily, as though he had never left home.

  “That so? You dress pretty good for a Billibottoner. Pretty fancy-dancy. Got a perfume stink about ya.” And he held up a little finger to imply effeminacy.

  “I won’t talk about your stink. I went up in the world.”

  “Up in the world? La-dee-da.” Two other men stepped into the bakery. Raych frowned slightly, for he wasn’t sure whether they had been summoned or not. The man at the table said to the newcomers, “This guy’s gone up in the world. Says he’s a Billibottoner.”

  One of the two newcomers shambled a mock salute and grinned with no appearance of amiability. His teeth were discolored. “Ain’t that nice? It’s always good to see a Billibottoner go up in the world. Gives ’em a chance to help their poor unfor’chnit sector people. Like, credits. You can always spare a credit or two for the poor, hey?”

  “How many you got, mister?” said the other, the grin disappearing.

  “Hey,” said the man behind the counter. “All you guys get out of my store. I don’t want no trouble in here.”

  “There’ll be no trouble,” said Raych. “I’m leaving.”

  He made to go, but the seated man put a leg in his way. “Don’t go, pal. We’d miss yer company.”

  (The man behind the counter, clearly fearing the worst, disappeared into the rear.)

  Raych smiled. He said, “One time when I was in Billibotton, guys, I was with my old man and old lady and there were ten guys who stopped us. Ten. I counted them. We had to take care of them.”

  “Yeah?” said the one who had been speaking. “Yer old man took care of ten?”

  “My old man? Nah. He wouldn’t waste his time. My old lady did. And I can do it better than she can. And there are only three of you. So, if you don’t mind, out of the way.”

  “Sure. Just leave all your credits. Some of your clothes, too.”

  The man at the table rose to his feet. There was a knife in his hand.

  “There you are,” said Raych. “Now you’re going to waste my time.” He had finished his coke-icer and he half-turned. Then, as quickly as thought, he anchored himself to the table, while his right leg shot out and the point of his toe landed unerringly in the groin of the man with the knife.

  Down he went with a loud cry. Up went the table, driving the second man toward the wall and keeping him there, while Raych’s right arm flashed out, with the edge of the palm striking hard against the larynx of the third, who coughed and went down.

  It had taken two seconds and Raych now stood there with a knife in each hand and said, “Now which one of you wants to move?”

  They glared at him but remained frozen in place and Raych said, “In that case, I will now leave.”

  But the server, who had retreated to the back room, must have summoned help, for three more men had now entered the store, while the server screeched, “Troublemakers! Nothing but troublemakers!”

  The newcomers were dressed alike in what was obviously a uniform—but one that Raych had never seen. Trousers were tucked into boots, loose green T-shirts were belted, and odd semispherical hats that looked vaguely comic were perched on top of their heads. On the front of the left shoulder of each T-shirt were the letters JG.

  They had the Dahlite look about them but not quite the Dahlite mustache. The mustaches were black and thick, but they were carefully trimmed at lip level and were kept from luxuriating too widely. Raych allowed himself an internal sneer. They lacked the vigor of his own wild mustache, but he had to admit they looked neat and clean.

  The leader of these three men said, “I’m Corporal Quinber. What’s been going on here?”

  The defeated Billibottoners were scrambling to their feet, clearly the worse for wear. One was still doubled over, one was rubbing his throat, and the third acted as though one of his shoulders had been wrenched.

  The corporal stared at them with a philosophic eye, while his two men blocked the door. He turned to Raych—the one man who seemed untouched. “Are you a Billibottoner, boy?”

  “Born and bred, but I’ve lived elsewhere for eight years.” He let the Billibotton accent recede, but it was still there, at least to the extent that it existed in the corporal’s speech as well. There were other parts of Dahl aside from Billibotton and some parts with considerable aspirations to gentility.

  Raych said, “Are you security officers? I don’t seem to recall the uniform you’re—”

  “We’re not security officers. You won’t find security officers in Billibotton much. We’re the Joranum Guard and we keep the peace here. We know these three and they’ve been warned. We’ll take care of them. You’re our problem, buster. Name. Reference number.”

  Raych told them.

  “And what happened here?”

  Raych told them.

  “And your business here?”

  Raych said, “Look here. Do you have the right to question me? If you’re not security officers—”

  “Listen,” said the corporal in a hard voice, “don’t you question rights. We’re all there is in Billibotton and we have the right because we take the right. You say you beat up these three men and I believe you. But you won’t beat us up. We’re not allowed to carry blasters—” And with that, the corporal slowly pulled out a blaster.

  “Now tell me your business here.”

  Raych sighed. If he had gone directly to a sector ha
ll, as he should have done—if he had not stopped to drown himself in nostalgia for Billibotton and coke-icers—

  He said, “I have come on important business to see Mr. Joranum, and since you seem to be part of his organi—”

  “To see the leader?”

  “Yes, Corporal.”

  “With two knives on you?”

  “For self-defense. I wasn’t going to have them on me when I saw Mr. Joranum.”

  “So you say. We’re taking you into custody, mister. We’ll get to the bottom of this. It may take time, but we will.”

  “But you don’t have the right. You’re not the legally const—”

  “Well, find someone to complain to. Till then, you’re ours.”

  And the knives were confiscated and Raych was taken into custody.

  15

  Cleon was no longer quite the handsome young monarch that his holographs portrayed. Perhaps he still was—in the holographs—but his mirror told a different story. His most recent birthday had been celebrated with the usual pomp and ritual, but it was his fortieth just the same.

  The Emperor could find nothing wrong with being forty. His health was perfect. He had gained a little weight but not much. His face would perhaps look older, if it were not for the microadjustments that were made periodically and that gave him a slightly enameled look.

  He had been on the throne for eighteen years—already one of the longer reigns of the century—and he felt there was nothing that might necessarily keep him from reigning another forty years and perhaps having the longest reign in Imperial history as a result.

  Cleon looked at the mirror again and thought he looked a bit better if he did not actualize the third dimension.

  Now take Demerzel—faithful, reliable, necessary, unbearable Demerzel. No change in him. He maintained his appearance and, as far as Cleon knew, there had been no microadjustments, either. Of course, Demerzel was so close-mouthed about everything. And he had never been young. There had been no young look about him when he first served Cleon’s father and Cleon had been the boyish Prince Imperial. And there was no young look about him now. Was it better to have looked old at the start and to avoid change afterward?

  Change!

  It reminded him that he had called Demerzel in for a purpose and not just so that he might stand there while the Emperor ruminated. Demerzel would take too much Imperial rumination as a sign of old age.

  “Demerzel,” he said.

  “Sire?”

  “This fellow Joranum. I tire of hearing of him.”

  “There is no reason you should hear of him, Sire. He is one of those phenomena that are thrown to the surface of the news for a while and then disappears.”

  “But he doesn’t disappear.”

  “Sometimes it takes a while, Sire.”

  “What do you think of him, Demerzel?”

  “He is dangerous but has a certain popularity. It is the popularity that increases the danger.”

  “If you find him dangerous and if I find him annoying, why must we wait? Can’t he simply be imprisoned or executed or something?”

  “The political situation on Trantor, Sire, is delicate—”

  “It is always delicate. When have you told me that it is anything but delicate?”

  “We live in delicate times, Sire. It would be useless to move strongly against him if that would but exacerbate the danger.”

  “I don’t like it. I may not be widely read—an Emperor doesn’t have the time to be widely read—but I know my Imperial history, at any rate. There have been a number of cases of these populists, as they are called, that have seized power in the last couple of centuries. In every case, they reduced the reigning Emperor to a mere figurehead. I do not wish to be a figurehead, Demerzel.”

  “It is unthinkable that you would be, Sire.”

  “It won’t be unthinkable if you do nothing.”

  “I am attempting to take measures, Sire, but cautious ones.”

  “There’s one fellow, at least, who isn’t cautious. A month or so ago, a University professor—a professor—stopped a potential Joranumite riot single-handedly. He stepped right in and put a stop to it.”

  “So he did, Sire. How did you come to hear of it?”

  “Because he is a certain professor in whom I am interested. How is it that you didn’t speak to me of this?”

  Demerzel said, almost obsequiously, “Would it be right for me to trouble you with every insignificant detail that crosses my desk?”

  “Insignificant? This man who took action was Hari Seldon.”

  “That was, indeed, his name.”

  “And the name was a familiar one. Did he not present a paper, some years ago, at the last Decennial Convention that interested us?”

  “Yes, Sire.”

  Cleon looked pleased. “As you see, I do have a memory. I need not depend on my staff for everything. I interviewed this Seldon fellow on the matter of his paper, did I not?”

  “Your memory is indeed flawless, Sire.”

  “What happened to his idea? It was a fortune-telling device. My flawless memory does not bring to mind what he called it.”

  “Psychohistory, Sire. It was not precisely a fortune-telling device but a theory as to ways of predicting general trends in future human history.”

  “And what happened to it?”

  “Nothing, Sire. As I explained at the time, the idea turned out to be wholly impractical. It was a colorful idea but a useless one.”

  “Yet he is capable of taking action to stop a potential riot. Would he have dared do this if he didn’t know in advance he would succeed? Isn’t that evidence that this—what?—psychohistory is working?”

  “It is merely evidence that Hari Seldon is foolhardy, Sire. Even if the psychohistoric theory were practical, it would not have been able to yield results involving a single person or a single action.”

  “You’re not the mathematician, Demerzel. He is. I think it is time I questioned him again. After all, it is not long before the Decennial Convention is upon us once more.”

  “It would be a useless—”

  “Demerzel, I desire it. See to it.”

  “Yes, Sire.”

  16

  Raych was listening with an agonized impatience that he was trying not to show. He was sitting in an improvised cell, deep in the warrens of Billibotton, having been accompanied through alleys he no longer remembered. (He, who in the old days could have threaded those same alleys unerringly and lost any pursuer.)

  The man with him, clad in the green of the Joranumite Guard, was either a missionary, a brainwasher, or a kind of theologian-manqué. At any rate, he had announced his name to be Sander Nee and he was delivering a long message in a thick Dahlite accent that he had clearly learned by heart.

  “If the people of Dahl want to enjoy equality, they must show themselves worthy of it. Good rule, quiet behavior, seemly pleasures are all requirements. Aggressiveness and the bearing of knives are the accusations others make against us to justify their intolerance. We must be clean in word and—”

  Raych broke in. “I agree with you, Guardsman Nee, every word. —But I must see Mr. Joranum.”

  Slowly the guardsman shook his head. “You can’t ’less you got some appointment, some permission.”

  “Look, I’m the son of an important professor at Streeling University, a mathematics professor.”

  “Don’t know no professor. —I thought you said you was from Dahl.”

  “Of course I am. Can’t you tell the way I talk?”

  “And you got an old man who’s a professor at a big University? That don’t sound likely.”

  “Well, he’s my foster father.”

  The guardsman absorbed that and shook his head. “You know anyone in Dahl?”

  “There’s Mother Rittah. She’ll know me.” (She had been very old when she had known him. She might be senile by now—or dead.)

  “Never heard of her.”

  (Who else? He had never known anyone lik
ely to penetrate the dim consciousness of this man facing him. His best friend had been another youngster named Smoodgie—or at least that was the only name he knew him by. Even in his desperation, Raych could not see himself saying: “Do you know someone my age named Smoodgie?”)

  Finally he said, “There’s Yugo Amaryl.”

  A dim spark seemed to light Nee’s eyes. “Who?”

  “Yugo Amaryl,” said Raych eagerly. “He works for my foster father at the University.”

  “He a Dahlite, too? Everyone at the University Dahlites?”

  “Just he and I. He was a heatsinker.”

  “What’s he doing at the University?”

  “My father took him out of the heatsinks eight years ago.”

  “Well— I’ll send someone.”

  Raych had to wait. Even if he escaped, where would he go in the intricate alleyways of Billibotton without being picked up instantly?

  Twenty minutes passed before Nee returned with the corporal who had arrested Raych in the first place. Raych felt a little hope; the corporal, at least, might conceivably have some brains.

  The corporal said, “Who is this Dahlite you know?”

  “Yugo Amaryl, Corporal, a heatsinker who my father found here in Dahl eight years ago and took to Streeling University with him.”

  “Why did he do that?”

  “My father thought Yugo could do more important things than heatsink, Corporal.”

  “Like what?”

  “Mathematics. He—”

  The corporal held up his hand. “What heatsink did he work in?”

  Raych thought for a moment. “I was only a kid then, but it was at C-2, I think.”

  “Close enough. C-3.”

  “Then you know about him, Corporal?”

  “Not personally, but the story is famous in the heatsinks and I’ve worked there, too. And maybe that’s how you’ve heard of it. Have you any evidence that you really know Yugo Amaryl?”

  “Look. Let me tell you what I’d like to do. I’m going to write down my name on a piece of paper and my father’s name. Then I’m going to write down one word. Get in touch—any way you want—with some official in Mr. Joranum’s group—Mr. Joranum will be here in Dahl tomorrow—and just read him my name, my father’s name, and the one word. If nothing happens, then I’ll stay here till I rot, I suppose, but I don’t think that will happen. In fact, I’m sure that they will get me out of here in three seconds and that you’ll get a promotion for passing along the information. If you refuse to do this, when they find out I am here—and they will—you will be in the deepest possible trouble. After all, if you know that Yugo Amaryl went off with a big-shot mathematician, just tell yourself that same big-shot mathematician is my father. His name is Hari Seldon.”