some new directions in our thinking. I happen to be an engineer, and I live in a highly technical society. Any sort of thinking that projects itself beyond the known or the solidly theoretical grates upon my nerves. There is nothing in any methodology that I can summon up that would provide any explanation. There may be others of you who are better based to suggest an explanation. How about our robot friend?”
“I also have a technical background,” said Jurgens, “but I am not aware of any methodology—”
“Why do you ask him?” shouted the Parson. “You call him a robot and that is a word that slips easily off the tongue, but when you come right down to it, he is no more than a machine, a mechanical contrivance.”
“You go too far,” said the Brigadier. “I happen to live in a world where mechanical contrivances have fought a war for years and have fought it intelligently and well, with an imagination that sometimes surpasses a human’s.”
“How horrible,” said the poetess.
“You mean, I suppose,” said the Brigadier, “that war is horrible.”
“Well, isn’t it?” she asked.
“War is a natural human function,” said the Brigadier. “There is an aggressive, competitive urge in the race that responds to conflict. If this were not so, there would not have been so many wars.”
“But the human suffering. The agony. The blasted hopes.”
“In my day it has become a game,” said the Brigadier. “As it was with many early human tribes. The Indians of the Western Continent looked upon it as a game. A young tribesman did not become a man until he’d counted his first coup. All that is manly and noble stems from war. There might have been times in the past when excessive zeal resulted in some of the consequences that you mention. Today little blood is spilled. We play it as one plays a game of chess.”
“Using robots,” said Jurgens.
“We don’t call them robots.”
“Perhaps not. Mechanicals. Mechanicals that have personal identity and the ability to think.”
“That’s correct. Well built, magnificently trained. They help us plan as well as fight. My staff is very heavily weighed with mechanicals. In many ways their grasp of a military situation is at times superior to mine.”
“And the field of battle is littered with mechanicals?”
“Yes, of course. We salvage those we can.”
“And fix them up and send them out again?”
“Why, certainly,” said the Brigadier. “In war you conserve your resources very jealously.”
“General,” said Jurgens, “I do not think I would like to live in the kind of world you have.”
“What is your kind of world? If you wouldn’t want to live in my kind of world, tell me the kind of world you do live in.”
“A peaceful world. A kindly world. We have compassion for our humans.”
“It sounds sickening,” said the Brigadier. “You have compassion for your humans. Your humans?”
“In our world there are few humans left. We take care of them.”
“Much as it goes against my gram,” said the Parson, “I’m coming to the conclusion that Edward Lansing may be right. Listening, it becomes apparent that we all do come from different worlds. A cynical world that regards war as a simple game—”
“It is not a simple game,” said the Brigadier. “At times it is complex.”
“A cynical world,” said the Parson, “that regards war as a complex game. A world of poetess and poet, of music and academies. A world in which robots take kindly care of humans. And in your world, my lady, a society where a woman may become an engineer.”
“And what is wrong with that?” asked Mary.
“The wrongness is that women should not be engineers. They should be faithful wives, competent keepers of the home, efficient raisers of children. These activities are the natural sphere of women.”
“In my world women are not only engineers,” said Mary. “They are physicists, physicians, chemists, philosophers, paleontologists, geologists, members of the board of great corporations, presidents of prestigious companies, lawyers and lawmakers, heads of executive agencies. The list could be greatly added to.”
Mine Host came bustling up to the table.
“Make way,” he said. “Make way for supper. I hope you’ll find it to your liking.”
7
The meal was finished, a most satisfactory one. Now, the table pushed back, they sat in front of the blazing fire. Back of them, in the other corner of the room, the card players were hunched above their table.
Lansing made a thumb over his shoulder in their direction. “What about them? They did not join us at supper.”
Mine Host made a gesture of contempt. “They will not leave their play. We served them sandwiches and they continued with their game. They will not cease until early in the morning and then be up again after little sleep. Then they hold a prayer breakfast and go back to the cards.”
“To whom do they pray?” asked Mary. “The gods of chance, perhaps.”
Mine Host shook his head. “I do not know. I have never eavesdropped.”
“It seems to me you are a most incurious man,” said the Parson. “You know less of common matters than any man I have ever met. You do not know what land we’re in. You do not know why we’re here or what we’re supposed to do.”
“I tell you true,” said Mine Host. “I do not know these things and I have never asked.”
“Could it be true that there is no one for you to ask? No one we can ask?”
“I think that is a fair statement,” said Mine Host.
“So we’ve been dumped here,” said Mary, “without knowledge and without instructions. Someone, or some agency, must have dumped us here for whatever reason. Do you have the slightest idea of—”
“I have none whatsoever, my lady. I can tell you this — the other groups that have come here have left this place, following an ancient road to seek out what lies beyond.”
“So there have been other groups?”
“Oh, yes. Very many of them. But at long intervals.”
“And do they return?”
“Seldom. Only stragglers now and then.”
“What happens when the stragglers return?”
“That I do not know. I close up for winter.”
“The ancient road you speak of,” said the Brigadier. “Can you tell us more of it? Where it might go or what’s to be found along the way?”
“Only rumors. There are rumors of a city and rumors of a cube.”
“Rumors only?”
“That is all.”
“A cube?” asked Lansing.
“That is all I know,” said Mine Host. “I know naught other of it. And now a matter that I hesitate to mention, but that must be done.”
“What is it?” asked the Parson.
“It is the matter of payment. I must be paid for my lodging and the meals, and I run a small commissary from which you might wish to purchase food and other items before you set out upon your way.”
“I have no money on me,” said the Brigadier. “I seldom carry any. Had I known I was coming here, I would have obtained some cash.”
“I have but a few bills and a handful of change,” the Parson told Mine Host. “As are all the clergy in my country, I am very poor.”
“I could write you a check,” said Mary.
“I am sorry. I can accept no checks. I must have cold, hard cash.”
Sandra Carver complained, “I do not understand all this. Cash and checks?”
