Keebles gave a roar of indignation. 'The time I waste haggling with you is worth twice as much!'
''Perhaps so, if you could find someone willing to pay.'
Glawen laid five sols on the desk. “Make the call, get the facts, and we'll go on from there. Do you want me to wait in the outer office?'
“I can't call now” grumbled Keebles. “It's the wrong time of day.” He glanced at the wall clock. “Also, I have another appointment. Come back this evening, at sunset or a bit later. It still may not be a convenient hour to call, but nothing is convenient on this cursed world, and I still can't fathom the thirty-seven hour days.'
Glawen walked back along Crippet Alley, pondering his interview with Melvish Keebles. Everything considered, the affair had gone about as well as could have been hoped, even though Keebles had left him in a state of nerve-wracking suspense.
Nonetheless, he had made progress, of a sort. Keebles had agreed to telephone the other party to the transaction, tacitly acknowledging the presence of this person upon Nion. Glawen wondered whether the admission had been an indiscretion which Keebles had regretted. If so, it indicated a carelessness which surely was not characteristic of Keebles. If not, the significance could only be that Keebles considered the business trivial, with little prospect of profit for himself and this seemed the most likely explanation. As for the other party to the transaction, it could hardly be anyone other than Keebles' long-time associate, now collecting tanglets out on the Plain of Standing Stones — a dangerous business, according to the woman who seemed to serve as Keebles' clerk, though perhaps she might be another of the wives he married so casually.
Crippet Alley expanded into a square, than narrowed again. More folk were abroad than before: for the most part the slight delicate-featured natives of Tanjaree, with here and there a man or a woman from one of the outer districts, of markedly different physiognomy and costume, in Tanjaree that they might visit the markets. No one paid Glawen the slightest heed; he might have been invisible for all the attention he aroused.
The long afternoon lay ahead. Glawen returned to the Novial Hotel. In the lobby the clerk leaned forward upon the counter. “The dining room is now prepared for the mid-afternoon service. Shall I announce that you will shortly be on hand to take your pold?”
Glawen stopped short. Mid-afternoon service? How many meals were consumed during the course of a thirty-seven hour day? Breakfast, lunch, dinner, mid-morning and mid-afternoon services, at the very least. What happened during the long hungry nineteen-hour nights?[8] Glawen temporarily put the question from his mind. At the moment, he was hungry. “I doubt if I am ready for pold,' he told the clerk. “Is standard cuisine available?”
“Naturally! A certain class of tourist will take nothing else, which is a pity, since pold gratifies, sustains and lubricates. It is wholesome and cannot be defeated. Still, you may eat as you like.'
'In that case I will take the risk.”
In the restaurant Glawen was handed the Tourist's Menu, from which he made a selection. As an unsolicited side dish, he was served a slab of pale cream-yellow pold which, when he tasted it, yielded a bland nutty flavor. He found no incentive to linger in the dining room and as soon as possible went out upon the avenue. The time was still early afternoon. Pharisse seemed welded to a spot on the sky. To east and west the pale daylight moons eased unobtrusively along their tracks. Across the lake the domes and spires of Old Town shimmered its reflection on the surface of the water.
Glawen went to sit on a bench. The Plain of Standing Stones, according to Keebles' clerk, was halfway around the world. Noon at Tanjaree was midnight on the Plain of Standing Stones, and dusk, correspondingly, would be early morning, so that it became clear why Keebles felt impelled to delay his telephone call.
Glawen brought out the packet of information folders he had received at the tourist information office, from which he took a map of Nion in Mercator projection, printed is a variety of colors. Vertical lines created thirty-seven segments, corresponding to the thirty-seven hours and fifteen minutes of the sidereal day. The origin — 0 o’clock, or midnight — passed through Tanjaree.
Nions surface area was roughly four times that of Earth: a disparity magnified by the absence of oceans and large seas. Colors indicated physiographic detail: gray for dry sea bottom, olive green for water fields, blue for open water, pink for vast steppes. Clots of population surrounded the three principal cities: Tanjaree; Sirmegosto, six thousand miles south and east; Tyl Toc, four thousand miles due west. Additionally, there were several dozen isolated towns scattered across the planet, including many tourist destinations: Hooktown, near the Tangting Forest; Moonway on the Plain of Standing Stones; Whipple’s Camp, under the Scintic Crag; also a spatter of even smaller villages. Black lines connecting the populated areas were identified as ‘nomad routes’.
Glawen found the Plain of standing Stones in the segment marked '18’, halfway around the world. Here was the town Moonway, the William Schulz Buttes to the north and the Gerhart Pastels to the south.
Glawen studied the map for a few moments, then folded it and replaced it in his pocket. He rose from the bench and walked along the avenue to a bookseller’s shop near the Cansaspara Hotel. He bought a tourist's guide, entitled:
NION: WHERE TO GO, WHAT TO DO!
Also, where not to go and what not to do, if you value your life and sanity. (Yes: Sanity. See section on Gangril pold).
Nearby was an outdoor cafe. Glawen found a table somewhat to the side and seated himself. The other patrons were for the most part off-worlders: tourists chattering and remarking upon the contradictions of Tanjaree, in their estimation a place forlorn and shabby, but truly exotic and of course incomprehensible. Some recounted their experiences with pold; others excitedly spoke of that excursion to the Tangting Forest and its mind numbing inhabitants. In the sky Pharisse seemed to hang steady and still among its retinue of moons.
Glawen started to read is the tourist guide, but was interrupted by the arrival of a waiter wearing a maroon uniform with a flowing black cravat. “Your order, sir?”
Glawen looked up from his book. “What is available?”
'We offer a full range of potations, sir. They are listed here, on the menu.” He indicated a card and started to turn away.
“Wait!” cried Glawen. “What is a ‘Tympanese Tonic’?'
“It is a local beverage, sir, with mildly stimulating effects.'
“It is derived from pold?'
“Yes, sir.'
“What is ‘Meteor Fuel’?'
“It is another mild stimulant, sir, and is sometimes taken before foot races.”
'Also, derived from — '
“A different sort of pold, sir.'
“The lady yonder what is she drinking?”
“That is our 'Corpse Reviver’. It is a secret recipe of the Gangrils and is popular among tourists with modernistic views.”
“I see. What about these 'Teas imported from Earth”? Are they also pold?”
“Not to my knowledge, sir.'
“You may bring me a pot of green tea, if you please.'
Glawen returned to the guidebook and found a section entitled: ‘The Plain of Standing Stones’. He read:
One cannot think of the Standing Stones without reference to the Shadowmen, who to this day lurk is the neighborhood. They are aptly named, if only because they are little more than shadows of their remarkable progenitors, each of whom strove incessantly for honor and devoted his life to the performance of mighty deeds. The Shadowmen of today are somber, taciturn, intensely superstitious, and so introverted as to be impenetrable. Etiquette guides each phase of his life, so that he seems overwhelmed by its minutiae, and his conduct is predictable. The casual visitor to Moonway, who chances to come upon one of the Shadowmen during the course of his excursion, will see a person stolid as a rock, and quite imperturbable. But let the visitor make no mistake: this aloof gentleman will cut his throat without a qualm if he finds the tourist tampering with his sacred objects. Still, do not be deterred from a visit to the Standing Stones; they are remarkable, and you will be safe so long as you conform to the regulations.
The Shadowmen of today must be viewed is the perspective of their history. It is a melancholy record: the
