The Fifth Head of Cerberus

Gasping, Eastwind answered, “We know.”

“By our power I made the stars to fall; but I now do a greater magic. I make you Sandwalker and Sandwalker you,” said the Shadow child, and as quickly as a striking snake darted forward and plunged his teeth into Eastwind’s arm. While Sandwalker watched, his twin’s face went slack and his eyes looked at things unseen.

That which swam in my mouth swims in his veins now,” the Shadow child said, wiping Eastwind’s blood from his lips. “And because I spoke to him and he believed me, in his thought he is you.”

Sandwalker’s arm was sore from flogging Lastvoice, and he rubbed it. “But how will we know what he does?”

“He will speak soon.”

“This is a game for children. He should die.” Sandwalker kicked Eastwind’s feet so that he fell into the water, and held him there until he felt the body go limp. When he straightened up he said to the last Shadow child, “I spoke.”

“Yes.”

“But now I don’t know if I am Sandwalker or Eastwind in his dream.”

“And neither do I,” said the Shadow child. “But there is something happening down there on the beach. Shall we go and see?”

The mist was burning away. Sandwalker looked where the Shadow child pointed and saw that where the river joined moaning Ocean a green thing was bobbing in the water. Three men with their limbs wrapped in leaves stood on the sand near it, pointing at the stranded body of Lastvoice and talking a speech Sandwalker did not understand. When he came close to them they extended their hands, open, and smiled; but he did not understand that open hands meant (or had meant, once) that they held no weapons. His people had never known weapons. That night Sandwalker dreamed that he was dead, but the long dreaming days were over.

V. R. T.

But don’t think that I am at all interested in you. You have warmed me, and now I will go out again and listen to the dark voices.

Karel Capek

It was a brown box, a dispatch box, of decayed dark brown leather with brass reinforced corners. The brass had been painted a brownish green when the box was new; but most of the paint was gone, and the dying sunlight from the window showed dull green tarnish around the bright scars of recent gouges. The slave set this box carefully, almost soundlessly, beside the junior officer’s lamp.

“Open it,” the officer said. The lock had been broken a long time ago; the box was tied shut with hard-reeved ropes twisted from reclaimed rags.

The slave—a high-shouldered, sharp-chinned man with a shock of dark hair—looked at the officer and the officer nodded his close-cropped head, his chin moving a sixteenth of an inch. The slave drew the officer’s dagger from the belt over the back of his chair, cut the ropes, kissed the blade reverently and replaced it. When he had gone the officer rubbed his palms on the thighs of his knee-length uniform trousers, then lifted the lid and dumped the contents on to his table.

Notebooks, spools and spools of tape. Reports, forms, letters. He saw a school composition book of cheap yellow paper, the cover half torn off, picked it up. An unskilled hand had monogramed it: V. R. T. The initials were ornate and very large but somehow wrongly formed, as though a savage had imitated them from letters indicated to him on a sign.

Birds I have seen today. I saw two birds today. One was a skull-shrike, and the other was a bird that the shrike had…

The officer tossed the composition book to the back of the table. His eyes, straying, had identified amid the clutter the precise, back-slanted writing favoured by the Civil Service.

SIR: The materials I send you…

…is my own opinion.

…from Earth.

The officer raised his eyebrows slightly, put down the letter, and picked up the composition book again. At the bottom of the cover, in smudged, dark letters, he read: Medallion Supplies, Frenchman’s Landing, Sainte. Anne. Inside the back cover:

name: Rm E2S14 Seat 18

school: Armstrong School

city: Frenchman’s Landing

Taking up one of the spools of tape, he looked for a label, but there was none. The labels lay loose among the other materials, robbed by the humidity of their adhesion, though still neatly titled, dated and signed.

Second Interrogation.

Fifth Interrogation.

Seventeenth Interrogation—Third Reel.

The officer allowed them to sift between his fingers, then chose a spool at random and set it up on his recorder.

A: Is it going now?

Q: Yes. Your name, please.

A: I have already given you my name, it is on all your records.

Q: You have given us that name a number of times.

A: Yes.

Q: Who are you?

A: I am the prisoner in cell 143.

Q: Oh, you are a philosopher. We had thought you an anthropologist, and you don’t seem old enough for both.

A:

Q: I am instructed to familiarize myself with your case. I could have done that without calling you from your cell—you realize that? I am subjecting myself to the danger of typhus and several other diseases for your sake. Do you want to return underground? You seemed to appreciate the cigarette a moment ago. Isn’t there anything else you’d like?

A: (Eagerly) Another blanket. More paper! More paper, and something to write on. A table.

The officer smiled to himself and stopped the tape. He had enjoyed the eagerness in A’s voice, and he now found pleasure in speculating to himself about the answer A would receive. He rewound a few inches of tape, then touched the PLAY button again.

Q: Do you want to return underground? You seemed to appreciate the cigarette a moment ago. Isn’t there anything else you’d like?

A: (Eagerly) Another blanket. More paper! More paper, and something to write on. A table.

Q: We’ve given you paper, a great deal of it. And look at the use you’ve made of it: filled it with scrawlings.