Syrilla gestures with an apparently boneless hand and raises her eyebrows to her hairline, miming astonishment. “Of course, Danivon Luze the Council Enforcer.” Danivon Luze, once a foundling child, the pet of Tolerance; then Zasper Ertigon’s youthful protégé; now a strikingly handsome though controversial officer. Who else?
Boarmus snorts, a muffled plopping, like boiling mud. How long has he come here in the afternoons to occupy this same table, this same chair? How long has he drunk one thing or another while looking down upon the uniformed guards, the two Doors, the ceremonial changing of the one about the other? Whatever time it has been, nothing has happened in it. Well, very little. A few minor rebellions, relentlessly put down. A few new ideas, squelched. A few innovations, which always turned out to be reinventions of things forgotten centuries ago. And now, at last, something. Something happening, and though in the past he had thought he longed for something to happen, he now wonders if such longings had been at all wise.
“My dear Syrilla, Danivon did it because he’s been trained to do it. Enforcers are trained to report wickedness.” He brackets his speech with sips from a porcelain cup heavily crusted with gold. Members of Council Supervisory have recently reinvented (for the umpteenth time and under another name) both teatime and the Baroque.
“Did he have to be so public about it?” she asks in a high, affected voice, a little-girl voice belied by the ageless cynicism of her eyes.
Boarmus grunts impatiently, weary of the woman. She’s a stick: thin to the point of emaciation, a well-groomed, talkative, much ornamented stick. He is bored with her and others like her. He is tired of himself, of being who he is, where he is. He is a much put-upon man. He had never wanted to be Provost, so he now recollects, conveniently forgetting many of the evasions and contortions he had gone through to end up with the job. Besides, that was long ago, when he was young and inept—and ignorant!
He says: “The rule is that one must assert guilt in the Rotunda, loudly, so a great many people hear the charge and it can’t be hushed up. Danivon Luze was taught what we’re all taught, that we can be forgiven for being naughty, but never for being covert about it. We all learned that as children, back in Heaven.” He longs briefly for that island home of the Supervisory people, that sea-washed paradise of tropical foliage, breeze-cooled days and velvety, star-washed nights. Small enough payment, Heaven, for what they go through!
“Of course,” Boarmus continues in an ironic tone, “we of Council Supervisory unlearn it during our first tour of duty here at Tolerance. Not being one of us, Danivon never unlearned it, that’s all.”
“Poor old Paff.”
Boarmus slits his pouchy eyes and runs a pudgy hand over his bare and sloping skull, murmuring, “Poor old Paff has been raping and murdering children since he reached puberty. We preferred not to notice, that’s all.”
“But he was one of us, Boarmus! And they were only ordinary children. Molockians and that.”
“Quite frankly, I don’t think—”
“No. It’s no excuse. Of course not. The Diversity Law admits of no exceptions. He had no right to take any children, not even Molockians. He had to Let Them Alone. I know that, Boarmus, I was merely feeling sorry for him.”
“Damn his nose, nonetheless.”
“Paff’s nose?”
“Danivon Luze’s nose.”
“I haven’t heard anything about his nose. I know who he is, of course.”
Boarmus contradicts her. “No one knows who he is. We only know who he became after he got here.”
“What is it about his nose?”
Boarmus’s laughter bursts in a soggy spray, like a mud bubble. “He sniffs things out. Corruption. Or trouble. Or whatever.”
“How very odd.”
“Odd, perhaps. But useful,” he replies, nodding ponderously. “I have found Danivon to be quite irreplaceable.”
“Just by virtue of this smelling out? I mean, really….” She subsides into silent thought. Poor old Paff. A pedo-necro-phile, without question, but such a courtly man. Always so elegantly dressed. Paff would take advantage of the finalizer booth, of course—the only honorable thing to do. If he couldn’t bring that off, something would happen to him. The Frickians would manage it quietly and neatly. They always did in such cases.
Boarmus muses, stroking his massive chin, regretting he has mentioned Danivon’s usefulness. He hadn’t intended to discuss Danivon with Syrilla, whose discretion he trusts no farther than he can fart against a high wind. Danivon has recently committed a tactless act. One might almost say an indiscretion. Boarmus knows about it, but no one else does, yet, and Boarmus hopes to remedy the matter before anyone does. Danivon Luze must get out of Tolerance before he has opportunity to repeat his lapse. Not that Danivon has done anything purposefully wrong. He has erred out of mere curiosity, Boarmus is sure—though there are those who will assume worse motives for the act, if they find out.
“I’m not sure I’ ve ever actually seen him. Danivon, I mean,” says Syrilla, still following her own thoughts.
“As a matter of fact, he should be here momentarily,” Boarmus announces. “I’ve decided to send him to Panubi.”
“You’re sending him to find out about the dragons!” squeals Syrilla in pretended surprise.
Boarmus glooms at her from beneath his heavy brows. Why does the fool woman insist upon this girlish posturing! All the fashion just now, posturing. Every social occasion given over to giggles and squeals and standing about with one’s hands flapping like some wide-winged wader bird about to take off! Well, no amount of squealing and chattering can make a surprise out of the matter. When people on Panubi report seeing dragons where there have never been dragons heretofore, certainly someone has to be sent to look into it.
“And that must be him coming now,” cries Syrilla, clapping her hands and
