Spiggy, who was having one of his all-time top highs, thought having dinner with a troupe of Thykerites would be great fun or ridiculous, one or the other, but in any case good for a laugh. Besides, his companion had to be elsewhere that evening.
As it turned out, the Damzels were nobody’s fools and gave him a good deal to think about. No, he told them seriously over the finishers of dried fruit and confections, he didn’t really think Zilia was mad.
“I rather like her, you know,” he admitted. “Despite her paranoia. She told me about her traumatic upbringing, and I’ve decided it’s really some kind of supersensitivity she has. She seems very alert to nuance. I don’t think she honestly believes anyone on Hobbs Land ever did anything naughty to a Departed, but she feels something covert is happening, and her quivering nerves translate that into something personal. By that, I mean something that affects Zilia or Zilia’s purpose in life. There are no remote and irrelevant sins with our Zilia. If there’s anything going on, she’s sure it pertains to her. She’s the only person I know who could overhear some harmless sexual hanky-panky between two settlers and translate it into a threat against the Departed.”
“So you think something could be going on?” Volsa asked.
“I know something is going on. Have you read Chaniger’s work on settlement applications of the classic Gaean hypothesis?”
Bombi shrugged at Shan who shrugged at Volsa, who said, “He was one of our instructors on Phansure.”
“He claims,” said Spiggy, ignoring the sceptical tone Volsa had used, “that the introduction of any strange species or, indeed, the loss of species causes great changes in the planetary psyche. Man has been on Hobbs Land some thirty-odd lifeyears, so, if Chaniger is right—and I’ve always felt there is a great deal to be said for his theories—we may expect the persona of Hobbs Land to be changing. It won’t be anything too obvious, I shouldn’t think. We occupy only a tiny land area and have been careful not to threaten local species in any way. Nonetheless, some change is probably occurring, and I think Zilia senses that change. It may be the most minor of adjustments. Some barely discernible shifting, but I think she feels it, as animals are said to feel the precursorial tension of climatic or tectonic events.”
“An interesting theory,” said Bombi, without expression.
“Of course, during this recent period, the Departed did die out,” murmured Volsa. “Assuming they were a predominate species, their demise might create considerable change in the planetary ecology. However, I think it only fair to tell you that the High Baidee do not accept the idea that planets or planetoids have psyches. To do so would imply that worlds have minds, and the proscriptions of the Baidee …”
“Oh, I’m well aware of all that,” Spiggy laughed. “I was born and bred on Thyker, after all. I lived there long enough to learn all about the Overmind and the Baidee prophetess. My stance upon such matters—which I will not allow you to call backsliding—is not due to ignorance of the words of Morgori Oestrydingh. No, my beliefs are, I like to think, my own device, not merely a reaction against revealed truth. However, you asked me a question, and I gave you an answer. You are free to reject the idea, or put it in terms you can accept if you like. Isn’t that what Baidee is all about, after all? Not allowing our minds to be controlled by others, so that we can be responsive to various ideas?”
He was laughing at them, and all three of them knew it. The prophetess had declared it a sin to believe in absolute truths, but the Scrutators claimed that didn’t apply to religious truths, of which they had manufactured a good supply over the centuries.
“If you can’t accept a planetary persona,” Spiggy went on, “then think in terms of shifting ecologies. No doubt they would also cause a bit of a premonitory tension. My real point is, I don’t want you to discard Zilia’s concerns as mere paranoia. She’s paranoid, yes, as many of those who share Voorstod heritage seem to be, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t something going on.”
“Would you be interested in joining our survey? If we could get you time off?” Bombi put the question as a hypothetical one, but Spiggy took it seriously.
“No,” he said, after some thought. “If I went with you, it would be for pure curiosity’s sake; I might do some damage, and I can’t imagine being of any help at all. My refusal isn’t due to lack of interest, however. I feel bound to suggest that, if you could record your travels, there’d be a ready market among the settlements for your records. Settlers are intensely curious about the unsettled parts of Hobbs Land.”
He accepted their lifted brows as sufficient consideration of his idea, and then fell back on hospitality. He invited them to walk about CM, to visit the Admin club as his guest, to use the sports complex, to take advantage of the Archives. He made appropriate small talk, then left them to settle into familiar patterns of half talk, half musing, which was their family trait.
“Personas …”
“… not likely, but …”
“Something they haven’t even thought of …”
“… seems to be alert and responsive …”
A very long silence.
Then, “Tomorrow,” said Shan.
And with that and their evening obeisance to the Overmind, they ended their day.
• • •
• In the upper-level personnel office of CM, Mugal Pye was attempting to impress Jamice Bend rather more than he had impressed a number of lesser functionaries on the floors below.
“You see, Ma’am,” he was saying in his insinuating voice, “this boy here, Ilion Girat, is a nephew of Maire Girat, who came here to Hobbs Land snorbel’s years ago. All the boy wants is to convey
