For Melchior, high in his tower, the time had passed unmarked. The sunset, pink and purple, golden and a clear cold green, spreading all over the sky to the west, brought him to his senses. This day was almost spent. And inside the tower the cold had clamped down again. The sky was still clear however. He lit his brazier, not without difficulty. In his vague way, on the outer rim of his mind he had never ceased to wonder at the fact that Senya, in many ways so witless, could set flint to under and in almost no time have a fire going. Whereas he, who could, had he been asked, have explained exactly why flint struck on iron made a spark which lit the under, must strike twenty times. But in the end he had his fire, the twigs caught and he blew upon them, gently, and presently the charcoal caught and began to glow and give off a faint warmth. He then took the water-jar from the basket, and opened the door to the little side chamber which was a stool room, with a chute which ran all the way down the side of the tower into a cess-pit at the bottom. He made use of it; then he poured water into a bowl which stood on a tripod, a bowl which even then would have commanded a good price and which presently was to be priceless, to him just a pretty, useful bowl, and carefully washed his hands. The used water he poured down the chute. Amongst all the other things which he must deal with tomorrow was the bringing up of at least two full jars of water so that the chute might be thoroughly flushed. Senya’s awkwardness about the rope had somewhat defeated him there. Clever as she was at making fires and in other ways, she had never quite’ managed the business of sending up that extra jar of water that was needed. But no matter. If he had been right in his calculations, tomorrow he would be a free man, able to give his mind to things like flushing the chute and providing food for himself, Senya and the pig. He was not so stupid as not to have realised that Senya thought him foolish over the pig. He knew, very well, that a young pig must be fed, must be fattened all through the months until autumn when it would be fit to kill. But until this moment he had foreseen a situation in which he might need another sheet of paper, and the pig was his one saleable asset. So he had been able to ignore Senya’s hints, and the pig’s squeals; for work came first, and he was prepared to say, “Take the pig and sell it and bring me back a piece of paper or parchment whichever is handiest.”
He went back into the tower room and sat down by the brazier. He reached for the basket and found the bread and the cheese. More than he had expected to find. Enough for twenty-four hours, he had told himself, and here was enough for two days. The old woman’s whining voice, talking about imminent starvation, came back into his mind. Women worried so, he thought. Food and fuel, the contents of the cooking pot—that was about as far as their minds could reach, poor creatures! And he felt a little guilty pang; he might have seemed oblivious to the plight in which he and Senya and the poor little pig were involved; but actually he was not. He’d seen this crisis coming
quite a long time ago, and he knew how he must deal with it.Tomorrow or the next day he must go down to Pyangyong and offer to teach. To a man of his kind, after so many years of quiet, dedicated, study, of separation from the world, the idea was appalling, but he had faced it, and faced it now, without flinching.
He’d been, he realised, careless and remiss, especially lately, but he’d been absorbed. Tonight—unless his reckonings were very much amiss, and after a day’s final, critical scrutiny he couldn’t see how they could be—a comet would start on its elliptic course. Melchior’s Comet. He had foretold it, on his charts; he had marked its probable course. And having seen it, having proved his worth as an astronomer, he would go down and hire himself out for regular salary; and old Senya could have her tea, her honey and flour and soya meal and everything else which he knew she had missed and craved.
Eating his meagre meal, slowly, fastidiously, he refused to think of himself, back in his old age in the crowded corridors, the packed halls of the university, facing all those lumpish young men, sent—as he himself had been sent—to get a smattering of learning. There might be one, just one, similar to himself, just one who cared for learning for its own sake, not as a means by which to gain respect from the vulgar, or to obtain a job. That one might be worth teaching.
Mumbling the stale bread, the hard cheese, he thought of that potential one and refused to think of the hundreds who had no wish to learn.
Then he took one mouthful, no more, of the rice wine, to clear the crumbs from his mouth. And he was ready. The sunset had died into a faint yellow line between the earth and the sky. Now, now, he thought, I am about to know whether I was right or wrong. He took his glass from the box and carefully climbed the steps of the ladder. For some reason always oh the ladder, never on the stairs, he remembered that old men were prone to fall and their bones were brittle. One day he was going to think about this oddity, it had something to do with the solidity of what you climbed upon; on the stairs you didn’t sec how far away the earth was; climbing the ladder you were conscious of the floor. Also, of course, he must carry the precious glass as though it were his child, his son, his first-born. He mounted carefully, full of expectation.
When he descended he came down the ladder like a cat dislodged from a wall. It was black night except for the stars and a small pink glow from the brazier. He found a stump of candle, made a light, pulled his stool up to the bench, reached for the chart and his tools and set to work. He breathed in quick, shallow gasps and his heart thudded so heavily that the vibration shook his hands. He had been right; the sky had been pregnant, and it had brought forth, not the comet that he had expected, nor an ordinary star to add to the existing myriads. He had half foreseen, and then witnessed the birth of the star of stars. Now he must make certain adjustments to his chart and work out the full meaning of what even his cautious mind recognised as a phenomenon.
When he had finished, in the bitter cold hour before dawn, he said to himself—Greater than Alexander! And he thought-It may be that I am the only man alive who knows this, and if that is so … He straightened his bowed shoulders to take the weight of the enormous responsibility. The expression of awe upon his face gave way to one of determination.
He reached for a map and spread it.” It was unsatisfactory; all maps were; too many blank spaces. It was curious that men had never yet succeeded in making maps of the solid earth—which could be walked upon and surveyed—anything like as complete and accurate as the charts which he and others had made of the unreachable sky. But no matter. There would be other maps, in other places. The one he held had been made on the assumption that Pyangyong was the centre of the world; map-makers in places blank on this map would have worked on some similar assumption; he would have to find his way as he moved.
Now he must think practically. Amusement brushed the surface of his mind as he remembered that on this day, just dawning, he had intended to be practical; had meant to go into Pyangyong and stick his head into the scholastic yoke and work for his keep, like an ox. There was a joke, one which it was unlikely that he would ever be able to share
with anyone. For amoment the completeness of his loneliness appalled him. And so did his penury. He had no money, no friend from whom he could borrow.
But he had one asset, his tower. And for that there was only one potential buyer—the University at Pyangyong. He felt a momentary regret that he had not bothered to keep on good terms with the governing body of the University; he had refused or neglected invitations to lecture to the students or to dine with the faculty. Still, what he was offering to sell was unique, they must realise that. If they failed to, if they hesitated or haggled he must sell it to a speculator, not for what it was, the best observatory in the world, but as a collection of stone from which many houses could be built, and a collection of glass, enough to glaze many window openings .. . but he hoped that it would not come to that.