Maclaren said at last, not looking toward the Saraian: “Why not tell me the reason? It might relieve you a bit.”
Nakamura drew a breath. “I have always been afraid of space,” he said. “And yet called to it also. Can you understand?”
“Yes. I think I know.”
“It has—” Nakamura giggled. “Unsettled me. All my life. First, as a child I was taken from my home on Earth, across space. And now, of course, I can never come back.”
“I have some pull in the Citadel. A visa could be arranged.”
“You are very kind. I am not sure whether it would help. Kyoto cannot be as I remember it. If it has not changed, surely I have, yes-s-s? But please let me continue. After a few years on Sarai, there was a meteor fall which killed all my family except my brother. A stone from space, do you see? We did not think of it that way, then. The monastery raised us. We got scholarships to an astronautical academy. We made a voyage together as cadets. Have you heard of the Firdawzi disaster?”
“No, I’m afraid not.” Maclaren poured smoke from his mouth, as a veil against the cosmos.
“Capella is a GO star like Sol, but a giant. The Firdawzi had been long at the innermost planet of the system, a remote-controlled survey trip. The radiations caused a metal fatigue. No one suspected. On our cruise, the ship suddenly failed. The pilot barely got us into an orbit, after we had fallen a long way toward Capella. There we must wait until rescue came. Many died from the heat. My brother was one of them.”
Stillness hummed.
“I see,” said Maclaren at last.
“Since then I have been afraid of space. It rises into my
consciousness from time to time.” Maclaren stole a glance at Nakamura. The little man was lotus-postured in midair, save that he stared at his hands and they twisted together. Wretchedness overrode his voice. “And yet I could not stop my work either. Because out in space I often seem to come closer to .
oneness . . . that which we all seek, what you have called understanding. But here, caught in this orbit about this star, the oneness is gone and the fear has grown and grown until I am afraid I will have to scream.”
“It might help,” said Maclaren.
Nakamura looked up. He tried to smile. “What do you think?” he asked.
Maclaren blew a meditative cloud of smoke. Now he would have to pick his words with care—and no background or training in the giving of succor-or lose the only man who could pull this ship free. Or lose Nakamura: that aspect of it seemed, all at once, more important.
“I wonder,” Maclaren murmured, “even in an absolutely free society, if any such thing could exist—I wonder if every man isn’t afraid of his bride.”
“What?” Nakamura’s lids snapped apart in startlement.
“And needs her at the same time,” said Maclaren. “I might even extend it beyond sex. Perhaps fear is a necessary part of anything that matters. Could Bach have loved his God so magnificently without being inwardly afraid of Him? I don’t know.”
He stubbed out his cigarette. “I suggest you meditate upon this,” he said lightly. “And on the further fact, which may be a little too obvious for you to have seen, that this is not Capella.”
Then he waited.
Nakamura made a gesture with his body. Only afterward, thinking about it, did Maclaren realize it was a free-fall prostration. “Thank you,” he said.
“I should thank you,” said Maclaren, quite honestly. “You gave me a leg up too, y’ know.”
Nakamura departed for the machine shop.
Maclaren hung at the viewport a while longer. The rasp of a pocket lighter brought his head around.
Chang Sverdlov entered from the living section. The cigar in his mouth was held at a somehow resentful angle.
“Well,” said Maclaren. “How long were you listening?”
“Long enough,” grunted the engineer.
He blew cheap, atrocious smoke until his pocked face was lost in it. “So,” he asked, “aren’t you going td get mad at me?”
“If it serves a purpose,” said Maclaren.