The Sense of Wonder by Stephen Marlowe (novels to read .TXT) 📖

—therefore, permit no unauthorized persons to go through this door. The machinery in the next room is your protection against the rigors of space. A thousand years from now, journey's end, you may have discarded it for something better—who knows? But if you have not, then here is your protection. As nearly as possible, this ship is a perfect, self-sustaining world. It is more than that: it is human-sustaining as well. Try to hurt yourself and the ship will not permit it—within limits, of course. But you can damage the ship, and to avoid any possibility of that, no unauthorized persons are to be permitted through this door—

Rikud gave the voice up as hopeless. There were too many confusing words. What in the world was an unauthorized person? More interesting than that, however, was the second door. Would it lead to another voice? Rikud hoped that it wouldn't.

When he opened the door a strange new noise filled his ears, a gentle humming, punctuated by a throb-throb-throb which sounded not unlike the booming of the engines last week, except that this new sound didn't blast nearly so loudly against his eardrums. And what met Rikud's eyes—he blinked and looked again, but it was still there—cogs and gears and wheels and nameless things all strange and beautiful because they shone with a luster unfamiliar to him.

"Odd," Rikud said aloud. Then he thought, "Now there's a good word, but no one quite seems to know its meaning."

Odder still was the third door. Rikud suddenly thought there might exist an endless succession of them, especially when the third one opened on a bare tunnel which led to yet another door.

Only this one was different. In it Rikud saw the viewport. But how? The viewport stood on the other end of the world. It did seem smaller, and, although it looked out on the garden, Rikud sensed that the topography was different. Then the garden extended even farther than he had thought. It was endless, extending all the way to a ridge of mounds way off in the distance.

And this door one could walk through, into the garden. Rikud put his hand on the door, all the while watching the garden through the new viewport. He began to turn the handle.

Then he trembled.

What would he do out in the garden?

He couldn't go alone. He'd die of the strangeness. It was a silly thought; no one ever died of anything until he was a hundred. Rikud couldn't fathom the rapid thumping of his heart. And Rikud's mouth felt dry; he wanted to swallow, but couldn't.

Slowly, he took his hand off the door lever. He made his way back through the tunnel and then through the room of machinery and finally through the little room with the confusing voice to Crifer.

By the time he reached the lame-footed man, Rikud was running. He did not dare once to look back. He stood shaking at Crifer's side, and sweat covered him in a clammy film. He never wanted to look at the garden again. Not when he knew there was a door through which he could walk and then might find himself in the garden.

It was so big.

Three or four days passed before Rikud calmed himself enough to talk about his experience. When he did, only Crifer seemed at all interested, yet the lame-footed man's mind was inadequate to cope with the situation. He suggested that the viewport might also be variable and Rikud found himself wishing that his friend had never read that book on astronomy.

Chuls did not believe Rikud at all. "There are not that many doors in the world," he said. "The library has a door and there is a door to the women's quarters; in five years, the Calculator will send you through that. But there are no others."

Chuls smiled an indulgent smile and Rikud came nearer to him. "Now, by the world, there are two other doors!"

Rikud began to shout, and everyone looked at him queerly.

"What are you doing that for?" demanded Wilm, who was shorter even than Crifer, but had no lame foot.

"Doing what?"

"Speaking so loudly when Chuls, who is close, obviously has no trouble hearing you."

"Maybe yelling will make him understand."

Crifer hobbled about on his good foot, doing a meaningless little jig. "Why don't we go see?" he suggested. Then, confused, he frowned.

"Well, I won't go," Chuls replied. "There's no reason to go. If Rikud has been imagining things, why should I?"

"I imagined nothing. I'll show you—"

"You'll show me nothing because I won't go."

Rikud grabbed Chuls' blouse with his big fist. Then, startled by what he did, his hands began to tremble. But he held on, and he tugged at the blouse.

"Stop that," said the older man, mildly.

Crifer hopped up and down. "Look what Rikud's doing! I don't know what he's doing, but look. He's holding Chuls' blouse."

"Stop that," repeated Chuls, his face reddening.

"Only if you'll go with me." Rikud was panting.

Chuls tugged at his wrist. By this time a crowd had gathered. Some of them watched Crifer jump up and down, but most of them watched Rikud holding Chuls' blouse.

"I think I can do that," declared Wilm, clutching a fistful of Crifer's shirt.

Presently, the members of the crowd had pretty well paired off, each partner grabbing for his companion's blouse. They giggled and laughed and some began to hop up and down as Crifer had done.

A buzzer sounded and automatically Rikud found himself releasing Chuls.

Chuls said, forgetting the incident completely, "Time to retire."

In a moment, the room was cleared. Rikud stood alone. He cleared his throat and listened to the sound, all by itself in the stillness. What would have happened if they hadn't retired? But they always did things punctually like that, whenever the buzzer sounded. They ate with the buzzer, bathed in the health-rays with it, slept with it.

What would they do if the buzzer stopped buzzing?

This frightened Rikud, although he didn't know why. He'd like it, though. Maybe then he could take them outside with him to the big garden of the two viewports. And then he wouldn't be afraid because he could huddle close to them and he wouldn't be alone.

Rikud heard the throbbing again as he stood in the room of the machinery. For a long time he watched the wheels and cogs and gears spinning and humming. He watched for he knew not how long. And then he began to wonder. If he destroyed the wheels and the cogs and the gears, would the buzzer stop? It probably would, because, as Rikud saw it, he was clearly an "unauthorized person." He had heard the voice again upon entering the room.

He found a metal rod, bright and shiny, three feet long and half as wide as his arm. He tugged at it and it came loose from the wires that held it in place. He hefted it carefully for a moment, and then he swung the bar into the mass of metal. Each time he heard a grinding, crashing sound. He looked as the gears and cogs and wheels crumbled under his blows, shattered by the strength of his arm.

Almost casually he strode about the room, but his blows were not casual. Soon his easy strides had given way to frenzied running. Rikud smashed everything in sight.

When the lights winked out, he stopped. Anyway, by that time the room was a shambles of twisted, broken metal. He laughed, softly at first, but presently he was roaring, and the sound doubled and redoubled in his ears because now the throbbing had stopped.

He opened the door and ran through the little corridor to the smaller viewport. Outside he could see the stars, and, dimly, the terrain beneath them. But everything was so dark that only the stars shone clearly. All else was bathed in a shadow of unreality.

Rikud never wanted to do anything more than he wanted to open that door. But his hands trembled too much when he touched it, and once, when he pressed his face close against the viewport, there in the darkness, something bright flashed briefly through the sky and was gone.

Whimpering, he fled.

All around Rikud were darkness and hunger and thirst. The buzzer did not sound because Rikud had silenced it forever. And no one went to eat or drink. Rikud himself had fumbled through the blackness and the whimpering to the dining room, his tongue dry