Forward the Foundation - Isaac Asimov [25]
"And you've done it."
And Seldon said with firm conviction, "Yes, I have."
But to himself, he thought what he dared not share with Dors. What if Raych's charm were gone? Or, worse, what if the consciousness of being a Dahlite became too strong for him?
14
Billibotton was Billibotton-dirty, sprawling, dark, sinuous Billibotton-exuding decay and yet full of a vitality that Raych was convinced was to be found nowhere else on Trantor. Perhaps it was to be found nowhere else in the Empire, though Raych knew nothing, firsthand, of any world but Trantor.
He had last seen Billibotton when he was not much more than twelve, but even the people seemed to be the same; still a mixture of the hangdog and the irreverent; filled with a synthetic pride and a grumbling resentment; the men marked by their dark rich mustaches and the women by their sacklike dresses that now looked tremendously slatternly to Raych's older and more worldly wise eyes.
How could women with dresses like that attract men? -But it was a foolish question. Even when he was twelve, he had had a pretty clear idea of how easily and quickly they could be removed.
So he stood there, lost in thought and memory, passing along a street of store windows and trying to convince himself that he remembered this particular place or that and wondering if, among them all, there were people he did remember who were now eight years older. Those, perhaps, who had been his boyhood friends-and he thought uneasily of the fact that, while he remembered some of the nicknames they had pinned on each other, he could not remember any real names.
In fact, the gaps in his memory were enormous. It was not that eight years was such a long time, but it was two fifths of the lifetime of a twenty-year-old and his life since leaving Billibotton had been so different that all before it had faded like a misty dream.
But the smells were there. He stopped outside a bakery, low and dingy, and smelled the coconut icing that reeked through the air-that he had never quite smelled elsewhere. Even when he had stopped to buy tarts with coconut icing, even when they were advertised as "Dahl-style," they had been faint imitations-no more.
He felt strongly tempted. Well, why not? He had the credits and Dors was not there to wrinkle her nose and wonder aloud how clean-or, more likely, not clean-the place might be. Who worried about clean in the old days?
The shop was dim and it took a while for Raych's eyes to acclimate. There were a few low tables in the place, with a couple of rather insubstantial chairs at each, undoubtedly where people might have a light repast, the equivalent of moka and tarts. A young man sat at one of the tables, an empty cup before him, wearing a once-white T-shirt that probably would have looked even dirtier in a better light.
The baker or, in any case, a server stepped out from a room in the rear and said in a rather surly fashion, "What'll ya have?"
"A coke-icer," said Raych in just as surly a fashion (he would not be a Billibottoner if he displayed courtesy), using the slang term he remembered well from the old days.
The term was still current, for the server handed him the correct item, using his bare fingers. The boy, Raych, would have taken that for granted, but now the man, Raych, felt taken slightly aback.
"You want a bag?"
"No," said Raych, "I'll eat it here." He paid the server and took the coke-icer from the other's hand and bit into its richness, his eyes half closing as he did so. It had been a rare treat in his boyhood-sometimes when he had scrounged the necessary credit to buy one with, sometimes when he had received a bite from a temporarily wealthy friend, most often when he had lifted one when nobody was watching. Now he could buy as many as he wished.
"Hey," said a voice.
Raych opened his eyes. It was the man at the table, scowling at him.
Raych said gently, "Are you speaking to me, bub?"
"Yeah. What'chuh