The City And The Stars - Arthur C. Clarke [17]
He seemed to be standing in a large open courtyard which he had never seen in reality but which probably still existed somewhere in Diaspar. It was unusually crowded and some kind of public meeting seemed to be in progress. Two men were arguing politely on a raised platform while their supporters stood round and made interjections from time to time. The complete silence added to the charm of the scene, for imagination immediately went to work supplying the missing sounds. What were they debating? Alvin wondered. Perhaps it was not a real scene from the past, but a purely created episode. The careful balance of figures, the slightly formal movements, all made it seem a little too neat for life.
He studied the faces in the crowd, seeking for anyone he could recognise. There was no one here that he knew, but he might be looking at friends he would not meet for centuries to come. How many possible patterns of human physiognomy were there? The number was enormous, but it was still finite, especially when all the unaesthetic variations had been eliminated.
The people in the mirror world continued their long-forgotten argument, ignoring the image of Alvin which stood motionless among them. Sometimes it was very hard to believe that he was not part of the scene himself, for the illusion was so flawless. When one of the phantoms in the mirror appeared to move behind Alvin, it vanished just as a real object would have done; and when one moved in front of him, he was the one that was eclipsed.
He was preparing to leave when he noticed an oddly-dressed man standing a little apart from the main group. His movements, his clothes—everything about him, seemed slightly out of place in this assembly. He spoilt the pattern; like Alvin, he was an anachronism.
He was a good deal more than that. He was real, and he was looking at Alvin with a slightly quizzical smile.
CHAPTER FIVE
IN HIS SHORT lifetime, Alvin had met less than one thousandth of the inhabitants of Diaspar. He was not surprised, therefore, that the man confronting him was a stranger. What did surprise him was to meet anyone at all here in this deserted tower, so near the frontier of the unknown.
He turned his back on the mirror world, and faced the intruder. Before he could speak, the other had addressed him.
‘You are Alvin, I believe. When I discovered that someone was coming here, I should have guessed it was you.’
The remark was obviously not intended to give offence; it was a simple statement of fact, and Alvin accepted it as such. He was not surprised to be recognised; whether he liked it or not, the fact of his uniqueness, and its unrevealed potentialities, had made him known to everyone in the city.
‘I am Khedron,’ continued the stranger, as if that explained everything. ‘They call me the Jester.’
Alvin looked blank, and Khedron shrugged his shoulders in mock resignation.
‘Ah, such is fame. Still, you are young and there have been no jests in your lifetime. Your ignorance is excused.’
There was something refreshingly unusual about Khedron. Alvin searched his mind for the meaning of the strange word ‘Jester’; it evoked the faintest of memories, but he could not identify it. There were many such titles in the complex social structure of the city, and it took a lifetime to learn them all.
‘Do you often come here?’ Alvin asked, a little jealously. He had grown to regard the Tower of Loranne as his personal property and felt slightly annoyed that its marvels were known to anyone else. But had Khedron, he wondered, ever looked out across the desert, or seen the stars sinking down into the west?
‘No,’ said Khedron almost as if answering his unspoken thoughts. ‘I have never been here before. But it is my pleasure to learn of unusual happenings in the city, and it is a very long time since anyone went to the Tower of Loranne.’
Alvin wondered fleetingly how Khedron knew of his earlier visits, but quickly dismissed the matter from his mind. Diaspar was full of eyes and ears and other more subtle sense organs