The Dragon Man - Brian Stableford [72]
He stopped typing and turned to look at her, but she wasn’t sure whether he had stopped in order to give her his full attention or because his fingers were having difficulty picking out the right keys.
He seemed to be considering the question with all due seriousness, searching for a honest answer.
In the end, he said: “Yes, I am. I’m a little tired—you’d be surprised how tired a man can get, just talking—but the conversation’s done me more good than harm. I needed this, I think—the shadowbat, the mystery. Now I need a rest, and you need to pick up a robocab on the other side of the square. I’ll see you again, no doubt. Bring Lem, if he’ll come. Bring them all—it’s about time they started making ready for the twenty-fifth century. Between the two of us, we might just be able to persuade them that the SAPsuit look is one part of our heritage that doesn’t need preserving.”
While he was speaking, the Dragon Man laid both his palms flat on the bench, to make certain that he couldn’t fall. It seemed to Sara that he was almost literally pulling himself together.
She relaxed, and said: “It’s worth a try. They’ll have to respect the wisdom of your years, won’t they? Even Father Lemuel.”
“I remember when Lemuel was just a boy,” the astral tattooist said, forming a broad but slightly lop-sided smile. “And I met Jolene, when she was a little girl younger than you. The others didn’t grow up around here, although I met Gus long before your parents got together, and Maryelle too. God, I’ve been here such a long time—but I don’t get out much any more, except for the occasional junk swap. I’ve become lazy as well as old. Try not to do that, Sara, if you can possibly avoid it.”
“Get lazy?” Sara queried, because she genuinely wasn’t sure.
“That too,” he said, meaning that what he’d really been advising her not to do, if she could avoid it, was to get old.
Sara realized—realizing, too, that this was only the latest in a long string of crucial realizations that she had made during the last few days and hours—that for her, though not for the Dragon Man, getting old really might be a matter of choice, something to be avoided.
“I really will have to go,” Sara said, relieved now that it seemed safe to do so. “My parents will be keeping an eye on the clock. I don’t want them to worry.”
“Me neither,” the old man said. “I shouldn’t really have asked you to stay, and I shouldn’t have rambled on like that, but...well, given that I used up my own child-rearing license a long time ago, I can’t help feeling that I’m as entitled as anyone else to take a quasi-paternal interest in other people’s. If it takes a village, everyone in the village has a duty to do his part. I’ll make sure the shadowbat’s reunited with its flock, if that’s a possibility. If not...well, let’s try to console ourselves with the thought that it didn’t die in vain.”
Sara stood up, and moved toward the door. The Dragon Man shifted slightly, as if to go before her and open it politely—but the movement seemed painful and it was obvious that he’d be better off resting a while longer.
“It’s okay,” she said, swiftly. “I can let myself out.”
The old man unleashed the longest and deepest sigh that Sara had ever heard, but it wasn’t a despairing sound—it was more like a summary of all that had gone before. “I’ll square things with the owner and the manufacturer tonight, just as soon as the proteonome analysis has told me the full story,” he promised. “Got to be scrupulous now—but I’m glad to have some real work to do, some real science to do, and I’ll lie down for a while first to make sure I’m up to it. I’ll let you know how it all comes out. Thank Lem for me, will you?”
Sara nearly asked what for, but stopped herself just in time. She had worked it out. “I wanted to come myself,” she said. “I insisted.”
“I know,” the Dragon Man replied. “When I was your age, I’d have insisted too.”
Sara let herself out of the workroom, and out of the shop. The square wasn’t so crowded now—there were only two families