The Starcomber by Alfred Bester Read Free Book Online Page B

they?”
    â€œGod damn. Everybody in fourteenth century had lice. Did that make it good? No, my young, such dreams are for childrens. Too many adults are still childrens. It is you, the artists, who must lead them out as I have led you. I purge you; now you purge them.”
    â€œWhy did you do this?”
    â€œBecause I have faith in you. Sic vos non vobis. It will not be easy for you. A long hard road and lonely.”
    â€œI suppose I ought to feel grateful,” Halsyon muttered, “but I feel . . . well . . . empty. Cheated.”
    â€œOh yes, God damn. If you live with one Jeez big ulcer long enough you miss him when he’s cut out. You were hiding in an ulcer. I have robbed you of said refuge. Ergo: you feel cheated. Wait! You will feel even more cheated. There was a price to pay, I told you. You have paid it. Look.”
    Mr. Aquila held up a hand mirror. Halsyon glanced into it, then started and stared. A fifty-year-old face stared back at him: lined, hardened, solid, determined. Halsyon leaped to his feet.
    â€œGently, gently,” Mr. Aquila admonished. “It is not so bad. It is damned good. You are still thirty-three in age of physique. You have lost none of your life . . . only all of your youth. What have you lost? A pretty face to lure young girls? Is that why you are wild?”
    â€œChrist!” Halsyon cried.
    â€œAll right. Still gently, my child. Here you are, purged, disillusioned, unhappy, bewildered, one foot on the hard road to maturity. Would you like this to have happened or not have happened? Si. I can do. This can never have happened. Spurlos versenkt. It is ten seconds from your escape. You can have your pretty young face back. You can be recaptured. You can return to the safe ulcer of the womb . . . a child again. Would you like same?”
    â€œYou can’t.”
    â€œSauve qui peut, my Pike’s Peak. I can. There is no end to the 15,000 angstrom band.”
    â€œDamn you! Are you Satan? Lucifer? Only the devil could have such powers.”
    â€œOr angels, my old.”
    â€œYou don’t look like an angel. You look like Satan.”
    â€œAh? Ha? But Satan was an angel before he fell. He has many relations on high. Surely there are family resemblances. God damn.” Mr. Aquila stopped laughing. He leaned across the desk and the sprightliness was gone from his face. Only the bitterness remained. “Shall I tell you who I am, my chicken? Shall I explain why one unguarded look from this phizz toppled you over the brink?” Halsyon nodded, unable to speak.
    â€œI am a scoundrel, a black sheep, a scapegrace, a blackguard. I am a remittance man. Yes. God damn! I am a remittance man.” Mr. Aquila’s eyes turned into wounds. “By your standards I am the great man of infinite power and variety. So was the remittance man from Europe to naive natives on the beaches of Tahiti. Eh? And so am I to you as I comb the beaches of the stars for a little amusement, a little hope, a little joy to while away the lonely years of my exile. . . .
    â€œI am bad,” Mr. Aquila said in a voice of chilling desperation. “I am rotten. There is no place in my home that can tolerate me. They pay me to stay away. And there are moments, unguarded, when my sickness and my despair fill my eyes and strike terror into your innocent souls. As I strike terror into you now. Yes?”
    Halsyon nodded again.
    â€œBe guided by me. It was the child in Solon Aquila that destroyed him and led him into the sickness that destroyed his life. Oui. I too suffer from baby fantasies from which I cannot escape. Do not make the same mistake. I beg of you . . .” Mr. Aquila glanced at his wrist-watch and leaped up. The sprightly returned to his manner. “Jeez. It’s late. Time to make up your mind, old bourbon and soda. Which will it be? Old face or pretty face? The reality of dreams or the dream of reality?”
    â€œHow many decisions did you say we