Free The Asutra by Jack Vance Page A

lifetime of hardship. I take no great pleasure from your compliment."
    "Surely you have other skills?"
    "Yes. I am reckoned a good barber. Occasionally in jest I imitate the mating antics of the ahulphs. But these are modest accomplishments; ten years after my death I will be forgotten, and one with the soil of Caraz. Still, I consider myself a fortunate man, more so than most. I have often wondered why it was given to me to live the life of Kyril Fabrache."
    "These reflections, at one time or another, have occurred to all of us," said Ifness, "but unless we are agreed upon a religion of gradated reincarnation, the question is ingenuous. " He rose to his feet and surveyed the landscape. "I assume that the Red Devils never ranged this far west?"
    Piqued by Ifness' indifference to his quest for personal truth, Fabrache gave only a short reply. "They never even reached Shagfe. " He went off to tend the pacers.
    Ifness considered the mass of the Orgai to the north, where the crag Thrie Orgai flared purple in the last rays of the setting suns. 'In this case, the spaceship battle would seem isolated from the slaughter of the Roguskhoi," he mused. "The events are of course related; there can be no doubt of this much. . .. Tomorrow will be an interesting day. " He made one of his rare gesticulations. "If I can produce a spaceship, even a hulk, I am vindicated. Dasconetta will be gray with rage; even now he gnaws his knuckles by the hour.... We can only hope that these spaceships exist in fact, that they are something more than mare's nests."
    Etzwane, vaguely irked by the nature of Ifness' aspirations, said, "I can see no value to a wrecked spaceship; they have been known for thousands of years, and must be common throughout the system of Earth worlds."
    "True," declared Ifness, still elevated by his visions of triumph, "but these are the product of human knowledge, and many knowledges exist."
    "Bah," growled Etzwane. "Iron is iron, glass is glass, and this is the same here or at the end of the universe."
    "True once more. The gross elementals are known to all. But there is no finite limit to knowledge. Each set of apparent ultimates is susceptible to examination and must be analyzed in new terms. These succeeding layers of knowledge are numberless. Those familiar to us are each derived from the level above, or below. Conceivably entire disassociated phases of knowledge exist; the field of parapsychology comes to mind. The basic law of the cosmos is this: in a situation of infinity, whatever is possible exists in fact. To particularize, the technology which propels an alien spaceship may be different from that of Earth, and such a technology must be a matter of intense interest, if only philosophically. " Ifness considered the fire. "I must remark that augmented knowledge is not necessarily a boon, and might easily be dangerous."
    "In that case," Etzwane asked, "why are you so anxious to broadcast this knowledge?"
    Ifness chuckled. "First, it is my normal human inclination to do so. Second, the group of which I am part— from which Dasconetta would naturally be expelled— is competent to control the most dangerous secrets. Thirdly, I cannot overlook my personal advantage. If I deliver an alien spaceship to the Historical Institute, even a wrecked hulk, I will gain great prestige."
    Etzwane turned away to make up his bed, reflecting that of Ifness' three reasons, the last was probably the most cogent.
    The night passed without incident. Three times Etzwane awoke. Once he heard from far off the rumbling -challenge of a chumpa and from an even greater distance the answering calls of an ahulph tribe, but none came to disturb the camp by the river.
    Fabrache awoke before dawn. Blowing up the fire, he prepared a breakfast of porridge boiled with pepper meat and tea.
    Not long after dawn the three mounted their pacers and set off to the south along the banks of the Vurush. Gradually they rose into the Orgai.
    Shortly before noon Fabrache