Foundation and Empire Read Free Page B

but will no longer open the door.”
    “Your repairs fall short?” The general’s voice was faintly mocking.
    “Parts are no longer available. If you will sit, sir. You drink tea?”
    “On Siwenna? My good sir, it is socially impossible not to drink it here.”
    The old patrician retreated noiselessly with a slow bow that was part of the ceremonious legacy left by the aristocracy of the last century’s better days.
    Riose looked after his host’s departing figure, and his studied urbanity grew a bit uncertain at the edges. His education had been purely military; his experience likewise. He had, as the cliché‚ has it, faced death many times; but always death of a very familiar and tangible nature, Consequently, there is no inconsistency in the fact that the idolized lion of the Twentieth Fleet felt chilled in the suddenly musty atmosphere of an ancient room.
    The general recognized the small black-ivroid boxes that lined the shelves to be books. Their titles were unfamiliar. He guessed that the large structure at one end of the room was the receiver that transmuted the books into sight-and-sound on demand. He had never seen one in operation; but he had heard of them.
    Once he had been told that long before, during the golden ages when the Empire had been co-extensive with the entire Galaxy, nine houses out of every ten had such receivers – and such rows of books.
    But there were borders to watch now; books were for old men. And half the stories told about the old days were mythical anyway. More than half.
    The tea arrived, and Riose seated himself. Ducem Barr lifted his cup. “To your honor.”
    “Thank you. To yours.”
    Ducem Barr said deliberately, “You are said to be young. Thirty-five?”
    “Near enough. Thirty-four.”
    “In that case,” said Barr, with soft emphasis, “I could not begin better than by informing you regretfully that I am not in the possession of love charms, potions, or philtres. Nor am I in the least capable of influencing the favors of any young lady as may appeal to you.”
    “I have no need of artificial aids in that respect, sir.” The complacency undeniably present in the general’s voice was stirred with amusement. “Do you receive many requests for such commodities?”
    “Enough. Unfortunately, an uninformed public tends to confuse scholarship with magicianry, and love life seems to be that factor which requires the largest quantity of magical tinkering.”
    “And so would seem most natural. But I differ. I connect scholarship with nothing but the means of answering difficult questions.”
    The Siwennian considered somberly, “You may be as wrong as they!”
    “That may turn out or not.” The young general set down his cup in its flaring sheath and it refilled. He dropped the offered flavor-capsule into it with a small splash. “Tell me then, patrician, who are the magicians? The real ones.”
    Barr seemed startled at a title long-unused. He said, “There are no magicians.”
    “But people speak of them. Siwenna crawls with the tales of them. There are cults being built about them. There is some strange connection between it and those groups among your countrymen who dream and drivel of ancient days and what they call liberty and autonomy. Eventually the matter might become a danger to the State.”
    The old man shook his head. “Why ask me? Do you smell rebellion, with myself at the head?”
    Riose shrugged, “Never. Never. Oh, it is not a thought completely ridiculous. Your father was an exile in his day; you yourself a patriot and a chauvinist in yours. It is indelicate in me as a guest to mention it, but my business here requires it. And yet a conspiracy now? I doubt it. Siwenna has had the spirit beat out of it these three generations.”
    The old man replied with difficulty, “I shall be as indelicate a host as you a guest. I shall remind you that once a viceroy thought as you did of the spiritless Siwennians. By the orders of that viceroy my father became