Prelude to Foundation

Chapter 4 Library

 
VENABILI, DORS-... Historian, born in Cinna... Her life might well have continued on its uneventful course were it not for the fact that, after she had spent two years on the faculty of Streeling University, she became involved with the young Hari Seldon during The Flight...
Encyclopedia Galactica
16.
The room that Hari Seldon found himself in was larger than Hummin's room in the Imperial Sector. It was a bedroom with one corner serving as a washroom and with no sign of any cooking or dining facilities. There was no window, though set in the ceiling was a grilled ventilator that made a steady sighing noise. Seldon looked about a bit ruefully.
Hummin interpreted that look with his usual assured manner and said, "It's only for tonight, Seldon. Tomorrow morning someone will come to install you at the University and you will be more comfortable."
"Pardon me, Hummin, but how do you know that?"
"I will make arrangements. I know one or two people here"-he smiled briefly without humor-"and I have a favor or two I can ask repayment for. Now let's go into some details."
He gazed steadily at Seldon and said, "Whatever you have left in your hotel room is lost. Does that include anything irreplaceable?"
"Nothing really irreplaceable. I have some personal items I value for their association with my past life, but if they are gone, they are gone. There are, of course, some notes on my paper. Some calculations. The paper itself."
"Which is now public knowledge until such time as it is removed from circulation as dangerous-which it probably will be. Still, I'll be able to get my hands on a copy, I'm sure. In any case, you can reconstruct it, can't you?"
"I can. That's why I said there was nothing really irreplaceable. Also, I've lost nearly a thousand credits, some books, clothing, my tickets back to Helicon, things like that."
"All replaceable.-Now I will arrange for you to have a credit tile in my name, charged to me. That will take care of ordinary expenses."
"That's unusually generous of you. I can't accept it."
"It's not generous at all, since I'm hoping to save the Empire in that fashion. You must accept it."
"But how much can you afford, Hummin? I'll be using it, at best, with an uneasy conscience."
"Whatever you need for survival or reasonable comfort I can afford, Seldon. Naturally, I wouldn't want you to try to buy the University gymnasium or hand out a million credits in largess."
"You needn't worry, but with my name on record-"
"It might as well be. It is absolutely forbidden for the Imperial government to exercise any security control over the University or its members. There is complete freedom. Anything can be discussed here, anything can be said here."
"What about violent crime?"
"Then the University authorities themselves handle it, with reason and care-and there are virtually no crimes of violence. The students and faculty appreciate their freedom and understand its terms. Too much rowdiness, the beginning of riot and bloodshed, and the government may feel it has a right to break the unwritten agreement and send in the troops. No one wants that, not even the government, so a delicate balance is maintained. In other words, Demerzel himself can not have you plucked out of the University without a great deal more cause than anyone in the University has given the government in at least a century and a half. On the other hand, if you are lured off the grounds by a student-agent-"
"Are there student-agents?"
"How can I say? There may be. Any ordinary individual can be threatened or maneuvered or simply bought-and may remain thereafter in the service of Demerzel or of someone else, for that matter. So I must emphasize this: You are safe in any reasonable sense, but no one is absolutely safe. You will have to be careful. But though I give you that warning, I don't want you to cower through life. On the whole, you will be far more secure here than you would have been if you had returned to Helicon or gone to any world of the Galaxy outside Trantor."
"I hope so," said Seldon drearily.
"I know so," said Hummin, "Or I would not feel it wise to leave you."
"Leave me?" Seldon looked up sharply. "You can't do that. You know this world. I don't."
"You will be with others who know this world, who know this part of it, in fact, even better than I do. As for myself, I must go. I have been with you all this day and I dare not abandon my own life any longer. I must not attract too much attention to myself. Remember that I have my own insecurities, just as you have yours."
Seldon blushed. "You're right. I can't expect you to endanger yourself indefinitely on my behalf. I hope you are not already ruined."
Hummin said coolly, "Who can tell? We live in dangerous times. Just remember that if anyone can make the times safe-if not for ourselves, then for those who follow after us-it is you. Let that thought be your driving force, Seldon."
17.
Sleep eluded Seldon. He tossed and turned in the dark, thinking. He had have never felt quite so alone or quite so helpless as he did after Hummin had nodded, pressed his hand briefly, and left him behind. Now he was on a strange world-and in a strange part of that world. He was without the only person he could consider a friend (and that of less than a day's duration) and he had no idea of where he was going or what he would be doing, either tomorrow or at any time in the future.
None of that was conducive to sleep so, of course, at about the time he decided, hopelessly, that he would not sleep that night or, possibly, ever again, exhaustion overtook him...
When he woke up it was still dark-or not quite, for across the room he saw a red light flashing brightly and rapidly, accompanied by a harsh, intermittent buzz. Undoubtedly, it was that which had awakened him. As he tried to remember where he was and to make some sort of sense out of the limited messages his senses were receiving, the flashing and buzzing ceased and he became aware of a peremptory rapping.
Presumably, the rapping was at the door, but he didn't remember where the door was. Presumably, also, there was a contact that would flood the room with light, but he didn't remember where that was either.
He sat up in bed and felt along the wall to his left rather desperately while calling out, "One moment, please."
He found the necessary contact and the room suddenly bloomed with a soft light. He scrambled out of bed, blinking, still searching for the door, finding it, reaching out to open it, remembering caution at the last moment, and saying in a suddenly stern, no-nonsense voice, "Who's there?"
A rather gentle woman's voice said, "My dame is Dors Venabili and I have come to see Dr. Hari Seldon."
Even as that was said, a woman was standing just in front of the door, without that door ever having been opened.
For a moment, Hari Seldon stared at her in surprise, then realized that he was wearing only a one-piece undergarment. He let out a strangled gasp and dashed for the bed and only then realized that he was staring at a holograph. It lacked the hard edge of reality and it became apparent the woman wasn't looking at him. She was merely showing herself for identification. He paused, breathing hard, then said, raising his voice to be heard through the door, "If you'll wait, I'll be with you. Give me... maybe half an hour."
The woman-or the holograph, at any rate-said, "I'll wait," and disappeared.
There was no shower, so he sponged himself, making a rare mess on the tiled floor in the washroom corner. There was toothpaste but no toothbrush, so he used his finger. He had no choice but to put on the clothes he had been wearing the day before. He finally opened the door.
He realized, even as he did so, that she had not really identified herself. She had merely given a name and Hummin had not told him whom to expect, whether it was to be this Dors Somebody or anyone else. He had felt secure because the holograph was that of a personable young woman, but for all he knew there might be half a dozen hostile young men with her.
He peered out cautiously, saw only the woman, then opened the door sufficiently to allow her to enter. He immediately closed and locked the door behind her. "Pardon me," he said, "What time is it?"
"Nine," she said, "The day has long since begun."
As far as official time was concerned, Trantor held to Galactic Standard, since only so could sense be made out of interstellar commerce and governmental dealings. Each world, however, also had a local time system and Seldon had not yet come to the point where he felt at home with casual Trantorian references to the hour.
"Midmorning?" he said.
"Of course."
"There are no windows in this room," he said defensively.
Dors walked to his bed, reached out, and touched a small dark spot on the wall.
Red numbers appeared on the ceiling just over his pillow. They read: 0903. She smiled without superiority. "I'm sorry," she said. "But I rather assumed Chetter Hummin would have told you I'd be coming for you at nine. The trouble with him is he's so used to knowing, he sometimes forgets that others occasionally don't know.-And I shouldn't have used radio-holographic identification. I imagine you don't have it on Helicon and I'm afraid I must have alarmed you."
Seldon felt himself relax. She seemed natural and friendly and the casual reference to Hummin reassured him. He said, "You're quite wrong about Helicon, Miss-"
"Please call me Dors."
"You're still wrong about Helicon, Dors. We do have radioholography, but I've never been able to afford the equipment. Nor could anyone in my circle, so I haven't actually had the experience. But I understood what had happened soon enough."
He studied her. She was not very tall, average height for a woman, he judged. Her hair was a reddish-gold, though not very bright, and was arranged in shore curls about her head. (He had seen a number of women in Trantor with their hair so arranged. It was apparently a local fashion that would have been laughed at in Helicon.) She was not amazingly beautiful, but was quite pleasant to look at, this being helped by full lips that seemed to have a slight humorous curl to them. She was slim, well-built, and looked quite young. (Too young, he thought uneasily, to be of use perhaps.)
"Do I pass inspection?" she asked. (She seemed to have Hummin's trick of guessing his thoughts, Seldon thought, or perhaps he himself lacked the trick of hiding them.)
He said, "I'm sorry. I seem to have been staring, but I've only been trying to evaluate you. I'm in a strange place. I know no one and have no friends."
"Please, Dr. Seldon, count me as a friend. Mr. Hummin has asked me to take care of you."
Seldon smiled ruefully. "You may be a little young for the job."
"You'll find I am not."
"Well, I'll try to be as little trouble as possible. Could you please repeat your name?"
"Dors Venabili." She spelled the last name and emphasized the stress on the second syllable. "As I said, please call me Dors and if you don't object too strenuously I will call you Hari. We're quite informal here at the University and there is an almost self-conscious effort to show no signs of status, either inherited or professional."
"Please, by all means, call me Hari."
"Good. I shall remain informal then. For instance, the instinct for formality, if there is such a thing, would cause me to ask permission to sit down. Informally, however, I shall just sit." She then sat down on the one chair in the room.
Seldon cleared his throat. "Clearly, I'm not at all in possession of my ordinary faculties. I should have asked you to sit." He sat down on the side of his crumpled bed and wished he had thought to straighten it out somewhat-but he had been caught by surprise.
She said pleasantly, "This is how it's going to work, Hari. First, we'll go to breakfast at one of the University cafes. Then I'll get you a room in one of the domiciles-a better room than this. You'll have a window. Hummin has instructed me to get you a credit tile in his name, but it will take me a day or two to extort one out of the University bureaucracy. Until that's done, I'll be responsible for your expenses and you can pay me back later.-And we can use you. Chetter Hummin told me you're a mathematician and for some reason there's a serious lack of good ones at the University."
"Did Hummin tell you that I was a good mathematician?"
"As a matter of fact, he did. He said you were a remarkable man-"
"Well." Seldon looked down at his fingernails. "I would like to be considered so, but Hummin knew me for less than a day and, before that, he had heard me present a paper, the quality of which he has no way of judging. I think he was just being polite."
"I don't think so," said Dors. "He is a remarkable person himself and has had a great deal of experience with people. I'll go by his judgment. In any case, I imagine you'll have a chance to prove yourself. You can program computers, I suppose."
"Of course."
"I'm talking about teaching computers, you understand, and I'm asking if you can devise programs to teach various phases of contemporary mathematics."
"Yes, that's part of my profession. I'm assistant professor of mathematics at the University of Helicon."
She said, "Yes, I know. Hummin told me that. It means, of course, that everyone will know you are a non-Trantorian, but that will present no serious problems. We're mainly Trantorian here at the University, but there's a substantial minority of Outworlders from any number of different worlds and that's accepted. I won't say that you'll never hear a planetary slur but actually the Outworlders are more likely to use them than the Trantorians. I'm an Outworlder myself, by the way."
"Oh?" He hesitated and then decided it would be only polite to ask. "What world are you from?"
"I'm from Cinna. Have you ever heard of it?"
He'd be caught out if he was polite enough to lie, Seldon decided, so he said, "No."
"I'm not surprised. It's probably of even less account than Helicon is. Anyway, to get back to the programming of mathematical teaching computers, I suppose that that can be done either proficiently or poorly."
"Absolutely."
"And you would do it proficiently."
"I would like to think so."
"There you are, then. The University will pay you for that, so let's go out and eat. Did you sleep well, by the way?"
"Surprisingly, I did."
"And are you hungry?"
"Yes, but-" He hesitated.
She said cheerfully, "But you're worried about the quality of the food, is that it? Well, don't be. Being an Outworlder myself, I can understand your feelings about the strong infusion of microfood into everything, but the University menus aren't bad. In the faculty dining room, at least. The students suffer a bit, but that serves to harden them."
She rose and turned to the door, but stopped when Seldon could not keep himself from saying, "Are you a member of the faculty?"
She turned and smiled at him impishly. "Don't I look old enough? I got my doctorate two years ago at Cinna and I've been here ever since. In two weeks, I'll be thirty."
"Sorry," said Seldon, smiling in his turn, "but you can't expect to look twenty-four and not raise doubts as to your academic status."
"Aren't you nice?" said Dors and Seldon felt a certain pleasure wash over him. After all, he thought, you can't exchange pleasantries with an attractive woman and feel entirely like a stranger.
18.
Dors was right. Breakfast was by no means bad. There was something that was unmistakably eggy and the meat was pleasantly smoked. The chocolate drink (Trantor was strong on chocolate and Seldon did not mind that) was probably synthetic, but it was tasty and the breakfast rolls were good. He felt is only right to say as much. "This has been a very pleasant breakfast. Food. Surroundings. Everything."
"I'm delighted you think so," said Dors.
Seldon looked about. There were a bank of windows in one wall and while actual sunlight did not enter (he wondered if, after a while, he would learn to be satisfied with diffuse daylight and would cease to look for patches of sunlight in a room), the place was light enough. In fact, it was quite bright, for the local weather computer had apparently decided is was time for a sharp, clear day.
The cables were arranged for four apiece and most were occupied by the full number, but Dors and Seldon remained alone at theirs. Dors had called over some of the men and women and had introduced them. All had been polite, but none had joined them. Undoubtedly, Dors intended that to be so, but Seldon did not see how she managed to arrange it.
He said, "You haven't introduced me to any mathematicians, Dors."
"I haven't seen any that I know. Most mathematicians start the day early and have classes by eight. My own feeling is that any student so foolhardy as to take mathematics wants to get that part of the course over with as soon as possible."
"I take it you're not a mathematician yourself."
"Anything but," said Dors with a short laugh. "Anything. History is my field. I've already published some studies on the rise of Trantor-I mean the primitive kingdom, not this world. I suppose that will end up as my field of specialization-Royal Trantor."
"Wonderful," said Seldon.
"Wonderful?" Dors looked at him quizzically. "Are you interested in Royal Trantor too?"
"In a way, yes. That and other things like that. I've never really studied history and I should have."
"Should you? If you had studied history, you'd scarcely have had time to study mathematics and mathematicians are very much needed-especially at this University. We're full to here with historians," she said, raising her hand to her eyebrows, "and economists and political scientists, but we're short on science and mathematics. Chetter Hummin pointed that out to me once. He called it the decline of science and seemed to think it was a general phenomenon."
Seldon said, "Of course, when I say I should have studied history, I don't mean that I should have made it a life work. I meant I should have studied enough to help me in my mathematics. My field of specialization is the mathematical analysis of social structure."
"Sounds horrible."
"In a way, it is. It's very complicated and without my knowing a great deal more about how societies evolved it's hopeless. My picture is too static, you see."
"I can't see because I know nothing about it. Chetter told me you were developing something called psychohistory and that it was important. Have I got it right? Psychohistory?"
"That's right. I should have called it 'psychosociology,' but it seemed to me that was too ugly a word. Or perhaps I knew instinctively that a knowledge of history was necessary and then didn't pay sufficient attention to my thoughts."
"Psychohistory does sound better, but I don't know what it is."
"I scarcely do myself." He brooded a few minutes, looking at the woman on the other side of the table and feeling that she might make this exile of his seem a little less like an exile. He thought of the other woman he had known a few years ago, but blocked it off with a determined effort. If he ever found another companion, it would have to be one who understood scholarship and what it demanded of a person.
To get his mind onto a new track, he said, "Chetter Hummin told me that the University is in no way troubled by the government."
"He's right."
Seldon shook his head. "That seems rather unbelievably forbearing of the Imperial government. The educational institutions on Helicon are by no means so independent of governmental pressures."
"Nor on Cinna. Nor on any Outworld, except perhaps for one or two of the largest. Trantor is another matter."
"Yes, but why?"
"Because it's the center of the Empire. The universities here have enormous prestige. Professionals are turned out by any university anywhere, but the administrators of the Empire-the high officials, the countless millions of people who represent the tentacles of Empire reaching into every corner of the Galaxy-are educated right here on Trantor."
"I've never seen the statistics-" began Seldon.
"Take my word for it. It is important that the officials of the Empire have some common ground, some special feeling for the Empire. And they can't all be native Trantorians or else the Outworlds would grow restless. For that reason, Trantor must attract millions of Outworlders for education here. It doesn't matter where they come from or what their home accent or culture may be, as long as they pick up the Trantorian patina and identify themselves with a Trantorian educational background. That's what holds the Empire together. The Outworlds are also less restive when a noticeable portion of the administrators who represent the Imperial government are their own people by birth and upbringing."
Seldon felt embarrassed again. This was something he had never given any thought to. He wondered if anyone could be a truly great mathematician if mathematics was all he knew. He said, "Is this common knowledge?"
"I suppose it isn't," said Dors after some thought. "There's so much knowledge to be had that specialists cling to their specialties as a shield against having to know anything about anything else. They avoid being drowned."
"Yet you know it."
"But that's my specialty. I'm a historian who deals with the rise of Royal Trantor and this administrative technique was one of the ways in which Trantor spread its influence and managed the transition from Royal Trantor to Imperial Trantor."
Seldon said, almost as though muttering to himself, "How harmful overspecialization is. It cuts knowledge at a million points and leaves it bleeding."
Dors shrugged. "What can one do?-But you see, if Trantor is going to attract Outworlders to Trantorian universities, it has to give them something in return for uprooting themselves and going to a strange world with an incredibly artificial structure and unusual ways. I've been here two years and I'm still not used to it. I may never get used to it. But then, of course, I don't intend to be an administrator, so I'm not forcing myself to be a Trantorian.
"And what Trantor offers in exchange is not only the promise of a position with high status, considerable power, and money, of course, but also freedom. While students are having their-education, they are free to denounce the government, demonstrate against it peacefully, work out their own theories and points of view. They enjoy that and many come here so that they can experience the sensation of liberty."
"I imagine," said Seldon, "that it helps relieve pressure as well. They work off all their resentments, enjoy all the smug self-satisfaction a young revolutionary would have, and by the time they take their place in the Imperial hierarchy, they are ready to settle down into conformity and obedience."
Dors nodded. "You may be right. In any case, the government, for all these reasons, carefully preserves the freedom of the universities. It's not a matter of their being forbearing at all-only clever."
"And if you're not going to be an administrator, Dors, what are you going to be?"
"A historian. I'll teach, put book-films of my own into the programming."
"Not much status, perhaps."
"Not much money, Hari, which is more important. As for status, that's the sort of push and pull I'd just as soon avoid. I've seen many people with status, but I'm still looking for a happy one. Status won't sit still under you; you have to continually fight to keep from sinking. Even Emperors manage to come to bad ends most of the time. Someday I may just go back to Cinna and be a professor."
"And a Trantorian education will give you status."
Dors laughed. "I suppose so, but on Cinna who would care? It's a dull world, full of farms and with lots of cattle, both four-legged and two-legged."
"Won't you find it dull after Trantor?"
"Yes, that's what I'm counting on. And if it gets too dull, I can always wangle a grant to go here or there to do a little historical research. That's the advantage of my field."
"A mathematician, on the other hand," said Seldon with a trace of bitterness at something that had never before bothered him, "is expected to sit at his computer and think. And speaking of computers-" He hesitated. Breakfast was done and it seemed to him more than likely she had some duties of her own to attend to.
But she did not seem to be in any great hurry to leave. "Yes? Speaking of computers?"
"Would I be able to get permission to use the history library?"
Now it was she who hesitated. "I think that can be arranged. If you work on mathematics programming, you'll probably be viewed as a quasi-member of the faculty and I could ask for you to be given permission. Only-"
"Only?"
"I don't want to hurt your feelings, but you're a mathematician and you say you know nothing about history. Would you know how to make use of a history library?"
Seldon smiled. "I suppose you use computers very much like those in a mathematics library."
"We do, but the programming for each specialty has quirks of its own. You don't know the standard reference book-films, the quick methods of winnowing and skipping. You may be able to find a hyperbolic interval in the dark..."
"You mean hyperbolic integral," interrupted Seldon softly.
Dors ignored him. "But you probably won't know how to get the terms of the Treaty of Poldark in less than a day and a half."
"I suppose I could learn."
"If... if..." She looked a little troubled. "If you want to, I can make a suggestion. I give a week's course-one hour each day, no credit-on library use. It's for undergraduates. Would you feel it beneath your dignity to sit in on such a course-with undergraduates, I mean? It starts in three weeks."
"You could give me private lessons." Seldon felt a little surprised at the suggestive tone that had entered his voice.
She did not miss it. "I dare say I could, but I think you'd be better off with more formal instruction. We'll be using the library, you understand, and at the end of the week you will be asked to locate information on particular items of historical interest. You will be competing with the other students all through and that will help you learn. Private tutoring will be far less efficient, I assure you. However, I understand the difficulty of competing with undergraduates. If you don't do as well as they, you may feel humiliated. You must remember, though, that they have already studied elementary history and you, perhaps, may not have."
"I haven't. No 'may' about it. But I won't be afraid to compete and I won't mind any humiliation that may come along-if I manage to learn the tricks of the historical reference trade."
It was clear to Seldon that he was beginning to like this young woman and that he was gladly seizing on the chance to be educated by her. He was also aware of the fact that he had reached a turning point in his mind. He had promised Hummin to attempt to work out a practical psychohistory, but that had been a promise of the mind and not the emotions. Now he was determined to seize psychohistory by the throat if he had to-in order to make it practical. That, perhaps, was the influence of Dors Venabili. Or had Hummin counted on that? Hummin, Seldon decided, might well be a most formidable person.
19.
Cleon I had finished dinner, which, unfortunately, had been a formal state affair. It meant he had to spend time talking to various officials-not one of whom he knew or recognized-in set phrases designed to give each one his stroke and so activate his loyalty to the crown. It also meant that his food reached him but lukewarm and had cooled still further before he could eat it. There had to be some way of avoiding that. Eat first, perhaps, on his own or with one or two close intimates with whom he could relax and then attend a formal dinner at which he could merely be served an imported pear. He loved pears. But would that offend the guests who would take the Emperor's refusal to eat with them as a studied insult.
His wife, of course, was useless in this respect, for her presence would but further exacerbate his unhappiness. He had married her because she was a member of a powerful dissident family who could be expected to mute their dissidence as a result of the union, though Cleon devoutly hoped that she, at least, would not do so. He was perfectly content to have her live her own life in her own quarters except for the necessary efforts to initiate an heir, for, to tell the truth, he didn't like her. And now that an heir had come, he could ignore her completely.
He chewed at one of a handful of nuts he had pocketed from the table on leaving and said, "Demerzel!"
"Sire?"
Demerzel always appeared at once when Cleon called. Whether he hovered constantly in earshot at the door or he drew close because the instinct of subservience somehow alerted him to a possible call in a few minutes, he did appear and that, Cleon thought idly, was the important thing. Of course, there were those times when Demerzel had to be away on Imperial business. Cleon always hated those absences. They made him uneasy.
"What happened to that mathematician? I forget his name."
Demerzel, who surely knew the man the Emperor had in mind, but who perhaps wanted to study how much the Emperor remembered, said, "What mathematician is it that you have in mind, Sire?"
Cleon waved an impatient hand. "The fortune-teller. The one who came to see me."
"The one we sent for?"
"Well, sent for, then. He did come to see me. You were going to take care of the matter, as I recall. Have you?"
Demerzel cleared his throat. "Sire, I have tried to."
"Ah! That means you have failed, doesn't it?" In a way, Cleon felt pleased. Demerzel was the only one of his Ministers who made no bones of failure. The others never admitted failure, and since failure was nevertheless common, it became difficult to correct. Perhaps Demerzel could afford to be more honest because he failed so rarely. If it weren't for Demerzel, Cleon thought sadly, he might never know what honesty sounded like. Perhaps no Emperor ever knew and perhaps that was one of the reasons that the Empire- He pulled his thoughts away and, suddenly nettled at the other's silence and wanting an admission, since he had just admired Demerzel's honesty in his mind, said sharply, "Well, you have failed, haven't you?"
Demerzel did not flinch. "Sire, I have failed in part. I felt that to have him here on Trantor where things are-difficult might present us with problems. It was easy to consider that he might be more conveniently placed on his home planet. He was planning to return to that home planet the next day, but there was always the chance of complications-of his deciding to remain on Trantor-so I arranged to have two young alley men place him on his plane that very day."
"Do you know alley men, Demerzel?" Cleon was amused.
"It is important, Sire, to be able to reach many kinds of people, for each type has its own variety of use-alley men not the least. As it happens, they did not succeed."
"And why was that?"
"Oddly enough, Seldon was able to fight them off."
"The mathematician could fight?"
"Apparently, mathematics and the martial arts are not necessarily mutually exclusive. I found out, not soon enough, that his world, Helicon, is noted for it-martial arts, not mathematics. The fact that I did not learn this earlier was indeed a failure, Sire, and I can only crave your pardon."
"But then, I suppose the mathematician left for his home planet the next day as he had planned."
"Unfortunately, the episode backfired. Taken aback by the event, he decided not to return to Helicon, but remained on Trantor. He may have been advised to this effect by a passerby who happened to be present on the occasion of the fight. That was another unlooked-for complication."
The Emperor Cleon frowned. "Then our mathematician-what is his name?"
"Seldon, Sire. Hari Seldon."
"Then this Seldon is out of reach."
"In a sense, Sire. We have traced his movements and he is now at Streeling University. While there, he is untouchable."
The Emperor scowled and reddened slightly. "I am annoyed at that word-'untouchable.' There should be nowhere in the Empire my hand cannot reach. Yet here, on my own world, you tell me someone can be untouchable. Insufferable!"
"Your hand can reach to the University, Sire. You can send in your army and pluck out this Seldon at any moment you desire. To do so, however, is... undesirable."
"Why don't you say 'impractical,' Demerzel. You sound like the mathematician speaking of his fortune-telling. It is possible, but impractical. I am an Emperor who finds everything possible, but very little practical. Remember, Demerzel, if reaching Seldon is not practical, reaching you is entirely so."
Eto Demerzel let this last comment pass. The "man behind the throne" knew his importance to the Emperor, he had heard such threats before. He waited in silence while the Emperor glowered.
Drumming his fingers against the arm of his chair, Cleon asked,... Well then, what good is this mathematician to us if he is at Streeling University?"
"It may perhaps be possible, Sire, to snatch use out of adversity. At the University, he may decide to work on his psychohistory."
"Even though he insists it's impractical?"
"He may be wrong and he may find out that he is wrong. And if he finds out that he is wrong, we would find some way of getting him out of the University. It is even possible he would join us voluntarily under those circumstances."
The Emperor remained lost in thought for a while, then said, "And what if someone else plucks him out before we do?"
"Who would want to do that, Sire?" asked Demerzel softy.
"The Mayor of Wye, for one," said Cleon, suddenly shouting. "He dreams still of taking over the Empire."
"Old age has drawn his fangs, Sire."
"Don't you believe it, Demerzel."
"And we have no reason for supposing he has any interest in Seldon or even knows of him, Sire."
"Come on, Demerzel. If we heard of the paper, so could Wye. If we see the possible importance of Seldon, so could Wye."
"If that should happen," said Demerzel, "or even if there should be a reasonable chance of its happening, then we would be justified in taking strong measures."
"How strong?"
Demerzel said cautiously, "It might be argued that rather than have Seldon in Wye's hands, we might prefer to have him in no one's hands. To have him cease to exist, Sire."
"To have him killed, you mean," said Cleon.
"If you wish to put it that way, Sire," said Demerzel.
20.
Hari Seldon sat back in his chair in the alcove that had been assigned to him through Dors Venabili's intervention. He was dissatisfied. As a matter of fact, although that was the expression he used in his mind, he knew that it was a gross underestimation of his feelings. He was not simply dissatisfied, he was furious-all the more so because he wasn't sure what it was he was furious about. Was it about the histories? The writers and compilers of histories? The worlds and people that made the histories? Whatever the target of his fury, it didn't really matter. What counted was that his notes were useless, his new knowledge was useless, everything was useless. He had been at the University now for almost six weeks. He had managed to find a computer outlet at the very start and with it had begun work-without instruction, but using the instincts he had developed over a number of years of mathematical labors. It had been slow and halting, but there was a certain pleasure in gradually determining the routes by which he could get his questions answered.
Then came the week of instruction with Dors, which had taught him several dozen shortcuts and had brought with it two sets of embarrassments. The first set included the sidelong glances he received from the undergraduates, who seemed contemptuously aware of his greater age and who were disposed to frown a bit at Dors's constant use of the honorific "Doctor" in addressing him. "I don't want them to think," she said, "that you're some backward perpetual student taking remedial history."
"But surely you've established the point. Surely, a mere 'Seldon' is sufficient now."
"No," Dors said and smiled suddenly. "Besides, I like to call you 'Dr. Seldon.' I like the way you look uncomfortable each time."
"You have a peculiar sense of sadistic humor."
"Would you deprive me?"
For some reason, that made him laugh. Surely, the natural reaction would have been to deny sadism. Somehow he found it pleasant that she accepted the ball of conversation and fired it back. The thought led to a natural question. "Do you play tennis here at the University?"
"We have courts, but I don't play."
"Good. I'll teach you. And when I do, I'll call you Professor Venabili."
"That's what you call me in class anyway."
"You'll be surprised how ridiculous it will sound on the tennis court."
"I may get to like it."
"In that case, I will try to find what else you might get to like."
"I see you have a peculiar sense of salacious humor."
She had put that ball in that spot deliberately and he said, "Would you deprive me?"
She smiled and later did surprisingly well on the tennis court.
"Are you sure you never played tennis?" he said, puffing, after one session.
"Positive," she said.
The other set of embarrassments was more private. He learned the necessary techniques of historical research and then burned-in private-at his earlier attempts to make use of the computer's memory. It was simply an entirely different mind-set from that used in mathematics. It was equally logical, he supposed, since it could be used, consistently and without error, to move in whatever direction he wanted to, but it was a substantially different brand of logic from that to which he was accustomed.
But with or without instructions, whether he stumbled or moved in swiftly, he simply didn't get any results.
His annoyance made itself felt on the tennis court. Dors quickly reached the stage where it was no longer necessary to lob easy balls at her to give her time to judge direction and distance. That made it easy to forget that she was just a beginner and he expressed his anger in his swing, firing the ball back at her as though it were a laser beam made solid.
She came trotting up to the net and said, "I can understand your wanting to kill me, since it must annoy you to watch me miss the shots so often. How is it, though, that you managed to miss my head by about three centimeters that time? I mean, you didn't even nick me. Can't you do better than that?"
Seldon, horrified, tried to explain, but only managed to sound incoherent.
She said, "Look. I'm not going to face any other returns of yours today, so why don't we shower and then get together for some tea and whatever and you can tell me just what you were trying to kill. If it wasn't my poor head and if you don't get the real victim off your chest, you'll be entirely too dangerous on the other side of the net for me to want to serve as a target."
Over tea he said, "Dors, I've scanned history after history; just scanned, browsed. I haven't had time for deep study yet. Even so, it's become obvious. All the book-films concentrate on the same few events."
"Crucial ones. History-making ones."
"That's just an excuse. They're copying each other. There are twenty-five million worlds out there and there's significant mention of perhaps twenty-five."
Dors said, "You're reading general Galactic histories only. Look up the special histories of some of the minor worlds. On every world, however small, the children are taught local histories before they ever find out there's a great big Galaxy outside. Don't you yourself know more about Helicon, right now, than you know about the rise of Trantor or of the Great Interstellar War?"
"That sort of knowledge is limited too," said Seldon gloomily. "I know Heliconian geography and the stories of its settlement and of the malfeasance and misfeasance of the planet Jennisek-that's our traditional enemy, though our teachers carefully told us that we ought to say 'traditional rival.' But I never learned anything about the contributions of Helicon to general Galactic history."
"Maybe there weren't any."
"Don't be silly. Of course there were. There may not have been great, huge space battles involving Helicon or crucial rebellions or peace treaties. There may not have been some Imperial competitor making his base on Helicon. But there must have been subtle influences. Surely, nothing can happen anywhere without affecting everywhere else. Yet there's nothing I can find to help me. See here, Dors. In mathematics, all can be found in the computer; everything we know or have found out in twenty thousand years. In history, that's not so. Historians pick and choose and every one of them picks and chooses the same thing."
"But, Hari," said Dors, "mathematics is an orderly thing of human invention. One thing follows from another. There are definitions and axioms, all of which are known. It is... it is... all one piece. History is different. It is the unconscious working out of the deeds and thoughts of quadrillions of human beings. Historians must pick and choose."
"Exactly," said Seldon, "but I must know all of history if I am to work out the laws of psychohistory."
"In that case, you won't ever formulate the laws of psychohistory."
That was yesterday. Now Seldon sat in his chair in his alcove, having spent another day of utter failure, and he could hear Dors's voice saying, "In that case, you won't ever formulate the laws of psychohistory." It was what he had thought to begin with and if it hadn't been for Hummin's conviction to the contrary and his odd ability to fire Seldon with his own blaze of conviction, Seldon would have continued to think so. And yet neither could he quite let go. Might there not be some way out?
He couldn't think of any.