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diff --git a/22893.txt b/22893.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fc23986 --- /dev/null +++ b/22893.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1315 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Pygmalion's Spectacles, by Stanley Grauman Weinbaum + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Pygmalion's Spectacles + +Author: Stanley Grauman Weinbaum + +Release Date: October 5, 2007 [EBook #22893] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PYGMALION'S SPECTACLES *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from _A Martian Odyssey and Others_ + published in 1949. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence + that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor + spelling and typographical errors have been corrected without note. + + + + +PYGMALION'S SPECTACLES + + + + +"But what is reality?" asked the gnomelike man. He gestured at the tall +banks of buildings that loomed around Central Park, with their countless +windows glowing like the cave fires of a city of Cro-Magnon people. "All +is dream, all is illusion; I am your vision as you are mine." + +Dan Burke, struggling for clarity of thought through the fumes of +liquor, stared without comprehension at the tiny figure of his +companion. He began to regret the impulse that had driven him to leave +the party to seek fresh air in the park, and to fall by chance into the +company of this diminutive old madman. But he had needed escape; this +was one party too many, and not even the presence of Claire with her +trim ankles could hold him there. He felt an angry desire to go +home--not to his hotel, but home to Chicago and to the comparative peace +of the Board of Trade. But he was leaving tomorrow anyway. + +"You drink," said the elfin, bearded face, "to make real a dream. Is it +not so? Either to dream that what you seek is yours, or else to dream +that what you hate is conquered. You drink to escape reality, and the +irony is that even reality is a dream." + +"Cracked!" thought Dan again. + +"Or so," concluded the other, "says the philosopher Berkeley." + +"Berkeley?" echoed Dan. His head was clearing; memories of a Sophomore +course in Elementary Philosophy drifted back. "Bishop Berkeley, eh?" + +"You know him, then? The philosopher of Idealism--no?--the one who +argues that we do not see, feel, hear, taste the object, but that we +have only the sensation of seeing, feeling, hearing, tasting." + +"I--sort of recall it." + +"Hah! But sensations are _mental_ phenomena. They exist in our minds. +How, then, do we know that the objects themselves do not exist only in +our minds?" He waved again at the light-flecked buildings. "You do not +see that wall of masonry; you perceive only a _sensation_, a feeling of +sight. The rest you interpret." + +"You see the same thing," retorted Dan. + +"How do you know I do? Even if you knew that what I call red would not +be green could you see through my eyes--even if you knew that, how do +you know that I too am not a dream of yours?" + +Dan laughed. "Of course nobody _knows_ anything. You just get what +information you can through the windows of your five senses, and then +make your guesses. When they're wrong, you pay the penalty." His mind +was clear now save for a mild headache. "Listen," he said suddenly. "You +can argue a reality away to an illusion; that's easy. But if your friend +Berkeley is right, why can't you take a dream and make it real? If it +works one way, it must work the other." + +The beard waggled; elf-bright eyes glittered queerly at him. "All +artists do that," said the old man softly. Dan felt that something more +quivered on the verge of utterance. + +"That's an evasion," he grunted. "Anybody can tell the difference +between a picture and the real thing, or between a movie and life." + +"But," whispered the other, "the realer the better, no? And if one could +make a--a movie--_very_ real indeed, what would you say then?" + +"Nobody can, though." + +The eyes glittered strangely again. "I can!" he whispered. "I _did_!" + +"Did what?" + +"Made real a dream." The voice turned angry. "Fools! I bring it here to +sell to Westman, the camera people, and what do they say? 'It isn't +clear. Only one person can use it at a time. It's too expensive.' Fools! +Fools!" + +"Huh?" + +"Listen! I'm Albert Ludwig--_Professor_ Ludwig." As Dan was silent, he +continued, "It means nothing to you, eh? But listen--a movie that gives +one sight and sound. Suppose now I add taste, smell, even touch, if your +interest is taken by the story. Suppose I make it so that you are in the +story, you speak to the shadows, and the shadows reply, and instead of +being on a screen, the story is all about you, and you are in it. Would +that be to make real a dream?" + +"How the devil could you do that?" + +"How? How? But simply! First my liquid positive, then my magic +spectacles. I photograph the story in a liquid with light-sensitive +chromates. I build up a complex solution--do you see? I add taste +chemically and sound electrically. And when the story is recorded, then +I put the solution in my spectacle--my movie projector. I electrolyze +the solution, break it down; the older chromates go first, and out comes +the story, sight, sound, smell, taste--all!" + +"Touch?" + +"If your interest is taken, your mind supplies that." Eagerness crept +into his voice. "You will look at it, Mr.----?" + +"Burke," said Dan. "A swindle!" he thought. Then a spark of recklessness +glowed out of the vanishing fumes of alcohol. "Why not?" he grunted. + +He rose; Ludwig, standing, came scarcely to his shoulder. A queer +gnomelike old man, Dan thought as he followed him across the park and +into one of the scores of apartment hotels in the vicinity. + +In his room Ludwig fumbled in a bag, producing a device vaguely +reminiscent of a gas mask. There were goggles and a rubber mouthpiece; +Dan examined it curiously, while the little bearded professor brandished +a bottle of watery liquid. + +"Here it is!" he gloated. "My liquid positive, the story. Hard +photography--infernally hard, therefore the simplest story. A +Utopia--just two characters and you, the audience. Now, put the +spectacles on. Put them on and tell me what fools the Westman people +are!" He decanted some of the liquid into the mask, and trailed a +twisted wire to a device on the table. "A rectifier," he explained. "For +the electrolysis." + +"Must you use all the liquid?" asked Dan. "If you use part, do you see +only part of the story? And which part?" + +"Every drop has all of it, but you must fill the eye-pieces." Then as +Dan slipped the device gingerly on, "So! Now what do you see?" + +"Not a damn' thing. Just the windows and the lights across the street." + +"Of course. But now I start the electrolysis. Now!" + + * * * * * + +There was a moment of chaos. The liquid before Dan's eyes clouded +suddenly white, and formless sounds buzzed. He moved to tear the device +from his head, but emerging forms in the mistiness caught his interest. +Giant things were writhing there. + +The scene steadied; the whiteness was dissipating like mist in summer. +Unbelieving, still gripping the arms of that unseen chair, he was +staring at a forest. But what a forest! Incredible, unearthly, +beautiful! Smooth boles ascended inconceivably toward a brightening sky, +trees bizarre as the forests of the Carboniferous age. Infinitely +overhead swayed misty fronds, and the verdure showed brown and green in +the heights. And there were birds--at least, curiously lovely pipings +and twitterings were all about him though he saw no creatures--thin +elfin whistlings like fairy bugles sounded softly. + +He sat frozen, entranced. A louder fragment of melody drifted down to +him, mounting in exquisite, ecstatic bursts, now clear as sounding +metal, now soft as remembered music. For a moment he forgot the chair +whose arms he gripped, the miserable hotel room invisibly about him, old +Ludwig, his aching head. He imagined himself alone in the midst of that +lovely glade. "Eden!" he muttered, and the swelling music of unseen +voices answered. + +Some measure of reason returned. "Illusion!" he told himself. Clever +optical devices, not reality. He groped for the chair's arm, found it, +and clung to it; he scraped his feet and found again an inconsistency. +To his eyes the ground was mossy verdure; to his touch it was merely a +thin hotel carpet. + +The elfin buglings sounded gently. A faint, deliciously sweet perfume +breathed against him; he glanced up to watch the opening of a great +crimson blossom on the nearest tree, and a tiny reddish sun edged into +the circle of sky above him. The fairy orchestra swelled louder in its +light, and the notes sent a thrill of wistfulness through him. Illusion? +If it were, it made reality almost unbearable; he wanted to believe that +somewhere--somewhere this side of dreams, there actually existed this +region of loveliness. An outpost of Paradise? Perhaps. + +And then--far through the softening mists, he caught a movement that was +not the swaying of verdure, a shimmer of silver more solid than mist. +Something approached. He watched the figure as it moved, now visible, +now hidden by trees; very soon he perceived that it was human, but it +was almost upon him before he realized that it was a girl. + +She wore a robe of silvery, half-translucent stuff, luminous as +starbeams; a thin band of silver bound glowing black hair about her +forehead, and other garment or ornament she had none. Her tiny white +feet were bare to the mossy forest floor as she stood no more than a +pace from him, staring dark-eyed. The thin music sounded again; she +smiled. + +Dan summoned stumbling thoughts. Was this being also--illusion? Had she +no more reality than the loveliness of the forest? He opened his lips to +speak, but a strained excited voice sounded in his ears. "Who are you?" +Had he spoken? The voice had come as if from another, like the sound of +one's words in fever. + +The girl smiled again. "English!" she said in queer soft tones. "I can +speak a little English." She spoke slowly, carefully. "I learned it +from"--she hesitated--"my mother's father, whom they call the Grey +Weaver." + +Again came the voice in Dan's ears. "Who are you?" + +"I am called Galatea," she said. "I came to find you." + +"To find me?" echoed the voice that was Dan's. + +"Leucon, who is called the Grey Weaver, told me," she explained smiling. +"He said you will stay with us until the second noon from this." She +cast a quick slanting glance at the pale sun now full above the +clearing, then stepped closer. "What are you called?" + +"Dan," he muttered. His voice sounded oddly different. + +"What a strange name!" said the girl. She stretched out her bare arm. +"Come," she smiled. + +Dan touched her extended hand, feeling without any surprise the living +warmth of her fingers. He had forgotten the paradoxes of illusion; this +was no longer illusion to him, but reality itself. It seemed to him that +he followed her, walking over the shadowed turf that gave with springy +crunch beneath his tread, though Galatea left hardly an imprint. He +glanced down, noting that he himself wore a silver garment, and that his +feet were bare; with the glance he felt a feathery breeze on his body +and a sense of mossy earth on his feet. + +"Galatea," said his voice. "Galatea, what place is this? What language +do you speak?" + +She glanced back laughing. "Why, this is Paracosma, of course, and this +is our language." + +"Paracosma," muttered Dan. "Para--cosma!" A fragment of Greek that had +survived somehow from a Sophomore course a decade in the past came +strangely back to him. Paracosma! Land-beyond-the-world! + +Galatea cast a smiling glance at him. "Does the real world seem +strange," she queried, "after that shadow land of yours?" + +"Shadow land?" echoed Dan, bewildered. "_This_ is shadow, not my world." + +The girl's smile turned quizzical. "Poof!" she retorted with an +impudently lovely pout. "And I suppose, then, that _I_ am the phantom +instead of you!" She laughed. "Do I seem ghostlike?" + +Dan made no reply; he was puzzling over unanswerable questions as he +trod behind the lithe figure of his guide. The aisle between the +unearthly trees widened, and the giants were fewer. It seemed a mile, +perhaps, before a sound of tinkling water obscured that other strange +music; they emerged on the bank of a little river, swift and +crystalline, that rippled and gurgled its way from glowing pool to +flashing rapids, sparkling under the pale sun. Galatea bent over the +brink and cupped her hands, raising a few mouthfuls of water to her +lips; Dan followed her example, finding the liquid stinging cold. + +"How do we cross?" he asked. + +"You can wade up there,"--the dryad who led him gestured to a sun-lit +shallows above a tiny falls--"but I always cross here." She poised +herself for a moment on the green bank, then dove like a silver arrow +into the pool. Dan followed; the water stung his body like champagne, +but a stroke or two carried him across to where Galatea had already +emerged with a glistening of creamy bare limbs. Her garment clung tight +as a metal sheath to her wet body; he felt a breath-taking thrill at the +sight of her. And then, miraculously, the silver cloth was dry, the +droplets rolled off as if from oiled silk, and they moved briskly on. + +The incredible forest had ended with the river; they walked over a +meadow studded with little, many-hued, star-shaped flowers, whose fronds +underfoot were soft as a lawn. Yet still the sweet pipings followed +them, now loud, now whisper-soft, in a tenuous web of melody. + +"Galatea!" said Dan suddenly. "Where is the music coming from?" + +She looked back amazed. "You silly one!" she laughed. "From the flowers, +of course. See!" she plucked a purple star and held it to his ear; true +enough, a faint and plaintive melody hummed out of the blossom. She +tossed it in his startled face and skipped on. + +A little copse appeared ahead, not of the gigantic forest trees, but of +lesser growths, bearing flowers and fruits of iridescent colors, and a +tiny brook bubbled through. And there stood the objective of their +journey--a building of white, marble-like stone, single-storied and vine +covered, with broad glassless windows. They trod upon a path of bright +pebbles to the arched entrance, and here, on an intricate stone bench, +sat a grey-bearded patriarchal individual. Galatea addressed him in a +liquid language that reminded Dan of the flower-pipings; then she +turned. "This is Leucon," she said, as the ancient rose from his seat +and spoke in English. + +"We are happy, Galatea and I, to welcome you, since visitors are a rare +pleasure here, and those from your shadowy country most rare." + +Dan uttered puzzled words of thanks, and the old man nodded, reseating +himself on the carven bench; Galatea skipped through the arched +entrance, and Dan, after an irresolute moment, dropped to the remaining +bench. Once more his thoughts were whirling in perplexed turbulence. Was +all this indeed but illusion? Was he sitting, in actuality, in a prosaic +hotel room, peering through magic spectacles that pictured this world +about him, or was he, transported by some miracle, really sitting here +in this land of loveliness? He touched the bench; stone, hard and +unyielding, met his fingers. + +"Leucon," said his voice, "how did you know I was coming?" + +"I was told," said the other. + +"By whom?" + +"By no one." + +"Why--_someone_ must have told you!" + +The Grey Weaver shook his solemn head. "I was just told." + +Dan ceased his questioning, content for the moment to drink in the +beauty about him and then Galatea returned bearing a crystal bowl of the +strange fruits. They were piled in colorful disorder, red, purple, +orange and yellow, pear-shaped, egg-shaped, and clustered +spheroids--fantastic, unearthly. He selected a pale, transparent ovoid, +bit into it, and was deluged by a flood of sweet liquid, to the +amusement of the girl. She laughed and chose a similar morsel; biting a +tiny puncture in the end, she squeezed the contents into her mouth. Dan +took a different sort, purple and tart as Rhenish wine, and then +another, filled with edible, almond-like seeds. Galatea laughed +delightedly at his surprises, and even Leucon smiled a grey smile. +Finally Dan tossed the last husk into the brook beside them, where it +danced briskly toward the river. + +"Galatea," he said, "do you ever go to a city? What cities are in +Paracosma?" + +"Cities? What are cities?" + +"Places where many people live close together." + +"Oh," said the girl frowning. "No. There are no cities here." + +"Then where are the people of Paracosma? You must have neighbors." + +The girl looked puzzled. "A man and a woman live off there," she said, +gesturing toward a distant blue range of hills dim on the horizon. "Far +away over there. I went there once, but Leucon and I prefer the valley." + +"But Galatea!" protested Dan. "Are you and Leucon alone in this valley? +Where--what happened to your parents--your father and mother?" + +"They went away. That way--toward the sunrise. They'll return some day." + +"And if they don't?" + +"Why, foolish one! What could hinder them?" + +"Wild beasts," said Dan. "Poisonous insects, disease, flood, storm, +lawless people, death!" + +"I never heard those words," said Galatea. "There are no such things +here." She sniffed contemptuously. "Lawless people!" + +"Not--death?" + +"What is death?" + +"It's--" Dan paused helplessly. "It's like falling asleep and never +waking. It's what happens to everyone at the end of life." + +"I never heard of such a thing as the end of life!" said the girl +decidedly. "There isn't such a thing." + +"What happens, then," queried Dan desperately, "when one grows old?" + +"Nothing, silly! No one grows old unless he wants to, like Leucon. A +person grows to the age he likes best and then stops. It's a law!" + +Dan gathered his chaotic thoughts. He stared into Galatea's dark, lovely +eyes. "Have you stopped yet?" + +The dark eyes dropped; he was amazed to see a deep, embarrassed flush +spread over her cheeks. She looked at Leucon nodding reflectively on his +bench, then back to Dan, meeting his gaze. + +"Not yet," he said. + +"And when will you, Galatea?" + +"When I have had the one child permitted me. You see"--she stared down +at her dainty toes--"one cannot--bear children--afterwards." + +"Permitted? Permitted by whom?" + +"By a law." + +"Laws! Is everything here governed by laws? What of chance and +accidents?" + +"What are those--chance and accidents?" + +"Things unexpected--things unforeseen." + +"Nothing is unforeseen," said Galatea, still soberly. She repeated +slowly, "Nothing is unforeseen." He fancied her voice was wistful. + +Leucon looked up. "Enough of this," he said abruptly. He turned to Dan, +"I know these words of yours--chance, disease, death. They are not for +Paracosma. Keep them in your unreal country." + +"Where did you hear them, then?" + +"From Galatea's mother," said the Grey Weaver, "who had them from your +predecessor--a phantom who visited here before Galatea was born." + +Dan had a vision of Ludwig's face. "What was he like?" + +"Much like you." + +"But his name?" + +The old man's mouth was suddenly grim. "We do not speak of him," he said +and rose, entering the dwelling in cold silence. + +"He goes to weave," said Galatea after a moment. Her lovely, piquant +face was still troubled. + +"What does he weave?" + +"This," She fingered the silver cloth of her gown. "He weaves it out of +metal bars on a very clever machine. I do not know the method." + +"Who made the machine?" + +"It was here." + +"But--Galatea! Who built the house? Who planted these fruit trees?" + +"They were here. The house and trees were always here." She lifted her +eyes. "I told you everything had been foreseen, from the beginning until +eternity--everything. The house and trees and machine were ready for +Leucon and my parents and me. There is a place for my child, who will be +a girl, and a place for her child--and so on forever." + +Dan thought a moment. "Were you born here?" + +"I don't know." He noted in sudden concern that her eyes were glistening +with tears. + +"Galatea, dear! Why are you unhappy? What's wrong?" + +"Why, nothing!" She shook her black curls, smiled suddenly at him. "What +could be wrong? How can one be unhappy in Paracosma?" She sprang erect +and seized his hand. "Come! Let's gather fruit for tomorrow." + +She darted off in a whirl of flashing silver, and Dan followed her +around the wing of the edifice. Graceful as a dancer she leaped for a +branch above her head, caught it laughingly, and tossed a great golden +globe to him. She loaded his arms with the bright prizes and sent him +back to the bench, and when he returned, she piled it so full of fruit +that a deluge of colorful spheres dropped around him. She laughed again, +and sent them spinning into the brook with thrusts of her rosy toes, +while Dan watched her with an aching wistfulness. Then suddenly she was +facing him; for a long, tense instant they stood motionless, eyes upon +eyes, and then she turned away and walked slowly around to the arched +portal. He followed her with his burden of fruit; his mind was once more +in a turmoil of doubt and perplexity. + +The little sun was losing itself behind the trees of that colossal +forest to the west, and a coolness stirred among long shadows. The brook +was purple-hued in the dusk, but its cheery notes mingled still with the +flower music. Then the sun was hidden; the shadow fingers darkened the +meadow; of a sudden the flowers were still, and the brook gurgled alone +in a world of silence. In silence too, Dan entered the doorway. + +The chamber within was a spacious one, floored with large black and +white squares; exquisite benches of carved marble were here and there. +Old Leucon, in a far corner, bent over an intricate, glistening +mechanism, and as Dan entered he drew a shining length of silver cloth +from it, folded it, and placed it carefully aside. There was a curious, +unearthly fact that Dan noted; despite windows open to the evening, no +night insects circled the globes that glowed at intervals from niches in +the walls. + +Galatea stood in a doorway to his left, leaning half-wearily against the +frame; he placed the bowl of fruit on a bench at the entrance and moved +to her side. + +"This is yours," she said, indicating the room beyond. He looked in upon +a pleasant, smaller chamber; a window framed a starry square, and a +thin, swift, nearly silent stream of water gushed from the mouth of a +carved human head on the left wall, curving into a six-foot basin sunk +in the floor. Another of the graceful benches covered with the silver +cloth completed the furnishings; a single glowing sphere, pendant by a +chain from the ceiling, illuminated the room. Dan turned to the girl, +whose eyes were still unwontedly serious. + +"This is ideal," he said, "but, Galatea, how am I to turn out the +light?" + +"Turn it out?" she said. "You must cap it--so!" A faint smile showed +again on her lips as she dropped a metal covering over the shining +sphere. They stood tense in the darkness; Dan sensed her nearness +achingly, and then the light was on once more. She moved toward the +door, and there paused, taking his hand. + +"Dear shadow," she said softly, "I hope your dreams are music." She was +gone. + +Dan stood irresolute in his chamber; he glanced into the large room +where Leucon still bent over his work, and the Grey Weaver raised a hand +in a solemn salutation, but said nothing. He felt no urge for the old +man's silent company and turned back into his room to prepare for +slumber. + + * * * * * + +Almost instantly, it seemed, the dawn was upon him and bright elfin +pipings were all about him, while the odd ruddy sun sent a broad +slanting plane of light across the room. He rose as fully aware of his +surroundings as if he had not slept at all; the pool tempted him and he +bathed in stinging water. Thereafter he emerged into the central +chamber, noting curiously that the globes still glowed in dim rivalry to +the daylight. He touched one casually; it was cool as metal to his +fingers, and lifted freely from its standard. For a moment he held the +cold flaming thing in his hands, then replaced it and wandered into the +dawn. + +Galatea was dancing up the path, eating a strange fruit as rosy as her +lips. She was merry again, once more the happy nymph who had greeted +him, and she gave him a bright smile as he chose a sweet green ovoid for +his breakfast. + +"Come on!" she called. "To the river!" + +She skipped away toward the unbelievable forest; Dan followed, marveling +that her lithe speed was so easy a match for his stronger muscles. Then +they were laughing in the pool, splashing about until Galatea drew +herself to the bank, glowing and panting. He followed her as she lay +relaxed; strangely, he was neither tired nor breathless, with no sense +of exertion. A question recurred to him, as yet unasked. + +"Galatea," said his voice, "Whom will you take as mate?" + +Her eyes went serious. "I don't know," she said. "At the proper time he +will come. That is a law." + +"And will you be happy?" + +"Of course." She seemed troubled. "Isn't everyone happy?" + +"Not where I live, Galatea." + +"Then that must be a strange place--that ghostly world of yours. A +rather terrible place." + +"It is, often enough," Dan agreed. "I wish--" He paused. What did he +wish? Was he not talking to an illusion, a dream, an apparition? He +looked at the girl, at her glistening black hair, her eyes, her soft +white skin, and then, for a tragic moment, he tried to feel the arms of +that drab hotel chair beneath his hands--and failed. He smiled; he +reached out his fingers to touch her bare arm, and for an instant she +looked back at him with startled, sober eyes, and sprang to her feet. + +"Come on! I want to show you my country." She set off down the stream, +and Dan rose reluctantly to follow. + +What a day that was! They traced the little river from still pool to +singing rapids, and ever about them were the strange twitterings and +pipings that were the voices of the flowers. Every turn brought a new +vista of beauty; every moment brought a new sense of delight. They +talked or were silent; when they were thirsty, the cool river was at +hand; when they were hungry, fruit offered itself. When they were tired, +there was always a deep pool and a mossy bank; and when they were +rested, a new beauty beckoned. The incredible trees towered in +numberless forms of fantasy, but on their own side of the river was +still the flower-starred meadow. Galatea twisted him a bright-blossomed +garland for his head, and thereafter he moved always with a sweet +singing about him. But little by little the red sun slanted toward the +forest, and the hours dripped away. It was Dan who pointed it out, and +reluctantly they turned homeward. + +As they returned, Galatea sang a strange song, plaintive and sweet as +the medley of river and flower music. And again her eyes were sad. + +"What song is that?" he asked. + +"It is a song sung by another Galatea," she answered, "who is my +mother." She laid her hand on his arm. "I will make it into English for +you." She sang: + + "The River lies in flower and fern, + In flower and fern it breathes a song. + It breathes a song of your return, + Of your return in years too long. + In years too long its murmurs bring + Its murmurs bring their vain replies, + Their vain replies the flowers sing, + The flowers sing, 'The River lies!'" + +Her voice quavered on the final notes; there was silence save for the +tinkle of water and the flower bugles. Dan said, "Galatea--" and paused. +The girl was again somber-eyed, tearful. He said huskily, "That's a sad +song, Galatea. Why was your mother sad? You said everyone was happy in +Paracosma." + +"She broke a law," replied the girl tonelessly. "It is the inevitable +way to sorrow." She faced him. "She fell in love with a phantom!" +Galatea said. "One of your shadowy race, who came and stayed and then +had to go back. So when her appointed lover came, it was too late; do +you understand? But she yielded finally to the law, and is forever +unhappy, and goes wandering from place to place about the world." She +paused. "I shall never break a law," she said defiantly. + +Dan took her hand. "I would not have you unhappy, Galatea. I want you +always happy." + +She shook her head. "I _am_ happy," she said, and smiled a tender, +wistful smile. + +They were silent a long time as they trudged the way homeward. The +shadows of the forest giants reached out across the river as the sun +slipped behind them. For a distance they walked hand in hand, but as +they reached the path of pebbly brightness near the house, Galatea drew +away and sped swiftly before him. Dan followed as quickly as he might; +when he arrived, Leucon sat on his bench by the portal, and Galatea had +paused on the threshold. She watched his approach with eyes in which he +again fancied the glint of tears. + +"I am very tired," she said, and slipped within. + +Dan moved to follow, but the old man raised a staying hand. + +"Friend from the shadows," he said, "will you hear me a moment?" + +Dan paused, acquiesced, and dropped to the opposite bench. He felt a +sense of foreboding; nothing pleasant awaited him. + +"There is something to be said," Leucon continued, "and I say it without +desire to pain you, if phantoms feel pain. It is this: Galatea loves +you, though I think she has not yet realized it." + +"I love her too," said Dan. + +The Grey Weaver stared at him. "I do not understand. Substance, indeed, +may love shadow, but how can shadow love substance?" + +"I love her," insisted Dan. + +"Then woe to both of you! For this is impossible in Paracosma; it is a +confliction with the laws. Galatea's mate is appointed, perhaps even now +approaching." + +"Laws! Laws!" muttered Dan. "Whose laws are they? Not Galatea's nor +mine!" + +"But they are," said the Grey Weaver. "It is not for you nor for me to +criticize them--though I yet wonder what power could annul them to +permit your presence here!" + +"I had no voice in your laws." + +The old man peered at him in the dusk. "Has anyone, anywhere, a voice in +the laws?" he queried. + +"In my country we have," retorted Dan. + +"Madness!" growled Leucon. "Man-made laws! Of what use are man-made laws +with only man-made penalties, or none at all? If you shadows make a law +that the wind shall blow only from the east, does the west wind obey +it?" + +"We do pass such laws," acknowledged Dan bitterly. "They may be stupid, +but they're no more unjust than yours." + +"Ours," said the Grey Weaver, "are the unalterable laws of the world, +the laws of Nature. Violation is always unhappiness. I have seen it; I +have known it in another, in Galatea's mother, though Galatea is +stronger than she." He paused. "Now," he continued, "I ask only for +mercy; your stay is short, and I ask that you do no more harm than is +already done. Be merciful; give her no more to regret." + +He rose and moved through the archway; when Dan followed a moment later, +he was already removing a square of silver from his device in the +corner. Dan turned silent and unhappy to his own chamber, where the jet +of water tinkled faintly as a distant bell. + +Again he rose at the glow of dawn, and again Galatea was before him, +meeting him at the door with her bowl of fruit. She deposited her +burden, giving him a wan little smile of greeting, and stood facing him +as if waiting. + +"Come with me, Galatea," he said. + +"Where?" + +"To the river bank. To talk." + +They trudged in silence to the brink of Galatea's pool. Dan noted a +subtle difference in the world about him; outlines were vague, the thin +flower pipings less audible, and the very landscape was queerly +unstable, shifting like smoke when he wasn't looking at it directly. And +strangely, though he had brought the girl here to talk to her, he had +now nothing to say, but sat in aching silence with his eyes on the +loveliness of her face. + +Galatea pointed at the red ascending sun. "So short a time," she said, +"before you go back to your phantom world. I shall be sorry, very +sorry." She touched his cheek with her fingers. "Dear shadow!" + +"Suppose," said Dan huskily, "that I won't go. What if I won't leave +here?" His voice grew fiercer. "I'll not go! I'm going to stay!" + +The calm mournfulness of the girl's face checked him; he felt the irony +of struggling against the inevitable progress of a dream. She spoke. +"Had I the making of the laws, you should stay. But you can't, dear one. +You can't!" + +Forgotten now were the words of the Grey Weaver. "I love you, Galatea," +he said. + +"And I you," she whispered. "See, dearest shadow, how I break the same +law my mother broke, and am glad to face the sorrow it will bring." She +placed her hand tenderly over his. "Leucon is very wise and I am bound +to obey him, but this is beyond his wisdom because he let himself grow +old." She paused. "He let himself grow old," she repeated slowly. A +strange light gleamed in her dark eyes as she turned suddenly to Dan. + +"Dear one!" she said tensely. "That thing that happens to the old--that +death of yours! What follows it?" + +"What follows death?" he echoed. "Who knows?" + +"But--" Her voice was quivering. "But one can't simply--vanish! There +must be an awakening." + +"Who knows?" said Dan again. "There are those who believe we wake to a +happier world, but--" He shook his head hopelessly. + +"It must be true! Oh, it must be!" Galatea cried. "There must be more +for you than the mad world you speak of!" She leaned very close. +"Suppose, dear," she said, "that when my appointed lover arrives, I send +him away. Suppose I bear no child, but let myself grow old, older than +Leucon, old until death. Would I join you in your happier world?" + +"Galatea!" he cried distractedly. "Oh, my dearest--what a terrible +thought!" + +"More terrible than you know," she whispered, still very close to him. +"It is more than violation of a law; it is rebellion! Everything is +planned, everything was foreseen, except this; and if I bear no child, +her place will be left unfilled, and the places of her children, and of +_their_ children, and so on until some day the whole great plan of +Paracosma fails of whatever its destiny was to be." Her whisper grew +very faint and fearful. "It is destruction, but I love you more than I +fear--death!" + +Dan's arms were about her. "No, Galatea! No! Promise me!" + +She murmured, "I can promise and then break my promise." She drew his +head down; their lips touched, and he felt a fragrance and a taste like +honey in her kiss. "At least," she breathed. "I can give you a name by +which to love you. Philometros! Measure of my love!" + +"A name?" muttered Dan. A fantastic idea shot through his mind--a way of +proving to himself that all this was reality, and not just a page that +any one could read who wore old Ludwig's magic spectacles. If Galatea +would speak his name! Perhaps, he thought daringly, perhaps then he +could stay! He thrust her away. + +"Galatea!" he cried. "Do you remember my name?" + +She nodded silently, her unhappy eyes on his. + +"Then say it! Say it, dear!" + +She stared at him dumbly, miserably, but made no sound. + +"Say it, Galatea!" he pleaded desperately. "My name, dear--just my +name!" Her mouth moved; she grew pale with effort and Dan could have +sworn that his name trembled on her quivering lips, though no sound +came. + +At last she spoke. "I can't, dearest one! Oh, I can't! A law forbids +it!" She stood suddenly erect, pallid as an ivory carving. "Leucon +calls!" she said, and darted away. Dan followed along the pebbled path, +but her speed was beyond his powers; at the portal he found only the +Grey Weaver standing cold and stern. He raised his hand as Dan appeared. + +"Your time is short," he said. "Go, thinking of the havoc you have +done." + +"Where's Galatea?" gasped Dan. + +"I have sent her away." The old man blocked the entrance; for a moment +Dan would have struck him aside, but something withheld him. He stared +wildly about the meadow--there! A flash of silver beyond the river, at +the edge of the forest. He turned and raced toward it, while motionless +and cold the Grey Weaver watched him go. + +"Galatea!" he called. "Galatea!" + +He was over the river now, on the forest bank, running through columned +vistas that whirled about him like mist. The world had gone cloudy; fine +flakes danced like snow before his eyes; Paracosma was dissolving around +him. Through the chaos he fancied a glimpse of the girl, but closer +approach left him still voicing his hopeless cry of "Galatea!" + +After an endless time, he paused; something familiar about the spot +struck him, and just as the red sun edged above him, he recognized the +place--the very point at which he had entered Paracosma! A sense of +futility overwhelmed him as for a moment he gazed at an unbelievable +apparition--a dark window hung in midair before him through which glowed +rows of electric lights. Ludwig's window! + +It vanished. But the trees writhed and the sky darkened, and he swayed +dizzily in turmoil. He realized suddenly that he was no longer standing, +but sitting in the midst of the crazy glade, and his hands clutched +something smooth and hard--the arms of that miserable hotel chair. Then +at last he saw her, close before him--Galatea, with sorrow-stricken +features, her tear-filled eyes on his. He made a terrific effort to +rise, stood erect, and fell sprawling in a blaze of coruscating lights. + +He struggled to his knees; walls--Ludwig's room--encompassed him; he +must have slipped from the chair. The magic spectacles lay before him, +one lens splintered and spilling a fluid no longer water-clear, but +white as milk. + +"God!" he muttered. He felt shaken, sick, exhausted, with a bitter sense +of bereavement, and his head ached fiercely. The room was drab, +disgusting; he wanted to get out of it. He glanced automatically at his +watch: four o'clock--he must have sat here nearly five hours. For the +first time he noticed Ludwig's absence; he was glad of it and walked +dully out of the door to an automatic elevator. There was no response +to his ring; someone was using the thing. He walked three flights to the +street and back to his own room. + +In love with a vision! Worse--in love with a girl who had never lived, +in a fantastic Utopia that was literally nowhere! He threw himself on +his bed with a groan that was half a sob. + +He saw finally the implication of the name Galatea. Galatea--Pygmalion's +statue, given life by Venus in the ancient Grecian myth. But _his_ +Galatea, warm and lovely and vital, must remain forever without the gift +of life, since he was neither Pygmalion nor God. + + * * * * * + +He woke late in the morning, staring uncomprehendingly about for the +fountain and pool of Paracosma. Slow comprehension dawned; how +much--_how much_--of last night's experience had been real? How much was +the product of alcohol? Or had old Ludwig been right, and was there no +difference between reality and dream? + +He changed his rumpled attire and wandered despondently to the street. +He found Ludwig's hotel at last; inquiry revealed that the diminutive +professor had checked out, leaving no forwarding address. + +What of it? Even Ludwig couldn't give what he sought, a living Galatea. +Dan was glad that he had disappeared; he hated the little professor. +Professor? Hypnotists called themselves "professors." He dragged through +a weary day and then a sleepless night back to Chicago. + +It was mid-winter when he saw a suggestively tiny figure ahead of him in +the Loop. Ludwig! Yet what use to hail him? His cry was automatic. +"Professor Ludwig!" + +The elfin figure turned, recognized him, smiled. They stepped into the +shelter of a building. + +"I'm sorry about your machine, Professor. I'd be glad to pay for the +damage." + +"_Ach_, that was nothing--a cracked glass. But you--have you been ill? +You look much the worse." + +"It's nothing," said Dan. "Your show was marvelous, +Professor--marvelous! I'd have told you so, but you were gone when it +ended." + +Ludwig shrugged. "I went to the lobby for a cigar. Five hours with a wax +dummy, you know!" + +"It was marvelous!" repeated Dan. + +"So real?" smiled the other. "Only because you co-operated, then. It +takes self-hypnosis." + +"It was real, all right," agreed Dan glumly. "I don't understand +it--that strange beautiful country." + +"The trees were club-mosses enlarged by a lens," said Ludwig. "All was +trick photography, but stereoscopic, as I told you--three dimensional. +The fruits were rubber; the house is a summer building on our +campus--Northern University. And the voice was mine; you didn't speak at +all, except your name at the first, and I left a blank for that. I +played your part, you see; I went around with the photographic apparatus +strapped on my head, to keep the viewpoint always that of the observer. +See?" He grinned wryly. "Luckily I'm rather short, or you'd have seemed +a giant." + +"Wait a minute!" said Dan, his mind whirling. "You say you played my +part. Then Galatea--is _she_ real too?" + +"Tea's real enough," said the Professor. "My niece, a senior at +Northern, and likes dramatics. She helped me out with the thing. Why? +Want to meet her?" + +Dan answered vaguely, happily. An ache had vanished; a pain was eased. +Paracosma was attainable at last! + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Pygmalion's Spectacles, by Stanley Grauman Weinbaum + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PYGMALION'S SPECTACLES *** + +***** This file should be named 22893.txt or 22893.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/2/8/9/22893/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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