Foundation and Chaos

Page 27

He forced himself to relax, performed his breathing exercises, just as Dors had once taught him. The music played, soft and highly structured and very melodic. As Hari listened, beating time with one hand where it rested on the chair arm, he worked over in his mind the roles that would be played by the Chen and Divart families as Trantor continued its decline. The Commission of Public Safety would run the Empire for some time, until a strong leader emerged--very likely an Emperor and not a military man. Hari suspected--though he would never have recorded this prediction--that the Emperor would take on the name of Cleon, become Cleon II, to appeal to the Empire’s, and especially Trantor’s, sense of tradition and history.

It was when a society became the most distressed and antiquated that it would recreate an overwhelming fantasy of some Golden Age, a time when all was great and glorious, when people were more noble and causes more magnificent and honorable. Chivalry is the last refuge of a rotting corpse.

Nikolo Pas had said as much. Hari closed his eyes. He easily visualized the defeated tyrant, sitting in his bare cell, a pitiful figure who had once occupied the center of a huge social cancer, yet who had also understood the Empire’s destiny with almost as clear a vision as Hari’s.

“I reached out to the wealthy noble families, the aristocrats, that squat on the lines of money and commerce like giant old leeches,” Pas had explained. “As provincial governor, I nurtured their sense of superiority and self-importance. I encouraged agrarian reforms--instructed that all municipalities should place farmlands back into production and require their young citizens and even gentry to work them, whether or not they were profitable, for spiritual reasons. I encouraged the development of secret religious societies, especially those that placed a premium on wealth and social position. And I encouraged the memory, the history, of a past time when life was much simpler and we were all closer to moral perfection. How easy it was! How the rich and powerful lapped up these corrupt old myths! I believed them myself for a time...Until the political tide turned, and I needed something more powerful. Then it was I began the revolution against the Eternals.”

Hari jerked up in his seat at a sound within his room. He ordered the music to stop and listened. He was sure he had heard footsteps.

They’ve come! He got up from his seat, heart pounding. Linge Chen had finally gotten tired of the game and was playing his hand. Just as Farad Sinter could send out assassins, so could the Chief Commissioner. Assassins--or merely arresting officers.

There were only three rooms. Surely he would have seen someone enter.

Hari searched the bedroom and kitchen, plodding across the soft floor in his bare feet and robe, all too aware of his vulnerability, even within his own home.

He found no one.

Relieved, he returned to the living room--and even before he noticed the visitors, felt a wave of reassurance. It was with little or no shock and not much surprise even that he saw three people standing in his living room, arranged in a half circle around his favorite chair.

Despite some cosmetic changes, he knew immediately that one, the tallest, with reddish brown hair, was his old friend Daneel. The other two he did not recognize. One was female, one a bulky male.

“Hello, Hari,” Daneel said. The voice had changed as well.

“I thought--I remembered a visit from you,” Hari stammered, confusion fighting with joy. He felt some irrational hope that Daneel had come to take him away, to tell him the Plan was fulfilled and he did not have to stand trial, did not have to live in the shadow of the displeasure of Linge Chen...

“Perhaps you anticipated,” Daneel said. “That’s something you do very well. But we have not been in each other’s presence for some years now.”

“I am not much of a prophet,” Hari said wryly. “It’s good to see you again. Who are these people? Friends?” He gave the next word a suggestive emphasis. “Colleagues?”

The female looked at him with a steady gaze he found discomfiting. Something familiar...

“Friends. We are all here to provide assistance in a crucial time.”

“Please, sit. Do any of you...feel thirsty, or hungry?”

Daneel knew he did not need to reply. The bulky male shook his head, no, but the female, also, made no reply. She simply watched him, her attractive face intensely blank.

Hari felt his heart sink, then rebound with painful excitement. His mouth hung open, and he sat in a smaller chair near the wall, to keep from collapsing. His eyes did not leave the woman. The right size, approximately. The same shapely figure, though younger than he last remembered her, but then, she had always been exceptionally resilient and youthful.

If she was a robot--secret steel!--

“Dors?” He could say nothing more. His mouth became too dry to talk.

“No,” the woman said, but did not look away.

“We are not here to renew old acquaintances,” Daneel said. “You will not remember this visit, Hari.”

“No, of course not,” Hari said, suddenly miserable and very alone again, despite Daneel’s presence. “I sometimes wonder whether I have any freedom at all...whether I can make any of my own choices.”

“I have never influenced you, except to prepare the way and maximize your effects, and to help you keep necessary secrets.”

Hari held out his hands, and wailed, “Release me, Daneel! Take all this off of my shoulders! I am an old man--I feel so very, very old, and I am so afraid!”

Daneel--listened with a concerned and sympathetic expression. “You know that is not true, Hari. There is still great strength within you, and enthusiasm. You are truly Hari Seldon.”

Hari drew back and covered his mouth with one hand, then swiftly wiped his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he murmured.