Lem, Stanislaw (21 page)

forming such a thick coat, that the constructors lost all hope of

ever getting it clean again.

By now the stars had vanished in the

general gloom, so the two proceeded gropingly, till suddenly their

ship lurched, and all the furniture, pots and pans went flying; they

felt themselves hurtling forward, faster and faster, then at last

there was an awful crunch and the ship came to a stop, landing softly

enough though at an angle, as if its nose had stuck in something

doughy. They ran to the window, but couldn't see a thing, as it was

pitch black outside—and now they heard someone banging, someone

fearfully strong, whoever it was, for the very walls were buckling

in. At this point Trurl and Klapaucius began to feel a little less

confident in the power of their unarmed wits, but it was too

late now, so they opened the hatch, since otherwise it would be

forced from without and broken for good.

As they looked, someone stuck his face

in the opening— a face so huge, that it was clearly out of the

question for the rest of the body to climb in after it, and not only

huge, but unspeakably hideous, studded up and down and every which

way with bulging eyes, and the nose was a saw, and an iron hook

served for the jaw. The face didn't move, pressed up against the open

hatch, only the eyes darted back and forth, avidly examining

everything, as if appraising whether or not the take was worth the

trouble. Even someone far less intelligent than our constructors

would have understood what that scrutiny meant, for it was

unmistakable.

"Well?" said Trurl finally,

exasperated by such shameless eyeing, which went on in silence. "What

do you want, you unwashed mug?! I am Trurl, constructor and general

omni-potentiary, and this is my friend Klapaucius, also of great

renown, and we were flying by in our ship as tourists, so kindly

remove your ugly muzzle and take us immediately out of this unsavory

place—full of litter and rubbish, no doubt—and direct us

to some clean, respectable sector, or we'll lodge a complaint and

they'll have you broken down into little scrap—do you hear me,

you scavenger, ragpicker, pack rat?!"

But the face said nothing, just looked

and looked, as if calculating, making an estimate of how much.

"Listen here, you unmitigated

freak," yelled Trurl, throwing all caution to the winds,

though Klapaucius kept elbowing him to show some restraint, "we

have no gold, no silver, no precious stones, so you let us go this

instant, and above all cover up that oversized physiognomy of yours,

for it's unspeakably hideous. And you"—he said,

turning to Klapaucius—"stop jabbing me with that

elbow! This is the way you have to talk to such types!"

"I have no use," suddenly

said the face, turning its thousand glittering eyes on Trurl,

"for gold or silver, and the way you have to talk to me is

delicately and with respect, as I am a pirate with a Ph.D.,

well-educated and by nature extremely high-strung. Other guests have

been here and needed sweetening up—and when I've given you

a proper pounding too, why, you'll be positively dripping with good

manners. My name is Pugg, I'm thirty arshins in every direction and

it's true I rob, but in a manner that is modern and scientific, for I

collect precious facts, genuine truths, priceless knowledge, and

in general all information of value. And now, let's hand it over,

otherwise I whistle! Very well then, I'll count to five—one,

two, three …"

And at five, when they had handed him

nothing, he let loose such a whistle, that their ears nearly flew

off, and Klapaucius realized that the "PHT" of which the

natives spoke with terror was indeed "Ph.D.," for the

pirate had obviously studied at some higher institution, like the

Criminal Academy. Trurl held his head and groaned—Pugg's

whistle was fully commensurate with his size.

"We'll give you nothing!" he

cried, while Klapaucius ran off to find some cotton. "And get

your face out of here!"

"You don't like my face, maybe

you'll like my hand," replied the pirate. "It's one

huge humdinger of a hand and heavy as the devil! And here it comes!"

And indeed: the cotton Klapaucius

brought was no longer needed, for the face had disappeared, and in

its place was a paw, a paw to end all paws, with knots and knobs and

shovel claws, and it rummaged and clutched, breaking tables and

hutches and cupboards, till all the pots and pans came crashing

down, and the paw chased Trurl and Klapaucius into the engine room,

where they climbed up on top of the atomic pile and rapped its

knuckles—pow! pow!—with a poker. This made the diplomaed

pirate mad, and he put his face back in the hatch and said:

"Look, I strongly advise you to

come to terms with me at once, otherwise I'll put you aside for

later, at the very bottom of my storage bin, and cover you with

garbage, and wedge you in with rocks, so you can't move, and you'll

just sit there and slowly rust. So then, which is it to be?"

Trurl wouldn't hear of negotiating,

but Klapaucius politely asked what exactly it was that His

Doctoral Diploma-hood wanted?

"Now you're talking," he

said. "I gather rich mines of information, for such is my

lifelong love and avocation, the result of a higher education and, I

might add, a practical grasp of the situation, when you consider

that, with the usual treasures untutored pirates like to hoard, there

is not a blessed thing here one can buy. Information, on the other

hand, satisfies one's thirst for knowledge, and it is well known

besides, that everything that is, is information; and thus for

centuries now I gather it, and will continue to do so, though it's

true I'm not against a little gold or diamonds now and then, for

they're pretty and decorative—but that's strictly on the side,

as occasion warrants. Observe, however, that for false information,

no less than for false coin, I give a good shellacking, since I am

refined and insist on authenticity!"

"But what kind of authentic and

valuable information do you require?" asked Klapaucius.

"All kinds, as long as it's

true," replied the pirate. "You never can tell what facts

may come in handy. I already have a few hundred wells and cellars

full of them, but there's room for twice again as much. So out with

it; tell me everything you know, and I'll jot it down. But make

it snappy!"

"A fine state of affairs,"

Klapaucius whispered in Trurl's ear. "He could keep us here for

an eon or two before we tell him everything we know. Our knowledge is

colossal!!"

"Wait," whispered Trurl, "I

have an idea." And he said aloud:

"Listen here, you thief with a

degree, we possess a piece of information worth more than any other,

a formula to fashion gold from ordinary atoms—for instance,

hydrogen, of which the Universe has an inexhaustible supply. We'll

let you have it if you let us go."

"I have a whole trunk full of

such recipes," answered the face, batting its eyes ferociously.

"And they're all worthless. I don't intend to be tricked

again—you demonstrate it first."

"Sure, why not? Do you have a

jug?"

"No."

"That's all right, we can do

without one/' said Trurl. "The method is simplicity itself: take

as many atoms of hydrogen as the weight of an atom of gold, namely

one hundred and ninety-six; first you shell the electrons, then knead

the protons, working the nuclear batter till the mesons appear,

and now sprinkle your electrons all around, and voila, there's the

gold. Watch!"

And Trurl began to catch atoms,

peeling their electrons and mixing their protons with such nimble

speed, that his fingers were a blur, and he stirred the subatomic

dough, stuck all the electrons back in, then on to the next

molecule. In less than five minutes he was holding a nugget of

the purest gold, which he presented to the face; it took a sniff and

said with a nod:

"Yes, that's gold, but I'm too

big to go running around like that after atoms."

"No problem, we'll give you a

suitable machine!" coaxed Trurl. "Just think, this way you

can turn anything into gold, not only hydrogen—we'll give you

the formula for other atoms, too. Why, one could make the entire

Universe gold, if only he applied himself!"

"If the Universe was gold, gold

would be worthless," observed Pugg. "No, I have no use for

your formula—I've written it down, yes, but that's not enough!

It's the wealth of knowledge that I crave."

"But what do you want to know,

for heaven's sake?!"

"Everything!"

Trurl looked at Klapaucius, Klapaucius

looked at Trurl, and the latter finally said:

"If first you will solemnly

swear, up and down and cross your heart, that you will let us go, we

will give you information, information about infinite

information, that is, we will make you your very own Demon of the

Second Kind, which is magical and thermodynamical, nonclassical and

stochastical, and from any old barrel or even a sneeze it will

extract information for you about everything that was, is, may be or

ever will be. And there is no demon beyond this Demon, for it is of

the Second Kind, and if you want it, say so now!"

The pirate with the Ph.D. was

suspicious, and didn't agree all at once to these conditions, but

finally swore the required oath, with the stipulation that the Demon

first give clear proof of its informational prowess. Which was fine

with Trurl.

"Now pay attention, big-face!"

he said. "Do you have any air knocking about? Without air the

Demon won't work."

"I have a little," said

Pugg, "but it's not too clean…"

"Stale, stagnant, polluted, it

doesn't matter, not in the least," replied the constructors.

"Lead us to it, and we'll show you something!"

So he withdrew his face and let them

leave the ship, and they followed him to his house, noticing that he

had legs like towers, shoulders like a precipice, and hadn't been

washed for centuries, nor oiled, hence creaked something awful. They

went down cellar corridors, with sacks moldering on every hand—in

these the pirate kept his stolen facts —bunches and bundles of

sacks, all tied with string, and the most important, valuable items

marked in red pencil. On the wall hung an immense catalog, fastened

to the rock by a rust-eaten chain and full of entries and headings,

beginning, of course, with A. On they went, raising muffled

echoes, and Trurl looked and grimaced, as did Klapaucius, for though

there was plenty of authentic and top-quality information lying

about, wherever the eye fell was nothing but must, dust and clutter.

Plenty of air, too, but thoroughly stale. They stopped and Trurl

said:

"Now pay attention! Air is made

up of atoms, and these atoms jump this way and that, and collide

billions of times a second in each and every cubic micromillimeter,

and it is precisely this eternal jumping and bumping together that

constitutes a gas. Now, even though their jumping is blind and wholly

random, there are billions upon billions of atoms in every

interstice, and as a consequence of this great number, their little

skips and scamperings give rise to, among other things—and

purely by accident—to significant configurations… Do you

know what a configuration is, blockhead?"

"No insults, please!" said

Pugg. "For I am not your usual uncouth pirate, but refined and

with a Ph.D., and therefore extremely high-strung."

"Fine. So then, from all this

atomic hopping around, we obtain significant, that is meaningful

configurations, as if, for instance, you were to fire at a wall

blindfold and the bullet holes formed some letter. That, which on a

large scale is rare and quite unlikely, happens in atomic gases all

the time, on account of those trillion collisions every one

hundred-thousandth of a second. But here's the problem: in every