Space Opera
Copyright 1964, 2012 by Jack Vance
Cover art by Ronald Marc
Published by
Spatterlight Press
ISBN 978-1-61947-033-0
2012-10-01
Visit
jackvance.com
for more
Spatterlight Press releases
This title was created from the digital archive of the Vance Integral Edition, a series of 44 books produced under the aegis of the author by a worldwide group of his readers. The VIE project gratefully acknowledges the editorial guidance of Norma Vance, as well as the cooperation of the Department of Special Collections at Boston University, whose John Holbrook Vance collection has been an important source of textual evidence. Special thanks to R.C. Lacovara, Patrick Dusoulier, Koen Vyverman, Paul Rhoads, Chuck King, Gregory Hansen, Suan Yong and Josh Geller for their invaluable assistance preparing final versions of the source files.
Digitize
: Richard Chandler, Joel Hedlund, R.C. Lacovara, Peter Strickland,
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: Joel Hedlund, Charles King,
Tech Proof
: Patrick Dusoulier,
Text Integrity
: Alun Hughes, Steve Sherman, Tim Stretton,
Implement
: Mark Adams, Joel Hedlund,
Security
: Paul Rhoads,
Compose
: John A. Schwab,
Comp Review
: Marcel van Genderen, Brian Gharst, Karl Kellar, Bob Luckin,
Update Verify
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RTF-Diff
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Proofread
: Linnea Anglemark, Patrick Dusoulier, Charles King, Roderick MacBeath, Michael Mitchell, Till Noever, David Reitsema, Gabriel Stein, Fred ZoetemeyerEbook Creation
: Arjen Broeze, Christopher Wood,
Artwork (maps based on original drawings by Jack and Norma Vance)
: Paul Rhoads, Christopher Wood,
Proofing
: Arjen Broeze, Evert Jan de Groot, Gregory Hansen, Menno van der Leden, Koen Vyverman,
Management
: John Vance, Koen Vyverman,
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THE COMPLETE WORKS
of
THE VANCE DIGITAL EDITION
Oakland
2012
Chapter I
Roger Wool, sitting to the rear of his aunt’s box at the Palladian Theater, poured himself a third glass of champagne. Dame Isabel Grayce, occupied with her two guests, failed to notice and Roger sat back with a pleasant sense of accomplishment.
Five minutes to curtain time! The air was rich with golden light, heavy with a delicious expectancy. After triumphs elsewhere around the world, the Ninth Company of Rlaru at last had come to the Palladian. Everyone knew of their distinctive programs, which were like nothing ever before seen on Earth: some charming and wistful, others projecting an almost terrible sense of doom.
Augmenting popular interest in the Ninth Company was the controversy which had accompanied them around the world: was the troupe genuinely the product of a far planet, or did they represent a hoax perpetrated by an exceeding clever set of musicians? Everywhere critics and experts were divided. The evidence of the music was ambiguous: in some respects it seemed absolutely alien; in others it appeared hauntingly similar to certain Earth musics.
Roger Wool had hardly bothered to form an opinion; but Dame Isabel Grayce, Secretary-Treasurer of the Opera League, was more deeply involved: indeed, only her sponsorship had secured Adolph Gondar entrée into the theaters and opera houses of the world. At the moment Dame Isabel was engaged in a stiff conversation with her two guests. These were Joseph Lewis Thorpe, music critic for the
Transatlantic Times,
and Elgin Seaboro, theatrical editor of the
Galactic Review
. Both had written cynically in regard to the Ninth Company without troubling to attend a performance, and Dame Isabel had insisted that they repair the deficiency.
The curtain parted to reveal an empty stage. The impresario, Adolph Gondar, stepped forward: a tall dark man with a saturnine forehead, brooding black eyes, a long melancholy jaw and chin: not a man to inspire confidence, but by the same token, not a man to whom such large-scale chicanery would come easily. He spoke a few perfunctory words and left the stage. After several electric moments the orchestral members of the Ninth Troupe appeared, went to a dais at one side of the stage, almost idly picked up instruments and began to play. The music was thin and sweet, and tonight it seemed almost gay.
Presently others of the troupe came forth to present a merry little operetta, so casual as to seem impromptu, yet precisely timed and exquisite in regard to polish and flair. The plot? It could never be stated in words; perhaps there was none. Roger enjoyed the presentation and wondered what all the fuss was about. The performers seemed not quite human, though close enough for empathy. They were flexible and frail, and somehow one received the impression that their internal organs were different in formation and arrangement from those of Earth-folk. The men were straight, sinewy, with startling white skins, blazing black eyes and sleek black hair. The women were softer, delightfully shaped, with piquant little faces half-hidden in puffs of black hair. They pranced gaily from one side of the stage to the other, singing in sweet plaintive voices, changing costumes with bewildering celerity, while the men stood stern and stiff, facing in various directions or whirling about in accordance with a definite but incomprehensible set of canons. Meanwhile other members of the troupe provided music, a fragile polyphony sometimes seeming mere random sound, then just as the suspicion approached certainty, resolving into a set of ravishing chords which explained and ordered all which had gone before.
Pleasant, if puzzling, thought Roger Wool, pouring himself another glass of champagne. The bottle clinked in the ice and Dame Isabel swung around her formidable glance. Roger replaced the bottle with exaggerated caution.
Presently the performance halted for intermission. Dame Isabel turned from Joseph Lewis Thorpe to Elgin Seaboro with an austere and challenging air of triumph. “Your doubts and misgivings are erased, or so I trust?”
Joseph Lewis Thorpe cleared his throat, glanced at Elgin Seaboro. “Virtuosity of a sort. Indeed, indeed, indeed.”
Elgin Seaboro said, “No question but what we have here a clever and daring group, rather well integrated. Fresh new talent, I would say. Completely fresh.”
“This is a fair pronouncement,” stated Thorpe.
Dame Isabel knit her brows. “You agree then that Adolph Gondar and the Ninth Troupe are genuine?”
Joseph Lewis Thorpe laughed uneasily. “My dear lady, I can only reiterate that I find his conduct the opposite of reassuring. Why will he allow no press interviews? Why has not some ethnologist of reputation examined these people? The circumstances do not conduce to easy acceptance of Mr. Gondar’s claims.”
“You think then that Mr. Gondar has hoodwinked me? After all, the whole tour has been under my supervision; I control all financial matters, and I doubt if you can seriously accuse me of peccancy.”
“My dear lady, there is not the slightest hint of such a thing!” declared Thorpe. “You are almost notoriously straight-forward!”
“Adolph Gondar may well be an excellent fellow,” chimed in Seaboro, “aside from his attempt to pull the wool over our eyes.”
“Yes,” said Thorpe. “Exactly who is Gondar?”
Dame Isabel compressed her lips and Roger watched fascinated. “Mr. Gondar,” she said with great distinctness, “is a sensitive and perspicacious man. His trade is that of a spaceship captain. He has visited dozens of far worlds. On one of these, that world called Rlaru, he managed to prevail upon the Ninth Company to undertake a tour of Earth. That is all there is to it. I cannot understand your skepticism, especially after my reassurances.”
Seaboro gave a hearty laugh. “It is our business to be skeptical. Who ever heard of a credulous critic?”
“My objections,” said Thorpe, “are based partly on musical theory, and partly on an informed layman’s knowledge of the galaxy. I find it hard to believe that an alien race can employ a comprehensible musical idiom, and also I have never heard mention of the planet ‘Rlaru’ which presumably exhibits a highly advanced civilization.”
“Ah,” said Dame Isabel, eyelids hooding her eyes — a signal which caused Roger to wince uneasily. “Then you believe these performers to be ordinary Earth-people masquerading as aliens?”
Seaboro shrugged. “As to that I can’t say. All of us have seen presentations which appear miraculous, but which we know to be clever stage management. These people show no strikingly non-human characteristics. If you identified them as the graduating class of the Golliwog Cakewalk Academy of Earthville on Procyon Planet, I would not disbelieve you.”
“You are a fool,” said Dame Isabel, with the air of one pronouncing a considered and final judgment.
Seaboro sniffed, swung around in his seat. Thorpe laughed nervously. “Unfair! Unfair! We are all mere mortals pushing through our various dark thickets! Bernard Bickel, who probably knows —”
Dame Isabel made a sound of intense annoyance. “Don’t mention that name to me!” she snapped. “He is an opinionated
poseur
, completely superficial.”
“He is probably the world’s leading authority on comparative musicology,” stated Seaboro coldly. “We cannot help but be influenced by his views.”