MANY MANSIONS

. . . If it were not so, I would have told you.

Gene Wolfe

Old Woman: So you are the new woman from the Motherworld. Well, come in and sit down. I saw you coming up the road on your machine.

Oh yes, Todd and I, we’ve always been friendly with you people, though there are some here still that remember the War. This was a rich district, you know, before; for a few, that’s hard to forget.

Well, it’s all behind us now, and it wasn’t us anyway. Just my father and Todd’s—and your grandmother, I suppose. Even if you were carried in a bottle, you must have had a grandmother, and she would have fought against us. Still, it’s good of you now to send people to help us rebuild here, though as you can see it hasn’t done much good.

I didn’t mean this place was here before the War—not much that you’ll see was. Todd built this thirty years ago; he was younger then —couldn’t do it now. You know, you are such a pretty thing—can’t I get you a cup? Well, we call it tea, but your people don’t. The woman who was here before you, she always said how much better the real tea was, but she never gave us any.

I tasted it once, but I didn’t like it. I was brought up on our own brewing, you see. I’ll pour you a glass of our wine if you won’t take tea; this cake has got a trifle dry.

Oh, I can imagine well enough what it’s been like. Going around from one to another saying, “Have you seen her? Do you know what happened to her?” and getting hostile looks and not much else. It’s because of the War, you know. That’s what my mother always said. People here weren’t like that before the War. Now—well, they know that you’re supposed to help them, to make up for it; and you’re not doing it now, are you? Just going about looking for your friend.

I doubt you’ll ever see her again. She’s been taken. I don’t suppose you know about that—the old houses? She didn’t either when she came; we had to tell her about it. I would have thought they’d teach you—put it in a little book to give out or something. Did you get one of those? Never mind—I’ve seen them. Saw hers, for all of that. She was such a pretty thing, just like you.

I don’t mind telling you—it’s the old houses, the ones built before the War. Todd’s family had one down at Breaker, and my own family, we had one here. I hear yours are different—all shiny metal and shaped like eggs, or else like nails stood on end. Ours weren’t like that; not in the old days, and no more now. More like this one you’re sitting in: wood, or what looked like it. But for all that you beat us, our fathers and grandfathers—and our mothers and grandmothers too, for our women weren’t what you think, you don’t really know about it—they had more power over machines than you do. They didn’t use them to make more machines, though; just put them in their houses to help out. They were friendly to their homes, you see, and thought their homes should be friendly to them.

Some say the brains of people were used to make the houses think. Taken out of the heads and put in jars in secret rooms, with wires running all over to work little fusion motors. Others say that the heads are still there, and the bodies too, to take care of the brains; but the houses don’t know it anymore, or don’t care. They say that if you were to go inside, and open the door of the right room, you’d see someone still lying on a bed that was turning to dust, while the eyes watched you from every picture.

Yes, they’re still here—some of them. Your girls burned most—I’ve never understood why. Beautiful things they were, so my mother used to tell me. Ours was white, and four stories high. They kept themselves up, you understand, the same as a woman. If there were people’s brains in them (and I’ve never been sure that was true) then they must have been women’s brains mostly. They kept themselves up. There were roses climbing up them, the same as a woman will wear a flower in her hair; and ours pinned wisteria to her like a corsage. The roofs were tight and good all the time, and if a window broke it mended itself with nobody troubling. It’s not like that now, from what I hear.

I’ve never seen one myself, not to speak of. Todd has, or says he has. He’ll tell you about it, if you like, when he comes in. But I’m not thinking, am I? Here you’ve sat all this time with your glass empty.

It’s no trouble—it’s our courtesy, you see, to host strangers. I know you don’t do it, but this is my house. Now, don’t you get angry; I’m a headstrong old lady, and I’m used to having my own way.

Don’t you use that word anymore? It just means woman now. Drink this and I’ll cut you some more cake.

None at all? I won’t force it on you. Yes, people see them—they’re still here, some of them, and so why not? Take our land; it ran back as far as you could go if you walked all day—clear to the river. The south property line was at the edge of town, and the north way up in the mountains. That was in the old days. Most of it was plowed and cultivated then, and what woodlands there was were cleared out. Then the War came. Half the autochthons were killed, like most of us; those that were left were happy enough to run off into the fens, or lie around the towns waiting for somebody to rob. We would have civilized them if you’d given us another century.

But you wanted to know about the houses. Pull the curtain there to one side, will you? It’s starting to get dark, and I always worry when Todd’s not home. No, dear, I’m not hinting for you to go—that machine of yours has a light on the front, don’t it? And a girl-woman—like you, that’s not afraid of anything, wouldn’t be afraid of riding home in the dark, I would think. Besides, I’d feel better if you’d stay; you’re a comfort to me.

Well, the War came, and most of the houses were told to hide themselves. Your people bombed them while we were still fighting, you know, and burned them after we gave up. So they hid, as well as they could.

Oh, yes, they can move around. It must have been so nice for the people before the War—they could have their homes down by the river in summer, and wherever the firewood was in winter—no, they didn’t need it for heat, I said they had fusion motors, didn’t I? Still, they liked wood fires.

So the houses hid, as I said. Hid for years while your girl soldiers went over the country and your ornithopters flapped around all day. In the deepest parts of the woods, most of them, and down in the crevasses where the sunlight never comes. They grew mosses on their roofs then, and that must have saved quite a few. Some went into the tarns, they say, and stood for years on the bottoms—Saint Syncletica’s church is under Lake Kell yet, and the people hear the bells ringing when they’re out on the water in storms.

If you’re fond of fishing, it’s a good lake, but there’s no roads to it —you’d have to walk. Your patrols used the roads mostly, so we let a lot of them grow up in trees again. The houses make false ones though, slipping through the thickets. That’s what the men say. Todd will be hunting in deep timber, where there shouldn’t be any road and there’s no place to go if there were, and come on one twice or three times the size of this room and the porch together, just going nowhere, winding down through the brakes. Some say you can follow those roads forever and never come to anything; but my Todd says that one time he walked one till it was near dark, and then he saw a house at the end of it, a tall, proud house, with a light in the gable window. My own home, that was, is what I think. My father used to tell how when he’d go out riding and not come back till midnight or later, there’d be a light burning for him in the highest window. It’s still waiting for him, I suppose.

Does anyone live in them? Well, some say one thing, some another. I told you I’ve never seen one myself, so how would I know? You’ll meet people who say they’ve seen faces staring out through the windows—who knows if they’re telling the truth? Maybe it was just shadows they saw on the walls in there. Maybe it wasn’t.

Oh, a lot of people go looking for them. There’s money inside, of course. Wealth, I should say, because the money’s worth nothing now. Still, the people who had those big houses had jewels, and platinum flatware—there was a fad for that then, so I’ve heard; and who could be trusted better to take care of it than their own homes? The ones that say they go hunting for people tell stories about little boys finding a spoon gleaming in the ferns, and seeing something else, a creamer or something, farther on. Following the trail, you know, picking up the things, until the house nearly has them. Then (this is the way the story always goes) they get frightened and drop everything and run away. I don’t believe a word of it. I’ve told Todd, if he should ever find any platinumware in the woods, or gold, or those cat’s-eye carbuncles they talk about, to turn around right then and bring it home. But he’s never brought back anything like that.

Don’t go yet—you’re company for me. I don’t get much, out here away from everybody. I’ll tell you about Lily—have you heard of her? It might have some bearing on the woman who was here before you.

I don’t know how you feel about morality—with your people it’s so hard to tell. Todd says we ought to forgive women like her, but then men always do. She was pretty enough—beautiful, you might say—and it’s hard for a woman alone to make a living. Maybe I ought not to blame her too much; she gave good value, I suppose, for what she received. A pretty face, men like that, not round like yours, but a long oval shape. Waist no bigger than this, and one of those full chests—at least, after she had begun doing what she did regular, and was getting enough to eat and all the drink she wanted. Skin like cream—I always had to hold back my hand to keep from running my fingers over it.

As well as you know me by now, you know I wouldn’t have her in my house. But it was an act of charity, I thought, to talk to her sometimes. She must have been lonely for woman-company. I used to go into town every so often then, and if I met her and there wasn’t anybody else about, I’d pass the time. That was a mistake, because when I’d done it once or twice she came out to visit me. See the two chairs out there? Through the window? Well, I kept her sitting there on the porch for over a hour, and never did ask her in or give her a bite to eat. When she went home she knew, believe me. She knew what I thought, and how far she could go. Coming to ask if she could help with the canning, like a neighbor!

Here’s what she told me, though. I don’t imagine you know where the Settles’ farm is? Anyway, up past it is where Dode Beckette lives —just a little shack set back in the trees. She was going up there one spring evening. He had sent for her, I suppose, or maybe she was just looking for trade; when a man has a woman alone knock at his door ... a woman like that—I don’t intend you, dear—why, nature is liable to take its course, isn’t it? She was carrying a load, if you know what I mean; she told me so herself. The air was chill, possibly, and it’s likely someone had left a bottle with her the night before. Still, I don’t think she was seeing things. She was accustomed to it, and that makes all the difference. Just enough to make her hum to herself, I would say. I used to hear her singing on the various roads round and about in just that way; it’s always those that have the least to make music about that sing, I always say.

First thing you know she went around a bend, and there was the house. It wasn’t the Settles’, or Dode’s shack—a big place. Like a palace, she said, but I would think that was stretching it a bit. More like the hotel, I should think. Not kept up, the paint peeling here and there, and the railing of the veranda broke; some of them have got a little careless, I think, hiding so long. Hunted things grow strange sometimes, though I don’t suppose you’ve noticed.

There was a light, she said. Not high like the one Todd saw, but on the first floor where the big front room would be. Yellow at first, she told me, but it got a rosy cast when she came closer; she thought someone had put a red shawl over it. There was music too. Happy dancing music, the kind men like. She knew what sort of house it was then, and so did I. She told me she wanted to walk up on that porch right then and never come out; but when she had the chance she was afraid.

She’s gone now, all right, but not because she found her house again. She’s dead.

I’m sorry, though there’s others I would miss more. They found her in a ditch over on the other side of Pierced Rock. Some man didn’t want to pay, very likely; her neck was broken.

Here comes Todd now. Hark to his step?

* * * *

Old Man: Got company, do we? I think I know who you are—the new young woman sent out from town. What is it they call it, the Reconstruction Office? Well, I hope Nor has entertained you. We ain’t much for society out here, but we try to treat our company right, and don’t think we’re high enough to look down on a visitor just because there wasn’t no father in her making. Nor fetched you a piece of cake, I see, and I’ll pour something for us all a trifle stouter than that wine you’ve been drinking. Keep the stabbers off.

Tingles your nose, don’t it? Sweet on the tongue, though.

That’s only this old house a-creaking. Old houses do, you know, particularly by night, and this one was carpentered by Nor’s dad just after the War. It’s the cooling off when the sun sets. Drink up—it won’t hurt you.

No, I can’t say I felt a thing. Know what it is, though—Nor filling you with tales of the walking houses hereabouts.

It’s true enough, ma’am, though we don’t often mention them to your women. I’ve seen them myself—Nor will have told you, no doubt. There’s those that think them so frightful—say that anybody setting foot in one just vanishes away, or gets ate, or whatever. Well now, it’s true enough they’re seldom seen again; but seldom’s not never, now is it? I’ll tell you a tale of my own. We had a man around here called Pim Pyntey; a drinking man in his way, as a good many of us are. Everybody said no good would come to him, though drunk or sober he was about as friendly a soul as I’ve known, and always willing to pitch in and help a neighbor if it was only a matter of working—didn’t have any money, you know; that kind never does.

Still, I’ve gone fishing with him often, though I wouldn’t hunt with him—always afraid he’d burn one of these here legs of mine off by accident. I’m ‘tached to both of them, as they say.

Anyhow, Pim, he started seeing them. I’d run into him down at the Center, and he’d tell me about them. Followin’ him—that was what he always claimed. “They’re after me, Todd, I don’t know why it should be, but they are. They’re followin’ me.” You’ve got drink, I know, where you come from, ma’am; but not like here. The Firstcomers didn’t feel it was up to what they were accustomed to—said the yeasts were different or some such; at least, that’s what I’ve heard. They put other things in them to raise it up, and we use them yet. There’s—oh, maybe twenty or thirty different herbs and roots and whatnot we favor, and a little whitey-greeny worm we get out of the mud around aruum trees that’s particularly good if there’s a den in the roots, and then a fungus that grows in the mountain caves and has a picture like an autochthon’s hand in the middle sometimes and smells like haying. Those are poison when they’re old, but if you get a young one and cut it up and soak it in salt water for a week before you drop it in the crock, it’ll give you a drink that makes you feel—well, I don’t know how to put it. Like you’re young and going to live forever. Like nothing bad ever happened to you, and you’re likely to meet your mother and dad and everybody you ever liked that’s dead now just around the next turn in the road.

What I’m trying to tell you is that Pim, when his head was full— which it was most of the time—was not entirely like anybody you’re likely to have known before. Now you may say, as a lot did, that it was the drinking that made him see the houses; but suppose it worked the other way, and it was the drinking that made them see him?

Be that as it may, when he was going across the Nepo pass he saw one up on a high rock. At least, that’s what he said. Maybe it’s true; it was snowing, according to what he told me, and a house would figure—as I see it—that it would be hard for any ornithopter to see through the falling flakes, and the buildup on the roof would be no different from what it would see on the stones of the Nepo. Angled stone, you see, looking a lot like angled roofs, with the snow on both.

There were buildings up there a long time ago—I don’t know of anybody who’ll say how long. Buildings and walls that run along the crests of the mountains for as far as a man can see to either side (all tumbledown now, some of that stone will run like sand if you rub it between your fingers), and closed-in places that don’t look like they ever had roofs or floors; and doorways, or what look like them, in front of the mouths of caves. People go up there on picnics in the summer, and go back into those caves carrying torches now. You can see the smoke marks on the ceilings. But there’s whippers farther back—you know about those, I expect, because they bother your flying machines after dark; and in the winter there’s other animals that come into the caves to get out of the cold, so the picnickers find bones and broken skulls in places that were clean the year before. Some say the autochthons cut the stone and built the buildings and the walls; some say they only killed the ones who did.

I can’t believe it matters much. The builders are gone now, whether they came from off-world and tried to stay here, like us, or were earlier people of this world, or the autochthons—in happier days, as you might say. We’re dying out too, now—I mean, the old settler families. You’ll be persuading your own people to come here to live soon, just to fill the place up. Yes you will. Then we’ll see what happens.

What Pim saw was a house. Three stories and a big attic. Lights in all the windows, he said, but only just dim. For some reason—I would guess it was the drink—he didn’t feel like he could turn around and go back; he had to go forward. He’d been to Chackerville, you see, and was coming home across the pass. A man with that much in him will get to where he can’t help but sleep sometimes, and he’d been worried about that, because of the snow, before he saw the house. Well, that was one worry less, was how he put it. Seeing it woke him right up. I guess I never will forget how he told me about all the time he spent climbing up to the saddle, him keeping open his eyes all the time against the snow, afraid of losing sight of the house up there because he thought it might jump down on him. It wouldn’t do such a thing, you know. They can’t jump. They’d crack something if they tried. Still, it was strange for him, and as he said himself, it’s a wonder he went on.

If you had been there, you’d know how it is—a hollow, like, between the two mountains, with the ground falling away to front and back. The old road, built I guess by the same ones that built the buildings there, went right through the middle of it; and when the Firstcomers started to travel in this part of the world, they laid a new road over the old one. That new one’s wearing away now, and you can see the bones of the old through it. Anyway, that was where Pim was walking, on those big lava blocks. One up, one down, one side-wise—that’s the way the slant of them always seems to me to run. There’s them that will tell you every seventh one is cracked, but I won’t vouch for that.

They were icy that night, so Pim said, and he had to pick his way along; but every so often he’d look up and see the house perched there on the outcrop. It reminded him, he said, of what the Bible tells about the man that built his house on rock; and he kept thinking that he could go into it and be home already. There was a fire there—he knew that because of the smoke-smell from the chimney—and he would sit down and put his feet up on the fender and take a pull or two at his bottle and finally have a nap.

In the end he didn’t do it, of course, or he wouldn’t have been in the Center telling it to me. But he said he always felt like there was some part of him that had. That he split into two, some way, coming through the pass, and the other half was in that house still—wherever it was, for it ain’t up there now or more people would have told about seeing it—doing he didn’t know what.

But the funny thing was what happened when he went past. He could hear it groan. The snow was flying right into his face, he said, but he knew it wasn’t just the wind; the house was sorry he hadn’t stopped. All the way down, until the pass was out of sight, he watched the lights in the windows blink out one by one.

Sure you won’t have another? The evening chill is coming now, and that machine of yours don’t keep the air off you, or so it looks to me. Still, you know best, and if you must go, you must; sorry Nor and me couldn’t be of more help.

I’ve got her—set easy, Nor.

Ma’am, you’ve got to be careful of your footing in here. These floorboards are uneven, and a lot of our furniture has those little spindly legs on it, just like that table. They can be tricksy, as you found out.

There’s no good ending to that story of Pim’s—no more than I told already. He dropped out of sight a while afterward, but he’d done that before. Old Wolter, down to the Center, says he looked out one night, and there was another house setting beside his, and in at the window of it he could see Pim laying there with someone else beside him; he said he couldn’t be certain if either of them was dead or not. But Wolter ain’t to be believed, if you know what I mean.

I didn’t feel no shifting, ma’am. I oughtn’t to have given you what I did out of my flask. You’re not used to it, and it’s not for the ladies anyhow. I helped build this place, though, and it’s solid as a rock.

Not that way, ma’am. The door’s over—

Sure, I see your gun, and I know what it will do, too. I think you ought to put it away, ma’am. I don’t believe you’re feeling quite yourself, and you might harm Nor with that thing. You wouldn’t want to do that. Still, I don’t think you ought to open that door.

There! No, I won’t give it back; it’s safer, I think, with me. I doubt that you’ll remember; and if you was to, you couldn’t find us.

I didn’t want you to see her—that’s all. You’d have been happier, I think, without it—and it would’ve saved you that yell. Nor’s grandmother’s sister, she was. Still is, I guess. Great-aunt Enid. She talks to us still—there’s mouths, you see, in various places; would you credit she remembers people that was born before the first transporter left? That far back. Didn’t you ever wonder how different it was—

* * * *

Old Woman: Well, Todd, that’s the last of her—at least, for now. Hear that machine kick gravel. She expected you’d try to stop her when she ran for it, and she’ll be disappointed you didn’t, once she gets away down the road. Hope she don’t run that thing into a tree.

We’ll move on now, Enid.

You’re right, she’s not ready yet; but someday—I suppose it might be possible. Look at that other one. Someday this one will be ready to seek her peace. Come into a woman. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again—that’s why we’re all so comfortable here: we’ve been here before. Feel the motion of her, Todd. How easy she goes!

MANY MANSIONS

. . . If it were not so, I would have told you.

Gene Wolfe

Old Woman: So you are the new woman from the Motherworld. Well, come in and sit down. I saw you coming up the road on your machine.

Oh yes, Todd and I, we’ve always been friendly with you people, though there are some here still that remember the War. This was a rich district, you know, before; for a few, that’s hard to forget.

Well, it’s all behind us now, and it wasn’t us anyway. Just my father and Todd’s—and your grandmother, I suppose. Even if you were carried in a bottle, you must have had a grandmother, and she would have fought against us. Still, it’s good of you now to send people to help us rebuild here, though as you can see it hasn’t done much good.

I didn’t mean this place was here before the War—not much that you’ll see was. Todd built this thirty years ago; he was younger then —couldn’t do it now. You know, you are such a pretty thing—can’t I get you a cup? Well, we call it tea, but your people don’t. The woman who was here before you, she always said how much better the real tea was, but she never gave us any.

I tasted it once, but I didn’t like it. I was brought up on our own brewing, you see. I’ll pour you a glass of our wine if you won’t take tea; this cake has got a trifle dry.

Oh, I can imagine well enough what it’s been like. Going around from one to another saying, “Have you seen her? Do you know what happened to her?” and getting hostile looks and not much else. It’s because of the War, you know. That’s what my mother always said. People here weren’t like that before the War. Now—well, they know that you’re supposed to help them, to make up for it; and you’re not doing it now, are you? Just going about looking for your friend.

I doubt you’ll ever see her again. She’s been taken. I don’t suppose you know about that—the old houses? She didn’t either when she came; we had to tell her about it. I would have thought they’d teach you—put it in a little book to give out or something. Did you get one of those? Never mind—I’ve seen them. Saw hers, for all of that. She was such a pretty thing, just like you.

I don’t mind telling you—it’s the old houses, the ones built before the War. Todd’s family had one down at Breaker, and my own family, we had one here. I hear yours are different—all shiny metal and shaped like eggs, or else like nails stood on end. Ours weren’t like that; not in the old days, and no more now. More like this one you’re sitting in: wood, or what looked like it. But for all that you beat us, our fathers and grandfathers—and our mothers and grandmothers too, for our women weren’t what you think, you don’t really know about it—they had more power over machines than you do. They didn’t use them to make more machines, though; just put them in their houses to help out. They were friendly to their homes, you see, and thought their homes should be friendly to them.

Some say the brains of people were used to make the houses think. Taken out of the heads and put in jars in secret rooms, with wires running all over to work little fusion motors. Others say that the heads are still there, and the bodies too, to take care of the brains; but the houses don’t know it anymore, or don’t care. They say that if you were to go inside, and open the door of the right room, you’d see someone still lying on a bed that was turning to dust, while the eyes watched you from every picture.

Yes, they’re still here—some of them. Your girls burned most—I’ve never understood why. Beautiful things they were, so my mother used to tell me. Ours was white, and four stories high. They kept themselves up, you understand, the same as a woman. If there were people’s brains in them (and I’ve never been sure that was true) then they must have been women’s brains mostly. They kept themselves up. There were roses climbing up them, the same as a woman will wear a flower in her hair; and ours pinned wisteria to her like a corsage. The roofs were tight and good all the time, and if a window broke it mended itself with nobody troubling. It’s not like that now, from what I hear.

I’ve never seen one myself, not to speak of. Todd has, or says he has. He’ll tell you about it, if you like, when he comes in. But I’m not thinking, am I? Here you’ve sat all this time with your glass empty.

It’s no trouble—it’s our courtesy, you see, to host strangers. I know you don’t do it, but this is my house. Now, don’t you get angry; I’m a headstrong old lady, and I’m used to having my own way.

Don’t you use that word anymore? It just means woman now. Drink this and I’ll cut you some more cake.

None at all? I won’t force it on you. Yes, people see them—they’re still here, some of them, and so why not? Take our land; it ran back as far as you could go if you walked all day—clear to the river. The south property line was at the edge of town, and the north way up in the mountains. That was in the old days. Most of it was plowed and cultivated then, and what woodlands there was were cleared out. Then the War came. Half the autochthons were killed, like most of us; those that were left were happy enough to run off into the fens, or lie around the towns waiting for somebody to rob. We would have civilized them if you’d given us another century.

But you wanted to know about the houses. Pull the curtain there to one side, will you? It’s starting to get dark, and I always worry when Todd’s not home. No, dear, I’m not hinting for you to go—that machine of yours has a light on the front, don’t it? And a girl-woman—like you, that’s not afraid of anything, wouldn’t be afraid of riding home in the dark, I would think. Besides, I’d feel better if you’d stay; you’re a comfort to me.

Well, the War came, and most of the houses were told to hide themselves. Your people bombed them while we were still fighting, you know, and burned them after we gave up. So they hid, as well as they could.

Oh, yes, they can move around. It must have been so nice for the people before the War—they could have their homes down by the river in summer, and wherever the firewood was in winter—no, they didn’t need it for heat, I said they had fusion motors, didn’t I? Still, they liked wood fires.

So the houses hid, as I said. Hid for years while your girl soldiers went over the country and your ornithopters flapped around all day. In the deepest parts of the woods, most of them, and down in the crevasses where the sunlight never comes. They grew mosses on their roofs then, and that must have saved quite a few. Some went into the tarns, they say, and stood for years on the bottoms—Saint Syncletica’s church is under Lake Kell yet, and the people hear the bells ringing when they’re out on the water in storms.

If you’re fond of fishing, it’s a good lake, but there’s no roads to it —you’d have to walk. Your patrols used the roads mostly, so we let a lot of them grow up in trees again. The houses make false ones though, slipping through the thickets. That’s what the men say. Todd will be hunting in deep timber, where there shouldn’t be any road and there’s no place to go if there were, and come on one twice or three times the size of this room and the porch together, just going nowhere, winding down through the brakes. Some say you can follow those roads forever and never come to anything; but my Todd says that one time he walked one till it was near dark, and then he saw a house at the end of it, a tall, proud house, with a light in the gable window. My own home, that was, is what I think. My father used to tell how when he’d go out riding and not come back till midnight or later, there’d be a light burning for him in the highest window. It’s still waiting for him, I suppose.

Does anyone live in them? Well, some say one thing, some another. I told you I’ve never seen one myself, so how would I know? You’ll meet people who say they’ve seen faces staring out through the windows—who knows if they’re telling the truth? Maybe it was just shadows they saw on the walls in there. Maybe it wasn’t.

Oh, a lot of people go looking for them. There’s money inside, of course. Wealth, I should say, because the money’s worth nothing now. Still, the people who had those big houses had jewels, and platinum flatware—there was a fad for that then, so I’ve heard; and who could be trusted better to take care of it than their own homes? The ones that say they go hunting for people tell stories about little boys finding a spoon gleaming in the ferns, and seeing something else, a creamer or something, farther on. Following the trail, you know, picking up the things, until the house nearly has them. Then (this is the way the story always goes) they get frightened and drop everything and run away. I don’t believe a word of it. I’ve told Todd, if he should ever find any platinumware in the woods, or gold, or those cat’s-eye carbuncles they talk about, to turn around right then and bring it home. But he’s never brought back anything like that.

Don’t go yet—you’re company for me. I don’t get much, out here away from everybody. I’ll tell you about Lily—have you heard of her? It might have some bearing on the woman who was here before you.

I don’t know how you feel about morality—with your people it’s so hard to tell. Todd says we ought to forgive women like her, but then men always do. She was pretty enough—beautiful, you might say—and it’s hard for a woman alone to make a living. Maybe I ought not to blame her too much; she gave good value, I suppose, for what she received. A pretty face, men like that, not round like yours, but a long oval shape. Waist no bigger than this, and one of those full chests—at least, after she had begun doing what she did regular, and was getting enough to eat and all the drink she wanted. Skin like cream—I always had to hold back my hand to keep from running my fingers over it.

As well as you know me by now, you know I wouldn’t have her in my house. But it was an act of charity, I thought, to talk to her sometimes. She must have been lonely for woman-company. I used to go into town every so often then, and if I met her and there wasn’t anybody else about, I’d pass the time. That was a mistake, because when I’d done it once or twice she came out to visit me. See the two chairs out there? Through the window? Well, I kept her sitting there on the porch for over a hour, and never did ask her in or give her a bite to eat. When she went home she knew, believe me. She knew what I thought, and how far she could go. Coming to ask if she could help with the canning, like a neighbor!

Here’s what she told me, though. I don’t imagine you know where the Settles’ farm is? Anyway, up past it is where Dode Beckette lives —just a little shack set back in the trees. She was going up there one spring evening. He had sent for her, I suppose, or maybe she was just looking for trade; when a man has a woman alone knock at his door ... a woman like that—I don’t intend you, dear—why, nature is liable to take its course, isn’t it? She was carrying a load, if you know what I mean; she told me so herself. The air was chill, possibly, and it’s likely someone had left a bottle with her the night before. Still, I don’t think she was seeing things. She was accustomed to it, and that makes all the difference. Just enough to make her hum to herself, I would say. I used to hear her singing on the various roads round and about in just that way; it’s always those that have the least to make music about that sing, I always say.

First thing you know she went around a bend, and there was the house. It wasn’t the Settles’, or Dode’s shack—a big place. Like a palace, she said, but I would think that was stretching it a bit. More like the hotel, I should think. Not kept up, the paint peeling here and there, and the railing of the veranda broke; some of them have got a little careless, I think, hiding so long. Hunted things grow strange sometimes, though I don’t suppose you’ve noticed.

There was a light, she said. Not high like the one Todd saw, but on the first floor where the big front room would be. Yellow at first, she told me, but it got a rosy cast when she came closer; she thought someone had put a red shawl over it. There was music too. Happy dancing music, the kind men like. She knew what sort of house it was then, and so did I. She told me she wanted to walk up on that porch right then and never come out; but when she had the chance she was afraid.

She’s gone now, all right, but not because she found her house again. She’s dead.

I’m sorry, though there’s others I would miss more. They found her in a ditch over on the other side of Pierced Rock. Some man didn’t want to pay, very likely; her neck was broken.

Here comes Todd now. Hark to his step?

* * * *

Old Man: Got company, do we? I think I know who you are—the new young woman sent out from town. What is it they call it, the Reconstruction Office? Well, I hope Nor has entertained you. We ain’t much for society out here, but we try to treat our company right, and don’t think we’re high enough to look down on a visitor just because there wasn’t no father in her making. Nor fetched you a piece of cake, I see, and I’ll pour something for us all a trifle stouter than that wine you’ve been drinking. Keep the stabbers off.

Tingles your nose, don’t it? Sweet on the tongue, though.

That’s only this old house a-creaking. Old houses do, you know, particularly by night, and this one was carpentered by Nor’s dad just after the War. It’s the cooling off when the sun sets. Drink up—it won’t hurt you.

No, I can’t say I felt a thing. Know what it is, though—Nor filling you with tales of the walking houses hereabouts.

It’s true enough, ma’am, though we don’t often mention them to your women. I’ve seen them myself—Nor will have told you, no doubt. There’s those that think them so frightful—say that anybody setting foot in one just vanishes away, or gets ate, or whatever. Well now, it’s true enough they’re seldom seen again; but seldom’s not never, now is it? I’ll tell you a tale of my own. We had a man around here called Pim Pyntey; a drinking man in his way, as a good many of us are. Everybody said no good would come to him, though drunk or sober he was about as friendly a soul as I’ve known, and always willing to pitch in and help a neighbor if it was only a matter of working—didn’t have any money, you know; that kind never does.

Still, I’ve gone fishing with him often, though I wouldn’t hunt with him—always afraid he’d burn one of these here legs of mine off by accident. I’m ‘tached to both of them, as they say.

Anyhow, Pim, he started seeing them. I’d run into him down at the Center, and he’d tell me about them. Followin’ him—that was what he always claimed. “They’re after me, Todd, I don’t know why it should be, but they are. They’re followin’ me.” You’ve got drink, I know, where you come from, ma’am; but not like here. The Firstcomers didn’t feel it was up to what they were accustomed to—said the yeasts were different or some such; at least, that’s what I’ve heard. They put other things in them to raise it up, and we use them yet. There’s—oh, maybe twenty or thirty different herbs and roots and whatnot we favor, and a little whitey-greeny worm we get out of the mud around aruum trees that’s particularly good if there’s a den in the roots, and then a fungus that grows in the mountain caves and has a picture like an autochthon’s hand in the middle sometimes and smells like haying. Those are poison when they’re old, but if you get a young one and cut it up and soak it in salt water for a week before you drop it in the crock, it’ll give you a drink that makes you feel—well, I don’t know how to put it. Like you’re young and going to live forever. Like nothing bad ever happened to you, and you’re likely to meet your mother and dad and everybody you ever liked that’s dead now just around the next turn in the road.

What I’m trying to tell you is that Pim, when his head was full— which it was most of the time—was not entirely like anybody you’re likely to have known before. Now you may say, as a lot did, that it was the drinking that made him see the houses; but suppose it worked the other way, and it was the drinking that made them see him?

Be that as it may, when he was going across the Nepo pass he saw one up on a high rock. At least, that’s what he said. Maybe it’s true; it was snowing, according to what he told me, and a house would figure—as I see it—that it would be hard for any ornithopter to see through the falling flakes, and the buildup on the roof would be no different from what it would see on the stones of the Nepo. Angled stone, you see, looking a lot like angled roofs, with the snow on both.

There were buildings up there a long time ago—I don’t know of anybody who’ll say how long. Buildings and walls that run along the crests of the mountains for as far as a man can see to either side (all tumbledown now, some of that stone will run like sand if you rub it between your fingers), and closed-in places that don’t look like they ever had roofs or floors; and doorways, or what look like them, in front of the mouths of caves. People go up there on picnics in the summer, and go back into those caves carrying torches now. You can see the smoke marks on the ceilings. But there’s whippers farther back—you know about those, I expect, because they bother your flying machines after dark; and in the winter there’s other animals that come into the caves to get out of the cold, so the picnickers find bones and broken skulls in places that were clean the year before. Some say the autochthons cut the stone and built the buildings and the walls; some say they only killed the ones who did.

I can’t believe it matters much. The builders are gone now, whether they came from off-world and tried to stay here, like us, or were earlier people of this world, or the autochthons—in happier days, as you might say. We’re dying out too, now—I mean, the old settler families. You’ll be persuading your own people to come here to live soon, just to fill the place up. Yes you will. Then we’ll see what happens.

What Pim saw was a house. Three stories and a big attic. Lights in all the windows, he said, but only just dim. For some reason—I would guess it was the drink—he didn’t feel like he could turn around and go back; he had to go forward. He’d been to Chackerville, you see, and was coming home across the pass. A man with that much in him will get to where he can’t help but sleep sometimes, and he’d been worried about that, because of the snow, before he saw the house. Well, that was one worry less, was how he put it. Seeing it woke him right up. I guess I never will forget how he told me about all the time he spent climbing up to the saddle, him keeping open his eyes all the time against the snow, afraid of losing sight of the house up there because he thought it might jump down on him. It wouldn’t do such a thing, you know. They can’t jump. They’d crack something if they tried. Still, it was strange for him, and as he said himself, it’s a wonder he went on.

If you had been there, you’d know how it is—a hollow, like, between the two mountains, with the ground falling away to front and back. The old road, built I guess by the same ones that built the buildings there, went right through the middle of it; and when the Firstcomers started to travel in this part of the world, they laid a new road over the old one. That new one’s wearing away now, and you can see the bones of the old through it. Anyway, that was where Pim was walking, on those big lava blocks. One up, one down, one side-wise—that’s the way the slant of them always seems to me to run. There’s them that will tell you every seventh one is cracked, but I won’t vouch for that.

They were icy that night, so Pim said, and he had to pick his way along; but every so often he’d look up and see the house perched there on the outcrop. It reminded him, he said, of what the Bible tells about the man that built his house on rock; and he kept thinking that he could go into it and be home already. There was a fire there—he knew that because of the smoke-smell from the chimney—and he would sit down and put his feet up on the fender and take a pull or two at his bottle and finally have a nap.

In the end he didn’t do it, of course, or he wouldn’t have been in the Center telling it to me. But he said he always felt like there was some part of him that had. That he split into two, some way, coming through the pass, and the other half was in that house still—wherever it was, for it ain’t up there now or more people would have told about seeing it—doing he didn’t know what.

But the funny thing was what happened when he went past. He could hear it groan. The snow was flying right into his face, he said, but he knew it wasn’t just the wind; the house was sorry he hadn’t stopped. All the way down, until the pass was out of sight, he watched the lights in the windows blink out one by one.

Sure you won’t have another? The evening chill is coming now, and that machine of yours don’t keep the air off you, or so it looks to me. Still, you know best, and if you must go, you must; sorry Nor and me couldn’t be of more help.

I’ve got her—set easy, Nor.

Ma’am, you’ve got to be careful of your footing in here. These floorboards are uneven, and a lot of our furniture has those little spindly legs on it, just like that table. They can be tricksy, as you found out.

There’s no good ending to that story of Pim’s—no more than I told already. He dropped out of sight a while afterward, but he’d done that before. Old Wolter, down to the Center, says he looked out one night, and there was another house setting beside his, and in at the window of it he could see Pim laying there with someone else beside him; he said he couldn’t be certain if either of them was dead or not. But Wolter ain’t to be believed, if you know what I mean.

I didn’t feel no shifting, ma’am. I oughtn’t to have given you what I did out of my flask. You’re not used to it, and it’s not for the ladies anyhow. I helped build this place, though, and it’s solid as a rock.

Not that way, ma’am. The door’s over—

Sure, I see your gun, and I know what it will do, too. I think you ought to put it away, ma’am. I don’t believe you’re feeling quite yourself, and you might harm Nor with that thing. You wouldn’t want to do that. Still, I don’t think you ought to open that door.

There! No, I won’t give it back; it’s safer, I think, with me. I doubt that you’ll remember; and if you was to, you couldn’t find us.

I didn’t want you to see her—that’s all. You’d have been happier, I think, without it—and it would’ve saved you that yell. Nor’s grandmother’s sister, she was. Still is, I guess. Great-aunt Enid. She talks to us still—there’s mouths, you see, in various places; would you credit she remembers people that was born before the first transporter left? That far back. Didn’t you ever wonder how different it was—

* * * *

Old Woman: Well, Todd, that’s the last of her—at least, for now. Hear that machine kick gravel. She expected you’d try to stop her when she ran for it, and she’ll be disappointed you didn’t, once she gets away down the road. Hope she don’t run that thing into a tree.

We’ll move on now, Enid.

You’re right, she’s not ready yet; but someday—I suppose it might be possible. Look at that other one. Someday this one will be ready to seek her peace. Come into a woman. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again—that’s why we’re all so comfortable here: we’ve been here before. Feel the motion of her, Todd. How easy she goes!