Divinity | Page 3

the precaution to remove from
the lifeboat before that shattered, wouldn't be able to handle.
Near him was a strange spring, or little river, or whatever you might
call it. It broke from the ground, ran along the hard rocky surface for a
dozen feet, and then plunged underground again. There were other
springs of a similar nature scattered here and there, and now he realized
that their combined murmuring was the noise he had mistaken, on first
removing his helmet, for the rustle of the wind in the woods.
He would have enough to drink. The natives would bring him food.
What else could any reasonable man want?
It wasn't the kind of life he had dreamed of. No Martian whiskey, no
drugs, no night spots, no bigtime gamblers slapping him on the back
and calling him "pal," no brassy blondes giving him the eye. Still, it
was better than the life he had actually lived, much better. It would do,
it would have to do.
* * * * *

From what he had seen of the natives, he liked them--and feared them.
For all their mistaken faith in him, they seemed to be no fools. How
many times before had men from some supposedly superior civilization
dropped in upon the people of a new world and made that first
impression of divinity, only to have the original attitude of worship by
the natives give way to disillusion and contempt? Who was that fellow
they told about in the history books he had read as a kid? Cortez, way
back on Earth, when that planet itself had offered unexplored territory.
And later on it had happened on one of the moons of Jupiter, and on
several planets outside the System. The explorers had been gods, until
they had been found out. Then they had been savage murderers,
plunderers, devils.
It would be too bad if he were found out. He was one against them all,
he would never be able to fight off so many enemies. More than that,
he was a stranger here, he needed friends. No, he mustn't be found out.
"Better put on your helmet, dope," he told himself savagely. "They'll be
coming back soon, and if they find you without it--" He put on his
helmet, still muttering to himself. It wouldn't make any difference if he
were overheard. They didn't know Earth language and would take his
words for oracular utterances. He could talk to himself all he wanted,
and from the looks of things, there would be no one to understand him.
He hoped he didn't grow crazy and eccentric, like those hermits who
had been lost alone in space for too many years.
The helmet was the first nuisance. There would be others too. He
couldn't even talk in what had become his natural manner, with a whine
in every word, a whine that came from being treated with contempt by
police and fellow-criminals alike. A god had to speak with slow gravity,
with dignity. A god had to walk like a god. A god had endless
responsibilities here, it seemed.
He thought again of his mother. Ever since he could remember, it had
been, "Georgie, wipe your nose!" and, "Georgie, keep your fingers out
of the cake!" and Georgie do this and don't do that. A fine way to speak
to a god. Even after he had grown up, his mother had continued to treat
him like a baby. She had never got over examining his face and his ears

and his fingernails to make sure that he had cleaned them properly. He
couldn't so much as comb his hair to suit her; all through his abortive
attempt at college, and later at a job, she had done it for him.
But she had been a lioness in his defense later on, when he had given
way to that first irresistible impulse to dip his fingers in the till and get
away with what he thought would be unnoticed petty cash. It had been
her fault that the thing had happened, of course. She could have given
him a decent amount of spending money, instead of doling it out to him
from his own wages as if she were giving money for candy to a
schoolboy. She could have treated him more like the man he was
supposed to be.
Still, he couldn't complain. She had stuck to him all the way through,
whatever the charges against him. When that lug of a traveling
salesman had accused her Georgie of picking his pockets, and that
female refugee from a TV studio had charged poor harmless Georgie
with slugging her, it was his mother who had stood up in court and
denounced them, and solemnly told judge and jury what a sweet, kind,