The Best of Michael Moorcock by Michael Moorcock

Author:Michael Moorcock [Moorcock, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Fantasy, Collections & Anthologies, Science Fiction, Short Stories (Single Author)
ISBN: 9781616963125
Publisher: Tachyon Publications - Tachyon Publications - Tachyon Publications
Published: 2009-04-15T04:00:00+00:00

Leaving Pasadena

I was asked by the woman why I had no pity. She sat on the floor, her elbow resting upon a couch, her head in her hand. She had not wept. Her anguish had tempered her eyes: they glittered with unvoiced needs. I could not touch her. I could not insult her with my compassion. I told her that pity was an inappropriate emotion. Our world was burning and there was no time for anything but rapid action. Africa and Australia were already gone. The clouds and the contamination were a matter of anxiety to those who survived. She told me, in slow, over-controlled syllables, that she was probably dying. She needed love, she said. I told her she should find someone, therefore, whose needs matched her own. My first loyalty was to my unit. I could not reach my hand to her. Any gesture would have been cruel.

The other two women came into the room. One had my bag. “You still don’t know where you’re going?” said the blonde, Julia. Her fashionably garish cosmetics appeared to give her face the lustre and texture of porcelain.

I turned my back and walked into the hallway. “Not yet.”

Julia said: “I’ll try to look after her.”

As I got to the front door of the apartment, the brown-haired woman, Honour, said: “You pious bastard.” She wore no make-up. Her face was as pale as Julia’s.

I accepted her accusation. I had at that moment nothing left but piety and I would not dignify it with words. I nodded, shook hands with them both. I heard her mumbling some despairing question from the room, then I had walked down the white steps of the Pasadena condominium, crossed the courtyard with its silenced fountain, its poised cherubs, brilliant in the sun, and entered the car which had been sent to collect me. I was leaving California. That was all I had been told.

My chief had a rented house in Long Beach, near the marina. We drove to it through avenues of gigantic palms until we reached the almost deserted freeway. Vehicles kept well apart, considering the others warily. Only government people had official driving permits; anyone else could be psychotic or a criminal.

Long Beach was still populated. There were even people sailing their yachts into the harbour. The Pacific threat seemed to bother the people only as much as they had been bothered by the threat of earthquakes. The houses were low and calm, divided by shrubs and trees, with neat grass. I saw a man riding a pony across his lawn. He waved sardonically at the car. Groups of women stared at the limousine with expressions of contempt. We found my chief’s house. The chauffeur went to tell him we were there. He came out immediately.

As he stopped to join me, the chief said: “You look bad. You should sleep more.”

I told him, dutifully, about the woman. He was sympathetic. “There’s a war on. It’s how it is in war.” Naturally, I agreed with him. “We are fighting for their good, after all,” he added.

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