White Mars

18

Weeks turned into months, and months into another year. There were many who, despite the misfortune of their confinement on Mars, regarded our society as a fair and just one. I, on the other hand, came to see Utopia as a condition of becoming, a glow in the distance, a journey for which human limitations precluded an end. Yet there were comforting indications of improvement in our lot.

Kissorian and Sharon were among the first to take advantage of the greater scope for solitude afforded by the subterranean extensions. Their marriage was celebrated to the joy of many (and the envy of some), and they retired for a while from public life.

At the same time, the men who worked on the Smudge Project were experiencing new difficulties. One of the positive results of the recognition of Chimborazo as a life form was a closer union between scientists and non-scientists. Most of the gallant 6,000 realised that ours was one of the great scientific ages, and took pride in sharing its news. So we all felt involved when Dreiser announced that there was a minor glitch in the superfluid. At last, a signal had been received that was interpreted as the passage of a HIGMO through the ring.

Dreiser said that the Mars operation was coming to fruition as planned.

“When we have found just two more HIGMOs, or even one more, we shall finally have an approach towards an estimate of the crucial parameters of the Omega Smudge.”

“How long do we have to wait?” someone asked.

“Depends. We must be patient. Even ten or fifteen more HIGMOs will begin to give us fairly accurate values for these parameters. Various controversial issues will be settled once and for all, among other important things.” He glanced sidelong at Kathi Skadmorr, as if saying “Don’t rock the boat’, when her face now came up on the Ambient.

“We should just say there are some minor anomalies about the glitch detected in the superfluid,” she said. “Maybe we have a signal representing a HIGMO passing through the ring, maybe not. Some of us have a few worries about that. So we are waiting for the second HIGMO. As Dreiser says, we must be patient.”

But a second HIGMO was indicated only two days later.

“Well, it does seem a little fishy,” said Dreiser. “The ring has only been in full working order for a year. I’m talking terrestrial years now, as though we were no more aware than our androids that we are on another planet.” He gave a dry chuckle. “A year till we get a signal, then a second so soon.”

“Can’t they come in groups?” I asked.

He seemed to ignore the question, muttering to someone beyond lens range. Turning to face his audience again, he said, “There’s something particularly odd about the signature of this second glitch. It’s not the form we expected. You see, there’s a gradual oscillatory build-up instead of the anticipated almost clean ‘step-function’ you’d expect from a HIGMO. You have to appreciate that the first glitch took us unawares. Full details of its profile were not obtained.

“We’ll keep you posted.”

So we had to get on with our lives. The betterment of conditions brought about by the development of Lower Ground, as we called it, improved everyone’s morale. But, as with many improvements, these would not guarantee lasting contentment. I had taken a liking to Dayo Obantuji, the anxious young Nigerian, who showed great interest in our circumstances. We often discussed the developments of Lower Ground. Having abandoned musical composition, Dayo proved adept at devising decorative tile patterns, bursting with life and colour, to adorn the main corridor.

But I said to him, “If we look back to the metropolises of the nineteenth century, we see filthy cities. In New York and Paris and London, filth and grit and stench were permanent features of life. These cities—London in particular—were coal-oriented. There was coal everywhere, coal dumped down chutes in the street, coal dragged upstairs, coal spilt and burned in a million grates, grimy smoke, cinders and ash strewn here and there.

“The exudations of coal mingled with the droppings of the horses that dragged the coal carts through the streets and pulled all kinds of carriages and cabs. The whole place was a microclimate of filth. The twentieth century saw vast improvements. Coal was banished, smokeless zones were introduced. The noisome fogs of London became a thing of the past. Electric heating developed into central heating and air-conditioning. Solar-heating panels replaced chimneys. Animals disappeared from the streets, to be replaced by automobiles, which—at least until they multiplied beyond tolerance and were banished from our cities—brought a decided improvement to urban life.

“And was the new comfort and ease of the home, reinforced by vacuum-cleaners and other devices that made homes more hygienic, considered Utopian? Not at all. The improvements came in gradually and, once there, were taken for granted.”

“I wish they could have been taken for granted where I came from,” said Dayo. “Our governments never had the interests of the people at heart.”

“To greater or lesser extent,” I said, “that is the characteristic of all governments. It happened that in Western countries an educated population had a strong enough voice to regulate or become government. That educated class also accumulated the capital to invest in sustained improvement, which has in itself promoted more improvement, often in unanticipated spheres.

“To give an instance of the sort of thing I’m thinking of, back in the 1930s, in the fairly early days of motoring, an ordinary family found that a small car was within its price range; they could buy what was called, in those bygone days, ‘the freedom of the road’.

“Crude though methods of contraception were in those days, the family then had a choice: another baby or a Baby Austin? Another mouth to feed or a T-model Ford? By opting for the car, they lowered population growth rates, which improved family living standards and encouraged the liberation of women.”

Dayo looked moody. “In Nigeria it is scarcely possible to speak of the liberation of women. Yet when I think how intelligent my mother was—far more clever than my father…” Looking at the floor, he added, “I wish I was dead when I think how I behaved to her—learned behaviour, of course … Now she’s gone and it’s too late to make amends.”

Because I was afflicted by a migraine, Belle Rivers and Crispin Barcunda conducted the debate on sex and marriage. The motion was opposed by John Homer Bateson and Beau Stephens.

Bateson began in his most flowery manner: “To look back over the history of matrimony is to recoil from the cruelty of it. Love between a man and a woman hardly enters into the picture. It all comes down to a question of property and dowry and enslavement, either and most probably of the woman by the man, or of the man by the woman. As a woman by name Greer or Green said last century, ‘For a woman to effect any amelioration in her condition, she must refuse to marry.’

“I would say too for a man to attain the detachment that wisdom brings, he also must refuse to marry. He must quell the lust to possess, which lies at the base of this question. The woman, until recently, was legally bound to give up everything, her freedom, even her name, while the man was supposed to give up his freedom of choice and to apply himself, sooner or later, to the expense of the rearing of the children he conceived on his wife.

“Thus, while the word ‘wedding’ may cause some excitement in some breasts, somewhat like the word ‘mealtime’, the excitement is evanescent as the true nature of marriage dawns on the wedded pair. They must then contrive somehow to love their demanding offspring, who, it is fair to say, are most unlikely to requite that love by reciprocal affection or gratitude.

“We have already made what to my mind is overdue provision for children here—not to mention their careless addition to our population. Let them go—as the saying used to be—‘on the parish’, into the care of Belle Rivers and her professional carers. Let there continue to be the usual conjunction of overheated bodies, men with women, women with women, and men with men. But let us not consider the continuance on Mars of matrimony in any shape or form. We are imprisoned enough as it is.”

Bateson sat down and Crispin took the stand. “The genial Oliver Goldsmith remarked that a man who married and brought up his family did more service to the community than he who remained single and complained about the growing population. The outburst of misogyny we have just heard takes no account of love. I know it’s a word that covers a multitude of sins as well as virtues, but if we weigh love against its opposite, hatred, then we see how easily love wins.

“True, marriage once involved property. That’s history. In any case, Upstairs here we have no property beyond our persons. Now we marry to make public our commitment to each other, and to ensure, as far as that is possible, the stability of our lives for the enhancement of our children’s most tender years.

“If we do not want children, then we need not marry, but must take precautions until lust gives out and we forsake our partner for another.

“How satisfactory that is, I leave you to judge, but it would be folly to legislate against it. Is free love a prescription for contentment? I remind you of the old joke I heard in the Seychelles long ago. ‘Remember, no matter how pretty the next girl is who comes along, somewhere in her background there’s a guy who got sick of her shit and nonsense.’ ” He showed his gold tooth in a wide grin, before adding, “And that goes for the other sex as well, ladies…

“I can tell you now that I believe, on the other hand, that there is something ennobling about marriage and constancy, and that those qualities should be encouraged in our constitution. So convinced of their virtue am I that I’m proud to say Belle and I—despite some difference in our ages—intend to marry soon.” He burst out laughing with joy, gesturing gallantly towards Belle.

Belle immediately rose to her feet. She was seen to blush. “Oh, that was meant to be a secret!” she cried, between tears and laughter herself. He put his arms round her and they clung together.

I wished that Kissorian and Sharon could have been present, but we had not seen them for a while. “After this display, we’re bound to win,” Cang Hai whispered to me.

But Beau Stephens now rose, frowning. “Friends, this is a disgraceful spectacle, carefully rehearsed, no doubt, to persuade us to vote with our hearts instead of our heads. If these two rather ageing people are emotionally involved with each other, it is better it should be kept secret than acted out before us in this embarrassing charade.

“The case against marriage is that it is out-of-date and has become merely an opportunity for display and sentiment. Present-day ethics are against the whole idea. After the party’s over, and the gifts mauled about and complained of, before the confetti’s trampled into the mud of the pavement, most couples get divorced, only to indulge in legal wrangles that may continue for some years.

“That’s when we see that marriage is simply about property and lust. It shows no care for any children. It’s dishonest—another bad old custom that must go, if only to impoverish the lawyers.

“You seem fond of quoting, so I’ll give you a quote from Nietzsche, whose Also Sprach Zarathustra I read in my university days. As far as I recall, Nietzsche takes a spiritual view. He says that you should first be mature enough to face the challenge of marriage, so that marriage can enable you both to grow. You should have children who will profit by your spirituality, to become greater than you are. He calls marriage the will of two people to create a someone who is more than those who created it.

“This is a rigorous view of marriage, I know, but, as a child of divorced parents who hated each other, I took stock of Nietzsche’s words. The gross side of marriage has killed it as an institution.

“What we propose should be written into our constitution is that marriage is forbidden. No more marriages. Instead, an unbreakable contract to produce and rear children. Demanding, yes, but with it will come benefits and support from the state.

“This unbreakable contract may be signed and sealed by any two people determined to devote themselves to creating the brilliant and loving kind of child Belle Rivers thinks can be produced by an impractical rank on rank of shrinks. The new contract cannot be broken by divorce. Divorce is also forbidden. So it will be respected by one and all. Outside of that contract, free love can prevail, much as it does now—but with severe penalties for any couple producing unwanted babies.”

Stephens sat down in a dense silence as the forum chewed over what he had said.

Crispin slowly rose to his feet. “Beau has been talking about breeding, not marriage. Just because his—or rather, Nietzsche’s—ideas are admirable in their way, that doesn’t make them practical. They’re too extreme. We could not tolerate being locked for ever into a twosome that had proved to have lost its original inspiration, or to have found no other inspiration. To grow as Beau suggests, we must be free. We offer no such draconian answer as Beau proposes, to a question that has defeated wiser heads than ours.” He sighed, and continued more slowly.

“But we do know that a marriage is as good as the society in which it flourishes—or fails … It may be that when our just society is fully established the ancient ways of getting married—and of getting divorced where necessary—will prove to be adequate. How adequate they are must depend not on laws, which can be broken, but on the people who try to abide by them.

“Marriage remains a lawful and honourable custom. We must just try to love better, and for that we shall have the assistance of our improved society.”

He sat down, looking rather dejected. There was a moment’s silence. Then a wave of applause broke out.

At this period, I felt dizzy and sick and little able to carry on with my work. I seemed to hear curious sounds, somewhat between the bleat of a goat and the cry of a gull. Even the presence of other people became burdensome.

There was an upper gallery, little frequented, which I sought out, and where I could sit in peace, gazing out at the Martian lithosphere. From this viewpoint, looking westward, I could see the sparsely fractured plain, where the fractures ran in parallel, as if ruled with a ruler. These lines had been there—at least by human standards—for ever! Time had frozen them. Only the play or withdrawal of the Sun’s light changed. At one time of day, I caught from this vantage point the glint of the Sun on a section of the ring of the Smudge Project.

Visiting the gallery on the day following the marriage debate, I found someone already present. The discovery was the more unwelcome because the man lounging there was John Homer Bateson, who had displayed such misanthropy in his speech.

It was too late to turn back. Bateson acknowledged my presence with a nod. He began to speak without preliminaries, perhaps fearing I might bring up the topic of the recent debate.

“I take it that you do not subscribe to this popular notion that Olympus Mons is a living thing? Why is it that poor suffering humanity cannot bear to think itself alone in the universe, but must be continually inventing alternative life forms, from gods to cartoon characters?

“Make no mistake, Jefferies, however industriously you busy yourself with schemes for a just society, which can never come about, constituting as it does merely another Judeo-Christian illusion, we are all going to die here on Mars.”

I reminded him that we were looking for a new and better way to live—on which score I remained optimistic.

He sighed at such a vulgar display of hope. “You speak like that, yet I can see you’re sick. I’m sorry—but you have merely to gaze from this window to perceive that this is a dead planet, a planet of death, and that we live suspended in a kind of limbo, severed from everything that makes existence meaningful.”

“This is a planet of life, as we have discovered—where life has survived against tremendous odds, just as we intend to do.”

He pulled his nose, indicating doubt. “You refer, I assume, to Olympus? You can forget that—a piece of impossible science invented by impossible scientists enamoured of a young Aborigine woman.”

“Ships will be returning here soon,” I responded. “The busy world of terrestrial necessity will break in on us. Then we shall regard this period—of exile, if you like—as a time of respite, when we were able to consider our lives and our destinies. Isn’t that why we DOPs and YEAs came here? An unconsidered life is a wasted life.”

“Oh, please!” He gave a dry chuckle. “You’ll be telling me next that an unconsidered universe is a wasted universe.”

“That may indeed prove to be the case.” I felt I had scored a point, but he ignored it in pursuit of his gloomy thought.

“I fear that our destiny is to die here. Not that it matters greatly. But why can we not accept our fate with Senecan dignity? Why do we have to follow the scientists and imagine that that extinct volcano somewhere out there, out in that airless there, is a chunk of life, of consciousness, even?”

“Why, there is evidence—”

“My dear Jefferies, there’s always evidence. I beg you not to afflict me with evidence! There’s evidence for Atlantis and for Noah’s flood and for fairies and for unidentified flying objects, and for a thousand impossibilities … Are not these absurd beliefs merely unwitting admissions that our own consciousness is so circumscribed we desire to extend it through other means? Weren’t the gods of the original Greek Olympus one such example, cooked up, as it were, to explain the inexplicable? I suspect that the universe, and the universes surrounding it, are really very simply comprehended, had we wit enough to manage the task.”

“We have wit enough. Our ascendancy over past centuries shows it.”

“You think so? What a comfortable lack of humility you do exhibit, Jefferies! I know you seek to do good, but heaven preserve us from those who mean well. Charles Darwin, a sensible man, admitted that the minds of mankind had evolved—if I recall his words correctly—from a mind as low as that of the lowest animal.”

Attempting a laugh, I said, “The operative word there is evolved. The sum is continually ever greater than its parts. Give us credit, we are trying to exceed our limitations and to comprehend the universe. We’ll get there one day.”

“I do not share your optimism. We have made no progress in our understanding of that curious continuity that we term life and death since—well, let’s say, to be specific, because specificity is generally conceded to be desirable—since the Venerable Bede wrote his Ecclesiastical History some time in the seventh century. I trust you are familiar with this work?”

“No. I’ve not heard of the book.”

“The news has been slow to reach you, n’est ce pas? Let me quote, from my all too fallible memory, the Venerable Bede’s reflections on those grand questions we have been discussing. He says something to this effect. ‘When compared with the stretch of time unknown to us, O king, the present life of men on Earth is like the flight of a solitary sparrow through the hall where you and your companions sit in winter. Entering by one high window and leaving by another, while it is inside the hastening bird is safe from the wintery storm. But this brief moment of calm is over in a moment. It returns to the winter whence it came, vanishing for ever from your sight. Such too is man’s life. Of what follows, of what went before, we are utterly ignorant.’”

Sighing, I told Bateson I must return to my work.

As I walked away, he called to me, so that I turned back.

“You know what the temperature is out there, Jefferies?” He indicated the surface of Mars with a pale fluttering hand. “I understand it’s round about minus 76 degrees Celsius. Even colder than a dead body in its earthly grave! Nothing mankind could do would warm that ground up to comfortable temperate zone temperatures, eh? Do you imagine any great work of art, any musical composition, was ever created at minus 76 Celsius?”

“We must set a precedent, John,” I told him.

I left him alone on the upper gallery, gazing at the bleached landscape outside.