Doorways in the Sand

by Roger Zelazny

But advisers come and go—general, departmental, special. I’ve dealt with the best and I’ve dealt with the worst. Offhand, I can’t say who was my favorite. Maybe Merimee. Maybe Crawford. Merimee helped me head off a suspension action. A very decent fellow. Crawford almost tricked me into graduating, which would probably have gotten him the Adviser of the Year award. A good guy, nevertheless. Just a little too creative. Where are they now?

Several minutes passed in this fashion, then: “All right,” he said, “I’m ready for you.” He looked up at me then and he smiled. “This semester. Mister Cassidy, we are going to graduate you,” he said. I smiled back at him. “That, Mister Wexroth, will be a cold day in hell,” I said.

Clocking his expressions, I noted disbelief, rage and puzzlement within the first five seconds. I was hoping for despair, but you can’t have everything all at once.

“Back where I left them so many years ago,” he went on. “I’ve a very peculiar feeling now—the thing I set out to analyze tonight. Did you ever look back at some moment in your past and have it suddenly grow so vivid that all the intervening years seemed brief, dreamlike, impersonal—the motions of a May afternoon surrendered to routine?” “No,” I said. “One day, when you do, remember—the cognac,” he said, and he took another sip and passed me the bottle. I had some more and returned it to him.

“They did actually creep, though, those thousands of days. Petty pace, and all that,” he continued. “I know this intellectually, though something else is currently denying it. I am aware of it particularly, because I am especially conscious of the difference between that earlier time and this present. It was a cumulative thing, the change. Space travel, cities under the sea, the advances in medicine—even our first contact with the aliens—all of these things occurred at different times and everything else seemed unchanged when they did. Petty pace. Life pretty much the same but for this one new thing. Then another, at another time. Then another. No massive revolution. An incremental process is what it was. Then suddenly a man is ready to retire, and this gives rise to reflection. He looks back, back to Cambridge, where a young man is climbing a building. He sees those stars. He feels the texture of that roof. Everything that follows is a blur, a kaleidoscopic monochrome. He is here and he is there. Everything else is unreal. But they are two different worlds, Fred—two completely different worlds—and he didn’t really see it happen, never actually caught either one in the act of going or coming. And that is the feeling that accompanies me tonight.”

“Two of the treasures of Earth are gone and we have a couple of theirs in return. What else would you call it?” “A link in a kula chain,” I said. “I am not familiar with the term. Tell me about it.” “The parallel struck me as I read the details of the deal we had been offered. The kula is a kind of ceremonial voyage undertaken at various times by the inhabitants of the island groups to the east of New Guinea—the Trobriand Islanders, the Papuans of Melanesia. It is a sort of double circuit, a movement in two opposite directions among the islands. The purpose is the mutual exchange of articles having no special functional value to the various tribes involved, but possessed of great cultural significance. Generally, they are body ornaments—necklaces, bracelets—bearing names and colorful histories. They move slowly about the great circuit of the islands, accompanied by their ever-growing histories, are exchanged with considerable pomp and ceremony and serve to focus cultural enthusiasm in a way that promotes a certain unity, a sense of mutual obligation and trust. Now, the general similarity to the exchange program we are entering with the aliens seems pretty obvious. The objects become both cultural hostages and emblems of honor to the trustees. By their existence, their circulation, their display, they inevitably create something of a community feeling. This is the true purpose of a kula chain, as I see it. That’s why I didn’t like the word ‘trade.’” “Most interesting. None ...