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his resource."
Cugel gave a bitter laugh. "I am a man of iron principle, and I will not complain,
even though, lacking any better fare, I was forced to devour a great transparent
insect which I found at the heart of your rock-carving."
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The Eyes of the Overworld
Pharesm swung about with a suddenly intent expression. "A great transparent
insect, you say?"
"Insect, epiphyte, mollusc who knows? It resembled no creature I have yet seen,
and its flavor even after carefully grilling at the brazier, was not distinctive."
Pharesm floated seven feet into the air, to turn the full power of his gaze down at
Cugel. He spoke in a low harsh voice: "Describe this creature in detail!"
Wondering at Pharesm's severity, Cugel obeyed. "It was thus and thus as to
dimension." He indicated with his hands. "In color it was a gelatinous
transparency shot with numberless golden specks. These flickered and pulsed
when the creature was disturbed. The tentacles seemed to grow flimsy and
disappear rather than terminate. The creature evinced a certain sullen
determination, and ingestion proved difficult."
Pharesm clutched at his head, hooking his fingers into the yellow down of his
hair. He rolled his eyes upward and uttered a tragic cry. "Ah! Five hundred years
I have toiled to entice this creature, despairing, doubting, brooding by night, yet
never abandoning hope that my calculations were accurate and my great talisman
cogent. Then, when finally it appears, you fall upon it for no other reaeson than to
sate your repulsive gluttony!"
Cugel, somewhat daunted by Pharesm's wrath, asserted his absence of malicious
intent. Pharesm would not be mollified. He pointed out that Cugel had
committed trespass and hence had forfeited the option of pleading innocence.
"Your very existence is a mischief, compounded by bringing the unpleasant fact
to my notice. Benevolence prompted me to forebearance, which now I perceive
for a grave mistake."
"In this case," stated Cugel with dignity, "I will depart your presence at once. I
wish you good fortune for the balance of the day, and now, farewell."
"Not so fast," said Pharesm hi the coldest of voices. "Exactitude has been
disturbed; the wrong which has been committed demands a counter-act to
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validate the Law of Equipoise. I can define the gravity of your act hi this manner:
should I explode you on this instant into the most minute of your parts the
atonement would measure one ten-millionth of your offense. A more stringent
retribution becomes necessary."
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The Eyes of the Overworld
Cugel spoke in great distress. "I understand that an act of consequence was
performed, but remember! my participation was basically casual. I categorically
declare first my absolute innocence, second my lack of criminal intent, and third
my effusive apologies. And now, since I have many leagues to travel, I will "
Pharesm made a peremptory gesture. Cugel fell silent. Pharesm drew a deep
breath. "You fail to understand the calamity you have visited upon me. I will
explain, so that you may not be astounded by the rigors which await you. As I
have adumbrated, the arrival of the creature was the culmination of my great
effort. I determined its nature through a perusal of forty-two thousand librams,
all written in cryptic language: a task requiring a hundred years. During a second
hundred years I evolved a pattern to draw it in upon itself and prepared exact
specification. Next I assembled stone-cutters, and across a period of three
hundred years gave solid form to my pattern. Since like subsumes like, the
variates and intercongeles create a suprapullulation of all areas, qualities and
intervals into a crystorrhoid whorl, eventually exciting the ponentiation of a pro-
ubietal chute. Today occurred the concatenation; the 'creature,' as you call it,
pervolved upon, itself; in your idiotic malice you devoured it."
Cugel, with a trace of haughtiness, pointed out that the "idiotic malice" to which
the distraught sorcerer referred was In actuality simple hunger. "In any event,
what is so extraordinary about the 'creature'? Others equally ugly may be found
in the net of any fisherman."
Pharesm drew himself to his full height, glared down at Cugel. "The 'creature,' "
he said In a grating voice, "is TOTALITY. The central globe is all of space, viewed
from the inverse. The tubes are vortices into various eras, and what terrible acts
you have accomplished with your prodding and poking, your boiling and
chewing, are impossible to imagine!"
"What of the effects of digestion?" inquired Cugel delicately. "Will the various
components of space, time and existence retain their identity after passing the
length of my inner tract?"
"Bah. The concept is jejune. Enough to say that you have wreaked damage and
created a serious tension hi the
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The Eyes of the Overworld
ontological fabric. Inexorably you are required to restore equilibrium."
Cugel held out his hands. "Is it not possible a mistake has been made? That the
'creature' was no more than pseudo-TOTALITY? Or is it conceivable that the
'creature' may by some means be lured forth once more?"
"The first two theories are untenable. As to the last, I must confess that certain
frantic expedients have been forming in my mind." Pharesm made a sign, and
Cugel's feet became attached to the soil. "I must go to my divina-tory and learn
the full significance of the distressing events. In due course I will return,"
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"At which time I will be feeble with hunger," said Cugel fretfully. "Indeed, a crust
of bread and a bite of cheese would have averted all the events for which I am
now reproached."
"Silence!" thundered Pharesm. "Do not forget that your penalty remains to be
fixed; it is the height of impudent recklessness to hector a person already
struggling to maintain his judicious calm!"
"Allow me to say this much," replied CugeL "If you return from your divining to
find me dead and desiccated here on the path, you will have wasted much time
fixing upon a penalty."
"The restoration of vitality is a small task," said Pharesm. "A variety of deaths by
contrasting processes may well enter into your judgment," He started toward his
divinatory, then turned back and made an impatient gesture. "Come, it is easier
to feed you than return to the road."
Cugel's feet were once more free and he followed Pharesm through a wide arch
into the divinatory. In a broad room with splayed gray walls, illuminated by
three-colored polyhedra, Cugel devoured the food Pharesm caused to appear.
Meanwhile Pharesm secluded himself in his work-room, where he occupied
himself with his divinations. As time passed Cugel grew restless, and on three
occasions approached the arched entrance. On each occasion, a Presentment
came to deter him, first in the shape of a leaping ghoul, next as a zig-zag blaze of
energy, and finally as a score of glittering purple wasps.
Discouraged, Cugel went to a bench, and sat waiting with elbows on long legs,
hands under his chin.
103
The Eyes of the Overworld
Pharesm at last reappeared, his robe wrinkled, the fine yellow down of his hair
disordered into a multitude of small spikes. Cugel slowly rose to his feet.
"I have learned the whereabouts of TOTALITY," said Pharesm, in a voice like the
strokes of a great gong. "In indignation, removing itself from your stomach, it has
recoiled a million years into the past."
Cugel gave his head a solemn shake. "Allow me to offer my sympathy, and my
counsel, which is: never despair! Perhaps the 'creature' will choose to pass this
way again."
"An end to your chatter! TOTALITY must be recovered. Come."
Cugel reluctantly followed Pharesm into a small room walled with blue tile,
roofed with a tall cupola of blue and orange glass. Pharesm pointed to a black
disk at the center of the floor. "Stand there."
Cugel glumly obeyed. "In a certain sense, I feel that "
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