The Complete Works: Fantasy & Sci-Fi Novels, Religious Studies, Poetry & Autobiography. C. S. Lewis
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These thoughts must have taken several hours and absorbed all his attention. He was aroused by what he least expected—the sound of a human voice. Emerging from his reverie he saw that all the fishes had deserted him. His own was swimming feebly: and there a few yards away, no longer fleeing him but moving slowly towards him, was the Un-man. It sat hugging itself, its eyes almost shut up with bruises, its flesh the colour of liver, its leg apparently broken, its mouth twisted with pain.
“Ransom,” it said feebly.
Ransom held his tongue. He was not going to encourage it to start that game again.
“Ransom,” it said again in a broken voice, “for God’s sake speak to me.”
He glanced at it in surprise. Tears were on its cheeks.
“Ransom, don’t cold-shoulder me,” it said. “Tell me what has happened. What have they done to us? You—you’re all bleeding. My leg’s broken . . .” its voice died away in a whimper.
“Who are you?” he asked sharply.
“Oh, don’t pretend you don’t know me,” mumbled Weston’s voice. “I’m Weston. You’re Ransom—Elwin Ransom of Leicester, Cambridge, the philologist. We’ve had our quarrels, I know. I’m sorry. I dare say I’ve been in the wrong. Ransom, you’ll not leave me to die in this horrible place, will you?”
“Where did you learn Aramaic?” asked Ransom, keeping his eyes on the other.
“Aramaic?” said Weston’s voice. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. It’s not much of a game to make fun of a dying man.”
“But are you really Weston?” said Ransom, for he began to think that Weston had actually come back.
“Who else should I be?” came the answer, with a burst of weak temper, on the verge of tears.
“Where have you been?” asked Ransom.
Weston—if it was Weston—shuddered. “Where are we now?” he asked presently.
“In Perelandra—Venus, you know,” answered Ransom.
“Have you found the space-ship?” asked Weston.
“I never saw it except at a distance,” said Ransom. “And I’ve no idea where it is now—a couple of hundred miles away for all I know.”
“You mean we’re trapped?” said Weston, almost in a scream. Ransom said nothing and the other bowed his head and cried like a baby.
“Come,” said Ransom at last, “there’s no good taking it like that. Hang it all, you’d not be much better off if you were on Earth. You remember they’re having a war there. The Germans may be bombing London to bits at this moment!” Then seeing the creature still crying, he added, “Buck up, Weston. It’s only death, all said and done. We should have to die some day, you know. We shan’t lack water, and hunger—without thirst—isn’t too bad. As for drowning—well, a bayonet wound, or cancer, would be worse.”
“You mean to say you’re going to leave me,” said Weston.
“I can’t, even if I wanted to,” said Ransom. “Don’t you see I’m in the same position as yourself?”
“You’ll promise not to go off and leave me in the lurch?” said Weston.
“All right, I’ll promise if you like. Where could I go to?”
Weston looked very slowly all round and then urged his fish a little nearer to Ransom’s.
“Where is . . . it?” he asked in a whisper. “You know,” and he made meaningless gestures.
“I might ask you the same question,” said Ransom.
“Me?” said Weston. His face was, in one way and another, so disfigured that it was hard to be sure of its expression.
“Have you any idea of what’s been happening to you for the last few days?” said Ransom.
Weston once more looked all round him uneasily.
“It’s all true, you know,” he said at last.
“What’s all true?” said Ransom.
Suddenly Weston turned on him with a snarl of rage. “It’s all very well for you,” he said. “Drowning doesn’t hurt and death is bound to come anyway, and all that nonsense. What do you know about death? It’s all true, I tell you.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’ve been stuffing myself up with a lot of nonsense all my life,” said Weston. “Trying to persuade myself that it matters what happens to the human race . . . trying to believe that anything you can do will make the universe bearable. It’s all rot, do you see?”
“And something else is truer!”
“Yes,” said Weston, and then was silent for a long time.
“We’d better turn our fishes head on to this,” said Ransom presently, his eyes on the seas, “or we’ll be driven apart.” Weston obeyed without seeming to notice what he did, and for a time the two men were riding very slowly side by side.
“I’ll tell you what’s truer,” said Weston presently.
“What?”