The Fabulous Riverboat

"Then, for heaven'th thaketh," Joe said, throwing up his football-sized hands, "vhat'th the uthe of talking about it? Or even doing anything? Vhy don't you jutht give up?"

"Because I can't help myself," Sam said. "Because, when the first atom in this universe bumped against the second atom, my fate was decreed, my very thought and action was fixed."

"Then you can't be, uh, rethponthible for vhat you do, right?" "That's right," Sam said. He felt very uncomfortable.

"Then John can't help it that he'th a murdering treacherouth thoroughly dethpicable thvine?"

"No, but then I can't help it that I despise him for being a swine."

"And I thuppothe that if thomebody thmarter than I am came along and thyowed you, by thtrict undeniable logic, that you vere wrong in your philothophy, that you vould thay that he can't help thinking you're wrong? But he'th wrong, it'th jutht that he'th predetermined, mechanically, to think the vay he doeth."

"I'm right, and I know it," Sam said, puffing harder on his cigar. "This hypothetical man couldn't convince me because his own reasoning does not spring from a free will, which is like a vegetarian tiger—that is, it doesn't exist."

"But your own reathoning doethn't thpring from a free vill, either." "True. We're all screwed. We believe what we have to."

"You laugh at thothe people who have vhat you call invinthible ignoranthe, Tham. Yet you're full of it, yourthelf."

"Lord deliver us from apes that think they're philosophers!"

"Thee! You fall back on inthultth vhen you can't think of anything elthe to thay! Admit it, Tham! You haven't got a lochical leg to thtand on!"

"You just aren't capable of seeing what I mean, because of the way you are," Sam said.

"You thyould talk to Thyrano de Bercherac more, Tham. He'th ath big a thynic ath you, although he doethn't go ath far ath you do vith determinithm."

"I'd think you two incapable of talking to each other. Don't you two resent each other, you look so much alike? How can you stand nose to nose, as it were, and not break up with laughter? It's like two anteaters..." "Inthultth! Inthultth! Oh, vhat'th the uthe?"

"Exactly," Sam said. Joe did not say good night, and he did not call alter him. He was nettled. Joe looked so dumb_ with that low forehead and the bone-ringed eyes and comical dill pickle nose and gorilla build and his hairiness. But behind those little blue eyes and the lisping was an undeniable intelligence.

What disturbed him most was Joe's comment that his deterministic belief was only a rationalization to excuse his guilt. Guilt for what? Guilt for just about everything bad that had happened to those whom he loved.

But it was a philosophic labyrinth which ended in a quagmire. Did he believe in mechanical determinism because he wanted to not feel guilty, or did he feel guilty, even though he should not, because the mechanical universe determined that he should feel guilty?

Joe was right. There was no use thinking about it. But if a man's thinking was set on its course by the collision of the first two atoms, then how could he keep from thinking about it if he were Samuel Langhorne Clemens, alias Mark Twain?

He sat up later than usual that night, but he was not working at his duties. He drank at least a fifth of ethyl alcohol mixed with fruit juice.

Two months before, Firebrass had said he could not understand the failure of Parolando to make ethyl alcohol. Sam had been upset. He had not known that grain alcohol could be made. He thought that the only supply of liquor would have to be the limited amounts that the grails yielded.

No, Firebrass had said. Hadn't any of his engineers told him? If the proper materials, such as acid, coal gas, or acetaldehyde and a proper catalyst were available, then wood cellulose could be converted into ethyl alcohol. That was common knowledge. But Parolando, until recently, was the only place on The River—he presumed—which had the materials to make grain alcohol.

Sam had called in Van Boom, who replied that he had enough to worry about without providing booze for people who drank too much as it was.

Sam had ordered materials and men diverted. For the first time in the history of The River, as far as anybody knew, potable alcohol was being made on a large scale. This resulted not only in happier citizens, except for the Second Chancers, but in a new industry for Parolando. They exported alcohol in exchange for wood and bauxite.

Sam fell into bed and the next morning, for the first time, refused to get up before dawn. But the next day he rose as usual.

Sam and John sent a message to Iyeyasu that they would regard it as a hostile act if he invaded the rest of the Ulmak territory or Chernsky's Land.

Iyeyasu replied that he had not intention of waging war on these lands, and he proved it by invading the state just north of his, Sheshshub's Land. Sheshshub, an Assyrian born in the seventh century B.C., had been a general of Sargon II, and so, like most powerful people on Earth, had become a leader on the Riverworld. He gave Iyeyasu a good fight, but the invaders were more numerous.

Iyeyasu was one worry. There were plenty of others to keep Sam going day and night. Hacking finally sent a message, through Firebrass, that Parolando should quit stalling He wanted the amphibian promised so long ago. Sam had kept pleading technical difficulties, but Firebrass told him that was no longer acceptable. So the Firedragon III was reluctantly shipped off.

Sam made a visit to Chernsky to reassure him that Parolando would defend Cernskujo. Coming back, a half mile upwind of the factories, Sam almost gagged. He had been living so long in the acid-bath-cum-smoke atmosphere that he had gotten used to it, but any vacation from it cleansed his lungs. It was like stepping into a glueand-sulphur factory. And, though the wind was a fifteenmph breeze, it did not carry the smoke away swiftly enough. The air definitely was hazy. No wonder, he thought, that Publiujo, to the south, complained.

But the boat continued to grow. Standing before the front port of his pilothouse, Sam could look out every morning and be consoled for his toil and tiredness and for the hideousness and stench of the land. In another six months, the three decks would be completed, and the great paddle-wheels would be installed. Then a plastic coating would be put over that part of the hull which would come into contact with water. This plastic would not only prevent electrolysis of the magnalium, it would reduce the water turbulence, thus adding ten mph to the boat's speed.

During this time, Sam received some good news. Tungsten and iridium had been found in Selinujo, the country just south of Soul City. The report was brought by the prospector, who trusted no one else to transmit it. He also brought some bad news. Selina Hastings refused to let Parolando mine there. In fact, if she had known that a Parolandano was digging along her mountain, she would have thrown him out. She did not want to be unfriendly, indeed, she loved Sam Clemens, since he was a human being. But she did not approve of the Riverboat, and she would not permit anything to go out of her land that would help build the vessel.

Sam erupted, and, as Joe said, "Thyot blue thyit for mileth around." The tungsten was very much needed for hardening their machine tools but even more for the radios and, eventually, the closed-circuit TV sets. The iridium could be used to harden their platinum for various uses, for scientific instruments, surgical tools and for pen points.

The Mysterious Stranger had told Sam that he had set up the deposit of minerals here but that his fellow Ethicals did not know that he had done so. Along with the bauxite, cryolite, and platinum would be tungsten and iridium. But an error had been made, and the latter two metals had been deposited several miles south of the first three.