Brian W. Aldiss - There is a tide

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THERE IS A TIDE

by Brian W. Aldiss

How SOOTHING to the heart it was to be home. I began that

evening with nothing but peace in me: and the evening itself

jellied down over Africa with a mild mother's touch: so that

even now I must refuse myself the luxury of claiming any pre-

monition of the disaster for which the scene was already set.

My half-brother, K-Jubal (we had the same father), was

in a talkative mood. As we sat at the table on the veranda

of his house, his was the major part of the conversation: and

this was unusual, for I am a poet, and poets are generally

articulate enough.

"... because the new dam is now complete," he was say-

ing, "and I shall take my days more easily. I am going to

write my life story, Rog. G-Williams on the World Weekly

has been pressing me for it for some time; it'll be serialized,

and then turned into audibook form. I should make a lot of

money, eh?"

He smiled as he asked this; in my company he always

enjoyed playing the heavy materialist. Generally I encouraged

him; this time I said: "Jubal, no man in Congo States, no

man in the world possibly, has done more for people than

you. I am the idle singer of an idle day, but youwhy, your

good works lie about you."

I swept my hand out over the still bright land.

Mokulgu is a rising town on the western fringes of Lake

Tanganyika's nothem end. Before Jubal and his engineers

came here, it was a sleepy market town, and its natives lived

in the indolent fashion of their countless forefathers. In ten

years, that ancient pattern was awry; in fifteen, shattered

completely. If you lived in Mokulgu now, you slept in a bed

in a towering nest of flats, you ate food unfouled by flies,

and you moved to the sound of whistles and machinery. You

had at your black fingertips, in fact, the benefits of what

we persist in calling "Western civilization". If you were more

hygienic and healthyso ran the theoryyou were happier.

But I begin to sound sceptical. That is my error. I happen

to have little love for my fellow men; the thought of the

Massacre is always with me, even after all this time. I could

not deny that the trend of things at Mokulgu and elsewhere,

the constant urbanization, was almost unavoidable. But as

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a man of sensibility, I regretted that human advance should

always be over the corpse of Nature.

From where we sat over our southern wines, both lake

and town were partially visible, the forests in the immediate

area having been demolished long ago. The town was already

blazing with light, the lake looked already dark, a thing

preparing for night. And to our left, standing out with a

clarity which suggested yet more rain to come, stretched the

rolling jungles of the Congo tributaries.

For at least three hundred miles in that direction, man had

not invaded: there lived the pygmies, flourishing without

despoiling. That area, the Congo Source land, would be the

next to go; Jubal, indeed, was the spearhead of the attack.

But for my generation at least that vast tract of primitive

beauty would stand, and I was selfishly glad of it. I always

gained more pleasure from trees than population increase

statistics.

Jubal caught something of the expression on my face.

"The power we are releasing here will last for ever," he

said. "It's already changingimprovingthe entire economy

of the area. At last, at long last, Africa is realizing her

potentialities."

His voice held almost a tremor, and I thought that this

passion for Progress was the secret of his strength.

"You cling too much to the past, Rog," he added.

"Why all this digging and tunnelling and wrenching up of

riverbeds?" I asked. "Would not atomics haye been a cheaper

and easier answer?"

"No," he said decisively. "This system puts to use idle

water; once in operation, everything is entirely self-servicing.

Besides, uranium is none too plentiful, water is. Venus has

no radioactive materials, I believe?"

This sounded to me like an invitation to change the sub-

ject. I accepted it.

"They've found none yet," I assented. "But I can speak

with no authority. I went purely as a touristand a glorious

trip it was."

"It must be wonderful to be so many million miles nearer

the sun," he said. It was the sort of plain remark I had

often heard him make. On others' lips it might have sounded

platitudinous; in his quiet tones I caught a note of sublimity.

"I shall never get to Venus," he said. "There's too much

work to be done here. You must have seen some marvels

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