V.

One midnight, Mondaugen stood on a small balcony just under the eaves, officially on watch, though little could be seen in the uncertain illumination. The moon, or half of it, had risen above the house: his antennas cut like rigging, dead-black across its face. As he swung his rifle idly by its shoulder strap, gazing out across the ravine at nothing in particular, someone stepped on to the balcony beside him: it was an old Englishman named Godolphin, tiny in the moonlight. Small scrubland noises now and again rose to them from the outside.

"I hope I don't disturb you," Godolphin said. Mondaugen shrugged, keeping his eyes in a constant sweep over what he guessed to be the horizon. "I enjoy it on watch," the Englishman continued, "it's the only peace there is to this eternal celebration." He was a retired sea captain; in his seventies, Mondaugen would guess. "I was in Cape Town, trying to raise a crew for the Pole."

Mondaugen's eyebrows went up. Embarrassed, he began to pick at his nose. "The South Pole?"

"Of course. Rather awkward if it were the other, haw-haw.

"And I'd heard of a stout boat in Swakopmund. But of course she was too small. Hardly do for the pack ice. Foppl was in town, and invited me out for a weekend. I imagine I needed the rest."

"You sound cheerful. In the face of what must be frequent disappointment."

"They leave the sting out. Treat the doddering old fool with sympathy. He's living in the past. Of course I'm living in the past. I was there."

"At the Pole."

"Certainly. Now I have to go back, it's that simple. I'm beginning to think that if I get through our siege party I shall be quite ready for anything the Antarctic has for me."

Mondaugen was inclined to agree. "Though I don't plan on any little Antarctic."

The old sea dog chuckled. "Oh, there will be. You wait. Everyone has an Antarctic."

Which it occurred to Mondaugen, was as far South as one could get. At first he'd plunged eagerly into the social life that jittered all over the sprawling plantation house, usually leaving his Scientific duties until the early afternoon, when everyone but the watch was asleep. He had even begun a dogged pursuit of Hedwig Vogelsang, but somehow kept running into Vera Meroving instead. Southsickness in its tertiary stage, whispered that adenoidal Saxon youth who was Mondaugen's doubleganger: beware, beware.

The woman, twice as old as he, exerted a sexual fascination he found impossible to explain away. He'd meet her head-on in corridors, or rounding some salient of cabinetwork, or on the roof, or simply in the night, always unlooked for. He would make no advances, she no response; but despite all efforts to hold it in check, their conspiracy grew.

As if it were a real affair, Lieutenant Weissmann cornered him in the billiard room. Mondaugen quivered and prepared to flee: but it proved to be something else entirely.

"You're from Munich," Weissmann established. "Ever been around the Schwabing quarter?" On occasion. "The Brennessel cabaret?" Never. "Ever heard of D'Annunzio?" Then: Mussolini? Fiume? Italia irredenta? Fascisti? National Socialist German Workers' Party? Adolf Hitler? Kautsky's Independents?

"So many capital letters," Mondaugen protested.

"From Munich, and never heard of Hitler," said Weissmann, as if "Hitler" were the name of an avant-garde play. "What the hell's wrong with young people." Light from the green overhead lamp turned his spectacles to twin, tender leaves, giving him a gentle look.

"I'm an engineer, you see. Politics isn't my line."

"Someday we'll need you," Weissmann told him, "for something or other, I'm sure. Specialized and limited as you are, you fellows will be valuable. I didn't mean to get angry."

"Politics is a kind of engineering, isn't it. With people as your raw material."

"I don't know," Weissmann said. "Tell me, how long are you staying in this part of the world?"

"No longer than I have to. Six months? it's indefinite."

"If I could put you in the way of something, oh, with a little authority to it, not really involving much of your time . . ."

"Organizing, you'd call it?"

"Yes, you're sharp. You knew right away, didn't you. Yes. You are my man. The young people especially, Mondaugen, because, you see - I know this won't be repeated - we could be getting it back."

"The Protectorate? But it's under the League of Nations."

Weissmann threw back his head and began to laugh, and would say no more. Mondaugen shrugged, took down a cue, dumped the three balls from their velvet bag and practiced draw shots till well into the morning.