The City of Gold and Lead (The Tripods) by John Christopher Page B

few pigs, making things to sell in the village across the river. Then his father had died, in turn, and he had stayed on. No one from the village troubled about him; he was not counted as part of their life. This had happened in the spring of the year in which he would have been Capped, and during that summer he had not moved from the island, concerned with doing on his own all the things in which previously he had assisted his father. (He had buried his father, he told us, not far from the hut, and over slow months next winter carved a stone with his name to put over his grave.) Since then he had gone across to the village perhaps twice a year. He had a boat in which he rowed there and back.
    At first I was incredulous, thinking of the trouble allwe who had fled to the White Mountains had taken to avoid being Capped, while this man had just stayed where he was, not worrying. Surely there could not be flaws like this in the Tripods’ mastery of the earth? But the more I thought about it, the less surprising it seemed. He was one man, living like a hermit. The domination of the Tripods depended on the serfdom of men as such, and to that end it was enough that Capping should be accepted as a natural and inevitable thing where a handful of men, two or three even, were gathered together. One man did not matter, as long as he stayed quiet and caused no trouble. And the moment he did cause trouble, of course, he would be dealt with, either by the Tripods or their human servants.
    Beanpole, once he had established all this, quizzed him about the Tripods. Did he see much of them? What did he feel about them? I saw where the line of questioning was heading, and was content to leave it to him. He did not seem surprised at or suspicious of the conversation, and this in itself showed how small his contact with the wider world must have been. Local customs varied in different countries, but in every one the subject of Tripods and Caps was covered by a taboo. No one, Capped as we appeared to be, would have spoken like this.
    But if unsuspicious, he was also indifferent. He saw the Tripods from time to time, yes. He believed they damaged crops on the mainland; it was hard to see how they could avoid it, great massive things like they were.But none of them, he was glad to say, had ever planted its heavy foot on this island. As for Caps, well, people wore them, and they didn’t seem to do a lot of harm and didn’t seem to do any particular good. He believed it was something to do with the Tripods, since the boys who went for Capping were taken up by the Tripods. Did they prevent people wanting to fight against the Tripods? Beanpole asked daringly.
    Hans looked at him over his pipe. He said shrewdly:
    “Well, you’d know more about that than I do, would you not? But it wouldn’t make a lot of sense wanting to fight against the Tripods, would it? You would have to be pretty strong in the arm to throw a stone high enough to hit that part at the top, and what good would it do you if you did? For that matter, what’s the point in it? It’s not as though they do much harm. A bit of damage now and then to crops and cattle—to men, maybe, if they don’t get out of the way fast enough. But lightning can kill you with less chance of dodging, and hailstones can ruin crops.”
    Beanpole said, “We were on a raft further up the river. The raft was smashed by a Tripod. That’s how we came to be washed up here.”
    Hans nodded. “Bad luck comes to everyone. Some sickness got among my hens two years back. Wiped out all but three of them.”
    “We’re very grateful to you,” Beanpole said, “for giving us food and shelter.”
    Hans stared from his face to the fire, and back.
    “As to that, I get along without seeing people wellenough, but now you’re here . . . There’s some wood that needs cutting, up at the top end. I’ve had rheumatics in my shoulder, and it’s not got done. You can get on with that tomorrow, and it will pay for the