Tessnek hissed scornfully. “I am not referring to the Big Ugly’s usual rudeness. I am resigned to that.” He was lying, as Ttomalss knew, for the sake of moral advantage. Before Ttomalss could call him on it, he continued, “I am referring to the disgusting growth of hair she is cultivating on top of her head. It truly does sicken me. I want to turn my eye turrets away every time I see her.”
“You have never complained about the hair wild Big Uglies grow,” Ttomalss replied, “so I think you are singling her out for undue, unfair attention.”
“But those other Big Uglies are, as you point out, wild,” Tessnek said. “Both you and Kassquit have been prating that she is a proper citizen of the Empire. Proper citizens of the Empire do not grow hair.”
“I know of no law or regulation forbidding citizens of the Empire from growing hair.” Ttomalss swung both eye turrets toward Tessrek and spoke in judicious tones: “As a matter of fact, you might try it yourself. It could do wonders for your appearance.”
Tessrek hissed again, this time in real fury. Ttomalss broke the connection in the middle of the hiss. With any luck, Tessrek wouldn’t bother him for some time. Ttomalss’ mouth fell open in a laugh. He hadn’t enjoyed himself so much since… Since mating with Felless, he thought. But then he made the negative gesture. The pleasures of mating were altogether distinct from other sorts.
He went back to work with a lighter liver. A moment later, though, he too hissed, in chagrin and dismay. He’d bounced Kassquit’s arguments off Tessnek’s snout. They made a surprisingly good case when he used them against a male he’d long disliked.
Of course, when Kassquit used those arguments against him, he’d thought them absurd. What did that mean? He was scientist enough to see one possibility he’d rejected out of hand before. By the Emperor, he thought, and cast down his eye turrets. What if she is right?
Once conquered, the Rabotevs and the Hallessi had soon abandoned almost all of their own cultural baggage and been assimilated into the larger, more complex, more sophisticated culture that was the Empire. And their cases had always been the Race’s models for what would happen on Tosev 3.
But what if the model was wrong? In terms of biology, the Big Uglies were fan more different from the Race than either the Rabotevs on the Hal-lessi. And in terms of culture, they were far closer to the Race than the Rabotevs on the Hallessi had been. Both those factors argued that they would acculturate more slowly and to a lesser degree than either of the other species the Race had conquered.
Even if Tosev 3 was finally conquered in full, Tosevites might go right on letting their hair grow and wearing wrappings. They might keep speaking their own languages and practicing their own superstitions. That would make life-to say nothing of administration-more difficult for the Race.
Ttomalss wondered if in their own history the Big Uglies had known any situations analogous to this one. He knew less than he should have about Tosevite history. So did the Race as a whole. It hadn’t seemed germane. But maybe it was. I wonder how I can get in touch with a Tosevite historian, he thought. Maybe Felless will know a way, down there on the surface of Tosev 3.
“No,” Pshing told Straha when he tried to call Atvar. “The fleetlond is busy with important matters, and has given orders that he cannot be disturbed.”
“Am I no longer an important matter, then?” Straha demanded angrily. “Were it not for me, you would still have no idea which Tosevite not-empire struck at the colonization fleet.”
“I am sorry, sup-” Atvan’s adjutant checked himself. Straha’s rank remained a point of ambiguity. He wasn’t a shiplond any more, not to anyone but himself. What was he? Nobody quite knew. Not enough for Pshing to call him superior sir, evidently. “I am sorry,” Pshing repeated. “The fleetlond has given me explicit orders, and I cannot disobey them.”
Straha wondered if he were the only male of the Race on Tosev 3 who’d ever imagined disobeying orders. After a moment’s thought, he realized he wasn’t. There had been mutinies during the first round of fighting-only a handful, but they did happen. By all he’d been able to find out, few of them had had happy aftermaths for the mutineers.
Had his own defection had a happy aftermath for him? He was still try-ing to figure that out. It could have been worse. He did know that. He could have defected to the SSSR, for instance. He shuddered at the thought. He might have done it. He hadn’t known any better then.
“And now, if you will excuse me…” Pshing said, and broke the connection.
Straha wondered what would happen if he tried to walk into Atvar’s of-fice despite being unwelcome. By far the most likely result would be his expulsion. He sighed. Much as he enjoyed irritating the fleetlond, here he would get more irritation than he gave out.
I was freer in the United States, he thought. For a moment, the idea of redefecting crossed his mind. But he made the negative gesture. After the destruction of Indianapolis, the Americans would not welcome him.
On the other fork of the tongue, the Race didn’t welcome him, either. He was still Straha the traitor as far as males and females here in Cairo were concerned. What he knew was useful. He himself? They wished they could take his knowledge and leave him alone. They might as well have been Americans.
He made the negative gesture again. In that regard, the Race was worse than the Americans, because his own kind were more self-righteous and sanctimonious. And, he realized, he had more of a taste for freedom, for doing what he wanted to do when he wanted to do it, than had been true before he defected to the United States.
Who would have believed it? he thought. The Big Uglies’ ideology has painted itself on me. That wasn’t true to any enormous extent-he still thought the American reporter who would have printed his opinion that the United States had been responsible for attacking the colonization fleet was addled. The male had had no business doing any such thing.
And then the ex-shiplord’s mouth fell open in a startled laugh. When he’d offered the reporter that opinion, he’d thought of it as nothing but a joke, a way to get under the Tosevite’s scales-no, under his skin was the English idiom, because Big Uglies had no scales. But he’d told the fellow the truth after all.
So what? he thought. Even if it was the truth, it had no business appearing in a newspaper. Maybe I am not so enamored of freedom as I thought. But he made the negative gesture once more. Compared to the Americans, he was a reactionary. Compared to his own kind, he was a radical, and a worse radical than he’d been before fleeing to the USA.
And there were plenty of males-and, by now, very likely some females, too-who were a good deal more radical than he. The expatriate community in the United States was flourishing. Some males were even prepared to look kindly on snoutcounting, and to propose institutionalizing it for the Race as well. That still struck Straha as laughable.
That members of the Race could hold such ideas, though, was bemusing. Everyone talked about the ways in which the Race was influencing Tosev 3 and the Tosevites. And with good reason: the Race’s influence on the planet and its folk was profound. And the Race’s influence on the Tosevites had been envisioned since the first probe sent to this world found it habitable.
No one-at least, no one among the Race-seemed much interested in talking about ways in which Tosev 3 and the Tosevites were exerting influence in the other direction. Nobody had expected the Big Uglies to own any ideas worth investigating. The probe sent to this world hadn’t shown everything worth showing-or rather, Tosev 3 and the Tosevites had changed far faster than anyone back on Home had imagined possible. The leading civilizations here were formidable intellectually as well as technologically.
And Tosev 3 itself was influencing the Race. A good-sized jar of ginger sat on the floor by Straha’s sleeping mat. He went over and had a taste. How many males, how many females, indulged themselves so whenever they found the chance? He could freely do so-a small mercy from Atvar, who did not seem inclined to grant any large ones.
For the Race as a whole, though, an
d especially for females, ginger nemained illegal, with harsh penalties levied against those caught using it. But males and females kept right on tasting. Mating season as a brief, separate time was a thing of the past. The colonists were still new to Tosev 3. They hadn’t fully adjusted to the change yet; a lot of them kept trying to pretend it hadn’t happened. But how would things look in a couple of generations?
Straha had heard the scandalous story of the two perverts who’d become as sexually addicted to each other as they were physically addicted to the herb. All things considered, Straha supposed Atvar had been wise to exile them to the USA, where the Big Uglies reckoned such infatuations normal.
“But Atvar has all the imagination of a mud puddle,” Straha said. He was sure his chamber was monitored, but didn’t care; his opinion of the fleetlond was about as far removed from secret as it could be. Atvar no doubt believed the two perverts an aberration. Maybe they were. Straha wouldn’t have bet on it. To him, they seemed far more likely to be the shape of things to come.
The telephone hissed. “Former shiplord and current nuisance Straha speaking,” Straha said. “I greet you.”
“And I greet you.” Atvan’s image appeared in the monitor. “You have named yourself well.”
“For which I more or less thank you.” With ginger making every nerve twang, Straha didn’t much care what he said.
“Pshing tells me you tried to call,” Atvan said. “I was occupied. I am no longer. What do you want? If it is anything reasonable, I will try to get it for you.”
“That is more than you have said for some time,” Straha replied. “What I chiefly want to know is whether you have finally extracted all the yolk from my egg. If you have, I would like to live somewhere other than Shepheard’s Hotel.”
“Your debriefing appears to be complete, yes,” Atvar answered. “But what will you do if you are turned loose on the members of the Race here on Tosev 3? How will you support yourself? The position of shiplord came with pay. The position of nuisance, while otherwise eminent, does not.”
In genuine curiosity, Straha asked, “Where did you learn such sarcasm? You did not speak so when I was a shiplord.”
“Dealing with Fleetlord Reffet may have something to do with it,” Atvar told him. “Dealing with Big Uglies may have something to do with it, too. In different ways, they drive a sensible male mad.”
That assumed he was sensible. Straha made no such assumption. But he kept quiet about the assumptions he did make. Atvar held his fate in his fingerclaws. All he said was, “You are not quite the male you were.”
“No one who comes to Tosev 3 escapes unchanged,” Atvar said. “But you have not answered my question. Have you any plans for making a living if you are allowed entry into the greater society of the Race?”
“As a matter of fact, I have,” Straha said. “I was thinking of drafting my memoirs and living off the proceeds of publication. I am, I gather, notorious. I ought to be able to exploit that for the sake of profit.”
“No one who comes to Tosev 3 escapes unchanged,” Atvar repeated. “When you were a shiplord, you would never have debased yourself so.”
“Perhaps not,” Straha said. “But then again, who knows? I have had unique experiences. Why should others not be interested in learning of them?”
“Because they were illegal?” Atvar suggested. “Because they were shameful? Because your descriptions of them may be libelous?”
“All those things should attract interest to my story,” Straha said cheerfully. “No one would care to read the memoirs of a clerk who did nothing but sit in front of a monitor his whole life long.”
“No one will read your memoirs if they are libelous,” Atvar said. “You are not in the United States any more, you know.”
“Exalted Fleetlord, I do not need to be libelous to be interesting,” Straha said.
“I will be the judge of that, when my aides and I see the manuscript you produce,” Atvar said.
Had Straha been a Big Ugly, he would have smiled. “You and your aides will not be the only ones judging it. I am sure Fleetlord Reffet and many of the colonists would be fascinated to learn all the details of what happened before they got here. And, as I say, I doubt I would need to distort the truth in any way to keep them entertained and their tongues wagging.”
He waited to see how Atvar would take that. He despised Reffet almost as much as Atvar did, but if he could use the fleetlord of the colonization fleet as a lever against the fleetlord of the conquest fleet, he would not only do it, he would enjoy doing it. And, sure enough, Atvar said, “You mean you will go out of your way to embarrass me and hope Reffet will like the result enough to let you go ahead and publish it.”
“That is not at all what I said, Exalted Fleetlord,” Straha protested, although it was exactly what he’d meant.
“Suppose I let you get away with that,” Atvar said. “Suppose I pretend not to notice whatever you may have to say about me. Will you include in your memoirs passages indicating the need for a long-term Soldiers’ Time here on Tosev 3, to help stop the endless grumbling from the colonists? The Race, after all, is more important than either one of us.”
Straha hadn’t expected that, either. Yes, Atvar had changed over the years. To some degree, that made him harder to dislike, but only to some degree. Straha made the affirmative gesture. “I think we have a bargain.”
“Imagine my delight.” Atvar broke the connection. No, he wasn’t so hard to dislike after all.
15
As Reuven and Moishe Russie were walking from their home to the office they now shared, Reuven’s father asked him, “And how is Mrs. Radofsky’s toe these days?”
His tone was a little too elaborately casual to be quite convincing. “It seems to be coming along very well,” Reuven answered. Listening to himself, he found he also sounded a little too elaborately casual to be quite convincing.
“I’m glad to hear it,” Moishe Russie said. “And what is your opinion of those parts of Mrs. Radofsky located north of her fractured toe?”
“My medical opinion is that the rest of Mrs. Radofsky is quite healthy,” Reuven replied.
His father smiled. “I don’t believe I asked for your medical opinion.”
“Well, it’s what you’re going to get,” Reuven said, which made Moishe Russie laugh out loud. After a few more paces, Reuven added, “I think she’s a very nice person. Her daughter is a sweet little girl.”
“Yes, that’s always a good sign,” Moishe Russie agreed.
“A good sign of what?” Reuven asked.
“That someone is a nice person,” his father said. “Nice people commonly have nice children.” He gave his own son a sidelong glance. “There are exceptions every now and then, of course.”
“Yes, I suppose an obnoxious father could have a nice son,” Reuven said blandly. His father laughed again, and thumped him on the back.
They were both still chuckling as they went into the office. Yetta, the receptionist, had got there ahead of both of them. She sent them disapproving looks. “What’s waiting for us today, Yetta?” Moishe Russie asked. He and Reuven already had a pretty good idea of their scheduled appointments, but Yetta got fussy if they didn’t respect what she saw as her prerogative.
Sometimes, as now, she got fussy anyhow. “Neither one of you has enough to keep you busy,” she complained. “I don’t know how you expect to pay the bills if you don’t have more patients.”
“We’re doing all right,” Reuven said, which was true and more than true.
“Well, you won’t keep doing all right unless more people come down sick,” Yetta snapped. Reuven looked at his father. His father was looking at him. That made it harder for both of them to keep from laughing. Somehow, they managed. They went past the disapproving Yetta and into their own offices. Neither of them had an appointment scheduled till ten o’clock, an hour and a half away. Reuven caught up on paperwork-a never-ending struggle-and was working his way through a Lizard medical journal when his
father called him.
“What’s up?” Reuven asked.
“I hear Ppurrin and Waxxa really have gone to the United States,” Moishe Russie answered.
“Have they?” Reuven said. “Well, that’s one problem solved for old Atvar, then, and some credit for us because we came up with the idea for him.”
“Credit for us, yes,” his father said. “A problem solved? I don’t know. I wouldn’t bet on it, though for the time being I think Atvar thinks he won’t have to worry about it any more.”
“What do you mean?” Reuven said. “The Americans will let those Lizards stay. They may be perverts to the Race, but not to us.”
“I’m sure the Americans will let them stay, yes.” His father nodded. “That’s not the problem, or not as I see it, anyhow.”
Reuven scratched his head. “What is, then? I’m sorry, Father, but I’m not following you at all.”
No? Moishe Russie grinned. “All right. Let’s put it like this: do you think Ppurrin and Waxxa will be the only pair of what the Lizards call perverts that they’ll have? A lot of Lizards taste ginger.”
“Oh,” Reuven said, and then, in an altogether different tone of voice, “Oh.” He gave his father an admiring look. “You think those two are just the tip of the iceberg, don’t you?”
“Don’t you?” his father returned. “The colonists haven’t been here very long, after all, and this is already starting to happen. What will things be like when you’re my age? What will things be like when your children are my age?”
Most times, Reuven would have pointed out with some heat that he had no children at present. Today, though, he nodded thoughtfully. “They’ll have to change a lot of things to adjust to that, won’t they? I mean, if they really do start forming permanent mated pairs.”
“Start falling in love and getting married,” Moishe Russie said, and Reuven nodded, accepting the correction. His father went on, “It will be as hard for them to get used to the idea of pairs settling down together as it would be for us to get used to the idea of being promiscuous all the time.” He wagged a finger at his son. “And wipe that dirty grin off your face.”
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