by H. M. Hoover
Dr. Farr immediately crossed his eyes and let his jaw hang slack. "Perhaps drool a bit," he added.
"You couldn't keep up that pose for long," said Scotty as she joined them. "If you were intelligent, you'd do what the lumpies do—deadpan."
"But why did they do it?" the man persisted. "They had the technology here to sustain them on arrival, give them time to acclimate before moving out. Yet they built nothing, did nothing. I don't understand it."
"I think well find out soon," said Lian. "The computer is talking to them. Whatever it's saying . . ."
Like a person long deprived of fellowship, the Counter could not stop talking once it started. There was so much to tell, so long a time to make up for, so many things it wanted its people to know. With each passing hour of sunlight, the Counter thought of more and more information it needed to impart.
One by one the smallest lumpies fell asleep on their feet, arms folded over their chests, heads resting on the legs or side of whoever was nearest to them. Some of the adults were staring too fixedly at the screen. Lian checked her watch. More than three hours had passed since the film began. No wonder they were glassy-eyed.
She tried to pay attention, but her mind was wandering. What was going to happen to the lumpies? Why did her mother make her feel as if she were six years
old sometimes? This dome was much too dirty to house a computer; there was a haze in the still air. Dust motes danced in the light cone focused on the computer housing. And it was too hot in here. Lian opened her jacket, unsnapped the cuffs, and yawned. There was a camera watching her; she stared up at it, thinking, Why don't you take a break so we can all go and eat?
The Guardian was turning off; the Counter could not pinpoint why. The Guardian's thought processes seemed almost totally occupied by images of airborne particles and edibles. The Counter's own people were similarly preoccupied. The Counter fell quiet to reflect on this new input With one minute portion of its mind it tested long-unused connections and found them responding.
To its great surprise, no sooner had the Counter stopped talking than its entire audience rose to leave. In less than two minutes the dome was empty, the gate closed. The Counter was alone again. It thought it over. In human terms its analysis could have been summarized as, "It must have been something I said."
Like children released from school, the lumpies ran out into the sunshine. Although they didn't seem to be talking, their eyes, their smiles, their very gait gave the impression of ebullience. By the time Lian, Scotty, and Dr. Farr reached the outer door, the last of the lumpies could be seen romping up the earthwork and down into the thick woods on the other side.
"Do you think we should follow them?" asked Scotty. "They look so happy ... as if they were going off to celebrate." She looked rather wistful.
"I don't think it would be polite," Dr. Farr said.
"Probably not," she agreed with a sigh. "We don't know their customs. They might feel we were intruding on a family gathering."
"I think they're just hungry and went to find lunch," said Lian.
"Something so mundane?" asked Dr. Farr.
Lian returned his grin, then looked at the door. "I don't feel like going back today. I spend almost all my time indoors at home."
"At your age? Why?" Dr. Farr obviously did not approve.
"Because we're up most nights working, and we sleep during the day. Besides, there's no place to go. Just a road between the telescope domes. Half the time the weather is too cold to go out." By mutual unspoken consent, they began walking back to camp.
"But you're so close to the best climate on Balthor,'9 the man said. "Don't you ever go on vacation? Perhaps fly to the coast, or down here? We've been here only six weeks, and I know a dozen scenic places where you could camp."
"No," said Lian, and seeing him frown, explained. "Most of our staff, and my parents, too, prefer being indoors. They come from cities or colonies; they've spent most of their lives on spaceships or observation satellites. Always enclosed. Large open space frightens them. Insects and animals terrify them; they think everything is going to bite. They like walls around them and floors below, rooms preferably carpeted and climate-controlled. They are children of the Container Generation."
The man gave her an appraising look. "You've observed all this? Or did they tell you how to feel?"
"No one admits things like that. They don't even think about them."
"But you do?"
"I get very restless. That's why I make the supply runs, just for an excuse to get outside, to get away, to see trees and water. Limai isn't scenic, but at least—"
"It's a change of scene?" he said, and frowned thoughtfully. "Your parents, Lian—what do they plan for you? What was their purpose—"
"What was that?" Scotty raised her hand for quiet. From somewhere deep in the woods came a cascade of sounds. They stopped and held their breath to listen, and the sound came again. "It appears to be a song."
"Or lumpies talking," whispered Lian. "Listen to
the short phrases. The computer must have convinced them it was safe to talk."
"Do you think so?" Scotty's eyes lit up. "Let's see if we can find them? We don't have to intrude. We could stay hidden and watch."
"You must excuse me," whispered Dr. Farr. "I must get back to camp to call Tsri Zahr," and he left them with a wave. Scotty and Lian hardly saw him go.
It was like following elusive birds through the woods. Either the lumpies didn't want to be seen or their voices carried much farther than was normal. A flutelike call would sound, seemingly from behind the next bush. It would be answered by a warble from a nearby tree. But when they reached the tree, there was no one there. For large creatures, they moved with great stealth. No snapping twigs or rustling leaves betrayed them. They left no tracks the two humans could read.
They followed for twenty minutes or more, always within earshot but never sighting them. The farther they got from the site, the more the character of the forest changed. Thicket, vines, and second growth gave way to larger and larger trees, spaced in almost parklike order with enough sunlight to allow grass to grow beneath the leaf canopy.
Lian temporarily lost interest in the chase. "Does this look natural to you," she asked, "the way these trees are growing?"
"I hadn't noticed. Actually I don't know much about trees. How should they grow?"
"At random. Not in arrangements. Not all the same kind. I think this is an orchard."
"If the lumpies planted it, then they haven't totally regressed," Scotty said vaguely. "I wonder what kind of trees they are." Her main attention was still on the distant voices.
Lian shook her head; she didn't know. The trunks were thick, the leaves broad and shiny. As she walked, staring up at the branches, she stepped on something hard. Thinking it was a stone, she ignored it, only to
step on another and trip, falling onto the grass. She rubbed her ankle and reached for the offending stone, wanting to throw it with that same illogic that makes a person kick a chair after stubbing a toe. The object her hand closed over was not a stone but a green gourdlike fruit.
Dr. Scott hurried over and knelt beside her. "Are you hurt?" Lian shook her head and handed her the fruit.
"I've seen the lumpies eating these, but they were yellow," Scotty said, and detached a small sheathed knife from her belt.
Once through the outer rind, it was like cutting bread dough; the fruit split with reluctance to reveal a pale gold interior and five brown seeds. Lian took the half offered for examination. Where her fingers gripped, the fruit crushed to juice. The odor was winy, vaguely sickening with fermentation.
"I think these are windfalls," Lian said. The word "windfalls" evoked a memory, and for a moment she was in an orchard on Earth, smelling the scent of ripe peaches, feeling the warmth of Earth's sun on August-bare skin.
Dr. Scott had risen and wandered over to the nearest tree, where she found several yellowish fruit and picked them. Lian saw her cut one open and comment on it w
ithout really hearing what she said.
"Lian?" Scotty was holding a chunk of fruit on the knife blade.
"What?"
"This is more like the fruit I saw the lumpies eating, and . . ."
"De leep," said someone so close by that they both started. A small lumpie was standing behind them. "De leep," it said again. It stood erect and reached between them. Its little gray fingers closed deftly over the chunk, slid it off the blade, and popped it into its mouth. Then with both hands it took the whole fruit from Dr. Scott and walked off. As they watched the lumpie go, Cuddles, Poonie, and Naldo walked into
view partway down the orchard and stood watching them.
"It was hungry," said Lian, and laughed to see the infant march away.
"It talked!" Scotty said. "It talked to us! Maybe the others will talk now."
"Maybe . . ." said Lian, trying to remember what it was she had known while in the black hole of their computer. She suddenly glanced down to see a large gray beetle positioning itself to feed on the rotten fruit they had tossed aside. Her lip curled in disgust, and she stepped away. At that Scotty noticed it and gave a little "ugh!" of alarm. From the lumpies came a trill of sounds, and Cuddles came running.
The lumpie looked at the beetle-crowned fruit and then at Lian with an expression of puzzlement, as if to say, "This bothered you?" To illustrate the commonplace quality of beetles, he pointed to several more of the insects plowing about among the windfalls.
"I really don't care for beetles," Lian said sheepishly, "especially so close to me."
Cuddles smiled, shook his head in an almost human gesture, said something that sounded like "orakani saroo," and hurried off to rejoin his friends.
"He said, 'They're only fruit bugs.'" Lian frowned. "But not because I understand the words. I just know . . . from the computer. . . ."
"How could you know that?" Scotty paused to think. "There's something about that computer you haven't told us, isn't there? I wondered why it conveniently showed us where they came from—and that was the only thing it showed us that we could understand. . . ." When Lian didn't answer right away, the woman said, "O.K. But if it can do what I suspect now it can, if it can scan our minds . .. that's frightening."
"Not unless someone plans to harm it," said Lian, and then half-grinned. "You're the one who hinted the first day I was here that lumpies might be telepathic."
"And their ancestors built the computer—" Scotty
shivered and rubbed the goose bumps that rose on her arms. "I don't want to think too much about that now. Let's go find the tolats and see how they're doing on translating."
The three lumpies looked at one another as the
humans left the orchard. There was a brief exchange of ideas; their decision was shared with the rest of the family to let them know where the three were going. As an afterthought, Naldo added the location and solitary status of Payta minor, still eating fruit. Then they set off to find the tolats with the recording devices.
En route they discussed how strange it was that the appearance of the beetles revolted Lian-Guardian when
the appearance of the tolats was so much more frightening.
It was that quiet time of day between work's end and dinner when the staff was occupied with naps or laundry or other personal matters. Lian had spent part of the afternoon watching the tolats strip all the grass and soil off the meadow to expose a section of hull made of a substance that appeared to swallow light. It looked and felt like black jade, oily-smooth. For all its luster, it gave back no reflection.
"Gray people's solar cell," a tolat had said in answer to her question. "Computer may work everything if we give it light again. Perhaps ship's whole skin absorbs energy." From the amount of equipment they were using, Lian suspected the tolats were going to try to unearth most of the ship.
The rest of the time she had spent with Scotty, listening to the recording of the lumpie computer sound track. She had understood none of it and finally gave up to go outside and sit beneath a big tree on the bluff that overlooked the river. The water below was very
blue in this light. Hills stretched to the horizon and beyond. Somewhere in the trees a bird was singing. The sound seemed to accent the peacefulness.
"Tsri Lian?" Startled, she glanced up to find herself face to face with a tolat, close enough to see its mouth filaments. As she stared into the cavity, the tolat stared back, eyes up. "Too close," it decided, toe-danced sideways, and lowered its eyes into their slots with a neat little click.
"Three gray people," said the tolat, getting right to the point, "came to us this afternoon. They verbalized for one hundred sixty-three minutes, thirty-one seconds. At our feeding time we stopped to collect equipment. We put recorders down. They took one recorder and ran away with it."
"That's wonderful!"
"No. Our computer cannot analyze language if language is in recorder and recorder is with—"
"I understand that," said Lian, "but they will bring it back, I'm sure."
"Why?"
"Because they understand we need to translate."
"Yes?"
"Yes."
The tolat did not reply, but neither did it go away. She studied the pattern of pink and blue freckles around its eyes and bottom shell so she could recognize it again. She had to assume it was thinking; there was no facial expression to be read. It was. "You believe gray people are still intelligent?"
"Yes."
"They can understand their computer?"
"Yes."
"They will give us adequate samples?"
"I think they will try to."
"Good."
The tolat, having said all it had come to say, walked off. If it had been a human, she would have found its action very rude. As it was, she merely smiled. At least
the tolats were Interested in the lumpies* intelligence, whatever the motive.
She leaned back against the tree trunk, head cushioned on her hands, and looked up through the leaves to where the nova was the evening star, its blue-and-white dazzle highly visible before the sunset. Her only thought at seeing it was that it was quite beautiful. For the first time since leaving Earth, she was aware of being happy.
Later, when she was dressing after her shower, she heard people talking outside. The guest dome was at the end of the street near the bluff. People often stood there looking at the view. She ignored the voices until a particular remark caught her attention and she became fully alert.
"It's simple," a man was saying. "It's not a cultural antiquity. It's a wreck. Therefore we're not restricted by I.P.L.'s legal codes. There is no law against salvaging a wreck on Balthor. We don't even need permits."
"There are exquisite artifacts buried in the mud in some of those rooms," said a woman. "Museums or private collectors would pay a fortune for them."
"When that computer charges and we can open the sealed hatches, who knows what we'll find inside?" a second man said.
"We'd have to get the lumpies to open the doors. I don't want to be fried like those tolats."
"What if the lumpies won't cooperate?" said the woman.
"They will," said the first man. "They scare easy if you get 'em alone."
"There might be more money in intangibles, like data in the storage banks of the computer."
"It's yours. I'm not greedy. I'll stick to what I can carry. They were fleeing a dying world, and they had a long time to pack. You can bet they brought along the best stuff they owned."
Lian moved to where she could see out the window without being seen. There were four people outside, all
pretending great interest in the view of the sunset. The one who had said he wasn't greedy was the photographer, Vincent. She knew the others only by sight.
"Farr won't like it," said the woman. "Neither will the octopus."
"Old Klat? Who knows what bullheads thinks? Who cares?"
"I do if he has me arrested."
"People have stolen things from every archaeological find sin
ce time began."
"Yes," agreed the other man, "but they didn't have to smuggle it light years home. They were already on Earth."
"Is it worth our reputations?" said the woman. "If we're caught—"
"It's not theft if it's a salvage job," Vincent insisted. "Besides, we won't be caught if we're smart. Nobody knows what's there, so how can they tell if anything's missing? All we have to do is high-grade the artifacts before I photo-record. What do you say?"
"Sounds good."
"But suppose the lumpies object? Try to stop us?"
"Those dummies? Forget it."
"But suppose they do? They may want what's in there."
"What could they do—cry? Besides, they haven't found any use for the stuff. It's just wasted on them."
The smallest man laughed. "That's funny," he said. "That's what the invading Europeans said about the American Indians, what Pizarro said about the Incas— why waste all that good stuff on savages?"
Vincent didn't laugh. "You're overeducated, Professor. I don't know who you're talking about, but whoever they were, they were right. Why should we let good stuff go to waste if we can get rich from it? You're older than Farr, you have more degrees than Klat, yet you're taking orders from both of them."
"I came for the experience. The honor—"
"You're a loser."
The woman Intervened. "Come on, don't name-call," she pleaded. "We're all hungry, and our nerves are on edge. Let's go eat. Let's be civilized."
"Oh, we are," said the little professor with a bitter laugh. "We are."
"Suppose the lumpies tell that girl?"
"Tell her how? They can't talk." That was the last thing Lian heard as they moved off down the path.
Her first reaction was indignation and anger. How 'dare they! And what had that photographer done to her lumpies to make them cry? He must have done something; otherwise he wouldn't know they cried. She would tell Dr. Farr as soon as she got dressed and . ..
"Be realistic, Lian," her common sense told her. "If anyone wants to steal, they're going to. Dr. Farr can't watch them all. And this will just make him suspect everyone. There has to be a better way. The lumpies must learn to take care of themselves, like it or not."
