The Asa themselves, tall, almost hairless men with coarse gray skins and flat noses, stood silently about. One or two held war flails, but their leaders, the two young ritual brothers who were chosen every seven years to rule the village, stepped forward and patted their stomaches in sign of welcome.
Lucy removed her hood and gloves, and in their own tongue thanked them.
“Why do you thank us, Secretary?” said one of the brothers. “We have done nothing.”
“But we are safe here from the ouljit-li.”
“If your cloak shelters you from the snow, do you thank the cloak?”
The other brother said, “You are always welcome, in any case. Who is this man?”
Lucy introduced Leonard, who stepped forward to touch arms with the brothers. They at once stepped back.
“You must not touch them,” Lucy said. “They are—what would you say?—uthvul . . . taboo.”
Leonard contented himself with a bow. The brothers, glancing at each other, bowed back. One of them came close to Leonard and looked into his eyes. He said something to the other.
Lucy translated, “He says you have good eyes. They like you.”
“Tell them,” said Leonard, “that I am grateful. I would like to be able to visit them.”
The brothers replied gravely that he might come whenever he liked.
They led the way to the center of the village, pushed up the flap of a tent, and conducted Lucy and Leonard down hard-packed earthen steps into a hemispherical chamber some ten feet below the ground. A wood fire smoldered in the center with a spicy smell. A couple of elderly men brought in bowls of what looked like curdled milk and flat meat cakes. The brothers each took a bowl. One, pouring drink into a cup, offered it to Leonard.
“Kurdush-ve, im ve tver sukh’ma,” he said.
The second brother offered the cakes and repeated the sentence.
“Lucy whispered, “You must accept the food and reply, ‘U tver uz.’ “
Leonard did so. The brothers then repeated the ritual with Lucy, and themselves gravely sat down. They ate and drank together, and then the brothers turned their backs.
“Now we must go,” said Lucy. “They are about to sleep, and among the Asa no one must watch a man while he is sleeping, lest he take away his power, his life force you might say.”
“Can I come back tomorrow?” Leonard asked.
“Yes, whenever you like. But you’d better begin learning a little of their language.”
They climbed the stairs and left the village, which appeared, except for threads of smoke rising from holes in the ground, to be lifeless. As they walked back to the stream, carrying their hoods but still wearing their suits, Leonard said, “What was the prayer they said?”
“Before we ate? It means, ‘As I wish for myself, so I give to you.’ “
Leonard nodded. But it wasn’t until they were at the air lock of the commission bubble that he suddenly said, “Of course! It is the Golden Rule, isn’t it? Do unto others, and so on. I thought the Commissioner said they were stern and violent people.”
“I don’t remember that he said ‘violent,’ “ Lucy said. “Still, I have read much in the history of your earth, and I believe your Christians had such a precept, yet they were also in some ways both stem and violent.”
Later that evening, remembering the Commissioner s love for ethnic parallels, Leonard told him the story. Eisenstein, lolling in his favorite chair and watching the shadows cast by the single moon then in the sky, nodded. “I know about it. There are other similarities too. After all, given the development of life on a not too dissimilar world, and assuming that it is an oxygen-carbon life that evolves eventually into a manlike creature—really a quite efficient enough form when you come to think of it—one can also assume that the basic drives of communities of such creatures would be much the same.
“The Asa are grim and hard, but not in the way you assume. That is, they are not cruel; on the contrary, they live by a rigid rule in which they must love and assist each other and even their worst enemies. They have a saying, ‘Ardzil-le ur ghauma tve’—’Love even those who strike you.’ But life is harsh in the tundra: and Asa have nothing but their nours, those small grazing animals you saw, some edible mosses, and the tree-shrubs on which they depend for firewood, building materials, and edible bark. They are a seminomadic people, and like some other nomads whose life is hard, they have a strong sense of justice. There are specific punishments for specific crimes, and they never vary, nor is there any appeal from them.”
He uncrossed his legs and pressed a synthetic cigar against the chair lighter. “Do you know what would have happened to you if you had touched one of the kings?”
Leonard shook his head.
“With tears in their eyes, with words of sorrow—not hypocritical, I assure you—they would have beaten you to death with their flails. ‘A touch for a touch,’ they would have said.”
Leonard nodded. “I see their point,” he murmured. He accepted a drink and a cigarette from the service unit, which announced in its small monotone, “News broadcast in ten minutes.”
“No, thank you,” said Leonard.
Lucy said, “I don’t think I ever heard anyone say ‘thank you’ to a machine.”
Leonard grinned.
“I think it is very nice,” she added firmly.
“And what do you think after your brush with the widgits?” Eisenstein asked.
“I can understand what’s involved, now,” Leonard replied. “I still get the shivers when I remember it. Of course, I’d studied everything available on them, and looked at the pictures and the models, but it’s not. the same thing. I knew that their persistence can drive men insane, and I knew that their bites may eventually cause death. But I couldn’t really appreciate it until we went through the swarm.”
“And they are the most elusive creatures in the world when you want them,” Eisenstein said. “Of course, they’ve been collected and classified, but no one has ever been able to study them. You know that in captivity they simply die; they will not, like other insects, accept an artificial environment. And so far, no one has been courageous enough to study them in their natural habitat.”
“Mm. The thought of being among them without the protection of a suit is frightening. They never leave you once they’ve found you, do they? And I can see how research inside a widgit suit would be difficult.”
“Yes,” Eisenstein agreed. “Imagine Fabre doing his entomological studies in such an outfit! We have used widgit-proof machines, traveling laboratories really, but they’re dreadfully expensive and cumbersome as well. You can imagine: such a machine needs television equipment, scoops, diggers, water, food, measuring instruments, almost a whole spaceship! Even so, not long ago we had a tragedy here. I can’t imagine how it happened, but somehow, perhaps through an exhaust, or through one of the air filters, widgits entered one of the lab tanks. The things aren’t chitinous, you know, like our insects, and consequently they can squeeze through the damnedest spaces ... in any case, the lab’s signal came in about noon, our time, and an hour later the jet was back with the crew. Even in that short time, two of the men had to have psych treatment, and a third was dead. You know, the saliva of the little beasts stimulates the leucocytes: a kind of galloping leukemia. Luckily, it doesn’t happen to everyone in that short a time.”
He shook his head. Leonard, leaning forward, said, “But the Asa aren’t troubled by them. What’s their secret?”
“I wish I knew.”
“Why not simply hire teams of Asa-”
“Asa-li,” Lucy corrected automatically.
“—Asa-li—well, why not have teams of them—”
“—accompany our men in the field,” Eisenstein finished for him. “We thought of that, believe me. But the Asa aren’t interested. They simply won’t do it.”
He chuckled. “They told us they had enough work of their own to do. And what could we hire them with? They say we have nothing they want. But I
think it goes deeper than that. You see, the widgits are sacred. So the Asa have resisted all our efforts to destroy them. By the terms of our contract, we can’t oppose them or interfere with them.”
“Sacred insects?”
“It isn’t so strange. Among the Australian bushmen the witchetty grub, the larva of an acacia beetle, is sacred. There is a whole clan of men who, at certain seasons, perform a ritual of the grub and ceremonially eat it. And the Egyptians held the dung beetle in reverence, you remember, while among the Zuni the dragonfly is a totem insect.”
Leonard said, “It is hard to imagine anyone trying to eat a widgit.”
“I won’t go so-far as to say they eat them. But there is a ritual of some sort every month, held by the widgit society, the Women of the Ouljit-li. In about a week, I think, they perform it again.”
“I’d like to see that,” Leonard said soberly.
“So would I, so would a lot of anthropologists,” said Eisenstein. “Unfortunately, it is held in great secrecy.”
“I wonder-” Leonard began, but Lucy interrupted.
“Don’t even think that.”
“How do you know what I was thinking?” he said.
“I know,” she said, “what your curiosity can get you into.”
They both laughed, and Eisenstein, at first laughing with them, fell silent and looked from one to the other of the young people, tapping his chin thoughtfully.
And on the morning of the eighth day after that, Leonard was missing.
~ * ~
He had gone off to his apartment the night before, a little earlier than usual, claiming that he had some notes to put in order. There was no alarm nor any indication that he was gone until late in the morning, when a team left the bubble to do some excavating and discovered that the open signal at a side door had been disconnected.
Lucy and Eisenstein knew at once where he had gone.
“I can’t tell you how serious this is,” the Commissioner said. His moonface was grave, and he strode up and down the long glass-walled chamber that served him as living room and office, twisting his hands together behind his back. “There’s no question that he spied on the widgit society rites. Do you know what the punishment is for that?”
“Yes,” said Lucy. “Since he has offended the widgits, he will be given to them. The Asa will take him to a secret place and leave him there unprotected. But we must do something, Sam.”
“I simply cannot use force against the Asa. It would be a violation of our contract. I can’t go against their laws, either.” He looked at the wall chronometer. “In any case, it may be too late by now.”
He stopped before her and took her by the arms. “Lucy, my dear, I don’t know what to tell you. If they caught him last night, by now—”
“By now you think he is a screaming madman.” She broke away from him. “I don’t believe it.” Her crimson eyes flashed, and she thrust out her jaw.
“You don’t want to believe it.”
“Nonsense.” Abruptly she burst into tears. She wept passionately for exactly one minute, then stopped, blew her nose, and wiped her eyes. “You think I am a hysterical female, like one of those in Dickens, or the romances of Creuth Dedan. Well, if you have no more to do than walk up and down here until you wear a river in the floor, do so. I’m going to the village.”
“I’ll go with you,” Eisenstein said moodily. “I don’t know why. Well, I’ll have to make a formal protest, anyway. Come on.”
They strapped on widgit packs, but they took the Commissioner’s closed tricycle which, with its tiny motor and narrow wheel base, could cover the distance along the path in minutes. At first Eisenstein considered taking along some of the station personnel, but he decided against it; he knew very well that no show of force would be enough to overawe the Asa.
The village appeared, as usual, to be deserted except for two or three boys watching the herds. But as soon as Eisenstein and Lucy had dismounted from the tricycle, the two kings appeared from their house and from other houses came the rest of the village, the women in their dark hoods and cloaks in the rear, the men in an impassive circle around the visitors.
The Commissioner made the sign of greeting, which the brother kings returned.
“You have come about the man with good eyes,” said one.
“We have,” Eisenstein replied. “Where is he?”
“We have given him to the ouljit-li. Where he may be now, we do not know.”
“He was not yours to punish,” Eisenstein said. “He is a citizen of our Earth. You should have given him to me.”
The two kings looked at each other. Then one of them said, “Tell me, he was a man, was he not?”
“Of course.”
“Then he was not yours, nor ours. He belonged only to himself. If that is so, he broke the law of his own will and deed. Hence, his punishment came upon him.”
Eisenstein bit his lip and stared around the circle of men. They showed neither approval nor disapproval, but only watchful interest. For them, the matter had already been decided. He looked at Lucy out of the corner of his eye. She had the determined, angry air he had come to know after more than a year with her in the station; he knew that her mind was made up to some sudden deed, and he wished he knew what it was. Although the Asa had no visible weapons, he did not doubt they could produce them if necessary.
He said desperately, “Perhaps that is so. But Jackson meant no harm. He did not intend to violate any of your secrets.”
“You speak,” said one of the kings, “as if he were our enemy, as if we had punished him out of rancor or hatred. It is not so. If the Women of the Ouljit-li are watched by any man when they perform their ceremonies, the trees will die. Everyone knows this. Therefore, it is ordained that the ouljit-li must decide whether to destroy him or not.”
“That’s a pure quibble,” said Eisenstein, but without conviction. He had been one of those excellent anthropologists who can identify himself with the people he is studying, and in this case, although he liked Leonard and wanted to rescue him, he knew in his heart that reason and justice were on the side of the Asa. It was Lucy, however, who ended the discussion.
In a flat voice, she said, “Look at this, you Brothers.”
From the pocket of her coverall she had produced a small, flat, wicked-looking Loeg automatic, such as was used in her country for killing wire snakes and other small game. One arm she had crossed over her body, the wrist of the other hand resting on it, the butt of the weapon against her stomach, the muzzle pointed at the two kings.
“You know what this is” she said.
One of the kings replied calmly, “It is a light-weapon. We have seen them.”
“You know that I can kill one of you without touching you. So I will not be breaking the law.”
“We know.”
“If I kill one of you, the other must die also. Then the people will die, for the herds will no longer produce, nor the mosses grow.”
Eisenstein held his breath. He had never before seen Martians threaten each other with violence. In spite of the quiet tones of Lucy and the kings, the atmosphere was charged with tension. The Asa did not move nor speak, and this too lent a dreadful suspense to the moment; if they had chattered or shouted imprecations, he would have felt better. But there was no sound from any of them, nothing but the rush of breathing of half a hundred people, and across the space in the center the soft, taut voices of the three.
Lucy said, “The man, Jackson, was my . . . friend. And it is said, ‘Do all for your friend.’ Tell me where he is.”
“We cannot tell you that. But we think he must surely be dead-” The king who was speaking, glanced at the sun. “If they had spared him, he would have returned by now. Who can say where a man goes when he dies?”
“Then,” said Lucy, in a cold, brittle voice such as Eisenstein had never heard her use, “I will kill you.”
The kings eyed her without emotion. Then one said, equally coldly, “That may be so. But you will
die also. For the law requires that whoever injures the herds or mosses, must die. And if you kill one of us, you will be doing that injury.”
“Yes,” said Lucy. “And it is also said, ‘Even give your life for your friend.’ ‘‘
Her voice broke. The weapon in her hand trembled, and steadied again. Eisenstein braced himself. Then he sprang. Like many fat men, he was much swifter than he looked, and he dropped on Lucy like a meteorite. He wrapped one arm around her, and twisted as they fell together so that she came uppermost, but he held her tight against his chest.
The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction Sixth Series Page 6
