She did as it suggested, but kept one eye slightly open so that she could see Braithwaite, who was still watching her intently while pretending, for some odd, Earth-human reason, not to do so. While she ate, her mind went back to the incident with the ship ruler on Som-maradva, the voyage, and her reception here, and she realized that she was becoming suspicious, and irritated.
“On the subject of your stronger feelings,” Danalta said, seemingly intent upon resuming the lecture it had broken off at the entrance, “do you have any strong feelings against discussing personal or professional matters in the presence of strangers?”
The ship ruler, Chiang; paused with what looked like a piece of what had once been a liying creature halfway to its eating orifice. It said, “On Sommaradva they prefer to hear directly what other people think of them. And conversely, the presence of interested witnesses during a discussion of their affairs is often considered beneficial.”
Braithwaite, she saw, was concentrating too much attention on its disgusting meal. She turned as many eyes as would bear on the shape-changer, ignoring the many things she did not want to see in the background.
“Very well,” Danalta said, turning its alien mimic’s eyes on her. “You must already have realized, Cha Thrat, that your situation is unlike that of the other staff members who join the hospital for a probationary period. Appointments to Sector General are much sought after, and candidates must pass rigorous professional examinations and deep psychological investigation on their home worlds to ensure that they will have a fair chance of adapting to a multispecies hospital environment so that they will profit from our training.
“You were not screened in this manner,” her alien twin went on. “There were no professional examinations, no birth-to-maturity psych profiles, no objective measure of your worth as a healer. We know only that you come with a very high recommendation, from the Cultural Contact department of the Monitor Corps and, presumably, your professional colleagues on Sommaradva, a world and society about which we know little.
“You appreciate our difficulty, Cha Thrat?” it continued. “An untrained, unprepared, single-species-oriented being could cause untold harm to itself and to the hospital staff and patients. We have to know what exactly it is that we’re getting, and quickly.”
The others had stopped eating and so did she, even though there was a mouth free for speaking. She said, “As a stranger arriving and expecting to take up an appointment here, I thought that my treatment showed a lack of sensitivity, but I decided that alien behavior patterns, of which I have very limited experience, were to blame. Then I began to suspect that the harsh and insen-sitive treatment was deliberate, and I was being tested in some fashion. You have confirmed this suspicion, but I am seriously displeased that I was not informed of the test. Secret tests, to my mind, can often show a failure in the examiner.”
There was a long silence. She looked at Danalta and away again. The shape-changer’s body and features and expression were the mirror of her own, and told her nothing. She turned her attention to Braithwaite, who had been taking such a continuous and covert interest in her, and waited for a reaction.
For a moment the Earth-human’s two recessed eyes looked calmly into her four, and she began to feel very sure that the being was, in fact, a ruler and not a warrior as it said, “A secret test is sometimes given to avoid the unpleasantness of telling a candidate that it has failed. By pretending that no test took place, another and more acceptable reason, one that does not imply any lack of professional competence or psychological or emotional weakness, can be given for refusing the candidate an appointment. I’m sorry that you are displeased by the covert nature of the test, but in the circumstances we decided that it was better to … to …”
It broke off and began to bark quietly, as if there was something humorous in the situation, then went on. “We Earth-humans have an expression that covers your position very well. We threw you in at the deep end of the pool.”
“And what,” Cha Thrat said, deliberately omitting the gesture of politeness due a ruler, “did you discover from this secret test?”
“We discovered,” Braithwaite said, and this time it did not bark, “that you are a very good swimmer.”
CHAPTER 2
BRAITHWAITE left before the others had finished eating, saying that O’Mara would have its intestines for hosiery supports if it was late back from lunch two days in a row. Cha Thrat knew nothing of the entity other than that it was a greatly respected and feared ruler of some kind, but the punishment for tardiness sounded a bit extreme. Danalta said that she should not worry about it, that Earth-humans frequently made such ridiculously exaggerated statements, that there was no factual basis to the remark, and that it was some kind oflinguistic code they used among themselves which had a tenuous connection with the mental associative process they called humor.
“I understand,” Cha Thrat said.
“I don’t,” Danalta said.
Ship ruler Chiang barked quietly but did not speak.
As a result, the shape-changer was their only guide on an even longer and more complicated journey to the place where Chiang was to undergo its examination— one of the casualty reception and observation wards, she was informed, reserved for the treatment of warmblooded, oxygen-breathing patients. Danalta had returned to its original body configuration of a large, dark-green, uneven ball that guided itself, with surprising speed and accuracy, through the wheeled and walking traffic in the corridors. Was the Sommaradvan form too difficult to maintain, she wondered, or did it now feel that such psychological props were no longer necessary?It was a surprisingly large compartment, rendered small by the number and variety of examination tables and associated equipment covering the floor and walls. There was an observation gallery for the use of visitors and trainees, and Danalta suggested that she choose the least uncomfortable chair while they were waiting. One of the silver-furred beings had already taken Chiang away to be prepared for the examination.
“We shall be able to see and hear everything that is happening,” Danalta said, “but they will not hear us unless you press the transmit button, just there, on the side of your chair. You may have to use it if they ask questions.”
Another silver-furred being, or perhaps it was the same one, undulated into the compartment, performed a seemingly purposeless act on an as-yet incomprehensible piece of equipment, then looked up at them briefly as it was leaving.
“And now we wait,” Danalta went on. “But you must have questions, Cha Thrat. There is enough time to answer a few of them.”
The shape-changer had retained the form of’a lumpy green hemisphere, featureless except for one bulbous eye and a small fleshy protuberance that seemed to combine the functions of hearing and speech. In time, she thought, one could become used to anything — except the lack of discipline among these people, and their unwillingness to define properly their areas of authority and responsibility.
Choosing her words with care, she said, “As yet I am too ignorant and confused by all this to ask the rightquestions. But could 1 begin by asking for a detailed clarification of your own duties and responsibilities, and the class of patient you treat?”
The answer left her feeling more confused than ever.
“I don’t treat patients,” Danalta replied, “and unless there was a major surgical emergency, I would not be asked to do so. As for my duties, I am part of the medical team on Rhabwar. That is the hospital’s special ambulance ship, which carries an operational crew of Monitor Corps officers and a medical team that assumes overall authority once the ship has reached the location of the vessel in distress or, as the case may be, the site of the disaster.