“I’m waiting to hear relevance, Mr. Holloway,” Soltan said.
“Exactly,”Holloway said. “You’re waiting to hear relevance, but you can’t, because you’re listening too low. We all have been. The loudspeakers on the fence line work because the predators of Zara Twenty-three hear higher frequencies than we do. And they hear higher frequencies not for some random reason, but because it makes evolutionary sense for them to do so. Say, because their prey and other small animals make sounds in that range.”
Holloway reset the video and popped up a settings overlay on top of it. “One of the nice things about the research-level camera Dr. Wangai used to record the fuzzys is that unlike most commercial cameras, it records data humans don’t perceive on their own,” he said. “For example, in addition to recording the visible color spectrum, it records into the infrared and ultraviolet frequencies. You have to use filters to see these data, of course, but the data are there. It also records sounds above and below human hearing. You have to use filters for them, too.”
Holloway flipped through the overlay’s menus and reset the video’s audio filters to bring sounds above human hearing range into audibility. He started the video again.
It was the same image of Papa, Mama, and Grandpa Fuzzy sitting in a semicircle. Only now it sounded as if they were talking to each other.
“Look,” Holloway said, quietly, and pointed. “Look how they wait their turn to speak. Look how they respond to whatever the other is saying.” He turned up the volume of the monitor; the chittering between the fuzzys got louder. “You can hear the structure of the language.”
After a few more moments Holloway paused the video, closed it, and pulled up another one, this one of Grandpa Fuzzy and Pinto. Now beside the head-smacking was a constant stream of noise from Grandpa, interrupted occasionally by a squeak from Pinto. The squeak sounded, of all things, petulant.
Pause, close, open another video. In this one Mama Fuzzy was grooming Baby Fuzzy. The noises coming from Mama Fuzzy in this one were different from the noises in the other videos: softer, more sibilant.
“My god,” Isabel said. “Mama’s singing.”
In the video Baby Fuzzy added its voice to Mama Fuzzy’s, the two creatures joined in harmony. Everyone watched and listened to the video for a moment.
Then Holloway paused the video and looked over to Isabel. “I’m sorry, Dr. Wangai,” he said, walking to her. “But this is yet another case of your observational skills failing you. You knew, I presume, that Zara Twenty-three creatures could hear above the human hearing range, which implies quite strongly that they or other creatures make noises above that range as well. Yet, just as you let my assertion of the fuzzys’ genders get past you, so you also worked from the implicit assumption that speech for the fuzzys would be like speech for any other sentient species—something you could hear. And thus, the most important part of your argument for the fuzzys’ sentience—their ability to speak—went unheard and unobserved.”
Holloway held out Isabel’s infopanel to her. She took it, shaking.
Holloway turned to Meyer, who was looking at him with the same expression she might have if he had stripped naked right there in the courtroom. “And this is how I misled Isabel, Ms. Meyer, Your Honor,” he said, turning briefly to nod in the direction of the similarly shocked-looking Judge Soltan. “I mentioned that the last time I spoke to her I told her I didn’t believe the fuzzys were sentient, because I didn’t. But then I saw one of the fuzzys make my dog sit and lie down and roll over—vocal commands. I couldn’t hear them, but I remembered that other animals here heard higher frequencies, just like my dog could. So I went back through the data and found the fuzzys had been speaking all along.
“I misled Isabel by not telling her this,” Holloway said. “And thus by making her think that I disagreed with her about the sentience of the fuzzys, when in fact over the last few days I have become completely convinced of it. They speak, Ms. Meyer, Your Honor. They speak and discuss and argue and sing. That’s not a trick you can fake, no matter how clever an animal you are, or how clever you, as a human, might be with training animals. These aren’t just animals. These are people.
“And Dr. Wangai,” Holloway said, turning to Isabel again, “I was wrong. I was wrong to keep this information from you, and for allowing you to enter into this inquiry without all the facts you needed to defend your assertion, and for allowing anyone to cast doubt on your reputation. It was wrong. I was wrong for ever doing it or for ever allowing it. I am sorry.”
Holloway turned away from Isabel and sat back down in the witness stand.
“I’m done with my presentation,” he said, to the judge.
Chapter Eighteen
“This proves nothing,” Meyer said, once she had gained enough composure to begin again.
“It proves that we can’t immediately discount the idea that the fuzzys have speech,” Holloway said. “That’s something. It’s something fairly big.” “You could very well have taught them to make these sounds,” Meyer said.
“Are you suggesting that I created a hoax so byzantine that it includes teaching animals to speak something no one could hear?” Holloway said. “To what end, Ms. Meyer? If it was a trick to fool Isabel, then it failed, because she didn’t know of it until just a couple minutes ago.” “It’s a hoax to put the Zarathustra Company in an uncomfortable financial position,” Meyer said.
“Then it’s a hoax that also puts me in an uncomfortable financial position, because I stand to lose billions if the fuzzys are deemed sentient,” Holloway said. “I have a very distinct and obvious reason to hope the fuzzys are simply animals.” Meyer opened her mouth; Holloway held up his hand. “I know where you’re going next,” he said. “The only possible way this does me any good is if I’ve somehow set things up to short ZaraCorp stock on the market, in the hope of reaping the benefit when the stock price falls. But to forestall such an argument, I’m willing to give Judge Soltan complete access to all my financial and communication data for the last couple of years. She’s more than welcome to have forensics experts go through the data to look for evidence that I’m trying to manipulate ZaraCorp stock. But I can tell you right now that she won’t find it. My only financial holdings at this point are the royalties ZaraCorp automatically puts into my account at the Zarathustra Corporate Bank. I think I earn half a percent on that annually.” “But we have no way of knowing if these sounds are speech!” Meyer said. “You’re a surveyor, not an expert on xenosapience. And we’ve already established that Dr. Wangai has no formal training in xenosapience. Neither of you can even knowledgably guess at what those sounds mean.” Holloway saw Isabel’s eyes widen; she knew the hole Meyer had just fallen into. Holloway smiled. “You are quite correct, Ms. Meyer,” he said. “So I suggest we let someone who canknowledgably guess give an expert opinion. I suggest we call Arnold Chen.” “Who?” Meyer said.
“Arnold Chen,” Holloway repeated. “He received his doctorate in xenolinguistics. University of Chicago, I believe. He works in the same office as Dr. Wangai. Just down the street from here. I understand he was mistakenly assigned to Zara Twenty-three. Lucky for us he’s here.” “Is this correct?” Soltan said to Meyer.
“I don’t know,” Meyer said. She was thoroughly confused by the course of events.
“Excuse me, Your Honor,” Isabel said. “Jack’s correct. Dr. Chen is a xenolinguist. He’s also likely to be in his office right now.” “Doing what, exactly?” Soltan said.