He knew the year of his "death"-Year Eight of the Emperor and Eight Hundred and Ninety-Nine of Rome. I wrote out the dates in Roman numerals to make sure. But I did not remember when Rome was founded nor could I identify the "Caesar" even by his full name-there have been so many Caesars. But Hadrian's Wall had been built and Britain was still occupied; that placed lunio close to the third century.
He wasn't interested in the cave man across the way-it embodied to him the worst vice of a barbarian: cowardice. I didn't argue but I would be timid, too, if I had saber-toothed tigers yowling at my door. (Did they have sabertooths then? Make it "cave bears.")
Iunio went back and returned with hard dark bread, cheese, and a cup. He did not offer me any and I don't think it was the barrier. He poured a little of his drink on the floor and started to chomp. It was a mud floor; the walls were rough stone and the ceiling was supported by wooden beams. It may have been a copy of dwellings during the occupation of Britain, but I'm no expert.
I didn't stay much longer. Not only did bread and cheese remind me that I was hungry, but I offended lunio. I don't know what set him off, but he discussed me with cold thoroughness, my eating habits, ancestry, appearance, conduct, and method of earning a living. Iunio was pleasant as long as you agreed with him, ignored insults, and deferred to him. Many older people demand this, even in buying a thirty-nine-cent can of talcum; you learn to give it without thinking-otherwise you get a reputation as a fresh kid and potential juvenile delinquent. The less respect an older person deserves the more certain he is to demand it from anyone younger. So I left, as lunio didn't know anything helpful anyhow. As I went back I saw the cave man peering out his cave. I said, "Take it easy, Jo-Jo," and went on.
I bumped into another invisible barrier blocking our archway. I felt it, then said quietly, "I want to go in." The barrier melted away and I walked in-then found that it was back in place.
My rubber soles made no noise and I didn't call out because Peewee might be asleep. Her door was open and I peeped in. She was sitting tailor-fashion on that incredible Oriental divan, rocking Madame Pompadour and crying.
I backed away, then returned whistling, making a racket, and calling to her. She popped out of her door, with smiling face and no trace of tears. "Hi, Kip! It took you long enough."
"That guy talks too much. What's new?"
"Nothing. I ate and you didn't come back, so I took a nap. You woke me. What did you find out?"
"Let me order dinner and I'll tell you while I eat."
I was chasing the last bit of gravy when a bellhop robot came for us. It was like the other one except that it had in glowing gold on its front that triangle with three spirals. "Follow me," it said in English.
I looked at Peewee. "Didn't the Mother Thing say she was coming back?"
"Why, I thought so."
The machine repeated, "Follow me. Your presence is required."
I laid my ears back. I have taken lots of orders, some of which I shouldn't have, but I had never yet taken orders from a piece of machinery. "Go climb a rope!" I said. "You'll have to drag me."
This is not what to say to a robot. It did.
Peewee yelled, "Mother Thing! Where are you? Help us!"
Her birdsong came out of the machine. ("It's all right, dears. The servant will lead you to me.")
I quit struggling and started to walk. That refugee from an appliance dealer took us into another lift, then into a corridor whose walls whizzed past as soon as we entered. It nudged us through an enormous archway topped by the triangle and spirals and herded us into a pen near one wall. The pen was not apparent until we moved-more of that annoying solid air.
It was the biggest room I have ever been in, triangular, unbroken by post or pillar, with ceiling so high and walls so distant that I half expected local thunderstorms. An enormous room makes me feel like an ant; I was glad to be near a wall. The room was not empty-hundreds in it-but it looked empty because they were all near the walls; the giant floor was bare.
But there were three wormfaces out in the center-Wormface's trial was in progress.
I don't know if our own Wormface was there. I would not have known even if they had not been a long way off as the difference between two wormfaces is the difference between having your throat cut and being beheaded. But, as we learned, the presence or absence of the individual offender was the least important part of a trial. Wormface was being tried, present or not-alive or dead.
The Mother Thing was speaking. I could see her tiny figure, also far out on the floor but apart from the wormfaces. Her birdsong voice reached me faintly but I heard her words clearly-in English; from somewhere near us her translated words were piped to us. The feel of her was in the English translation just as it was in her bird tones.
She was telling what she knew of wormface conduct, as dispassionately as if describing something under a microscope, like a traffic officer testifying: "At 9:17 on the fifth, while on duty at-" etc. The facts. The Mother Thing was finishing her account of events on Pluto. She chopped it off at the point of explosion.
Another voice spoke, in English. It was flat with a nasal twang and reminded me of a Vermont grocer we had dealt with one summer when I was a kid. He was a man who never smiled nor frowned and what little he said was all in the same tone, whether it was, "She is a good woman," or, "That man would cheat his own son," or, "Eggs are fifty-nine cents," cold as a cash register. This voice was that sort.
It said to the Mother Thing: "Have you finished?"
"I have finished."
"The other witnesses will be heard. Clifford Russell-"
I jumped, as if that grocer had caught me in the candy jar.
The voice went on: "-listen carefully." Another voice started.
My own-it was the account I had dictated, flat on my back on Vega Five.
But it wasn't all of it; it was just that which concerned wormfaces. Adjectives and whole sentences had been cut-as if someone had taken scissors to a tape recording. The facts were there; what I thought about them was missing.
It started with ships landing in the pasture back of our house; it ended with that last wormface stumbling blindly down a hole. It wasn't long, as so much had been left out-our hike across the Moon, for example. My description of Wormface was left in but had been trimmed so much that I could have been talking about Venus de Milo instead of the ugliest thing in creation.
My recorded voice ended and the Yankee-grocer voice said, "Were those your words?"
"Huh? Yes."
"Is the account correct?"
"Yes, but-"
"Is it correct?"
"Yes."
"Is it complete?"
I wanted to say that it certainly was not-but I was beginning to understand the system. "Yes."
"Patricia Wynant Reisfeld-"
Peewee's story started earlier and covered all those days when she had been in contact with wormfaces while I was not. But it was not much longer, for, while Peewee has a sharp eye and a sharper memory, she is loaded with opinions. Opinions were left out.
When Peewee had agreed that her evidence was correct and complete the Yankee voice stated, "All witnesses have been heard, all known facts have been integrated. The three individuals may speak for themselves."
I think the wormfaces picked a spokesman, perhaps the Wormface, if he was alive and there. Their answer, as translated into English, did not have the guttural accent with which Wormface spoke English; nevertheless it was a wormface speaking. That bone-chilling yet highly intelligent viciousness, as unmistakable as a punch in the teeth, was in every syllable.