There was a silence. Mike Terry wiped his forehead and smiled.
“It’s the strain, folks, the terrible strain. The doctor tells me...Well, folks, Jim Raeder is temporarily not himself. But it’s only temporary!JBC is hiring the best psychiatrists and psychoanalysts in the country. We’re going to do everything humanly possible for this gallant boy. And entirely at our own expense.”
Mike Terry glanced at the studio clock. “Well, it’s about time to sign off folks. Watch for the announcement of our next great thrill show. And don’t worry, I’m sure that very soon we’11 have Jim Raeder back with us.”
Mike Terry smiled, and winked at the audience. “He’s bound to get well, friends. After all, we’re all pulling for him!
FEAR IN THE NIGHT
There are regulations to govern the conduct of First Contact spaceships, rules drawn up in desperation and followed in despair, for what rule can predict the effect of any action upon the mentality of an alien people?
Jan Maarten was gloomily pondering this as he came into the atmosphere of Durell IV. He was a big, middle-aged man with thin ash-blond hair and a round worried face. Long ago, he had concluded that almost any rule was better than none. Therefore he followed his meticulously, but with an ever-present sense of uncertainty and human fallibility.
He circled the planet, low enough for observation, but not too low, since he didn’t want to frighten the inhabitants. He noted the signs of a primitive-pastoral civilization and tried to remember everything he had learned in Volume 4, Projected Techniques for First Contact on So-called Primitive-pastoral Worlds, published by the Department of Alien Psychology. Then he brought the ship down on a rocky, grass-covered plain, near a typical medium-sized village, but not too near, using the Silent Sam landing technique.
“Prettily done,” commented Croswell, his assistant, who was too young to be bothered by uncertainties.
Chedka, the Eborian linguist, said nothing. He was sleeping, as usual.
Maarten grunted something and went to the rear of the ship to run his tests. Croswell took up his post at the viewport.
“Here they come,” Croswell reported half an hour later. “About a dozen of them, definitely humanoidal.” Upon closer inspection, he saw that the natives of Durell were flabby, dead-white in coloration, and deadpan in expression. Croswell hesitated, then added, “They’re not too handsome.”
“What are they doing?” Maarten asked.
“Just looking us over,” Croswell said. He was a slender young man with an unusually large and lustrous mustache which he had grown on the long journey out from Terra. He stroked it with the pride of a man who has been able to raise a really good mustache.
“They’re about twenty yards from the ship now,” Croswell reported. He leaned forward, flattening his nose ludicrously against the port, which was constructed of one-way glass.
Croswell could look out, but no one could look in. The Department of Alien Psychology had ordered the change last year, after a Department ship had botched a first contact on Carella II. The Carellans had stared into the ship, become alarmed at something within, and fled. The Department still didn’t know what had alarmed them, for a second contact had never been successfully established.
That mistake would never happen again.
“What now?” Maarten called.
“One of them’s coming forward alone. Chief, perhaps. Or sacrificial offering.”
“What is he wearing?”
“He has on a—a sort of—will you kindly come here and look for yourself?”
Maarten, at his instrument bank, had been assembling a sketchy picture of Durell. The planet had a breathable atmosphere, an equitable climate, and gravity comparable to that of Earth. It had valuable deposits of radioactives and rare metals. Best of all, it tested free of the virulent microorganisms and poisonous vapors which tended to make a Contacter’s life feverishly short.
Durell was going to be a valuable neighbor to Earth, provided the natives were friendly—and the Contacters skillful.
Maarten walked to the viewport and studied the natives. “They are wearing pastel clothing. We shall wear pastel clothing.”
“Check,” said Croswell.
“They are unarmed. We shall go unarmed.”
“Roger.”
“They are wearing sandals. We shall wear sandals as well.”
“To hear is to obey.”
“I notice they have no facial hair,” Maarten said, with the barest hint of a smile. “I’m sorry, Ed, but that mustache—”
“Not my mustache!” Croswell yelped, quickly putting a protective hand over it.
“I’m afraid so.”
“But, Jan, I’ve been six months raising it!”
“It has to go. That should be obvious.”
“I don’t see why,” Croswell said indignantly.
“Because first impressions are vital. When an unfavorable first impression has been made, subsequent contacts become difficult, sometimes impossible. Since we know nothing about these people, conformity is our safest course. We try to look like them, dress in colors that are pleasing, or at least acceptable to them, copy their gestures, interact within their framework of acceptance in every way—”
“All right, all right,” Croswell said. “I suppose I can grow another on the way back.”
They looked at each other; then both began laughing. Croswell had lost three mustaches in this manner.
While Croswell shaved, Maarten stirred their linguist into wakefulness. Chedka was a lemur-like humanoid from Eboria IV, one of the few planets where Earth maintained successful relations. The Eborians were natural linguists, aided by the kind of associative ability found in nuisances who supply words in conversation—only the Eborians were always right. They had wandered over a considerable portion of the Galaxy in their time and might have attained quite a place in it were it not that they needed twenty hours sleep out of twenty-four.
Croswell finished shaving and dressed in pale green coveralls and sandals. All three stepped through the degermifier. Maarten took a deep breath, uttered a silent prayer and opened the port.
A low sigh went up from the crowd of Durellans, although the chief—or sacrifice—was silent. They were indeed humanlike, if one overlooked their pallor and the gentle sheep-like blandness of their features—features upon which Maarten could read no trace of expression.
“Don’t use any facial contortions,” Maarten warned Croswell.
Slowly they advanced until they were ten feet from the leading Durellan. Then Maarten said in a low voice, “We come in peace.”
Chedka translated, then listened to the answer, which was so soft as to be almost undecipherable.
“Chief says welcome,” Chedka reported in his economical English.
“Good, good,” Maarten said. He took a few more steps forward and began to speak, pausing every now and then for translation. Earnestly, and with extreme conviction, he intoned Primary Speech BB-32 (for humanoid, primitive-pastoral, tentatively nonaggressive aliens).
Even Croswell, who was impressed by very little, had to admit it was a fine speech. Maarten said they were wanderers from afar, come out of the Great Nothingness to engage in friendly discourse with the gentle people of Durell. He spoke of green and distant Earth, so like this planet, and of the fine and humble people of Earth who stretched out hands in greeting. He told of the great spirit of peace and cooperation that emanated from Earth, of universal friendship, and many other excellent things.
Finally he was done. There was a long silence.
“Did he understand it all?” Maarten whispered to Chedka.
The Eborian nodded, waiting for the chiefs reply. Maarten was perspiring from the exertion and Croswell couldn’t stop nervously fingering his newly shaven upper lip.
The chief opened his mouth, gasped, made a little half turn, and collapsed to the ground.