“But this time he was right. He tells Chuck, that funny-looking monster, what I want to say and Chuck tells these aliens. And these aliens tell Chuck and Chuck tells Beasly and Beasly tells me.”
“Ridiculous!” snorted Henry. “Beasly hasn’t got the sense to be … what did you say he was?”
“A telepath,” said Taine.
One of the aliens had gotten up and climbed into a saddle. He rode it forth and back. Then he swung out of it and sat down again.
“Remarkable,” said the U.N. man. “Some sort of antigravity unit, with complete control. We could make use of that, indeed.”
He scraped his hand across his chin.
“And you’re going to exchange the idea of paint for the idea of that saddle?”
“That’s exactly it,” said Taine, “but I need some help. I need a chemist or a paint manufacturer or someone to explain how paint is made. And I need some professor or other who’ll understand what they’re talking about when they tell me the idea of the saddle.”
“I see,” said Lancaster. “Yes, indeed, you have a problem. Mr. Taine, you seem to me a man of some discernment –”
“Oh, he’s all of that,” interrupted Henry. “Hiram’s quite astute.”
“So I suppose you’ll understand,” said the U.N. man, “that this whole procedure is quite irregular –”
“But it’s not,” exploded Taine. “That’s the way they operate. They open up a planet and then they exchange ideas. They’ve been doing that with other planets for a long, long time. And ideas are all they want, just the new ideas, because that is the way to keep on building a technology and culture. And they have a lot of ideas, sir, that the human race can use.”
“That is just the point,” said Lancaster. “This is perhaps the most important thing that has ever happened to we humans. In just a short year’s time we can obtain data and ideas that will put us ahead – theoretically, at least – by a thousand years. And in a thing that is so important, we should have experts on the job –”
“But,” protested Henry, “you can’t find a man who’ll do a better dickering job than Hiram. When you dicker with him your back teeth aren’t safe. Why don’t you leave him be? He’ll do a job for you. You can get your experts and your planning groups together and let Hiram front for you. These folks have accepted him and have proved they’ll do business with him and what more do you want? All he needs is just a little help.”
Beasly came over and faced the U.N. man.
“I won’t work with no one else,” he said. “If you kick Hiram out of here, then I go along with him. Hiram’s the only person who ever treated me like a human –”
“There, you see!” Henry said, triumphantly.
“Now, wait a second, Beasly,” said the U.N. man. “We could make it worth your while. I should imagine that an interpreter in a situation such as this could command a handsome salary.”
“Money don’t mean a thing to me,” said Beasly. “It won’t buy me friends. People still will laugh at me.”
“He means it, mister,” Henry warned. “There isn’t anyone who can be as stubborn as Beasly. I know; he used to work for us.”
The U.N. man looked flabbergasted and not a little desperate.
“It will take you quite some time,” Henry pointed out, “to find another telepath – leastwise one who can talk to these people here.”
The U.N. man looked as if he were strangling. “I doubt,” he said, “there’s another one on Earth.”
“Well, all right,” said Beasly, brutally, “let’s make up our minds. I ain’t standing here all day.”
“All right,” cried the U.N. man. “You two go ahead. Please, will you go ahead? This is a chance we can’t let slip through our fingers. Is there anything you want? Anything I can do for you?”
“Yes, there is,” said Taine. “There’ll be the boys from Washington and bigwigs from other countries. Just keep them off my back.”
“I’ll explain most carefully to everyone. There’ll be no interference.”
“And I need that chemist and someone who’ll know about the saddles. And I need them quick. I can stall these boys a little longer, but not for too much longer.”
“Anyone you need,” said the U.N. man. “Anyone at all. I’ll have them here in hours. And in a day or two there’ll be a pool of experts waiting for you whenever you may need them – on a moment’s notice.”
“Sir,” said Henry, unctuously, “that’s most co-operative. Both Hiram and I appreciate it greatly. And now, since this is settled, I understand that there are reporters waiting. They’ll be interested in your statement.”
The U.N. man, it seemed, didn’t have it in him to protest. He and Henry went tramping up the stairs. Taine turned around and looked out across the desert.
“It’s a big front yard,” he said.
THE OBSERVER
Presaging, perhaps, the until-now-unpublished “I Had No Head and My Eyes Were Floating Way Up in the Air,” “The Observer” probably represents an experiment on the author’s part, one in which he sought to portray a being discovering itself after an event that reminds me, irresistibly, of a computer recovering from a forced shutdown.
It existed. Whether it had slept and wakened, or been turned on, or if this might be the first instant of its creation, it had no way of knowing. There was no memory of other time, or place.
Words came to fit where it found itself. Words emerging out of nowhere, symbols quite unbidden – awakened or turned on or first appearing, as it had itself.
It was in a place of red and yellow. The land was red. The sky was yellow. A brightness stood straight above the red land in the yellow sky. Liquid ran gurgling down a channel in the land.
In a little time it knew more, had a better understanding. It knew the brightness was a sun. It knew the running liquid was a brook. It thought of the liquid as a compound, but it wasn’t water. Life forms sprang from the redness of the soil. Their stems were green. They had purple fruits at the top of them.
It had the names now, identifying symbols it could use – life, liquid, land, sky, red, yellow, purple, green, sun, bright, water. Each instant it had more words, more names, more terms. And it could see, although seeing might not be the proper term, for it had no eyes. Nor legs. Nor arms. Nor body.
It had no eyes and seemed to have no body, either. It had no idea of position – standing up or lying down or sitting. It could look anywhere it wished without turning its head, since it hadn’t any head. Although, strangely, it did seem to occupy a specific position in relation to the landscape.
It looked straight up into the sky at the brightness of the sun and could look directly at the brightness since it was seeing without eyes, without frail organic structures that might be harmed by brilliance.
The sun was a B8 star, five times more massive than the Sun, and it lay 3.76 A.U. distant from this planet.
Sun, capitalized? A.U.? Five? 3.76? Planet?
Sometime in the past – when past, where past, what past – it had known the terms, a sun that was capitalized, water that ran in brooks, the idea of a body and eyes. Or had it known them? Had it ever had a past in which it could have known them? Or were they simply terms that were being fed into it from another source, to be utilized as the need arose, tools – and there was yet another term – to be used in interpreting this place where it found itself? Interpreting this place for what? For itself? That was ridiculous, for it did not need to know, did not even care to know.
Knowing, how did it know? how did it know the sun was a B8 star, and what was a B8 star? How know its distance, its diameter, its mass just by looking at it? How know a star, for it had never seen a star before?