“Then let’s get started,” said Harl in a pleased tone. “Y’know, Link, you not only got manners, you got words! I got to introduce you to my sister!”
He descended the stairs, Link following. The situation was probably serious. It could be appalling. But Link had been restless for days, now, from a lack of things to interest his normally active brain. He felt himself challenged. It appeared that Sord Three might turn out to be a very interesting place.
When they reached the open-air, the two pig-like animals had joined the party of waiting unicorns and men. They moved about underfoot with the accustomed air of dogs with a hunting party of men. But they did not wear dogs’ amiable expressions. They looked distinctly peevish.
“I want somebody to take a message,” said Harl briskly. “It’s worth two beers.”
A pig-like animal looked at him scornfully. Link heard a voice remarkably resembling that of the invisible conversationalist he’d talked to before these men arrived.
“This is our ship!” said the voice stridently. “We saw it first!”
“You didn’t tell us,” said Harl firmly. “And we found it without you. Besides, it belongs to this gentleman. You want two beers?”
“Tyrant!” snapped the voice. “Robber! Grinding down the poor! Robbing—”
“Hush up!” said Harl. “Do you take the message or not?”
A second voice said defiantly:
“For four beers! It’s worth ten!”
“All right, four beers it is,” agreed Harl. “The message is not to hang that whiskery fella till we get there. We’ll be right along.”
The first scornful voice snapped:
“Who gets the message?”
“Tell my sister,” said Harl impatiently. “Shoo!”
The two pig-like animals broke into a gallop together and went streaking over the nearest bill crest. As they went, squabbling voices accused each other, the one because the bargain was for only two beers apiece, and the other for having gotten himself included in the bargain out of all reason. Link stared after them, his jaw dropped open. The voices dwindled, disputing, and ended as the piggish creatures disappeared.
Link swallowed and blinked. Harl appointed one of his followers to remain in the Glamorgan as caretaker. That left a splay-footed animal with a drooping nose-horn as a mount for Link. Bemused and almost incredulous, he climbed into the saddle on a signal from Harl. The completely improbable cavalcade moved briskly away from the landed spaceship. It was not an indiscretion on Link’s part. A care-taker remained with the ship, and Thistlethwaite was in trouble. Link went to try to get him out. Also, it appeared to be definite that Link had somehow made himself a guest in Harl’s Household—whatever that might be—and etiquette protected him from ordinary peril so long as he did nothing equivalent to offering to pay to have a message delivered, or rather, so long as he did nothing equivalent to offering to pay Harl for having a message delivered. It was approvable to offer to pay small animals like pigs who—
“My fella back there,” said Harl reassuringly as they mounted a hillock and from its top saw other hillocks stretching away indefinitely, “my fella, he’ll take good care of your ship, Link. I warned him not to touch a thing but just keep uffts out and if any human come by to say you’re guestin’ with me.”
“Thanks,” said Link. Then he said painfully, “Those small fat animals—”
“Uffts?” said Harl. “Don’t you have ’em where you come from?”
“No,” said Link. “We don’t. It seems that… they talk!”
“Natural,” Harl agreed. “They talk too much, if you ask me. Those two will stop on the way an’ tell all the other uffts all about the message, and about you, an’ everything. But they were on this world when the old-timers came an’ settled’ here. They were the smartest critters on the planet. Plenty smart! But they’re awful proud. They got brains, but they’ve got hoofs instead of hands, so all they can do is talk. They have big gatherin’s and drink beer and make speeches to each other about how superior they are to human bein’s because they ain’t got paws like us.”
The motion of the splay-footed unicorns was unpleasant. The one Link rode put down each foot separately, and the result was a series of swayings in various directions which had a tendency to make a rider sea-sick. Link struggled with that sensation. Harl appeared to be thinking deeply, and sadly. The unicorns were not hoofed animals so there was no sound of hoofbeats. There was only the creaking of saddle leather and very occasionally the clatter of a spear or some other object against something else.
“Y’know,” said Harl presently, “I’d like to believe that you comin’ here, Link, is meant, or something. I’ve been getting pretty discouraged, with things seemin’ to get worse all the time. Time was, the old folks say, when uffts was polite and respectful and did what they was told and took thank-you gifts and was glad to’ve done a human a favor. But nowadays they won’t work for anybody without a agreement of just how much beer they’re goin’ to get for doin’ it. And the old folks say there used to be unduplied cloth an’ stuff that was better than we got now. And knives was better, an’ tools was better, and there was lectric and machines and folks lived real comfortable. But lately it’s been gettin’ harder an’ harder to get uffts to bring in greenstuff, an’ they want more an’ more beer for it. I tell you, it ain’t simple, bein’ a Householder these days! You got people to feed an’ clothe, and the women fuss and the men get sour and the uffts set back and laugh, and make speeches to each other about how much smarter they are than us. I tell you, Link, it’s time for something to happen, or things are goin’ to get just so bad we can’t stand them!”
The cavalcade went on, and Harl’s voice continued. The thing he deplored came out properly marshaled, and it was evident that responsibilities in an imperfect universe had caused him much grief, of which he was conscious.
Link caught an idea now and then, but most of Harl’s melancholy referred to conditions Harl took as a matter of course and Link knew nothing about. For example, there was the idea that it was disgraceful to pay or be paid for anything that was done, except by uffts. On no other planet Link had heard of was commerce considered disreputable. He knew of none on which work was not supposed to be performed in exchange for wages. And there was, irrelevantly, the matter of Thistlethwaite’s clothing. It was not “duplied.” What was “duplied”? Everywhere, of course, the good old days are praised by those who managed to live through them. But when cloth was duplied it was inferior, and tools were inferior, and there was no more lectric—that would be electricity—and there were no more engines.
Link almost asked a question, then. The ancestors of Harl and his followers had colonized this planet from space. By spaceship. It was unthinkable that they hadn’t had electricity and engines or motors. And when the way to make things is known and they are wanted, they are made! The way to make them is not forgotten! It simply isn’t! But according to Harl they’d had those things and lost them. Why?
Harl murmured on, with a sort of resigned unhappiness. The state of things on Sord Three was bad. He hoped Link’s arrival might help, but it didn’t seem really likely. He named ways in which times had formerly been better. He named matters in which deterioration had plainly gone a long way. But he gave no clue to what made them worse, except that everything that was duplied was inferior, and everything was duplied. But what duplying was—
They passed over the top of a rolling hill. Below them the ground was disturbed. An illimitable number of burrows broke its surface, with piles of dirt and stones as evidence of excavations below ground. An incredible number of pink-skinned, pig-like creatures appeared to live here.