He sat and worried at the question, without reaching a conclusion, without getting any nearer to the answer until the door chimes sounded.
It was the Widow Foshay and she was empty-handed. She had no broth today.
“Good afternoon,” he said. “You are a little late.”
“I was just opening my door to come over when I saw you had a caller. He’s gone now, isn’t he?”
“For some time,” said Packer.
She stepped inside and he closed the door. They walked across the room.
“Mr. Packer,” said the Widow, “I must apologize. I brought no broth today. The truth of the matter is, I’m tired of making it all the time.”
“In such a case,” he said, very gallantly, “the treats will be on me.”
He opened the desk drawer and lifted out the brand new box of PugAlNash’s leaf, which had arrived only the day before.
Almost reverently, he lifted the cover and held the box out to her. She recoiled from it a little.
“Go ahead,” he urged. “Take a pinch of it. Don’t swallow it. Just chew it.”
Cautiously, she dipped her fingers in the box.
“That’s too much,” he warned her. “Just a little pinch. You don’t need a lot. And it’s rather hard to come by.”
She took a pinch and put it in her mouth.
He watched her closely, smiling. She looked for all the world as if she had taken poison. But soon she settled back in her chair, apparently convinced it was not some lethal trick.
“I don’t believe,” she said, “I’ve ever tasted anything quite like it.”
“You never have. Other than myself, you may well be the only human that has ever tasted it. I get it from a friend of mine who lives on one of the far-out stars. His name is PugAlNash and he sends it regularly. And he always includes a note.”
He looked in the drawer and found the latest note.
“Listen to this,” he said.
He read it:
Der Fiend: Grately injoid latter smoke you cent me. Ples mor of sam agin. You du knot no that I profetick and wach ahed for you. Butt it be so and I grately hapy to perform this taske for fiend. I assur you it be onely four the beste. You prophet grately, maybee.
Your luving fiend,
He finished reading it and tossed it on the desk.
“What do you make of it?” he asked. “Especially that crack about his being a prophet and watching ahead for me?”
“It must be all right,” the widow said. “He claims you will profit greatly.”
“He sounds like a gypsy fortune-teller. He had me worried for a while.”
“But why should you worry over that?”
“Because I don’t want to know what’s going to happen to me. And sometime he might tell me. If a man could look ahead, for example, he’d know just when he was going to die and how and all the –”
“Mr. Packer,” she told him, “I don’t think you’re meant to die. I swear you are getting to look younger every day.”
“As a matter of fact,” said Packer, vastly pleased, “I’m feeling the best I have in years.”
“It may be that leaf he sends you.”
“No, I think most likely it is that broth of yours.”
They spent a pleasant afternoon—more pleasant, Packer admitted, than he would have thought was possible.
And after she had left, he asked himself another question that had him somewhat frightened.
Why in the world, of all people in the world, had he shared the leaf with her?
He put the box back in the drawer and picked up the note. He smoothed it out and read it once again.
The spelling brought a slight smile to his lips, but he quickly turned it off, for despite the atrociousness of it, PugAlNash nevertheless was one score up on him. For Pug had been able, after a fashion, to master the language of Earth, while he had bogged down completely when confronted with Pug’s language.
I profetick and wach ahed for you.
It was crazy, he told himself. It was, perhaps, some sort of joke, the kind of thing that passed for a joke with Pug.
He put the note away and prowled the apartment restlessly, vaguely upset by the whole pile-up of worries.
What should he do about the Griffin offer?
Why had he shared the leaf with the Widow Foshay?
What about that crack of Pug’s?
He went to the bookshelves and put out a finger and ran it along the massive set of Galactic Abstracts. He found the right volume and took it back to the desk with him.
He leafed through it until he found Unuk al Hay. Pug, he remembered, lived on Planet X of the system.
He wrinkled up his forehead as he puzzled out the meaning of the compact, condensed, sometimes cryptic wording, bristling with fantastic abbreviations. It was a bloated nuisance, but it made sense, of course. There was just too much information to cover in the galaxy—the set of books, unwieldy as it might be, would simply become unmanageable if anything like completeness of expression and description were attempted.
X-lt.kn., int., uninh. hu., (T-67), tr. intrm. (T-102) med. hbs., leg. forst., diff. lang …
Wait a second, there!
Leg. forst.
Could that be legend of foresight?
He read it again, translating as he went:
X-little known, intelligence, uninhabitable for humans (see table 67), trade by intermediaries (see table 102), medical herbs, legend (or legacy?) of foresight, difficult language …
And that last one certainly was right. He’d gained a working knowledge of a lot of alien tongues, but with Pug’s he could not even get an inkling.
Leg. forst.?
One couldn’t be sure, but it could be—it could be!
He slapped the book shut and took it back to the shelf.
So you watch ahead for me, he said.
And why? To what purpose?
PugAlNash, he said, a little pleased, someday I’ll wring your scrawny, meddling neck.
But, of course, he wouldn’t. PugAlNash was too far away and he might not be scrawny and there was no reason to believe he even had a neck.
CHAPTER IV
When bedtime came around, he got into his flame-red pajamas with the yellow parrots on them and sat on the edge of the bed, wiggling his toes.
It had been quite a day, he thought.
He’d have to talk with Tony about this government offer to sell him the stamp material. Perhaps, he thought, he should insist upon it even if it meant a loss of possible revenue to Efficiency, Inc. He might as well get what he could and what he wanted when it was for the taking. For Tony, before they were through with it, probably would beat him out of what he had coming to him. He had expected it by now—but more than likely Tony had been too busy to indulge in any crookedness. Although it was a wonder, for Tony enjoyed a dishonest dollar twice as much as he did an honest one.
He remembered that he had told Griffin that he had faith in Tony and he guessed that he’d been right—he had faith in him and a little pride as well. Tony was an unprincipled rascal and there was no denying it. Thinking about it, Packer chuckled fondly. Just like me, he told himself, when I was young as Tony and was still in business.