“Whatever you like,” said the biped indifferently.
“See, he gives me his promise,” said Griick, with emphasis. “And my promise to you, Emma. So long as he stays on his side of the room, you will work on your side, and not be frightened. But if he should cross over the line, Emma, then you have my permission to be frightened again, and to run into your room and bar the door! Understood?”
The female seemed impressed. “Very well then, Herr Doktor,” she said at last.
“Good!” ejaculated Griick. He rubbed his hands together, beaming. “Now, what else is left?” He looked around the room. “Wenzl, move one of those typewriters so that Fritz has one to use. And some of the work, also, on this side - not too much for Fritz, I’m sure Emma works much faster! Good, good.” He started to leave, followed by Wenzl and the young keeper. “Until next time, then, Emma, Fritz!”
The door closed.
THE biped made as if to sit down at his desk. At his first movement Emma flinched back, jaw gaping in fright, hands over her knob. This startled the biped, who said irritably, “I’m not going to hurt you.”
“Don’t speak to me,” the female said faintly. She clutched her knob. Her body was trembling all over, slightly but perceptibly.
The biped, trying to ignore her involuntary starts and shrieks, moved to the desk and sat down. He took the cover off his machine, looked at the heap of dictaphone spools in the in basket, then opened the desk drawer and quickly glanced inside to make sure his letter was there. By this time, the female was in the doorway of her room, poised for further flight.
Under her horrified gaze, the biped did not dare take his unfinished letter out of the drawer. He picked up the first dictaphone spool, inserted it in the machine, put the earphones on his head and began to listen.
A sudden loud noise in his ears made him jump and tear off the earphones. After a moment he turned down the volume and cautiously tried again. A voice was speaking faintly; he recognized it as Griick’s, but could not make out the words. He turned the spool back to start. The abrupt sound came again, and this time he realized that it was Griick clearing his throat.
He turned up the volume. Griick’s voice was saying, “Attention, Emma! Here is tape number two of Some Aspects of Extra-Terrestrial Biology. Begin. Bibliography. Birney, R. C. Bayee-air-en-eh-ipsilon, Emma. Phylum and genus in the Martian biota. Journal of comparative physiology, 1985, 50, 162 to 167. Bulev, M. I. Bay-oo-ell-eh-fow, Emma. Remember, not with vay again, as last time! A preliminary study of natator veneris schultzii. Dissertation abstracts, 1990, 15, 1652 to 1653. Cooper, J. G. …”
The biped irritably removed the earphones and switched off the machine. The earphones did not press hard on his small external ears, but they felt unfamiliar and made him nervous.
The female had moved out a few steps from her doorway, but when he glanced up, she backed away hastily.
The biped swore. After a moment, reluctantly, he turned the dictaphone spool back to the beginning and put the earphones on again. He rolled paper into the typewriter carriage, then switched on the dictaphone and began trying to type as he listened. But in the first few words he typed there were so many errors that he ripped the paper out and threw it in the wastebasket.
There was a stifled shriek from the female, who had advanced halfway across the room. Clutching her knob, she retreated two steps.
“Don’t look at me!” she piped.
“Then don’t shriek,” said the biped, annoyed. He rolled another sheet into the machine.
“I wouldn’t shriek, if you only wouldn’t look at me.”
He glanced up. “How can I help looking at you if you shriek?”
Except for another piping sound, more a gasp than a scream, she made no reply. The biped went back to work. Touching one key at a time with painful care, he managed to get through five entries in the bibliography before making an error.
He threw the pages away and started over once more.
TIME passed. At length he was aware that the female had crossed the room to her desk. He concentrated on his work, and did not look up. After a few minutes, he heard the clatter of her machine. Her typing was smooth and rapid; the carriage banged against the stop, banged back, and reeled off another line.
Angrily, the biped hit a key too hard and it repeated. He ripped the page out.
“You are spoiling all your work,” she said.
He glanced up - her hands leaped to her knob - he looked down again. “I can’t help it if I am,” he said.
“Weren’t you taught to type properly?”
“No. I mean yes.” The biped clenched his three-fingered fists in frustration. “I know how to type, but this animal doesn’t. I can’t make his hands work.”
She stared at him with her mouth slightly open. It was plain that she did not understand a word.
The biped growled angrily and went back to his work. After a moment he heard the clatter of Emma’s machine begin again.
For a long time neither spoke. Keeping at it grimly, in the next hour the biped managed to complete a page. He took it from the machine and put it into his out basket with a feeling of triumph. Glancing over at the female’s desk, he was a little disconcerted to note that her out basket was heaped with typescript and dictaphone spools, while her in basket was empty.
His back and his hands ached from the unaccustomed work. He felt weary and dejected again. How was he going to finish the letter, the all-important letter, while the female was constantly in the same room? Perhaps if he deliberately frightened her once again …
The thought ended as he heard the outer door open. Emma looked up expectantly. The clatter of her machine ceased. She covered the machine in two deft movements and stood up.
In walked Griick, beaming and nodding; then Wenzl, grim as ever; finally the pimply keeper with his cart.
Griick’s expression changed slightly when he glanced at the biped.
“Please!” he ejaculated, making upward motions with his fat hands. Belatedly realizing what was meant, the biped got up and stood at attention beside his desk, as Emma was doing beside hers.
“Good!” cried Griick happily. “Excellent! You see, Fritz, a little politeness, and everything is better.” He turned to Emma, examined the contents of her out basket, beaming with approval. “Fine, Emma, good work. Emma shall have three bonbons with her dinner! You hear, Rudi?”
“Very good, Herr Doktor,” said the keeper, with a bow. He put three large lumps of some drylooking, pale green substance on a plate which already contained a sort of gray-brown stew, and carried it into Emma’s room. When he returned, Griick was staring at the biped’s out basket with an expression of hurt disbelief.
“Fritz, can this be all?” asked Griick. “For a whole morning’s work? Surely you can’t be so lazy!”
The biped muttered, “I did the best I could.”
Griick shook his head sadly. “No bonbons for Fritz today, Karl. What a shame, eh, Wenzl? Poor Fritz has earned no bonbons. We are sorry for Fritz. But to give him bonbons for such work would not be fair to Emma, who works hard! Correct, Wenzl?”
Wenzl, fixing the biped with a cold and unregretful stare, said nothing. Griick went on, “But this afternoon, if there is an improvement - well, we shall see! Until then-” He picked up the single page in the biped’s basket, glanced at it again, and clucked his tongue. “Not correct! Not correct!” he said, stabbing a blunt finger against the page. “Here are mistakes, Fritz! So little work, and also so bad! And where … where are the carbon copies?”
“No one said anything to me about any carbon copies,” the biped replied angrily. “As for the typewriting, I’ve told you, this animal’s body is unfamiliar to me. Let me see you type with somebody else’s fingers, and see if you do as well!” He felt a little dizzy, and went on shouting without caring much what happened. You can take your whole damned Zoo, for all I care, he said, shaking his fist in Griick’s face, “and slide down my-”