Homeward Bound Part 20

Jonathan had heard all sorts of excuses for not eating all sorts of things-quite a few of them from his sons when they were little-but never one that Darwin would have approved of. He admired Trir's creativity.

When the krellepem came, they looked more like trilobites than anything else Jonathan had ever seen. They'd evolved even less than he'd expected. The servers brought special tools for eating them-tools that put him in mind of a hammer and chisel. Each segment of sh.e.l.l had its own chunk of meat inside.

"This is a savage way of feeding oneself," Ka.s.squit said as the pile of broken bits of krellep sh.e.l.l in front of her grew taller.

"Possibly," Frank Coffey said. "But the results are worth it."

"Truth," Jonathan agreed. The krellepem tasted something like oysters, something like scallops. He discovered they had meat inside their skinny little legs, too, and sucked it out one leg at a time. The others started imitating him.

"How do you do that?" Trir asked, watching them. Jonathan demonstrated. Trir said, "We would have to use tools to get at that meat. Our mouthparts are not flexible enough to do what you are doing."

She was right, though Jonathan hadn't thought about it till that moment. Lizards didn't have lips, not the way humans did. The edges of their mouths were hard. They couldn't suck meat out of a tubular leg, they couldn't kiss. . . . They can't make fart jokes, They can't make fart jokes, Jonathan thought, and realized he was even tireder than he'd suspected. Jonathan thought, and realized he was even tireder than he'd suspected.

"What is funny?" Karen asked when he snorted. He told her.

"What is a fart joke fart joke?" Trir asked; the relevant phrase had been in English.

"Something that proves my mate is seriously deranged," Karen told her.

"I thank you. I thank you very much." Jonathan used an emphatic cough.

"You Tosevites can be most confusing," Trir said.

All the Americans chorused, "We thank you. We thank you very much." They all used emphatic coughs. Trir was . . . most confused.

Glen Johnson looked down on Home from his...o...b..tal path in the Admiral Peary. Admiral Peary. He shared the control room with Mickey Flynn and Dr. Melanie Blanchard. Flynn eyed him and said, "I don't believe the Lizards are going to want to let you aboard any more of their s.p.a.cecraft. I told you bathing before you went would have been a good idea." He shared the control room with Mickey Flynn and Dr. Melanie Blanchard. Flynn eyed him and said, "I don't believe the Lizards are going to want to let you aboard any more of their s.p.a.cecraft. I told you bathing before you went would have been a good idea."

"Funny. Ha, ha. I laugh," Johnson said. "Hear me laugh?"

He glanced over toward the doctor. She smiled, but she wasn't laughing. That left him relieved. She said, "They really are anxious about ginger, though, aren't they?"

"Anxious about it and eager for it, both at the same time," Johnson answered. "That one scaly b.a.s.t.a.r.d who went helmet-to-helmet with me . . ."

"Good thing you had the recorder going," she said.

"If somebody wants to talk off the record, that's usually the time when it's a good idea to make sure he's on," Johnson said. "As soon as he told me to turn off my radio, I figured he had to have ginger on his miserable little mind. And as soon as I knew that, I knew he was liable to try to diddle me if I didn't have any to give him."

"Did the captain of the Lizard ship ever apologize for seizing you?" Dr. Blanchard asked.

"Ventris? Oh, h.e.l.l, yes-pardon my French-finally, in a way, once I browbeat him into it. Then he made it sound like it was our fault his scooter pilot got trapped by the wicked herb. To hear him talk, it was like ginger came after that Lizard with a gun. He He didn't have anything to do with it, of course." didn't have anything to do with it, of course."

"Why, heaven forfend," Mickey Flynn said. "The very idea is ridiculous. That anything could possibly be a Lizard's fault . . . ?" He shook his head. "Next thing you know, there'll be Big Uglies traveling between the stars."

"Don't hold your breath for that," Johnson said.

Melanie Blanchard looked from one of them to the other. "I can see how both of you'd be welcome guests on the surface of Home."

"Certainly," Flynn said. "The Lizards wouldn't kill me. They'd let their planet do it for them." He mimed being squashed flat.

"When are you going down to the surface?" Johnson asked the doctor.

"I don't know yet," she answered. "I'll have to take it easy down there for a while-I do know that. I spent too long weightless aboard the Lewis and Clark. Lewis and Clark."

"Is it safe for you to go?" he said.

"I think so," Dr. Blanchard answered. "If I have any doubts when the time comes, I'll get a second opinion."

"What if the other docs lie to you because they want to be the ones who go down there?" Johnson asked.

She looked startled, then shook her head. "No, they wouldn't do that," she said. "They need to know they can count on me, too."

"Wouldn't be so good if the doctor who was treating you might want you dead instead of better," Flynn observed.

"Wanted-dead more than alive," Johnson intoned solemnly.

She glared at each of them in turn. Had she been a Lizard with eye turrets that moved independently, she would have glared at both of them at the same time. "Thanks a lot, guys," she said, mostly in jest. "Thanks a h.e.l.l of a lot. Now I'll be looking back over my shoulder whenever I see anybody else wearing a white coat."

"Well, spread the word around," Flynn said. "That way, the others will be looking over their shoulders at you, too."

"Helpful," Melanie Blanchard said. "Very G.o.dd.a.m.n helpful." To show how helpful it was, she glided out of the control room.

"There-now look what you did," Flynn said to Johnson. "You scared her away."

"Me?" Johnson shook his head. "I thought it was you."

Her voice floated up the hatchway by which she'd departed: "It was both of you, as a matter of fact."

The two pilots looked at each other. They pointed at each other. Johnson started to laugh. Mickey Flynn, refusing to yield to such vulgar displays of emotion, looked even more impa.s.sive than before. That only made Johnson laugh harder than ever. He said, "No wonder we confuse the d.a.m.ned Lizards. We confuse each other, too."

"You don't confuse me a bit," Flynn declared.

"That's because you were confused to begin with," Johnson answered. "And if you don't believe me, ask Stone. He'll tell you."

Flynn shook his head. "He thinks he's not confused, which only makes him the most confused of all."

Johnson raised an eyebrow. "I have to think that one over."

"I hope nothing breaks," Flynn said helpfully. "But if it will a.s.sist in your cogitations, let me remind you that he still more than half wants to see how long you'll last if you go out the air lock without a suit."

Since he was right yet again, Johnson did the only thing a sensible man could do: he changed the subject. "Well," he said, "one of these days, the Lizards are going to get in an uproar about ginger that has something behind it."

"How can they do that?" the other pilot replied. "Everybody knows there is no ginger aboard the Admiral Peary. Admiral Peary."

"Yeah, and then you wake up," Johnson said scornfully. "Missiles with bombs in their noses are weapons. We brought plenty of those. Ginger is a weapon, too. You think we don't have any?"

Flynn shrugged. "I know about missiles. I know where they fit on the plans for the ship. I know how to arm them. I know how to launch them. I know how to tell the ship to do all that automatically in about nothing flat, so we can get the missiles away even if we're under attack. n.o.body has briefed me about ginger, which is the sum total of what I know about it. I will also point out that it's the sum total of what you know about it, too."

He was right again, of course. That didn't mean Johnson wasn't also right, not this time. "We can addle half the scaly so-and-sos down on that planet," he insisted. "There's got to be a way to get the herb from hither to yon."

"You are a.s.suming what you want to prove," Mickey Flynn said. "If you'd gone to the same sort of school I did, the nuns would have rapped your knuckles with a steel yardstick for a breach of logic like that."

"If I'd gone to the kind of school you did, I'd have to drop my pants if I wanted to count to twenty-one," Johnson retorted.

Flynn eyed him with mild astonishment. "You mean you don't? Truly, you are a fount-or at least a drip-of knowledge."

"Thank you so much." Johnson suddenly snapped his fingers. "I've got it!"

"I hope you can take something for it," Flynn said with well-simulated concern.

Johnson ignored him. "I know where I'd put the ginger if I were designing the Admiral Peary. Admiral Peary." He held up a hand. "If you make that particular suggestion, I'm going to be very annoyed at you."

With dignity, the other pilot said, "Moi? Je ne comprende pas." "Moi? Je ne comprende pas."

"Of course you don't," Johnson said. "Listen, how many people in cold sleep is this ship carrying?"

"Seventeen," Flynn answered. "Or was it forty-six thousand? I forget."

"Heh," Johnson said. "Funny. But the point is, you don't know for sure. I don't, either. And neither do the Lizards. What looks like s.p.a.ce for people in cold sleep could be s.p.a.ce for the herb just as easily."

"You have a low, nasty, suspicious mind," Flynn told him.

"Why, thank you," Johnson said.

"I don't know. Why not thank me?"

Johnson scowled. "I'd throw something at you, but I might miss you and hit something valuable instead."

Flynn a.s.sumed a look of injured innocence. By his face, his innocence had suffered enough injuries to end up on the critical list. Then he said, "You know, if you keep speculating about all these things we haven't got, you won't make our esteemed and benevolent commandant very happy with you."

"Who's going to tell him?" Johnson asked. "You?"

"Certainly not," Mickey Flynn replied. "But the walls have ears, the ceilings have eyes, and the floors probably have kidneys or livers or something else you wouldn't want to eat unless your stomach were rubbing up against your backbone."

Walls with ears were a cliche. Ceilings with eyes at least made sense. As for the rest . . . "Your mother dropped you on your head when you were little."

"Only when I needed it," Flynn said. "Of course, there were times when she needed to be retrained. Or was that restrained? Amazing how one's entire childhood can revolve around a typographical error."

"That's not all that's amazing," Johnson said darkly, but Flynn took it for a compliment, which spoiled his fun.

Over the next few days, he wondered if the commandant would summon him to his office to give him a roasting. Then, when that didn't happen, he wondered why it didn't. Because the Admiral Peary Admiral Peary carried no ginger, and the idea that it might was ridiculous? Or because the ship was full of ginger, and the less said about the herb, the better? The one thing that didn't occur to Johnson was that Healey hadn't heard his speculation. The floors did indeed have kidneys, or maybe livers. carried no ginger, and the idea that it might was ridiculous? Or because the ship was full of ginger, and the less said about the herb, the better? The one thing that didn't occur to Johnson was that Healey hadn't heard his speculation. The floors did indeed have kidneys, or maybe livers.

Dr. Blanchard worked with grim intensity in the exercise chamber, doing her best to build up her strength for the trip down to the surface of Home. Johnson spent stretches on the exercise bicycle, too, but he didn't get excited about them the way she did. He was in pretty good shape for a man who'd spent the last twenty years of his life weightless. He could exercise till everything turned blue and not be fit enough to face gravity.

He said, "I wish they'd send one of the other docs down, not you."

"Why?" she demanded, working the bicycle harder than ever so that her sweaty hair plastered itself against the side of her face. "I'll be d.a.m.ned if I want to go through all this c.r.a.p for nothing."

"Well, I can see that," he said, pedaling along beside her at his own slower pace-one of the great advantages of a stationary bike. "But you're a h.e.l.l of a lot better looking than they are."

"Not right now, I'm not," she said, which wasn't true, at least not to someone of the male persuasion. She added, "Besides, I must smell like an old goat," which was.

Johnson denied it anyway, saying, "I'm the old goat."

"What you are is a guy with too much time on his hands," she said. "Exercise more. That'll help some."

"Thanks a lot," he muttered. "Some problems, you know, you're not really looking for a cure."

"Well, you'd better be," Dr. Blanchard said, and that was effectively that.

"I greet you, Amba.s.sador," Atvar told Sam Yeager when he met the Big Ugly in the hotel conference room. "And I am pleased to tell you congratulations are in order."

"And I greet you. I also thank you. What kind of congratulations, Fleetlord?" the American Tosevite inquired.

"Your pet.i.tion for an audience with the Emperor has been granted," Atvar answered. "This news comes through me and not directly to you because I have been appointed your sponsor, so to speak."

"That is excellent news. Excellent!" Sam Yeager not only used an emphatic cough, he also got out of his chair and bent into the posture of respect. "I am in your debt for the help you gave me. Ah . . . what does being a sponsor entail?"

He was pleased. Atvar knew that. But the wild Big Ugly was not overjoyed, as a proper citizen of the Empire would have been. He was just pleased-much too mild a reaction. His question, though, was reasonable enough. Atvar said, "A sponsor does about what you would expect. He trains his hatchling-that is the technical term-in responses and rituals required in the audience. If the hatchling disgraces himself, the sponsor is also disgraced. Not all those who win audiences have a sponsor. Getting one is most common among those least likely to have their pet.i.tions accepted and so least likely to be familiar with the rituals."

"Among the poor and the ignorant, eh?" Sam Yeager laughed in the noisy fashion of his kind. "Which am I?"

"You are ignorant, of course, Amba.s.sador. Will you deny it?" Atvar said. "I suppose I was chosen as your sponsor not only because I know you but because I am familiar with Tosevites in general and because I have had a recent audience with his Majesty. I will do my best to help you avoid the pitfalls."

"Again, I thank you," Sam Yeager said. "I do hope the Race will remember that I really am ignorant, that I am only a poor, stupid wild Big Ugly who knows no better. If I make a mistake, I will not be doing it on purpose."

"I believe that is understood, yes," Atvar said. "If the Emperor and his court did not understand it, your pet.i.tion would have been rejected."

"Good." The Tosevite paused. "And something else occurs to me. The Emperor ought to grant Ka.s.squit an audience."

That took Atvar by surprise. Both his eye turrets swung sharply toward Yeager. "Interesting," he said. "Why do you propose this?"

"For the good of the Empire-and for Ka.s.squit's own good," Sam Yeager answered. "She is a citizen of the Empire, after all, and she is proud of being a citizen of the Empire. The Empire might do well to show that it is proud to have her as a citizen."

"What an . . . interesting idea indeed," Atvar said. "You realize we may do this and use it in propaganda aimed at the Tosevites under our control on Tosev 3? It would show them they can truly become part of the Empire themselves."

"Oh, yes. I realize that," the wild Big Ugly replied. "I will take my chances nonetheless. For one thing, it will be more than twenty of your years before those pictures arrive at Tosev 3." He stopped.

Atvar eyed Yeager with amused scorn. The Tosevite thought of the interval signals took to go from Home to Tosev 3 as a long time. If it wasn't happening right now, it wasn't real for a Big Ugly. But then Atvar looked at Sam Yeager in a different way. Say what you would about him, he was not a fool. And . . . "You said, 'For one thing,' Amba.s.sador, but you did not go on with any more after the first. What were your other points?"

"Ah, you noticed, did you?" Sam Yeager shrugged. "Well, I suppose I can tell you. My one other point would have been simply that Ka.s.squit's audience with the Emperor might do you less good than you would expect if you were to broadcast it widely in the areas of Tosev 3 that you rule."

"Oh? And why do you say that?" Atvar wondered if Yeager was going to try to spout some persuasive nonsense to keep the Race from doing what was really in its best interest to do.

But the wild Big Ugly answered, "Because you will be photographing a Tosevite female without her wrappings. This will perhaps arouse some of your audience. It will scandalize a great deal more. I suspect, though, that it will have the desired effect on very few."