The Mote in God's Eye (38 page)

“Perhaps they will change their minds when they know you better. Besides, I’m not a physicist,” Bury said blandly.

“Ah. Bury, we have not exhausted the subject of art. Our artists have a free hand and ready access to materials, and very little supervision. In principle the exchange of art between Mote and Empire would facilitate communication. We have never yet tried to aim our art at an alien mind.”

“Dr. Hardy’s books and education tapes contain many such works of art.”

“We must study them.” Bury’s Motie sipped contemplatively at his dirty water. “We spoke of coffees and wines. My associates have noticed—how shall I put it?—a strong cultural set toward wines, among your scientists and Navy officers.”

“Yes. Place of origin, dates, labels, ability to travel in free fall, what wines go with what foods.” Bury grimaced. “I have listened, but I know nothing of this. I find it annoying and expensive that some of my ships must move under constant acceleration merely to protect a wine bottle from its own sediments. Why can they not simply be centrifuged on arrival?”

“And coffees? They all drink coffee. Coffee varies according to its genetics, soil, climate, method of roasting. I know this is so. I have seen your stores.”

“I have much greater variety aboard
MacArthur
. Yes, and there is variety among coffee drinkers. Cultural differences. On an American-descended world like Tabletop they would not touch the oily brew preferred in New Paris, and they find the brew of Levant much too sweet and strong.”

“Ah.”

“Have you heard of Jamaica Blue Mountain? It grows on Earth itself, on a large island; the island was never bombed, and the mutations were weeded out in the centuries following the collapse of the CoDominium. It cannot be bought. Navy ships carry it to the Imperial Palace on Sparta.”

“How does it taste?”

“As I told you, it is reserved for the Royal—” Bury hesitated. “Very well. You know me that well. I would not pay such a price again, but I do not regret it.”

“The Navy misjudges your worth because you lack knowledge of wines.” Bury’s Motie did not seem to be smiling. Its bland expression was a Trader’s: it matched Bury’s own. “Quite foolish of them, of course. If they knew how much there was to learn about coffee—”

“What are you suggesting?”

“You have stores aboard. Teach them about coffee. Use your own stores for the purpose.”

“My stores would not last a week among the officers of a battle cruiser!”

“You would show them a similarity between your culture and theirs. Or do you dislike that idea? No, Bury, I am not reading your mind. You dislike the Navy; you tend to exaggerate the differences between them and you. Perhaps they think the same way?”

“I am not reading your mind.” Bury suppressed the fury building in him—and at that moment he saw it. He knew why the alien kept repeating that phrase. It was to keep him off balance. In a trading situation.

Bury smiled broadly. “A week’s worth of good will. Well, I will try your suggestion when we are back in orbit and I dine aboard
MacArthur
. Allah knows they have much to learn about coffee. Perhaps I can even teach them how to use their percolators correctly.”

Rod and Sally sat alone in the Captain’s patrol cabin. The intercom screens were off, and the status board above Rod’s desk showed a neat pattern of green lights. Rod stretched his long legs out and sipped at his drink. “You know, this is about the first time we’ve had alone together since we left New Caledonia. It’s nice.”

She smiled uncertainly. “But we don’t have very long—the Moties are expecting us to come back, and I’ve got dictating to do... How much longer can we stay in the Mote system, Rod?”

Blaine shrugged. “Up to the Admiral. Viceroy Merrill wanted us back as soon as possible, but Dr. Horvath wants to learn more. So do I. Sally, we
still
don’t have anything significant to report! We don’t
know
whether the Moties are a threat to the Empire or not.”

“Rod Blaine, will you stop acting like a Regular Navy officer and be yourself? There is not one shred of evidence that the Moties are hostile. We haven’t seen any signs of weapons, or wars, or anything like that—”

“I know,” Rod said sourly. “And that worries me. Sally, have you ever heard of a human civilization that didn’t have soldiers?”

“No, but Moties aren’t human.”

“Neither are ants, but they’ve got soldiers— Maybe you’re right, I’m catching it from Kutuzov. Speaking of which, he wants more frequent reports. You know that every scrap of data gets transmitted raw to
Lenin
inside an hour? We’ve even sent over samples of Motie artifacts, and some of the modified stuff the Brownies worked on...”

Sally laughed. Rod looked pained for a moment, then joined her. “I’m sorry, Rod. I know it must have been painful to have to tell the Tsar that you had Brownies on your ship—but it
was
funny!”

“Yeah. Funny. Anyway, we send everything we can to
Lenin
—and you think
I’m
paranoid? Kutuzov has everything inspected in space, then sealed into containers filled with ciphogene and parked
outside
his ship! I think he’s afraid of contamination.” The intercom buzzed. “Oh, damn.” Rod tuned to the screen. “Captain here.”

“Chaplain Hardy to see you, Captain,” the Marine sentry announced. “With Mr. Renner and the scientists.”

Rod sighed and gave Sally a helpless look. “Send them in and send in my steward. I imagine they’ll all want a drink.”

They did. Eventually everyone was seated, and his cabin was crowded. Rod greeted the Mote expedition personnel, then took a sheaf of papers from his desk. “First question: Do you need Navy ratings with you? I understand they’ve nothing to do.”

“Well, there’s no harm in their being there,” Dr. Horvath said. “But they do take up room the scientific staff could use.”

“In other words, no,” Rod said. “Fine. I’ll let you decide which of your people to replace them with, Dr. Horvath. Next point: Do you need Marines?”

“Good heavens, no,” Sally protested. She looked quickly to Horvath, who nodded. “Captain, the Moties are so far from being hostile, they’ve built the Castle for us. It’s magnificent! Why can’t you come down and
see
it?”

Rod laughed bitterly. “Admiral’s orders. For that matter, I can’t let any officer who knows how to construct a Langston Field go down.” He nodded to himself. “The Admiral and I agree on one point: If you do need help, two Marines won’t be any use—and giving the Moties a chance to work that Fyunch(click) thing on a pair of warriors doesn’t seem like a good idea. That brings up the next point. Dr. Horvath, is Mr. Renner satisfactory to you? Perhaps I should ask him to leave the room while you reply.”

“Nonsense. Mr. Renner has been very helpful. Captain, does your restriction apply to my people? Am I forbidden to take, say, a physicist to Mote Prime?”

“Yes.”

“But Dr. Buckman is counting on going. The Moties have been studying Murcheson’s Eye and the Coal Sack for a long time . . . how long, Mr. Potter?”

The midshipman squirmed uncomfortably before answering. “Thousands of years, sir,” he said finally. “Only...”

“Only what, Mister?” Rod prompted. Potter was a bit shy, and he’d have to outgrow that. “Speak up.”

“Yes, sir. There are gaps in their observations, Captain. The Moties hae never mentioned the fact, but Dr. Buckman says it is obvious. I would hae said they sometimes lose interest in astronomy, but Dr. Buckman can nae understand that.”

“He wouldn’t,” Rod laughed. “Just how important are those observations, Mr. Potter?”

“For astrophysics, perhaps verra important, Captain. They hae been watching yon supergiant for aye their history as it passed across the Coal Sack. ‘Twill go supernova and then become a black hole—and the Moties say they know when.”

Midshipman Whitbread laughed. Everyone turned to stare at him. Whitbread could hardly control his features. “Sorry, sir—but I was there when Gavin told Buckman about that. The Eye will explode in A.D. 2,774,020 on April 27 between four and four-thirty in the morning, they say. I thought Dr. Buckman was going to strangle himself. Then he started doing his own checking. It took him thirty hours—”

Sally grinned. “And he almost killed the Fyunch(click) doing it,” she added. “Had Dr. Horvath’s Motie translating for him when his own came apart.”

“Yes, but he found out they were right,” Whitbread told them. The midshipman cleared his throat and mimicked Buckman’s dry voice. “Damned close, Mr. Potter. I’ve got the mathematics and observations to prove it.”

“You’re developing a talent for acting, Mr. Whitbread,” First Lieutenant Cargill said. “Pity your work in astrogation doesn’t show a similar improvement. Captain, it seems to me that Dr. Buckman can get everything he needs here. There’s no reason for him to go to the Motie planet.”

“Agreed. Dr. Horvath, the answer is no. Besides—do you
really
want to spend a week cooped up with Buckman? You needn’t answer that,” he added quickly. “Whom will you take?”

Horvath frowned for a moment. “De Vandalia, I suppose.”

“Yes, please,” Sally said quickly. “We
need
a geologist. I’ve tried digging for rock samples, and I didn’t learn a thing about the make-up of Mote Prime. There’s nothing but ruins made up of older ruins.”

“You mean they don’t have rocks?” Cargill asked.

“They have rocks, Commander,” she answered. “Granite and lava and basalts, but they aren’t where whatever formed this planet put them. They’ve all been
used
, for walls, or tiles, or roofs. I did find cores in a museum, but I can’t make much sense out of them.”

“Now wait a minute,” said Rod. “You mean you go out and dig at random, and wherever you dig you find what’s left of a city? Even out in the farm lands?”

“Well, there wasn’t time for many digs. But where I did dig, there was always something else underneath. I never knew when to stop! Captain, there was a city like A.D. 2000 New York under a cluster of adobe huts without plumbing. I think they had a civilization that collapsed, perhaps two thousand years ago.”

“That would explain the observation lapses,” Rod said. “But—they seem brighter than that. Why would they let a civilization collapse?” He looked to Horvath, who shrugged.

“I have an idea,” Sally said. “The contaminants in the air—wasn’t there a problem with pollution from internal combustion engines on Earth sometime during the CoDominium? Suppose the Moties had a civilization based on fossil fuels and ran out? Mightn’t they have dropped back into an Iron Age before they developed fusion power and plasma physics again? They seem to be awfully short on radioactive ores.”

Rod shrugged. “A geologist could help a lot, then—and he has far more need to be on the spot than Dr. Buckman does. I take it that’s settled, Dr. Horvath?”

The Science Minister nodded sourly. “But I still don’t like this Navy interference with our work. You tell him, Dr. Hardy. This must stop.”

The Chaplain linguist looked surprised. He had sat at the back of the room, saying nothing but listening attentively. “Well, I have to agree that a geologist will be more useful on the surface than an astrophysicist, Anthony. And—Captain, I find myself in a unique position. As a scientist I cannot approve of all these restrictions placed on our contact with the Moties. As a representative of the Church I have an impossible task. And as a Navy officer—I think I have to agree with the Admiral.”

Everyone turned toward the portly Chaplain in surprise. “I am astonished, Dr. Hardy,” Horvath said. “Have you seen the smallest evidence of warlike activities on Mote Prime?”

Hardy folded his hands carefully and spoke across the tops of his fingertips. “No. And that, Anthony, is what concerns me. We know the Moties
do
have wars: the Mediator class was evolved, possibly consciously evolved, to stop them. I do not think they always succeed. So why are the Moties hiding their armaments from us? For the same reason we conceal ours, is the obvious answer, but consider: we do not conceal the fact that we
have
weapons, or even what their general nature is. Why do they?”

“Probably ashamed of them,” Sally answered. She winced at the look on Rod’s face. “I didn’t really mean it
that
way—but they
have
been civilized longer than we have, and they might be embarrassed by their violent past.”

“Possibly,” Hardy admitted. He sniffed his brandy speculatively. “And possibly not, Sally. I have the impression the Moties are hiding something important—and hiding it right under our noses, so to speak.”

There was a long silence. Horvath sniffed loudly. Finally the Science Minister said, “And how could they do that, Dr. Hardy? Their government consists of informal negotiations by representatives of the givers of orders class. Every city seems to be nearly autonomous. Mote Prime hardly has a planetary government, and you think they’re able to conspire against us? It is not very reasonable.”

Hardy shrugged again. “From what we have seen, Dr. Horvath, you are certainly correct. And yet I cannot rid myself of the impression that they are hiding something.”

“They showed us everything,” Horvath insisted. “Even givers of orders’ households, where they don’t normally have visitors.”

“Sally was just getting to that before you came in,” Rod said quickly. “I’m fascinated—how does the Motie officer class live? Like the Imperial aristocracy?”

“That’s a better guess than you might think,” Horvath boomed. Two dry martinis had mellowed him considerably. “There were many similarities—although the Moties have an entirely different conception of luxuries from ours. Some things in common, though. Land. Servants. That sort of thing.” Horvath took another drink and warmed to his subject.

“Actually, we visited two households. One lived in a skyscraper near the Castle. Seemed to control the entire building: shops, light industry, hundreds of Browns and Reds and Workers and—oh, dozens of other castes. The other one, though, the agriculturist, was very like a country baron. The work force lived in long rows of houses, and in between the row houses were fields. The ‘baron’ lived in the center of all that,”