big tweezers made by tying two green stickstogether. There was an old Arabian legend that Allah had made thefirst tongs and given them to the first smith, because nobody couldmake tongs without having a pair already.
Sonny didn't understand the fan-blower until it was taken apart.Then he made a great discovery. The wheels, and the fan, and thepivoted tongs, all embodied the same principle, one his peoplehad evidently never discovered. A whole new world seemed to openbefore him; from then on, he was constantly finding things piercedand rotating on pivots.
* * * * *
By this time, Mom was fidgeting again. She ought to be doingsomething to justify her presence in the camp. He was wonderingwhat sort of work he could invent for her when Karl Dorver calledto him from the door of the headquarters hut.
"Mark, can you spare Mom for a while?" he asked. "We want her tolook at pictures and show us which of the animals are meat-cattle,and which of the crops are ripe."
"Think you can get anything out of her?"
"Sign-talk, yes. We may get a few words from her, too."
At first, Mom was unwilling to leave Sonny. She finally decided thatit would be safe, and trotted over to Dorver, entering the hut.
Dave Questell's construction crew began at once on the water tank,using a power shovel to dig the foundation. They had to haul waterin a tank from the river a quarter-mile away to mix the concrete.Sonny watched that interestedly. So did a number of the villagers,who gathered safely out of bowshot. They noticed Sonny among theTerrans and pointed at him. Sonny noticed that. He unobtrusivelypicked up a double-bitted ax and kept it to hand.
He and Mom had lunch with the contact team. As they showed no illeffects from breakfast, Fayon decided that it was safe to let themhave anything the Terrans ate or drank. They liked wine; they knewwhat it was, all right, but this seemed to have a delightfullydifferent flavor. They each tried a cigarette, choked over thefirst few puffs, and decided that they didn't like smoking.
"Mom gave us a lot of information, as far as she could, on the cropsand animals. The big things, the size of rhinoceroses, are draftanimals and nothing else; they're not eaten," Dorver said. "I don'tknow whether the meat isn't good, or is taboo, or they are toovaluable to eat. They eat all the other three species, and milk twoof them. I have an idea they grind their grain in big stone mortarsas needed."
That was right; he'd seen things like that.
"Willi, when you're over in the mountains, see if you can findsomething we can make millstones out of. We can shape them withsono-cutters; after they get the idea, they can do it themselvesby hand. One of those big animals could be used to turn the mill.Did you get any words from her?"
Paul Meillard shook his head gloomily. "Nothing we can be sure of.It was the same thing as in the village, yesterday. She'd saysomething, I'd repeat it, and she'd tell us it was wrong and saythe same thing over again. Lillian took recordings; she got thesame results as last night. Ask her about it later."
"She has the same effect on Mom as on the others?"
"Yes. Mom was very polite and tried not to show it, but--"
Lillian took him aside, out of earshot of the two Svants, afterlunch. She was almost distracted.
"Mark, I don't know what I'm going to do. She's like the others.Every time I open my mouth in front of her, she's simply horrified.It's as though my voice does something loathsome to her. And I'm theone who's supposed to learn to talk to them."
"Well, those who can do, and those who can't teach," he told her."You can study recordings, and tell us what the words are andteach us how to recognize and pronounce them. You're the onlylinguist we have."
That seemed to comfort her a little. He hoped it would work out thatway. If they could communicate with these people and did leave aparty here to prepare for the first colonization, he'd stay on, toteach the natives Terran technologies and study theirs. He'd beenexpecting that Lillian would stay, too. She was the linguist; she'dhave to stay. But now, if it turned out that she would be no help buta liability, she'd go back with the _Hubert Penrose_. Paul wouldn'tkeep a linguist who offended the natives' every sensibility withevery word she spoke. He didn't want that to happen. Lillian and hehad come to mean a little too much to each other to be parted now.
* * * * *
Paul Meillard and Karl Dorver had considerable difficulty with Mom,that afternoon. They wanted her to go with them and help trade forcattle. Mom didn't want to; she was afraid. They had to do a lot ofplay-acting, with half a dozen Marines pretending to guard her withfixed bayonets from some of Dave Questell's Navy construction menwho had red bandannas on their heads to simulate combs before shegot the idea. Then she was afraid to get into the contragravitylorry that was to carry the hoes and the wagon wheels. Sonny managedto reassure her, and insisted on going along, and he insisted ontaking his ax with him. That meant doubling the guard, to make sureSonny didn't lose his self-control when he saw his formerpersecutors within chopping distance.
It went off much better than either Paul Meillard or Luis Gofredoexpected. After the first shock of being air-borne had worn off,Mom found that she liked contragravity-riding; Sonny was wildlydelighted with it from the start. The natives showed neither of themany hostility. Mom's lavender bathrobe and Sonny's green coverallsand big ax seemed to be symbols of a new and exalted status; eventhe Lord Mayor was extremely polite to them.
The Lord Mayor and half a dozen others got a contragravity ride,too, to the meadows to pick out cattle. A dozen animals, includinga pair of the two-ton draft beasts, were driven to the Terran camp.A couple of lorry-loads of assorted vegetables were brought in, too.Everybody seemed very happy about the deal, especially Bennet Fayon.He wanted to slaughter one of the sheep-sized meat-and-milk animalsat once and get to work on it. Gofredo advised him to put it offtill the next morning. He wanted a large native audience to seethe animal being shot with a rifle.
The water tower was finished, and the big spherical tank hoisted ontop of it and made fast. A pump, and a filter-system were installed.There was no water for hot showers that evening, though. They wouldhave to run a pipeline to the river, and that would entail a ditchthat would cut through several cultivated fields, which, in turn,would provoke an uproar. Paul Meillard didn't want that happeninguntil he'd concluded the cattle-trade.
Charley Loughran and Willi Schallenmacher had gone up to the ship onone of the landing craft; they accompanied the landing party that wentdown into the mountains. Ayesha Keithley arrived late in the afternoonon another landing craft, with five or six tons of instruments andparts and equipment, and a male Navy warrant-officer helper.
They looked around the lab Lillian had been using at one end ofthe headquarters hut.
"This won't do," the girl Navy officer said. "We can't get a quarterof the apparatus we're going to need in here. We'll have to buildsomething."
Dave Questell was drawn into the discussion. Yes, he could putup something big enough for everything the girls would need toinstall, and soundproof it. Concrete, he decided; they'd have towait till he got the water line down and the pump going, though.
There was a crowd of natives in the fields, gaping at the Terrancamp, the next morning, and Gofredo decided to kill theanimal--until they learned the native name, they were calling itDomesticated Type C. It was herded out where everyone could watch,and a Marine stepped forward unslung his rifle took a kneelingposition, and aimed at it. It was a hundred and fifty yards away.Mom had come out to see what was going on; Sonny and Howell, whohad been consulting by signs over the construction of a wagon, werestanding side by side. The Marine squeezed his trigger. The riflebanged, and the Domesticated-C bounded into the air, dropped, andkicked a few times and was still. The natives, however, missed thatpart of it; they were howling piteously and rubbing their heads.All but Sonny. He was just mildly surprised at what had happenedto the Dom.-C.
Sonny, it would appear, was stone deaf.
* * * * *
&nbs
p; As anticipated, there was another uproar later in the morning whenthe ditching machine started north across the meadow. A mob ofSvants, seeing its relentless progress toward a field of somethinglike turnips, gathered in front of it, twittering and brandishingimplements of agriculture, many of them Terran-made.
Paul Meillard was ready for this. Two lorries went out; one loadedwith Marines, who jumped off with their rifles ready. By thistime, all the Svants knew what rifles would do beside make anoise. Meillard, Dorver, Gofredo and a few others got out of theother vehicle, and unloaded presents. Gofredo did all the talking.The Svants couldn't understand him, but they liked it. They alsoliked the presents, which included a dozen empty half-gallon rumdemijohns, tarpaulins, and a lot of assorted knickknacks. Thepipeline