Izzy said nervously, “In our…society it doesn’t mean that. Eunuch. It simply means he guarded females of another tribe, ah, species. Soaz wishes me to tell you he can make kittens, cubs, whenever he feels like it.”
Dora swallowed deeply, and I saw her struggling not to laugh. Abby said something loud and hearty to turn attention away, and we assembled ourselves comfortably in the room while Dora and Abby went to the kitchen area to get food for Soaz, politely refusing Dzilobommo’s offer of assistance.
I heard Soaz say to Izzy, “You see! You call that intelligence?”
Quickly, I followed the umminhi, staying out of sight beside the cold box as they whispered to one another.
“Now what’s he!” demanded Abby.
“I don’t know. He’s got kind of a Persian look to him, but he’s bigger than any domestic cat I ever saw. What do you think? Forty, fifty pounds?”
“He’s spotted.”
“Well, not really. It’s kind of an interrupted tabby. Grandma had a mama cat like that. It looks like spots, but it’s really interrupted stripes—”
“What’s the difference?” he hissed. “He’s spotted, he’s striped, he’s Persian, he’s a mutated cheetah. That doesn’t matter. What matters is, he talks!”
“If it weren’t for that rather fluffy fur, his head shape would be more evident. It’s big. Room enough in there for vocal chords, a bigger brain…”
I looked at Soaz with new eyes. He did, indeed, have a very large head. But then, so did I. Compared to the umminhi, that is. But then, they were taller.
“Sahir doesn’t think you are intelligent,” I said, coming out from behind the cold box, speaking quite loudly, so the others could hear me.
“We haven’t had the pleasure of meeting Sahir,” said Abby.
“He says you just make noises. They don’t mean anything.”
“Well, if that were so, conversation would be difficult, wouldn’t it?” he said.
“Oh, Abby,” Dora said. “I don’t blame him. Think of all those people who’ve worked with apes. The ape learns hundreds of signs or symbols, and the ape learns to ask for things and comment on things, and then some linguist pops up and says it isn’t language at all, it’s just labeling or recitation of nouns or the researcher misinterpreted, or the standards weren’t rigorous, because the grammar isn’t there. Think of that gray parrot that can identify colors and shapes and materials. Not language, they say. They assume speech isn’t speech without grammar, and they assume human grammar is the only kind there is.”
“Well, if it isn’t the only kind of speech, why do we speak it?” I asked.
Dora sighed. I had heard the countess sigh in just such a fashion. Of these small things are similarities drawn.
“My guess,” she said. “My guess is that a scientist we know of, a Dr. Edgar Winston, or perhaps one of his colleagues, did some gene mixing and came up with animals who had some humanish interpolations in their brains plus a more or less parrot or human voice box and tongue muscles. I say muscles, because Soaz’s tongue is not manlike, but his words are.”
Prince Izakar said, in a voice of dawning awareness, “You’re saying that there is in this…world…science of…ummm…changing creatures? Changing their shape? Their nature? Their, ah…characteristics?”
“Genetics,” she said. “Playing with DNA. Putting one creature’s gene’s in another creature’s body, or mind. Yes. Up until recently it was mostly vegetables, but they are recombining human and animal DNA. The man who was foremost in the research was murdered recently.”
More conversation, even more intense.
Then Izzy said incredulously, “You are saying, we are not people who have evolved but are…creations of your people?”
Dora looked at Abby, shrugging. We read what she meant, though she did not want to say it.
“In light of what we find here, one would almost think it possible,” said the countess at last, her solemn voice giving the words an ominous weight. “If you are only…speaking species in this time, we would have to consider…if your people could have created us.”
Soaz screamed. “No. Impossible! We were not created by umminhi!”
Silently, Dora crossed the room to a long, low bookcase that separated the room from the stair. She took from it a book, and she placed the book on the low table beside the couch. Izzy leapt upon the table, and so did I. We looked at the cover. It said:
The Audubon Society
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF
ANIMAL LIFE
Beneath the words was a picture of a regal person, his hair radiating from his forehead, his sideburns and beard smooth and well groomed, his eyes very wise, his expression one of kindly tolerance.
“The emperor!” cried Izzy. “A picture of the emperor!”
The countess came to look. “It is! How can you have a picture of Emperor Faros VII?”
Abby said very quietly: “It is a picture of a grizzly bear.”
We stared at the two umminhi, our mouths open. Dora’s expression was sympathetic to our confusion. “Look at the book,” she said. “Look at the book.”
Oh, we looked at the book. We found many ponji people in it. Lemurs and vervets and orangutans and chimpanzees and there, on page 39, a picture that could almost have been of Izzy. Macaque, it said. He was standing naked in a forest. The kasturic people, who do so much of our building, were there. Beavers, they were called. The sea people were there, and the Onchik-Dau, what are called sea lions. There were many pheleds. Soaz looked at those pictures long and hard. He was most like the lynx, I thought, looking from him to picture and back to him again. The kannic people were there, foxes and coyotes—almost like Oyk and Irk—and wolves. Dzilobommo’s people were there, on the same page as a mythical creature all our children knew, the panda. Who has not received a little stuffed panda doll as a child? I had one. I used to sleep with it.
There was the legendary elefant, huge and horrid, and there were the horses and burros, in many kinds. One was even striped. There were creatures we had never heard of: the rhinoceros and the tapir—relatives of the scuinic people, said the book—and the giraffe. There was only one, very unflattering picture of a scuinic person, and it was labeled “wild boar.” There were pictures of bison and deer—Soaz said they still existed, far to the south of Isfoin. There were also goats, much like our kapriel people. Then there were the birds, with a beautiful picture of one of Blanche’s kin, the Hyacinthine Macaw. And then the serpents and the fishes. Our mammalian peoples were all spoken of in the first few pages of the book. We were not many compared to all the swimming and squirming creatures of the world.
None of the peoples or creatures in the book wore clothing.
“Prince Sahir should have taken off his clothing,” I cried. “If a human sees him, he will be in danger.”
I had no sooner uttered the words than we heard Blanche, screaming at us from below. We could not make out her words until she arrived at the top of the stairs, where she flapped her wings in a frenzy and screamed:
“The prince has been captured; Prince Sahir has been captured. The umminhi have taken him away.”
30
Meeting Prince Sahir
Dora knotted her hands into fists and hit the wall. “Damn,” she said. “He should have been warned….”
“We never had the chance to warn him,” said Abby. “The thing is, how are we going to get him back?”
“Describe the happening, Blanche!” demanded the countess. “Who was it took the prince?”
“Umminhi…”
“We know that, dear. Calm down. Describe them. Perhaps Dora can tell something from their clothing, or their size or something.”
Blanche fluttered for a few moments more, eventually calming down enough to say, “They came in a vehicle. It had a room in the front for the umminhi, and rooms along the sides with doors. The umminhi had caught a kannic person who looked rather like Oyk, and they were putting him into one of the little rooms along the side. The prince sa
w this, and he stepped out of the trees and demanded to know what they were doing.
“One of the men had a long pole in his hand. He reached out with it before the prince could move, and swooped him up. It was a net on the pole, I think. The umminhi laughed very loudly and they put the prince into another of the little rooms, then they stood looking at him for a long time, shaking their heads, then they got in the front room of the vehicle and it moved away. I followed, among the trees, calling the prince’s name, and he screamed at me to get help.” She moaned. “I should have told him to be more careful!”
“Which direction did the vehicle go?” demanded Dora.
Blanche shivered. “I was on the near side of the avenue, and it went to my left.”
“Toward town,” said Dora. “Were there words on the side of the vehicle?”
“Yes. I did not read them. They were in a circle around some kind of emblem….”
“Animal control truck,” said Abby. “Has to be.”
“We’ll go in your car,” said Dora. “We’ll need to get to the pound as soon as possible.”
“Why?” demanded the countess. “Why such a hurry?”
“He might be…injured,” said Dora. “He was wearing clothing, and he probably doesn’t have the sense to keep his mouth shut. The animal control officers are going to tell everyone they’ve caught a talking pig, and it won’t be an hour before the media find out, plus maybe the people at Randall Pharmaceuticals. Edgar Winston may have been their chief genius, but other people out there are working on the same thing!”
“I will go with you,” the countess announced.
“With all due respect,” said Dora. “We will be better able to save the prince if we go alone. I am a law enforcement officer. That is my job. I have identification that entitles me to go into places and ask questions. It would be better if I could do that without people wondering why I have animals with me.”
“She’s right,” said Izzy. “We will be safer staying here.”
“We are not accomplishing our mission here,” said Soaz.
“No,” agreed Abby. “But, as we’ve said before, you’re going to have to trust us to help you accomplish your mission. Your job is to find your Woput, ours, as I see it, is to help you, but first, presumably, you want Prince Sahir saved.”
The visitors could only agree.
“I wish one of us could go along. Even Blanche…,” said the countess.
“The safest ones to go along would be Oyk and Irk,” said Dora. “They’re laconic anyhow, and lots of people ride around with dogs in the car. We’ll take them, if you like.”
Dora brushed her hair, got into her jacket, and was met at the foot of the stairs by Oyk and Irk, both of whom announced their readiness to go along.
“Do you know the command, heel?” asked Dora.
“It is one we use with puppies,” admitted Oyk in a grudging growl.
“Well, it’s one that will keep you safe,” said Dora. “One of you heel to me, and the other one to Abby, left side, close, and you’ll be almost as safe as if you were on the leash. And for heaven’s sake, don’t say anything!”
They jogged down the street to the avenue, where Abby’s car was parked, top down, beside the custodial tree. Oyk and Irk got in the back. As soon as they started to move, the two kannids put their front feet on the window and stuck their heads out into the windstream.
“Why do you do that?” Dora asked.
“Oh, the smells,” said Oyk. “The wonderful smells, going by so fast, it’s like…oh, it’s like…”
“Music,” said Irk. “It feels exactly as I have heard Prince Izakar describe music. Crescendos. Diminuendos. Arpeggios. Harmonies. Melodies. Ahhhh.” He took a deep breath, nostrils quivering, then let it out again with a sigh.
Dora and Abby exchanged glances. “Well,” said Dora, “haven’t you wondered?”
“Not really,” he said. “I always figured they liked the smells.”
“Musically?”
He shrugged. “It’s probably the only analogy he could come up with. I think taste would be closer, personally. A meal created by a master chef, complete with wines….” He licked his lips. “Where is the pound, by the way?”
She gave him directions. It was past noon when they arrived at the hill overlooking the city. Oyk and Irk stopped smelling the wind and sat quite erect on the rear seat, taking it all in.
“It’s a lot bigger than Palmody,” said Oyk.
“It’s a lot bigger than anything,” Irk agreed.
“It’s too big, and that’s what we meant when we said there are too many of us,” remarked Abby, making a left turn onto a cross street busy with pedestrians.
“Umminhi,” said Oyk gravely, as though his worst fears had been realized. “Ganchi umminhi.”
A few more turns, a bumpy crossing over railroad tracks, and they came to the long, low building that housed the pound.
“I want you to understand the dangers and communicate them to your colleagues,” said Dora in a low voice. “So I’m going to try to get you in there. Heel, just like before, and if the guy in charge says you have to leave, you wait until Abby takes you out, understand?”
“We would be perfectly capable of coming out by ourselves,” said Oyk.
“Not unless you understood human speech,” growled Dora. “Which you must not let on that you do!”
The two subsided, putting themselves in close heel position and staying there as Abby and Dora negotiated the doors. The desk inside was empty. Dora pushed a brightly labeled button, and they sat down to wait.
“What’s our story?” asked Abby.
“You’re my neighbor, you lost your pig, I’ve brought you down to see if they have it.”
“And if the pig has been talking?”
“I’ll think of something,” muttered Dora.
There was noise beyond the double doors, shouting and laughter.
“Dora,” whispered Irk. “I hear Prince Sahir.”
She stared down at him. “You can hear him?”
“My ears are very good. He’s talking. He’s yelling, in fact. He’s calling them sons of menstruating mares. That is very dirty talk.”
“Oh, Lord,” said Abby.
“All right,” Dora mused. “We say he isn’t a talking pig, he swallowed a microphone.”
“I’ll try,” said Abby.
They got up from the bench and pushed their way through the double doors. Beyond a file room and office was another door, this one opening on a long aisle between cages. The people at the end of the aisle were conducting an excited conversation, above the sound of which rose a frenzied voice.
“You let me out at once, you hear, you beasts, you creatures, fit for nothing but riding on, you evildoers…”
Abby began laughing loudly. This attracted the attention of the people at the end of the aisle, who turned and moved toward them as Abby shouted, “You’ve got my pig! Good, I thought I’d lost him.”
Abby was at once surrounded. He began a long, complicated story about the pig and the microphone, while Oyk and Irk slipped around the group and trotted down to the end of the aisle. Inside the cage raged a furious Sahir, his clothing torn, one ear crumpled. He opened his mouth to scream at the sight of Oyk and Irk.
“Don’t say a word,” whispered Oyk. “Not another word.”
Prince Sahir subsided, seething.
“Dora and Abby are trying to get you out. Don’t say a word more to any umminha, not any. If Dora and Abby can’t get you out, remain silent. The more you talk, the more they will be determined to keep you. You must make them think you are a creature! If it were me, I’d get those clothes off.”
“Hey,” came a shout from down the aisle. “What’re those dogs doing there?”
“They’re mine,” said Dora in a firm, no nonsense voice. “Come, Irk. Come, Oyk.”
Obediently, with a last warning look at Sahir, the kanni turned and trotted back up the aisle.
“Heel,” said Dora.
<
br /> A belligerent man in a brown shirt was saying, “Swallowed a microphone, eh? So how come he seemed to be answering questions we asked?”
“Well, it’s got a receiver and transmitter,” Abby said. “My brother’s at the other end, listening and answering. He’s a practical joker, and he’s the one who dressed up the pig and put the mike in his food trough, then the pig swallowed the microphone and got out of the yard…. Well, you know the rest.”
“And you can prove this is your pig?”
Dora knelt down and patted Oyk, whispering urgently, “What was he wearing?”
“Trousers, robe, headcloth, all white cotton,” muttered Oyk.
“He was wearing trousers, a robe, and a headcloth, all white cotton,” said Dora.
“I guess that’s your pig, all right,” said the brown-shirted man. “Well, I’ll tell the lab people when they come that he’s yours, and you can get him from them.”
“What lab people?” asked Abby.
“People from Randall Pharmaceuticals,” said the brownshirt. “Ramon, there, he used to work for Randall. He called them as soon as the pig got here, figured it was one of their animals. They said they were missing a talking pig, but they didn’t know what he was wearing. You know what he’s wearing, but you say he don’t really talk. So, I figure, you work it out between you.”
Dora thought of using her badge, then discarded the idea. Actually having Sahir at Randall might get them some information they needed.
“Well, then, Abby and I’ll just go down and see Piggy,” she said.
They were not allowed to go alone. When they arrived outside the pen, they found Sahir, naked as a sausage, lying sprawled on the ragged remnants of his clothing.
“Poor Piggy,” said Dora in a cooing voice. “We’re going to get issums home just as soon as we can, but issums has to go to Randall Pharmaceuticals first, because they thought issums was a talky pig. They cut up talky pigs to see what makes them talk. That’s all right. Dora and Abby will go to Randall Pharmaceuticals and bring issums home, very soon.”