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“I did not,” Straha said. “That we should attempt to rear Tosevite hatchlings makes sense to me, however. How better to learn to what degree your species can come to conform to our usages?”
He waited for the Big Ugly to wax indignant. Tosevites-especially American Tosevites-often got very shrill about the rights of their kind, especially when they thought the Race was violating those rights. If they or their fellow Big Uglies violated them, though, they were much less strident.
To Straha’s surprise, all Yeager said was, “Yes, I can see how that would make sense from your point of view. But I have the feeling it is liable to be hard on the hatchling you are rearing.”
“That is part of the nature of experiments-do you not agree?” Straha said. “It is unfortunate when the experiments involve intelligent beings, but I do not see how it is avoidable. Sometimes such things are necessary.”
Again, he expected Sam Yeager to get angry. Again, Yeager failed to do so. “You may have something there, Shiplord,” he replied. Straha had to fight down a small, puzzled hiss. He’d known this Big Ugly longer than almost any other, and thought he knew him better than any other save perhaps his own driver. Now Yeager wasn’t responding as he should have. Straha knew the Tosevites were a highly variable species, but Yeager usually thought so much like a male of the Race that the ex-shiplord had expected him to maintain a respectable consistence.
“How did you happen to make the acquaintance of this Tosevite reared under the tutelage of the Race?” Straha asked, trying to find what lay behind Yeager’s curious indifference to the experiment.
“She identified me as a Big Ugly by the way I wrote,” Yeager answered. “I had no idea she was one till I heard her speak. You know we have trouble with some sounds in your language because of the way our mouths are made.”
“Yes, just as we do in Tosevite tongues,” Straha agreed. Yeager didn’t seem inclined to be very forthcoming, for which Straha could hardly blame him. That being so… “Have you anything else?”
“No, Shiplord. I thank you for your time,” the Big Ugly said, and broke the connection.
Straha also hung up the Tosevite-style telephone. He did let out the discontented hiss he’d held in before. Something was going on under his snout, and he didn’t know what it was. That annoyed him. He walked from the kitchen into the front room, where his driver sat leafing through a Tosevite news magazine.
“I greet you, Shiplord,” the Big Ugly said. As far as grammar and pronunciation went, he spoke the language of the Race as well as Yeager. He didn’t think like a male of the Race, though. His next question was sharp, not deferential. “What was that all about on the telephone?”
“That was Sam Yeager, the soldier and student of the Race,” Straha answered. His driver was not just an aide; the Tosevite was charged with monitoring what Straha did. The English description for such a male, which Straha found expressive, was watchdog.
“Ah,” the driver said. “Sam Yeager has a gift for sticking his snout where it does not belong. What was he trying to learn from you that is none of his business?”
“Nothing, as a matter of fact,” Straha said tartly. “In my humble opinion”-a bit of sarcasm all too likely to sail past the Tosevite-“a female of your kind who has been raised by the Race from hatchlinghood to maturity is very much within Yeager’s area of responsibility.”
“Oh-that. Yes. Truth, Shiplord,” the driver said. Then he let out several barks of Big Ugly laughter. “More truth than you know about, as a matter of fact.”
“Suppose you enlighten me, then,” Straha suggested.
To a male of the Race, such a suggestion would have been as good as an order. The driver shook his head, and then, for good measure, also used the Race’s negative hand gesture. “Suppose I do not, Shiplord.” His tone was so emphatic, he didn’t bother with a cough. “You do not need to know that.”
Straha understood security without having a Big Ugly explain it to him. He also understood the driver had slipped. “Then you should not have alluded to such a thing,” he said. “Now my curiosity is aroused.”
“You speak truth, Shiplord-I should not have mentioned it,” the Tosevite admitted. “Since I did, I must ask you to pretend I did not.”
“Next I suppose you will ask a female to unlay an egg,” Straha snapped. “What would happen if I went back to the telephone and asked Sam Yeager to tell me what you will not?”
“He might do it. He has a way of talking too much,” the driver said. “But, Shiplord, I very strongly ask you not to do that.” Now he did use an emphatic cough.
He was not simply asking, Straha realized. He was giving an order, and expected to be obeyed. That the driver presumed to do such a thing spoke of who had power here and who had none. With an emphatic cough of his own, Straha said, “I am not your servant. Nor am I going to betray whatever I may learn to the Race. Nor is the Race likely to try to kidnap me, not after all these years.”
“Perhaps not,” the driver replied. “But the Race may well be monitoring your telephone line, and Yeager’s. I would be, were I a male from the conquest fleet’s intelligence service.” Straha hissed unhappily; his driver made a good point. The Big Ugly went on, “And we still do not know at whom the miscreants were shooting when you visited Yeager’s house while the Chinese females were also there. It could have been them. It could have been Yeager. But it could also have been you, Shiplord.”
“Me?” Straha swung both eye turrets sharply toward the driver: such was his surprise. “I assumed those females were the targets. The Race is not in the habit of using assassination as a weapon.”
“The Race has picked up all sorts of bad habits since coming to Tosev 3,” his driver answered. To compound his insolence, the Tosevite bent his head over one hand and pretended to taste ginger.
But what he said, while it held enough truth to be infuriating, did not hold enough to be convincing. “I am not involved in the ginger trade, except as one more male who tastes,” Straha said. “And, since you are giving forth with nonsense, who would want to murder Yeager, and why?”
“Who would want to kill Yeager?” Straha’s driver echoed. “Someone who got tired of his habit of sticking his snout where it does not belong, that is who. I assure you, he has made enemies doing so.”
“And are you one of those enemies?” the ex-shiplord asked. “You certainly speak as if you have considerable knowledge of them.”
I shall have to find some way to warn Sam Yeager, Straha thought. Yeager had always behaved in a proper manner toward him. Like any well-trained male of the Race, Straha understood that loyalty from below created obligations in those above. Yeager had left Straha in his debt, and debt required repayment.
“In some ways, at some time, I may be an enemy of Ye
ager’s,” the driver answered evenly. “I had nothing to do with the shots fired at his home, however. Indeed, if you will recall, I shot at the shooters.”
“Yes, I do recall,” Straha said, wondering if the driver had opened fire to make himself appear innocent.
“All things considered, I still believe the attack was most likely aimed at the Chinese females,” the Big Ugly said. “An assault on you or on Yeager would have been better planned and would also have been more likely to succeed.”
“You so relieve my mind.” Straha’s voice was dry.
“I am so happy to hear it.” So was his driver’s. Straha would have taken most Tosevites literally. With this one, he knew better. The driver continued, “It is, however, one more reason for you not to telephone Yeager.”
“It may be, if what you say is truth,” Straha said. “You have not proved that; you have only mentioned it as a possibility.”
The driver sighed. “Shiplord, is this your day to be particularly difficult?”
“Perhaps it is,” Straha answered. “And perhaps we can compromise. At a time convenient to Sam Yeager, will you drive me to his house, so we can discuss these things without fretting over insecure telephone lines?”
“It shall be done,” the Tosevite said, and sighed again. He was not happy about Straha’s request, but evidently saw no way to evade it. Gradually, over the long years of his exile, the ex-shiplord had come to learn the subtleties of the Big Uglies’ responses. When setting out for Tosev 3, he hadn’t imagined such knowledge would be useful-but then, the Race hadn’t imagined a great many things about Tosev 3.
Since his driver was also in some measure his keeper, and was his link to the Tosevite authorities of the United States, Straha decided conciliation might be a wise course. “Will you eat with me?” he asked: that was an amicable gesture among the Big Uglies, as it was among the Race. “I have some zisuili chops defrosting in the kitchen.”
