“What is a monkey?” asked Doctor Mel.
“An animal that is somehow related to humans, though it has fur—as humans do not—and lives in trees.”
When she finished with the story, leaving out a lot, because the book really was very long, Doctor Mel said, “I hope that one is published in our language.”
“I think it will be, though it will have to be shortened, and there are some parts that will have to be removed. For the most part, it is decent. Still, it seems that humans can never be one hundred percent decent. They are a strange species.”
“They are all we have,” Doctor Mel said.
This was true. No other intelligent species had been found. Why had the Goddess given the hwarhath only one companion species in the vast darkness and cold of interstellar space? Especially since humans was more like the hwarhath than anyone had ever expected and also unpleasantly different. Surely if two similar species were possible, then many unlike species ought to be possible, but these had not been found; and why was a species so like the hwarhath so disturbing? Kla had no answer. The Goddess was famous for her sense of humor.
In the end, Kla and the doctor became lovers and moved to a larger apartment in a building with a view of the fjord. When she had free time, Kla continued to translate stories about Holmes Sherlock and handed them around to relatives, with the permission of the foremost woman. Some stories were too dangerous to spread around, but these were mostly safe.
“People need to get used to human behavior,” the foremost woman said. “But not all at once. Eh Matsehar has done a fine job of turning the plays of Shakespeare William into work that we can understand. Now we will give them a little more truth about humans, though only in your northern town. Be sure you get your copies back, after people have read them, and be sure to ask the people what they think. Are they interested or horrified? Do they want to meet humans or avoid them forever?”
When Kla and the doctor had been together almost a year, something disturbing happened in the town; and it happened to one of Kla’s remote cousins. The girl had taken a rowboat out into the fjord late one afternoon. She did not come back. In the morning, people went looking for her. They found the rowboat floating in the fjord water, which was still and green and so clear that it was possible to look down and see schools of fish turning and darting. The rowboat was empty, its oars gone. People kept searching on that day and days following. But the girl’s body did not turn up, though the oars did, floating in the water only a short distance away.
The girl was a good swimmer, but the fjord was cold. She could have gotten hypothermia and drowned. But why had she gone out so late in the afternoon? And how had a child from a town full of skilled sailors managed to fall out of a boat and been unable to get back in? Where was her body? It was possible that the ebbing tide had pulled it out into the ocean, but this was not likely. She ought to be in the fjord, and she ought to float to the surface.
All of this together was a mystery.
After twenty days or thereabouts, Kla’s grandmother sent for her. Of course she went, climbing the steep street that led to the largest of the Amadi houses, which was on a hill above the town. The house went down in layers from the hilltop, connected by covered stairways. Kla climbed these to the topmost building. Her grandmother was there, on a terrace overlooking the town and fjord. The day was mild. Nonetheless, the old lady was wrapped in a heavy jacket and had a blanket over her knees. A table with a pot of tea stood next to her.
“Sit down,” the grandmother said. “Pour tea for both of us.”
Kla did.
“You still wear that absurd cape,” the grandmother said.
“Yes.”
“I have read some of your stories about the human investigator.”
“Yes?” Kla said. “Did you like them?”
“They seemed alien.” The grandmother sipped her tea, then said, “We have a mystery in our house.”
Kla waited.
“The girl who vanished,” her grandmother said after a moment. “People are saying she must have weighted herself down and jumped into the water deliberately. Otherwise, her body would have appeared by now. This is possible, I think. But we don’t know why. She had no obvious reason. Her mother is grieving, but refuses to believe the girl is gone. I would like you to investigate this mystery.”
“I am a translator, not an investigator.”
“You have translated many stories about investigation. Surely you have learned something. We have no one else, unless we send to the regional government or the capital. I would like to keep whatever has happened private, in case it turns out to be shameful.”
Kla considered, looking down at the green fjord, edged with mountains. Rays of sunlight shone down through broken clouds, making the water shine in spots. “I will have to talk to people in this house and look at the girl’s computer.”
“The girl erased all her files and overwrote them. We have not been able to recover anything. That is a reason to think she killed herself.”
“Then she must have had a secret,” Kla said.
“But what?” the grandmother said. “It’s hard to keep secrets in a family or a small town.”
Kla could not refuse. Her grandmother was asking, and the woman was an important matriarch. In addition, she wanted to see if she could solve a mystery. She tilted her head in agreement and finished her tea. “Tell the people in the house I will be asking questions.”
“I will do that,” the grandmother said. “The girl was only eighteen, not yet full grown, but she was clever and might have become an imposing woman. I want to know what happened.”
Two days later, Kla went back to the house and questioned the women who had known the girl, whose name was—or had been—Nam.
A quiet girl, they told her. She had no close friends in the family or elsewhere. When she wasn’t busy at household tasks or studying, she liked to walk in the mountains around the town. She always carried a camera and did fine landscape photography.
One aunt said, “I expected her to go to an art school in the capital. She had enough talent.”
“Can I see her work?” Kla asked.
“Most is gone. It was on her computer. You know she erased it?”
“Yes.”
“But some of us have photographs she gave us. I’ll show you.”
Kla followed the woman around the Amadi house. The photographs hung on walls in public and private rooms. They were indeed fine: long vistas of mountain valleys and the town’s fjord, close-ups of rocks and low vegetation. The girl had potential. It was a pity she was gone.
Kla went home to her apartment and filled her pipe with herb, then smoked, looking out at the docks and the water beyond. When Doctor Mel came home from looking at a fisher with a bad fracture, Kla described her day.
“What will you do next?” Mel asked.
“Find out where the girl went on her walks. Do you want to come with me?”
“With my leg? I’m not going to limp through the countryside.”
“Let’s rent tsina and ride,” Kla said.
They went the next day, which was mild though overcast. Now and then, they felt fine drops of rain. The tsina were docile animals, used to poor riders, which was good, since neither Kla nor the doctor was a practiced traveler-by-tsina.
They visited the town’s outlying houses. Most were too far away to be reached by walking. Nonetheless, they contained relatives, Amadi or Hewil, though most of these were not fishers. Instead, they spent their days herding or tending gardens that lay in sheltered places, protected by stone walls. Some of these people remembered the girl. They had seen her walking along farm roads and climbing the hillsides. A shy lass, who barely spoke. She always carried a camera and took pictures of everything.
Some had photographs she had given them, fastened to the walls of herding huts: favorite livestock, the mountains, the huts themselves. The girl did have an eye. Everything she photographed looked true and honest, as sharp as a good knife
and balanced like a good boat that could ride out any storm.
“This is a loss,” Doctor Mel said.
“Yes,” Kla replied.
After several days of exploring the nearby country, they returned their tsina to the town stable and went home to their apartment. A fog rolled in at evening, hiding the fjord and the neighboring houses. Streetlights shone dimly. Sounds were muffled. Kla smoked her pipe.
“What next?” the doctor asked.
“There are paths going up the mountains above the fjord. No one lives up there, except the two soldiers at the weather station. We’ll ask them about the girl.”
“It’s too steep for me,” Doctor Mel said.
Kla tilted her head in agreement. “I’ll go by myself.”
The next day she did. The fog had lifted, but low clouds hid the mountain peaks. The fjord’s water was as gray as steel. Kla took a staff and leaned on it as she climbed the narrow path that led to the station. Hah! It seemed perilous! Drop offs went abruptly down toward the gray water. Cliffs hung overhead, seeming ready to fall. She was a townswoman, a bit afraid of heights, though she came of mountain ancestry. Her gift was language and a curious mind.
The station was a prefab metal building, set against the cliff wall. Beyond it was a promontory overlooking the fjord. Equipment stood there, far more complicated than an ordinary weather station. Well, it was maintained by the military. Who could say what they were watching, even here on the safe home planet? No doubt important women knew what was going on here.
A soldier came out of the prefab building, a slim male with dark grey fur. He wore shorts and sandals and an open jacket.
Casual, thought Kla.
“Can I help you?” he asked.
She explained that she was looking for people who had met Amadi Nam, a shy girl who loved to photograph.
“No such person has been here,” the soldier replied.
“Hah!” said Kla and looked at the magnificent view of the fjord beyond the equipment.
Now the second soldier appeared. He was the same height as the first male, but much broader with thick, white fur that was lightly spotted. He also wore shorts, but no jacket. His fur must be enough, even on this cool, damp day.
He agreed with the first man. The girl had never been to the station.
Kla thanked them and went back down the mountain. She arrived home at twilight. Lamps shone in the apartment windows. The electric heater in the main room was on. Doctor Mel had bought dinner, fish stew from a shop in town.
They ate, then Kla smoked, settled in a low chair close to the heater. Doctor Mel turned on her computer and watched a play on the world information net, her injured leg lifted up on a stool. Kla could hear music and cries of anger or joy. But the dialogue was a mumble, too soft to understand.
The play ended, and Doctor Mel turned the computer off. “Well?”
“I have a clue,” answered Kla.
“You do?”
Kla knocked the dottle out of her pipe. “It is similar to the dog that made noise in the night time.”
“What is a dog?”
“A domestic animal similar to a sul, though smaller and less ferocious. The humans use them to herd and guard, as we use sulin. In this case, in a story you have apparently not read, the dog did not make any noise.”
“Kla, you are being irritating. What are you trying to say?”
“The dog did not do what was expected, and this was the clue that enabled Holmes Sherlock to solve the problem.”
“You met a sul on the mountain?”
“I met two young men who said they never met my cousin, though she climbed every slope in the area and loved to photograph splendid vistas.”
“They are lying?”
“Almost certainly.”
“Why?”
“I have no idea.”
Doctor Mel looked confused. “They belong to far-off lineages and have no relatives in town. Why would they become involved in something here? If Amadi Nam had been a boy, one might suspect a romance. But she was a girl, and the soldiers are lovers, as everyone knows.”
“This is true,” Kla replied. “But I am certain the soldiers are lying. I need to confront them.”
Doctor Mel rose and went to pour two cups of halin. She gave one to Kla and settled back in her chair. “If they are telling the truth, they will think you are crazy and may tell people in town. You will have to endure joking. More important, if they are lying, then they are crazy and may be dangerous. I’d go with you, except for the climb.”
“I’ll go to my grandmother tomorrow and explain the situation. She will know what to do.”
“Good,” said Doctor Mel.
The next day was clear and cold. Ice rimmed puddles in the streets and made the street paving stones slippery. Kla could see her breath.
Her grandmother was inside, next to an old-fashioned brazier full of glowing coals.
“Help yourself to tea and pour a cup for me,” the old lady said. “Then tell me what you have found.”
Kla did as she was told. When she had finished her story, the matriarch said, “The soldiers must be confronted.”
“My lover has suggested that they may be dangerous.”
“Hardly likely. But this story is disturbing. Something unpleasant has happened.” Her grandmother drank more tea. “I want to keep this in the family. I’ll pick two of your cousins, large and solid fisher-women. They’ll go with you up the mountain. Even if the soldiers are crazy, they will hardly do harm to three women, all larger than they are, though you are thin. The fishers will not be.”
A day later, Kla went back up the weather station. It was another clear, cold day. The fjord sparkled like silver.
The two fisher-women were named Serit and Doda. Both were second cousins to Kla, and both were tall and broad, with big knives in their tunic belts. Serit carried a harpoon gun, and Doda had a club.
“Is that necessary?” Kla asked.
“Always be prepared,” Serit replied in a deep, calm voice.
“The soldiers have been trained for war,” Doda added. “But the war they were trained to fight is fought by ships in space. How can that help them here? We, by contrast, have struggled with many large and dangerous fish, while the fish thrashed on the decks of our boats. If the soldiers threaten us, though that does not seem likely, we will know what to do.”
When they reached the station, both men came out.
“How can we help?” the dark soldier asked.
“We are certain Amadi Nam came here,” Kla said. “Since you lied about this, we are going to search your building.”
What did she hope to find? Some evidence that Nam had been there—a picture that had been printed out or her camera, full of pictures. People did not easily throw away Amadi Nam’s work.
The dark soldier frowned. “This is a military installation. You can’t examine our equipment or building until you get permission from the officers in front of us.”
Serit lifted the harpoon gun. “This is not space, where your senior officers make decisions. This is our town, our country and our planet. Our senior women are in charge, and you are here on this mountain with their—and our—permission. If we want to know what you do in your building, we have the right.”
“We will go in,” Kla said.
“Women do not fight and kill,” the dark soldier said, as if trying to reassure himself.
“What nonsense,” Serit replied. “Doda and I fight large and dangerous fish and other sea animals.”
“But not people,” the dark soldier said.
“Of course not. We are fishers, and we are still young. But who decides which newborn children will live? Who gives death to those who have nothing left but suffering?”
“The old women,” said the spotted soldier in a resigned tone.
“So,” Serit continued in a tone of satisfaction. “Women can fight, and we are able to kill. We will go into this building.”
Kla felt uneasy. As a rule, men and
women did not interfere with each other’s activities. If it had been up to her, she would have waited for the soldiers to consult their senior officers, though she suspected they were stalling. What did they have hidden which could be better hidden, if they had time?
But her grandmother had picked Serit and Doda. She must have known how aggressive they were.
The spotted soldier exhaled. “I will not fight women, Perin, even for you.”
The dark soldier made the gesture that meant be quiet!
So, thought Kla, there was a secret. “I will go in and search. The two of you watch the soldiers.”
Doda made the gesture of assent, and Serit tilted her head in agreement.
Kla entered the building. It was messy, as was to be expected, with two young men living alone, no senior officers near them. Unwashed dishes stood on tables. The beds were unmade. Kla saw no sign of the girl, even in the closets and under the beds. But there were pieces of paper tucked between one bed and the wall. She pulled them out, surprised that she had noticed them. Printouts of photographs. They showed the green fjord, the black and white surrounding mountains, and the dark soldier, Perin.
She took the printouts into sunlight. “What are these?”
“I took them,” the spotted man said quickly.
This was almost certainly a lie. Kla knew Nam’s work when she saw it. She gave the printouts to Doda and went back in the building, going through it a second time. An uncomfortable experience! She was a translator, not someone who poked around in other people’s homes.
This time she found the girl, wedged into a low cabinet and folded over like the kind of scissors that bend back on themselves, the blade points touching the handles.
“Come out,” said Kla.
“No,” said the girl, her voice muffled.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Kla replied. “I might not be able to get you out, but I have two large, strong fisher-women with me. They can easily pull you from that hole.”
After a moment or two, the girl squeezed herself out, groaning as she did so. Once she was upright, Kla could see her clearly. A plump young woman with badly rumpled clothing and fur. She looked miserable and angry.
The Mammoth Book of Best New SF 26 (Mammoth Books) Page 23