The Eskimo Invasion

by Hayden Howard

  Dr. West insisted that he record a handprint now -- of Marthalik. Turning a dull red, the obstetrician tried to smile and humor him. "Normally it is the handprint of the newborn baby we take to eliminate any worry as to positive identification." But Dr. West insisted, and the obstetrician suddenly laughed. "First time I've ever handprinted a mother."

  "We'll be back in four days," Dr. West said.

  "If you wish, but I wouldn't worry about a thing," the OB laughed, steering him out the door. "She's young, has borne previous children, has outstanding muscle tone. Since this is your fourth child, there's no reason for you to suffer such acute symptoms. Don't worry!"

  In four days, it was the OH who was suffering acute symptoms. In only four days, Marthalik had swelled up like a balloon. The OH feared a huge watery tumor and insisted that a heat print of the uterus and fetus not only was justified, it was imperative. When he inspected the blurry picture of the nearly full-term fetus, the OH glared at Dr. West as if suspecting a bad joke. "This is a different woman. This is a different baby. It will be born within six weeks. Different woman -- "

  "Compare handprints of my wife."

  Making another handprint of Marthalik and comparing it with the one in his files only made the obstetrician angrier. "Even my nurse -- someone in my office is in on this so-called joke. Switching handprints has to be an inside job. Mr. West, if you're not satisfied with my services and are trying to make a fool of me I would recommend another doctor. You still have six weeks."

  "I'm satisfied." Dr. West was not satisfied, worrying that this OB might prove too unadaptable for his purpose. The OB would undergo a shock in three days. But to change doctors now would frustrate Dr. West's whole purpose.

  In three days, the obstetrician was called to the hospital to deliver the baby. When he recognized Marthalik, he called in a specialist. "You won't be billed for his time, Mr. West. If necessary, I'll pay him out of my own pocket. When I deliver this baby, which should be a simple procedure, which is supposed to be a simple procedure, and I've been delivering babies for thirty years including many premies, I expect no problems, and the incubator and my usual assisting physician for interesting cases are ready -- but I want an expert witness."

  Dr. West smiled. This was exactly what Dr. West wanted, witnesses. Marthalik had an easy birth, a baby boy who gave one squawl, then lay on the OB's rubber gloves, seeming almost smiling with confidence in this cold and drying new world.

  "Full-term," remarked the specialist, and shrugged, coldly eyeing the obstetrician.

  The OB became embarrassed. Evidently he had given the specialist and the other doctor the impression that the baby would be premature. Plainly the OB had lacked the confidence to tell them his patient had progressed from the apparent six-month to a full-term pregnancy in one week, and now he had no intention of doing so. Before the witnesses could depart, Dr. West desperately whispered to the OB that he handprint Marthalik in the presence of these two doctors and get their signatures on the handprint. Surprisingly the OB nodded in agreement. With odd expressions the two doctors signed and left.

  The OB peered at Dr. West. With a deductive hypothesis worthy of Sherlock Holmes, the OB laughed hopefully. "Is it possible, you'll be bringing your wife -- to my office again -- in a couple of months?"

  Dr. West returned with Marthalik in a week. With nervous hands, the OB personally did the pregnancy lab ten-minute test and other exam procedures. "I suppose I don't know much about Eskimos. But this heat print suggests she's already in her second month of this second pregnancy. I never imagined that Eskimos -- "

  "Marthalik's not an Eskimo," replied Dr. West.

  The OB stared at him. "Will you do me a favor and bring your wife in every day except -- of course, Wednesday. Your daily appointments could be at 6:00 if that is convenient. No charge, no charge at all." The obstetrician smiled with boyish excitement as if he were about to make a great medical discovery.

  In less than a month, this baby was born before too many witnesses. Some of them clutched Dr. West's arm and virtually demanded a repeat performance.

  "Visit Canada," Dr. West retorted with a narrow smile. "Put pressure on the Canadian Government and demand to be allowed to inspect the Boothia Peninsula Eskimo Cultural Sanctuary. There's nothing unusual about Marthalik. Believe me, a one-month gestation period is normal for Boothia Peninsula Eskimos -- if they are Eskimos."

  He was feeling fierce because the University finally had notified him that day his contract would not be renewed.

  "Go to Boothia," he told the reporter, "and see if I'm lying. Those poor people are multiplying so fast, it's like the next hundred years of the world's population explosion compressed into the next ten. Unless those bureaucrats in Ottawa hurry up and introduce birth control instead of endless food, Canada could be submerged by Eskimos. No, call them Esks. They're not the same as Eskimos. They're something new. But their hunger is as old as mankind."

  Dr. West had only one more sabbatical paycheck, and already five children to feed. He intended to practice birth control from now on. Five children were more than enough. In this crowding world, in his crowding apartment, he lectured Marthalik on when to take The Pill. Conscientiously, she seemed to follow his instructions.

  Each morning when he rolled out of bed to type exploratory letters to colleagues at other universities, not openly applying for a job, Marthalik already would be up, boiling tea, pouring milk, spooning baby food, nursing the smallest baby, frying ham and eggs for Dr. West.

  Like Icarus at the breakfast table, he devoured his ham and eggs regardless of cholesterol consequences. Like Icarus at the typewriter, he hammered wings of words beginning his Boothia report, planning to impress the universities who soon would be competing for his services. He thought U.C. would regret making him a free agent just before he became famous. But to be recognized in the academic world, his report first needed to be published in a professional journal, which meant a time lag of months, if he were published at all. Unfortunately, when he was on the Boothia Peninsula he had spent more time making love to Marthalik and then traveling to the Burned Place to try to question Peterluk, than in gathering the detailed statistics which would impress the editors of a professional population journal.

  He regretted working up his age-sex census from memory. Hans Suxbey had his notebook. He wished he could provide more statistical clues as to the rate at which these pseudo-Eskimos really were increasing. It was an unprofessional report.

  One important factor in any population's rate of increase was the average age at which marriage began. How soon did each generation begin breeding the next generation? From his questioning of Marthalik he was confused as to how fast an Esk child would mature.

  Watching Little Joe riding his tricycle round and round the living room, already chirping whole sentences in understandable English although he was less than a year old, Dr. West knew Little Joe hadn't inherited such precocity from the West side of the family.

  To his dismay Marthalik became pregnant again as promptly as if she'd spit out birth control pills when he wasn't looking.

  When he stared at his daughter, Little Martha, whose physical father he had believed he could not be, he thought he could see some of his characteristics. Fingering the cartilage of her ear, he even thought he could feel the West family lump. Eva, the third child, who also could not be his, also had his ears, he thought. So did Little Sam, and also the new baby they had named after the obstetrician. All five of them equally appeared to be his children, he pondered, although Little Martha and Eva could not be. But he felt they were his. Was this too much fatherly pride? No. "Marthalik, we've had enough children."

  But Marthalik refused to accept an intrauterine device. "Children are so nice, Joe. They are our purpose in life. If you love me, you will permit me to have children."

  Stubbornly, Dr. West not only was gulping guaranteed sperm-suppressant capsules, he was making double sure by using condoms.

  To his dismay, Marthalik became pregna
nt right on schedule. He didn't think she had been unfaithful to him. He had his pride. Who had been alone with her? Steve Jervasoni. Impossible. He wasn't going to question her or accuse him. He could not believe she had been unfaithful to him.

  "Marthalik, six children will be enough! This next baby must be your last."

  "But this is why we are alive -- to have children, Joe. My babies are my purpose."

  "Marthalik, in your village -- " Dr. West paused in embarrassment. "Sometimes husbands would be gone for many days hunting seals on the ice. While these husbands were gone, their wives would sleep with other men?"

  "Sometimes yes, sometimes no."

  "If some women did not sleep with other men while their husbands were away, did they miss having a baby?"

  "Why should they not have babies? Babies come because the woman has thought faithfully about Grandfather Bear -- and even if she hasn't."

  "No men are needed?" Dr. West smiled at this startling innocence as to the facts of life.

  "Yes, this person thinks a man is needed -- the first time. Young girls do not have babies until they have known a man. After that, perhaps a man is not needed if a girl continues to think good thoughts."

  "Or even if she doesn't," Dr. West murmured, realizing with relief that he was the physical father of all six of her children. She had been physically faithful to him. Even Little Martha and Baby Eva, who apparently were conceived and growing in her womb during the two months he was 2000 miles away in Ottawa imprisoned in a hospital, were his children.

  Nervously he thought of tropical fish he owned when he was a boy, multiplying until his little aquarium was overcrowded with red platys. Forced to buy a second aquarium, shrewdly he had transferred only the swollen female to the new aquarium. To avoid being overwhelmed by more platys, as the female gave birth he netted out her babies and guiltily flushed them down the toilet. Momentarily the lonely female platy appeared slim. With relief he had thought he was freed from killing any more babies. But in a month, she was swollen again. Without any contact with males, miraculously she was giving birth. Swimming weakly above the gravel were more baby platys. In defeat, he had traded both aquariums to another kid for a telescope.

  "Marthalik," he muttered, stroking her arm, "you are a fountain of life."

  There seemed two possibilities. Either his male sperm survived much longer than the normal two to three days in her uterus and Fallopian tubes; this seemed unlikely. Or on up in the narrow Fallopian tubes, perhaps into the ovaries themselves, his sperm that first night had impregnated all her partially developed ova. Did some hormone delay their growth? Hundreds of ova still might be waiting their turns to ripen and descend through her Fallopian tubes. As if from a savings bank for babies, these prefertilized but undividing ova were descending into her vacated uterus at monthly intervals. Triggered there, each grew from cell to embryo to fetus.

  After a month each baby emerged smiling into the world.

  With five little children already crowding the apartment, a sixth on the way, and Little Joe tackling his leg, loudly shouting like a two-year-old although he was barely five months old, Dr. West had no intention of finding out how many more babies his wife could have. "Dammit, I'm not trying to breed a touch football team."

  They needed a bigger apartment, but his last sabbatical paycheck was devoured by grocery bills, even though the kids were small eaters like Marthalik, and by clothing bills, even though each child's clothing was passed down to the next younger one. The oldest, Little Joe, seemed to be outgrowing his overalls overnight. And there were overdue bills from the hospital for the delivery room. Until now, Dr. West hadn't comprehended how expensive marriage could be. Bills were piling up so fast it was terrifying.

  In his letter to his former Harvard school buddy, Tom Randolph, he inquired about a position at Duke University where Dr. Tom Randolph now was Director of a new research project reportedly rich with Pentagon money. Tom's reply was friendly but so vague.

  Tom had been so cautious in mentioning his own project that Dr. West suspected Tom suspected the Defense Department had rescinded Dr. West's security clearance. Although Tom didn't say so, obviously he couldn't or wouldn't help Dr. West meet the Dean of the Demography Department at Duke. In spite of the help Dr. West had given Tom at the beginning of his career, Tom wasn't going to stick his neck out one inch for Dr. West.

  "Screw you, Tom." Dr. West mailed off his hurried report: "A Preliminary Analysis of a Population Growth Trend on the Boothia Peninsula" to the Journal of American Population Scientists.

  "When this is published, recruiters from a dozen universities will be phoning me," he muttered, hoping against hope.

  Trying not to think of the weeks he would have to wait in torment while not hearing whether the Journal had accepted or rejected his paper, Dr. West wondered if he ought to start a popular article in simple but terrifying language aimed at one of the newsstand magazines. Perhaps he should be aiming at the New Saturday Evening Post or even at one of the thick women's magazines like Good Apartment-Keeping . Even publication here might help him get a grant from some government agency. He knew the cancellation of his security clearance had been simply because he no longer was in a Defense Department funded project. He hoped it wasn't a permanent cancellation because a certain general considered him insubordinate. Hoping for a grant from the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, he daydreamed of returning to the Boothia Peninsula as director of a major project. He would name his project: Institute for the Study of the Shortened Gestation Period. "Vitally significant research if this shortened gestation period is a trait which might also appear in other parts of the world."

  He thought the Canadian Government might let him enter the Sanctuary. Right now, a Parliamentary Committee was questioning Hans Suxbey, embattled Director of the Eskimo Cultural Sanctuary. The elder LaRue was chairman of the vilifying committee. Old LaRue must have Hans Suxbey sweating.

  "I'll bet, within a year, the whole Eskimo Cultural Sanctuary will be abolished by Parliament." Dr. West leaned over his coffee cup toward Dr. Darwin. "I've got to get back into Boothia with cameras, grad students for census takers, and tape recorders, before the Esks' myths are altered even in their own minds by loudmouthed newspaper interviewers. I've got to beat Life ."

  "You have the advantage of being married to Marthalik."

  "Yes, Life 's bringing out our picture-story in the next issue, and this may help me get a grant. I've got to get back to Boothia."

  "I hear through the grapevine that ethnologists over at the State University in Palo Alto," Dr. Darwin remarked, "have snitched a copy of that synopsis you submitted to Cal. They are applying to the Canadian Government for a -- "

  "Damn! Spies from that diploma farm won't get into Boothia yet. Of course Henry LaRue, the younger LaRue, candidate for public office, has been in and out and in again."

  "Oh, the hero?" Dr. Darwin laughed. "I saw the rebroadcast of that CBC program. LaRue dramatically translates for this young Eskimo man whose babies are starving."

  "That was Edwardluk, the Esk who dragged me to the Sanctuary Guard Station."

  "Then all this talk about babies starving is true?" Dr. Darwin asked. "There's a solid reason a chapter of the SAVE THE ESKIMOS LEAGUE is being formed here at Free U.?"

  "The Canadian Government already is air-dropping Family Allowances. The Esks should survive this summer ok, and they'll be a bigger problem each winter."

  "You have a growing family problem yourself," Dr. Darwin thrust. "You can still pay for your own cup of coffee, but next month, who knows? I invited you here for coffee to tell you I'm confident the Student Hiring Council will accept you as a lecturer in population problems."

  Dr. West stood up, abruptly pushing a dime beside his coffee cup. "I'm thinking about it, I'm thinking about it." He was worrying that some weird things had happened to teachers at Free U. He still was hoping to find a job elsewhere in some graduate university.

  "Did you know the Defense Department has
blacklisted you?" Dr. Darwin said. "They even mail Free U. copies of their latest blacklists. We throw them in the wastebasket."

  Dr. West went home and tried to balance his checkbook, but his hand was shaking, so that he got a different answer every time. All answers said: not enough money. Another month and he'd be overdrawn.