The Ninth Science Fiction Megapack

by Arthur C. Clarke

  “Say,” he asked, “d’you think those Starmen will look like people?”

  Strickland began to enjoy the driver. After all, a taxi driver represents the people of America, their hopes, their fears, their opinions, their intelligence. Everybody knows that.

  “I don’t have any idea,” he answered with a chuckle. He had begun to hope they wouldn’t look like men. When the Supreme Court came to deciding his case, they might let some line creep in about the Starmen being different from men and therefore not having the same rights. Precedent for one person’s being different from another person, and therefore not having the same rights. Wow! Nineteen sixty here we come, right back where we started from! Make that eighteen sixty. Or seventeen, or sixteen, or any damn century you want to name.

  An extra fold of skin at the corner of the eyelid, a few more pigment cells per square inch of skin, the shape of a nose line—he had a fleeting thought that it might be an idea to put through a law forbidding plastic surgeons to make alterations which concealed racial characteristics…

  “A friend of mine,” the driver was saying, “smart cooky runs a newsstand and is pretty sharp from being around all those books and magazines. He says maybe they’ll be like big green spiders, with red eyes all up and down their legs. He showed me a picture on one of the magazine covers like that. Jeez!”

  Strickland nodded and smiled.

  “Jeez!” the driver repeated with more emphasis, now that his fare gave agreement. “I gotta wangle a place at the Mall tomorrow morning. That’s where they’re going to have the reception. How are them visitors gonna know where they ought to land?”

  “We’ll tell ’em on the radio. Remember, we have to give them permission to land?”

  “Yeah, yeah, sure,” the driver said, remembering, and nodded sagely. “I guess we’ll send out a landing beam for them to follow in. You think they might be smart enough to follow a landing beam down?”

  “That’s one I’m not going to worry about,” Strickland said. “Yeah, sure,” the driver agreed instantly. “That’s somebody else’s problem.” He thought for a moment. “Them fellows out at the Pentagon will probably check up on that one.”

  “Them fellows out at the Pentagon had better check up on quite a few things,” Strickland answered ominously. He felt a stirring of something unfinished. Oh yes, there was some young punk out at the Pentagon he’d asked his secret service to check up on. They hadn’t given him a report, yet. So now his secret service was falling down on the job. That had been yesterday, and no report yet. The battle of the globes and the discs was no excuse.

  The traffic tangle unraveled, and the cab jerked forward. “You gonna be there? At the Mall, I mean?” the driver shouted back over his shoulder.

  “I’ll be there,” Strickland answered.

  “Get yourself a good connection,” the driver advised him with a sage nod. “Don’t depend on your congressman or any of the common help like that. If you got a real good connection, you might make it.”

  “I’ll make it,” Strickland said confidently. “You think the President would be connection enough?”

  It didn’t seem to impress the taxi driver.

  “Oh, him,” was the answer. “I guess this is sort of a social hoopla, at that. Yeah, I guess he oughta be able to swing it.” Strickland made a wry mouth. Maybe he’d gone too far in pushing this nonentity into the White House. After all, the prestige of the Presidency was a mighty useful tool. No point in letting it get rusty. Better let a dedicated reformer get in next time.

  A safe one, of course. Better get the F.B.I. to release the customary lists of acceptable candidates to the grass-roots political clubs right away.

  THIRTEEN

  Civil service being what it is, I thought it slightly miraculous that Shirley had already browbeaten enough clerks into reporting for work to pass out forms of application for interview to the growing line of generals and admirals who wanted to be filled in on the latest estimates of extraterrestrial psychology.

  Sara and I managed to get into the office not more than fifteen minutes after the final words of the Starmen, and already our day was beginning—the damnedest day I ever went through. My something like five weeks in Washington had taught me a lot, but apparently not enough.

  As the day progressed, in a fleeting few seconds here and there between conferences and conferences, telephone calls and telephone calls, I began to wonder how in hell the nation managed to keep going when apparently nobody was concerned with whether or not it got governed. Sitting there as I was, the answer-boy in the Bureau of Extraterrestrial Psychology, and therefore the final word on how we should conduct ourselves in relation to the Starmen, I got a pretty good cross-section of what must have been going on all over Washington. A pretty good thermometer measuring the rising fever. I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised, I’d been around enough people not to be astonished at anything they might do, but I must have had an unsuspected residue of illusion left about the wisdom, levelheadedness, good sense, and balanced judgment of those who govern us.

  There had to be plans, of course, for a reception of the Starmen. I had no preferences in the matter,’and the Mall sounded as likely a spot for the landing as anywhere else. There was plenty of space which could be kept clear for the globe to set down, and plenty of space around the perimeter for the few dignitaries who would be permitted through the police lines.

  Since the original planning took place there in the Pentagon, it was decided that a simple military welcome would be most impressive to the space visitors. Fighting men to fighting men. Just the Chief of Staff and the Joint Chiefs. With possibly a side dish of drill formation by the Space Cadets.

  “And, gentlemen,” I said firmly, “representatives from the Bureau of Extraterrestrial Psychology. Dr. Kibbie, myself, my secretary, one or two others. After all, gentlemen,” I said, answering their dubious frowns, “we are the first, the final, the only authority on the psychology of extraterrestrials. How will we be of further service to you if we don’t get close enough to them to learn something of their psychology?”

  They conceded that all right, it was logical enough that we should be there, but nobody else. Was that understood? It was all right with me.

  Apparently it was not all right with Congress. On a clear day the screams of outrage arising on the Hill might have been heard all the way to the Pentagon. Since there were telephones, it didn’t need a clear day. Under the threat of new loyalty investigations, the military backed down and conceded that picked committees, including the members of investigating committees, of course, could be represented.

  The Secretary of State decreed that really the visit was more diplomatic than military. Hadn’t the Starmen themselves already told us they had the status of ambassadors? What was military about that? Fighting men to fighting men, indeed! Since when did ambassadors fight! If anything, it might be the worst sort of diplomatic blunder to have military men on the scene at all; construed as a threat and all that. No, these were ambassadors from Star Government to Earth Government, and protocol demanded it be handled as such.

  This pulled the plug.

  From 3100 Massachusetts Avenue came the cryptic question: Since when did the State Department of the United States represent Earth Government? The Right Honorable British Ambassador, Knight Commander of the Bath, C.B.E., expected to be placed in line of reception at the Mall, and in a position commensurate with Empire Status.

  Almost simultaneously, the white-fronted, palatial Russian Embassy at 1125 Sixteenth Street announced that the true representatives of the toiling masses should be first in line to greet these sons of the galaxy proletariat. The rather vague wording of this ukase gave the impression that an Inter-Universe Comintern had been responsible for Earth’s rescue by the white globes, and only diplomatic sensitivity had kept them from wearing the hammer and sickle.

  A rather feeble, and purely routine, request was filed by the Secretary of the United Nations, on the basis that, since this was a w
orld-to-world visit, didn’t somebody think that the United Nations organization ought to be the one to represent Earth? Just a suggestion, of course.

  Nobody seemed to think so.

  Norway, Saudi Arabia, Argentina were next to demand appropriate positions. The ambassador from France was somewhat handicapped in that he didn’t know who their premier was today, and therefore didn’t quite know whose name to use, but “Welcome in the name of France” had always been good, and he didn’t intend to let the big powers use this occasion to brand France as a second-rate power. Each of the two ambassadors from the Chinas spoke darkly of what would happen if the other were permitted to attend.

  Official Washington and all the nations were conducting business as usual.

  Within the hour, every diplomatic mission in the capital was hammering at the doors of the State Department, who, by their position, had lifted a considerable part of the load from my shoulders. The missions were being reinforced as fast as planes could empty the United Nations building in New York and transfer the occupants to Washington.

  The president of the W.C.T.U. demanded that the Spacemen be given the alcohol test before being permitted to set foot on Earth. The Secretary General of the Antivivisection League demanded that we get a signed certificate that no experimental animals had been used in finding out how to get here. A committee from the Vegetarian Society wanted documentary evidence of their diet before declaring its position. The D.A.R. was also undecided on their official attitude since obviously none of the Spacemen had ancestors who fought in the Revolutionary War and were therefore beneath notice.

  One Senator Gasbie rushed to the floor of the deserted upper chamber and delivered an impassioned speech to two page boys who were stuck with duty and too naive to disappear. Why, he asked the two page boys, should the principle of states’ rights be pilloried?

  The Immigration Department was rushing all over Washington trying to find a judge who would issue an injunction against the landing until the Starmen had complied with the loyalty-oath requirements.

  In final desperation, since there was nothing else to do, appeals even filtered through to the President to make a decision on who should stand where in the reception line. Never one to make a decision anyway, this came at a most inappropriate time, for he hadn’t yet decided the much more important question of which Image he wished to Project. For thirty-forty years the country, from election to election, had wavered between the affable but ineffectual Father Image, and the bright but annoying Kid-Brother Image. Should he radiate calm, fatherly indulgence; or should he be sharp and inquisitive—this being about Space and all?

  The F.B.I. didn’t care who stood where, just so long as there was no sex hanky-panky going on.

  If Official Washington was confused, Social Washington was more so.

  There must be a dinner and formal reception in the evening after the arrival. From the distinguished alleys of Georgetown to the Hunt Club Set of Virginia and Maryland, the battle raged on who would sponsor it.

  The social problems posed were stupendous. Who should be invited to the dinner? Should there be multiple dinners? Certainly not, this was no political election gimmick! For once and for all, status levels would be decided by who received invitations. It must be quite exclusive. But should they establish a secondary status level by inviting more people to the reception following the dinner? What about seating arrangements?

  Should all five of the Spacemen be seated together? Did I think their officers would be insulted if they were seated with their men? How many were officers and how many were men, anyway? I didn’t know? How stupid, how very stupid of me not to have found out such an important thing as that!

  Perhaps they should set up a second affair in the scullery, where the common help from the spaceship could be fed later with the servants?

  What would the Starmen wear? Would they come in smelly uniforms, or would they have black tie, or white tie? What dishes did they prefer? No information whatever! Now wasn’t that just like a foreigner, not to give their hostesses a teeny hint!

  What about this word going around that the visitors were really green spiders with red eyes running up and down their legs? Just on the chance, should the menu include—ugh—flies?

  I suddenly created a new position for Sara. I switched such calls over to the Social Secretary of the Bureau of Extraterrestrial Psychology. She didn’t thank me, but she did pick up on it with considerable more finesse than I had been able to muster.

  Gently, firmly, she suggested on the matter of flies, for example, that they wait and see what the visitors really did look like. We didn’t really have it on the best authority that they actually were spiders; but if they happened to be, weren’t there just oodles and oodles of flies in the slums? And didn’t Washington have some of the finest slums in the country? Let the flies wait. They’d have from the morning, when the Starmen appeared, until evening to gather flies. Perhaps the Junior League and the Junior Chamber could make a day’s outing gathering enough flies?

  Oh, you’re quite, quite welcome. We’re glad to be of service on such an important matter. That’s why we pay taxes, you know.

  But not all questions were referred to our department. After all, the women were American, with pioneer blood coursing through their veins. They were able to make some decisions all by themselves. On the matter of addressing the Starmen, for example. Your Excellencies? No. How did we know they were excellent? Your Worthy Starshipsires? Awkward, and one simply mustn’t be awkward. They finally had to let Sara arbitrate. She ruled a simple Sir should be adequate, until we knew more.

  Should the women curtsy to the Spacemen? To spiders, my dear? Better wait on that momentous decision, too.

  Now about dress? Wait a minute.

  Sara looked over at me. For the moment I was between calls and conferences.

  “They want to know how to dress,” she said.

  “Oh, damn it, Sara,” I snapped. “For Chrissake! All right. Let the men wear tails. It’ll be symbolic. Let the women dress the way savages dress everywhere—bedeck themselves in old dead parts of birds and animals, smear their faces with colored clay, mash flowers over themselves to conceal their natural stench. The same way they always dress. Now, for Chrissake!”

  “Don’t you think it should be formal, really formal?” Sara asked her caller sweetly.

  We even got a call from two enterprising fixers who had formed a merger and cornered all the local call girls, just in case the Starmen could get away from the public reception for a while to relax and enjoy themselves. The girls weren’t quite sure how to manage green spiders, but at least they wouldn’t be any worse than some of those drunken, slobbering old congressmen who were always so pure and noble back home.

  The long, hellish day gradually drew to a close. The intervals between calls grew longer. I looked over at Sara during one of those intervals, and she was crying.

  “S’matter, Sara?” I asked.

  She looked up at me while she fished in her desk drawer for a tissue.

  “Don’t they remember last night at all? The courage? The beauty? The purity? You’d think…”

  “I know,” I said. “I’d like to go somewhere and hide, pretend I don’t belong to the human race.”

  She wiped her eyes, and blew her nose.

  “When I was a kid,” I said, and looked back in memory to a long time ago, “I used to dream about the time when we would meet some other life intelligence face to face. I was pretty innocent, I guess. Because, in that imagining, I always saw Man standing straight and proud—and I was so proud of him.”

  She lay her head down on her desk and sobbed uncontrollably.

  FOURTEEN

  The President, or at least his phalanx of advisers, had made a protocol decision on who should stand where. It was 9:52 a.m. Radio contact with the globe, invisible somewhere out in space and unregistered on any of our tracking equipment, had agreed on 10:00 a.m. as a suitable landing time.

  The President stood
at the head of a flying wedge of dignitaries. He was flanked on either side by the key Senate and House leaders, appropriately spaced with an eye to the best camera angles. Behind the President, and blocked from view from any direction, stood the Vice-President. Behind them were intermingled some five hundred congressmen—not really intermingled, since seniority and party affiliation sorted them rigidly, although nobody but Congress would see the order of their standing. In a little group, by itself on one side of the Congress, stood the Cabinet. In a little group, on the opposing side, stood the Supreme Court. To the left stood the leftist-country ambassadors, and to the right stood the rightist ambassadors—and if the uncommitted nations didn’t know where to stand it served them right that they were left without any special place to stand.

  Still farther off to the right, we representatives of the Pentagon stood. I seemed to be the only male in mufti in that contingent. Trouble was, they still hadn’t officially made me a Half-Planet-Admiral-Rear-Side; and I wasn’t sure I would be violating more sensitivities by assuming a uniform not officially mine, or appearing as a civilian. Apparently either way I was damned, for the uniformed officers seemed to shrink away from me, as if to say they didn’t know me and couldn’t account for why I was there. Even Dr. Kibbie in his Star Admiral’s uniform, seemed to prefer standing with Star Admiral Lytle, Space Navy’s Personnel Director.

  Sara, loyally, stood proudly beside me.

  “Nine fifty-two,” she said. “Eight minutes. But the globe is nowhere in sight.”

  “Insects are sluggish until the air warms up,” I said, sotto voce. “Maybe ten o’clock was too early.”

  She didn’t bother to smile.

  As far as we could see, in any direction, the Mall and all avenues tunneling into it were packed with humanity. There was a ceaseless pushing, shoving, elbowing for better view. Each time a new VIP had arrived with police or military escort, those who lost their favored positions in making way fought to regain them. Most had got some sleep, since the night before last had been all waking, but many had needed the fortification of alcohol to keep the little burner stoves of their souls alight. The crowd more nearly resembled the peak hour of an Irish clambake than a solemn reception of the first visitors to Earth from another world.