by John Boyd
At 9:45 his telephone rang. Like the sound of many waters, Kyra’s voice rippled over the line. “Breedlove, what the hell does Veni, vidi, vici mean?”
“That’s Latin for ‘I came, I saw, I conquered.’ ”
“They’ve got a terrific library here, and I’m learning to read, but I came a cropper in that one. Who speaks Latin?”
“Nobody. It’s a dead language. Where are you calling from?”
“From a telephone booth behind the sick bay. You only gave me two dimes and I’ve used one already.”
“I gave you two quarters. You can get anyone to change them for five dimes.”
“Breedlove, you never cease to amaze me.”
“How’s your examination coming?”
“Veni, vidi, vici. Every doctor on the base has come to pay me homage, and nobody around here worries about my nakedness. What have you been doing all day?”
“Moping around. Pining for you. I wrote you the first poem I’ve written to a girl since high school.”
“Read it to me, Breedlove, with expression.”
“I was hoping to give it to you.”
“Don’t leave me dangling. Read it now, Breedlove.”
He read the poem with expression.
For a moment she was silent, and when she spoke she seemed genuinely thrilled. “It’s darling, Breedlove. I’ll treasure this little poem forever.”
“But I haven’t given it to you.”
“You have, Breedlove, It’s engraved on my heart. Shall I read it back to you, word for word?”
“No. I’m acquainted with your memory. Did they give you any idea how long you’ll be there?”
“Nobody knows. Some doctors are coming in tomorrow to ask me about Kanab. Everyone here is very nice, but you know, Breedlove, underneath they’re afraid of me. I know Myra scared hell out of you, but anyone who’s not afraid of Myra is an idiot. With all these big men around they’re afraid of me.”
“They’re afraid you might bring diseases to the planet no one has ever heard of.”
“They shouldn’t judge me by their Neanderthal standards. I know about diseases and take preventive measures. Anyway, if they were afraid of diseases they’d put me behind glass.”
“Where’d you learn the word ‘Neanderthal’?”
“I’ve been in the library since chow. If I couldn’t learn something about the planet in three hours, I’d be stupid.”
His heart sank. If she was already reading books on anthropology, it was only a matter of time before she came across an anthology containing Poe’s “To One in Paradise.”
“You ought to find lots about uranium in the library. Get the books on chemistry and physics.”
“I’ve read a few already. Look, I’d better hang up. If the nurse comes and finds me out of my room, she’ll get worried.”
“Doesn’t she know you’re calling me?”
“No. I went out the window. The telephone in my room isn’t working. They’re setting up something that’ll hook me into the command network, a man told me.”
Then the recording had not been wrong, he realized, but he still did not know what the Navy’s policy would be regarding her private calls.
“If I haven’t called you by seven tomorrow, if you’re still there, slip out the window and call me. If they try to hold you incommunicado, I’ll start pushing to get access to you.”
“Don’t worry, Breedlove. I’ve got a few tricks to play.”
She hung up, and for the first time since she had passed through the swinging doors he felt optimistic. Peterson was right. His plan to blackmail Defense had been wild. And he didn’t need Interior’s help. He had his personal deus ex machina, Kyra, who would drop down to lift him over his problems.
Clasping his hands behind his neck he lay back on the bed, remembering the musical lilt of her voice. She had the most non sequitur mind he had ever encountered, leaping forward and back, keeping to no agenda, yet her observations revealed strong deductive powers. As she said, if the doctors had feared disease, they would have kept her isolated, but if they didn’t fear disease, what did they fear? And who were the doctors coming to question her? Of course the interviewers did not have to mean medical doctors. That was it.
She was no longer in quarantine. She was being held for interrogation. Experts were coming to question her, anthropologists, sociologists, zoologists, awaiting their turns to question her. She might be there for weeks while the planet tilted toward the solstice, when the instincts of her species, commanded by the sun, would bind them forever to an earth they could not share with others.
Yet, strangely, it was not genocide for his own species that fretted most strongly at his mind. In the long hours she would be forced to spend in the library, she would run across the poems of Poe, and his fraudulence would be revealed. A remorse all out of proportion to his transgression filled him with a bleak despair, and when he arose to undress for sleep, sleep did not come easily. For almost an hour he tossed and turned, tortured by symptoms he did not recognize, because he had never before suffered the disease.
In the morning he slept late and was emerging from the shower when Peterson’s call came.
“A lawyer by the name of Abe Cohen will call on you around noon. He couldn’t be sure of the exact time, because Abe’s a very busy man, but he’s on retainer with Interior and happens to be an expert in immigration problems. Also he’s worked in Washington and knows interdepartmental procedures. Tell him your story and let him take it from there. He’s not there to make waves, but the fact that he can won’t go unnoticed. He’ll see that Kyra’s out of quarantine in a reasonable time, and he’ll see that you sit in on any conferences involving her. Meanwhile, take a cold shower and try to forget the girl.”
Cohen arrived before noon and telephoned Breedlove from the lobby. Breedlove went out to meet him, and the man he found waiting had none of the poised tension Breedlove expected in a dynamic Washington lawyer. About sixty, Cohen had a soft voice and softer manner. Thin gray hair receded from his high forehead. Large brown eyes and age-slackened jowls gave him a faint resemblance to a cocker spaniel. His thin frame was stooped, and he walked with a sidling motion. At Cohen’s suggestion—he feared being overheard—they returned to Breedlove’s room.
“I’ve come at the request of Interior, Mr. Breedlove, to look out for the interests of the young lady. There might be a tendency to exhibit her as a talking simian when in fact, under provisions of the immigration code, she might qualify as a head of state entitled to a grant of privilege by the State Department. At the moment I’m not looking forward to any request so ambitious, but it offers a line of attack.
“The de facto situs of her space vehicle is important. If it is in fact in the state of Idaho, she might be covered by provisions of Idaho’s Good Samaritan Law. Then we could quote a few state ordinances in her support.”
“Her ship’s a good twenty miles south of the Canadian border,” Breedlove assured him, “and thirty miles east of the Washington line.”
Breedlove motioned Cohen to a chair and settled himself on the edge of the bed.
“I’m here in her interest,” Cohen said, “but I’m still mindful of my own reputation. I wish to be sure I’m not perpetuating some hoax.”
“You don’t have to worry about that, Mr. Cohen. She took me inside her spaceship. It’s real.”
“Yet we have to admit, Mr. Breedlove, there’s room even here for skepticism. As the Devil’s Advocate, I must ask you, have you ever taken any hallucinatory drugs?”
“Never.”
“Then there’s the possibility of false memories implanted through hypnotic suggestion. Did you bring any item or artifact with you when you exited from her spaceship?”
“No. I went fishing.”
“Then, actually, we lack all but subjective evidence when it comes to your testimony.”
Breedlove saw that Cohen was moving to establish the credibility of Kyra’s chief witness, and his gentle manner softened the
incisiveness of his interrogation. He was beginning to understand and respect Abe Cohen.
“I have before-and-after Polaroid shots of Kyra taken when her hair was its original green and later after it was dyed platinum. But I suppose those could be faked.”
“Hardly,” Cohen said. “It’s difficult to fake a Polaroid shot.”
He showed the photographs to the attorney, who took them to the window to study them under various angles of light, then handed them back to Breedlove with his verdict.
“They’re not faked. She appears very human, and very attractive. Now, let’s take your step-by-step story of how you met her and how you became convinced she was not a fraud.”
Breedlove told the story of his encounter with Kyra. He could not be sure the lawyer believed everything, but Cohen did not seem to disbelieve him, either. In his polite manner Cohen cross-questioned him, taking an occasional note. Breedlove was finishing the tale when the telephone rang.
A woman’s voice inquired, “Ranger Thomas Breedlove?”
“Yes.”
“Admiral Harper’s office calling. The admiral would like to see you without delay. It’s concerning the fair visitor. If you do not have transportation, a car will be dispatched to your motel immediately.”
“I have a car. Where’s the admiral’s office?”
“Room 812, Federal Building. When may the admiral expect you?”
“I haven’t had lunch.”
“The admiral invites you to lunch with him in the commissary at 1300.”
“Accepted,” Breedlove said tersely, taking his cue from the voice.
Breedlove hung up and turned back to Cohen. “We’re getting action. That was Admiral Harper’s office. He wants to see me, whoever he is.”
“He’s Naval Intelligence,” Cohen said, glancing at his watch. “It’s twelve-fifteen, and it’s not kosher to keep an admiral waiting. You can finish the story on the way to your car.”
With quaint, old-world gallantry Cohen held Breedlove’s jacket for him and, with his slue-footed walk, went with Breedlove to the parking lot as the ranger continued his tale. The lawyer smiled when Breedlove described Pilsudski’s reaction to Kyra’s absent navel.
At the car Cohen gave Breedlove his card.
“Call me if you need me. Admiral Harper should give you some idea of the official attitude, and if it’s hard line, if it looks like they’re going to hold Kyra for more than a couple of days, I can start making legal noises.”
“Would my rights as her guardian hold in court?”
“Definitely. It was sagacious of you to sign those papers.”
He held the door open for Breedlove, saw that it was locked when closed, and said, “If Harper tries to tell you that the Bill of Rights does not apply to nonhuman aliens, you tell him Abe Cohen has a different opinion.”
Chapter Seven
Admiral Jonathan Harper was a vegetarian. He ordered soyburger for lunch.
Cohen had suggested cocker spaniels and Levantine warmth. There had been human softness in his eyes and manner. Tall, lean, ramrod straight, Harper’s florid features, topped by well-groomed white hair, suggested New England birches and Maine frost. His eyes were a wintry blue. Though his manners were gracious, his demeanor projected power and authority.
He apologized for the tape recorder beside his salad plate. “I don’t approve of these infernal machines, but you’ll be talking to others after lunch, and this one will spare you repetition. You’re my guest. If you prefer the repetition to the recorder, I’ll turn it off.”
“No problem,” Breedlove said. “Leave it on.”
“I met Kyra this morning, a very impressive young she-thing if you consider a life span of a few thousand years as being young. She’s charming, and she has a high opinion of you.”
“It’s a mutual trust, Admiral. I believe she’s here for exactly the reason given, to get fuel for her space vehicle.”
“We’d all like to believe that.”
“Don’t you, personally?”
“I can’t permit myself the luxury of personal opinions.”
By the snap in his voice the admiral dismissed such speculations. In the military hierarchy, Breedlove knew, admirals were royalty, and it was not good form to question royalty,—but Breedlove was not in the military, and the admiral had said this was a social conversation.
“Then what is your official attitude?”
“The official attitude is still being formulated,” Harper said. “No doubt it will hold that Kyra’s a danger to the planet. That she’s a charming female does nothing to abate the danger.” Here the hint of a smile played over the admiral’s face. “Heightens it, in fact. Except for very limited breeding purposes, men have been eliminated from her social order.”
“She told you that?”
“With amused candor. And, I might add, she looked at me with a certain avidity when she spoke.”
“It was her sense of humor,” Breedlove said.
“I hope that’s all it was.”
“If not, then all the more reason to get her off the earth.”
“Superficially, yes.” The admiral nodded. “But with the capabilities of a space vehicle immune to detection and with fissionable material aboard, she’s more a threat off the earth than on.”
“Not with the small amount of uranium she needs.”
“You’re probably correct,” the admiral agreed, “but we have to hypothecate the more dreadful possibilities. With only the added intelligence it took to invent a bow and arrow, Cro-Magnon man eliminated Neanderthal man. Imagine what Kyra could do with her technology.”
“But the dreadful assumptions aren’t logical in the light of her behavior.”
“Logic’s a process of human minds, Breedlove, and Kyra’s superhuman… I’m not saying we won’t give her the uranium, but we have to analyze the comparative risks, and it will be a while before we make our recommendations to the Atomic Energy Commission.”
“Time is her problem, Admiral.”
“We’re aware of this. Our recommendation is being formulated with all due haste. That’s why you’re here—to help us decide.”
“It seems to me we have no choice but to grant her request.”
“Negative,” Harper snapped. “We have options. She could be retained on earth in protective custody indefinitely.”
“That would be illegal,” Breedlove said, and there was an edge to his voice. “Abe Cohen would have something to say about that.”
“Then we have legal but more drastic options, fail safe and, in the end perhaps, more humane.” He was cutting his salad with the side of his fork when he added, “A formal declaration of war on Kanab would solve the legal problems very nicely.”
Harper’s passive, uninflected tone of voice when he advanced the proposal was more chilling to Breedlove than regret or even vehemence could have made it. Suddenly and incongruously he recalled that Adolf Hitler had been a vegetarian also.
“That would only be giving legal sanction to murder.”
“Not murder,” the admiral demurred. “ ‘Slaughter’ is the better term. It’s done in stockyards every day for far less urgent reasons, as we vegetarians know. Remember, we’re not dealing in human beings.”
He paused to taste the soyburger patty, focusing on his palate with the detached concentration of a wine taster, and delivered his verdict, “Excellent!”
Not to be put off by the epicurean interruption, Breedlove continued his attack. “Admiral, the beasts we slaughter in stockyards are dumb brutes.”
“Don’t tell that to an animal trainer. The beasts have a different order of intelligence, as do the Kanabians. But extermination of the visitors, if not a likely alternative, must remain out option, and you can help us here. You’re the only human being on earth who can pinpoint the space vehicle on a military map of the area.”
“It will be a cold day in hell before I do that!”
For a moment the admiral’s gaze seemed to soften as he looked up fro
m the patty, and he said, “Welcome to the loneliness of command, Breedlove.”
“With all respect for the gravity of the problem as you see it, Admiral, I suggest that it’s a criminal perversion of the Good Samaritan doctrine to even consider destroying that gallant band.”
Harper took no umbrage from Breedlove’s remarks.
“Yours might be my own personal opinion, but above my personal wishes stands my duty to my country,—above that my duty to mankind.”
“It’s precisely my duty to mankind that I’m thinking about,” Breedlove said, and even as he spoke he realized he was not thinking exclusively about his duty to mankind. Much of his concern was for Kyra, and a little of his loyalty to her was in atonement. In a manner of speaking, he had betrayed her already by trying to palm off Poe’s poem to her as his own—it was an intellectual and cultural betrayal—and many a cock would crow before he betrayed her twice. No argument of this gold-striped merchant of death would go undisputed.
“Remember, this is a social conversation, Breedlove,” the admiral said placatingly, “and my reasons for mentioning the military contingencies are to give you time to think over the problems. You’re not under oath, and you won’t be at 1400 when I’m asking you to address a group of concerned scientists in the ready room. I’m confident you’re a patriotic citizen who’ll cooperate when the need arises, and besides, I’m sure as a ranger you’ll want to minimize any damage to the park area that high explosives might incur.”
Arguing with Harper was futile, Breedlove decided. The man reflected nothing but official policy, and the policy was hard line.
“I’d like to talk to Abe Cohen about these matters, Admiral.”
“Leave his number with my secretary, and she’ll have Cohen proceed over without delay.”
“I’ll be honest, Admiral, I don’t like the drift of this conversation. I have confidence in Kyra. I trust that her reason for being here is precisely as she claims. I believe she’s been honest with me all the way.”
Harper arched an eyebrow over his lifted cup of coffee.