In the Beginning: Tales From the Pulp Era

by Robert Silverberg

  There was a faintly musty odor about the place. Despite himself, Harriman felt a twinge of revulsion as he was ushered into the presence of Trinnin Nirot, ranking Nirotan diplomat in North America.

  The Nirotan was standing in one corner of the office—Nirotans never sat. His small, muscular arms were folded in a surprisingly human posture. The great sleek wings sat huddled on his shoulders. On Earth the atmosphere was too thin, the gravitational pull too strong, to make it possible for the Nirotans to fly: Their home world had a thicker atmosphere and lighter gravity, and there they soared on wings that measured fifteen feet from tip to tip.

  Harriman tried to hide the irrational fear he experienced at the sight of the huge bat-like creature. He stared at the face, covered, like the rest of the Nirotan’s body, with fine, purplish fur. He could see the dog-like snout, the tiny yellow eyes, the enormous fan-like ears, and, gleaming behind the Nirotan’s thin lips, the teeth. Teeth that might, perhaps, be able to drain blood from an Earthman’s throat.

  Harriman said, “You understand why I am here, of course.”

  “I understand that there are rioters outside this building, and that my people on this planet must take cover for fear of their lives,” said the Nirotan crisply. Like most aliens on Earth, his command of the language was flawless. “More than that I do not understand. I am waiting for an explanation.”

  Harriman’s jaws tightened. He felt awkward standing halfway across the room from the Nirotan; but there was no place to sit down, and the alien did not offer any sort of hospitality. Harriman fidgeted, crossing and uncrossing his arms. After a brief pause he said—quietly, since the Nirotans were extraordinarily sensitive to sound—“Last night and this morning three Earthmen were found dead in widely separated places, their bodies drained of blood. Many people believe that they were killed by members of your race.”

  The alien’s facial expression was unreadable. “Why should they believe this? Why choose us as the killers, and not the Qafliks or the Zadoorans or some other race? There are many alien beings on this planet.”

  “There are two reasons for suspecting Nirotans,” Harriman said. “The first is an ancient superstitious belief in vampires. Bats who drink human blood. The people of Nirotans are closest in physical appearance to the popular image of the vampire.”

  “And the other reason?”

  “The other reason,” said Harriman, “is more pertinent. Two eye-witnesses in San Francisco said they saw a Nirotan in the process of attacking one of the victims.”

  The alien was silent for a long moment. Finally he said, “Tell me, Mr. Harriman: if you could, would you kill and eat me?”

  Harriman was stunned. “Would I—kill and eat you?” he repeated slowly:

  “Yes. Do you feel any inclination to feast on a roasted Nirotan?”

  “Why—of course not. The idea’s monstrous!”

  “Exactly so,” the Nirotan said calmly. “Let me assure you that a member of my race would no sooner drink the blood of an Earthman than an Earthman would dine on Nirotan flesh. Pardon me when I say that we find your physical appearance as repugnant as you seem to find ours. The whole concept of this crime is beyond our belief. We are not vampires. We do not feed on animal matter off any sort. The crime we are accused of could not possibly have been committed by a Nirotan.”

  Harriman silently regarded the alien, staring at the flashing teeth, needle-sharp, at the vicious little claws, at the folded, leathery, infinitely terrifying wings. Appearance seemed to belie the calm denial of guilt that Harriman had just heard.

  The Earthman said, “It might be possible to determine guilt or innocence quickly. If you would lend us a member of your staff for examination—”

  “No,” came the curt, immediate response.

  “But our physicians might be able to establish beyond doubt the impossibility of any—ah—vampirism. I can assure you that no harm would come—”

  “No.”

  “But—”

  “We do not tolerate any handling of our bodies by alien beings,” said the Nirotan haughtily. “If you persist in accusing us of this incredible crime, we will be forced to withdraw from your planet. But we cannot and will not submit to any sort of examination of the sort you suggest, Mr. Harriman.”

  “Don’t you see, though, it might clear your people at once, and—”

  “You have heard my reply,” the Nirotan said. He rustled his wings in an unfriendly gesture. “We have stated our innocence. I must take your refusal to believe my statement as a deeply wounding insult.”

  There was crackling silence in the room. This was an alien, Harriman reflected. On Nirota, perhaps, the idea of lying was not known. Or perhaps the Nirotan was a very subtle devil indeed. In any event, the interview was rapidly getting nowhere.

  “Very well,” Harriman said. “If your refusal is final—”

  “It is.”

  “We’ll have to proceed with your investigation as best we can. For your own sake, I must ask you not to let any of your people venture out unprotected. We can’t be responsible for the actions of hysterical mobs. And, naturally, we’ll do everything in our power to discover the guilty parties. Your cooperation might have made things a little easier all around, of course.”

  “Good day, Mr. Harriman.”

  Harriman scowled. “For the sake of good relations between Earth and Nirota, I hope none of your people is responsible for this crime. But you can be sure that when we do find the murderers, they’ll be fully punished under the laws of Earth. Good day, Trinnin Nirot.”

  Harriman was shaking with repressed disgust as he made his way down the consulate steps, through the path between the gesticulating rioters, and into his car. The Nirotan stench seemed to cling to him, to hover in a cloud about him. And he knew the Nirotan’s hideous face would plague his dreams for weeks to come.

  He rode uptown, back to the skyscraper that housed the headquarters of the Terran Security Agency, in a bleak and bitter mood. For the ten years that he had held his job, he had devoted himself to protecting the alien beings on Earth, guarding them from the outcroppings of superstitious hatred that sometimes rose up to threaten them. And now, he could no longer defend the extraterrestrials. Three vicious crimes had been committed. And Trinnin Nirot’s cold refusal to permit investigation made it that much harder to believe in the innocence of the Nirotans. The vampire image was ingrained too deeply.

  When he returned to his office, Harriman found a message instructing him to report to Director Russell at once. He found Russell in conference. In the Director’s office were four men—George Zachary, Secretary-General of the United Nations; Henri Lamartine, Commissioner of Extraterrestrial Relationships; Dr. David van Dyne, chief medical examiner of the Security Agency; and Paul Hennessey, Commissioner of Justice and Russell’s immediate superior.

  Director Russell said, “Well, Harriman? Did you see the Nirotans?”

  “I saw Trinnin Nirot himself,” Harriman said. “And I got nowhere.”

  “What do you mean, nowhere?”

  “Trinnin Nirot categorically denies the possibility that any Nirotan might have committed the crimes. He says that Nirotans are vegetarians, and that the whole idea of their being vampires is beyond belief. But he won’t let us have a look at any of his men to confirm it.”

  “We expected the denial,” muttered Commissioner Hennessey. “But where do we go from here?”

  “Isn’t there any evidence on the bodies?” Harriman asked.

  Dr. van Dyne said, “All three bodies are here, and I’ve examined them. All that can be definitely determined was that two needle-like instruments penetrated the jugular veins of the victims and rapidly withdrew their blood. The withdrawal might have been done with teeth, or it could have been done mechanically. Of course, if we could get hold of a Nirotan and examine his teeth, we could probably find out readily enough whether one of them actually committed the crime or not. If they’re really vegetarians, they probably don’t have the equipment for doing i
t.”

  “Are we trying to decide whether a Nirotan actually did it?” Director Russell asked in some surprise. “I thought that was all settled. There were witnesses, after all, for the San Francisco murder.”

  Commissioner Lamartine said, “Before we can start to take legal action against the Nirotans, we’ll have to rule out all possibility that any other race might have done it—or that the crimes were committed by Earthmen.”

  Russell blinked. “Earthmen? Are you suggesting—”

  The bearded little commissioner shook his head stubbornly. “We’re dealing with a proud and stubborn race here, as Mr. Harriman can confirm. We can’t simply accuse them of a crime like this without proof.”

  “Eyewitnesses constitute some beginning of proof,” Russell snapped.

  Commissioner Hennessy held up a hand to cut short the dispute. “Please, gentlemen. I think Trinnin Nirot’s refusal to permit examination of any Nirotans speaks for itself in the matter of guilt or innocence.”

  “I’m not so sure,” Harriman put in. “They seem to have some kind of taboo against letting other species get too close to them.”

  “But certainly they’d be willing to let the taboo go by the boards for the sake of clearing themselves,” Russell objected.

  “Not necessarily,” said Lamartine. “We’re dealing with alien beings, remember. They don’t see things the way we do.”

  “In any event,” said Secretary-General Zachary, “we’ll have to reach some solution in a hurry. There’s rioting going on in every city where Nirotans are located. And the bitterness is starting to spread to take in other aliens, too. If we don’t restore order in a hurry, we’re going to find all the extraterrestrials pulling out—and turning Earth into a backwater world considered not fit for civilized beings to visit.”

  Harriman stared at the five grim faces. These men, like himself, were shaken to the core by the notion that the beings from the stars might be blood-drinkers in fact as well as in appearance. And it was hard to believe in the innocence of the Nirotans.

  The phone rang. Director Russell reached out with a plump hand and snatched the telephone nervously from its cradle. He listened for a moment, snapped some sort of reply, and slammed the instrument down again.

  “Bad news,” he said, his face becoming grimmer. “A mob broke into the building where the Nirotans were taking sanctuary in Budapest. Dragged three Nirotans out and killed them. Drove wooden stakes through their hearts.”

  Harriman felt chilled. Legends weighted with medieval dust were erupting into the neat, ordered world of the twenty-second century. Wooden stakes in Budapest! Ominous mutterings against the winged people—and three bloodless bodies lying in the morgue ten floors below.

  “Heaven help us if the Nirotans are innocent,” Secretary-General Zachary said tonelessly. “They’ll never forgive us for today.”

  “I’ll order triple protection,” Russell said. “We don’t want a massacre.”

  Hysteria was the order of the day on Earth in the next six hours. Three murders in themselves were not of any great importance; round the world each day, hundreds of human beings met violent deaths without causing a stir. But it was the manner of the deaths that dug deep into humanity. The killings struck subconscious fears, and brought to the surface the old myths. It was dread of the unknown, dread of the people from the stars, that touched off the rioting round the world. The relative handful of Nirotans waited behind the walls of their shelters, waiting for the mobs to come bursting in.

  The United Nations General Assembly, which had become the world government in fact as well as in name during the past seventy-five years, met in an extraordinary session that evening at U.N. headquarters. The purpose of the meeting was simply to vote additional appropriations for the protection of extraterrestrial beings against mob violence—but during the session a delegate from the United States rose in wrath to demand the immediate withdrawal of what he termed the “Nirotan vampires” from Earth.

  The resolution was declared out of order, and did not come to a vote. But it represented the sentiments of a great majority of Earth’s nine billion people on that evening.

  Harriman flew to San Francisco that evening aboard a midnight jetliner that made the journey in four hours. A waiting taxi took him to the downtown San Francisco offices of the Nirotan Trade Delegation, in the heart of the city on Market Street. The summer fog shrouded everything in gloom.

  Special Agent Michaels was waiting for him outside the heavily protected building. The agent’s face was set tightly. Fifty or sixty people were parading wearily around the building, despite the lateness of the hour. They no longer seemed violent, but they carried hastily constructed placards which bore slogans like VAMPIRES MUST DIE! and NIROTANS GO HOME!

  “Been any trouble with the pickets?” Harriman asked, indicating the mob.

  “Not as much as earlier,” Michaels said. “There were about five hundred people out here around nine o’clock, but they’ve all gone home, except the diehards. They were parading the mother of the murdered man around the building and screaming for justice, but they didn’t try to do any damage, at least.”

  Harriman nodded. “Good. Let’s go in.”

  There were fifteen Nirotans standing inside. Michaels assured Harriman that the group included every Nirotan who had been in the San Francisco area in the past three days. If a Nirotan had been the murderer of Sam Barrett, then the murderer was in this room.

  Harriman stared at the group. As always, the facial expressions of the aliens defied interpretation. They seemed to be waiting for the disturbance to die down, so they could resume their normal way of life.

  Conscious of their dread appearance, of his own insignificance, of the nauseous odor of fifteen Nirotans in one room, Harriman moistened his lips. A mental image came to him unexpectedly—the fifteen bat-like creatures surrounding him, throwing themselves on him with once accord, fastening their fangs in his throat and sucking away his lifeblood. He winced involuntarily at the vividness of the picture.

  Then he remembered that he was an officer of the law, and that these beings facing him were simply suspects in a murder case.

  He said, “Early yesterday morning a man was killed in this city. I’m sure you all know how he was killed. I’ve come here from New York to talk to you about the murder of Sam Barrett.”

  None of the aliens spoke. In the solemn silence, Harriman continued. “Two witnesses claim they saw a Nirotan struggling with the murdered man in the street. If the witnesses are telling the truth, one of you in this room committed that crime.”

  “The witnesses are saying that which is not so,” declared an immense Nirotan boomingly. “We have committed no crimes. The offense you charge us with is unthinkable in Nirotan eyes.”

  “I haven’t charged you with anything,” Harriman said. “The evidence implies that a Nirotan was responsible. For your sake and the sake of interstellar relations, I hope it isn’t so. But my job is to find out who is responsible for the killings.”

  Harriman shook his head. “My first step has to be to establish guilt or innocence in this room. As a beginning, suppose I ask each of you to account for your whereabouts at the time of the murder?”

  “We will give no information,” rumbled the Nirotan who seemed to be the spokesman.

  A stone wall again, Harriman thought gloomily. He said, “Don’t you see that by refusing to answer questions or permit us an examination, you naturally make yourselves look suspicious in humanity’s eyes?”

  “We have no concern with appearances. We did not commit the crime.”

  “On Earth we need proof of that. Your word isn’t enough here.”

  “We will not submit to interrogation. We demand the right to leave this planet at once, in order to return to Nirota.”

  Harriman’s eyes narrowed. “The Interstellar Trade Agreements prevent any suspected criminals from leaving Earth for their home world. You’ll have to stay here until something definite is settled, one way or the othe
r, on the murder.”

  “We will answer no questions,” came the flat, positive, unshakeable reply.

  Anger glimmered in Harriman’s eyes. “All right, then. But you’ll rot here until we decide to let you go! See how you like that!”

  He turned and spun out of the room.

  He slept fitfully and uneasily on the return journey to New York. It was mid-morning when the jetliner touched down at New York Jet Skyport, and it was noon by the time Harriman returned to his office at the Terran Security Agency. He felt deep frustration. There was no way for the investigation to proceed—not when the only suspects refused to defend themselves. Earth couldn’t accuse members of an alien species of murder on the basis of two early-morning eyewitnesses and a lot of circumstantial evidence rising out of old hysterical legends. It was always a risky business when one planet tried people of another world for crime—and in this case, the evidence was simply too thin for a solid indictment.

  On the other hand, Earth clamored for a trial. The overwhelming mass of the people, utterly convinced that the Nirotans were vampires, stood ready to enforce justice themselves if the authorities lingered. Already, three Nirotans had died at the hands of the jeering mobs—an incident which would have serious consequences once the hysteria died down.

  Director Russell growled a greeting at Harriman as the Agency subchief entered the office. It was obvious from Russell’s harried expression and from the overflowing ashtrays that the Director had been up all night, keeping in touch with the crisis as it unfolded and as new complications developed.

  “Well?” Russell demanded. “What’s the word from San Francisco?”

  “The word is nothing, chief,” Harriman said tiredly. “The Nirotans clammed up completely. They insist that they’re innocent, but beyond that they refuse to say anything. And they’re demanding to be allowed to return to their home world now.”

  “I know. Trinnin Nirot petitioned Secretary-General Zachary late last night to permit all Nirotans on Earth to withdraw.”