Hal Clement - Heavy Planet

Fortunately Reejaaren did not return for a good many days. His people remained; four to six gliders were always drifting overhead, and several more squatted on the hilltops beside their catapults. The number of aircraft did not change noticeably, but the population of the hilltops increased day by day. The Earthmen above had entered into Dondragmer’s plan with enthusiasm and, Barlennan suspected, some little amusement. A few of the sailors were unable to pick up what was needed with sufficient speed, and had to be left out of the main plan in one sense; but even they understood the situation and would, Barlennan was sure, be able to contribute to the desired effect. In the meantime he put them to work repairing the shattered masts, whose rigging had at least kept them with the ship. The plan was matured and well rehearsed long before the interpreter’s return, and the officers found themselves impatient to try it out though Dondragmer had been spending time at the radio meanwhile on yet another project. In fact, after controlling themselves for a few days, the captain and mate strolled one morning up the hill toward the parked gliders with a full determination to make a test of the idea, though neither had said a word to the other about his intention. The weather had completely cleared long since, and there was only the perpetual wind of Mesklin’s seas to help or hinder flying. Apparently it wanted to help; the gliders were tugging at their tie-down cables like living creatures, and crewmen were standing by the wings with a secure grip on the surrounding bushes, evidently ready to add their strength if necessary to that of the restraining lines. Barlennan and Dondragmer approached the machines until they were ordered sharply to halt. They had no idea of the rank or authority of the individual giving the order, since he wore no insignia; but it was not part of their plan to argue such matters. They halted, and looked over the machines casually from a distance of thirty or forty yards, while the crewmen looked back rather belligerently. Apparently Reejaaren’s superciliousness was not a rare trait with his nation. “You look astonished, barbarians,” one of them remarked after a brief silence. “If I thought you could learn anything by looking at our machines, I would have to force you to stop. As it is, I can only assure you that you look rather childish.” He spoke Barlennan’s tongue with an accent not much worse than that of the chief linguist. “There seems little to learn from your machines. You could save much trouble with the wind in your present situation by warping the front of your wings down; why do you keep so many people busy instead?” He used the English word for “wings,” not having one in his own language. The other requested an explanation; receiving it, he was startled out of his superiority for a moment. “You have seen gliders before? Where?”

“I have never seen your type of flying machine in my life,” Barlennan answered. His words were truthful, though their emphasis was decidedly misleading. “I have not been this close to the Rim before, and I should imagine that these flimsy structures would collapse from their added weight if you flew them much farther south.”

“How—” The guard stopped, realizing that his attitude was not that of a civilized being toward a barbarian. He was silent for a moment, trying to decide just what his attitude should be in this case; then he decided to pass the problem higher in the chain of command. “When Reejaaren returns, he will no doubt be interested in any minor improvements you may be able to suggest. He might even reduce your port fee, if he deems them of sufficient value. Until then, I think you had better stay entirely away from our gliders; you might notice some of their more valuable features, and then we would regretfully have to consider you a spy.” Barlennan and his mate retired to the Bree without argument, highly satisfied with the effect they had produced, and reported the conversation in its entirety to the Earthmen. “How do you think he reacted to the implication that you had gliders capable of flying up in the two-hundred-gravity latitudes?” asked Lackland. “Do you think he believed you?”

“I couldn’t say; he decided about then either that he was saying too much or hearing too much, and put us in storage until his chief returns. I think we started the right attitude developing, though.” Barlennan may have been right, but the interpreter gave no particular evidence of it when he returned. There was some delay between his actual landing and his descent of the hill to the Bree, and it seemed likely that the guard had reported the conversation; but he made no reference to it at first. “The Officer of the Outer Ports has decided to assume for the moment that your intentions are harmless,” he began. “You have of course violated our rules in coming ashore without permission; but he recognized that you were in difficulties at the time, and is inclined to be lenient. He authorizes me to inspect your cargo and evaluate the amount of the necessary port fee and fine.”

“The Officer would not care to see our cargo for himself and perhaps accept some token of our gratitude for his kindness?” Barlennan managed to keep sarcasm out of his voice. Reejaaren gave the equivalent of a smile. “Your attitude is commendable, and I am sure we will get along very well with each other. Unfortunately, he is occupied on one of the other islands, and will be for many days to come. Should you still be here at the end of that time, I am sure he will be delighted to take advantage of your offer. In the meantime we might proceed to business.” Reejaaren lost little if any of his superiority during his examination of the Bree’s cargo, but he managed to give Barlennan some information during the process which he would probably have died rather than give consciously. His words, of course, tended to belittle the value of everything he saw; he harped endlessly on the “mercy” of his so far unseen chief Marreni. However, he appropriated as fine a respectable number of the “fir cones” that had been acquired during the journey across the isthmus. Now these should have been fairly easy to obtain here, since the distance could not be too great for the gliders — in fact, the interpreter had made remarks indicating acquaintance with the natives of those regions. If, then, Reejaaren held the fruit as being of value, it meant that the “barbarians” of the isthmus were a little too much for the interpreter’s highly cultured people, and the latter were not so close to being the lords of creation as they wanted people to think. That suggested that the mate’s plan had a very good chance of success, since the interpreter would probably do almost anything rather than appear inferior to the “barbarian” crew of the Bree. Barlennan, reflecting on this, felt his morale rise like the Earthmen’s rocket; he was going to be able to lead this Reejaaren around like a pet ternee. He bent all his considerable skill to the task, and the crew seconded nobly. Once the fine was paid, the spectators on the hills descended in swarms; and the conclusion about the value of the fir-cone-like fruit was amply confirmed. Barlennan at first had a slight reluctance to sell all of it, since he had hoped to get really high prices at home; but then he reflected that he would have to go back through the source of supply before reaching his home in any case. Many of the buyers were evidently professional merchants themselves, and had plentiful supplies of trade goods with them. Some of these were also edibles, but on their captain’s orders the crew paid these little attention. This was accepted as natural enough by the merchants; after all, such goods would be of little value to an overseas trader, who could supply his own food from the ocean but could hardly expect to preserve most types of comestibles for a long enough time to sell at home. The “spices” which kept more or less permanently were the principal exception to this rule, and none of these were offered by the local tradesmen. Some of the merchants, however, did have interesting materials. Both the cord and the fabric in which Barlennan had been interested were offered, rather to his surprise. He personally dealt with one of the salesmen who had a supply of the latter. The captain felt its unbelievably sheer and even more incredibly tough texture for a long time before satisfying himself that it was really the same material as that used in the glider wings. Reejaaren was close beside him, which made a little care necessary. He learned from the merchant that it was a woven fabric in spite of appearances, the fiber being of vegetable origin?the canny salesman refused to be more specific?the cloth being treated after weaving with a liquid which partly dissolved the threads and filled the holes with the material thus obtained. “Then the cloth is windproof? I think I could sell this easily at home. It is hardly strong enough for practical uses like roofing, but it is certainly ornamental, particularly the colored versions. I will admit, though it is hardly good buying procedure, that this is the most salable material I have yet seen on this island.”