Arthur Clarke: The Songs of Distant Earth

“Thank you — but I doubt if we’d have much use for several hundred tons of ice a day. Meanwhile, what facilities can Tarna offer — accommodation, catering, transport? — we’ll be happy to oblige. I assume that quite a number of you will be coming down to work here.”

“Probably about a hundred, and we appreciate your offer of hospitality. But I’m” afraid we’d be terrible guests: we’ll be having conferences with the ship at all hours of the day and night. So we have to stick together — and as soon as we’ve assembled our little prefabricated village, we’ll move into it with all our equipment. I’m sorry if this seems ungracious — but any other arrangement simply wouldn’t be practical.”

“I suppose you’re right,” the mayor sighed. She had been wondering how she could bend protocol and offer what passed for the hospitality suite to the spectacular Lieutenant Commander Lorenson instead of to Deputy Captain Malina. The problem had appeared insoluble; now, alas, it would not even arise.

She felt so discouraged that she was almost tempted to call North Island and invite her last official consort back for a vacation. But the wretch would probably turn her down again, and she simply couldn’t face that.

Even when she was a very old woman, Mirissa Leonidas could still remember the exact moment when she first set eyes on Loren. There was no one else — not even Brant — of which this was true.

Novelty had nothing to do with it; she had already met several of the Earthmen before encountering Loren, and they had made no unusual impression on her. Most of them could have passed as Lassans if they had been left out in the sun for a few days.

But not Loren; his skin never tanned, and his startling hair became, if anything, even more silvery. That was certainly what had first drawn her notice as he was emerging from Mayor Waldron’s office with two of his colleagues — all of them bearing that slightly frustrated look which was the usual outcome of a session with Tarna’s lethargic and well-entrenched bureaucracy.

Their eyes had met, but for a moment only. Mirissa took a few more paces; then, without any conscious volition, she came to a dead halt and looked back over her shoulder — to see that the visitor was staring at her. Already, they both knew that their lives had been irrevocably changed.

Later that night, after they had made love, she asked Brant, “Have they said how long they’re staying?”

“You do choose the worst times,” he grumbled sleepily. “At least a year. Maybe two. Goodnight — again.”

She knew better than to ask any more questions even though she still felt wide awake. For a long time she lay open-eyed, watching the swift shadows of the inner moon sweep across the floor while the cherished body beside her sank gently into sleep.

She had known not a few men before Brant, but since they had been together she had been utterly indifferent to anyone else. Then why this sudden interest — she still pretended it was no stronger than that — in a man she had glimpsed only for a few seconds and whose very name she did not even know? (Though that would certainly be one of tomorrow’s first priorities.)

Mirissa prided herself on being honest and clear-sighted; she looked down on women — or men — who let themselves be ruled by their emotions. Part of the attraction, she was quite sure, was the element of novelty, the glamour of vast new horizons. To be able to speak to someone who had actually walked through the cities of Earth — had witnessed the last hours of the solar system — and was now on the way to new suns was a wonder beyond her wildest dreams. It made her once more aware of that underlying dissatisfaction with the placid tempo of Thalassan life despite her happiness with Brant.

Or was it merely contentment and not true happiness? What did she really want? Whether she could find it with these strangers from the stars she did not know, but before they left Thalassa forever, she meant to try.

That same morning, Brant had also visited Mayor Waldron, who greeted him with slightly less than her usual warmth when he dumped the fragments of his fish-trap on her desk.

“I know you’ve been busy with more important matters,” he said, “but what are we going to do about this?”

The mayor looked without enthusiasm at the tangled mess of cables. It was hard to focus on the day-to-day routine after the heady excitements of interstellar politics.

“What do you think happened?” she asked.

“It’s obviously deliberate — see how this wire was twisted until it broke. Not only was the grid damaged, but sections have been taken away. I’m sure no one on South Island would do such a thing. What motive would they have? And I’d be bound to find out, sooner or later…”

Brant’s pregnant pause left no doubt as to what would happen then.

“Who do you suspect?”

“Ever since I started experimenting with electric trapping, I’ve been fighting not only the Conservers but those crazy people who believe that all food should be synthetic because it’s wicked to eat living creatures, like animals — or even plants.”

“The Conservers, at least, may have a point. If your trap is as efficient as you claim, it could upset the ecological balance they’re always talking about.”

“The regular reef census would tell us if that was happening, and we’d just switch off for a while. Anyway, it’s the pelagics I’m really after; my field seems to attract them from up to three or four kilometres away. And even if everyone on the Three Islands ate nothing but fish, we couldn’t make a dent in the oceanic population.”

“I’m sure you’re right — as far as the indigenous pseudofish are concerned. And much good that does, since most of them are too poisonous to be worth processing. Are you sure that the Terran stock has established itself securely? You might be the last straw, as the old saying goes.”

Brant looked at the mayor with respect; she was continually surprising him with shrewd questions like this. It never occurred to him that she would not have held her position for so long if there was not a great deal more in her than met the eye.

“I’m afraid the tuna aren’t going to survive; it will be a few billion years before the oceans are salty enough for them. But the trout and salmon are doing very well.”

“And they’re certainly delicious; they might even overcome the moral scruples of the Synthesists. Not that I really accept your interesting theory. Those people may talk, but they don’t do anything.”

“They released a whole herd of cattle from that experimental farm a couple of years ago.”

“You mean they tried to — the cows walked straight home again. Everyone laughed so much that they called off any further demonstrations. I simply can’t imagine that they’d go to all this trouble.’ She gestured towards the broken grid.

“It wouldn’t be difficult — a small boat at night, a couple of divers — the water’s only twenty metres deep.”

“Well, I’ll make some inquiries. Meanwhile, I want you to do two things.”

“What?” Brant said, trying not to sound suspicious and failing completely.

“Repair the grid — Tech Stores will give you anything you need. And stop making any more accusations until you’re one hundred per cent certain. If you’re wrong, you’ll look foolish and may have to apologize. If you’re right, you may scare the perpetrators away before we can catch them. Understand?”

Brant’s jaw dropped slightly: he had never seen the mayor in so incisive a mood. He gathered up Exhibit A and made a somewhat chastened departure.