Clifford Simak - The Big Front Yard and Other Stories

Housing architecture – no, that was hardly an idea and, anyhow, there was that other house, so they knew of houses.

Cloth? No, they had cloth.

Paint, he thought. Maybe paint was it.

“See if they are interested in paint,” Taine told Beasly.

“They say, what is it? Please explain yourself.”

“O.K., then. Let’s see. It’s a protective device to be spread over almost any surface. Easily packaged and easily applied. Protects against weather and corrosion. It’s decorative, too. Comes in all sorts of colors. And it’s cheap to make.”

“They shrug in their mind,” said Beasly. “They’re just slightly interested. But they will listen more. Go ahead and tell them.”

And that was more like it, thought Taine.

That was the kind of language that he could understand.

He settled himself more firmly on the ground and bent forward slightly, flicking his eyes across the three dead-pan, ebony faces, trying to make out what they might be thinking.

There was no making out. Those were three of the deadest pans he had ever seen.

It was all familiar. It made him feel at home. He was in his element.

And in the three across from him, he felt somehow subconsciously, he had the best dickering opposition he had ever met. And that made him feel good too.

“Tell them,” he said, “that I’m not quite sure. I may have spoken up too hastily. Paint, after all, is a mighty valuable idea.”

“They say, just as a favor to them, not that they’re really interested, would you tell them a little more.”

Got them hooked, Taine told himself. If he could only play it right –

He settled down to dickering in earnest.

Hours later Henry Horton showed up. He was accompanied by a very urbane gentleman, who was faultlessly turned out and who carried beneath his arm an impressive attaché case.

Henry and the man stopped on the steps in sheer astonishment.

Taine was squatted on the ground with a length of board and he was daubing paint on it while the aliens watched. From the daubs here and there upon their anatomies, it was plain to see the aliens had been doing some daubing of their own. Spread all over the ground were other lengths of half-painted boards and a couple of dozen old cans of paint.

Taine looked up and saw Henry and the man.

“I was hoping,” he said, “that someone would show up.”

“Hiram,” said Henry, with more importance than usual, “may I present Mr. Lancaster. He is a special representative of the United Nations.”

“I’m glad to meet you, sir,” said Taine. “I wonder if you would –”

“Mr. Lancaster,” Henry explained grandly, “was having some slight difficulty getting through the lines outside, so I volunteered my services. I’ve already explained to him our joint interest in this matter.”

“It was very kind of Mr. Horton,” Lancaster said. “There was this stupid sergeant –”

“It’s all in knowing,” Henry said, “how to handle people.”

The remark, Taine noticed, was not appreciated by the man from the U.N.

“May I inquire, Mr. Taine,” asked Lancaster, “exactly what you’re doing?”

“I’m dickering,” said Taine.

“Dickering. What a quaint way of expressing –”

“An old Yankee word,” said Henry quickly, “with certain connotations of its own. When you trade with someone you are exchanging goods, but if you’re dickering with him you’re out to get his hide.”

“Interesting,” said Lancaster. “And I suppose you’re out to skin these gentlemen in the sky-blue vests –”

“Hiram,” said Henry, proudly, “is the sharpest dickerer in these parts. He runs an antique business and he has to dicker hard –”

“And may I ask,” said Lancaster, ignoring Henry finally, “what you might be doing with these cans of paint? Are these gentlemen potential customers for paint or –”

Taine threw down the board and rose angrily to his feet.

“If you’d both shut up!” he shouted. “I’ve been trying to say something ever since you got here and I can’t get in a word. And I tell you, it’s important –”

“Hiram!” Henry exclaimed in horror.

“It’s quite all right,” said the U.N. man. “We have been jabbering. And now, Mr. Taine?”

“I’m backed into a corner,” Taine told him, “and I need some help. I’ve sold these fellows on the idea of paint, but I don’t know a thing about it – the principle back of it or how it’s made or what goes into it or –”

“But, Mr. Taine, if you’re selling them the paint, what difference does it make –”

“I’m not selling them the paint,” yelled Taine. “Can’t you understand that? They don’t want the paint. They want the idea of paint, the principle of paint. It’s something that they never thought of and they’re interested. I offered them the paint idea for the idea of their saddles and I’ve almost got it –”

“Saddles? You mean those things over there, hanging in the air?”

“That is right. Beasly, would you ask one of our friends to demonstrate a saddle?”

“You bet I will,” said Beasly.

“What,” demanded Henry, “has Beasly got to do with this?”

“Beasly is an interpreter. I guess you’d call him a telepath. You remember how he always claimed he could talk with Towser?”

“Beasly was always claiming things.”

“But this time he was right. He tells Chuck, that funny-looking monster, what I want to say and Chuck tells these aliens. And these aliens tell Chuck and Chuck tells Beasly and Beasly tells me.”

“Ridiculous!” snorted Henry. “Beasly hasn’t got the sense to be … what did you say he was?”

“A telepath,” said Taine.

One of the aliens had gotten up and climbed into a saddle. He rode it forth and back. Then he swung out of it and sat down again.

“Remarkable,” said the U.N. man. “Some sort of antigravity unit, with complete control. We could make use of that, indeed.”

He scraped his hand across his chin.

“And you’re going to exchange the idea of paint for the idea of that saddle?”

“That’s exactly it,” said Taine, “but I need some help. I need a chemist or a paint manufacturer or someone to explain how paint is made. And I need some professor or other who’ll understand what they’re talking about when they tell me the idea of the saddle.”

“I see,” said Lancaster. “Yes, indeed, you have a problem. Mr. Taine, you seem to me a man of some discernment –”

“Oh, he’s all of that,” interrupted Henry. “Hiram’s quite astute.”

“So I suppose you’ll understand,” said the U.N. man, “that this whole procedure is quite irregular –”

“But it’s not,” exploded Taine. “That’s the way they operate. They open up a planet and then they exchange ideas. They’ve been doing that with other planets for a long, long time. And ideas are all they want, just the new ideas, because that is the way to keep on building a technology and culture. And they have a lot of ideas, sir, that the human race can use.”

“That is just the point,” said Lancaster. “This is perhaps the most important thing that has ever happened to we humans. In just a short year’s time we can obtain data and ideas that will put us ahead – theoretically, at least – by a thousand years. And in a thing that is so important, we should have experts on the job –”

“But,” protested Henry, “you can’t find a man who’ll do a better dickering job than Hiram. When you dicker with him your back teeth aren’t safe. Why don’t you leave him be? He’ll do a job for you. You can get your experts and your planning groups together and let Hiram front for you. These folks have accepted him and have proved they’ll do business with him and what more do you want? All he needs is just a little help.”