Hal Clement: Star Light

Easy had no time to answer; Aucoin himself appeared in the room. He did not bother with greetings, and took for granted that the meteorologists would have the background information from Easy.

“Eight point four five five degrees south of the equator, seven point nine two three east of the Settlement meridian. That’s as close as they’ll swear to. Is a thousand yards or so too much uncertainty for what you need?”

“Everybody’s being sarcastic today,” muttered McDevitt. “Thanks, that’ll be fine. Easy, can we go down to Comm and have that talk with Dondragmer?”

“All right. Do you mind if Benj comes along, or is there work he should be doing here? I’d like him to meet Dondragmer, too.

“And incidentally display his linguistic powers. All right, he may come. You, too, Alan?”

“No. There’s other work to do. I’d like to know the details on any forecast you consider trustworthy, though, and anything Dondragmer reports which might conceivably affect Planning. I’ll be in PL.”

The weather man nodded. Aucoin took himself off in one direction, and the other three made their way down ladders to the communication room. Mersereau had disappeared, as he had intimated he might, but one of the other watchers had shifted his position to keep an eye on the Kwembly ’s screens. He waved and returned to his place as Easy entered. The others paid the party little attention. They had been aware of Easy’s and Mersereau’s departures simply because of the standing rule that there were never to be fewer than ten observers in the room at once. The stations were not assigned on a rigid schedule; this had been found to lead to the equivalent of road hypnosis.

The four communication sets tied to the Kwembly had their speakers centered in front of a group of six seats. The corresponding vision screens were set higher, so that they could also be seen from the general seats further back. Each of the six “station” seats was equipped with a microphone and a selector switch permitting contact with any one or all four of the Kwembly ’s radios.

Easy settled herself in a comfortably central chair and switched its microphone to the set on Dondragmer’s bridge. There was little to be seen on the corresponding screen, since the transmitter’s eye was pointed forward toward the bridge windows and the Mesklinites’ report of fog was perfectly correct. The helmsman’s station and its occupant could be partly seen in the lower left-hand corner of the screen; the rest was gray blankness marked off into rectangles by the window braces. The bridge lights were subdued, but the fog beyond the windows was illuminated by the Kwembly ’s outside floods, Easy judged.

“Don!” she called. “Easy here. Are you on the bridge?” She snapped on a timer and shifted her selector switch to the set in the laboratory. “Borndender, or whoever is there,” she called, still in Stennish, “we can’t get a reliable weather prediction with the information we have. We’re talking to the bridge, but we’d be glad if you could give us as exactly as possible your present temperature, wind velocity, outside pressure, anything quantitative you have on the fog, and—” she hesitated.

“And the same information for the past few hours, with times given as closely as possible,” Benj cut in in the same language.

“We’ll be ready to receive as soon as the bridge finishes talking,” continued the woman.

“We could also use whatever you have on air, fog, and snow composition,” added her son.

“If there is any other material you think might be of help, it will also be welcome,” finished Easy. “You’re there and we aren’t, and there must be some ideas about Dhrawn’s weather you. We formed on your own.” The timer sounded a bell note. “The bridge is coming in now. We’ll be waiting for your words when the captain finishes.”

The speaker’s first words overlapped her closing phrase. The timer had been set for the light-speed lag of a round-trip message between Dhrawn and the station, and the bridge had answered promptly.

“Kervenser here, Mrs. Hoffman. The captain is below in the life-support room. I’ll call him here if you like, or you can switch to the set down there, but if you have any advice for us we’d like it as quickly as possible. We can’t see a body-length from the bridge and don’t dare move, except in circles. The fliers gave us an idea of the neighborhood before we stopped and it seems solid enough, but we certainly can’t take a chance on going forward. We’re going dead slow, in a circle about twenty-five cables in diameter. Except when we’re bow or stern to the wind, the ship feels as though it were going to capsize every few seconds. The fog has been freezing as it hits the windows, which is why we can’t see out. The tracks still seem to be clear, I suppose because they’re moving and ice gets cracked off before it can hurt, but I expect the tiller lines to freeze up any time, and getting the ice off them will be a glorious job. I suppose it will be possible to work outside, but I’d hate to do it myself until the wind stops. Having an air suit ice up sounds unpleasant. Any thoughts?”

Easy waited patiently for Kervenser to finish. The sixty-four-second message delay had had a general effect on everyone who did much talking between station and planet; they developed a strong tendency to say as much as possible at one time, guessing at what the other party wanted to hear. When she knew that Kervenser had finished and was waiting for an answer, she quickly summarized the message which had been given to the scientists. As with them, she omitted all mention of the computer result which had insisted that the weather must be clear. The Mesklinites knew that human science was not infallible — most of them had, in fact, a much more realistic and healthy idea of its limitations than many human beings — but there was no point in making one’s self look too silly if it could be helped. She was not, of course, a meteorologist, but she was human and Kervenser would probably lump her in with the others.

The group waited almost silently for the first officer’s answer when she finished. Benj’s muttered translation for the benefit of McDevitt took only a few seconds longer than the message itself. When the response finally came it was merely an acknowledgment and a polite hope that the human beings could furnish useful information soon; the Kwembly scientists were sending up the requested material at once.

Easy and her son readied themselves for the data. She started a recorder to check any technical terms before attempting translation, but the message came through in the human language. Evidently Borndender was sending. McDevitt recovered promptly from his surprise and began taking notes, while the boy kept his eyes on the pencil point and his ears on the speaker.

It was just as well that Easy was not needed for translation. Well as she knew Stennish, there were many words strange to her in both languages; she couldn’t have interpreted either way. She knew that she should not be embarrassed by the fact, but she couldn’t help it. She could not help thinking of the Mesklinites as representing a culture like that of Robin Hood or Haroun al Raschid, though she knew perfectly well that several hundred of them had received very comprehensive scientific and technical education in the last half century. The fact had not been widely published, since there was a widespread notion that it was bad to release much advanced knowledge to “backward” peoples. It was likely to give them an inferiority complex and prevent further progress.

The weather men didn’t care. When the final “over” came through, McDevitt and his assistant uttered a hasty “Thank You” into the nearest microphone and hurried off toward the laboratory. Easy, noting that the selector switch had been set for the bridge radio, corrected it and returned a more careful acknowledgment before signing off. Then, deciding that she would be useless in the meteorology lab, she settled back on the chair which gave her the best view of the Kwembly ’s four screens, and waited for something to happen.