Page 113 of Second Contact (Colonization 1)

“Perhaps you didn’t notice I’m a Jew,” Goldfarb said. Then, seeing the surprise on the clerk’s face, he realized the fellow hadn’t noticed. Such indifference was rare in the United Kingdom of 1963. He hoped it was common in Canada.

He rode to the American consulate a few blocks away. The clerk there was female and pretty. The forms, however, were much longer and uglier than the ones the Canadians used. Goldfarb slogged through them, too, and turned them in.

“Thank you, Flight Lieutenant,” the clerk said. She, too, looked over the papers. “The USA can pick and choose whom we let in, you know, but by these I’d say-unofficially, of course-you have a fair chance. Better than fair, in fact.”

He grinned all the way back to his flat. The Canadians wanted him. So did the Americans. He wasn’t used to that, not in Britain these days he wasn’t. “I ought to be,” he said, careless of the looks he might get for talking to himself. “By God, I bloody well ought to be.”

18

“I remain of the opinion that you are making too much of this,” Ttomalss said.

Kassquit glared at him out of his computer screen. “My investigation shows otherwise, superior sir,” she replied, deferential but unyielding, “and I remain of the opinion that you make too little of it. It is a serious matter.”

“It may be,” Ttomalss said. “You have no real proof.”

“Superior sir, are you being deliberately blind?” Kassquit asked. “There is no such title as senior tube specialist. This Regeya, whoever he may be, does not write like any member of the Race whose words are familiar to me. I think-as you yourself suggested-he really must be a Big Ugly.”

Hearing that come from one Tosevite’s mouth to describe another amused Ttomalss. He didn’t let that show, not wanting to offend Kassquit. He did say, “I have done a little investigating of my own.” And he had-a very little. “It would not be easy for a Tosevite to gain access to our network from the outside, so to speak.”

“You have always told me how the wild Big Uglies succeed in doing what seems most difficult to us,” Kassquit said. “If we can gain access to their computers-and I assume we can and do-they may be able to do the same to us.”

Ttomalss knew the Race did just that; his conversation with the embassy’s science officer would have told him as much had he been naive enough to believe otherwise. But he did not fancy having his own words thrown back in his snout. “We can do things to them that they cannot do to us in return.”

“Can you be sure computer spying is one of those things?” Kassquit asked. “If I were a Big Ugly”-she paused in momentary confusion, for in biological terms she was a Big Ugly-“I would try my best to reach the Race’s computers.”

“Well, so would I,” Ttomalss agreed, “but I have since spoken with Slomikk, the science officer here”-his research, a casual conversation-“and he does not think the Tosevites have this ability regardless of what they may desire.”

“No one will listen to me!” Kassquit said angrily. “I have tried and tried to persuade males and females involved in computer security to investigate this Regeya, and they ignore me, because to them I am nothing but a Big Ugly myself. I had hoped they would take me seriously, but now I discover that even you do not take me seriously. Farewell, then.” She broke the connection.

“Foolishness,” Ttomalss muttered. Kassquit was surely seeing things that were not there. Big Uglies seemed far more susceptible to wild imaginings than did males and females of the Race.

And yet, as the senior researcher had to admit, his Tosevite ward did make a sort of circumstantial case. He could not imagine what sort of body paint a senior tube technician would wear. Checking a data store, he found Kassquit was right: no such classification existed. And Regeya was an unusual name. But not all males and females used their true names under all circumstances. When aiming criticism at a superior, for instance, anonymity came in handy.

With a sigh, Ttomalss began sifting through computer records in search of the elusive Regeya, whoever he might be. Because the fellow had that unusual name, his messages were easy to track, even without knowing his pay number. And, Ttomalss discovered, Kassquit was right: Regeya did have an unusual turn of phrase. But did that make him a Big Ugly, or just a male with a mind of his own?

The more Ttomalss read of Regeya’s messages, the more he doubted the fellow whose phosphors he followed was a Tosevite. He did not believe any Big Ugly could have such insight into the way the Race thought and felt. No, Regeya might be eccentric, but Ttomalss felt nearly certain he was a male of the Race.

Being in Nuremberg and concerned with the Deutsche, Ttomalss had paid no attention to the American space station and to whatever the Big Uglies from the lesser continental mass were doing to it. Whatever it was, it struck him as suspicious. He did not seem to be the only one who thought it was, either. By all the signs, this Regeya did, too.

Because of that more than because of Regeya, whoever the individual behind the messages under the name might be, Ttomalss did send a message of his own to Security, asking what was known about the American space station.

Nothing that can be released to unauthorized personnel. The answer, sharp and stinging, came back almost at once.

It infuriated Ttomalss, who, unlike Kassquit, wasn’t used to being ignored. He did what he almost certainly would not have done otherwise: he wrote back, saying, Are you aware that a possible Tosevite under an assumed identity as a male of the Race is also seeking information about this space station?

Again, the response was very prompt. A Tosevite? Impossible.

To his bemusement, Ttomalss found himself using with Security all the arguments Kassquit had used with him. And Security was little more impressed with them than he had been. Tell me the individual named Regeya is demonstrably a male of the Race, and I will be convinced there is no need for concern here, he wrote.

This time, he waited a long time for an answer. He waited, and waited, and waited, and no answer came. At last, when he’d almost given up, he did get one last message. Your continued interest in the security of the Race is appreciated, it said: only that, and nothing more.

He stared at the screen. “Well, what does that mean?” he asked. “Did I make them think of something that had not occurred to them before, or are they just trying to get rid of me?” The words displayed gave him no answer.

He did not get long to wonder, for he had just turned away to try to do some other work when Felless telephoned. He guessed that meant she’d been tasting ginger; otherwise, she would have come to his office. “Those idiots!” she exclaimed. “Those treacherous, lying, double-dealing idiots!”

“What have the Deutsche done now?” Ttomalss asked. He did not think the Race could have infuriated her so.

He turned out to be right. “They have released from imprisonment the ginger smuggler Dutourd,” she blazed. That incensed reply almost made him laugh, considering how fond of the Tosevite herb she was. She went on,

“They promised he would stay imprisoned for a long time. They promised, and they lied.”

“This is unfortunate, but hardly unique in our experience on Tosev 3,” Ttomalss said. “Big Uglies, I sometimes think, lie for the sport of it.”

“So I gather,” Felless answered. “Rather more than the sport of it is involved here, however. The Deutsch minister of justice, a male named Dietrich, all but said-I thought he did say-to Ambassador Veffani that this Dutourd would remain imprisoned for a long time to come. I was there. I heard him.”

“Ah,” Ttomalss said. “That does put things in a different light.”

“I should say so!” Felless said. “The ambassador is furious. He has already begun composing a memorandum of protest to the justice minister and another one to the ruler of this not-empire: to Himmler, whatever his title may be.”

“Reichs Chancellor,” Ttomalss supplied.

“Reichs Chancellor, General Secretary, President-what difference does it make?” Felless said impatiently. “All these titles are only fancy names pasted over emptiness. But this one has the nerve to defy the Race. I cannot believe his duplicity will stand.”

“Is making Himmler and, ah, Dietrich change their minds worth a possible nuclear exchange with the Reich?” Ttomalss asked. “That is the question the fleetlord will have to answer for himself before proceeding.”

“If we do not persuade the Big Uglies that they must keep their word, they will promise us peace one day and then begin a nuclear exchange themselves the next,” Felless said.

“This is likely to be truth,” Ttomalss agreed. “It is also my point: we should not let their lies take us by surprise.”

“They yielded on all other matters pertaining to this incident,” Felless said. “They released the American Tosevites who were acting as our agents. Despite protests, they even released a Tosevite in some way related to a Big Ugly who advises the fleetlord of the conquest fleet. And then they defy us about this smuggler-defy us after saying they would not.”

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