V
Victor Grego crushed out his cigarette slowly and deliberately.
"Yes, Leonard," he said patiently. "It's very interesting, and doubtlessan important discovery, but I can't see why you're making such aproduction of it. Are you afraid I'll blame you for letting non-Companypeople beat you to it? Or do you merely suspect that anything BennettRainsford's mixed up in is necessarily a diabolical plot against theCompany and, by consequence, human civilization?"
Leonard Kellogg looked pained. "What I was about to say, Victor, is thatboth Rainsford and this man Holloway seem convinced that these things theycall Fuzzies aren't animals at all. They believe them to be sapientbeings."
"Well, that's--" He bit that off short as the significance of what Kellogghad just said hit him. "Good God, Leonard! I beg your pardon abjectly; Idon't blame you for taking it seriously. Why, that would make Zarathustraa Class-IV inhabited planet."
"For which the Company holds a Class-III charter," Kellogg added. "For anuninhabited planet."
Automatically void if any race of sapient beings were discovered onZarathustra.
"You know what will happen if this is true?"
"Well, I should imagine the charter would have to be renegotiated, and nowthat the Colonial Office knows what sort of a planet this is, they'll beanything but generous with the Company...."
"They won't renegotiate anything, Leonard. The Federation government willsimply take the position that the Company has already made an adequatereturn on the original investments, and they'll award us what we can showas in our actual possession--I hope--and throw the rest into the publicdomain."
The vast plains on Beta and Delta continents, with their herds ofveldbeest--all open range, and every 'beest that didn't carry a Companybrand a maverick. And all the untapped mineral wealth, and the untilledarable land; it would take years of litigation even to make the Company'sclaim to Big Blackwater stick. And Terra-Baldur-Marduk Spacelines wouldlose their monopolistic franchise and get sticky about it in the courts,and in any case, the Company's import-export monopoly would go out theairlock. And the squatters rushing in and swamping everything--
"Why, we won't be any better off than the Yggdrasil Company, squatting ona guano heap on one continent!" he burst out. "Five years from now,they'll be making more money out of bat dung than we'll be making out ofthis whole world!"
And the Company's good friend and substantial stockholder, Nick Emmert,would be out, too, and a Colonial Governor General would move in, withregular army troops and a complicated bureaucracy. Elections, and arepresentative parliament, and every Tom, Dick and Harry with a grudgeagainst the Company would be trying to get laws passed--And, of course, aNative Affairs Commission, with its nose in everything.
"But they couldn't just leave us without any kind of a charter," Kellogginsisted. Who was he trying to kid--besides himself? "It wouldn't befair!" As though that clinched it. "It isn't our fault!"
He forced more patience into his voice. "Leonard, please try to realizethat the Terran Federation government doesn't give one shrill soprano hooton Nifflheim whether it's fair or not, or whose fault what is. TheFederation government's been repenting that charter they gave the Companyever since they found out what they'd chartered away. Why, this planet isa better world than Terra ever was, even before the Atomic Wars. Now, ifthey have a chance to get it back, with improvements, you think they won'ttake it? And what will stop them? If those creatures over on BetaContinent are sapient beings, our charter isn't worth the parchment it'sengrossed on, and that's an end of it." He was silent for a moment. "Youheard that tape Rainsford transmitted to Jimenez. Did either he orHolloway actually claim, in so many words, that these things really aresapient beings?"
"Well, no; not in so many words. Holloway consistently alluded to them aspeople, but he's just an ignorant old prospector. Rainsford wouldn't comeout and commit himself one way or another, but he left the door wide openfor anybody else to."
"Accepting their account, could these Fuzzies be sapient?"
"Accepting the account, yes," Kellogg said, in distress. "They could be."
They probably were, if Leonard Kellogg couldn't wish the evidence out ofexistence.
"Then they'll look sapient to these people of yours who went over to Betathis morning, and they'll treat it purely as a scientific question andnever consider the legal aspects. Leonard, you'll have to take charge ofthe investigation, before they make any reports everybody'll be sorryfor."
Kellogg didn't seem to like that. It would mean having to exerciseauthority and getting tough with people, and he hated anything like that.He nodded very reluctantly.
"Yes. I suppose I will. Let me think about it for a moment, Victor."
One thing about Leonard; you handed him something he couldn't delegate ordodge and he'd go to work on it. Maybe not cheerfully, butconscientiously.
"I'll take Ernst Mallin along," he said at length. "This man Rainsford hasno grounding whatever in any of the psychosciences. He may be able toimpose on Ruth Ortheris, but not on Ernst Mallin. Not after I've talked toMallin first." He thought some more. "We'll have to get these Fuzzies awayfrom this man Holloway. Then we'll issue a report of discovery, beingcareful to give full credit to both Rainsford and Holloway--we'll evenaccept the designation they've coined for them--but we'll make it veryclear that while highly intelligent, the Fuzzies are not a race of sapientbeings. If Rainsford persists in making any such claim, we will brand itas a deliberate hoax."
"Do you think he's gotten any report off to the Institute of Xeno-Sciencesyet?"
Kellogg shook his head. "I think he wants to trick some of our people intosupporting his sapience claims; at least, corroborating his and Holloway'salleged observations. That's why I'll have to get over to Beta as soon aspossible."
By now, Kellogg had managed to convince himself that going over to Betahad been his idea all along. Probably also convincing himself thatRainsford's report was nothing but a pack of lies. Well, if he could workbetter that way, that was his business.
"He will, before long, if he isn't stopped. And a year from now, there'llbe a small army of investigators here from Terra. By that time, you shouldhave both Rainsford and Holloway thoroughly discredited. Leonard, you getthose Fuzzies away from Holloway and I'll personally guarantee they won'tbe available for investigation by then. Fuzzies," he said reflectively."Fur-bearing animals, I take it?"
"Holloway spoke, on the tape, of their soft and silky fur."
"Good. Emphasize that in your report. As soon as it's published, theCompany will offer two thousand sols apiece for Fuzzy pelts. By the timeRainsford's report brings anybody here from Terra, we may have them alltrapped out."
Kellogg began to look worried.
"But, Victor, that's genocide!"
"Nonsense! Genocide is defined as the extermination of a race of sapientbeings. These are fur-bearing animals. It's up to you and Ernst Mallin toprove that."
* * * * *
The Fuzzies, playing on the lawn in front of the camp, froze intoimmobility, their faces turned to the west. Then they all ran to the benchby the kitchen door and scrambled up onto it.
"Now what?" Jack Holloway wondered.
"They hear the airboat," Rainsford told him. "That's the way they actedyesterday when you were coming in with your machine." He looked at thepicnic table they had been spreading under the featherleaf trees."Everything ready?"
"Everything but lunch; that won't be cooked for an hour yet. I see themnow."
"You have better eyes than I do, Jack. Oh, I see it. I hope the kids puton a good show for them," he said anxiously.
He'd been jittery ever since he arrived, shortly after breakfast. Itwasn't that these people from Mallorysport were so important themselves;Ben had a bigger name in scientific circles than any of this Companycrowd. He was just excited about the Fuzzies.
The airboat grew from a barely visible speck, and came spiraling down toland in the clearing. When it was grounded and off c
ontragravity, theystarted across the grass toward it, and the Fuzzies all jumped down fromthe bench and ran along with them.
The three visitors climbed down. Ruth Ortheris wore slacks and a sweater,but the slacks were bloused over a pair of ankle boots. Gerd van Riebeekhad evidently done a lot of field work: his boots were stout, and he woreold, faded khakis and a serviceable-looking sidearm that showed he knewwhat to expect up here in the Piedmont. Juan Jimenez was in the samesports casuals in which he had appeared on screen last evening. All ofthem carried photographic equipment. They shook hands all around andexchanged greetings, and then the Fuzzies began clamoring to be noticed.Finally all of them, Fuzzies and other people, drifted over to the tableunder the trees.
Ruth Ortheris sat down on the grass with Mamma and Baby. Immediately Babybecame interested in a silver charm which she wore on a chain around herneck which tinkled fascinatingly. Then he tried to sit on her head. Shespent some time gently but firmly discouraging this. Juan Jimenez wassquatting between Mike and Mitzi, examining them alternately and talkinginto a miniature recorder phone on his breast, mostly in Latin. Gerd vanRiebeek dropped himself into a folding chair and took Little Fuzzy on hislap.
"You know, this is kind of surprising," he said. "Not only findingsomething like this, after twenty-five years, but finding something asunique as this. Look, he doesn't have the least vestige of a tail, andthere isn't another tailless mammal on the planet. Fact, there isn'tanother mammal on this planet that has the slightest kinship to him. Takeourselves; we belong to a pretty big family, about fifty-odd genera ofprimates. But this little fellow hasn't any relatives at all."
"Yeek?"
"And he couldn't care less, could he?" Van Riebeek pummeled Little Fuzzygently. "One thing, you have the smallest humanoid known; that's onerecord you can claim. Oh-oh, what goes on?"
Ko-Ko, who had climbed upon Rainsford's lap, jumped suddenly to theground, grabbed the chopper-digger he had left beside the chair andstarted across the grass. Everybody got to their feet, the visitorsgetting cameras out. The Fuzzies seemed perplexed by all the excitement.It was only another land-prawn, wasn't it?
Ko-Ko got in front of it, poked it on the nose to stop it and then strucka dramatic pose, flourishing his weapon and bringing it down on theprawn's neck. Then, after flopping it over, he looked at it almost insorrow and hit it a couple of whacks with the flat. He began pulling itapart and eating it.
"I see why you call him Ko-Ko," Ruth said, aiming her camera, "Don't theothers do it that way?"
"Well, Little Fuzzy runs along beside them and pivots and gives them aquick chop. Mike and Mitzi flop theirs over first and behead them on theirbacks. And Mamma takes a swipe at their legs first. But beheading andbreaking the undershell, they all do that."
"Uh-huh; that's basic," she said. "Instinctive. The technique is eitherself-learned or copied. When Baby begins killing his own prawns, see if hedoesn't do it the way Mamma does!"
"Hey, look!" Jimenez cried. "He's making a lobster pick for himself!"
Through lunch, they talked exclusively about Fuzzies. The subjects of thediscussion nibbled things that were given to them, and yeeked amongthemselves. Gerd van Riebeek suggested that they were discussing the oddhabits of human-type people. Juan Jimenez looked at him, slightlydisturbed, as though wondering just how seriously he meant it.
"You know, what impressed me most in the taped account was the incident ofthe damnthing," said Ruth Ortheris. "Any animal associating with man willtry to attract attention if something's wrong, but I never heard of one,not even a Freyan kholph or a Terran chimpanzee, that would usedescriptive pantomime. Little Fuzzy was actually making a symbolicrepresentation, by abstracting the distinguishing characteristic of thedamnthing."
"Think that stiff-arm gesture and bark might have been intended torepresent a rifle?" Gerd van Riebeek asked. "He'd seen you shootingbefore, hadn't he?"
"I don't think it was anything else. He was telling me, 'Big nastydamnthing outside; shoot it like you did the harpy.' And if he hadn't runpast me and pointed back, that damnthing would have killed me."
Jimenez, hesitantly, said, "I know I'm speaking from ignorance. You're theFuzzy expert. But isn't it possible that you're overanthropomorphizing?Endowing them with your own characteristics and mental traits?"
"Juan, I'm not going to answer that right now. I don't think I'll answerat all. You wait till you've been around these Fuzzies a little longer,and then ask it again, only ask yourself."
* * * * *
"So you see, Ernst, that's the problem."
Leonard Kellogg laid the words like a paperweight on the other words hehad been saying, and waited. Ernst Mallin sat motionless, his elbows onthe desk and his chin in his hands. A little pair of wrinkles, likeparentheses, appeared at the corners of his mouth.
"Yes. I'm not a lawyer, of course, but...."
"It's not a legal question. It's a question for a psychologist."
That left it back with Ernst Mallin, and he knew it.
"I'd have to see them myself before I could express an opinion. You havethat tape of Holloway's with you?" When Kellogg nodded, Mallin continued:"Did either of them make any actual, overt claim of sapience?"
He answered it as he had when Victor Grego had asked the same question,adding:
"The account consists almost entirely of Holloway's uncorroboratedstatements concerning things to which he claims to have been the solewitness."
"Ah." Mallin permitted himself a tight little smile. "And he's not aqualified observer. Neither, for that matter, is Rainsford. Regardless ofhis position as a xeno-naturalist, he is a complete layman in thepsychosciences. He's just taken this other man's statements uncritically.As for what he claims to have observed for himself, how do we know heisn't including a lot of erroneous inferences with his descriptivestatements?"
"How do we know he's not perpetrating a deliberate hoax?"
"But, Leonard, that's a pretty serious accusation."
"It's happened before. That fellow who carved a Late Upland Martianinscription in that cave in Kenya, for instance. Or Hellermann's claim tohave cross-bred Terran mice with Thoran tilbras. Or the Piltdown Man, backin the first century Pre-Atomic?"
Mallin nodded. "None of us like to think of a thing like that, but, as yousay, it's happened. You know, this man Rainsford is just the type to dosomething like that, too. Fundamentally an individualistic egoist; badlyadjusted personality type. Say he wants to make some sensational discoverywhich will assure him the position in the scientific world to which hebelieves himself entitled. He finds this lonely old prospector, into whoseisolated camp some little animals have strayed. The old man has made petsof them, taught them a few tricks, finally so projected his ownpersonality onto them that he has convinced himself that they are peoplelike himself. This is Rainsford's great opportunity; he will presenthimself as the discoverer of a new sapient race and bring the wholelearned world to his feet." Mallin smiled again. "Yes, Leonard, it isaltogether possible."
"Then it's our plain duty to stop this thing before it develops intoanother major scientific scandal like Hellermann's hybrids."
"First we must go over this tape recording and see what we have on ourhands. Then we must make a thorough, unbiased study of these animals, andshow Rainsford and his accomplice that they cannot hope to foist theseridiculous claims on the scientific world with impunity. If we can'tconvince them privately, there'll be nothing to do but expose thempublicly."
"I've heard the tape already, but let's play if off now. We want toanalyze these tricks this man Holloway has taught these animals, and seewhat they show."
"Yes, of course. We must do that at once," Mallin said. "Then we'll haveto consider what sort of statement we must issue, and what sort ofevidence we will need to support it."
* * * * *
After dinner was romptime for Fuzzies on the lawn, but when the dusk camecreeping into the ravine, they all went inside and were given one of the
irnew toys from Mallorysport--a big box of many-colored balls and shortsticks of transparent plastic. They didn't know that it was amolecule-model kit, but they soon found that the sticks would go intoholes in the balls, and that they could be built into three-dimensionaldesigns.
This was much more fun than the colored stones. They made a fewexperimental shapes, then dismantled them and began on a single largedesign. Several times they tore it down, entirely or in part, and beganover again, usually with considerable yeeking and gesticulation.
"They have artistic sense," Van Riebeek said. "I've seen lots of abstractsculpture that wasn't half as good as that job they're doing."
"Good engineering, too," Jack said. "They understand balance andcenter-of-gravity. They're bracing it well, and not making it top-heavy."
"Jack, I've been thinking about that question I was supposed to askmyself," Jimenez said. "You know, I came out here loaded with suspicion.Not that I doubted your honesty; I just thought you'd let your obviousaffection for the Fuzzies lead you into giving them credit for moreintelligence than they possess. Now I think you've consistentlyunderstated it. Short of actual sapience, I've never seen anything likethem."
"Why short of it?" van Riebeek asked. "Ruth, you've been pretty quiet thisevening. What do you think?"
Ruth Ortheris looked uncomfortable. "Gerd, it's too early to form opinionslike that. I know the way they're working together looks like cooperationon an agreed-upon purpose, but I simply can't make speech out of thatyeek-yeek-yeek."
"Let's keep the talk-and-build-a-fire rule out of it," van Riebeek said."If they're working together on a common project, they must becommunicating somehow."
"It isn't communication, it's symbolization. You simply can't thinksapiently except in verbal symbols. Try it. Not something like changingthe spools on a recorder or field-stripping a pistol; they're just learnedtricks. I mean ideas."
"How about Helen Keller?" Rainsford asked. "Mean to say she only startedthinking sapiently after Anna Sullivan taught her what words were?"
"No, of course not. She thought sapiently--And she only thought insense-imagery limited to feeling." She looked at Rainsford reproachfully;he'd knocked a breach in one of her fundamental postulates. "Of course,she had inherited the cerebroneural equipment for sapient thinking." Shelet that trail off, before somebody asked her how she knew that theFuzzies hadn't.
"I'll suggest, just to keep the argument going, that speech couldn't havebeen invented without pre-existing sapience," Jack said.
Ruth laughed. "Now you're taking me back to college. That used to be oneof the burning questions in first-year psych students' bull sessions. Bythe time we got to be sophomores, we'd realized that it was only anegg-and-chicken argument and dropped it."
"That's a pity," Ben Rainsford said. "It's a good question."
"It would be if it could be answered."
"Maybe it can be," Gerd said. "There's a clue to it, right there. I'll saythat those fellows are on the edge of sapience, and it's an even-money betwhich side."
"I'll bet every sunstone in my bag they're over."
"Well, maybe they're just slightly sapient," Jimenez suggested.
Ruth Ortheris hooted at that. "That's like talking about being justslightly dead or just slightly pregnant," she said. "You either are or youaren't."
Gerd van Riebeek was talking at the same time. "This sapience question isjust as important in my field as yours, Ruth. Sapience is the result ofevolution by natural selection, just as much as a physical characteristic,and it's the most important step in the evolution of any species, our ownincluded."
"Wait a minute, Gerd," Rainsford said. "Ruth, what do you mean by that?Aren't there degrees of sapience?"
"No. There are degrees of mentation--intelligence, if you prefer--just asthere are degrees of temperature. When psychology becomes an exact sciencelike physics, we'll be able to calibrate mentation like temperature. Butsapience is qualitatively different from nonsapience. It's more than justa higher degree of mental temperature. You might call it a sort of mentalboiling point."
"I think that's a damn good analogy," Rainsford said. "But what happenswhen the boiling point is reached?"
"That's what we have to find out," van Riebeek told him. "That's what Iwas talking about a moment ago. We don't know any more about how sapienceappeared today than we did in the year zero, or in the year 654 Pre-Atomicfor that matter."
"Wait a minute," Jack interrupted. "Before we go any deeper, let's agreeon a definition of sapience."
Van Riebeek laughed. "Ever try to get a definition of life from abiologist?" he asked. "Or a definition of number from a mathematician?"
"That's about it." Ruth looked at the Fuzzies, who were looking at theircolored-ball construction as though wondering if they could add anythingmore without spoiling the design. "I'd say: a level of mentationqualitatively different from nonsapience in that it includes ability tosymbolize ideas and store and transmit them, ability to generalize andability to form abstract ideas. There; I didn't say a word abouttalk-and-build-a-fire, did I?"
"Little Fuzzy symbolizes and generalizes," Jack said. "He symbolizes adamnthing by three horns, and he symbolizes a rifle by a long thing thatpoints and makes noises. Rifles kill animals. Harpies and damnthings areboth animals. If a rifle will kill a harpy, it'll kill a damnthing too."
Juan Jimenez had been frowning in thought; he looked up and asked, "What'sthe lowest known sapient race?"
"Yggdrasil Khooghras," Gerd van Riebeek said promptly. "Any of you everbeen on Yggdrasil?"
"I saw a man shot once on Mimir, for calling another man a son of aKhooghra," Jack said. "The man who shot him had been on Yggdrasil and knewwhat he was being called."
"I spent a couple of years among them," Gerd said. "They do build fires;I'll give them that. They char points on sticks to make spears. And theytalk. I learned their language, all eighty-two words of it. I taught a fewof the intelligentsia how to use machetes without maiming themselves, andthere was one mental giant I could trust to carry some of my equipment, ifI kept an eye on him, but I never let him touch my rifle or my camera."
"Can they generalize?" Ruth asked.
"Honey, they can't do nothin' else but! Every word in their language is ahigh-order generalization. _Hroosha_, live-thing. _Noosha_, bad-thing._Dhishta_, thing-to-eat. Want me to go on? There are only seventy-ninemore of them."
Before anybody could stop him, the communication screen got itself into anuproar. The Fuzzies all ran over in front of it, and Jack switched it on.The caller was a man in gray semiformals; he had wavy gray hair and a facethat looked like Juan Jimenez's twenty years from now.
"Good evening; Holloway here."
"Oh, Mr. Holloway, good evening." The caller shook hands with himself,turning on a dazzling smile. "I'm Leonard Kellogg, chief of the Company'sscience division. I just heard the tape you made about the--the Fuzzies?"He looked down at the floor. "Are these some of the animals?"
"These are the Fuzzies." He hoped it sounded like the correction it wasintended to be. "Dr. Bennett Rainsford's here with me now, and so are Dr.Jimenez, Dr. van Riebeek and Dr. Ortheris." Out of the corner of his eyehe could see Jimenez squirming as though afflicted with ants, van Riebeekgetting his poker face battened down and Ben Rainsford suppressing a grin."Some of us are out of screen range, and I'm sure you'll want to ask a lotof questions. Pardon us a moment, while we close in."
He ignored Kellogg's genial protest that that wouldn't be necessary untilthe chairs were placed facing the screen. As an afterthought, he handedFuzzies around, giving Little Fuzzy to Ben, Ko-Ko to Gerd, Mitzi to Ruth,Mike to Jimenez and taking Mamma and Baby on his own lap.
Baby immediately started to climb up onto his head, as expected. It seemedto disconcert Kellogg, also as expected. He decided to teach Baby to thumbhis nose when given some unobtrusive signal.
"Now, about that tape I recorded last evening," he began.
"Yes, Mr. Holloway." Kellogg's smile was getting more mechanical every
minute. He was having trouble keeping his eyes off Baby. "I must say, Iwas simply astounded at the high order of intelligence claimed for thesecreatures."
"And you wanted to see how big a liar I was. I don't blame you; I hadtrouble believing it myself at first."
Kellogg gave a musically blithe laugh, showing even more dental equipment.
"Oh, no. Mr. Holloway; please don't misunderstand me. I never thoughtanything like that."
"I hope not," Ben Rainsford said, not too pleasantly. "I vouched for Mr.Holloway's statements, if you'll recall."
"Of course, Bennett; that goes without saying. Permit me to congratulateyou upon a most remarkable scientific discovery. An entirely new order ofmammals--"
"Which may be the ninth extrasolar sapient race," Rainsford added.
"Good heavens, Bennett!" Kellogg jettisoned his smile and slid on a lookof shocked surprise. "You surely can't be serious?" He looked again at theFuzzies, pulled the smile back on and gave a light laugh.
"I thought you'd heard that tape," Rainsford said.
"Of course, and the things reported were most remarkable. But sapiences!Just because they've been taught a few tricks, and use sticks and stonesfor weapons--" He got rid of the smile again, and quick-changed toseriousness. "Such an extreme claim must only be made after carefulstudy."
"Well, I won't claim they're sapient," Ruth Ortheris told him. "Not tillday after tomorrow, at the earliest. But they very easily could be. Theyhave learning and reasoning capacity equal to that of any eight-year-oldTerran Human child, and well above that of the adults of some recognizedlysapient races. And they have not been taught tricks; they have learned byobservation and reasoning."
"Well, Dr. Kellogg, mentation levels isn't my subject," Jimenez took itup, "but they do have all the physical characteristics shared by othersapient races--lower limbs specialized for locomotion and upper limbs formanipulation, erect posture, stereoscopic vision, color perception,hand with opposing thumb--all the characteristics we consider asprerequisite to the development of sapience."
"I think they're sapient, myself," Gerd van Riebeek said, "but that's notas important as the fact that they're on the very threshold of sapience.This is the first race of this mental level anybody's ever seen. I believethat study of the Fuzzies will help us solve the problem of how sapiencedeveloped in any race."
Kellogg had been laboring to pump up a head of enthusiasm; now he wasready to valve it off.
"But this is amazing! This will make scientific history! Now, of course,you all realize how pricelessly valuable these Fuzzies are. They must bebrought at once to Mallorysport, where they can be studied underlaboratory conditions by qualified psychologists, and--"
"No."
Jack lifted Baby Fuzzy off his head and handed him to Mamma, and set Mammaon the floor. That was reflex; the thinking part of his brain knew hedidn't need to clear for action when arguing with the electronic image ofa man twenty-five hundred miles away.
"Just forget that part of it and start over," he advised.
Kellogg ignored him. "Gerd, you have your airboat; fix up some nicecomfortable cages--"
_"Kellogg!_"
The man in the screen stopped talking and stared in amazed indignation. Itwas the first time in years he had been addressed by his naked patronymic,and possibly the first time in his life he had been shouted at.
"Didn't you hear me the first time Kellogg? Then stop gibbering aboutcages. These Fuzzies aren't being taken anywhere."
"But Mr. Holloway! Don't you realize that these little beings must becarefully studied? Don't you want them given their rightful place in thehierarchy of nature?"
"If you want to study them, come out here and do it. That's so long as youdon't annoy them, or me. As far as study's concerned, they're beingstudied now. Dr. Rainsford's studying them, and so are three of yourpeople, and when it comes to that, I'm studying them myself."
"And I'd like you to clarify that remark about qualified psychologists,"Ruth Ortheris added, in a voice approaching zero-Kelvin. "You wouldn't bechallenging my professional qualifications, would you?"
"Oh, Ruth, you know I didn't mean anything like that. Please don'tmisunderstand me," Kellogg begged. "But this is highly specialized work--"
"Yes; how many Fuzzy specialists have you at Science Center, Leonard?"Rainsford wanted to know. "The only one I can think of is Jack Holloway,here."
"Well, I'd thought of Dr. Mallin, the Company's head psychologist."
"He can come too, just as long as he understands that he'll have to havemy permission for anything he wants to do with the Fuzzies," Jack said."When can we expect you?"
Kellogg thought some time late the next afternoon. He didn't have to askhow to get to the camp. He made a few efforts to restore the conversationto its original note of cordiality, gave that up as a bad job and blankedout. There was a brief silence in the living room. Then Jimenez saidreproachfully:
"You certainly weren't very gracious to Dr. Kellogg, Jack. Maybe you don'trealize it, but he is a very important man."
"He isn't important to me, and I wasn't gracious to him at all. It doesn'tpay to be gracious to people like that. If you are, they always try totake advantage of it."
"Why, I didn't know you knew Len," van Riebeek said.
"I never saw the individual before. The species is very common and widelydistributed." He turned to Rainsford. "You think he and this Mallin willbe out tomorrow?"
"Of course they will. This is a little too big for underlings andnon-Company people to be allowed to monkey with. You know, we'll have towatch out or in a year we'll be hearing from Terra about the discovery ofa sapient race on Zarathustra; _Fuzzy fuzzy Kellogg_. As Juan says, Dr.Kellogg is a very important man. That's how he got important."