The Fourth Murray Leinster Read online

  Then I hear a noise. Inspector Caldwell is regarding me with loathing in her eyes.

  “Did you say they were friendly creatures?” she asks, bitter. “I think affectionate would be a better word!” Her voice shakes. “You are going to be transferred out of here the instant the Palmyra gets back!”

  “What’s the matter?” I ask, surprised. “She paid me a compliment and I gave her a present. It’s a custom. She’s satisfied. I never see her before that I remember.”

  “You don’t?” she says. “The—the callousness! You’re revolting!”

  Brooks begins to sputter, then he snickers, and all of a sudden he’s howling with laughter. He is laughing at Inspector Caldwell. Then I get it, and I snort. Then I hoot and holler. It gets funnier when she gets madder still. She near blows up from being mad!

  We must look crazy, the two of us there in the post, just hollering with laughter while she gets furiouser and furiouser. Finally I have to lay down on the floor to laugh more comfortable. You see, she doesn’t get a bit of what I’ve told her about there being a special kind of evolution on Moklin. The more disgusted and furious she looks at me, the harder I have to laugh. I can’t help it.

  * * * *

  When we set out for the other trading post next day, the atmosphere ain’t what you’d call exactly cordial. There is just the Inspector and me, with Deeth and a couple of other Moklins for the look of things. She has on a green forest suit, and with her red hair she sure looks good! But she looks at me cold when Brooks says I’ll take her over to the other post, and she doesn’t say a word the first mile or two.

  We trudge on, and presently Deeth and the others get ahead so they can’t hear what she says. And she remarks indignant, “I must say Mr. Brooks isn’t very cooperative. Why didn’t he come with me? Is he afraid of the men at the other post?”

  “Not him,” I says. “He’s a good guy. But you got authority over him and you ain’t read his reports.”

  “If I have authority,” she says, sharp, “I assure you it’s because I’m competent!”

  “I don’t doubt it,” I says. “If you wasn’t cute, he wouldn’t care. But a man don’t want a good-looking girl giving him orders. He wants to give them to her. A homely woman, it don’t matter.”

  * * * *

  She tosses her head, but it don’t displease her. Then she says, “What’s in the reports that I should have read?”

  “I don’t know,” I admit. “But he’s been sweating over them. It makes him mad that nobody bothered to read ’em.”

  “Maybe,” she guesses, “it was what I need to know about this other trading post. What do you know about it, Mr. Brinkley?”

  I tell her what Deeth has told Brooks. Brooks found out about it because one day some Moklins come in to trade and ask friendly why we charge so much for this and that. Deeth told them we’d always charged that, and they say the other trading post sells things cheaper, and Deeth says what trading post? So they up and tell him there’s another post that sells the same kind of things we do, only cheaper. But that’s all they’ll say.

  So Brooks tells Deeth to find out, and he scouts around and comes back. There is another trading post only fifteen miles away, and it is selling stuff just like ours. And it charges only half price. Deeth didn’t see the men—just the Moklin clerks. We ain’t been able to see the men either.

  “Why haven’t you seen the men?”

  “Every time Brooks or me go over,” I explain, “the Moklins they got working for them say the other men are off somewhere. Maybe they’re starting some more posts. We wrote ’em a note, asking what the hell they mean, but they never answered it. Of course, we ain’t seen their books or their living quarters—”

  “You could find out plenty by a glimpse at their books!” she snaps. “Why haven’t you just marched in and made the Moklins show you what you want to know, since the men were away?”

  “Because,” I says, patient, “Moklins imitate humans. If we start trouble, they’ll start it too. We can’t set a example of rough stuff like burglary, mayhem, breaking and entering, manslaughter, or bigamy, or those Moklins will do just like us.”

  “Bigamy!” She grabs on that sardonic. “If you’re trying to make me think you’ve got enough moral sense—”

  I get a little mad. Brooks and me, we’ve explained to her, careful, how it is admiration and the way evolution works on Moklin that makes Moklin kids get born with long whiskers and that the compliment the Moklin girl has paid me is just exactly that. But she hasn’t listened to a word.

  “Miss Caldwell,” I says, “Brooks and me told you the facts. We tried to tell them delicate, to spare your feelings. Now if you’ll try to spare mine, I’ll thank you.”

  “If you mean your finer feelings,” she says, sarcastic, “I’ll spare them as soon as I find some!”

  So I shut up. There’s no use trying to argue with a woman. We tramp on through the forest without a word. Presently we come on a nest-bush. It’s a pretty big one. There are a couple dozen nests on it, from the little-bitty bud ones no bigger than your fist, to the big ripe ones lined with soft stuff that have busted open and have got cacklebirds housekeeping in them now.

  There are two cacklebirds sitting on a branch by the nest that is big enough to open up and have eggs laid in it, only it ain’t. The cacklebirds are making noises like they are cussing it and telling it to hurry up and open, because they are in a hurry.

  “That’s a nest-bush,” I says. “It grows nests for the cackle-birds. The birds—uh—fertilize the ground around it. They’re sloppy feeders and drop a lot of stuff that rots and is fertilizer too. The nest-bush and the cackle-birds kind of cooperate. That’s the way evolution works on Moklin, like Brooks and me told you.”

  She tosses that red head of hers and stamps on, not saying a word. So we get to the other trading post. And there she gets one of these slow-burning, long-lasting mads on that fill a guy like me with awe.

  There’s only Moklins at the other trading post, as usual. They say the humans are off somewhere. They look at her admiring and polite. They show her their stock. It is practically identical with ours—only they admit that they’ve sold out of some items because their prices are low. They act most respectful and pleased to see her.

  But she don’t learn a thing about where their stuff comes from or what company is horning in on Moklin trade. And she looks at their head clerk and she burns and burns.

  * * * *

  When we get back, Brooks is sweating over memorandums he has made, getting another report ready for the next Company ship. Inspector Caldwell marches into the trade room and gives orders in a controlled, venomous voice. Then she marches right in on Brooks.

  “I have just ordered the Moklin sales force to cut the price on all items on sale by seventy-five per cent,” she says, her voice trembling a little with fury. “I have also ordered the credit given for Moklin trade goods to be doubled. They want a trade war? They’ll get it!”

  * * * *

  She is a lot madder than business would account for. Brooks says, tired, “I’d like to show you some facts. I’ve been over every inch of territory in thirty miles, looking for a place where a ship could land for that other post. There isn’t any. Does that mean anything to you?”

  “The post is there, isn’t it?” she says. “And they have trade goods, haven’t they? And we have exclusive trading rights on Moklin, haven’t we? That’s enough for me. Our job is to drive them out of business!”

  But she is a lot madder than business would account for. Brooks says, very weary, “There’s nearly a whole planet where they could have put another trading post. They could have set up shop on the other hemisphere and charged any price they pleased. But they set up shop right next to us! Does that make sense?”

  “Setting up close,” she says, “would furnish them with customers already used to human trade goods. And it furnished them with Moklins trained to be interpreters and clerks! And—” Then it come out, what she’s raging,
boiling, steaming, burning up about. “And,” she says, furious, “it furnished them with a Moklin head-clerk who is a very handsome young man, Mr. Brooks! He not only resembles you in every feature, but he even has a good many of your mannerisms. You should be very proud!”

  With this she slams out of the room. Brooks blinks.

  “She won’t believe anything,” he says, sour, “except only that man is vile. Is that true about a Moklin who looks like me?”

  I nod.

  “Funny his folks never showed him to me for a compliment-present!” Then he stares at me, hard. “How good is the likeness?”

  “If he is wearing your clothes,” I tell him, truthful, “I’d swear he is you.”

  Then Brooks—slow, very slow—turns white. “Remember the time you went off with Deeth and his folks, hunting? That was the time a Moklin got killed. You were wearing guest garments, weren’t you?”

  I feel queer inside, but I nod. Guest garments, for Moklins, are like the best bedroom and the drumstick of the chicken among humans. And a Moklin hunting party is something. They go hunting garlikthos, which you might as well call dragons, because they’ve got scales and they fly and they are tough babies.

  The way to hunt them is you take along some cacklebirds that ain’t nesting—they are no good for anything while they’re honeymooning—and the cacklebirds go flapping around until a garlikthos comes after them, and then they go jet-streaking to where the hunters are, cackling a blue streak to say, “Here I come, boys! Hold everything until I get past!” Then the garlikthos dives after them and the hunters get it as it dives.

  You give the cacklebirds its innards, and they sit around and eat, cackling to each other, zestful, like they’re bragging about the other times they done the same thing, only better.

  “You were wearing guest garments?” repeats Brooks, grim.

  I feel very queer inside, but I nod again. Moklin guest garments are mighty easy on the skin and feel mighty good. They ain’t exactly practical hunting clothes, but the Moklins feel bad if a human that’s their guest don’t wear them. And of course he has to shed his human clothes to wear them.

  “What’s the idea?” I want to know. But I feel pretty unhappy inside.

  “You didn’t come back for one day, in the middle of the hunt, after tobacco and a bath?”

  “No,” I says, beginning to get rattled. “We were way over at the Thunlib Hills. We buried the dead Moklin over there and had a hell of a time building a tomb over him. Why?”

  “During that week,” says Brooks, grim, “and while you were off wearing Moklin guest garments, somebody came back wearing your clothes—and got some tobacco and passed the time of day and went off again. Joe, just like there’s a Moklin you say could pass for me, there’s one that could pass for you. In fact, he did. Nobody suspected either.”

  I get panicky. “But what’d he do that for?” I want to know. “He didn’t steal anything! Would he have done it just to brag to the other Moklins that he fooled you?”

  “He might,” says Brooks, “have been checking to see if he could fool me. Or Captain Haney of the Palmyra. Or—”

  He looks at me. I feel myself going numb. This can mean one hell of a mess!

  “I haven’t told you before,” says Brooks, “but I’ve been guessing at something like this. Moklins like to be human, and they get human kids—kids that look human, anyway. Maybe they can want to be smart like humans, and they are.” He tries to grin, and can’t. “That rival trading post looked fishy to me right at the start. They’re practicing with that. It shouldn’t be there at all, but it is. You see?”

  I feel weak and sick all over. This is a dangerous sort of thing! But I say quick, “If you mean they got Moklins that could pass for you and me, and they’re figuring to bump us off and take our places—I don’t believe that! Moklins like humans! They wouldn’t harm humans for anything!”

  Brooks don’t pay any attention. He says, harsh, “I’ve been trying to persuade the Company that we’ve got to get out of here, fast! And they send this Inspector Caldwell, who’s not only female, but a redhead to boot! All they think about is a competitive trading post! And all she sees is that we’re a bunch of lascivious scoundrels, and since she’s a woman there’s nothing that’ll convince her otherwise!”

  Then something hits me. It looks hopeful.

  “She’s the first human woman to land on Moklin. And she has got red hair. It’s the first red hair the Moklins ever saw. Have we got time?”

  He figures. Then he says, “With luck, it ought to turn up! You’ve hit it!” And then his expression sort of softens. “If that happens—poor kid, she’s going to take it hard! Women hate to be wrong. Especially redheads! But that might be the saving of—of humanity, when you think of it.”

  I blink at him. He goes on, fierce, “Look, I’m no Moklin! You know that. But if there’s a Moklin that looks enough like me to take my place…. You see? We got to think of Inspector Caldwell, anyhow. If you ever see me cross my fingers, you wiggle your little finger. Then I know it’s you. And the other way about. Get it? You swear you’ll watch over Inspector Caldwell?”

  “Sure!” I say. “Of course!”

  I wiggle my little finger. He crosses his. It’s a signal nobody but us two would know. I feel a lot better.

  * * * *

  Brooks goes off next morning, grim, to visit the other trading post and see the Moklin that looks so much like him. Inspector Caldwell goes along, fierce, and I’m guessing it’s to see the fireworks when Brooks sees his Moklin double that she thinks is more than a coincidence. Which she is right, only not in the way she thinks.

  Before they go, Brooks crosses his fingers and looks at me significant. I wiggle my little finger back at him. They go off.

  I sit down in the shade of Sally and try to think things out. I am all churned up inside, and scared as hell. It’s near two weeks to landing time, when the old Palmyra ought to come bulging down out of the sky with a load of new trade goods. I think wistful about how swell everything has been on Moklin up to now, and how Moklins admire humans, and how friendly everything has been, and how it’s a great compliment for Moklins to want to be like humans, and to get like them, and how no Moklin would ever dream of hurting a human and how they imitate humans joyous and reverent and happy. Nice people, Moklins. But—

  The end of things is in sight. Liking humans has made Moklins smart, but now there’s been a slip-up. Moklins will do anything to produce kids that look like humans. That’s a compliment. But no human ever sees a Moklin that’s four or five years old and all grown up and looks so much like him that nobody can tell them apart. That ain’t scheming. It’s just that Moklins like humans, but they’re scared the humans might not like to see themselves in a sort of Moklin mirror. So if they did that at all, they’d maybe keep it a secret, like children keep secrets from grownups.

  Moklins are a lot like kids. You can’t help liking them. But a human can get plenty panicky if he thinks what would happen if Moklins get to passing for humans among humans, and want their kids to have top-grade brains, and top-grade talents, and so on….

  I sweat, sitting there. I can see the whole picture. Brooks is worrying about Moklins loose among humans, outsmarting them as their kids grow up, being the big politicians, the bosses, the planetary pioneers, the prettiest girls and the handsomest guys in the Galaxy—everything humans want to be themselves. Just thinking about it is enough to make any human feel like he’s going nuts. But Brooks is also worrying about Inspector Caldwell, who is five foot three and red-headed and cute as a bug’s ear and riding for a bad fall.

  They come back from the trip to the other trading post. Inspector Caldwell is baffled and mad. Brooks is sweating and scared. He slips me the signal and I wiggle my little finger back at him, just so I’ll know he didn’t get substituted for without Inspector Caldwell knowing it, and so he knows nothing happened to me while he was gone. They didn’t see the Moklin that looks like Brooks. They didn’t get a bit of info
rmation we didn’t have before—which is just about none at all.

  Things go on. Brooks and me are sweating it out until the Palmyra lets down out of the sky again, meanwhile praying for Inspector Caldwell to get her ears pinned back so proper steps can be taken, and every morning he crosses his fingers at me, and I wiggle my little finger back at him…. And he watches over Inspector Caldwell tender.

  * * * *

  The other trading post goes on placid. They sell their stuff at half the price we sell ours for. So, on Inspector Caldwell’s orders, we cut ours again to half what they sell theirs for. So they sell theirs for half what we sell ours for, so we sell ours for half what they sell theirs for. And so on. Meanwhile we sweat.

  Three days before the Palmyra is due, our goods are marked at just exactly one per cent of what they was marked a month before, and the other trading post is selling them at half that. It looks like we are going to have to pay a bonus to Moklins to take goods away for us to compete with the other trading post.

  Otherwise, everything looks normal on the surface. Moklins hang around as usual, friendly and admiring. They’ll hang around a couple days just to get a look at Inspector Caldwell, and they regard her respectful.

  Brooks looks grim. He is head over heels crazy about her now, and she knows it, and she rides him hard. She snaps at him, and he answers her patient and gentle—because he knows that when what he hopes is going to happen, she is going to need him to comfort her. She has about wiped out our stock, throwing bargain sales. Our shelves are almost bare. But the other trading post still has plenty of stock.

  “Mr. Brooks,” says Inspector Caldwell, bitter, at breakfast, “we’ll have to take most of the Palmyra’s cargo to fill up our inventory.”

  “Maybe,” he says, tender, “and maybe not.”

  “But we’ve got to drive that other post out of business!” she says, desperate. Then she breaks down. “This—this is my first independent assignment. I’ve got to handle it successfully!”