Vietnam and Other Alien Worlds by Joe Haldeman Read Free Book Online Page B

might have been City Hall. It was evidently guarded, at least symbolically, since two !tang stood by the door with their arms exposed.
    It was a single large room similar to a Terran mosque, with a regular pattern of square columns holding up the ceiling. The columns supported shelving in neat squares, up to about two meters; on the shelves were neat stacks of accordion-style books. Although the ceiling had inset squares of glass that gave adequate light, there was a strong smell of burnt fish oil, which meant the building was used at night. (We had introduced them to electricity, but they used it only for heavy machinery and toys.)
    The !tang led me to the farthest corner, where a large haystack was bent over a book, scribbling. They had to read or write with their heads a few centimeters from the book, since their light-eyes were only good for close work.
    â€”It has happened as you foretold, Uncle.
    Not too amazing a prophecy, as I’d sent a messenger over yesterday.
    Uncle waved his nose in my direction. —Are you the same one who came four days ago?
    â€”No. I have never been to this place. I am Ricardo Navarro, from the Starlodge tribe.
    â€”I grovel in embarrassment. Truly it is difficult to tell one human from another. To my poor eyes you look exactly like Peter Lafitte.
    (Peter Rabbit is bald and ugly, with terrible ears. I have long curly hair with only a trace of gray, and women have called me attractive.)—Please do not be embarrassed. This is often true when different peoples meet. Did my brother say what tribe he represented?
    â€”I die. O my hair falls out and my flesh rots and my bones are cracked by the hungry ta!a’an. He drops me behind him all around the forest and nothing will grow where his excrement from my marrow falls. As the years pass the forest dies from the poison of my remains. The soil washes into the sea and poisons the fish, and all die. O the embarrassment.
    â€”He didn’t say?
    â€”He did but said not to tell you.
    That was that. —Did he by some chance say he was interested in the small morsel of land I mentioned to you by courier long ago?
    â€”No, he was not interested in the land.
    â€”Can you tell me what he was interested in?
    â€”He was interested in buying the land.
    Verbs. —May I ask a potentially embarrassing question?
    He exposed his arms. —We are businessmen.
    â€”What were the terms of his offer?
    â€”I die. I breathe in and breathe in and cannot exhale. I explode all over my friends. They forget my name and pretend it is dung. They wash off in the square and the well becomes polluted. All die. O the embarrassment.
    â€”He said not to tell me?
    â€”That’s right.
    â€”Did you agree to sell him the land?
    â€”That is a difficult question to answer.
    â€”Let me rephrase the question: is it possible that you might sell the land to my tribe?
    â€”It is possible, if you offer better terms. But only possible, in any case.
    â€”This is embarrassing. I, uh, die and, um, the last breath from my lungs is a terrible acid. It melts the seaward wall of the city and a hurricane comes and washes it away. All die. O the embarrassment.
    â€”You’re much better at that than he was.
    â€”Thank you. But may I ask you to amplify as to the possibility?
    â€”Certainly. Land is not a fish or an elevator. Land is something that keeps you from falling all the way down. It gives the sea a shore and makes the air stop. Do you understand?
    â€”So far. Please continue.
    â€”Land is time, but not in a mercantile sense. I can say “In return for the time it takes me to decide which one of you is the guilty party, you must give me such-and-so.” But how can I say “In return for the land I am standing on you must give me this-and-that”? Nobody can step off the time, you see, but I can step off the land, and then what is it? Does it even exist? In a mercantile sense? These questions and corollaries to them