A World by the Tale by the Tale by Randall Garrett (smallest ebook reader .TXT) ๐
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- Author: the Tale by Randall Garrett
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"Maybe," said McLeod. "But if they really wanted to cheat me, they could just pirate the book. There wouldn't be a thing I could do about it."
"Yeah. But to keep up their facade of high ethics, they toss us a sop. And we have to take whatever they hand out. You will take it, of course." It was more of an order than a question.
"I told him I'd think it over," McLeod said.
Jackson stood up. "Professor McLeod, the human race needs every Galactic credit it can lay its hands on. It's your duty to accept the offer, no matter how lousy it is. We have no choice in the matter. And a Galactic credit is worth ten dollars American, four pounds U.K., or forty rubles Soviet. If you sell a hundred thousand copies of your book, you can get yourself a meal in a fairly good restaurant and Earth will have one more Galactic credit stashed away. If you don't sell that many, you aren't out anything."
"I suppose not," McLeod said slowly. He knew that the Government could force him to take the offer. Under the Planetary Security Act, the Government had broad powersโvery broad.
"Well, that isn't my business right now," Jackson said. "I just wanted to find out what this was all about. You'll hear from us, Professor McLeod."
"I don't doubt it," said McLeod.
The six men filed out the door.
Alone, McLeod stared at the wall and thought.
Earth needed every Galactic credit it could get; that was certain. The trouble came in getting them.
Earth had absolutely nothing that the Galactics wanted. Well, not absolutely, maybe, but so near as made no difference. Certainly there was no basis for trade. As far as the Galactics were concerned, Earth was a little backwater planet that was of no importance. Nothing manufactured on the planet was of any use to Galactics. Nothing grown on Earth was of any commercial importance. They had sampled the animals and plants for scientific purposes, but there was no real commercial value in them. The Government had added a few credits to its meager collection when the animals had been taken, but the amount was small.
McLeod thought about the natives of New Guinea and decided that on the Galactic scale Earth was about in the same position. Except that there had at least been gold in New Guinea. The Galactics didn't have any interest in Earth's minerals; the elements were much more easily available in the asteroid belts that nearly every planetary system seemed to have.
The Galactics were by no means interested in bringing civilization to the barbarians of Earth, either. They had no missionaries to bring new religion, no do-gooders to "elevate the cultural level of the natives." They had no free handouts for anyone. If Earthmen wanted anything from them, the terms were cash on the barrelhead. Earth's credit rating in the Galactic equivalent of Dun & Bradstreet was triple-Z-zero.
A Galactic ship had, so to speak, stumbled over Earth fifteen years before. Like the English explorers of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, the Galactics seemed to feel that it was necessary to install one of their own people on a new-found planet, but they were not in the least interested in colonization nor in taking over Earth's government. The Galactic Resident was not in any sense a Royal Governor, and could hardly even be called an ambassador. He and his staffโa small one, kept more for company than for any necessary workโlived quietly by themselves in a house they'd built in Hawaii. Nobody knew what they did, and it didn't seem wise to ask.
The first Galactic Resident had been shot and killed by some religious nut. Less than twenty-four hours later, the Galactic Space Navyโif that was the proper termโhad come to claim the body. There were no recriminations, no reprisals. They came, "more in sorrow than in anger," to get the body. They came in a spaceship that was easily visible to the naked eye long before it hit the atmosphereโa sphere three kilometers in diameter. The missiles with thermonuclear warheads that were sent up to intercept the ship were detonated long before they touched the ship, and neither Galactics nor Earthmen ever mentioned them again. It had been the most frightening display of power ever seen on Earth, and the Galactics hadn't even threatened anyone. They just came to get a body.
Needless to say, there was little danger that they would ever have to repeat the performance.
The national governments of Earth had organized themselves hurriedly into the Terrestrial Union. Shaky at first, it had gained stability and power with the years. The first thing the Union Government had wanted to do was send an ambassador to the Galactic Government. The Galactic Resident had politely explained that their concept of government was different from ours, that ambassadors had no place in that concept, and, anyway, there was no capital to send one to. However, if Earth wanted to send an observer of some kind....
Earth did.
Fine. A statement of passenger fares was forthcoming; naturally, there were no regular passenger ships stopping at Earth and there would not be in the foreseeable future, but doubtless arrangements could be made to charter a vessel. It would be expensive, but....
If a New Guinea savage wants to take passage aboard a Qantas airliner, what is the fare in cowrie shells?
As far as McLeod knew, his book was the first thing ever produced on Earth that the Galactics were even remotely interested in. He had a higher opinion of the ethics of the Galactics than Jackson did, but a thousandth of a per cent seemed like pretty small royalties. And he couldn't for the life of him see why his book would interest a Galactic. Clem had explained that it gave Galactics a chance to see what they looked like through the eyes of an Earthman, but that seemed rather weak to McLeod.
Nevertheless, he knew he would take Clem's offer.
Eight months later, a shipload of Galactic tourists arrived. For a while, it looked as though Earth's credit problem might be solved. Tourism has always been a fine method for getting money from other countriesโespecially if one's own country is properly picturesque. Tourists always had money, didn't they? And they spend it freely, didn't they?
No.
Not in this case.
Earth had nothing to sell to the tourists.
Ever hear of baluts? The Melanesians of the South Pacific consider it a very fine delicacy. You take a fertilized duck egg and you bury it in the warm earth. Six months later, when it is nice and overripe, you dig it up again, knock the top off the shell the way you would a soft-boiled egg, and eat it. Then you pick the pinfeathers out of your teeth. Baluts.
Now you know how the greatest delicacies of Earth's restaurants affected the Galactics.
Earth was just a little too picturesque. The tourists enjoyed the sights, but they ate aboard their ship, which was evidently somewhat like a Caribbean cruise ship. And they bought nothing. They just looked.
And laughed.
And of course they all wanted to meet Professor John Hamish McLeod.
When the news leaked out and was thoroughly understood by Earth's population, there was an immediate reaction.
Editorial in Pravda:
The stupid book written by the American J. H. McLeod has made Earth a laughingstock throughout the galaxy. His inability to comprehend the finer nuances of Galactic Socialism has made all Earthmen look foolish. It is too bad that a competent Russian zoologist was not chosen for the trip that McLeod made; a man properly trained in the understanding of the historical forces of dialectic materialism would have realized that any Galactic society must of necessity be a Communist State, and would have interpreted it as such. The petty bourgeois mind of McLeod has made it impossible for any Earthman to hold up his head in the free Socialist society of the galaxy. Until this matter is corrected....
News item Manchester Guardian:
Professor James H. McLeod, the American zoologist whose book has apparently aroused a great deal of hilarity in Galactic circles, admitted today that both Columbia University and the American Museum of Natural History have accepted his resignation. The recent statement by a University spokesman that Professor McLeod had "besmirched the honor of Earthmen everywhere" was considered at least partially responsible for the resignations. (See editorial.)
Editorial, Manchester Guardian:
... It is a truism that an accepted wit has only to say, 'Pass the butter,' and everyone will laugh. Professor McLeod, however, far from being an accepted wit, seems rather to be in the position of a medieval Court Fool, who was laughed at rather than with. As a consequence, all Earthmen have been branded as Fools....
Statement made by the American Senator from Alabama:
"He has made us all look like jackasses in the eyes of the Galactics, and at this precarious time in human history it is my considered opinion that such actions are treasonous to the human race and to Earth and should be treated and considered as such!"
Book review, Literary Checklist, Helvar III, Bornis Cluster:
"Interstellar Ark, an Earthman's View of the Galaxy," translated from the original tongue by Vonis Delf, Cr. 5.00. This inexpensive little book is one of the most entertainingly funny publications in current print. The author, one John McLeod, is a member of a type 3-7B race inhabiting a planet in the Outer Fringes.... As an example of the unwitting humor of the book, we have only to quote the following:
"I was shown to my quarters shortly before takeoff. Captain Benarly had assigned me a spacious cabin which was almost luxurious in its furnishings. The bed was one of the most comfortable I have ever slept in."
Or the following:
"I found the members of the crew to be friendly and co-operative, especially Nern Cronzel, the ship's physician."
It is our prediction that this little gem will be enjoyed for a long time to come and will be a real money-maker for its publishers.
They haven't hanged me yet, McLeod thought. He sat in his apartment alone and realized that it would take very little to get him hanged.
How could one book have aroused such wrath? Even as he thought it, McLeod knew the answer to that question. It wasn't the book. No one who had read it two and a half years before had said anything against it.
No, it wasn't the book. It was the Galactic reaction to the book. Already feeling inferior because of the stand-offish attitude of the beings from the stars, the Homeric laughter of those same beings had been too much. It would have been bad enough if that laughter had been generated by one of the Galactics. To have had it generated by an Earthman made it that much worse. Against an Earthman, their rage was far from impotent.
Nobody understood why the book was funny, of course. The joke was over their heads, and that made human beings even angrier.
He remembered a quotation from a book he had read once. A member of some tribal-taboo cultureโAfrican or South Pacific, he forgot whichโhad been treated at a missionary hospital for something or other and had described his experience.
"The white witch doctor protects himself by wearing a little round mirror on his head which reflects back the evil spirits."
Could that savage have possibly understood what was humorous about that remark? No. Not even if you explained to him why the doctor used the mirror that way.
Now what? McLeod thought. He was out of a job and his bank account was running low. His credit rating had dropped to zero.
McLeod heard a key turn in the lock. The door swung open and Jackson entered with his squad of U.B.I. men.
"Hey!" said McLeod, jumping to his feet. "What do you think this is?"
"Shut up, McLeod," Jackson growled. "Get your coat. You're wanted at headquarters."
McLeod started to say something, then thought better of it. There was nothing he could say. Nobody would care if the U.B.I. manhandled him. Nobody would protest that his rights were being ignored. If McLeod got his teeth knocked in, Jackson would probably be voted a medal.
McLeod didn't say another word. He followed orders. He got his coat and was taken down to the big building on the East River which had begun its career as the United Nations Building.
He was bundled up to an office and shoved into a chair.
Somebody shoved a paper at him. "Sign this!"
"What is it?" McLeod asked, finding his voice.
"A receipt. For two thousand dollars. Sign it."
McLeod looked the paper over, then looked up at the burly man who had shoved it at him. "Fifty thousand Galactic credits! What is this for?"
"The royalty check for your unprintably qualified book has come in, Funny Man. The Government is taking ninety-eight per cent for income taxes. Sign!"
McLeod pushed the paper back across the
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