"'Jack Holloway found himself squinting, the orange sun full in his eyes. He\nraised a hand to push his hat forward, then lowered it to the controls to\nalter the pulse rate of the contragravity-field generators and lift the\nmanipulator another hundred feet. For a moment he sat, puffing on the\nshort pipe that had yellowed the corners of his white mustache, and looked\ndown at the red rag tied to a bush against the rock face of the gorge five\nhundred yards away. He was smiling in anticipation.\n\n\"This\'ll be a good one,\" he told himself aloud, in the manner of men who\nhave long been their own and only company. \"I want to see this one go up.\"\n\nHe always did. He could remember at least a thousand blast-shots he had\nfired back along the years and on more planets than he could name at the\nmoment, including a few thermonuclears, but they were all different and\nthey were always something to watch, even a little one like this. Flipping\nthe switch, his thumb found the discharger button and sent out a radio\nimpulse; the red rag vanished in an upsurge of smoke and dust that mounted\nout of the gorge and turned to copper when the sunlight touched it. The\nbig manipulator, weightless on contragravity, rocked gently; falling\ndebris pelted the trees and splashed in the little stream.\n\nHe waited till the machine stabilized, then glided it down to where he had\nripped a gash in the cliff with the charge of cataclysmite. Good shot:\nbrought down a lot of sandstone, cracked the vein of flint and hadn\'t\nthrown it around too much. A lot of big slabs were loose. Extending the\nforward claw-arms, he pulled and tugged, and then used the underside\ngrapples to pick up a chunk and drop it on the flat ground between the\ncliff and the stream. He dropped another chunk on it, breaking both of\nthem, and then another and another, until he had all he could work over\nthe rest of the day. Then he set down, got the toolbox and the\nlong-handled contragravity lifter, and climbed to the ground where he\nopened the box, put on gloves and an eyescreen and got out a microray\nscanner and a vibrohammer.\n\nThe first chunk he cracked off had nothing in it; the scanner gave the\nuninterrupted pattern of homogenous structure. Picking it up with the\nlifter, he swung it and threw it into the stream. On the fifteenth chunk,\nhe got an interruption pattern that told him that a sunstone--or\nsomething, probably something--was inside.\n\nSome fifty million years ago, when the planet that had been called\nZarathustra (for the last twenty-five million) was young, there had\nexisted a marine life form, something like a jellyfish. As these died,\nthey had sunk into the sea-bottom ooze; sand had covered the ooze and\npressed it tighter and tighter, until it had become glassy flint, and the\nentombed jellyfish little beans of dense stone. Some of them, by some\nancient biochemical quirk, were intensely thermofluorescent; worn as gems,\nthey glowed from the wearer\'s body heat.\n\nOn Terra or Baldur or Freya or Ishtar, a single cut of polished sunstone\nwas worth a small fortune. Even here, they brought respectable prices from\nthe Zarathustra Company\'s gem buyers. Keeping his point of expectation\nsafely low, he got a smaller vibrohammer from the toolbox and began\nchipping cautiously around the foreign object, until the flint split open\nand revealed a smooth yellow ellipsoid, half an inch long.\n\n\"Worth a thousand sols--if it\'s worth anything,\" he commented. A deft tap\nhere, another there, and the yellow bean came loose from the flint.\nPicking it up, he rubbed it between gloved palms. \"I don\'t think it is.\"\nHe rubbed harder, then held it against the hot bowl of his pipe. It still\ndidn\'t respond. He dropped it. \"Another jellyfish that didn\'t live right.\"\n\nBehind him, something moved in the brush with a dry rustling. He dropped\nthe loose glove from his right hand and turned, reaching toward his hip.\nThen he saw what had made the noise--a hard-shelled thing a foot in\nlength, with twelve legs, long antennae and two pairs of clawed mandibles.\nHe stopped and picked up a shard of flint, throwing it with an oath.\nAnother damned infernal land-prawn.\n\nHe detested land-prawns. They were horrible things, which, of course,\nwasn\'t their fault. More to the point, they were destructive. They got\ninto things at camp; they would try to eat anything. They crawled into\nmachinery, possibly finding the lubrication tasty, and caused jams. They\ncut into electric insulation. And they got into his bedding, and bit, or\nrather pinched, painfully. Nobody loved a land-prawn, not even another\nland-prawn.\n\nThis one dodged the thrown flint, scuttled off a few feet and turned,\nwaving its antennae in what looked like derision. Jack reached for his hip\nagain, then checked the motion. Pistol cartridges cost like crazy; they\nweren\'t to be wasted in fits of childish pique. Then he reflected that no\ncartridge fired at a target is really wasted, and that he hadn\'t done any\nshooting recently. Stooping again, he picked up another stone and tossed\nit a foot short and to the left of the prawn. As soon as it was out of his\nfingers, his hand went for the butt of the long automatic. It was out and\nthe safety off before the flint landed; as the prawn fled, he fired from\nthe hip. The quasi-crustacean disintegrated. He nodded pleasantly.\n\n\"Ol\' man Holloway\'s still hitting things he shoots at.\"\n\nWas a time, not so long ago, when he took his abilities for granted. Now\nhe was getting old enough to have to verify them. He thumbed on the safety\nand holstered the pistol, then picked up the glove and put it on again.\n\nNever saw so blasted many land-prawns as this summer. They\'d been bad last\nyear, but nothing like this. Even the oldtimers who\'d been on Zarathustra\nsince the first colonization said so. There\'d be some simple explanation,\nof course; something that would amaze him at his own obtuseness for not\nhaving seen it at once. Maybe the abnormally dry weather had something to\ndo with it. Or increase of something they ate, or decrease of natural\nenemies.\n\nHe\'d heard that land-prawns had no natural enemies; he questioned that.\nSomething killed them. He\'d seen crushed prawn shells, some of them close\nto his camp. Maybe stamped on by something with hoofs, and then picked\nclean by insects. He\'d ask Ben Rainsford; Ben ought to know.\n\nHalf an hour later, the scanner gave him another interruption pattern. He\nlaid it aside and took up the small vibrohammer. This time it was a large\nbean, light pink in color, He separated it from its matrix of flint and\nrubbed it, and instantly it began glowing.\n\n\"Ahhh! This is something like it, now!\"\n\nHe rubbed harder; warmed further on his pipe bowl, it fairly blazed.\nBetter than a thousand sols, he told himself. Good color, too. Getting his\ngloves off, he drew out the little leather bag from under his shirt,\nloosening the drawstrings by which it hung around his neck. There were a\ndozen and a half stones inside, all bright as live coals. He looked at\nthem for a moment, and dropped the new sunstone in among them, chuckling\nhappily.\n\n * * * * *\n\nVictor Grego, listening to his own recorded voice, rubbed the sunstone on\nhis left finger with the heel of his right palm and watched it brighten.\nThere was, he noticed, a boastful ring to his voice--not the suave,\nunemphatic tone considered proper on a message-tape. Well, if anybody\nwondered why, when they played that tape off six months from now in\nJohannesburg on Terra, they could look in the cargo holds of the ship that\nhad brought it across five hundred light-years of space. Ingots of gold\nand platinum and gadolinium. Furs and biochemicals and brandy. Perfumes\nthat defied synthetic imitation; hardwoods no plastic could copy. Spices.\nAnd the steel coffer full of sunstones. Almost all luxury goods, the only\nreally dependable commodities in interstellar trade.\n\nAnd he had spoken of other things. Veldbeest meat, up seven per cent from\nlast month, twenty per cent from last year, still in demand on a dozen\nplanets unable to produce Terran-type foodstuffs. Grain, leather, lumber.\nAnd he had added a dozen more items to the lengthening list of what\nZarathustra could now produce in adequate quantities and no longer needed\nto import. Not fishhooks and boot buckles, either--blasting explosives and\npropellants, contragravity-field generator parts, power tools,\npharmaceuticals, synthetic textiles. The Company didn\'t need to carry\nZarathustra any more; Zarathustra could carry the Company, and itself.\n\nFifteen years ago, when the Zarathustra Company had sent him here, there\nhad been a cluster of log and prefab huts beside an improvised landing\nfield, almost exactly where this skyscraper now stood. Today, Mallorysport\nwas a city of seventy thousand; in all, the planet had a population of\nnearly a million, and it was still growing. There were steel mills and\nchemical plants and reaction plants and machine works. They produced all\ntheir own fissionables, and had recently begun to export a little refined\nplutonium; they had even started producing collapsium shielding.\n\nThe recorded voice stopped. He ran back the spool, set for sixty-speed,\nand transmitted it to the radio office. In twenty minutes, a copy would be\naboard the ship that would hyper out for Terra that night. While he was\nfinishing, his communication screen buzzed.\n\n\"Dr. Kellogg\'s screening you, Mr. Grego,\" the girl in the outside office\ntold him.\n\nHe nodded. Her hands moved, and she vanished in a polychromatic explosion;\nwhen it cleared, the chief of the Division of Scientific Study and\nResearch was looking out of the screen instead. Looking slightly upward at\nthe showback over his own screen, Victor was getting his warm,\nsympathetic, sincere and slightly too toothy smile on straight.\n\n\"Hello, Leonard. Everything going all right?\"\n\nIt either was and Leonard Kellogg wanted more credit than he deserved or\nit wasn\'t and he was trying to get somebody else blamed for it before\nanybody could blame him.\n\n\"Good afternoon, Victor.\" Just the right shade of deference about using\nthe first name--big wheel to bigger wheel. \"Has Nick Emmert been talking\nto you about the Big Blackwater project today?\"\n\nNick was the Federation\'s resident-general; on Zarathustra he was, to all\nintents and purposes, the Terran Federation Government. He was also a\nlarge stockholder in the chartered Zarathustra Company.\n\n\"No. Is he likely to?\"\n\n\"Well, I wondered, Victor. He was on my screen just now. He says there\'s\nsome adverse talk about the effect on the rainfall in the Piedmont area of\nBeta Continent. He was worried about it.\"\n\n\"Well, it would affect the rainfall. After all, we drained half a million\nsquare miles of swamp, and the prevailing winds are from the west. There\'d\nbe less atmospheric moisture to the east of it. Who\'s talking adversely\nabout it, and what worries Nick?\"\n\n\"Well, Nick\'s afraid of the effect on public opinion on Terra. You know\nhow strong conservation sentiment is; everybody\'s very much opposed to any\nsort of destructive exploitation.\"\n\n\"Good Lord! The man doesn\'t call the creation of five hundred thousand\nsquare miles of new farmland destructive exploitation, does he?\"\n\n\"Well, no, Nick doesn\'t call it that; of course not. But he\'s concerned\nabout some garbled story getting to Terra about our upsetting the\necological balance and causing droughts. Fact is, I\'m rather concerned\nmyself.\"\n\nHe knew what was worrying both of them. Emmert was afraid the Federation\nColonial Office would blame him for drawing fire on them from the\nconservationists. Kellogg was afraid he\'d be blamed for not predicting the\neffects before his division endorsed the project. As a division chief, he\nhad advanced as far as he would in the Company hierarchy; now he was on a\nRed Queen\'s racetrack, running like hell to stay in the same place.\n\n\"The rainfall\'s dropped ten per cent from last year, and fifteen per cent\nfrom the year before that,\" Kellogg was saying. \"And some non-Company\npeople have gotten hold of it, and so had Interworld News. Why, even some\nof my people are talking about ecological side-effects. You know what will\nhappen when a story like that gets back to Terra. The conservation\nfanatics will get hold of it, and the Company\'ll be criticized.\"\n\nThat would hurt Leonard. He identified himself with the Company. It was\nsomething bigger and more powerful than he was, like God.\n\nVictor Grego identified the Company with himself. It was something big and\npowerful, like a vehicle, and he was at the controls.\n\n\"Leonard, a little criticism won\'t hurt the Company,\" he said. \"Not where\nit matters, on the dividends. I\'m afraid you\'re too sensitive to\ncriticism. Where did Emmert get this story anyhow? From your people?\"\n\n\"No, absolutely not, Victor. That\'s what worries him. It was this man\nRainsford who started it.\"\n\n\"Rainsford?\"\n\n\"Dr. Bennett Rainsford, the naturalist. Institute of Zeno-Sciences. I\nnever trusted any of those people; they always poke their noses into\nthings, and the Institute always reports their findings to the Colonial\nOffice.\"\n\n\"I know who you mean now; little fellow with red whiskers, always looks as\nthough he\'d been sleeping in his clothes. Why, of course the Zeno-Sciences\npeople poke their noses into things, and of course they report their\nfindings to the government.\" He was beginning to lose patience. \"I don\'t\nsee what all this is about, Leonard. This man Rainsford just made a\nroutine observation of meteorological effects. I suggest you have your\nmeteorologists check it, and if it\'s correct pass it on to the news\nservices along with your other scientific findings.\"\n\n\"Nick Emmert thinks Rainsford is a Federation undercover agent.\"\n\nThat made him laugh. Of course there were undercover agents on\nZarathustra, hundreds of them. The Company had people here checking on\nhim; he knew and accepted that. So did the big stockholders, like\nInterstellar Explorations and the Banking Cartel and Terra Baldur-Marduk\nSpacelines. Nick Emmert had his corps of spies and stool pigeons, and the\nTerran Federation had people here watching both him and Emmert. Rainsford\ncould be a Federation agent--a roving naturalist would have a wonderful\ncover occupation. But this Big Blackwater business was so utterly silly.\nNick Emmert had too much graft on his conscience; it was too bad that\noverloaded consciences couldn\'t blow fuses.\n\n\"Suppose he is, Leonard. What could he report on us? We are a chartered\ncompany, and we have an excellent legal department, which keeps us safely\ninside our charter. It is a very liberal charter, too. This is a Class-III\nuninhabited planet; the Company owns the whole thing outright. We can do\nanything we want as long as we don\'t violate colonial law or the\nFederation Constitution. As long as we don\'t do that, Nick Emmert hasn\'t\nanything to worry about. Now forget this whole damned business, Leonard!\"\nHe was beginning to speak sharply, and Kellogg was looking hurt. \"I know\nyou were concerned about injurious reports getting back to Terra, and that\nwas quite commendable, but....\"\n\nBy the time he got through, Kellogg was happy again. Victor blanked the\nscreen, leaned back in his chair and began laughing. In a moment, the\nscreen buzzed again. When he snapped it on, his screen-girl said:\n\n\"Mr. Henry Stenson\'s on, Mr. Grego.\"\n\n\"Well, put him on.\" He caught himself just before adding that it would be\na welcome change to talk to somebody with sense.\n\nThe face that appeared was elderly and thin; the mouth was tight, and\nthere were squint-wrinkles at the corners of the eyes.\n\n\"Well, Mr. Stenson. Good of you to call. How are you?\"\n\n\"Very well, thank you. And you?\" When he also admitted to good health, the\ncaller continued: \"How is the globe running? Still in synchronization?\"\n\nVictor looked across the office at his most prized possession, the big\nglobe of Zarathustra that Henry Stenson had built for him, supported six\nfeet from the floor on its own contragravity unit, spotlighted in orange\nto represent the KO sun, its two satellites circling about it as it\nrevolved slowly.\n\n\"The globe itself is keeping perfect time, and Darius is all right, Xerxes\nis a few seconds of longitude ahead of true position.\"\n\n\"That\'s dreadful, Mr. Grego!\" Stenson was deeply shocked. \"I must adjust\nthat the first thing tomorrow. I should have called to check on it long\nago, but you know how it is. So many things to do, and so little time.\"\n\n\"I find the same trouble myself, Mr. Stenson.\" They chatted for a while,\nand then Stenson apologized for taking up so much of Mr. Grego\'s valuable\ntime. What he meant was that his own time, just as valuable to him, was\nwasting. After the screen blanked, Grego sat looking at it for a moment,\nwishing he had a hundred men like Henry Stenson in his own organization.\nJust men with Stenson\'s brains and character; wishing for a hundred\ninstrument makers with Stenson\'s skills would have been unreasonable, even\nfor wishing. There was only one Henry Stenson, just as there had been only\none Antonio Stradivari. Why a man like that worked in a little shop on a\nfrontier planet like Zarathustra....\n\nThen he looked, pridefully, at the globe. Alpha Continent had moved slowly\nto the right, with the little speck that represented Mallorysport\ntwinkling in the orange light. Darius, the inner moon, where the\nTerra-Baldur-Marduk Spacelines had their leased terminal, was almost\ndirectly over it, and the other moon, Xerxes, was edging into sight.\nXerxes was the one thing about Zarathustra that the Company didn\'t own;\nthe Terran Federation had retained that as a naval base. It was the one\nreminder that there was something bigger and more powerful than the\nCompany.\n\n * * * * *\n\nGerd van Riebeek saw Ruth Ortheris leave the escalator, step aside and\nstand looking around the cocktail lounge. He set his glass, with its inch\nof tepid highball, on the bar; when her eyes shifted in his direction, he\nwaved to her, saw her brighten and wave back and then went to meet her.\nShe gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, dodged when he reached for her and\ntook his arm.\n\n\"Drink before we eat?\" he asked.\n\n\"Oh, Lord, yes! I\'ve just about had it for today.\"\n\nHe guided her toward one of the bartending machines, inserted his credit\nkey, and put a four-portion jug under the spout, dialing the cocktail they\nalways had when they drank together. As he did, he noticed what she was\nwearing: short black jacket, lavender neckerchief, light gray skirt. Not\nher usual vacation get-up.\n\n\"School department drag you back?\" he asked as the jug filled.\n\n\"Juvenile court.\" She got a couple of glasses from the shelf under the\nmachine as he picked up the jug. \"A fifteen-year-old burglar.\"\n\nThey found a table at the rear of the room, out of the worst of the\ncocktail-hour uproar. As soon as he filled her glass, she drank half of\nit, then lit a cigarette.\n\n\"Junktown?\" he asked.\n\nShe nodded. \"Only twenty-five years since this planet was discovered, and\nwe have slums already. I was over there most of the afternoon, with a pair\nof city police.\" She didn\'t seem to want to talk about it. \"What were you\ndoing today?\"\n\n\"Ruth, you ought to ask Doc Mallin to drop in on Leonard Kellogg sometime,\nand give him an unobstusive going over.\"\n\n\"You haven\'t been having trouble with him again?\" she asked anxiously.\n\nHe made a face, and then tasted his drink. \"It\'s trouble just being around\nthat character. Ruth, to use one of those expressions your profession\ndeplores, Len Kellogg is just plain nuts!\" He drank some more of his\ncocktail and helped himself to one of her cigarettes. \"Here,\" he\ncontinued, after lighting it. \"A couple of days ago, he told me he\'d been\ngetting inquiries about this plague of land-prawns they\'re having over on\nBeta. He wanted me to set up a research project to find out why and what\nto do about it.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"I did. I made two screen calls, and then I wrote a report and sent it up\nto him. That was where I jerked my trigger; I ought to have taken a couple\nof weeks and made a real production out of it.\"\n\n\"What did you tell him?\"\n\n\"The facts. The limiting factor on land-prawn increase is the weather. The\neggs hatch underground and the immature prawns dig their way out in the\nspring. If there\'s been a lot of rain, most of them drown in their holes\nor as soon as they emerge. According to growth rings on trees, last spring\nwas the driest in the Beta Piedmont in centuries, so most of them\nsurvived, and as they\'re parthenogenetic females, they all laid eggs. This\nspring, it was even drier, so now they have land prawns all over central\nBeta. And I don\'t know that anything can be done about them.\"\n\n\"Well, did he think you were just guessing?\"\n\nHe shook his head in exasperation. \"I don\'t know what he thinks. You\'re\nthe psychologist, you try to figure it. I sent him that report yesterday\nmorning. He seemed quite satisfied with it at the time. Today, just after\nnoon, he sent for me and told me it wouldn\'t do at all. Tried to insist\nthat the rainfall on Beta had been normal. That was silly; I referred him\nto his meteorologists and climatologists, where I\'d gotten my information.\nHe complained that the news services were after him for an explanation. I\ntold him I\'d given him the only explanation there was. He said he simply\ncouldn\'t use it. There had to be some other explanation.\"\n\n\"If you don\'t like the facts, you ignore them, and if you need facts,\ndream up some you do like,\" she said. \"That\'s typical rejection of\nreality. Not psychotic, not even psychoneurotic. But certainly not sane.\"\nShe had finished her first drink and was sipping slowly at her second.\n\"You know, this is interesting. Does he have some theory that would\ndisqualify yours?\"\n\n\"Not that I know of. I got the impression that he just didn\'t want the\nsubject of rainfall on Beta discussed at all.\"\n\n\"That is odd. Has anything else peculiar been happening over on Beta\nlately?\"\n\n\"No. Not that I know of,\" he repeated. \"Of course, that swamp-drainage\nproject over there was what caused the dry weather, last year and this\nyear, but I don\'t see....\" His own glass was empty, and when he tilted the\njug over it, a few drops trickled out. He looked at his watch. \"Think we\ncould have another cocktail before dinner?\" he asked.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nJack Holloway landed the manipulator in front of the cluster of prefab\nhuts. For a moment he sat still, realizing that he was tired, and then he\nclimbed down from the control cabin and crossed the open grass to the door\nof the main living hut, opening it and reaching in to turn on the lights.\nThen he hesitated, looking up at Darius.\n\nThere was a wide ring around it, and he remembered noticing the wisps of\ncirrus clouds gathering overhead through the afternoon. Maybe it would\nrain tonight. This dry weather couldn\'t last forever. He\'d been letting\nthe manipulator stand out overnight lately. He decided to put it in the\nhangar. He went and opened the door of the vehicle shed, got back onto the\nmachine and floated it inside. When he came back to the living hut, he saw\nthat he had left the door wide open.\n\n\"Damn fool!\" he rebuked himself. \"Place could be crawling with prawns by\nnow.\"\n\nHe looked quickly around the living room--under the big combination desk\nand library table, under the gunrack, under the chairs, back of the\ncommunication screen and the viewscreen, beyond the metal cabinet of the\nmicrofilm library--and saw nothing. Then he hung up his hat, took off his\npistol and laid it on the table, and went back to the bathroom to wash his\nhands.\n\nAs soon as he put on the light, something inside the shower stall said,\n\"_Yeeeek!_\" in a startled voice.\n\nHe turned quickly to see two wide eyes staring up at him out of a ball of\ngolden fur. Whatever it was, it had a round head and big ears and a\nvaguely humanoid face with a little snub nose. It was sitting on its\nhaunches, and in that position it was about a foot high. It had two tiny\nhands with opposing thumbs. He squatted to have a better look at it.\n\n\"Hello there, little fellow,\" he greeted it. \"I never saw anything like\nyou before. What are you anyhow?\"\n\nThe small creature looked at him seriously and said, \"Yeek,\" in a timid\nvoice.\n\n\"Why, sure; you\'re a Little Fuzzy, that\'s what you are.\"\n\nHe moved closer, careful to make no alarmingly sudden movements, and kept\non talking to it.\n\n\"Bet you slipped in while I left the door open. Well, if a Little Fuzzy\nfinds a door open, I\'d like to know why he shouldn\'t come in and look\naround.\"\n\nHe touched it gently. It started to draw back, then reached out a little\nhand and felt the material of his shirt-sleeve. He stroked it, and told it\nthat it had the softest, silkiest fur ever. Then he took it on his lap. It\nyeeked in pleasure, and stretched an arm up around his neck.\n\n\"Why, sure; we\'re going to be good friends, aren\'t we? Would you like\nsomething to eat? Well, suppose you and I go see what we can find.\"\n\nHe put one hand under it, to support it like a baby--at least, he seemed\nto recall having seen babies supported in that way; babies were things he\ndidn\'t fool with if he could help it--and straightened. It weighed between\nfifteen and twenty pounds. At first, it struggled in panic, then quieted\nand seemed to enjoy being carried. In the living room he sat down in his\nfavorite armchair, under a standing lamp, and examined his new\nacquaintance.\n\nIt was a mammal--there was a fairly large mammalian class on\nZarathustra--but beyond that he was stumped. It wasn\'t a primate, in the\nTerran sense. It wasn\'t like anything Terran, or anything else on\nZarathustra. Being a biped put it in a class by itself for this planet. It\nwas just a Little Fuzzy, and that was the best he could do.\n\nThat sort of nomenclature was the best anybody could do on a Class-III\nplanet. On a Class-IV planet, say Loki, or Shesha, or Thor, naming animals\nwas a cinch. You pointed to something and asked a native, and he\'d gargle\na mouthful of syllables at you, which might only mean, \"Whaddaya wanna\nknow for?\" and you took it down in phonetic alphabet and the whatzit had a\nname. But on Zarathustra, there were no natives to ask. So this was a\nLittle Fuzzy.\n\n\"What would you like to eat, Little Fuzzy?\" he asked. \"Open your mouth,\nand let Pappy Jack see what you have to chew with.\"\n\nLittle Fuzzy\'s dental equipment, allowing for the fact that his jaw was\nrounder, was very much like his own.\n\n\"You\'re probably omnivorous. How would you like some nice Terran\nFederation Space Forces Emergency Ration, Extraterrestrial, Type Three?\"\nhe asked.\n\nLittle Fuzzy made what sounded like an expression of willingness to try\nit. It would be safe enough; Extee Three had been fed to a number of\nZarathustran mammals without ill effects. He carried Little Fuzzy out into\nthe kitchen and put him on the floor, then got out a tin of the field\nration and opened it, breaking off a small piece and handing it down.\nLittle Fuzzy took the piece of golden-brown cake, sniffed at it, gave a\ndelighted yeek and crammed the whole piece in his mouth.\n\n\"You never had to live on that stuff and nothing else for a month, that\'s\nfor sure!\"\n\nHe broke the cake in half and broke one half into manageable pieces and\nput it down on a saucer. Maybe Little Fuzzy would want a drink, too. He\nstarted to fill a pan with water, as he would for a dog, then looked at\nhis visitor sitting on his haunches eating with both hands and changed his\nmind. He rinsed a plastic cup cap from an empty whisky bottle and put it\ndown beside a deep bowl of water. Little Fuzzy was thirsty, and he didn\'t\nhave to be shown what the cup was for.\n\nIt was too late to get himself anything elaborate; he found some leftovers\nin the refrigerator and combined them into a stew. While it was heating,\nhe sat down at the kitchen table and lit his pipe. The spurt of flame from\nthe lighter opened Little Fuzzy\'s eyes, but what really awed him was Pappy\nJack blowing smoke. He sat watching this phenomenon, until, a few minutes\nlater, the stew was hot and the pipe was laid aside; then Little Fuzzy\nwent back to nibbling Extee Three.\n\nSuddenly he gave a yeek of petulance and scampered into the living room.\nIn a moment, he was back with something elongated and metallic which he\nlaid on the floor beside him.\n\n\"What have you got there, Little Fuzzy? Let Pappy Jack see?\"\n\nThen he recognized it as his own one-inch wood chisel. He remembered\nleaving it in the outside shed after doing some work about a week ago, and\nnot being able to find it when he had gone to look for it. That had\nworried him; people who got absent-minded about equipment didn\'t last long\nin the wilderness. After he finished eating and took the dishes to the\nsink, he went over and squatted beside his new friend.\n\n\"Let Pappy Jack look at it, Little Fuzzy,\" he said. \"Oh, I\'m not going to\ntake it away from you. I just want to see it.\"\n\nThe edge was dulled and nicked; it had been used for a lot of things wood\nchisels oughtn\'t to be used for. Digging, and prying, and most likely, it\nhad been used as a weapon. It was a handy-sized, all-purpose tool for a\nLittle Fuzzy. He laid it on the floor where he had gotten it and started\nwashing the dishes.\n\nLittle Fuzzy watched him with interest for a while, and then he began\ninvestigating the kitchen. Some of the things he wanted to investigate had\nto be taken away from him; at first that angered him, but he soon learned\nthat there were things he wasn\'t supposed to have. Eventually, the dishes\ngot washed.\n\nThere were more things to investigate in the living room. One of them was\nthe wastebasket. He found that it could be dumped, and promptly dumped it,\npulling out everything that hadn\'t fallen out. He bit a corner off a sheet\nof paper, chewed on it and spat it out in disgust. Then he found that\ncrumpled paper could be flattened out and so he flattened a few sheets,\nand then discovered that it could also be folded. Then he got himself\ngleefully tangled in a snarl of wornout recording tape. Finally he lost\ninterest and started away. Jack caught him and brought him back.\n\n\"No, Little Fuzzy,\" he said. \"You do not dump wastebaskets and then walk\naway from them. You put things back in.\" He touched the container and\nsaid, slowly and distinctly, \"Waste ... basket.\" Then he righted it, doing\nit as Little Fuzzy would have to, and picked up a piece of paper, tossing\nit in from Little Fuzzy\'s shoulder height. Then he handed Little Fuzzy a\nwad of paper and repeated, \"Waste ... basket.\"\n\nLittle Fuzzy looked at him and said something that sounded as though it\nmight be: \"What\'s the matter with you, Pappy; you crazy or something?\"\nAfter a couple more tries, however, he got it, and began throwing things\nin. In a few minutes, he had everything back in except a brightly colored\nplastic cartridge box and a wide-mouthed bottle with a screw cap. He held\nthese up and said, \"Yeek?\"\n\n\"Yes, you can have them. Here; let Pappy Jack show you something.\"\n\nHe showed Little Fuzzy how the box could be opened and shut. Then, holding\nit where Little Fuzzy could watch, he unscrewed the cap and then screwed\nit on again.\n\n\"There, now. You try it.\"\n\nLittle Fuzzy looked up inquiringly, then took the bottle, sitting down and\nholding it between his knees. Unfortunately, he tried twisting it the\nwrong way and only screwed the cap on tighter. He yeeked plaintively.\n\n\"No, go ahead. You can do it.\"\n\nLittle Fuzzy looked at the bottle again. Then he tried twisting the cap\nthe other way, and it loosened. He gave a yeek that couldn\'t possibly be\nanything but \"Eureka!\" and promptly took it off, holding it up. After\nbeing commended, he examined both the bottle and the cap, feeling the\nthreads, and then screwed the cap back on again.\n\n\"You know, you\'re a smart Little Fuzzy.\" It took a few seconds to realize\njust how smart. Little Fuzzy had wondered why you twisted the cap one way\nto take it off and the other way to put it on, and he had found out. For\npure reasoning ability, that topped anything in the way of animal\nintelligence he\'d ever seen. \"I\'m going to tell Ben Rainsford about you.\"\n\nGoing to the communication screen, he punched out the wave-length\ncombination of the naturalist\'s camp, seventy miles down Snake River from\nthe mouth of Cold Creek. Rainsford\'s screen must have been on automatic;\nit lit as soon as he was through punching. There was a card set up in\nfront of it, lettered: AWAY ON TRIP, BACK THE FIFTEENTH. RECORDER ON.\n\n\"Ben, Jack Holloway,\" he said. \"I just ran into something interesting.\" He\nexplained briefly what it was. \"I hope he stays around till you get back.\nHe\'s totally unlike anything I\'ve ever seen on this planet.\"\n\nLittle Fuzzy was disappointed when Jack turned off the screen; that had\nbeen interesting. He picked him up and carried him over to the armchair,\ntaking him on his lap.\n\n\"Now,\" he said, reaching for the control panel of the viewscreen. \"Watch\nthis; we\'re going to see something nice.\"\n\nWhen he put on the screen, at random, he got a view, from close up, of the\ngreat fires that were raging where the Company people were burning off the\ndead forests on what used to be Big Blackwater Swamp. Little Fuzzy cried\nout in alarm, flung his arms around Pappy Jack\'s neck and buried his face\nin the bosom of his shirt. Well, forest fires started from lightning\nsometimes, and they\'d be bad things for a Little Fuzzy. He worked the\nselector and got another pickup, this time on the top of Company House in\nMallorysport, three time zones west, with the city spread out below and\nthe sunset blazing in the west. Little Fuzzy stared at it in wonder. It\nwas pretty impressive for a little fellow who\'d spent all his life in the\nbig woods.\n\nSo was the spaceport, and a lot of other things he saw, though a view of\nthe planet as a whole from Darius puzzled him considerably. Then, in the\nmiddle of a symphony orchestra concert from Mallorysport Opera House, he\nwriggled loose, dropped to the floor and caught up his wood chisel,\nswinging it back over his shoulder like a two-handed sword.\n\n\"What the devil? Oh-oh!\"\n\nA land-prawn, which must have gotten in while the door was open, was\ncrossing the living room. Little Fuzzy ran after and past it, pivoted and\nbrought the corner of the chisel edge down on the prawn\'s neck, neatly\nbeheading it. He looked at his victim for a moment, then slid the chisel\nunder it and flopped it over on its back, slapping it twice with the flat\nand cracking the undershell. The he began pulling the dead prawn apart,\ntearing out pieces of meat and eating them delicately. After disposing of\nthe larger chunks, he used the chisel to chop off one of the prawn\'s\nmandibles to use as a pick to get at the less accessible morsels. When he\nhad finished, he licked his fingers clean and started back to the\narmchair.\n\n\"No.\" Jack pointed at the prawn shell. \"Wastebasket.\"\n\n\"Yeek?\"\n\n\"Wastebasket.\"\n\nLittle Fuzzy gathered up the bits of shell, putting them where they\nbelonged. Then he came back and climbed up on Pappy Jack\'s lap, and looked\nat things in the screen until he fell asleep.\n\nJack lifted him carefully and put him down on the warm chair seat without\nwakening him, then went to the kitchen, poured himself a drink and brought\nit in to the big table, where he lit his pipe and began writing up his\ndiary for the day. After a while, Little Fuzzy woke, found that the lap he\nhad gone to sleep on had vanished, and yeeked disconsolately.\n\nA folded blanket in one corner of the bedroom made a satisfactory bed,\nonce Little Fuzzy had assured himself that there were no bugs in it. He\nbrought in his bottle and his plastic box and put them on the floor beside\nit. Then he ran to the front door in the living room and yeeked to be let\nout. Going about twenty feet from the house, he used the chisel to dig a\nsmall hole, and after it had served its purpose he filled it in carefully\nand came running back.\n\nWell, maybe Fuzzies were naturally gregarious, and were\nhomemakers--den-holes, or nests, or something like that. Nobody wants\nmesses made in the house, and when the young ones did it, their parents\nwould bang them around to teach them better manners. This was Little\nFuzzy\'s home now; he knew how he ought to behave in it.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe next morning at daylight, he was up on the bed, trying to dig Pappy\nJack out from under the blankets. Besides being a most efficient\nland-prawn eradicator, he made a first rate alarm clock. But best of all,\nhe was Pappy Jack\'s Little Fuzzy. He wanted out; this time Jack took his\nmovie camera and got the whole operation on film. One thing, there\'d have\nto be a little door, with a spring to hold it shut, that little Fuzzy\ncould operate himself. That was designed during breakfast. It only took a\ncouple of hours to make and install it; Little Fuzzy got the idea as soon\nas he saw it, and figured out how to work it for himself.\n\nJack went back to the workshop, built a fire on the hand forge and forged\na pointed and rather broad blade, four inches long, on the end of a foot\nof quarter-inch round tool-steel. It was too point-heavy when finished, so\nhe welded a knob on the other end to balance it. Little Fuzzy knew what\nthat was for right away; running outside, he dug a couple of practice\nholes with it, and then began casting about in the grass for land-prawns.\n\nJack followed him with the camera and got movies of a couple of prawn\nkillings, accomplished with smooth, by-the-numbers precision. Little Fuzzy\nhadn\'t learned that chop-clap-clap routine in the week since he had found\nthe wood chisel.\n\nGoing into the shed, he hunted for something without more than a general\nidea of what it would look like, and found it where Little Fuzzy had\ndiscarded it when he found the chisel. It was a stock of hardwood a foot\nlong, rubbed down and polished smooth, apparently with sandstone. There\nwas a paddle at one end, with enough of an edge to behead a prawn, and the\nother end had been worked to a point. He took it into the living hut and\nsat down at the desk to examine it with a magnifying glass. Bits of soil\nembedded in the sharp end--that had been used as a pick. The paddle end\nhad been used as a shovel, beheader and shell-cracker. Little Fuzzy had\nknown exactly what he wanted when he\'d started making that thing, he\'d\nkept on until it was as perfect as possible, and had stopped short of\nspoiling it by overrefinement.\n\nFinally, Jack put it away in the top drawer of the desk. He was thinking\nabout what to get for lunch when Little Fuzzy burst into the living room,\nclutching his new weapon and yeeking excitedly.\n\n\"What\'s the matter, kid? You got troubles?\" He rose and went to the\ngunrack, picking down a rifle and checking the chamber. \"Show Pappy Jack\nwhat it is.\"\n\nLittle Fuzzy followed him to the big door for human-type people, ready to\nbolt back inside if necessary.\n\nThe trouble was a harpy--a thing about the size and general design of a\nTerran Jurassic pterodactyl, big enough to take a Little Fuzzy at one\nmouthful. It must have made one swoop at him already, and was circling\nback for another. It ran into a 6-mm rifle bullet, went into a backward\nloop and dropped like a stone.\n\nLittle Fuzzy made a very surprised remark, looked at the dead harpy for a\nmoment and then spotted the ejected empty cartridge. He grabbed it and\nheld it up, asking if he could have it. When told that he could, he ran\nback to the bedroom with it. When he returned, Pappy Jack picked him up\nand carried him to the hangar and up into the control cabin of the\nmanipulator.\n\nThe throbbing of the contragravity-field generator and the sense of rising\nworried him at first, but after they had picked up the harpy with the\ngrapples and risen to five hundred feet he began to enjoy the ride. They\ndropped the harpy a couple of miles up what the latest maps were\ndesignating as Holloway\'s Run, and then made a wide circle back over the\nmountains. Little Fuzzy thought it was fun.\n\nAfter lunch, Little Fuzzy had a nap on Pappy Jack\'s bed. Jack took the\nmanipulator up to the diggings, put off a couple more shots, uncovered\nmore flint and found another sunstone. It wasn\'t often that he found\nstones on two successive days. When he returned to the camp, Little Fuzzy\nwas picking another land-prawn apart in front of the living hut.\n\nAfter dinner--Little Fuzzy liked cooked food, too, if it wasn\'t too\nhot--they went into the living room. He remembered having seen a bolt and\nnut in the desk drawer when he had been putting the wooden prawn-killer\naway, and he got it out, showing it to Little Fuzzy. Little Fuzzy studied\nit for a moment, then ran into the bedroom and came back with his\nscrew-top bottle. He took the top off, put it on again and then screwed\nthe nut off the bolt, holding it up.\n\n\"See, Pappy?\" Or yeeks to that effect. \"Nothing to it.\"\n\nThen he unscrewed the bottle top, dropped the bolt inside after replacing\nthe nut and screwed the cap on again.\n\n\"Yeek,\" he said, with considerable self-satisfaction.\n\nHe had a right to be satisfied with himself. What he\'d been doing had been\ngeneralizing. Bottle tops and nuts belonged to the general class of\nthings-that-screwed-onto-things. To take them off, you turned left; to put\nthem on again, you turned right, after making sure that the threads\nengaged. And since he could conceive of right- and left-handedness, that\nmight mean that he could think of properties apart from objects, and that\nwas forming abstract ideas. Maybe that was going a little far, but....\n\n\"You know, Pappy Jack\'s got himself a mighty smart Little Fuzzy. Are you a\ngrown-up Little Fuzzy, or are you just a baby Little Fuzzy? Shucks, I\'ll\nbet you\'re Professor Doctor Fuzzy.\"\n\nHe wondered what to give the professor, if that was what he was, to work\non next, and he doubted the wisdom of teaching him too much about taking\nthings apart, just at present. Sometime he might come home and find\nsomething important taken apart, or, worse, taken apart and put together\nincorrectly. Finally, he went to a closet, rummaging in it until he found\na tin canister. By the time he returned, Little Fuzzy had gotten up on the\nchair, found his pipe in the ashtray and was puffing on it and coughing.\n\n\"Hey, I don\'t think that\'s good for you!\"\n\nHe recovered the pipe, wiped the stem on his shirt-sleeve and put it in\nhis mouth, then placed the canister on the floor, and put Little Fuzzy on\nthe floor beside it. There were about ten pounds of stones in it. When he\nhad first settled here, he had made a collection of the local minerals,\nand, after learning what he\'d wanted to, he had thrown them out, all but\ntwenty or thirty of the prettiest specimens. He was glad, now, that he had\nkept these.\n\nLittle Fuzzy looked the can over, decided that the lid was a member of\nthe class of things-that-screwed-onto-things and got it off. The inside\nof the lid was mirror-shiny, and it took him a little thought to discover\nthat what he saw in it was only himself. He yeeked about that, and looked\ninto the can. This, he decided, belonged to the class of\nthings-that-can-be-dumped, like wastebaskets, so he dumped it on the\nfloor. Then he began examining the stones and sorting them by color.\n\nExcept for an interest in colorful views on the screen, this was the first\nreal evidence that Fuzzies possessed color perception. He proceeded to\ngive further and more impressive proof, laying out the stones by shade, in\ncorrect spectral order, from a lump of amethystlike quartz to a dark red\nstone. Well, maybe he\'d seen rainbows. Maybe he\'d lived near a big misty\nwaterfall, where there was always a rainbow when the sun was shining. Or\nmaybe that was just his natural way of seeing colors.\n\nThen, when he saw what he had to work with, he began making arrangements\nwith them, laying them out in odd circular and spiral patterns. Each time\nhe finished a pattern, he would yeek happily to call attention to it, sit\nand look at it for a while, and then take it apart and start a new one.\nLittle Fuzzy was capable of artistic gratification too. He made useless\nthings, just for the pleasure of making and looking at them.\n\nFinally, he put the stones back into the tin, put the lid on and rolled it\ninto the bedroom, righting it beside his bed along with his other\ntreasures. The new weapon he laid on the blanket beside him when he went\nto bed.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe next morning, Jack broke up a whole cake of Extee Three and put it\ndown, filled the bowl with water, and, after making sure he had left\nnothing lying around that Little Fuzzy could damage or on which he might\nhurt himself, took the manipulator up to the diggings. He worked all\nmorning, cracking nearly a ton and a half of flint, and found nothing.\nThen he set off a string of shots, brought down an avalanche of sandstone\nand exposed more flint, and sat down under a pool-ball tree to eat his\nlunch.\n\nHalf an hour after he went back to work, he found the fossil of some\njellyfish that hadn\'t eaten the right things in the right combinations,\nbut a little later, he found four nodules, one after another, and two of\nthem were sunstones; four or five chunks later, he found a third. Why,\nthis must be the Dying Place of the Jellyfish! By late afternoon, when he\nhad cleaned up all his loose flint, he had nine, including one deep red\nmonster an inch in diameter. There must have been some convection current\nin the ancient ocean that had swirled them all into this one place. He\nconsidered setting off some more shots, decided that it was too late and\nreturned to camp.\n\n\"Little Fuzzy!\" he called, opening the living-room door. \"Where are you,\nLittle Fuzzy? Pappy Jack\'s rich; we\'re going to celebrate!\"\n\nSilence. He called again; still no reply or scamper of feet. Probably\ncleaned up all the prawns around the camp and went hunting farther out\ninto the woods, thought Jack. Unbuckling his gun and dropping it onto the\ntable, he went out to the kitchen. Most of the Extee Three was gone. In\nthe bedroom, he found that Little Fuzzy had dumped the stones out of the\nbiscuit tin and made an arrangement, and laid the wood chisel in a neat\ndiagonal across the blanket.\n\nAfter getting dinner assembled and in the oven, he went out and called for\na while, then mixed a highball and took it into the living room, sitting\ndown with it to go over his day\'s findings. Rather incredulously, he\nrealized that he had cracked out at least seventy-five thousand sols\'\nworth of stones today. He put them into the bag and sat sipping the\nhighball and thinking pleasant thoughts until the bell on the stove warned\nhim that dinner was ready.\n\nHe ate alone--after all the years he had been doing that contentedly, it\nhad suddenly become intolerable--and in the evening he dialed through his\nmicro-film library, finding only books he had read and reread a dozen\ntimes, or books he kept for reference. Several times he thought he heard\nthe little door open, but each time he was mistaken. Finally he went to\nbed.\n\nAs soon as he woke, he looked across at the folded blanket, but the wood\nchisel was still lying athwart it. He put down more Extee Three and\nchanged the water in the bowl before leaving for the diggings. That day he\nfound three more sunstones, and put them in the bag mechanically and\nwithout pleasure. He quit work early and spent over an hour spiraling\naround the camp, but saw nothing. The Extee Three in the kitchen was\nuntouched.\n\nMaybe the little fellow ran into something too big for him, even with his\nfine new weapon--a hobthrush, or a bush-goblin, or another harpy. Or maybe\nhe\'d just gotten tired staying in one place, and had moved on.\n\nNo; he\'d liked it here. He\'d had fun, and been happy. He shook his head\nsadly. Once he, too, had lived in a pleasant place, where he\'d had fun,\nand could have been happy if he hadn\'t thought there was something he\'d\nhad to do. So he had gone away, leaving grieved people behind him. Maybe\nthat was how it was with Little Fuzzy. Maybe he didn\'t realize how much of\na place he had made for himself here, or how empty he was leaving it.\n\nHe started for the kitchen to get a drink, and checked himself. Take a\ndrink because you pity yourself, and then the drink pities you and has a\ndrink, and then two good drinks get together and that calls for drinks all\naround. No; he\'d have one drink, maybe a little bigger than usual, before\nhe went to bed.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\nHe started awake, rubbed his eyes and looked at the clock. Past twenty-two\nhundred; now it really was time for a drink, and then to bed. He rose\nstiffly and went out to the kitchen, pouring the whisky and bringing it in\nto the table desk, where he sat down and got out his diary. He was almost\nfinished with the day\'s entry when the little door behind him opened and a\nsmall voice said, \"Yeeek.\" He turned quickly.\n\n\"Little Fuzzy?\"\n\nThe small sound was repeated, impatiently. Little Fuzzy was holding the\ndoor open, and there was an answer from outside. Then another Fuzzy came\nin, and another; four of them, one carrying a tiny, squirming ball of\nwhite fur in her arms. They all had prawn-killers like the one in the\ndrawer, and they stopped just inside the room and gaped about them in\nbewilderment. Then, laying down his weapon, Little Fuzzy ran to him;\nstooping from the chair, he caught him and then sat down on the floor with\nhim.\n\n\"So that\'s why you ran off and worried Pappy Jack? You wanted your family\nhere, too!\"\n\nThe others piled the things they were carrying with Little Fuzzy\'s steel\nweapon and approached hesitantly. He talked to them, and so did Little\nFuzzy--at least it sounded like that--and finally one came over and\nfingered his shirt, and then reached up and pulled his mustache. Soon all\nof them were climbing onto him, even the female with the baby. It was\nsmall enough to sit on his palm, but in a minute it had climbed to his\nshoulder, and then it was sitting on his head.\n\n\"You people want dinner?\" he asked.\n\nLittle Fuzzy yeeked emphatically; that was a word he recognized. He took\nthem all into the kitchen and tried them on cold roast veldbeest and\nyummiyams and fried pool-ball fruit; while they were eating from a couple\nof big pans, he went back to the living room to examine the things they\nhad brought with them. Two of the prawn-killers were wood, like the one\nLittle Fuzzy had discarded in the shed. A third was of horn, beautifully\npolished, and the fourth looked as though it had been made from the\nshoulder bone of something like a zebralope. Then there was a small _coup\nde poing_ ax, rather low paleolithic, and a chipped implement of flint the\nshape of a slice of orange and about five inches along the straight edge.\nFor a hand the size of his own, he would have called it a scraper. He\npuzzled over it for a while, noticed that the edge was serrated, and\ndecided that it was a saw. And there were three very good flake knives,\nand some shells, evidently drinking vessels.\n\nMamma Fuzzy came in while he was finishing the examination. She seemed\nsuspicious, until she saw that none of the family property had been taken\nor damaged. Baby Fuzzy was clinging to her fur with one hand and holding a\nslice of pool-ball fruit, on which he was munching, with the other. He\ncrammed what was left of the fruit into his mouth, climbed up on Jack and\nsat down on his head again. Have to do something to break him of that. One\nof these days, he\'d be getting too big for it.\n\nIn a few minutes, the rest of the family came in, chasing and pummeling\neach other and yeeking happily. Mamma jumped off his lap and joined the\nfree-for-all, and then Baby took off from his head and landed on Mamma\'s\nback. And he thought he\'d lost his Little Fuzzy, and, gosh, here he had\nfive Fuzzies and a Baby Fuzzy. When they were tired romping, he made beds\nfor them in the living room, and brought out Little Fuzzy\'s bedding and\nhis treasures. One Little Fuzzy in the bedroom was just fine; five and a\nBaby Fuzzy were a little too much of a good thing.\n\nThey were swarming over the bed, Baby and all, to waken him the next\nmorning.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe next morning he made a steel chopper-digger for each of them, and half\na dozen extras for replacements in case more Fuzzies showed up. He also\nmade a miniature ax with a hardwood handle, a handsaw out of a piece of\nbroken power-saw blade and half a dozen little knives forged in one piece\nfrom quarter-inch coil-spring material. He had less trouble trading the\nFuzzies\' own things away from them than he had expected. They had a very\nkeen property sense, but they knew a good deal when one was offered. He\nput the wooden and horn and bone and stone artifacts away in the desk\ndrawer. Start of the Holloway Collection of Zarathustran Fuzzy Weapons and\nImplements. Maybe he\'d will it to the Federation Institute of\nXeno-Sciences.\n\nOf course, the family had to try out the new chopper-diggers on\nland-prawns, and he followed them around with the movie camera. They\nkilled a dozen and a half that morning, and there was very little interest\nin lunch, though they did sit around nibbling, just to be doing what he\nwas doing. As soon as they finished, they all went in for a nap on his\nbed. He spent the afternoon pottering about camp doing odd jobs that he\nhad been postponing for months. The Fuzzies all emerged in the late\nafternoon for a romp in the grass outside.\n\nHe was in the kitchen, getting dinner, when they all came pelting in\nthrough the little door into the living room, making an excited outcry.\nLittle Fuzzy and one of the other males came into the kitchen. Little\nFuzzy squatted, put one hand on his lower jaw, with thumb and little\nfinger extended, and the other on his forehead, first finger upright. Then\nhe thrust out his right arm stiffly and made a barking noise of a sort he\nhad never made before. He had to do it a second time before Jack got it.\n\nThere was a large and unpleasant carnivore, called a damnthing--another\nexample of zoological nomenclature on uninhabited planets--which had a\nsingle horn on its forehead and one on either side of the lower jaw. It\nwas something for Fuzzies, and even for human-type people, to get excited\nabout. He laid down the paring knife and the yummiyam he had been peeling,\nwiped his hands and went into the living room, taking a quick nose count\nand satisfying himself that none of the family were missing as he crossed\nto the gunrack.\n\nThis time, instead of the 6-mm he had used on the harpy, he lifted down a\nbig 12.7 double express, making sure that it was loaded and pocketing a\nfew spare rounds. Little Fuzzy followed him outside, pointing around the\nliving hut to the left. The rest of the family stayed indoors.\n\nStepping out about twenty feet, he started around counter-clockwise. There\nwas no damnthing on the north side, and he was about to go around to the\neast side when Little Fuzzy came dashing past him, pointing to the rear.\nHe whirled, to see the damnthing charging him from behind, head down, and\nmiddle horn lowered. He should have thought of that; damnthings would\ndouble and hunt their hunters.\n\nHe lined the sights instinctively and squeezed. The big rifle roared and\nbanged his shoulder, and the bullet caught the damnthing and hurled all\nhalf-ton of it backward. The second shot caught it just below one of the\nfungoid-looking ears, and the beast gave a spasmodic all-over twitch and\nwas still. He reloaded mechanically, but there was no need for a third\nshot. The damnthing was as dead as he would have been except for Little\nFuzzy\'s warning.\n\nHe mentioned that to Little Fuzzy, who was calmly retrieving the empty\ncartridges. Then, rubbing his shoulder where the big rifle had pounded\nhim, he went in and returned the weapon to the rack. He used the\nmanipulator to carry the damnthing away from the camp and drop it into a\ntreetop, where it would furnish a welcome if puzzling treat for the\nharpies.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThere was another alarm in the evening after dinner. The family had come in\nfrom their sunset romp and were gathered in the living room, where Little\nFuzzy was demonstrating the principle of things-that-screwed-onto-things\nwith the wide-mouthed bottle and the bolt and nut, when something huge\nbegan hooting directly overhead. They all froze, looking up at the ceiling,\nand then ran over and got under the gunrack. This must be something far\nmore serious than a damnthing, and what Pappy Jack would do about it would\nbe nothing short of catastrophic. They were startled to see Pappy Jack\nmerely go to the door, open it and step outside. After all, none of them\nhad ever heard a Constabulary aircar klaxon before.\n\nThe car settled onto the grass in front of the camp, gave a slight lurch\nand went off contragravity. Two men in uniform got out, and in the\nmoonlight he recognized both of them: Lieutenant George Lunt and his\ndriver, Ahmed Khadra. He called a greeting to them.\n\n\"Anything wrong?\" he asked.\n\n\"No; just thought we\'d drop in and see how you were making out,\" Lunt told\nhim. \"We don\'t get up this way often. Haven\'t had any trouble lately, have\nyou?\"\n\n\"Not since the last time.\" The last time had been a couple of woods\ntramps, out-of-work veldbeest herders from the south, who had heard about\nthe little bag he carried around his neck. All the Constabulary had needed\nto do was remove the bodies and write up a report. \"Come on in and hang up\nyour guns awhile. I have something I want to show you.\"\n\nLittle Fuzzy had come out and was pulling at his trouser leg; he stooped\nand picked him up, setting him on his shoulder. The rest of the family,\ndeciding that it must be safe, had come to the door and were looking out.\n\n\"Hey! What the devil are those things?\" Lunt asked, stopping short halfway\nfrom the car.\n\n\"Fuzzies. Mean to tell me you\'ve never seen Fuzzies before?\"\n\n\"No, I haven\'t. What are they?\"\n\nThe two Constabulary men came closer, and Jack stepped back into the\nhouse, shooing the Fuzzies out of the way. Lunt and Khadra stopped inside\nthe door.\n\n\"I just told you. They\'re Fuzzies. That\'s all the name I know for them.\"\n\nA couple of Fuzzies came over and looked up at Lieutenant Lunt; one of\nthem said, \"Yeek?\"\n\n\"They want to know what you are, so that makes it mutual.\"\n\nLunt hesitated for a moment, then took off his belt and holster and hung\nit on one of the pegs inside the door, putting his beret over it. Khadra\nfollowed his example promptly. That meant that they considered themselves\ntemporarily off duty and would accept a drink if one were offered. A Fuzzy\nwas pulling at Ahmed Khadra\'s trouser leg and asking to be noticed, and\nMamma Fuzzy was holding Baby up to show to Lunt. Khadra, rather\nhesitantly, picked up the Fuzzy who was trying to attract his attention.\n\n\"Never saw anything like them before, Jack,\" he said. \"Where did they\ncome from?\"\n\n\"Ahmed; you don\'t know anything about those things,\" Lunt reproved.\n\n\"They won\'t hurt me, Lieutenant; they haven\'t hurt Jack, have they?\" He\nsat down on the floor, and a couple more came to him. \"Why don\'t you get\nacquainted with them? They\'re cute.\"\n\nGeorge Lunt wouldn\'t let one of his men do anything he was afraid to do;\nhe sat down on the floor, too, and Mamma brought her baby to him.\nImmediately, the baby jumped onto his shoulder and tried to get onto his\nhead.\n\n\"Relax, George,\" Jack told him, \"They\'re just Fuzzies; they want to make\nfriends with you.\"\n\n\"I\'m always worried about strange life forms,\" Lunt said. \"You\'ve been\naround enough to know some of the things that have happened--\"\n\n\"They are not a strange life form; they are Zarathustran mammals. The same\nlife form you\'ve had for dinner every day since you came here. Their\nbiochemistry\'s identical with ours. Think they\'ll give you the Polka-Dot\nPlague, or something?\" He put Little Fuzzy down on the floor with the\nothers. \"We\'ve been exploring this planet for twenty-five years, and\nnobody\'s found anything like that here.\"\n\n\"You said it yourself, Lieutenant,\" Khadra put in. \"Jack\'s been around\nenough to know.\"\n\n\"Well.... They are cute little fellows.\" Lunt lifted Baby down off his\nhead and gave him back to Mamma. Little Fuzzy had gotten hold of the chain\nof his whistle and was trying to find out what was on the other end. \"Bet\nthey\'re a lot of company for you.\"\n\n\"You just get acquainted with them. Make yourselves at home; I\'ll go\nrustle up some refreshments.\"\n\nWhile he was in the kitchen, filling a soda siphon and getting ice out of\nthe refrigerator, a police whistle began shrilling in the living room. He\nwas opening a bottle of whisky when Little Fuzzy came dashing out, blowing\non it, a couple more of the family pursuing him and trying to get it away\nfrom him. He opened a tin of Extee Three for the Fuzzies, as he did,\nanother whistle in the living room began blowing.\n\n\"We have a whole shoebox full of them at the post,\" Lunt yelled to him\nabove the din. \"We\'ll just write these two off as expended in service.\"\n\n\"Well, that\'s real nice of you, George. I want to tell you that the\nFuzzies appreciate that. Ahmed, suppose you do the bartending while I give\nthe kids their candy.\"\n\nBy the time Khadra had the drinks mixed and he had distributed the Extee\nThree to the Fuzzies, Lunt had gotten into the easy chair, and the Fuzzies\nwere sitting on the floor in front of him, still looking him over\ncuriously. At least the Extee Three had taken their minds off the whistles\nfor a while.\n\n\"What I want to know, Jack, is where they came from,\" Lunt said, taking\nhis drink. \"I\'ve been up here for five years, and I never saw anything\nlike them before.\"\n\n\"I\'ve been here five years longer, and I never saw them before, either. I\nthink they came down from the north, from the country between the\nCordilleras and the West Coast Range. Outside of an air survey at ten\nthousand feet and a few spot landings here and there, none of that country\nhas been explored. For all anybody knows, it could be full of Fuzzies.\"\n\nHe began with his first encounter with Little Fuzzy, and by the time he\nhad gotten as far as the wood chisel and the killing of the land-prawn,\nLunt and Khadra were looking at each other in amazement.\n\n\"That\'s it!\" Khadra said. \"I\'ve found prawn-shells cracked open and the\nmeat picked out, just the way you describe it. I always wondered what did\nthat. But they don\'t all have wood chisels. What do you suppose they used\nordinarily?\"\n\n\"Ah!\" He pulled the drawer open and began getting things out. \"Here\'s the\none Little Fuzzy discarded when he found my chisel. The rest of this stuff\nthe others brought in when they came.\"\n\nLunt and Khadra rose and came over to look at the things. Lunt tried to\nargue that the Fuzzies couldn\'t have made that stuff. He wasn\'t even able\nto convince himself. Having finished their Extee Three, the Fuzzies were\nlooking expectantly at the viewscreen, and it occurred to him that none of\nthem except Little Fuzzy had ever seen it on. Then Little Fuzzy jumped up\non the chair Lunt had vacated, reached over to the control-panel and\nswitched it on. What he got was an empty stretch of moonlit plain to the\nsouth, from a pickup on one of the steel towers the veldbeest herders\nused. That wasn\'t very interesting; he twiddled the selector and finally\ngot a night soccer game at Mallorysport. That was just fine; he jumped\ndown and joined the others in front of the screen.\n\n\"I\'ve seen Terran monkeys and Freyan Kholphs that liked to watch screens\nand could turn them on and work the selector,\" Lunt said. It sounded like\nthe token last salvo before the surrender.\n\n\"Kholphs are smart,\" Khadra agreed. \"They use tools.\"\n\n\"Do they make tools? Or tools to make tools with, like that saw?\" There\nwas no argument on that. \"No. Nobody does that except people like us and\nthe Fuzzies.\"\n\nIt was the first time he had come right out and said that; the first time\nhe had even consciously thought it. He realized that he had been convinced\nof it all along, though. It startled the constabulary lieutenant and\ntrooper.\n\n\"You mean you think--?\" Lunt began.\n\n\"They don\'t talk, and they don\'t build fires,\" Ahmed Khadra said, as\nthough that settled it.\n\n\"Ahmed, you know better than that. That talk-and-build-a-fire rule isn\'t\nany scientific test at all.\"\n\n\"It\'s a legal test.\" Lunt supported his subordinate.\n\n\"It\'s a rule-of-thumb that was set up so that settlers on new planets\ncouldn\'t get away with murdering and enslaving the natives by claiming\nthey thought they were only hunting and domesticating wild animals,\" he\nsaid. \"Anything that talks and builds a fire is a sapient being, yes.\nThat\'s the law. But that doesn\'t mean that anything that doesn\'t isn\'t. I\nhaven\'t seen any of this gang building fires, and as I don\'t want to come\nhome sometime and find myself burned out, I\'m not going to teach them. But\nI\'m sure they have means of communication among themselves.\"\n\n\"Has Ben Rainsford seen them yet?\" Lunt asked.\n\n\"Ben\'s off on a trip somewhere. I called him as soon as Little Fuzzy, over\nthere, showed up here. He won\'t be back till Friday.\"\n\n\"Yes, that\'s right; I did know that.\" Lunt was still looking dubiously at\nthe Fuzzies. \"I\'d like to hear what he thinks about them.\"\n\nIf Ben said they were safe, Lunt would accept that. Ben was an expert, and\nLunt respected expert testimony. Until then, he wasn\'t sure. He\'d probably\norder a medical check-up for himself and Khadra the first thing tomorrow,\nto make sure they hadn\'t picked up some kind of bug.\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\n\nThe Fuzzies took the manipulator quite calmly the next morning. That\nwasn\'t any horrible monster, that was just something Pappy Jack took rides\nin. He found one rather indifferent sunstone in the morning and two good\nones in the afternoon. He came home early and found the family in the\nliving room; they had dumped the wastebasket and were putting things back\ninto it. Another land-prawn seemed to have gotten into the house; its\npicked shell was with the other rubbish in the basket. They had dinner\nearly, and he loaded the lot of them into the airjeep and took them for a\nlong ride to the south and west.\n\nThe following day, he located the flint vein on the other side of the\ngorge and spent most of the morning blasting away the sandstone above it.\nThe next time he went into Mallorysport, he decided, he was going to shop\naround for a good power-shovel. He had to blast a channel to keep the\nlittle stream from damming up on him. He didn\'t get any flint cracked at\nall that day. There was another harpy circling around the camp when he got\nback; he chased it with the manipulator and shot it down with his pistol.\nHarpies probably found Fuzzies as tasty as Fuzzies found land-prawns. The\nfamily were all sitting under the gunrack when he entered the living room.\n\nThe next day he cracked flint, and found three more stones. It really\nlooked as though he had found the Dying Place of the Jellyfish at that. He\nknocked off early that afternoon, and when he came in sight of the camp,\nhe saw an airjeep grounded on the lawn and a small man with a red beard in\na faded Khaki bush-jacket sitting on the bench by the kitchen door,\nsurrounded by Fuzzies. There was a camera and some other equipment laid up\nwhere the Fuzzies couldn\'t get at it. Baby Fuzzy, of course, was sitting\non his head. He looked up and waved, and then handed Baby to his mother\nand rose to his feet.\n\n\"Well, what do you think of them, Ben?\" Jack called down, as he grounded\nthe manipulator.\n\n\"My God, don\'t start me on that now!\" Ben Rainsford replied, and then\nlaughed. \"I stopped at the constabulary post on the way home. I thought\nGeorge Lunt had turned into the biggest liar in the known galaxy. Then I\nwent home, and found your call on the recorder, so I came over here.\"\n\n\"Been waiting long?\"\n\nThe Fuzzies had all abandoned Rainsford and come trooping over as soon as\nthe manipulator was off contragravity. He climbed down among them, and\nthey followed him across the grass, catching at his trouser legs and\nyeeking happily.\n\n\"Not so long.\" Rainsford looked at his watch. \"Good Lord, three and half\nhours is all. Well, the time passed quickly. You know, your little fellows\nhave good ears. They heard you coming a long time before I did.\"\n\n\"Did you see them killing any prawns?\"\n\n\"I should say! I got a lot of movies of it.\" He shook his head slowly.\n\"Jack, this is almost incredible.\"\n\n\"You\'re staying for dinner, of course?\"\n\n\"You try and chase me away. I want to hear all about this. Want you to\nmake a tape about them, if you\'re willing.\"\n\n\"Glad to. We\'ll do that after we eat.\" He sat down on the bench, and the\nFuzzies began climbing upon and beside him. \"This is the original, Little\nFuzzy. He brought the rest in a couple of days later. Mamma Fuzzy, and\nBaby Fuzzy. And these are Mike and Mitzi. I call this one Ko-Ko, because\nof the ceremonious way he beheads land-prawns.\"\n\n\"George says you call them all Fuzzies. Want that for the official\ndesignation?\"\n\n\"Sure. That\'s what they are, isn\'t it?\"\n\n\"Well, let\'s call the order Hollowayans,\" Rainsford said. \"Family,\nFuzzies; genus, Fuzzy. Species, Holloway\'s Fuzzy--_Fuzzy fuzzy holloway_.\nHow\'ll that be?\"\n\nThat would be all right, he supposed. At least, they didn\'t try to\nLatinize things in extraterrestrial zoology any more.\n\n\"I suppose our bumper crop of land-prawns is what brought them into this\nsection?\"\n\n\"Yes, of course. George was telling me you thought they\'d come down from\nthe north; about the only place they could have come from. This is\nprobably just the advance guard; we\'ll be having Fuzzies all over the\nplace before long. I wonder how fast they breed.\"\n\n\"Not very fast. Three males and two females in this crowd, and only one\nyoung one.\" He set Mike and Mitzi off his lap and got to his feet. \"I\'ll\ngo start dinner now. While I\'m doing that, you can look at the stuff they\nbrought in with them.\"\n\nWhen he had placed the dinner in the oven and taken a couple of highballs\ninto the living room, Rainsford was still sitting at the desk, looking at\nthe artifacts. He accepted his drink and sipped it absently, then raised\nhis head.\n\n\"Jack, this stuff is absolutely amazing,\" he said.\n\n\"It\'s better than that. It\'s unique. Only collection of native weapons and\nimplements on Zarathustra.\"\n\nBen Rainsford looked up sharply. \"You mean what I think you mean?\" he\nasked. \"Yes; you do.\" He drank some of his highball, set down the glass\nand picked up the polished-horn prawn-killer. \"Anything--pardon,\nanybody--who does this kind of work is good enough native for me.\" He\nhesitated briefly. \"Why, Jack this tape you said you\'d make. Can I\ntransmit a copy to Juan Jimenez? He\'s chief mammalogist with the Company\nscience division; we exchange information. And there\'s another Company man\nI\'d like to have hear it. Gerd van Riebeek. He\'s a general\nxeno-naturalist, like me, but he\'s especially interested in animal\nevolution.\"\n\n\"Why not? The Fuzzies are a scientific discovery. Discoveries ought to be\nreported.\"\n\nLittle Fuzzy, Mike and Mitzi strolled in from the kitchen. Little Fuzzy\njumped up on the armchair and switched on the viewscreen. Fiddling with\nthe selector, he got the Big Blackwater woods-burning. Mike and Mitzi\nshrieked delightedly, like a couple of kids watching a horror show. They\nknew, by now, that nothing in the screen could get out and hurt them.\n\n\"Would you mind if they came out here and saw the Fuzzies?\"\n\n\"Why, the Fuzzies would love that. They like company.\"\n\nMamma and Baby and Ko-Ko came in, seemed to approve what was on the screen\nand sat down to watch it. When the bell on the stove rang, they all got\nup, and Ko-Ko jumped onto the chair and snapped the screen off. Ben\nRainsford looked at him for a moment.\n\n\"You know, I have married friends with children who have a hell of a time\nteaching eight-year-olds to turn off screens when they\'re through watching\nthem,\" he commented.\n\n * * * * *\n\nIt took an hour, after dinner, to get the whole story, from the first\nlittle yeek in the shower stall, on tape. When he had finished, Ben\nRainsford made a few remarks and shut off the recorder, then looked at his\nwatch.\n\n\"Twenty hundred; it\'ll be seventeen hundred in Mallorysport,\" he said. \"I\ncould catch Jimenez at Science Center if I called now. He usually works a\nlittle late.\"\n\n\"Go ahead. Want to show him some Fuzzies?\" He moved his pistol and some\nother impedimenta off the table and set Little Fuzzy and Mamma Fuzzy and\nBaby upon it, then drew up a chair beside it, in range of the\ncommunication screen, and sat down with Mike and Mitzi and Ko-Ko.\nRainsford punched out a wavelength combination. Then he picked up Baby\nFuzzy and set him on his head.\n\nIn a moment, the screen flickered and cleared, and a young man looked out\nof it, with the momentary upward glance of one who wants to make sure his\npublic face is on straight. It was a bland, tranquilized, life-adjusted,\ngroup-integrated sort of face--the face turned out in thousands of copies\nevery year by the educational production lines on Terra.\n\n\"Why, Bennett, this is a pleasant surprise,\" he began. \"I never expec--\"\nThen he choked; at least, he emitted a sound of surprise. \"What in the\nname of Dai-Butsu are those things on the table in front of you?\" he\ndemanded. \"I never saw anything--_And what is that on your head?_\"\n\n\"Family group of Fuzzies,\" Rainsford said. \"Mature male, mature female,\nimmature male.\" He lifted Baby Fuzzy down and put him in Mamma\'s arms.\n\"Species _Fuzzy fuzzy holloway zarathustra_. The gentleman on my left is\nJack Holloway, the sunstone operator, who is the original discoverer.\nJack, Juan Jimenez.\"\n\nThey shook their own hands at one another in the ancient Terran-Chinese\ngesture that was used on communication screens, and assured each\nother--Jimenez rather absently--that it was a pleasure. He couldn\'t take\nhis eyes off the Fuzzies.\n\n\"Where did they come from?\" he wanted to know. \"Are you sure they\'re\nindigenous?\"\n\n\"They\'re not quite up to spaceships, yet, Dr. Jimenez. Fairly early\nPaleolithic, I\'d say.\"\n\nJimenez thought he was joking, and laughed. The sort of a laugh that could\nbe turned on and off, like a light. Rainsford assured him that the Fuzzies\nwere really indigenous.\n\n\"We have everything that\'s known about them on tape,\" he said. \"About an\nhour of it. Can you take sixty-speed?\" He was making adjustments on the\nrecorder as he spoke. \"All right, set and we\'ll transmit to you. And can\nyou get hold of Gerd van Riebeek? I\'d like him to hear it too; it\'s as\nmuch up his alley as anybody\'s.\"\n\nWhen Jimenez was ready, Rainsford pressed the play-off button, and for a\nminute the recorder gave a high, wavering squeak. The Fuzzies all looked\nstartled. Then it ended.\n\n\"I think, when you hear this, that you and Gerd will both want to come out\nand see these little people. If you can, bring somebody who\'s a qualified\npsychologist, somebody capable of evaluating the Fuzzies\' mentation. Jack\nwasn\'t kidding about early Paleolithic. If they\'re not sapient, they only\nmiss it by about one atomic diameter.\"\n\nJimenez looked almost as startled as the Fuzzies had. \"You surely don\'t\nmean that?\" He looked from Rainsford to Jack Holloway and back. \"Well,\nI\'ll call you back, when we\'ve both heard the tape. You\'re three time\nzones west of us, aren\'t you? Then we\'ll try to make it before your\nmidnight--that\'ll be twenty-one hundred.\"\n\nHe called back half an hour short of that. This time, it was from the\nliving room of an apartment instead of an office. There was a portable\nrecord player in the foreground and a low table with snacks and drinks,\nand two other people were with him. One was a man of about Jimenez\'s age\nwith a good-humored, non-life-adjusted, non-group-integrated and slightly\nweather-beaten face. The other was a woman with glossy black hair and a\nMona Lisa-ish smile. The Fuzzies had gotten sleepy, and had been bribed\nwith Extee Three to stay up a little longer. Immediately, they registered\ninterest. This was more fun than the viewscreen.\n\nJimenez introduced his companions as Gerd van Riebeek and Ruth Ortheris.\n\"Ruth is with Dr. Mallin\'s section; she\'s been working with the school\ndepartment and the juvenile court. She can probably do as well with your\nFuzzies as a regular xeno-psychologist.\"\n\n\"Well, I have worked with extraterrestrials,\" the woman said. \"I\'ve been\non Loki and Thor and Shesha.\"\n\nJack nodded. \"Been on the same planets myself. Are you people coming out\nhere?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes,\" van Riebeek said. \"We\'ll be out by noon tomorrow. We may stay a\ncouple of days, but that won\'t put you to any trouble; I have a boat\nthat\'s big enough for the three of us to camp on. Now, how do we get to\nyour place?\"\n\nJack told him, and gave map coordinates. Van Riebeek noted them down.\n\n\"There\'s one thing, though, I\'m going to have to get firm about. I don\'t\nwant to have to speak about it again. These little people are to be\ntreated with consideration, and not as laboratory animals. You will not\nhurt them, or annoy them, or force them to do anything they don\'t want to\ndo.\"\n\n\"We understand that. We won\'t do anything with the Fuzzies without your\napproval. Is there anything you\'d want us to bring out?\"\n\n\"Yes. A few things for the camp that I\'m short of; I\'ll pay you for them\nwhen you get here. And about three cases of Extee Three. And some toys.\nDr. Ortheris, you heard the tape, didn\'t you? Well, just think what you\'d\nlike to have if you were a Fuzzy, and bring it.\"\n\n\n\n\nV\n\n\nVictor Grego crushed out his cigarette slowly and deliberately.\n\n\"Yes, Leonard,\" he said patiently. \"It\'s very interesting, and doubtless\nan important discovery, but I can\'t see why you\'re making such a\nproduction of it. Are you afraid I\'ll blame you for letting non-Company\npeople beat you to it? Or do you merely suspect that anything Bennett\nRainsford\'s mixed up in is necessarily a diabolical plot against the\nCompany and, by consequence, human civilization?\"\n\nLeonard Kellogg looked pained. \"What I was about to say, Victor, is that\nboth Rainsford and this man Holloway seem convinced that these things they\ncall Fuzzies aren\'t animals at all. They believe them to be sapient\nbeings.\"\n\n\"Well, that\'s--\" He bit that off short as the significance of what Kellogg\nhad just said hit him. \"Good God, Leonard! I beg your pardon abjectly; I\ndon\'t blame you for taking it seriously. Why, that would make Zarathustra\na Class-IV inhabited planet.\"\n\n\"For which the Company holds a Class-III charter,\" Kellogg added. \"For an\nuninhabited planet.\"\n\nAutomatically void if any race of sapient beings were discovered on\nZarathustra.\n\n\"You know what will happen if this is true?\"\n\n\"Well, I should imagine the charter would have to be renegotiated, and now\nthat the Colonial Office knows what sort of a planet this is, they\'ll be\nanything but generous with the Company....\"\n\n\"They won\'t renegotiate anything, Leonard. The Federation government will\nsimply take the position that the Company has already made an adequate\nreturn on the original investments, and they\'ll award us what we can show\nas in our actual possession--I hope--and throw the rest into the public\ndomain.\"\n\nThe vast plains on Beta and Delta continents, with their herds of\nveldbeest--all open range, and every \'beest that didn\'t carry a Company\nbrand a maverick. And all the untapped mineral wealth, and the untilled\narable land; it would take years of litigation even to make the Company\'s\nclaim to Big Blackwater stick. And Terra-Baldur-Marduk Spacelines would\nlose their monopolistic franchise and get sticky about it in the courts,\nand in any case, the Company\'s import-export monopoly would go out the\nairlock. And the squatters rushing in and swamping everything--\n\n\"Why, we won\'t be any better off than the Yggdrasil Company, squatting on\na guano heap on one continent!\" he burst out. \"Five years from now,\nthey\'ll be making more money out of bat dung than we\'ll be making out of\nthis whole world!\"\n\nAnd the Company\'s good friend and substantial stockholder, Nick Emmert,\nwould be out, too, and a Colonial Governor General would move in, with\nregular army troops and a complicated bureaucracy. Elections, and a\nrepresentative parliament, and every Tom, Dick and Harry with a grudge\nagainst the Company would be trying to get laws passed--And, of course, a\nNative Affairs Commission, with its nose in everything.\n\n\"But they couldn\'t just leave us without any kind of a charter,\" Kellogg\ninsisted. Who was he trying to kid--besides himself? \"It wouldn\'t be\nfair!\" As though that clinched it. \"It isn\'t our fault!\"\n\nHe forced more patience into his voice. \"Leonard, please try to realize\nthat the Terran Federation government doesn\'t give one shrill soprano hoot\non Nifflheim whether it\'s fair or not, or whose fault what is. The\nFederation government\'s been repenting that charter they gave the Company\never since they found out what they\'d chartered away. Why, this planet is\na better world than Terra ever was, even before the Atomic Wars. Now, if\nthey have a chance to get it back, with improvements, you think they won\'t\ntake it? And what will stop them? If those creatures over on Beta\nContinent are sapient beings, our charter isn\'t worth the parchment it\'s\nengrossed on, and that\'s an end of it.\" He was silent for a moment. \"You\nheard that tape Rainsford transmitted to Jimenez. Did either he or\nHolloway actually claim, in so many words, that these things really are\nsapient beings?\"\n\n\"Well, no; not in so many words. Holloway consistently alluded to them as\npeople, but he\'s just an ignorant old prospector. Rainsford wouldn\'t come\nout and commit himself one way or another, but he left the door wide open\nfor anybody else to.\"\n\n\"Accepting their account, could these Fuzzies be sapient?\"\n\n\"Accepting the account, yes,\" Kellogg said, in distress. \"They could be.\"\n\nThey probably were, if Leonard Kellogg couldn\'t wish the evidence out of\nexistence.\n\n\"Then they\'ll look sapient to these people of yours who went over to Beta\nthis morning, and they\'ll treat it purely as a scientific question and\nnever consider the legal aspects. Leonard, you\'ll have to take charge of\nthe investigation, before they make any reports everybody\'ll be sorry\nfor.\"\n\nKellogg didn\'t seem to like that. It would mean having to exercise\nauthority and getting tough with people, and he hated anything like that.\nHe nodded very reluctantly.\n\n\"Yes. I suppose I will. Let me think about it for a moment, Victor.\"\n\nOne thing about Leonard; you handed him something he couldn\'t delegate or\ndodge and he\'d go to work on it. Maybe not cheerfully, but\nconscientiously.\n\n\"I\'ll take Ernst Mallin along,\" he said at length. \"This man Rainsford has\nno grounding whatever in any of the psychosciences. He may be able to\nimpose on Ruth Ortheris, but not on Ernst Mallin. Not after I\'ve talked to\nMallin first.\" He thought some more. \"We\'ll have to get these Fuzzies away\nfrom this man Holloway. Then we\'ll issue a report of discovery, being\ncareful to give full credit to both Rainsford and Holloway--we\'ll even\naccept the designation they\'ve coined for them--but we\'ll make it very\nclear that while highly intelligent, the Fuzzies are not a race of sapient\nbeings. If Rainsford persists in making any such claim, we will brand it\nas a deliberate hoax.\"\n\n\"Do you think he\'s gotten any report off to the Institute of Xeno-Sciences\nyet?\"\n\nKellogg shook his head. \"I think he wants to trick some of our people into\nsupporting his sapience claims; at least, corroborating his and Holloway\'s\nalleged observations. That\'s why I\'ll have to get over to Beta as soon as\npossible.\"\n\nBy now, Kellogg had managed to convince himself that going over to Beta\nhad been his idea all along. Probably also convincing himself that\nRainsford\'s report was nothing but a pack of lies. Well, if he could work\nbetter that way, that was his business.\n\n\"He will, before long, if he isn\'t stopped. And a year from now, there\'ll\nbe a small army of investigators here from Terra. By that time, you should\nhave both Rainsford and Holloway thoroughly discredited. Leonard, you get\nthose Fuzzies away from Holloway and I\'ll personally guarantee they won\'t\nbe available for investigation by then. Fuzzies,\" he said reflectively.\n\"Fur-bearing animals, I take it?\"\n\n\"Holloway spoke, on the tape, of their soft and silky fur.\"\n\n\"Good. Emphasize that in your report. As soon as it\'s published, the\nCompany will offer two thousand sols apiece for Fuzzy pelts. By the time\nRainsford\'s report brings anybody here from Terra, we may have them all\ntrapped out.\"\n\nKellogg began to look worried.\n\n\"But, Victor, that\'s genocide!\"\n\n\"Nonsense! Genocide is defined as the extermination of a race of sapient\nbeings. These are fur-bearing animals. It\'s up to you and Ernst Mallin to\nprove that.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe Fuzzies, playing on the lawn in front of the camp, froze into\nimmobility, their faces turned to the west. Then they all ran to the bench\nby the kitchen door and scrambled up onto it.\n\n\"Now what?\" Jack Holloway wondered.\n\n\"They hear the airboat,\" Rainsford told him. \"That\'s the way they acted\nyesterday when you were coming in with your machine.\" He looked at the\npicnic table they had been spreading under the featherleaf trees.\n\"Everything ready?\"\n\n\"Everything but lunch; that won\'t be cooked for an hour yet. I see them\nnow.\"\n\n\"You have better eyes than I do, Jack. Oh, I see it. I hope the kids put\non a good show for them,\" he said anxiously.\n\nHe\'d been jittery ever since he arrived, shortly after breakfast. It\nwasn\'t that these people from Mallorysport were so important themselves;\nBen had a bigger name in scientific circles than any of this Company\ncrowd. He was just excited about the Fuzzies.\n\nThe airboat grew from a barely visible speck, and came spiraling down to\nland in the clearing. When it was grounded and off contragravity, they\nstarted across the grass toward it, and the Fuzzies all jumped down from\nthe bench and ran along with them.\n\nThe three visitors climbed down. Ruth Ortheris wore slacks and a sweater,\nbut the slacks were bloused over a pair of ankle boots. Gerd van Riebeek\nhad evidently done a lot of field work: his boots were stout, and he wore\nold, faded khakis and a serviceable-looking sidearm that showed he knew\nwhat to expect up here in the Piedmont. Juan Jimenez was in the same\nsports casuals in which he had appeared on screen last evening. All of\nthem carried photographic equipment. They shook hands all around and\nexchanged greetings, and then the Fuzzies began clamoring to be noticed.\nFinally all of them, Fuzzies and other people, drifted over to the table\nunder the trees.\n\nRuth Ortheris sat down on the grass with Mamma and Baby. Immediately Baby\nbecame interested in a silver charm which she wore on a chain around her\nneck which tinkled fascinatingly. Then he tried to sit on her head. She\nspent some time gently but firmly discouraging this. Juan Jimenez was\nsquatting between Mike and Mitzi, examining them alternately and talking\ninto a miniature recorder phone on his breast, mostly in Latin. Gerd van\nRiebeek dropped himself into a folding chair and took Little Fuzzy on his\nlap.\n\n\"You know, this is kind of surprising,\" he said. \"Not only finding\nsomething like this, after twenty-five years, but finding something as\nunique as this. Look, he doesn\'t have the least vestige of a tail, and\nthere isn\'t another tailless mammal on the planet. Fact, there isn\'t\nanother mammal on this planet that has the slightest kinship to him. Take\nourselves; we belong to a pretty big family, about fifty-odd genera of\nprimates. But this little fellow hasn\'t any relatives at all.\"\n\n\"Yeek?\"\n\n\"And he couldn\'t care less, could he?\" Van Riebeek pummeled Little Fuzzy\ngently. \"One thing, you have the smallest humanoid known; that\'s one\nrecord you can claim. Oh-oh, what goes on?\"\n\nKo-Ko, who had climbed upon Rainsford\'s lap, jumped suddenly to the\nground, grabbed the chopper-digger he had left beside the chair and\nstarted across the grass. Everybody got to their feet, the visitors\ngetting cameras out. The Fuzzies seemed perplexed by all the excitement.\nIt was only another land-prawn, wasn\'t it?\n\nKo-Ko got in front of it, poked it on the nose to stop it and then struck\na dramatic pose, flourishing his weapon and bringing it down on the\nprawn\'s neck. Then, after flopping it over, he looked at it almost in\nsorrow and hit it a couple of whacks with the flat. He began pulling it\napart and eating it.\n\n\"I see why you call him Ko-Ko,\" Ruth said, aiming her camera, \"Don\'t the\nothers do it that way?\"\n\n\"Well, Little Fuzzy runs along beside them and pivots and gives them a\nquick chop. Mike and Mitzi flop theirs over first and behead them on their\nbacks. And Mamma takes a swipe at their legs first. But beheading and\nbreaking the undershell, they all do that.\"\n\n\"Uh-huh; that\'s basic,\" she said. \"Instinctive. The technique is either\nself-learned or copied. When Baby begins killing his own prawns, see if he\ndoesn\'t do it the way Mamma does!\"\n\n\"Hey, look!\" Jimenez cried. \"He\'s making a lobster pick for himself!\"\n\nThrough lunch, they talked exclusively about Fuzzies. The subjects of the\ndiscussion nibbled things that were given to them, and yeeked among\nthemselves. Gerd van Riebeek suggested that they were discussing the odd\nhabits of human-type people. Juan Jimenez looked at him, slightly\ndisturbed, as though wondering just how seriously he meant it.\n\n\"You know, what impressed me most in the taped account was the incident of\nthe damnthing,\" said Ruth Ortheris. \"Any animal associating with man will\ntry to attract attention if something\'s wrong, but I never heard of one,\nnot even a Freyan kholph or a Terran chimpanzee, that would use\ndescriptive pantomime. Little Fuzzy was actually making a symbolic\nrepresentation, by abstracting the distinguishing characteristic of the\ndamnthing.\"\n\n\"Think that stiff-arm gesture and bark might have been intended to\nrepresent a rifle?\" Gerd van Riebeek asked. \"He\'d seen you shooting\nbefore, hadn\'t he?\"\n\n\"I don\'t think it was anything else. He was telling me, \'Big nasty\ndamnthing outside; shoot it like you did the harpy.\' And if he hadn\'t run\npast me and pointed back, that damnthing would have killed me.\"\n\nJimenez, hesitantly, said, \"I know I\'m speaking from ignorance. You\'re the\nFuzzy expert. But isn\'t it possible that you\'re overanthropomorphizing?\nEndowing them with your own characteristics and mental traits?\"\n\n\"Juan, I\'m not going to answer that right now. I don\'t think I\'ll answer\nat all. You wait till you\'ve been around these Fuzzies a little longer,\nand then ask it again, only ask yourself.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\n\"So you see, Ernst, that\'s the problem.\"\n\nLeonard Kellogg laid the words like a paperweight on the other words he\nhad been saying, and waited. Ernst Mallin sat motionless, his elbows on\nthe desk and his chin in his hands. A little pair of wrinkles, like\nparentheses, appeared at the corners of his mouth.\n\n\"Yes. I\'m not a lawyer, of course, but....\"\n\n\"It\'s not a legal question. It\'s a question for a psychologist.\"\n\nThat left it back with Ernst Mallin, and he knew it.\n\n\"I\'d have to see them myself before I could express an opinion. You have\nthat tape of Holloway\'s with you?\" When Kellogg nodded, Mallin continued:\n\"Did either of them make any actual, overt claim of sapience?\"\n\nHe answered it as he had when Victor Grego had asked the same question,\nadding:\n\n\"The account consists almost entirely of Holloway\'s uncorroborated\nstatements concerning things to which he claims to have been the sole\nwitness.\"\n\n\"Ah.\" Mallin permitted himself a tight little smile. \"And he\'s not a\nqualified observer. Neither, for that matter, is Rainsford. Regardless of\nhis position as a xeno-naturalist, he is a complete layman in the\npsychosciences. He\'s just taken this other man\'s statements uncritically.\nAs for what he claims to have observed for himself, how do we know he\nisn\'t including a lot of erroneous inferences with his descriptive\nstatements?\"\n\n\"How do we know he\'s not perpetrating a deliberate hoax?\"\n\n\"But, Leonard, that\'s a pretty serious accusation.\"\n\n\"It\'s happened before. That fellow who carved a Late Upland Martian\ninscription in that cave in Kenya, for instance. Or Hellermann\'s claim to\nhave cross-bred Terran mice with Thoran tilbras. Or the Piltdown Man, back\nin the first century Pre-Atomic?\"\n\nMallin nodded. \"None of us like to think of a thing like that, but, as you\nsay, it\'s happened. You know, this man Rainsford is just the type to do\nsomething like that, too. Fundamentally an individualistic egoist; badly\nadjusted personality type. Say he wants to make some sensational discovery\nwhich will assure him the position in the scientific world to which he\nbelieves himself entitled. He finds this lonely old prospector, into whose\nisolated camp some little animals have strayed. The old man has made pets\nof them, taught them a few tricks, finally so projected his own\npersonality onto them that he has convinced himself that they are people\nlike himself. This is Rainsford\'s great opportunity; he will present\nhimself as the discoverer of a new sapient race and bring the whole\nlearned world to his feet.\" Mallin smiled again. \"Yes, Leonard, it is\naltogether possible.\"\n\n\"Then it\'s our plain duty to stop this thing before it develops into\nanother major scientific scandal like Hellermann\'s hybrids.\"\n\n\"First we must go over this tape recording and see what we have on our\nhands. Then we must make a thorough, unbiased study of these animals, and\nshow Rainsford and his accomplice that they cannot hope to foist these\nridiculous claims on the scientific world with impunity. If we can\'t\nconvince them privately, there\'ll be nothing to do but expose them\npublicly.\"\n\n\"I\'ve heard the tape already, but let\'s play if off now. We want to\nanalyze these tricks this man Holloway has taught these animals, and see\nwhat they show.\"\n\n\"Yes, of course. We must do that at once,\" Mallin said. \"Then we\'ll have\nto consider what sort of statement we must issue, and what sort of\nevidence we will need to support it.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nAfter dinner was romptime for Fuzzies on the lawn, but when the dusk came\ncreeping into the ravine, they all went inside and were given one of their\nnew toys from Mallorysport--a big box of many-colored balls and short\nsticks of transparent plastic. They didn\'t know that it was a\nmolecule-model kit, but they soon found that the sticks would go into\nholes in the balls, and that they could be built into three-dimensional\ndesigns.\n\nThis was much more fun than the colored stones. They made a few\nexperimental shapes, then dismantled them and began on a single large\ndesign. Several times they tore it down, entirely or in part, and began\nover again, usually with considerable yeeking and gesticulation.\n\n\"They have artistic sense,\" Van Riebeek said. \"I\'ve seen lots of abstract\nsculpture that wasn\'t half as good as that job they\'re doing.\"\n\n\"Good engineering, too,\" Jack said. \"They understand balance and\ncenter-of-gravity. They\'re bracing it well, and not making it top-heavy.\"\n\n\"Jack, I\'ve been thinking about that question I was supposed to ask\nmyself,\" Jimenez said. \"You know, I came out here loaded with suspicion.\nNot that I doubted your honesty; I just thought you\'d let your obvious\naffection for the Fuzzies lead you into giving them credit for more\nintelligence than they possess. Now I think you\'ve consistently\nunderstated it. Short of actual sapience, I\'ve never seen anything like\nthem.\"\n\n\"Why short of it?\" van Riebeek asked. \"Ruth, you\'ve been pretty quiet this\nevening. What do you think?\"\n\nRuth Ortheris looked uncomfortable. \"Gerd, it\'s too early to form opinions\nlike that. I know the way they\'re working together looks like cooperation\non an agreed-upon purpose, but I simply can\'t make speech out of that\nyeek-yeek-yeek.\"\n\n\"Let\'s keep the talk-and-build-a-fire rule out of it,\" van Riebeek said.\n\"If they\'re working together on a common project, they must be\ncommunicating somehow.\"\n\n\"It isn\'t communication, it\'s symbolization. You simply can\'t think\nsapiently except in verbal symbols. Try it. Not something like changing\nthe spools on a recorder or field-stripping a pistol; they\'re just learned\ntricks. I mean ideas.\"\n\n\"How about Helen Keller?\" Rainsford asked. \"Mean to say she only started\nthinking sapiently after Anna Sullivan taught her what words were?\"\n\n\"No, of course not. She thought sapiently--And she only thought in\nsense-imagery limited to feeling.\" She looked at Rainsford reproachfully;\nhe\'d knocked a breach in one of her fundamental postulates. \"Of course,\nshe had inherited the cerebroneural equipment for sapient thinking.\" She\nlet that trail off, before somebody asked her how she knew that the\nFuzzies hadn\'t.\n\n\"I\'ll suggest, just to keep the argument going, that speech couldn\'t have\nbeen invented without pre-existing sapience,\" Jack said.\n\nRuth laughed. \"Now you\'re taking me back to college. That used to be one\nof the burning questions in first-year psych students\' bull sessions. By\nthe time we got to be sophomores, we\'d realized that it was only an\negg-and-chicken argument and dropped it.\"\n\n\"That\'s a pity,\" Ben Rainsford said. \"It\'s a good question.\"\n\n\"It would be if it could be answered.\"\n\n\"Maybe it can be,\" Gerd said. \"There\'s a clue to it, right there. I\'ll say\nthat those fellows are on the edge of sapience, and it\'s an even-money bet\nwhich side.\"\n\n\"I\'ll bet every sunstone in my bag they\'re over.\"\n\n\"Well, maybe they\'re just slightly sapient,\" Jimenez suggested.\n\nRuth Ortheris hooted at that. \"That\'s like talking about being just\nslightly dead or just slightly pregnant,\" she said. \"You either are or you\naren\'t.\"\n\nGerd van Riebeek was talking at the same time. \"This sapience question is\njust as important in my field as yours, Ruth. Sapience is the result of\nevolution by natural selection, just as much as a physical characteristic,\nand it\'s the most important step in the evolution of any species, our own\nincluded.\"\n\n\"Wait a minute, Gerd,\" Rainsford said. \"Ruth, what do you mean by that?\nAren\'t there degrees of sapience?\"\n\n\"No. There are degrees of mentation--intelligence, if you prefer--just as\nthere are degrees of temperature. When psychology becomes an exact science\nlike physics, we\'ll be able to calibrate mentation like temperature. But\nsapience is qualitatively different from nonsapience. It\'s more than just\na higher degree of mental temperature. You might call it a sort of mental\nboiling point.\"\n\n\"I think that\'s a damn good analogy,\" Rainsford said. \"But what happens\nwhen the boiling point is reached?\"\n\n\"That\'s what we have to find out,\" van Riebeek told him. \"That\'s what I\nwas talking about a moment ago. We don\'t know any more about how sapience\nappeared today than we did in the year zero, or in the year 654 Pre-Atomic\nfor that matter.\"\n\n\"Wait a minute,\" Jack interrupted. \"Before we go any deeper, let\'s agree\non a definition of sapience.\"\n\nVan Riebeek laughed. \"Ever try to get a definition of life from a\nbiologist?\" he asked. \"Or a definition of number from a mathematician?\"\n\n\"That\'s about it.\" Ruth looked at the Fuzzies, who were looking at their\ncolored-ball construction as though wondering if they could add anything\nmore without spoiling the design. \"I\'d say: a level of mentation\nqualitatively different from nonsapience in that it includes ability to\nsymbolize ideas and store and transmit them, ability to generalize and\nability to form abstract ideas. There; I didn\'t say a word about\ntalk-and-build-a-fire, did I?\"\n\n\"Little Fuzzy symbolizes and generalizes,\" Jack said. \"He symbolizes a\ndamnthing by three horns, and he symbolizes a rifle by a long thing that\npoints and makes noises. Rifles kill animals. Harpies and damnthings are\nboth animals. If a rifle will kill a harpy, it\'ll kill a damnthing too.\"\n\nJuan Jimenez had been frowning in thought; he looked up and asked, \"What\'s\nthe lowest known sapient race?\"\n\n\"Yggdrasil Khooghras,\" Gerd van Riebeek said promptly. \"Any of you ever\nbeen on Yggdrasil?\"\n\n\"I saw a man shot once on Mimir, for calling another man a son of a\nKhooghra,\" Jack said. \"The man who shot him had been on Yggdrasil and knew\nwhat he was being called.\"\n\n\"I spent a couple of years among them,\" Gerd said. \"They do build fires;\nI\'ll give them that. They char points on sticks to make spears. And they\ntalk. I learned their language, all eighty-two words of it. I taught a few\nof the intelligentsia how to use machetes without maiming themselves, and\nthere was one mental giant I could trust to carry some of my equipment, if\nI kept an eye on him, but I never let him touch my rifle or my camera.\"\n\n\"Can they generalize?\" Ruth asked.\n\n\"Honey, they can\'t do nothin\' else but! Every word in their language is a\nhigh-order generalization. _Hroosha_, live-thing. _Noosha_, bad-thing.\n_Dhishta_, thing-to-eat. Want me to go on? There are only seventy-nine\nmore of them.\"\n\nBefore anybody could stop him, the communication screen got itself into an\nuproar. The Fuzzies all ran over in front of it, and Jack switched it on.\nThe caller was a man in gray semiformals; he had wavy gray hair and a face\nthat looked like Juan Jimenez\'s twenty years from now.\n\n\"Good evening; Holloway here.\"\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Holloway, good evening.\" The caller shook hands with himself,\nturning on a dazzling smile. \"I\'m Leonard Kellogg, chief of the Company\'s\nscience division. I just heard the tape you made about the--the Fuzzies?\"\nHe looked down at the floor. \"Are these some of the animals?\"\n\n\"These are the Fuzzies.\" He hoped it sounded like the correction it was\nintended to be. \"Dr. Bennett Rainsford\'s here with me now, and so are Dr.\nJimenez, Dr. van Riebeek and Dr. Ortheris.\" Out of the corner of his eye\nhe could see Jimenez squirming as though afflicted with ants, van Riebeek\ngetting his poker face battened down and Ben Rainsford suppressing a grin.\n\"Some of us are out of screen range, and I\'m sure you\'ll want to ask a lot\nof questions. Pardon us a moment, while we close in.\"\n\nHe ignored Kellogg\'s genial protest that that wouldn\'t be necessary until\nthe chairs were placed facing the screen. As an afterthought, he handed\nFuzzies around, giving Little Fuzzy to Ben, Ko-Ko to Gerd, Mitzi to Ruth,\nMike to Jimenez and taking Mamma and Baby on his own lap.\n\nBaby immediately started to climb up onto his head, as expected. It seemed\nto disconcert Kellogg, also as expected. He decided to teach Baby to thumb\nhis nose when given some unobtrusive signal.\n\n\"Now, about that tape I recorded last evening,\" he began.\n\n\"Yes, Mr. Holloway.\" Kellogg\'s smile was getting more mechanical every\nminute. He was having trouble keeping his eyes off Baby. \"I must say, I\nwas simply astounded at the high order of intelligence claimed for these\ncreatures.\"\n\n\"And you wanted to see how big a liar I was. I don\'t blame you; I had\ntrouble believing it myself at first.\"\n\nKellogg gave a musically blithe laugh, showing even more dental equipment.\n\n\"Oh, no. Mr. Holloway; please don\'t misunderstand me. I never thought\nanything like that.\"\n\n\"I hope not,\" Ben Rainsford said, not too pleasantly. \"I vouched for Mr.\nHolloway\'s statements, if you\'ll recall.\"\n\n\"Of course, Bennett; that goes without saying. Permit me to congratulate\nyou upon a most remarkable scientific discovery. An entirely new order of\nmammals--\"\n\n\"Which may be the ninth extrasolar sapient race,\" Rainsford added.\n\n\"Good heavens, Bennett!\" Kellogg jettisoned his smile and slid on a look\nof shocked surprise. \"You surely can\'t be serious?\" He looked again at the\nFuzzies, pulled the smile back on and gave a light laugh.\n\n\"I thought you\'d heard that tape,\" Rainsford said.\n\n\"Of course, and the things reported were most remarkable. But sapiences!\nJust because they\'ve been taught a few tricks, and use sticks and stones\nfor weapons--\" He got rid of the smile again, and quick-changed to\nseriousness. \"Such an extreme claim must only be made after careful\nstudy.\"\n\n\"Well, I won\'t claim they\'re sapient,\" Ruth Ortheris told him. \"Not till\nday after tomorrow, at the earliest. But they very easily could be. They\nhave learning and reasoning capacity equal to that of any eight-year-old\nTerran Human child, and well above that of the adults of some recognizedly\nsapient races. And they have not been taught tricks; they have learned by\nobservation and reasoning.\"\n\n\"Well, Dr. Kellogg, mentation levels isn\'t my subject,\" Jimenez took it\nup, \"but they do have all the physical characteristics shared by other\nsapient races--lower limbs specialized for locomotion and upper limbs for\nmanipulation, erect posture, stereoscopic vision, color perception,\nhand with opposing thumb--all the characteristics we consider as\nprerequisite to the development of sapience.\"\n\n\"I think they\'re sapient, myself,\" Gerd van Riebeek said, \"but that\'s not\nas important as the fact that they\'re on the very threshold of sapience.\nThis is the first race of this mental level anybody\'s ever seen. I believe\nthat study of the Fuzzies will help us solve the problem of how sapience\ndeveloped in any race.\"\n\nKellogg had been laboring to pump up a head of enthusiasm; now he was\nready to valve it off.\n\n\"But this is amazing! This will make scientific history! Now, of course,\nyou all realize how pricelessly valuable these Fuzzies are. They must be\nbrought at once to Mallorysport, where they can be studied under\nlaboratory conditions by qualified psychologists, and--\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\nJack lifted Baby Fuzzy off his head and handed him to Mamma, and set Mamma\non the floor. That was reflex; the thinking part of his brain knew he\ndidn\'t need to clear for action when arguing with the electronic image of\na man twenty-five hundred miles away.\n\n\"Just forget that part of it and start over,\" he advised.\n\nKellogg ignored him. \"Gerd, you have your airboat; fix up some nice\ncomfortable cages--\"\n\n_\"Kellogg!_\"\n\nThe man in the screen stopped talking and stared in amazed indignation. It\nwas the first time in years he had been addressed by his naked patronymic,\nand possibly the first time in his life he had been shouted at.\n\n\"Didn\'t you hear me the first time Kellogg? Then stop gibbering about\ncages. These Fuzzies aren\'t being taken anywhere.\"\n\n\"But Mr. Holloway! Don\'t you realize that these little beings must be\ncarefully studied? Don\'t you want them given their rightful place in the\nhierarchy of nature?\"\n\n\"If you want to study them, come out here and do it. That\'s so long as you\ndon\'t annoy them, or me. As far as study\'s concerned, they\'re being\nstudied now. Dr. Rainsford\'s studying them, and so are three of your\npeople, and when it comes to that, I\'m studying them myself.\"\n\n\"And I\'d like you to clarify that remark about qualified psychologists,\"\nRuth Ortheris added, in a voice approaching zero-Kelvin. \"You wouldn\'t be\nchallenging my professional qualifications, would you?\"\n\n\"Oh, Ruth, you know I didn\'t mean anything like that. Please don\'t\nmisunderstand me,\" Kellogg begged. \"But this is highly specialized work--\"\n\n\"Yes; how many Fuzzy specialists have you at Science Center, Leonard?\"\nRainsford wanted to know. \"The only one I can think of is Jack Holloway,\nhere.\"\n\n\"Well, I\'d thought of Dr. Mallin, the Company\'s head psychologist.\"\n\n\"He can come too, just as long as he understands that he\'ll have to have\nmy permission for anything he wants to do with the Fuzzies,\" Jack said.\n\"When can we expect you?\"\n\nKellogg thought some time late the next afternoon. He didn\'t have to ask\nhow to get to the camp. He made a few efforts to restore the conversation\nto its original note of cordiality, gave that up as a bad job and blanked\nout. There was a brief silence in the living room. Then Jimenez said\nreproachfully:\n\n\"You certainly weren\'t very gracious to Dr. Kellogg, Jack. Maybe you don\'t\nrealize it, but he is a very important man.\"\n\n\"He isn\'t important to me, and I wasn\'t gracious to him at all. It doesn\'t\npay to be gracious to people like that. If you are, they always try to\ntake advantage of it.\"\n\n\"Why, I didn\'t know you knew Len,\" van Riebeek said.\n\n\"I never saw the individual before. The species is very common and widely\ndistributed.\" He turned to Rainsford. \"You think he and this Mallin will\nbe out tomorrow?\"\n\n\"Of course they will. This is a little too big for underlings and\nnon-Company people to be allowed to monkey with. You know, we\'ll have to\nwatch out or in a year we\'ll be hearing from Terra about the discovery of\na sapient race on Zarathustra; _Fuzzy fuzzy Kellogg_. As Juan says, Dr.\nKellogg is a very important man. That\'s how he got important.\"\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\n\nThe recorded voice ceased; for a moment the record player hummed\nvoicelessly. Loud in the silence, a photocell acted with a double click,\nopening one segment of the sun shielding and closing another at the\nopposite side of the dome. Space Commodore Alex Napier glanced up from his\ndesk and out at the harshly angular landscape of Xerxes and the blackness\nof airless space beyond the disquietingly close horizon. Then he picked up\nhis pipe and knocked the heel out into the ashtray. Nobody said anything.\nHe began packing tobacco into the bowl.\n\n\"Well, gentlemen?\" He invited comment.\n\n\"Pancho?\" Captain Conrad Greibenfeld, the Exec., turned to Lieutenant\nYbarra, the chief psychologist.\n\n\"How reliable is this stuff?\" Ybarra asked.\n\n\"Well, I knew Jack Holloway thirty years ago, on Fenris, when I was just\nan ensign. He must be past seventy now,\" he parenthesized. \"If he says he\nsaw anything, I\'ll believe it. And Bennett Rainsford\'s absolutely\nreliable, of course.\"\n\n\"How about the agent?\" Ybarra insisted.\n\nHe and Stephen Aelborg, the Intelligence officer, exchanged glances. He\nnodded, and Aelborg said:\n\n\"One of the best. One of our own, lieutenant j.g., Naval Reserve. You\ndon\'t need to worry about credibility, Pancho.\"\n\n\"They sound sapient to me,\" Ybarra said. \"You know, this is something I\'ve\nalways been half hoping and half afraid would happen.\"\n\n\"You mean an excuse to intervene in that mess down there?\" Greibenfeld\nasked.\n\nYbarra looked blankly at him for a moment. \"No. No, I meant a case of\nborderline sapience; something our sacred talk-and-build-a-fire rule won\'t\ncover. Just how did this come to our attention, Stephen?\"\n\n\"Well, it was transmitted to us from Contact Center in Mallorysport late\nFriday night. There seem to be a number of copies of this tape around; our\nagent got hold of one of them and transmitted it to Contact Center, and it\nwas relayed on to us, with the agent\'s comments,\" Aelborg said. \"Contact\nCenter ordered a routine surveillance inside Company House and, to play\nsafe, at the Residency. At the time, there seemed no reason to give the\nthing any beat-to-quarters-and-man-guns treatment, but we got a report on\nSaturday afternoon--Mallorysport time, that is--that Leonard Kellogg had\nplayed off the copy of the tape that Juan Jimenez had made for file, and\nhad alerted Victor Grego immediately.\n\n\"Of course, Grego saw the implications at once. He sent Kellogg and the\nchief Company psychologist, Ernst Mallin, out to Beta Continent with\norders to brand Rainsford\'s and Holloway\'s claims as a deliberate hoax.\nThen the Company intends to encourage the trapping of Fuzzies for their\nfur, in hopes that the whole species will be exterminated before anybody\ncan get out from Terra to check on Rainsford\'s story.\"\n\n\"I hadn\'t heard that last detail before.\"\n\n\"Well, we can prove it,\" Aelborg assured him.\n\nIt sounded like a Victor Grego idea. He lit his pipe slowly. Damnit, he\ndidn\'t want to have to intervene. No Space Navy C.O. did. Justifying\nintervention on a Colonial planet was too much bother--always a board of\ninquiry, often a courtmartial. And supersession of civil authority was\ncompletely against Service Doctrine. Of course, there were other and more\nimportant tenets of Service Doctrine. The sovereignty of the Terran\nFederation for one, and the inviolability of the Federation Constitution.\nAnd the rights of extraterrestrials, too. Conrad Greibenfeld, too, seemed\nto have been thinking about that.\n\n\"If those Fuzzies are sapient beings, that whole setup down there is\nillegal. Company, Colonial administration and all,\" he said.\n\"Zarathustra\'s a Class-IV planet, and that\'s all you can make out of it.\"\n\n\"We won\'t intervene unless we\'re forced to. Pancho, I think the decision\nwill be largely up to you.\"\n\nPancho Ybarra was horrified.\n\n\"Good God, Alex! You can\'t mean that. Who am I? A nobody. All I have is an\nordinary M.D., and a Psych.D. Why, the best psychological brains in the\nFederation--\"\n\n\"Aren\'t on Zarathustra, Pancho. They\'re on Terra, five hundred\nlight-years, six months\' ship voyage each way. Intervention, of course, is\nmy responsibility, but the sapience question is yours. I don\'t envy you,\nbut I can\'t relieve you of it.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nGerd van Riebeek\'s suggestion that all three of the visitors sleep aboard\nthe airboat hadn\'t been treated seriously at all. Gerd himself was\naccommodated in the spare room of the living hut. Juan Jimenez went with\nBen Rainsford to his camp for the night. Ruth Ortheris had the cabin of\nthe boat to herself. Rainsford was on the screen the next morning, while\nJack and Gerd and Ruth and the Fuzzies were having breakfast; he and\nJimenez had decided to take his airjeep and work down from the head of\nCold Creek in the belief that there must be more Fuzzies around in the\nwoods.\n\nBoth Gerd and Ruth decided to spend the morning at the camp and get\nacquainted with the Fuzzies on hand. The family had had enough breakfast\nto leave them neutral on the subject of land-prawns, and they were given\nanother of the new toys, a big colored ball. They rolled it around in the\ngrass for a while, decided to save it for their evening romp and took it\ninto the house. Then they began playing aimlessly among some junk in the\nshed outside the workshop. Once in a while one of them would drift away to\nlook for a prawn, more for sport than food.\n\nRuth and Gerd and Jack were sitting at the breakfast table on the grass,\ntalking idly and trying to think of excuses for not washing the dishes.\nMamma Fuzzy and Baby were poking about in the tall grass. Suddenly Mamma\ngave a shrill cry and started back for the shed, chasing Baby ahead of her\nand slapping him on the bottom with the flat of her chopper-digger to\nhurry him along.\n\nJack started for the house at a run. Gerd grabbed his camera and jumped up\non the table. It was Ruth who saw the cause of the disturbance.\n\n\"Jack! Look, over there!\" She pointed to the edge of the clearing. \"Two\nstrange Fuzzies!\"\n\nHe kept on running, but instead of the rifle he had been going for, he\ncollected his movie camera, two of the spare chopper-diggers and some\nExtee Three. When he emerged again, the two Fuzzies had come into the\nclearing and stood side by side, looking around. Both were females, and\nthey both carried wooden prawn-killers.\n\n\"You have plenty of film?\" he asked Gerd. \"Here, Ruth; take this.\" He\nhanded her his own camera. \"Keep far enough away from me to get what I\'m\ndoing and what they\'re doing. I\'m going to try to trade with them.\"\n\nHe went forward, the steel weapons in his hip pocket and the Extee Three\nin his hand, talking softly and soothingly to the newcomers. When he was\nas close to them as he could get without stampeding them, he stopped.\n\n\"Our gang\'s coming up behind you,\" Gerd told him. \"Regular skirmish line;\nchoppers at high port. Now they\'ve stopped, about thirty feet behind you.\"\n\nHe broke off a piece of Extee Three, put it in his mouth and ate it. Then\nhe broke off two more pieces and held them out. The two Fuzzies were\ntempted, but not to the point of rashness. He threw both pieces within a\nfew feet of them. One darted forward, threw a piece to her companion and\nthen snatched the other piece and ran back with it. They stood together,\nnibbling and making soft delighted noises.\n\nHis own family seemed to disapprove strenuously of this lavishing of\ndelicacies upon outsiders. However, the two strangers decided that it\nwould be safe to come closer, and soon he had them taking bits of field\nration from his hand. Then he took the two steel chopper-diggers out of\nhis pocket, and managed to convey the idea that he wanted to trade. The\ntwo strange Fuzzies were incredulously delighted. This was too much for\nhis own tribe; they came up yeeking angrily.\n\nThe two strange females retreated a few steps, their new weapon ready.\nEverybody seemed to expect a fight, and nobody wanted one. From what he\ncould remember of Old Terran history, this was a situation which could\ndevelop into serious trouble. Then Ko-Ko advanced, dragging his\nchopper-digger in an obviously pacific manner, and approached the two\nfemales, yeeking softly and touching first one and then the other. Then he\nlaid his weapon down and put his foot on it. The two females began\nstroking and caressing him.\n\nImmediately the crisis evaporated. The others of the family came forward,\nstuck their weapons in the ground and began fondling the strangers. Then\nthey all sat in a circle, swaying their bodies rhythmically and making\nsoft noises. Finally Ko-Ko and the two females rose, picked up their\nweapons and started for the woods.\n\n\"Jack, stop them,\" Ruth called out. \"They\'re going away.\"\n\n\"If they want to go, I have no right to stop them.\"\n\nWhen they were almost at the edge of the woods, Ko-Ko stopped, drove the\npoint of his weapon into the ground and came running back to Pappy Jack,\nthrowing his arms around the human knees and yeeking. Jack stooped and\nstroked him, but didn\'t try to pick him up. One of the two females pulled\nhis chopper-digger out, and they both came back slowly. At the same time,\nLittle Fuzzy, Mamma Fuzzy, Mike and Mitzi came running back. For a while,\nall the Fuzzies embraced one another, yeeking happily. Then they all\ntrooped across the grass and went into the house.\n\n\"Get that all, Gerd?\" he asked.\n\n\"On film, yes. That\'s the only way I did, though. What happened?\"\n\n\"You have just made the first film of intertribal social and mating\ncustoms, Zarathustran Fuzzy. This is the family\'s home; they don\'t want\nany strange Fuzzies hanging around. They were going to run the girls off.\nThen Ko-Ko decided he liked their looks, and he decided he\'d team up with\nthem. That made everything different; the family sat down with them to\ntell them what a fine husband they were getting and to tell Ko-Ko\ngood-bye. Then Ko-Ko remembered that he hadn\'t told me good-bye, and he\ncame back. The family decided that two more Fuzzies wouldn\'t be in excess\nof the carrying capacity of this habitat, seeing what a good provider\nPappy Jack is, so now I should imagine they\'re showing the girls the\nfamily treasures. You know, they married into a mighty well-to-do family.\"\n\nThe girls were named Goldilocks and Cinderella. When lunch was ready, they\nwere all in the living room, with the viewscreen on; after lunch, the\nwhole gang went into the bedroom for a nap on Pappy Jack\'s bed. He spent\nthe afternoon developing movie film, while Gerd and Ruth wrote up the\nnotes they had made the day before and collaborated on an account of the\nadoption. By late afternoon, when they were finished, the Fuzzies came out\nfor a frolic and prawn hunt.\n\nThey all heard the aircar before any of the human people did, and they all\nran over and climbed up on the bench beside the kitchen door. It was a\nconstabulary cruise car; it landed, and a couple of troopers got out,\nsaying that they\'d stopped to see the Fuzzies. They wanted to know where\nthe extras had come from, and when Jack told them, they looked at one\nanother.\n\n\"Next gang that comes along, call us and keep them entertained till we can\nget here,\" one of them said. \"We want some at the post, for prawns if\nnothing else.\"\n\n\"What\'s George\'s attitude?\" he asked. \"The other night, when he was here,\nhe seemed half scared of them.\"\n\n\"Aah, he\'s got over that,\" one of the troopers said. \"He called Ben\nRainsford; Ben said they were perfectly safe. Hey, Ben says they\'re not\nanimals; they\'re people.\"\n\nHe started to tell them about some of the things the Fuzzies did. He was\nstill talking when the Fuzzies heard another aircar and called attention\nto it. This time, it was Ben Rainsford and Juan Jimenez. They piled out as\nsoon as they were off contragravity, dragging cameras after them.\n\n\"Jack, there are Fuzzies all over the place up there,\" Rainsford began,\nwhile he was getting out. \"All headed down this way; regular\n_Volkerwanderung_. We saw over fifty of them--four families, and\nindividuals and pairs. I\'m sure we missed ten for every one we saw.\"\n\n\"We better get up there with a car tomorrow,\" one of the troopers said.\n\"Ben, just where were you?\"\n\n\"I\'ll show you on the map.\" Then he saw Goldilocks and Cinderella. \"Hey!\nWhere\'d you two girls come from? I never saw you around here before.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nThere was another clearing across the stream, with a log footbridge and a\npath to the camp. Jack guided the big airboat down onto it, and put his\nairjeep alongside with the canopy up. There were two men on the forward\ndeck of the boat, Kellogg and another man who would be Ernst Mallin. A\nthird man came out of the control cabin after the boat was off\ncontragravity. Jack didn\'t like Mallin. He had a tight, secretive face,\nwith arrogance and bigotry showing underneath. The third man was younger.\nHis face didn\'t show anything much, but his coat showed a bulge under the\nleft arm. After being introduced by Kellogg, Mallin introduced him as Kurt\nBorch, his assistant.\n\nMallin had to introduce Borch again at the camp, not only to Ben Rainsford\nbut also to van Riebeek, to Jimenez and even to Ruth Ortheris, which\nseemed a little odd. Ruth seemed to think so, too, and Mallin hastened to\ntell her that Borch was with Personnel, giving some kind of tests. That\nappeared to puzzle her even more. None of the three seemed happy about the\npresence of the constabulary troopers, either; they were all relieved when\nthe cruise car lifted out.\n\nKellogg became interested in the Fuzzies immediately, squatting to examine\nthem. He said something to Mallin, who compressed his lips and shook his\nhead, saying:\n\n\"We simply cannot assume sapience until we find something in their\nbehavior which cannot be explained under any other hypothesis. We would be\nmuch safer to assume nonsapience and proceed to test that assumption.\"\n\nThat seemed to establish the keynote. Kellogg straightened, and he and\nMallin started one of those \"of course I agree, doctor, but don\'t you\nfind, on the other hand, that you must agree\" sort of arguments, about the\ndifference between scientific evidence and scientific proof. Jimenez got\ninto it to the extent of agreeing with everything Kellogg said, and\ndiffering politely with everything Mallin said that he thought Kellogg\nwould differ with. Borch said nothing; he just stood and looked at the\nFuzzies with ill-concealed hostility. Gerd and Ruth decided to help\ngetting dinner.\n\nThey ate outside on the picnic table, with the Fuzzies watching them\ninterestedly. Kellogg and Mallin carefully avoided discussing them. It\nwasn\'t until after dusk, when the Fuzzies brought their ball inside and\neverybody was in the living room, that Kellogg, adopting a\npresiding-officer manner, got the conversation onto the subject. For some\ntime, without giving anyone else an opportunity to say anything, he gushed\nabout what an important discovery the Fuzzies were. The Fuzzies themselves\nignored him and began dismantling the stick-and-ball construction. For a\nwhile Goldilocks and Cinderella watched interestedly, and then they began\nassisting.\n\n\"Unfortunately,\" Kellogg continued, \"so much of our data is in the form of\nuncorroborated statements by Mr. Holloway. Now, please don\'t misunderstand\nme. I don\'t, myself, doubt for a moment anything Mr. Holloway said on that\ntape, but you must realize that professional scientists are most reluctant\nto accept the unsubstantiated reports of what, if you\'ll pardon me, they\nthink of as nonqualified observers.\"\n\n\"Oh, rubbish, Leonard!\" Rainsford broke in impatiently. \"I\'m a\nprofessional scientist, of a good many more years\' standing than you, and\nI accept Jack Holloway\'s statements. A frontiersman like Jack is a very\ncareful and exact observer. People who aren\'t don\'t live long on frontier\nplanets.\"\n\n\"Now, please don\'t misunderstand me,\" Kellogg reiterated. \"I don\'t doubt\nMr. Holloway\'s statements. I was just thinking of how they would be\nreceived on Terra.\"\n\n\"I shouldn\'t worry about that, Leonard. The Institute accepts my reports,\nand I\'m vouching for Jack\'s reliability. I can substantiate most of what\nhe told me from personal observation.\"\n\n\"Yes, and there\'s more than just verbal statements,\" Gerd van Riebeek\nchimed in. \"A camera is not a nonqualified observer. We have quite a bit\nof film of the Fuzzies.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes; there was some mention of movies,\" Mallin said. \"You don\'t have\nany of them developed yet, do you?\"\n\n\"Quite a lot. Everything except what was taken out in the woods this\nafternoon. We can run them off right now.\"\n\nHe pulled down the screen in front of the gunrack, got the film and loaded\nhis projector. The Fuzzies, who had begun on a new stick-and-ball\nconstruction, were irritated when the lights went out, then wildly excited\nwhen Little Fuzzy, digging a toilet pit with the wood chisel, appeared.\nLittle Fuzzy in particular was excited about that; if he didn\'t recognize\nhimself, he recognized the chisel. Then there were pictures of Little\nFuzzy killing and eating land-prawns, Little Fuzzy taking the nut off the\nbolt and putting it on again, and pictures of the others, after they had\ncome in, hunting and at play. Finally, there was the film of the adoption\nof Goldilocks and Cinderella.\n\n\"What Juan and I got this afternoon, up in the woods, isn\'t so good, I\'m\nafraid,\" Rainsford said when the show was over and the lights were on\nagain. \"Mostly it\'s rear views disappearing into the brush. It was very\nhard to get close to them in the jeep. Their hearing is remarkably acute.\nBut I\'m sure the pictures we took this afternoon will show the things they\nwere carrying--wooden prawn-killers like the two that were traded from the\nnew ones in that last film.\"\n\nMallin and Kellogg looked at one another in what seemed oddly like\nconsternation.\n\n\"You didn\'t tell us there were more of them around,\" Mallin said, as\nthough it were an accusation of duplicity. He turned to Kellogg. \"This\nalters the situation.\"\n\n\"Yes, indeed, Ernst,\" Kellogg burbled delightedly. \"This is a wonderful\nopportunity. Mr. Holloway, I understand that all this country up here is\nyour property, by landgrant purchase. That\'s right, isn\'t it? Well, would\nyou allow us to camp on that clearing across the run, where our boat is\nnow? We\'ll get prefab huts--Red Hill\'s the nearest town, isn\'t it?--and\nhave a Company construction gang set them up for us, and we won\'t be any\nbother at all to you. We had only intended staying tonight on our boat,\nand returning to Mallorysport in the morning, but with all these Fuzzies\nswarming around in the woods, we can\'t think of leaving now. You don\'t\nhave any objection, do you?\"\n\nHe had lots of objections. The whole business was rapidly developing into\nan acute pain in the neck for him. But if he didn\'t let Kellogg camp\nacross the run, the three of them could move seventy or eighty miles in\nany direction and be off his land. He knew what they\'d do then. They\'d\nlive-trap or sleep-gas Fuzzies; they\'d put them in cages, and torment them\nwith maze and electric-shock experiments, and kill a few for dissection,\nor maybe not bother killing them first. On his own land, if they did\nanything like that, he could do something about it.\n\n\"Not at all. I\'ll have to remind you again, though, that you\'re to treat\nthese little people with consideration.\"\n\n\"Oh, we won\'t do anything to your Fuzzies,\" Mallin said.\n\n\"You won\'t hurt any Fuzzies. Not more than once, anyhow.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe next morning, during breakfast, Kellogg and Kurt Borch put in an\nappearance, Borch wearing old clothes and field boots and carrying his\npistol on his belt. They had a list of things they thought they would need\nfor their camp. Neither of them seemed to have more than the foggiest\nnotion of camp requirements. Jack made some suggestions which they\naccepted. There was a lot of scientific equipment on the list, including\nan X-ray machine. He promptly ran a pencil line through that.\n\n\"We don\'t know what these Fuzzies\' level of radiation tolerance is. We\'re\nnot going to find out by overdosing one of my Fuzzies.\"\n\nSomewhat to his surprise, neither of them gave him any argument. Gerd and\nRuth and Kellogg borrowed his airjeep and started north; he and Borch went\nacross the run to make measurements after Rainsford and Jimenez arrived\nand picked up Mallin. Borch took off soon after with the boat for Red\nHill. Left alone, he loafed around the camp, and developed the rest of the\nmovie film, making three copies of everything. Toward noon, Borch brought\nthe boat back, followed by a couple of scowlike farmboats. In a few hours,\nthe Company construction men from Red Hill had the new camp set up. Among\nother things, they brought two more air jeeps.\n\nThe two jeeps returned late in the afternoon, everybody excited. Between\nthem, the parties had seen almost a hundred Fuzzies, and had found three\ncamps, two among rocks and one in a hollow pool-ball tree. All three had\nbeen spotted by belts of filled-in toilet pits around them; two had been\nabandoned and the third was still occupied. Kellogg insisted on playing\nhost to Jack and Rainsford for dinner at the camp across the run. The\nmeal, because everything had been brought ready-cooked and only needed\nwarming, was excellent.\n\nReturning to his own camp with Rainsford, Jack found the Fuzzies finished\nwith their evening meal and in the living room, starting a new\nconstruction--he could think of no other name for it--with the\nmolecule-model balls and sticks. Goldilocks left the others and came over\nto him with a couple of balls fastened together, holding them up with one\nhand while she pulled his trouser leg with the other.\n\n\"Yes, I see. It\'s very beautiful,\" he told her.\n\nShe tugged harder and pointed at the thing the others were making.\nFinally, he understood.\n\n\"She wants me to work on it, too,\" he said. \"Ben, you know where the\ncoffee is; fix us a pot. I\'m going to be busy here.\"\n\nHe sat down on the floor, and was putting sticks and balls together when\nBen brought in the coffee. This was more fun than he\'d had in a couple of\ndays. He said so while Ben was distributing Extee Three to the Fuzzies.\n\n\"Yes, I ought to let you kick me all around the camp for getting this\nstarted,\" Rainsford said, pouring the coffee. \"I could make some excuses,\nbut they\'d all sound like \'I didn\'t know it was loaded.\'\"\n\n\"Hell, I didn\'t know it was loaded, either.\" He rose and took his coffee\ncup, blowing on it to cool it. \"What do you think Kellogg\'s up to, anyhow?\nThat whole act he\'s been putting on since he came here is phony as a\nnine-sol bill.\"\n\n\"What I told you, evening before last,\" Rainsford said. \"He doesn\'t want\nnon-Company people making discoveries on Zarathustra. You notice how hard\nhe and Mallin are straining to talk me out of sending a report back to\nTerra before he can investigate the Fuzzies? He wants to get his own\nreport in first. Well, the hell with him! You know what I\'m going to do?\nI\'m going home, and I\'m going to sit up all night getting a report into\nshape. Tomorrow morning I\'m going to give it to George Lunt and let him\nsend it to Mallorysport in the constabulary mail pouch. It\'ll be on a ship\nfor Terra before any of this gang knows it\'s been sent. Do you have any\ncopies of those movies you can spare?\"\n\n\"About a mile and a half. I made copies of everything, even the stuff the\nothers took.\"\n\n\"Good. We\'ll send that, too. Let Kellogg read about it in the papers a\nyear from now.\" He thought for a moment, then said: \"Gerd and Ruth and\nJuan are bunking at the other camp now; suppose I move in here with you\ntomorrow. I assume you don\'t want to leave the Fuzzies alone while that\ngang\'s here. I can help you keep an eye on them.\"\n\n\"But, Ben, you don\'t want to drop whatever else you\'re doing--\"\n\n\"What I\'m doing, now, is learning to be a Fuzzyologist, and this is the\nonly place I can do it. I\'ll see you tomorrow, after I stop at the\nconstabulary post.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe people across the run--Kellogg, Mallin and Borch, and van Riebeek,\nJimenez and Ruth Ortheris--were still up when Rainsford went out to his\nairjeep. After watching him lift out, Jack went back into the house,\nplayed with his family in the living room for a while and went to bed. The\nnext morning he watched Kellogg, Ruth and Jimenez leave in one jeep and,\nshortly after, Mallin and van Riebeek in the other. Kellogg didn\'t seem to\nbe willing to let the three who had come to the camp first wander around\nunchaperoned. He wondered about that.\n\nBen Rainsford\'s airjeep came over the mountains from the south in the late\nmorning and settled onto the grass. Jack helped him inside with his\nluggage, and then they sat down under the big featherleaf trees to smoke\ntheir pipes and watch the Fuzzies playing in the grass. Occasionally they\nsaw Kurt Borch pottering around outside the other camp.\n\n\"I sent the report off,\" Rainsford said, then looked at his watch. \"It\nought to be on the mail boat for Mallorysport by now; this time tomorrow\nit\'ll be in hyperspace for Terra. We won\'t say anything about it; just sit\nback and watch Len Kellogg and Ernst Mallin working up a sweat trying to\ntalk us out of sending it.\" He chuckled. \"I made a definite claim of\nsapience; by the time I got the report in shape to tape off, I couldn\'t\nsee any other alternative.\"\n\n\"Damned if I can. You hear that, kids?\" he asked Mike and Mitzi, who had\ncome over in hope that there might be goodies for them. \"Uncle Ben says\nyou\'re sapient.\"\n\n\"Yeek?\"\n\n\"They want to know if it\'s good to eat. What\'ll happen now?\"\n\n\"Nothing, for about a year. Six months from now, when the ship gets in,\nthe Institute will release it to the press, and then they\'ll send an\ninvestigation team here. So will any of the other universities or\nscientific institutes that may be interested. I suppose the government\'ll\nsend somebody, too. After all, subcivilized natives on colonized planets\nare wards of the Terran Federation.\"\n\nHe didn\'t know that he liked that. The less he had to do with the\ngovernment the better, and his Fuzzies were wards of Pappy Jack Holloway.\nHe said as much.\n\nRainsford picked up Mitzi and stroked her. \"Nice fur,\" he said. \"Fur like\nthat would bring good prices. It will, if we don\'t get these people\nrecognized as sapient beings.\"\n\nHe looked across the run at the new camp and wondered. Maybe Leonard\nKellogg saw that, too, and saw profits for the Company in Fuzzy fur.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe airjeeps returned in the middle of the afternoon, first Mallin\'s, and\nthen Kellogg\'s. Everybody went inside. An hour later, a constabulary car\nlanded in front of the Kellogg camp. George Lunt and Ahmed Khadra got out.\nKellogg came outside, spoke with them and then took them into the main\nliving hut. Half an hour later, the lieutenant and the trooper emerged,\nlifted their car across the run and set it down on the lawn. The Fuzzies\nran to meet them, possibly expecting more whistles, and followed them into\nthe living room. Lunt and Khadra took off their berets, but made no move\nto unbuckle their gun belts.\n\n\"We got your package off all right Ben,\" Lunt said. He sat down and took\nGoldilocks on his lap; immediately Cinderella jumped up, also. \"Jack, what\nthe hell\'s that gang over there up to anyhow?\"\n\n\"You got that, too?\"\n\n\"You can smell it on them for a mile, against the wind. In the first\nplace, that Borch. I wish I could get his prints; I\'ll bet we have them on\nfile. And the whole gang\'s trying to hide something, and what they\'re\ntrying to hide is something they\'re scared of, like a body in a closet.\nWhen we were over there, Kellogg did all the talking; anybody else who\ntried to say anything got shut up fast. Kellogg doesn\'t like you, Jack and\nhe doesn\'t like Ben, and he doesn\'t like the Fuzzies. Most of all he\ndoesn\'t like the Fuzzies.\"\n\n\"Well, I told you what I thought this morning,\" Rainsford said. \"They\ndon\'t want outsiders discovering things on this planet. It wouldn\'t make\nthem look good to the home office on Terra. Remember, it was some\nnon-Company people who discovered the first sunstones, back in\n\'Forty-eight.\"\n\nGeorge Lunt looked thoughtful. On him, it was a scowl.\n\n\"I don\'t think that\'s it, Ben. When we were talking to him, he admitted\nvery freely that you and Jack discovered the Fuzzies. The way he talked,\nhe didn\'t seem to think they were worth discovering at all. And he asked a\nlot of funny questions about you, Jack. The kind of questions I\'d ask if I\nwas checking up on somebody\'s mental competence.\" The scowl became one of\nanger now. \"By God, I wish I had an excuse to question him--with a\nveridicator!\"\n\nKellogg didn\'t want the Fuzzies to be sapient beings. If they weren\'t\nthey\'d be ... fur-bearing animals. Jack thought of some overfed society\ndowager on Terra or Baldur, wearing the skins of Little Fuzzy and Mamma\nFuzzy and Mike and Mitzi and Ko-Ko and Cinderella and Goldilocks wrapped\naround her adipose carcass. It made him feel sick.\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\n\nTuesday dawned hot and windless, a scarlet sun coming up in a hard, brassy\nsky. The Fuzzies, who were in to wake Pappy Jack with their whistles,\ndidn\'t like it; they were edgy and restless. Maybe it would rain today\nafter all. They had breakfast outside on the picnic table, and then Ben\ndecided he\'d go back to his camp and pick up a few things he hadn\'t\nbrought and now decided he needed.\n\n\"My hunting rifle\'s one,\" he said, \"and I think I\'ll circle down to the\nedge of the brush country and see if I can pick off a zebralope. We ought\nto have some more fresh meat.\"\n\nSo, after eating, Rainsford got into his jeep and lifted away. Across the\nrun, Kellogg and Mallin were walking back and forth in front of the camp,\ntalking earnestly. When Ruth Ortheris and Gerd van Riebeek came out, they\nstopped, broke off their conversation and spoke briefly with them. Then\nGerd and Ruth crossed the footbridge and came up the path together.\n\nThe Fuzzies had scattered, by this time, to hunt prawns. Little Fuzzy and\nKo-Ko and Goldilocks ran to meet them; Ruth picked Goldilocks up and\ncarried her, and Ko-Ko and Little Fuzzy ran on ahead. They greeted Jack,\ndeclining coffee; Ruth sat down in a chair with Goldilocks, Little Fuzzy\njumped up on the table and began looking for goodies, and when Gerd\nstretched out on his back on the grass Ko-Ko sat down on his chest.\n\n\"Goldilocks is my favorite Fuzzy,\" Ruth was saying. \"She is the sweetest\nthing. Of course, they\'re all pretty nice. I can\'t get over how\naffectionate and trusting they are; the ones we saw out in the woods were\nso timid.\"\n\n\"Well, the ones out in the woods don\'t have any Pappy Jack to look after\nthem\" Gerd said. \"I\'d imagine they\'re very affectionate among themselves,\nbut they have so many things to be afraid of. You know, there\'s another\nprerequisite for sapience. It develops in some small, relatively\ndefenseless, animal surrounded by large and dangerous enemies he can\'t\noutrun or outfight. So, to survive, he has to learn to outthink them. Like\nour own remote ancestors, or like Little Fuzzy; he had his choice of\ngetting sapient or getting exterminated.\"\n\nRuth seemed troubled. \"Gerd, Dr. Mallin has found absolutely nothing about\nthem that indicates true sapience.\"\n\n\"Oh, Mallin be bloodied; he doesn\'t know what sapience is any more than I\ndo. And a good deal less than you do, I\'d say. I think he\'s trying to\nprove that the Fuzzies aren\'t sapient.\"\n\nRuth looked startled. \"What makes you say that?\"\n\n\"It\'s been sticking out all over him ever since he came here. You\'re a\npsychologist; don\'t tell me you haven\'t seen it. Maybe if the Fuzzies were\nproven sapient it would invalidate some theory he\'s gotten out of a book,\nand he\'d have to do some thinking for himself. He wouldn\'t like that. But\nyou have to admit he\'s been fighting the idea, intellectually and\nemotionally, right from the start. Why, they could sit down with pencils\nand slide rules and start working differential calculus and it wouldn\'t\nconvince him.\"\n\n\"Dr. Mallin\'s trying to--\" she began angrily. Then she broke it off.\n\"Jack, excuse us. We didn\'t really come over here to have a fight. We came\nto meet some Fuzzies. Didn\'t we, Goldilocks?\"\n\nGoldilocks was playing with the silver charm on the chain around her neck,\nholding it to her ear and shaking it to make it tinkle, making small\ndelighted sounds. Finally she held it up and said, \"Yeek?\"\n\n\"Yes, sweetie-pie, you can have it.\" Ruth took the chain from around her\nneck and put it over Goldilocks\' head; she had to loop it three times\nbefore it would fit. \"There now; that\'s your very own.\"\n\n\"Oh, you mustn\'t give her things like that.\"\n\n\"Why not. It\'s just cheap trade-junk. You\'ve been on Loki, Jack, you know\nwhat it is.\" He did; he\'d traded stuff like that to the natives himself.\n\"Some of the girls at the hospital there gave it to me for a joke. I only\nwear it because I have it. Goldilocks likes it a lot better than I do.\"\n\nAn airjeep rose from the other side and floated across. Juan Jimenez was\npiloting it; Ernst Mallin stuck his head out the window on the right,\nasked her if she were ready and told Gerd that Kellogg would pick him up\nin a few minutes. After she had gotten into the jeep and it had lifted\nout, Gerd put Ko-Ko off his chest and sat up, getting cigarettes from his\nshirt pocket.\n\n\"I don\'t know what the devil\'s gotten into her,\" he said, watching the\njeep vanish. \"Oh, yes, I do. She\'s gotten the Word from On High. Kellogg\nhath spoken. Fuzzies are just silly little animals,\" he said bitterly.\n\n\"You work for Kellogg, too, don\'t you?\"\n\n\"Yes. He doesn\'t dictate my professional opinion, though. You know, I\nthought, in the evil hour when I took this job--\" He rose to his feet,\nhitching his belt to balance the weight of the pistol on the right against\nthe camera-binoculars on the left, and changed the subject abruptly.\n\"Jack, has Ben Rainsford sent a report on the Fuzzies to the Institute\nyet?\" he asked.\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"If he hasn\'t, tell him to hurry up and get one in.\"\n\nThere wasn\'t time to go into that further. Kellogg\'s jeep was rising from\nthe camp across the run and approaching.\n\nHe decided to let the breakfast dishes go till after lunch. Kurt Borch had\nstayed behind at the Kellogg camp, so he kept an eye on the Fuzzies and\nbrought them back when they started to stray toward the footbridge. Ben\nRainsford hadn\'t returned by lunchtime, but zebralope hunting took a\nlittle time, even from the air. While he was eating, outside, one of the\nrented airjeeps returned from the northeast in a hurry, disgorging Ernst\nMallin, Juan Jimenez and Ruth Ortheris. Kurt Borch came hurrying out; they\ntalked for a few minutes, and then they all went inside. A little later,\nthe second jeep came in, even faster, and landed; Kellogg and van Riebeek\nhastened into the living hut. There wasn\'t anything more to see. He\ncarried the dishes into the kitchen and washed them, and the Fuzzies went\ninto the bedroom for their nap.\n\nHe was sitting at the table in the living room when Gerd van Riebeek\nknocked on the open door.\n\n\"Jack, can I talk to you for a minute?\" he asked.\n\n\"Sure. Come in.\"\n\nVan Riebeek entered, unbuckling his gun belt. He shifted a chair so that\nhe could see the door from it, and laid the belt on the floor at his feet\nwhen he sat down. Then he began to curse Leonard Kellogg in four or five\nlanguages.\n\n\"Well, I agree, in principle; why in particular, though?\"\n\n\"You know what that son of a Khooghra\'s doing?\" Gerd asked. \"He and\nthat--\" He used a couple of Sheshan words, viler than anything in Lingua\nTerra. \"--that quack headshrinker, Mallin, are preparing a report,\naccusing you and Ben Rainsford of perpetrating a deliberate scientific\nhoax. You taught the Fuzzies some tricks; you and Rainsford, between you,\nmade those artifacts yourselves and the two of you are conspiring to foist\nthe Fuzzies off as sapient beings. Jack, if it weren\'t so goddamn stinking\ncontemptible, it would be the biggest joke of the century!\"\n\n\"I take it they wanted you to sign this report, too?\"\n\n\"Yes, and I told Kellogg he could--\" What Kellogg could do, it seemed, was\nboth appalling and physiologically impossible. He cursed again, and then\nlit a cigarette and got hold of himself. \"Here\'s what happened. Kellogg\nand I went up that stream, about twenty miles down Cold Creek, the one\nyou\'ve been working on, and up onto the high flat to a spring and a stream\nthat flows down in the opposite direction. Know where I mean? Well, we\nfound where some Fuzzies had been camping, among a lot of fallen timber.\nAnd we found a little grave, where the Fuzzies had buried one of their\npeople.\"\n\nHe should have expected something like that, and yet it startled him. \"You\nmean, they bury their dead? What was the grave like?\"\n\n\"A little stone cairn, about a foot and a half by three, a foot high.\nKellogg said it was just a big toilet pit, but I was sure of what it was.\nI opened it. Stones under the cairn, and then filled-in earth, and then a\ndead Fuzzy wrapped in grass. A female; she\'d been mangled by something,\nmaybe a bush-goblin. And get this Jack; they\'d buried her prawn-stick with\nher.\"\n\n\"They bury their dead! What was Kellogg doing, while you were opening the\ngrave?\"\n\n\"Dithering around having ants. I\'d been taking snaps of the grave, and I\nwas burbling away like an ass about how important this was and how it was\npositive proof of sapience, and he was insisting that we get back to camp\nat once. He called the other jeep and told Mallin to get to camp\nimmediately, and Mallin and Ruth and Juan were there when we got in. As\nsoon as Kellogg told them what we\'d found, Mallin turned fish-belly white\nand wanted to know how we were going to suppress it. I asked him if he was\nnuts, and then Kellogg came out with it. They don\'t dare let the Fuzzies\nbe proven sapient.\"\n\n\"Because the Company wants to sell Fuzzy furs?\"\n\nVan Riebeek looked at him in surprise. \"I never thought of that. I doubt\nif they did, either. No. Because if the Fuzzies are sapient beings, the\nCompany\'s charter is automatically void.\"\n\nThis time Jack cursed, not Kellogg but himself.\n\n\"I am a senile old dotard! Good Lord, I know colonial law; I\'ve been\nskating on the edge of it on more planets than you\'re years old. And I\nnever thought of that; why, of course it would. Where are you now, with\nthe Company, by the way?\"\n\n\"Out, but I couldn\'t care less. I have enough in the bank for the trip\nback to Terra, not counting what I can raise on my boat and some other\nthings. Xeno-naturalists don\'t need to worry about finding jobs. There\'s\nBen\'s outfit, for instance. And, brother, when I get back to Terra, what\nI\'ll spill about this deal!\"\n\n\"If you get back. If you don\'t have an accident before you get on the\nship.\" He thought for a moment. \"Know anything about geology?\"\n\n\"Why, some; I have to work with fossils. I\'m as much a paleontologist as a\nzoologist. Why?\"\n\n\"How\'d you like to stay here with me and hunt fossil jellyfish for a\nwhile? We won\'t make twice as much, together, as I\'m making now, but you\ncan look one way while I\'m looking the other, and we may both stay alive\nlonger that way.\"\n\n\"You mean that, Jack?\"\n\n\"I said it, didn\'t I?\"\n\nVan Riebeek rose and held out his hand; Jack came around the table and\nshook it. Then he reached back and picked up his belt, putting it on.\n\n\"Better put yours on, too, partner. Borch is probably the only one we\'ll\nneed a gun for, but--\"\n\nVan Riebeek buckled on his belt, then drew his pistol and worked the slide\nto load the chamber. \"What are we going to do?\" he asked.\n\n\"Well, we\'re going to try to handle it legally. Fact is, I\'m even going to\ncall the cops.\"\n\nHe punched out a combination on the communication screen. It lighted and\nopened a window into the constabulary post. The sergeant who looked out of\nit recognized him and grinned.\n\n\"Hi, Jack. How\'s the family?\" he asked. \"I\'m coming up, one of these\nevenings, to see them.\"\n\n\"You can see some now.\" Ko-Ko and Goldilocks and Cinderella were coming\nout of the hall from the bedroom; he gathered them up and put them on the\ntable. The sergeant was fascinated. Then he must have noticed that both\nJack and Gerd were wearing their guns in the house. His eyes narrowed\nslightly.\n\n\"You got problems, Jack?\" he asked.\n\n\"Little ones; they may grow, though. I have some guests here who have\noutstayed their welcome. For the record, better make it that I have\nsquatters I want evicted. If there were a couple of blue uniforms around,\nmaybe it might save me the price of a few cartridges.\"\n\n\"I read you. George was mentioning that you might regret inviting that\ngang to camp on you.\" He picked up a handphone. \"Calderon to Car Three,\"\nhe said. \"Do you read me, Three? Well, Jack Holloway\'s got a little\nsquatter trouble. Yeah; that\'s it. He\'s ordering them off his grant, and\nhe thinks they might try to give him an argument. Yeah, sure, Peace Lovin\'\nJack Holloway, that\'s him. Well, go chase his squatters for him, and if\nthey give you anything about being Company big wheels, we don\'t care what\nkind of wheels they are, just so\'s they start rolling.\" He replaced the\nphone. \"Look for them in about an hour, Jack.\"\n\n\"Why, thanks, Phil. Drop in some evening when you can hang up your gun and\nstay awhile.\"\n\nHe blanked the screen and began punching again. This time he got a girl,\nand then the Company construction boss at Red Hill.\n\n\"Oh, hello, Jack; is Dr. Kellogg comfortable?\"\n\n\"Not very. He\'s moving out this afternoon. I wish you\'d have your gang\ncome up with those scows and get that stuff out of my back yard.\"\n\n\"Well, he told us he was staying for a couple of weeks.\"\n\n\"He got his mind changed for him. He\'s to be off my land by sunset.\"\n\nThe Company man looked troubled. \"Jack, you haven\'t been having trouble\nwith Dr. Kellogg, have you?\" he asked. \"He\'s a big man with the Company.\"\n\n\"That\'s what he tells me. You\'ll still have to come and get that stuff,\nthough.\"\n\nHe blanked the screen. \"You know,\" he said, \"I think it would be no more\nthan fair to let Kellogg in on this. What\'s his screen combination?\"\n\nGerd supplied it, and he punched it out. One of those tricky special\nCompany combinations. Kurt Borch appeared in the screen immediately.\n\n\"I want to talk to Kellogg.\"\n\n\"Doctor Kellogg is very busy, at present.\"\n\n\"He\'s going to be a damned sight busier; this is moving day. The whole\ngang of you have till eighteen hundred to get off my grant.\"\n\nBorch was shoved aside, and Kellogg appeared. \"What\'s this nonsense?\" he\ndemanded angrily.\n\n\"You\'re ordered to move. You want to know why? I can let Gerd van Riebeek\ntalk to you; I think there are a few things he\'s forgotten to call you.\"\n\n\"You can\'t order us out like this. Why, you gave us permission--\"\n\n\"Permission cancelled. I\'ve called Mike Hennen in Red Hill; he\'s sending\nhis scows back for the stuff he brought here. Lieutenant Lunt will have a\ncouple of troopers here, too. I\'ll expect you to have your personal things\naboard your airboat when they arrive.\"\n\nHe blanked the screen while Kellogg was trying to tell him that it was all\na misunderstanding.\n\n\"I think that\'s everything. It\'s quite a while till sundown,\" he added,\n\"but I move for suspension of rules while we pour a small libation to\nsprinkle our new partnership. Then we can go outside and observe the\nenemy.\"\n\nThere was no observable enemy action when they went out and sat down on\nthe bench by the kitchen door. Kellogg would be screening Mike Hennen and\nthe constabulary post for verification, and there would be a lot of\ngathering up and packing to do. Finally, Kurt Borch emerged with a\ncontragravity lifter piled with boxes and luggage, and Jimenez walking\nbeside to steady the load. Jimenez climbed up onto the airboat and Borch\nfloated the load up to him and then went back into the huts. This was\nrepeated several times. In the meantime, Kellogg and Mallin seemed to be\nhaving some sort of exchange of recriminations in front. Ruth Ortheris\ncame out, carrying a briefcase, and sat down on the edge of a table under\nthe awning.\n\nNeither of them had been watching the Fuzzies, until they saw one of them\nstart down the path toward the footbridge, a glint of silver at the throat\nidentifying Goldilocks.\n\n\"Look at that fool kid; you stay put, Gerd, and I\'ll bring her back.\"\n\nHe started down the path; by the time he had reached the bridge,\nGoldilocks was across and had vanished behind one of the airjeeps parked\nin front of the Kellogg camp. When he was across and within twenty feet of\nthe vehicle, he heard a sound across and within twenty feet of the\nvehicle, he heard a sound he had never heard before--a shrill, thin\nshriek, like a file on saw teeth. At the same time, Ruth\'s voice screamed.\n\n\"Don\'t! Leonard, stop that!\"\n\nAs he ran around the jeep, the shrieking broke off suddenly. Goldilocks\nwas on the ground, her fur reddened. Kellogg stood over her, one foot\nraised. He was wearing white shoes, and they were both spotted with blood.\nHe stamped the foot down on the little bleeding body, and then Jack was\nwithin reach of him, and something crunched under the fist he drove into\nKellogg\'s face. Kellogg staggered and tried to raise his hands; he made a\nstrangled noise, and for an instant the idiotic thought crossed Jack\'s\nmind that he was trying to say, \"Now, please don\'t misunderstand me.\" He\ncaught Kellogg\'s shirt front in his left hand, and punched him again in\nthe face, and again, and again. He didn\'t know how many times he punched\nKellogg before he heard Ruth Ortheris\' voice:\n\n\"Jack! Watch out! Behind you!\"\n\nHe let go of Kellogg\'s shirt and jumped aside, turning and reaching for\nhis gun. Kurt Borch, twenty feet away, had a pistol drawn and pointed at\nhim.\n\nHis first shot went off as soon as the pistol was clear of the holster. He\nfired the second while it was still recoiling; there was a spot of red on\nBorch\'s shirt that gave him an aiming point for the third. Borch dropped\nthe pistol he hadn\'t been able to fire, and started folding at the knees\nand then at the waist. He went down in a heap on his face.\n\nBehind him, Gerd van Riebeek\'s voice was saying, \"Hold it, all of you; get\nyour hands up. You, too, Kellogg.\"\n\nKellogg, who had fallen, pushed himself erect. Blood was gushing from his\nnose, and he tried to stanch it on the sleeve of his jacket. As he\nstumbled toward his companions, he blundered into Ruth Ortheris, who\npushed him angrily away from her. Then she went to the little crushed\nbody, dropping to her knees beside it and touching it. The silver charm\nbell on the neck chain jingled faintly. Ruth began to cry.\n\nJuan Jimenez had climbed down from the airboat; he was looking at the body\nof Kurt Borch in horror.\n\n\"You killed him!\" he accused. A moment later, he changed that to\n\"murdered.\" Then he started to run toward the living hut.\n\nGerd van Riebeek fired a bullet into the ground ahead of him, bringing him\nup short.\n\n\"You\'ll stop the next one, Juan,\" he said. \"Go help Dr. Kellogg; he got\nhimself hurt.\"\n\n\"Call the constabulary,\" Mallin was saying. \"Ruth, you go; they won\'t\nshoot at you.\"\n\n\"Don\'t bother. I called them. Remember?\"\n\nJimenez had gotten a wad of handkerchief tissue out of his pocket and was\ntrying to stop his superior\'s nosebleed. Through it, Kellogg was trying to\ntell Mallin that he hadn\'t been able to help it.\n\n\"The little beast attacked me; it cut me with that spear it was carrying.\"\n\nRuth Ortheris looked up. The other Fuzzies were with her by the body of\nGoldilocks; they must have come as soon as they had heard the screaming.\n\n\"She came up to him and pulled at his trouser leg, the way they all do\nwhen they want to attract your attention,\" she said. \"She wanted him to\nlook at her new jingle.\" Her voice broke, and it was a moment before she\ncould recover it. \"And he kicked her, and then stamped her to death.\"\n\n\"Ruth, keep your mouth shut!\" Mallin ordered. \"The thing attacked Leonard;\nit might have given him a serious wound.\"\n\n\"It did!\" Still holding the wad of tissue to his nose with one hand,\nKellogg pulled up his trouser leg with the other and showed a scar on his\nshin. It looked like a briar scratch. \"You saw it yourself.\"\n\n\"Yes, I saw it. I saw you kick her and jump on her. And all she wanted was\nto show you her new jingle.\"\n\nJack was beginning to regret that he hadn\'t shot Kellogg as soon as he saw\nwhat was going on. The other Fuzzies had been trying to get Goldilocks\nonto her feet. When they realized that it was no use, they let the body\ndown again and crouched in a circle around it, making soft, lamenting\nsounds.\n\n\"Well, when the constabulary get here, you keep quiet,\" Mallin was saying.\n\"Let me do the talking.\"\n\n\"Intimidating witnesses, Mallin?\" Gerd inquired. \"Don\'t you know\neverybody\'ll have to testify at the constabulary post under veridication?\nAnd you\'re drawing pay for being a psychologist, too.\" Then he saw some of\nthe Fuzzies raise their heads and look toward the southeastern horizon.\n\"Here come the cops, now.\"\n\nHowever, it was Ben Rainsford\'s airjeep, with a zebralope carcass lashed\nalong one side. It circled the Kellogg camp and then let down quickly;\nRainsford jumped out as soon as it was grounded, his pistol drawn.\n\n\"What happened, Jack?\" he asked, then glanced around, from Goldilocks to\nKellogg to Borch to the pistol beside Borch\'s body. \"I get it. Last time\nanybody pulled a gun on you, they called it suicide.\"\n\n\"That\'s what this was, more or less. You have a movie camera in your jeep?\nWell, get some shots of Borch, and some of Goldilocks. Then stand by, and\nif the Fuzzies start doing anything different, get it all. I don\'t think\nyou\'ll be disappointed.\"\n\nRainsford looked puzzled, but he holstered his pistol and went back to his\njeep, returning with a camera. Mallin began insisting that, as a licensed\nM.D., he had a right to treat Kellogg\'s injuries. Gerd van Riebeek\nfollowed him into the living hut for a first-aid kit. They were just\nemerging, van Riebeek\'s automatic in the small of Mallin\'s back, when a\nconstabulary car grounded beside Rainsford\'s airjeep. It wasn\'t Car Three.\nGeorge Lunt jumped out, unsnapping the flap of his holster, while Ahmed\nKhadra was talking into the radio.\n\n\"What\'s happened, Jack? Why didn\'t you wait till we got here?\"\n\n\"This maniac assaulted me and murdered that man over there!\" Kellogg began\nvociferating.\n\n\"Is your name Jack too?\" Lunt demanded.\n\n\"My name\'s Leonard Kellogg, and I\'m a chief of division with the\nCompany--\"\n\n\"Then keep quiet till I ask you something. Ahmed, call the post; get\nKnabber and Yorimitsu, with investigative equipment, and find out what\'s\ntying up Car Three.\"\n\nMallin had opened the first-aid kit by now; Gerd, on seeing the\nconstabulary, had holstered his pistol. Kellogg, still holding the sodden\ntissues to his nose, was wanting to know what there was to investigate.\n\n\"There\'s the murderer; you have him red-handed. Why don\'t you arrest him?\"\n\n\"Jack, let\'s get over where we can watch these people without having to\nlisten to them,\" Lunt said. He glanced toward the body of Goldilocks.\n\"That happen first?\"\n\n\"Watch out, Lieutenant! He still has his pistol!\" Mallin shouted\nwarningly.\n\nThey went over and sat down on the contragravity-field generator housing\nof one of the rented airjeeps. Jack started with Gerd van Riebeek\'s visit\nimmediately after noon.\n\n\"Yes, I thought of that angle myself,\" Lunt said disgustedly. \"I didn\'t\nthink of it till this morning, though, and I didn\'t think things would\nblow up as fast as this. Hell, I just didn\'t think! Well, go on.\"\n\nHe interrupted a little later to ask: \"Kellogg was stamping on the Fuzzy\nwhen you hit him. You were trying to stop him?\"\n\n\"That\'s right. You can veridicate me on that if you want to.\"\n\n\"I will; I\'ll veridicate this whole damn gang. And this guy Borch had his\nheater out when you turned around? Nothing to it, Jack. We\'ll have to have\nsome kind of a hearing, but it\'s just plain self-defense. Think any of\nthis gang will tell the truth here, without taking them in and putting\nthem under veridication?\"\n\n\"Ruth Ortheris will, I think.\"\n\n\"Send her over here, will you.\"\n\nShe was still with the Fuzzies, and Ben Rainsford was standing beside her,\nhis camera ready. The Fuzzies were still swaying and yeeking plaintively.\nShe nodded and rose without speaking, going over to where Lunt waited.\n\n\"Just what did happen, Jack?\" Rainsford wanted to know. \"And whose side is\nhe on?\" He nodded toward van Riebeek, standing guard over Kellogg and\nMallin, his thumbs in his pistol belt.\n\n\"Ours. He\'s quit the Company.\"\n\nJust as he was finishing, Car Three put in an appearance; he had to tell\nthe same story over again. The area in front of the Kellogg camp was\ngetting congested; he hoped Mike Hennen\'s labor gang would stay away for a\nwhile. Lunt talked to van Riebeek when he had finished with Ruth, and then\nwith Jimenez and Mallin and Kellogg. Then he and one of the men from Car\nThree came over to where Jack and Rainsford were standing. Gerd van\nRiebeek joined them just as Lunt was saying:\n\n\"Jack, Kellogg\'s made a murder complaint against you. I told him it was\nself-defense, but he wouldn\'t listen. So, according to the book, I have to\narrest you.\"\n\n\"All right.\" He unbuckled his gun and handed it over. \"Now, George, I\nherewith make complaint and accusation against Leonard Kellogg, charging\nhim with the unlawful and unjustified killing of a sapient being, to wit,\nan aboriginal native of the planet of Zarathustra commonly known as\nGoldilocks.\"\n\nLunt looked at the small battered body and the six mourners around it.\n\n\"But, Jack, they aren\'t legally sapient beings.\"\n\n\"There is no such thing. A sapient being is a being on the mental level of\nsapience, not a being that has been declared sapient.\"\n\n\"Fuzzies are sapient beings,\" Rainsford said. \"That\'s the opinion of a\nqualified xeno-naturalist.\"\n\n\"Two of them,\" Gerd van Riebeek said. \"That is the body of a sapient\nbeing. There\'s the man who killed her. Go ahead, Lieutenant, make your\npinch.\"\n\n\"Hey! Wait a minute!\"\n\nThe Fuzzies were rising, sliding their chopper-diggers under the body of\nGoldilocks and lifting it on the steel shafts. Ben Rainsford was aiming\nhis camera as Cinderella picked up her sister\'s weapon and followed,\ncarrying it; the others carried the body toward the far corner of the\nclearing, away from the camp. Rainsford kept just behind them, pausing to\nphotograph and then hurrying to keep up with them.\n\nThey set the body down. Mike and Mitzi and Cinderella began digging; the\nothers scattered to hunt for stones. Coming up behind them, George Lunt\ntook off his beret and stood holding it in both hands; he bowed his head\nas the grass-wrapped body was placed in the little grave and covered.\n\nThen, when the cairn was finished, he replaced it, drew his pistol and\nchecked the chamber.\n\n\"That does it, Jack,\" he said. \"I am now going to arrest Leonard Kellogg\nfor the murder of a sapient being.\"\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\n\nJack Holloway had been out on bail before, but never for quite so much. It\nwas almost worth it, though, to see Leslie Coombes\'s eyes widen and\nMohammed Ali O\'Brien\'s jaw drop when he dumped the bag of sunstones,\nblazing with the heat of the day and of his body, on George Lunt\'s\nmagisterial bench and invited George to pick out twenty-five thousand\nsols\' worth. Especially after the production Coombes had made of posting\nKellogg\'s bail with one of those precertified Company checks.\n\nHe looked at the whisky bottle in his hand, and then reached into the\ncupboard for another one. One for Gus Brannhard, and one for the rest of\nthem. There was a widespread belief that that was why Gustavus Adolphus\nBrannhard was practicing sporadic law out here in the boondocks of a\nboondock planet, defending gun fighters and veldbeest rustlers. It\nwasn\'t. Nobody on Zarathustra knew the reason, but it wasn\'t whisky.\nWhisky was only the weapon with which Gus Brannhard fought off the memory\nof the reason.\n\nHe was in the biggest chair in the living room, which was none too ample\nfor him; a mountain of a man with tousled gray-brown hair, his broad face\nmasked in a tangle of gray-brown beard. He wore a faded and grimy bush\njacket with clips of rifle cartridges on the breast, no shirt and a torn\nundershirt over a shag of gray-brown chest hair. Between the bottoms of\nhis shorts and the tops of his ragged hose and muddy boots, his legs were\ncovered with hair. Baby Fuzzy was sitting on his head, and Mamma Fuzzy was\non his lap. Mike and Mitzi sat one on either knee. The Fuzzies had taken\ninstantly to Gus. Bet they thought he was a Big Fuzzy.\n\n\"Aaaah!\" he rumbled, as the bottle and glass were placed beside him. \"Been\nstaying alive for hours hoping for this.\"\n\n\"Well, don\'t let any of the kids get at it. Little Fuzzy trying to smoke\npipes is bad enough; I don\'t want any dipsos in the family, too.\"\n\nGus filled the glass. To be on the safe side, he promptly emptied it into\nhimself.\n\n\"You got a nice family, Jack. Make a wonderful impression in court--as\nlong as Baby doesn\'t try to sit on the judge\'s head. Any jury that sees\nthem and hears that Ortheris girl\'s story will acquit you from the box,\nwith a vote of censure for not shooting Kellogg, too.\"\n\n\"I\'m not worried about that. What I want is Kellogg convicted.\"\n\n\"You better worry, Jack,\" Rainsford said. \"You saw the combination against\nus at the hearing.\"\n\nLeslie Coombes, the Company\'s top attorney, had come out from Mallorysport\nin a yacht rated at Mach 6, and he must have crowded it to the limit all\nthe way. With him, almost on a leash, had come Mohammed Ali O\'Brien, the\nColonial Attorney General, who doubled as Chief Prosecutor. They had both\ntried to get the whole thing dismissed--self-defense for Holloway, and\nkilling an unprotected wild animal for Kellogg. When that had failed, they\nhad teamed in flagrant collusion to fight the inclusion of any evidence\nabout the Fuzzies. After all it was only a complaint court; Lieutenant\nLunt, as a police magistrate, had only the most limited powers.\n\n\"You saw how far they got, didn\'t you?\"\n\n\"I hope we don\'t wish they\'d succeeded,\" Rainsford said gloomily.\n\n\"What do you mean, Ben?\" Brannhard asked. \"What do you think they\'ll do?\"\n\n\"I don\'t know. That\'s what worries me. We\'re threatening the Zarathustra\nCompany, and the Company\'s too big to be threatened safely,\" Rainsford\nreplied. \"They\'ll try to frame something on Jack.\"\n\n\"With veridication? That\'s ridiculous, Ben.\"\n\n\"Don\'t you think we can prove sapience?\" Gerd van Riebeek demanded.\n\n\"Who\'s going to define sapience? And how?\" Rainsford asked. \"Why,\nbetween them, Coombes and O\'Brien can even agree to accept the\ntalk-and-build-a-fire rule.\"\n\n\"Huh-uh!\" Brannhard was positive. \"Court ruling on that, about forty years\nago, on Vishnu. Infanticide case, woman charged with murder in the death\nof her infant child. Her lawyer moved for dismissal on the grounds that\nmurder is defined as the killing of a sapient being, a sapient being is\ndefined as one that can talk and build a fire, and a newborn infant can do\nneither. Motion denied; the court ruled that while ability to speak and\nproduce fire is positive proof of sapience, inability to do either or both\ndoes not constitute legal proof of nonsapience. If O\'Brien doesn\'t know\nthat, and I doubt if he does, Coombes will.\" Brannhard poured another\ndrink and gulped it before the sapient beings around him could get at it.\n\"You know what? I will make a small wager, and I will even give odds, that\nthe first thing Ham O\'Brien does when he gets back to Mallorysport will be\nto enter _nolle prosequi_ on both charges. What I\'d like would be for him\nto _nol. pros._ Kellogg and let the charge against Jack go to court. He\nwould be dumb enough to do that himself, but Leslie Coombes wouldn\'t let\nhim.\"\n\n\"But if he throws out the Kellogg case, that\'s it,\" Gerd van Riebeek said.\n\"When Jack comes to trial, nobody\'ll say a mumblin\' word about sapience.\"\n\n\"I will, and I will not mumble it. You all know colonial law on homicide.\nIn the case of any person killed while in commission of a felony, no\nprosecution may be brought in any degree, against anybody. I\'m going to\ncontend that Leonard Kellogg was murdering a sapient being, that Jack\nHolloway acted lawfully in attempting to stop it and that when Kurt Borch\nattempted to come to Kellogg\'s assistance he, himself, was guilty of\nfelony, and consequently any prosecution against Jack Holloway is illegal.\nAnd to make that contention stick, I shall have to say a great many words,\nand produce a great deal of testimony, about the sapience of Fuzzies.\"\n\n\"It\'ll have to be expert testimony,\" Rainsford said. \"The testimony of\npsychologists. I suppose you know that the only psychologists on this\nplanet are employed by the chartered Zarathustra Company.\" He drank what\nwas left of his highball, looked at the bits of ice in the bottom of his\nglass and then rose to mix another one. \"I\'d have done the same as you\ndid, Jack, but I still wish this hadn\'t happened.\"\n\n\"_Huh!_\" Mamma Fuzzy looked up, startled by the exclamation. \"What do you\nthink Victor Grego\'s wishing, right now?\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nVictor Grego replaced the hand-phone. \"Leslie, on the yacht,\" he said.\n\"They\'re coming in now. They\'ll stop at the hospital to drop Kellogg, and\nthen they\'re coming here.\"\n\nNick Emmert nibbled a canape. He had reddish hair, pale eyes and a wide,\nbovine face.\n\n\"Holloway must have done him up pretty badly,\" he said.\n\n\"I wish Holloway\'d killed him!\" He blurted it angrily, and saw the\nResident General\'s shocked expression.\n\n\"You don\'t really mean that, Victor?\"\n\n\"The devil I don\'t!\" He gestured at the recorder-player, which had just\nfinished the tape of the hearing, transmitted from the yacht at\nsixty-speed. \"That\'s only a teaser to what\'ll come out at the trial. You\nknow what the Company\'s epitaph will be? _Kicked to death, along with a\nFuzzy, by Leonard Kellogg._\"\n\nEverything would have worked out perfectly if Kellogg had only kept his\nhead and avoided collision with Holloway. Why, even the killing of the\nFuzzy and the shooting of Borch, inexcusable as that had been, wouldn\'t\nhave been so bad if it hadn\'t been for that asinine murder complaint. That\nwas what had provoked Holloway\'s counter-complaint, which was what had\ndone the damage.\n\nAnd, now that he thought of it, it had been one of Kellogg\'s people, van\nRiebeek, who had touched off the explosion in the first place. He didn\'t\nknow van Riebeek himself, but Kellogg should have, and he had handled him\nthe wrong way. He should have known what van Riebeek would go along with\nand what he wouldn\'t.\n\n\"But, Victor, they won\'t convict Leonard of murder,\" Emmert was saying.\n\"Not for killing one of those little things.\"\n\n\"\'Murder shall consist of the deliberate and unjustified killing of any\nsapient being, of any race,\'\" he quoted. \"That\'s the law. If they can\nprove in court that the Fuzzies are sapient beings....\"\n\nThen, some morning, a couple of deputy marshals would take Leonard Kellogg\nout in the jail yard and put a bullet through the back of his head, which,\nin itself, would be no loss. The trouble was, they would also be shooting\nan irreparable hole in the Zarathustra Company\'s charter. Maybe Kellogg\ncould be kept out of court, at that. There wasn\'t a ship blasted off from\nDarius without a couple of drunken spacemen being hustled aboard at the\nlast moment; with the job Holloway must have done, Kellogg should look\njust right as a drunken spaceman. The twenty-five thousand sols\' bond\ncould be written off; that was pennies to the Company. No, that would\nstill leave them stuck with the Holloway trial.\n\n\"You want me out of here when the others come, Victor?\" Emmert asked,\npopping another canape into his mouth.\n\n\"No, no; sit still. This will be the last chance we\'ll have to get\neverybody together; after this, we\'ll have to avoid anything that\'ll look\nlike collusion.\"\n\n\"Well, anything I can do to help; you know that, Victor,\" Emmert said.\n\nYes, he knew that. If worst came to utter worst and the Company charter\nwere invalidated, he could still hang on here, doing what he could to\nsalvage something out of the wreckage--if not for the Company, then for\nVictor Grego. But if Zarathustra were reclassified, Nick would be\nfinished. His title, his social position, his sinecure, his grafts and\nperquisites, his alias-shrouded Company expense account--all out the\nairlock. Nick would be counted upon to do anything he could--however much\nthat would be.\n\nHe looked across the room at the levitated globe, revolving imperceptibly\nin the orange spotlight. It was full dark on Beta Continent now, where\nLeonard Kellogg had killed a Fuzzy named Goldilocks and Jack Holloway had\nkilled a gunman named Kurt Borch. That angered him, too; hell of a gunman!\nClear shot at the broad of a man\'s back, and still got himself killed.\nBorch hadn\'t been any better choice than Kellogg himself. What was the\nmatter with him; couldn\'t he pick men for jobs any more? And Ham O\'Brien!\nNo, he didn\'t have to blame himself for O\'Brien. O\'Brien was one of Nick\nEmmert\'s boys. And he hadn\'t picked Nick, either.\n\nThe squawk-box on the desk made a premonitory noise, and a feminine voice\nadvised him that Mr. Coombes and his party had arrived.\n\n\"All right; show them in.\"\n\nCoombes entered first, tall suavely elegant, with a calm, untroubled face.\nLeslie Coombes would wear the same serene expression in the midst of a\nbombardment or an earthquake. He had chosen Coombes for chief attorney,\nand thinking of that made him feel better. Mohammed Ali O\'Brien was\nneither tall, elegant nor calm. His skin was almost black--he\'d been born\non Agni, under a hot B3 sun. His bald head glistened, and a big nose\npeeped over the ambuscade of a bushy white mustache. What was it they said\nabout him? Only man on Zarathustra who could strut sitting down. And\nbehind them, the remnant of the expedition to Beta Continent--Ernst\nMallin, Juan Jimenez and Ruth Ortheris. Mallin was saying that it was a\npity Dr. Kellogg wasn\'t with them.\n\n\"I question that. Well, please be seated. We have a great deal to discuss,\nI\'m afraid.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nMr. Chief Justice Frederic Pendarvis moved the ashtray a few inches to the\nright and the slender vase with the spray of starflowers a few inches to\nthe left. He set the framed photograph of the gentle-faced, white-haired\nwoman directly in front of him. Then he took a thin cigar from the silver\nbox, carefully punctured the end and lit it. Then, unable to think of\nfurther delaying tactics, he drew the two bulky loose-leaf books toward\nhim and opened the red one, the criminal-case docket.\n\nSomething would have to be done about this; he always told himself so at\nthis hour. Shoveling all this stuff onto Central Courts had been all right\nwhen Mallorysport had had a population of less than five thousand and\nnothing else on the planet had had more than five hundred, but that time\nwas ten years past. The Chief Justice of a planetary colony shouldn\'t have\nto wade through all this to see who had been accused of blotting the brand\non a veldbeest calf or who\'d taken a shot at whom in a barroom. Well, at\nleast he\'d managed to get a few misdemeanor and small-claims courts\nestablished; that was something.\n\nThe first case, of course, was a homicide. It usually was. From Beta,\nConstabulary Fifteen, Lieutenant George Lunt. Jack Holloway--so old Jack\nhad cut another notch on his gun--Cold Creek Valley, Federation citizen,\nrace Terran human; willful killing of a sapient being, to wit Kurt Borch,\nMallorysport, Federation citizen, race Terran human. Complainant, Leonard\nKellogg, the same. Attorney of record for the defendant, Gustavus Adolphus\nBrannhard. The last time Jack Holloway had killed anybody, it had been a\ncouple of thugs who\'d tried to steal his sunstones; it hadn\'t even gotten\ninto complaint court. This time he might be in trouble. Kellogg was a\nCompany executive. He decided he\'d better try the case himself. The\nCompany might try to exert pressure.\n\nThe next charge was also homicide, from Constabulary, Beta Fifteen. He\nread it and blinked. Leonard Kellogg, willful killing of a sapient being,\nto wit, Jane Doe alias Goldilocks, aborigine, race Zarathustran Fuzzy,\ncomplainant, Jack Holloway, defendant\'s attorney of record, Leslie\nCoombes. In spite of the outrageous frivolity of the charge, he began to\nlaugh. It was obviously an attempt to ridicule Kellogg\'s own complaint out\nof court. Every judicial jurisdiction ought to have at least one Gus\nBrannhard to liven things up a little. Race Zarathustran Fuzzy!\n\nThen he stopped laughing suddenly and became deadly serious, like an\nengineer who finds a cataclysmite cartridge lying around primed and\nconnected to a discharger. He reached out to the screen panel and began\npunching a combination. A spectacled young man appeared and greeted him\ndeferentially.\n\n\"Good morning, Mr. Wilkins,\" he replied. \"A couple of homicides at the\nhead of this morning\'s docket--Holloway and Kellogg, both from Beta\nFifteen. What is known about them?\"\n\nThe young man began to laugh. \"Oh, your Honor, they\'re both a lot of\nnonsense. Dr. Kellogg killed some pet belonging to old Jack Holloway, the\nsunstone digger, and in the ensuing unpleasantness--Holloway can be very\nunpleasant, if he feels he has to--this man Borch, who seems to have been\nKellogg\'s bodyguard, made the suicidal error of trying to draw a gun on\nHolloway. I\'m surprised at Lieutenant Lunt for letting either of those\ncharges get past hearing court. Mr. O\'Brien has entered _nolle prosequi_\non both of them, so the whole thing can be disregarded.\"\n\nMohammed O\'Brien knew a charge of cataclysmite when he saw one, too. His\nimpulse had been to pull the detonator. Well, maybe this charge ought to\nbe shot, just to see what it would bring down.\n\n\"I haven\'t approved the _nolle prosequi_ yet, Mr. Wilkins,\" he mentioned\ngently. \"Would you please transmit to me the hearing tapes on these cases,\nat sixty-speed? I\'ll take them on the recorder of this screen. Thank you.\"\n\nHe reached out and made the necessary adjustments. Wilkins, the Clerk of\nthe Courts, left the screen, and returned. There was a wavering scream for\na minute and a half. Going to take more time than he had expected. Well....\n\n * * * * *\n\nThere wasn\'t enough ice in the glass, and Leonard Kellogg put more in.\nThen there was too much, and he added more brandy. He shouldn\'t have\nstarted drinking this early, be drunk by dinnertime if he kept it up, but\nwhat else was there to do? He couldn\'t go out, not with his face like\nthis. In any case, he wasn\'t sure he wanted to.\n\nThey were all down on him. Ernst Mallin, and Ruth Ortheris, and even Juan\nJimenez. At the constabulary post, Coombes and O\'Brien had treated him\nlike an idiot child who has to be hushed in front of company and coming\nback to Mallorysport they had ignored him completely. He drank quickly,\nand then there was too much ice in the glass again. Victor Grego had told\nhim he\'d better take a vacation till the trial was over, and put Mallin in\ncharge of the division. Said he oughtn\'t to be in charge while the\ndivision was working on defense evidence. Well, maybe; it looked like the\nfirst step toward shoving him completely out of the Company.\n\nHe dropped into a chair and lit a cigarette. It tasted badly, and after a\nfew puffs he crushed it out. Well, what else could he have done? After\nthey\'d found that little grave, he had to make Gerd understand what it\nwould mean to the Company. Juan and Ruth had been all right, but Gerd--The\nthings Gerd had called him; the things he\'d said about the Company. And\nthen that call from Holloway, and the humiliation of being ordered out\nlike a tramp.\n\nAnd then that disgusting little beast had come pulling at his clothes, and\nhe had pushed it away--well, kicked it maybe--and it had struck at him\nwith the little spear it was carrying. Nobody but a lunatic would give a\nthing like that to an animal anyhow. And he had kicked it again, and it\nhad screamed....\n\nThe communication screen in the next room was buzzing. Maybe that was\nVictor. He gulped the brandy left in the glass and hurried to it.\n\nIt was Leslie Coombes, his face remotely expressionless.\n\n\"Oh, hello, Leslie.\"\n\n\"Good afternoon, Dr. Kellogg.\" The formality of address was studiously\nrebuking. \"The Chief Prosecutor just called me; Judge Pendarvis has denied\nthe _nolle prosequi_ he entered in your case and in Mr. Holloway\'s, and\nordered both cases to trial.\"\n\n\"You mean they\'re actually taking this seriously?\"\n\n\"It is serious. If you\'re convicted, the Company\'s charter will be almost\nautomatically voided. And, although this is important only to you\npersonally, you might, very probably, be sentenced to be shot.\" He\nshrugged that off, and continued: \"Now, I\'ll want to talk to you about\nyour defense, for which I am responsible. Say ten-thirty tomorrow, at my\noffice. I should, by that time, know what sort of evidence is going to be\nused against you. I will be expecting you, Dr. Kellogg.\"\n\nHe must have said more than that, but that was all that registered.\nLeonard wasn\'t really conscious of going back to the other room, until he\nrealized that he was sitting in his relaxer chair, filling the glass with\nbrandy. There was only a little ice in it, but he didn\'t care.\n\nThey were going to try him for murder for killing that little animal, and\nHam O\'Brien had said they wouldn\'t, he\'d promised he\'d keep the case from\ntrial and he hadn\'t, they were going to try him anyhow and if they\nconvicted him they would take him out and shoot him for just killing a\nsilly little animal he had killed it he\'d kicked it and jumped on it he\ncould still hear it screaming and feel the horrible soft crunching under\nhis feet....\n\nHe gulped what was left in the glass and poured and gulped more. Then he\nstaggered to his feet and stumbled over to the couch and threw himself\nonto it, face down, among the cushions.\n\n * * * * *\n\nLeslie Coombes found Nick Emmert with Victor Grego in the latter\'s office\nwhen he entered. They both rose to greet him, and Grego said \"You\'ve\nheard?\"\n\n\"Yes. O\'Brien called me immediately. I called my client--my client of\nrecord, that is--and told him. I\'m afraid it was rather a shock to him.\"\n\n\"It wasn\'t any shock to me,\" Grego said as they sat down. \"When Ham\nO\'Brien\'s as positive about anything as he was about that, I always expect\nthe worst.\"\n\n\"Pendarvis is going to try the case himself,\" Emmert said. \"I always\nthought he was a reasonable man, but what\'s he trying to do now? Cut the\nCompany\'s throat?\"\n\n\"He isn\'t anti-Company. He isn\'t pro-Company either. He\'s just pro-law.\nThe law says that a planet with native sapient inhabitants is a Class-IV\nplanet, and has to have a Class-IV colonial government. If Zarathustra is\na Class-IV planet, he wants it established, and the proper laws applied.\nIf it\'s a Class-IV planet, the Zarathustra Company is illegally chartered.\nIt\'s his job to put a stop to illegality. Frederic Pendarvis\' religion is\nthe law, and he is its priest. You never get anywhere by arguing religion\nwith a priest.\"\n\nThey were both silent for a while after he had finished. Grego was looking\nat the globe, and he realized, now, that while he was proud of it, his\npride was the pride in a paste jewel that stands for a real one in a bank\nvault. Now he was afraid that the real jewel was going to be stolen from\nhim. Nick Emmert was just afraid.\n\n\"You were right yesterday, Victor. I wish Holloway\'d killed that son of a\nKhooghra. Maybe it\'s not too late--\"\n\n\"Yes, it is, Nick. It\'s too late to do anything like that. It\'s too late\nto do anything but win the case in court.\" He turned to Grego. \"What are\nyour people doing?\"\n\nGrego took his eyes from the globe. \"Ernest Mallin\'s studying all the\nfilmed evidence we have and all the descriptions of Fuzzy behavior, and\ntrying to prove that none of it is the result of sapient mentation. Ruth\nOrtheris is doing the same, only she\'s working on the line of instinct and\nconditioned reflexes and nonsapient, single-stage reasoning. She has a lot\nof rats, and some dogs and monkeys, and a lot of apparatus, and some\ntechnician from Henry Stenson\'s instrument shop helping her. Juan Jimenez\nis studying mentation of Terran dogs, cats and primates, and Freyan\nkholphs and Mimir black slinkers.\"\n\n\"He hasn\'t turned up any simian or canine parallels to that funeral, has\nhe?\"\n\nGrego said nothing, merely shook his head. Emmert muttered something\ninaudible and probably indecent.\n\n\"I didn\'t think he had. I only hope those Fuzzies don\'t get up in court,\nbuild a bonfire and start making speeches in Lingua Terra.\"\n\nNick Emmert cried out in panic. \"You believe they\'re sapient yourself!\"\n\n\"Of course. Don\'t you?\"\n\nGrego laughed sourly. \"Nick thinks you have to believe a thing to prove\nit. It helps but it isn\'t necessary. Say we\'re a debating team; we\'ve been\nhanded the negative of the question. _Resolved: that Fuzzies are Sapient\nBeings._ Personally, I think we have the short end of it, but that only\nmeans we\'ll have to work harder on it.\"\n\n\"You know, I was on a debating team at college,\" Emmert said brightly.\nWhen that was disregarded, he added: \"If I remember, the first thing was\ndefinition of terms.\"\n\nGrego looked up quickly. \"Leslie, I think Nick has something. What is the\nlegal definition of a sapient being?\"\n\n\"As far as I know, there isn\'t any. Sapience is something that\'s just\ntaken for granted.\"\n\n\"How about talk-and-build-a-fire?\"\n\nHe shook his head. \"_People of the Colony of Vishnu_ versus _Emily\nMorrosh_, 612 A.E.\" He told them about the infanticide case. \"I was\nlooking up rulings on sapience; I passed the word on to Ham O\'Brien. You\nknow, what your people will have to do will be to produce a definition of\nsapience, acceptable to the court, that will include all known sapient\nraces and at the same time exclude the Fuzzies. I don\'t envy them.\"\n\n\"We need some Fuzzies of our own to study,\" Grego said.\n\n\"Too bad we can\'t get hold of Holloway\'s,\" Emmert said. \"Maybe we could,\nif he leaves them alone at his camp.\"\n\n\"No. We can\'t risk that.\" He thought for a moment. \"Wait a moment. I think\nwe might be able to do it at that. Legally.\"\n\n\n\n\nIX\n\n\nJack Holloway saw Little Fuzzy eying the pipe he had laid in the ashtray,\nand picked it up, putting it in his mouth. Little Fuzzy looked\nreproachfully at him and started to get down onto the floor. Pappy Jack\nwas mean; didn\'t he think a Fuzzy might want to smoke a pipe, too? Well,\nmaybe it wouldn\'t hurt him. He picked Little Fuzzy up and set him back on\nhis lap, offering the pipestem. Little Fuzzy took a puff. He didn\'t cough\nover it; evidently he had learned how to avoid inhaling.\n\n\"They scheduled the Kellogg trial first,\" Gus Brannhard was saying, \"and\nthere wasn\'t any way I could stop that. You see what the idea is? They\'ll\ntry him first, with Leslie Coombes running both the prosecution and the\ndefense, and if they can get him acquitted, it\'ll prejudice the sapience\nevidence we introduce in your trial.\"\n\nMamma Fuzzy made another try at intercepting the drink he was hoisting,\nbut he frustrated that. Baby had stopped trying to sit on his head, and\nwas playing peek-a-boo from behind his whiskers.\n\n\"First,\" he continued, \"they\'ll exclude every bit of evidence about the\nFuzzies that they can. That won\'t be much, but there\'ll be a fight to get\nany of it in. What they can\'t exclude, they\'ll attack. They\'ll attack\ncredibility. Of course, with veridication, they can\'t claim anybody\'s\nlying, but they can claim self-deception. You make a statement you\nbelieve, true or false, and the veridicator\'ll back you up on it. They\'ll\nattack qualifications on expert testimony. They\'ll quibble about\nstatements of fact and statements of opinion. And what they can\'t exclude\nor attack, they\'ll accept, and then deny that it\'s proof of sapience.\n\n\"What the hell do they want for proof of sapience?\" Gerd demanded.\n\"Nuclear energy and contragravity and hyperdrive?\"\n\n\"They will have a nice, neat, pedantic definition of sapience, tailored\nespecially to exclude the Fuzzies, and they will present it in court and\ntry to get it accepted, and it\'s up to us to guess in advance what that\nwill be, and have a refutation of it ready, and also a definition of our\nown.\"\n\n\"Their definition will have to include Khooghras. Gerd, do the Khooghras\nbury their dead?\"\n\n\"Hell, no; they eat them. But you have to give them this, they cook them\nfirst.\"\n\n\"Look, we won\'t get anywhere arguing about what Fuzzies do and Khooghras\ndon\'t do,\" Rainsford said. \"We\'ll have to get a definition of sapience.\nRemember what Ruth said Saturday night?\"\n\nGerd van Riebeek looked as though he didn\'t want to remember what Ruth had\nsaid, or even remember Ruth herself. Jack nodded, and repeated it. \"I got\nthe impression of non-sapient intelligence shading up to a sharp line, and\nthen sapience shading up from there, maybe a different color, or wavy\nlines instead of straight ones.\"\n\n\"That\'s a good graphic representation,\" Gerd said. \"You know, that line\'s\nso sharp I\'d be tempted to think of sapience as a result of mutation,\nexcept that I can\'t quite buy the same mutation happening in the same way\non so many different planets.\"\n\nBen Rainsford started to say something, then stopped short when a\nconstabulary siren hooted over the camp. The Fuzzies looked up\ninterestedly. They knew what that was. Pappy Jack\'s friends in the blue\nclothes. Jack went to the door and opened it, putting the outside light\non.\n\nThe car was landing; George Lunt, two of his men and two men in civilian\nclothes were getting out. Both the latter were armed, and one of them\ncarried a bundle under his arm.\n\n\"Hello, George; come on in.\"\n\n\"We want to talk to you, Jack.\" Lunt\'s voice was strained, empty of warmth\nor friendliness. \"At least, these men do.\"\n\n\"Why, yes. Sure.\"\n\nHe backed into the room to permit them to enter. Something was wrong;\nsomething bad had come up. Khadra came in first, placing himself beside\nand a little behind him. Lunt followed, glancing quickly around and\nplacing himself between Jack and the gunrack and also the holstered\npistols on the table. The third trooper let the two strangers in ahead of\nhim, and then closed the door and put his back against it. He wondered if\nthe court might have cancelled his bond and ordered him into custody. The\ntwo strangers--a beefy man with a scrubby black mustache, and a smaller\none with a thin, saturnine face--were looking expectantly at Lunt.\nRainsford and van Riebeek were on their feet. Gus Brannhard leaned over to\nrefill his glass, but did not rise.\n\n\"Let me have the papers,\" Lunt said to the beefy stranger.\n\nThe other took a folded document and handed it over.\n\n\"Jack, this isn\'t my idea,\" Lunt said. \"I don\'t want to do it, but I have\nto. I wouldn\'t want to shoot you, either, but you make any resistance and\nI will. I\'m no Kurt Borch; I know you, and I won\'t take any chances.\"\n\n\"If you\'re going to serve that paper, serve it,\" the bigger of the two\nstrangers said. \"Don\'t stand yakking all night.\"\n\n\"Jack,\" Lunt said uncomfortably, \"this is a court order to impound your\nFuzzies as evidence in the Kellogg case. These men are deputy marshals\nfrom Central Courts; they\'ve been ordered to bring the Fuzzies into\nMallorysport.\"\n\n\"Let me see the order, Jack,\" Brannhard said, still remaining seated.\n\nLunt handed it to Jack, and he handed it across to Brannhard. Gus had been\ndrinking steadily all evening; maybe he was afraid he\'d show it if he\nstood up. He looked at it briefly and nodded.\n\n\"Court order, all right, signed by the Chief Justice.\" He handed it back.\n\"They have to take the Fuzzies, and that\'s all there is to it. Keep that\norder, though, and make them give you a signed and thumbprinted receipt.\nType it up for them now, Jack.\"\n\nGus wanted to busy him with something, so he wouldn\'t have to watch what\nwas going on. The smaller of the two deputies had dropped the bundle from\nunder his arm. It was a number of canvas sacks. He sat down at the\ntypewriter, closing his ears to the noises in the room, and wrote the\nreceipt, naming the Fuzzies and describing them, and specifying that they\nwere in good health and uninjured. One of them tried to climb to his lap,\nyeeking frantically; it clutched his shirt, but it was snatched away. He\nwas finished with his work before the invaders were with theirs. They had\nthree Fuzzies already in sacks. Khadra was catching Cinderella. Ko-Ko and\nLittle Fuzzy had run for the little door in the outside wall, but Lunt was\nstanding with his heels against it, holding it shut; when they saw that,\nboth of them began burrowing in the bedding. The third trooper and the\nsmaller of the two deputies dragged them out and stuffed them into sacks.\n\nHe got to his feet, still stunned and only half comprehending, and took\nthe receipt out of the typewriter. There was an argument about it; Lunt\ntold the deputies to sign it or get the hell out without the Fuzzies. They\nsigned, inked their thumbs and printed after their signatures. Jack gave\nthe paper to Gus, trying not to look at the six bulging, writhing sacks,\nor hear the frightened little sounds.\n\n\"George, you\'ll let them have some of their things, won\'t you?\" he asked.\n\n\"Sure. What kind of things?\"\n\n\"Their bedding. Some of their toys.\"\n\n\"You mean this junk?\" The smaller of the two deputies kicked the\nball-and-stick construction. \"All we got orders to take is the Fuzzies.\"\n\n\"You heard the gentleman.\" Lunt made the word sound worse than son of a\nKhooghra. He turned to the two deputies. \"Well, you have them; what are\nyou waiting for?\"\n\nJack watched from the door as they put the sacks into the aircar, climbed\nin after them and lifted out. Then he came back and sat down at the table.\n\n\"They don\'t know anything about court orders,\" he said. \"They don\'t know\nwhy I didn\'t stop it. They think Pappy Jack let them down.\"\n\n\"Have they gone, Jack?\" Brannhard asked. \"Sure?\" Then he rose, reaching\nbehind him, and took up a little ball of white fur. Baby Fuzzy caught his\nbeard with both tiny hands, yeeking happily.\n\n\"Baby! They didn\'t get him!\"\n\nBrannhard disengaged the little hands from his beard and handed him over.\n\n\"No, and they signed for him, too.\" Brannhard downed what was left of his\ndrink, got a cigar out of his pocket and lit it. \"Now, we\'re going to go\nto Mallorysport and get the rest of them back.\"\n\n\"But.... But the Chief Justice signed that order. He won\'t give them back\njust because we ask him to.\"\n\nBrannhard made an impolite noise. \"I\'ll bet everything I own Pendarvis\nnever saw that order. They have stacks of those things, signed in blank,\nin the Chief of the Court\'s office. If they had to wait to get one of the\njudges to sign an order every time they wanted to subpoena a witness or\nimpound physical evidence, they\'d never get anything done. If Ham O\'Brien\ndidn\'t think this up for himself, Leslie Coombes thought it up for him.\"\n\n\"We\'ll use my airboat,\" Gerd said. \"You coming along, Ben? Let\'s get\nstarted.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nHe couldn\'t understand. The Big Ones in the blue clothes had been friends;\nthey had given the whistles, and shown sorrow when the killed one was put\nin the ground. And why had Pappy Jack not gotten the big gun and stopped\nthem. It couldn\'t be that he was afraid; Pappy Jack was afraid of nothing.\n\nThe others were near, in bags like the one in which he had been put; he\ncould hear them, and called to them. Then he felt the edge of the little\nknife Pappy Jack had made. He could cut his way out of this bag now and\nfree the others, but that would be no use. They were in one of the things\nthe Big Ones went up into the sky in, and if he got out now, there would\nbe nowhere to go and they would be caught at once. Better to wait.\n\nThe one thing that really worried him was that he would not know where\nthey were being taken. When they did get away, how would they ever find\nPappy Jack again?\n\n * * * * *\n\nGus Brannhard was nervous, showing it by being overtalkative, and that\nworried Jack. He\'d stopped twice at mirrors along the hallway to make sure\nthat his gold-threaded gray neckcloth was properly knotted and that his\nblack jacket was zipped up far enough and not too far. Now, in front of\nthe door marked THE CHIEF JUSTICE, he paused before pushing the button to\nfluff his newly shampooed beard.\n\nThere were two men in the Chief Justice\'s private chambers. Pendarvis he\nhad seen once or twice, but their paths had never crossed. He had a good\nface, thin and ascetic, the face of a man at peace with himself. With him\nwas Mohammed Ali O\'Brien, who seemed surprised to see them enter, and then\napprehensive. Nobody shook hands; the Chief Justice bowed slightly and\ninvited them to be seated.\n\n\"Now,\" he continued, when they found chairs, \"Miss Ugatori tells me that\nyou are making complaint against an action by Mr. O\'Brien here.\"\n\n\"We are indeed, your Honor.\" Brannhard opened his briefcase and produced\ntwo papers--the writ, and the receipt for the Fuzzies, handing them across\nthe desk. \"My client and I wish to know upon what basis of legality your\nHonor sanctioned this act, and by what right Mr. O\'Brien sent his officers\nto Mr. Holloway\'s camp to snatch these little people from their friend and\nprotector, Mr. Holloway.\"\n\nThe judge looked at the two papers. \"As you know, Miss Ugatori took prints\nof them when you called to make this appointment. I\'ve seen them. But\nbelieve me, Mr. Brannhard, this is the first time I have seen the original\nof this writ. You know how these things are signed in blank. It\'s a\npractice that has saved considerable time and effort, and until now they\nhave only been used when there was no question that I or any other judge\nwould approve. Such a question should certainly have existed in this case,\nbecause had I seen this writ I would never have signed it.\" He turned to\nthe now fidgeting Chief Prosecutor. \"Mr. O\'Brien,\" he said, \"one simply\ndoes not impound sapient beings as evidence, as, say, one impounds a\nveldbeest calf in a brand-alteration case. The fact that the sapience of\nthese Fuzzies is still _sub judice_ includes the presumption of its\npossibility. Now you know perfectly well that the courts may take no\naction in the face of the possibility that some innocent person may suffer\nwrong.\"\n\n\"And, your Honor,\" Brannhard leaped into the breach, \"it cannot be denied\nthat these Fuzzies have suffered a most outrageous wrong! Picture\nthem--no, picture innocent and artless children, for that is what these\nFuzzies are, happy trusting little children, who, until then, had known\nonly kindness and affection--rudely kidnapped, stuffed into sacks by\nbrutal and callous men--\"\n\n\"Your Honor!\" O\'Brien\'s face turned even blacker than the hot sun of Agni\nhad made it. \"I cannot hear officers of the court so characterized without\nraising my voice in protest!\"\n\n\"Mr. O\'Brien seems to forget that he is speaking in the presence of two\neye witnesses to this brutal abduction.\"\n\n\"If the officers of the court need defense, Mr. O\'Brien, the court will\ndefend them. I believe that you should presently consider a defense of\nyour own actions.\"\n\n\"Your Honor, I insist that I only acted as I felt to be my duty,\" O\'Brien\nsaid. \"These Fuzzies are a key exhibit in the case of _People_ versus\n_Kellogg_, since only by demonstration of their sapience can any\nprosecution against the defendant be maintained.\"\n\n\"Then why,\" Brannhard demanded, \"did you endanger them in this criminally\nreckless manner?\"\n\n\"Endanger them?\" O\'Brien was horrified. \"Your Honor, I acted only to\ninsure their safety and appearance in court.\"\n\n\"So you took them away from the only man on this planet who knows anything\nabout their proper care, a man who loves them as he would his own human\nchildren, and you subjected them to abuse, which, for all you knew, might\nhave been fatal to them.\"\n\nJudge Pendarvis nodded. \"I don\'t believe, Mr. Brannhard, that you have\noverstated the case. Mr. O\'Brien, I take a very unfavorable view of your\naction in this matter. You had no right to have what are at least\nputatively sapient beings treated in this way, and even viewing them as\nmere physical evidence I must agree with Mr. Brannhard\'s characterization\nof your conduct as criminally reckless. Now, speaking judicially, I order\nyou to produce those Fuzzies immediately and return them to the custody of\nMr. Holloway.\"\n\n\"Well, of course, your Honor.\" O\'Brien had been growing progressively\ndistraught, and his face now had the gray-over-brown hue of a walnut\ngunstock that has been out in the rain all day. \"It\'ll take an hour or so\nto send for them and have them brought here.\"\n\n\"You mean they\'re not in this building?\" Pendarvis asked.\n\n\"Oh, no, your Honor, there are no facilities here. I had them taken to\nScience Center--\"\n\n\"_What?_\"\n\nJack had determined to keep his mouth shut and let Gus do the talking. The\nexclamation was literally forced out of him. Nobody noticed; it had also\nbeen forced out of both Gus Brannhard and Judge Pendarvis. Pendarvis\nleaned forward and spoke with dangerous mildness:\n\n\"Do you refer, Mr. O\'Brien, to the establishment of the Division of\nScientific Study and Research of the chartered Zarathustra Company?\"\n\n\"Why, yes; they have facilities for keeping all kinds of live animals, and\nthey do all the scientific work for--\"\n\nPendarvis cursed blasphemously. Brannhard looked as startled as though his\nown briefcase had jumped at his throat and tried to bite him. He didn\'t\nlook half as startled as Ham O\'Brien did.\n\n\"So you think,\" Pendarvis said, recovering his composure with visible\neffort, \"that the logical custodian of prosecution evidence in a murder\ntrial is the defendant? Mr. O\'Brien, you simply enlarge my view of the\npossible!\"\n\n\"The Zarathustra Company isn\'t the defendant,\" O\'Brien argued sullenly.\n\n\"Not of record, no,\" Brannhard agreed. \"But isn\'t the Zarathustra\nCompany\'s scientific division headed by one Leonard Kellogg?\"\n\n\"Dr. Kellogg\'s been relieved of his duties, pending the outcome of the\ntrial. The division is now headed by Dr. Ernst Mallin.\"\n\n\"Chief scientific witness for the defense; I fail to see any practical\ndifference.\"\n\n\"Well, Mr. Emmert said it would be all right,\" O\'Brien mumbled.\n\n\"Jack, did you hear that?\" Brannhard asked. \"Treasure it in your memory.\nYou may have to testify to it in court sometime.\" He turned to the Chief\nJustice. \"Your Honor, may I suggest the recovery of these Fuzzies be\nentrusted to Colonial Marshal Fane, and may I further suggest that Mr.\nO\'Brien be kept away from any communication equipment until they are\nrecovered.\"\n\n\"That sounds like a prudent suggestion, Mr. Brannhard. Now, I\'ll give you\nan order for the surrender of the Fuzzies, and a search warrant, just to\nbe on the safe side. And, I think, an Orphans\' Court form naming Mr.\nHolloway as guardian of these putatively sapient beings. What are their\nnames? Oh, I have them here on this receipt.\" He smiled pleasantly. \"See,\nMr. O\'Brien, we\'re saving you a lot of trouble.\"\n\nO\'Brien had little enough wit to protest. \"But these are the defendant and\nhis attorney in another murder case I\'m prosecuting,\" he began.\n\nPendarvis stopped smiling. \"Mr. O\'Brien, I doubt if you\'ll be allowed to\nprosecute anything or anybody around here any more, and I am specifically\nrelieving you of any connection with either the Kellogg or the Holloway\ntrial, and if I hear any argument out of you about it, I will issue a\nbench warrant for your arrest on charges of malfeasance in office.\"\n\n\n\n\nX\n\n\nColonial Marshal Max Fane was as heavy as Gus Brannhard and considerably\nshorter. Wedged between them on the back seat of the marshal\'s car, Jack\nHolloway contemplated the backs of the two uniformed deputies on the front\nseat and felt a happy smile spread through him. Going to get his Fuzzies\nback. Little Fuzzy, and Ko-Ko, and Mike, and Mamma Fuzzy, and Mitzi, and\nCinderella; he named them over and imagined them crowding around him,\nhappy to be back with Pappy Jack.\n\nThe car settled onto the top landing stage of the Company\'s Science\nCenter, and immediately a Company cop came running up. Gus opened the\ndoor, and Jack climbed out after him.\n\n\"Hey, you can\'t land here!\" the cop was shouting. \"This is for Company\nexecutives only!\"\n\nMax Fane emerged behind them and stepped forward; the two deputies piled\nout from in front.\n\n\"The hell you say, now,\" Fane said. \"A court order lands anywhere. Bring\nhim along, boys; we wouldn\'t want him to go and bump himself on a\ncommunication screen anywhere.\"\n\nThe Company cop started to protest, then subsided and fell in between the\ndeputies. Maybe it was beginning to dawn on him that the Federation courts\nwere bigger than the chartered Zarathustra Company after all. Or maybe he\njust thought there\'d been a revolution.\n\nLeonard Kellogg\'s--temporarily Ernst Mallin\'s--office was on the first\nfloor of the penthouse, counting down from the top landing stage. When\nthey stepped from the escalator, the hall was crowded with office people,\ngabbling excitedly in groups; they all stopped talking as soon as they saw\nwhat was coming. In the division chief\'s outer office three or four girls\njumped to their feet; one of them jumped into the bulk of Marshal Fane,\nwhich had interposed itself between her and the communication screen. They\nwere all shooed out into the hall, and one of the deputies was dropped\nthere with the prisoner. The middle office was empty. Fane took his\nbadgeholder in his left hand as he pushed through the door to the inner\noffice.\n\nKellogg\'s--temporarily Mallin\'s--secretary seemed to have preceded them by\na few seconds; she was standing in front of the desk sputtering\nincoherently. Mallin, starting to rise from his chair, froze, hunched\nforward over the desk. Juan Jimenez, standing in the middle of the room,\nseemed to have seen them first; he was looking about wildly as though for\nsome way of escape.\n\nFane pushed past the secretary and went up to the desk, showing Mallin his\nbadge and then serving the papers. Mallin looked at him in bewilderment.\n\n\"But we\'re keeping those Fuzzies for Mr. O\'Brien, the Chief Prosecutor,\"\nhe said. \"We can\'t turn them over without his authorization.\"\n\n\"This,\" Max Fane said gently, \"is an order of the court, issued by Chief\nJustice Pendarvis. As for Mr. O\'Brien, I doubt if he\'s Chief Prosecutor\nany more. In fact, I suspect that he\'s in jail. _And that_,\" he shouted,\nleaning forward as far as his waistline would permit and banging on the\ndesk with his fist, \"_is where I\'m going to stuff you, if you don\'t get\nthose Fuzzies in here and turn them over immediately!_\"\n\nIf Fane had suddenly metamorphosed himself into a damnthing, it couldn\'t\nhave shaken Mallin more. Involuntarily he cringed from the marshal, and\nthat finished him.\n\n\"But I can\'t,\" he protested. \"We don\'t know exactly where they are at the\nmoment.\"\n\n\"You don\'t know.\" Fane\'s voice sank almost to a whisper. \"You admit you\'re\nholding them here, but you ... don\'t ... know ... where. _Now start over\nagain; tell the truth this time!_\"\n\nAt that moment, the communication screen began making a fuss. Ruth\nOrtheris, in a light blue tailored costume, appeared in it.\n\n\"Dr. Mallin, what _is_ going on here?\" she wanted to know. \"I just came in\nfrom lunch, and a gang of men are tearing my office up. Haven\'t you found\nthe Fuzzies yet?\"\n\n\"What\'s that?\" Jack yelled. At the same time, Mallin was almost screaming:\n\"Ruth! Shut up! Blank out and get out of the building!\"\n\nWith surprising speed for a man of his girth, Fane whirled and was in\nfront of the screen, holding his badge out.\n\n\"I\'m Colonel Marshal Fane. Now, young woman; I want you up here right\naway. Don\'t make me send anybody after you, because I won\'t like that and\nneither will you.\"\n\n\"Right away, Marshal.\" She blanked the screen.\n\nFane turned to Mallin. \"Now.\" He wasn\'t bothering with vocal tricks any\nmore. \"Are you going to tell me the truth, or am I going to run you in and\nput a veridicator on you? Where are those Fuzzies?\"\n\n\"But I don\'t know!\" Mallin wailed. \"Juan, you tell him; you took charge of\nthem. I haven\'t seen them since they were brought here.\"\n\nJack managed to fight down the fright that was clutching at him and got\ncontrol of his voice.\n\n\"If anything\'s happened to those Fuzzies, you two are going to envy Kurt\nBorch before I\'m through with you,\" he said.\n\n\"All right, how about it?\" Fane asked Jimenez. \"Start with when you and\nHam O\'Brien picked up the Fuzzies at Central Courts Building last night.\n\n\"Well, we brought them here. I\'d gotten some cages fixed up for them,\nand--\"\n\nRuth Ortheris came in. She didn\'t try to avoid Jack\'s eyes, nor did she\ntry to brazen it out with him. She merely nodded distantly, as though\nthey\'d met on a ship sometime, and sat down.\n\n\"What happened, Marshal?\" she asked. \"Why are you here with these\ngentlemen?\"\n\n\"The court\'s ordered the Fuzzies returned to Mr. Holloway.\" Mallin was in\na dither. \"He has some kind a writ or something, and we don\'t know where\nthey are.\"\n\n\"Oh, _no!_\" Ruth\'s face, for an instant, was dismay itself. \"Not when--\"\nThen she froze shut.\n\n\"I came in about o-seven-hundred,\" Jimenez was saying, \"to give them food\nand water, and they\'d broken out of their cages. The netting was broken\nloose on one cage and the Fuzzy that had been in it had gotten out and let\nthe others out. They got into my office--they made a perfect shambles of\nit--and got out the door into the hall, and now we don\'t know where they\nare. And I don\'t know how they did any of it.\"\n\nCages built for something with no hands and almost no brains. Ever since\nKellogg and Mallin had come to the camp, Mallin had been hypnotizing\nhimself into the just-silly-little-animals doctrine. He must have\nsucceeded; last night he\'d acted accordingly.\n\n\"We want to see the cages,\" Jack said.\n\n\"Yeah.\" Fane went to the outer door. \"Miguel.\"\n\nThe deputy came in, herding the Company cop ahead of him.\n\n\"You heard what happened?\" Fane asked.\n\n\"Yeah. Big Fuzzy jailbreak. What did they do, make little wooden pistols\nand bluff their way out?\"\n\n\"By God, I wouldn\'t put it past them. Come along. Bring Chummy along with\nyou; he knows the inside of this place better than we do. Piet, call in.\nWe want six more men. Tell Chang to borrow from the constabulary if he has\nto.\"\n\n\"Wait a minute,\" Jack said. He turned to Ruth. \"What do you know about\nthis?\"\n\n\"Well, not much. I was with Dr. Mallin here when Mr. Grego--I mean, Mr.\nO\'Brien--called to tell us that the Fuzzies were going to be kept here\ntill the trial. We were going to fix up a room for them, but till that\ncould be done, Juan got some cages to put them in. That was all I knew\nabout it till o-nine-thirty, when I came in and found everything in an\nuproar and was told that the Fuzzies had gotten loose during the night. I\nknew they couldn\'t get out of the building, so I went to my office and lab\nto start overhauling some equipment we were going to need with the\nFuzzies. About ten-hundred, I found I couldn\'t do anything with it, and my\nassistant and I loaded it on a pickup truck and took it to Henry Stenson\'s\ninstrument shop. By the time I was through there, I had lunch and then\ncame back here.\"\n\nHe wondered briefly how a polyencephalographic veridicator would react to\nsome of those statements; might be a good idea if Max Fane found out.\n\n\"I\'ll stay here,\" Gus Brannhard was saying, \"and see if I can get some\nmore truth out of these people.\"\n\n\"Why don\'t you screen the hotel and tell Gerd and Ben what\'s happened?\" he\nasked. \"Gerd used to work here; maybe he could help us hunt.\"\n\n\"Good idea. Piet, tell our re-enforcements to stop at the Mallory on the\nway and pick him up.\" Fane turned to Jimenez. \"Come along; show us where\nyou had these Fuzzies and how they got away.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\n\"You say one of them broke out of his cage and then released the others,\"\nJack said to Jimenez as they were going down on the escalator. \"Do you\nknow which one it was?\"\n\nJimenez shook his head. \"We just took them out of the bags and put them\ninto the cages.\"\n\nThat would be Little Fuzzy; he\'d always been the brains of the family.\nWith his leadership, they might have a chance. The trouble was that this\nplace was full of dangers Fuzzies knew nothing about--radiation and\npoisons and electric wiring and things like that. If they really had\nescaped. That was a possibility that began worrying Jack.\n\nOn each floor they passed going down, he could glimpse parties of Company\nemployees in the halls, armed with nets and blankets and other catching\nequipment. When they got off Jimenez led them through a big room of glass\ncases--mounted specimens and articulated skeletons of Zarathustran\nmammals. More people were there, looking around and behind and even into\nthe cases. He began to think that the escape was genuine, and not just a\ncover-up for the murder of the Fuzzies.\n\nJimenez took them down a narrow hall beyond to an open door at the end.\nInside, the permanent night light made a blue-white glow; a swivel chair\nstood just inside the door. Jimenez pointed to it.\n\n\"They must have gotten up on that to work the latch and open the door,\" he\nsaid.\n\nIt was like the doors at the camp, spring latch, with a handle instead of\na knob. They\'d have learned how to work it from watching him. Fane was\ntrying the latch.\n\n\"Not too stiff,\" he said. \"Your little fellows strong enough to work it?\"\n\nHe tried it and agreed. \"Sure. And they\'d be smart enough to do it, too.\nEven Baby Fuzzy, the one your men didn\'t get, would be able to figure that\nout.\"\n\n\"And look what they did to my office,\" Jimenez said, putting on the\nlights.\n\nThey\'d made quite a mess of it. They hadn\'t delayed long to do it, just\nthrown things around. Everything was thrown off the top of the desk. They\nhad dumped the wastebasket, and left it dumped. He saw that and chuckled.\nThe escape had been genuine all right.\n\n\"Probably hunting for things they could use as weapons, and doing as much\ndamage as they could in the process.\" There was evidently a pretty wide\nstreak of vindictiveness in Fuzzy character. \"I don\'t think they like you,\nJuan.\"\n\n\"Wouldn\'t blame them,\" Fane said. \"Let\'s see what kind of a houdini they\ndid on these cages now.\"\n\nThe cages were in a room--file room, storeroom, junk room--behind\nJimenez\'s office. It had a spring lock, too, and the Fuzzies had dragged\none of the cages over and stood on it to open the door. The cages\nthemselves were about three feet wide and five feet long, with plywood\nbottoms, wooden frames and quarter-inch netting on the sides and tops. The\ntops were hinged, and fastened with hasps, and bolts slipped through the\nstaples with nuts screwed on them. The nuts had been unscrewed from five\nand the bolts slipped out; the sixth cage had been broken open from the\ninside, the netting cut away from the frame at one corner and bent back in\na triangle big enough for a Fuzzy to crawl through.\n\n\"I can\'t understand that,\" Jimenez was saying. \"Why that wire looks as\nthough it had been cut.\"\n\n\"It was cut. Marshal, I\'d pull somebody\'s belt about this, if I were you.\nYour men aren\'t very careful about searching prisoners. One of the Fuzzies\nhid a knife out on them.\" He remembered how Little Fuzzy and Ko-Ko had\nburrowed into the bedding in apparently unreasoning panic, and explained\nabout the little spring-steel knives he had made. \"I suppose he palmed it\nand hugged himself into a ball, as though he was scared witless, when they\nput him in the bag.\"\n\n\"Waited till he was sure he wouldn\'t get caught before he used it, too,\"\nthe marshal said. \"That wire\'s soft enough to cut easily.\" He turned to\nJimenez. \"You people ought to be glad I\'m ineligible for jury duty. Why\ndon\'t you just throw it in and let Kellogg cop a plea?\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nGerd van Riebeek stopped for a moment in the doorway and looked into what\nhad been Leonard Kellogg\'s office. The last time he\'d been here, Kellogg\nhad had him on the carpet about that land-prawn business. Now Ernst Mallin\nwas sitting in Kellogg\'s chair, trying to look unconcerned and not making\na very good job of it. Gus Brannhard sprawled in an armchair, smoking a\ncigar and looking at Mallin as he would look at a river pig when he\ndoubted whether it was worth shooting it or not. A uniformed deputy turned\nquickly, then went back to studying an elaborate wall chart showing the\ninterrelation of Zarathustran mammals--he\'d made the original of that\nchart himself. And Ruth Ortheris sat apart from the desk and the three\nmen, smoking. She looked up and then, when she saw that he was looking\npast and away from her, she lowered her eyes.\n\n\"You haven\'t found them?\" he asked Brannhard.\n\nThe fluffy-bearded lawyer shook his head. \"Jack has a gang down in the\ncellar, working up. Max is in the psychology lab, putting the Company cops\nwho were on duty last night under veridication. They all claim, and the\nveridicator backs them up, that it was impossible for the Fuzzies to get\nout of the building.\"\n\n\"They don\'t know what\'s impossible, for a Fuzzy.\"\n\n\"That\'s what I told him. He didn\'t give me any argument, either. He\'s\npretty impressed with how they got out of those cages.\"\n\nRuth spoke. \"Gerd, we didn\'t hurt them. We weren\'t going to hurt them at\nall. Juan put them in cages because we didn\'t have any other place for\nthem, but we were going to fix up a nice room, where they could play\ntogether....\" Then she must have seen that he wasn\'t listening, and\nstopped, crushing out her cigarette and rising. \"Dr. Mallin, if these\npeople haven\'t any more questions to ask me, I have a lot of work to do.\"\n\n\"You want to ask her anything, Gerd?\" Brannhard inquired.\n\nOnce he had had something very important he had wanted to ask her. He was\nglad, now, that he hadn\'t gotten around to it. Hell, she was so married to\nthe Company it\'d be bigamy if she married him too.\n\n\"No, I don\'t want to talk to her at all.\"\n\nShe started for the door, then hesitated. \"Gerd, I....\" she began. Then\nshe went out. Gus Brannhard looked after her, and dropped the ash of his\ncigar on Leonard Kellogg\'s--now Ernst Mallin\'s--floor.\n\n * * * * *\n\nGerd detested her, and she wouldn\'t have had any respect for him if he\ndidn\'t. She ought to have known that something like this would happen. It\nalways did, in the business. A smart girl, in the business, never got\ninvolved with any one man; she always got herself four or five boyfriends,\non all possible sides, and played them off one against another.\n\nShe\'d have to get out of the Science Center right away. Marshal Fane was\nquestioning people under veridication; she didn\'t dare let him get around\nto her. She didn\'t dare go to her office; the veridicator was in the lab\nacross the hall, and that\'s where he was working. And she didn\'t dare--\n\nYes, she could do that, by screen. She went into an office down the hall;\na dozen people recognized her at once and began bombarding her with\nquestions about the Fuzzies. She brushed them off and went to a screen,\npunching a combination. After a slight delay, an elderly man with a\nthin-lipped, bloodless face appeared. When he recognized her, there was a\nbrief look of annoyance on the thin face.\n\n\"Mr. Stenson,\" she began, before he could say anything: \"That apparatus I\nbrought to your shop this morning--the sensory-response detector--we\'ve\nmade a simply frightful mistake. There\'s nothing wrong with it whatever,\nand if anything\'s done with it, it may cause serious damage.\"\n\n\"I don\'t think I understand, Dr. Ortheris.\"\n\n\"Well, it was a perfectly natural mistake. You see, we\'re all at our wits\'\nend here. Mr. Holloway and his lawyer and the Colonial Marshal are here\nwith an order from Judge Pendarvis for the return of those Fuzzies. None\nof us know what we\'re doing at all. Why the whole trouble with the\napparatus was the fault of the operator. We\'ll have to have it back\nimmediately, all of it.\"\n\n\"I see, Dr. Ortheris.\" The old instrument maker looked worried. \"But I\'m\nafraid the apparatus has already gone to the workroom. Mr. Stephenson has\nit now, and I can\'t get in touch with him at present. If the mistake can\nbe corrected, what do you want done?\"\n\n\"Just hold it; I\'ll call or send for it.\"\n\nShe blanked the screen. Old Johnson, the chief data synthesist, tried to\ndetain her with some question.\n\n\"I\'m sorry, Mr. Johnson. I can\'t stop now. I have to go over to Company\nHouse right away.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe suite at the Hotel Mallory was crowded when Jack Holloway returned\nwith Gerd van Riebeek; it was noisy with voices, and the ventilators were\nlaboring to get rid of the tobacco smoke. Gus Brannhard, Ben Rainsford and\nBaby Fuzzy were meeting the press.\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Holloway!\" somebody shouted as he entered. \"Have you found them\nyet?\"\n\n\"No; we\'ve been all over Science Center from top to bottom. We know they\nwent down a few floors from where they\'d been caged, but that\'s all. I\ndon\'t think they could have gotten outside; the only exit on the ground\nlevel\'s through a vestibule where a Company policeman was on duty, and\nthere\'s no way for them to have climbed down from any of the terraces or\nlanding stages.\"\n\n\"Well, Mr. Holloway, I hate to suggest this,\" somebody else said, \"but\nhave you eliminated the possibility that they may have hidden in a trash\nbin and been dumped into the mass-energy converter?\"\n\n\"We thought of that. The converter\'s underground, in a vault that can be\nentered only by one door, and that was locked. No trash was disposed of\nbetween the time they were brought there and the time the search started,\nand everything that\'s been sent to the converter since has been checked\npiece by piece.\"\n\n\"Well, I\'m glad to hear that, Mr. Holloway, and I know that everybody\nhearing this will be glad, too. I take it you\'ve not given up looking for\nthem?\"\n\n\"Are we on the air now? No, I have not; I\'m staying here in Mallorysport\nuntil I either find them or am convinced that they aren\'t in the city. And\nI am offering a reward of two thousand sols apiece for their return to me.\nIf you\'ll wait a moment, I\'ll have descriptions ready for you....\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nVictor Grego unstoppered the refrigerated cocktail jug. \"More?\" he asked\nLeslie Coombes.\n\n\"Yes, thank you.\" Coombes held his glass until it was filled. \"As you say,\nVictor, you made the decision, but you made it on my advice, and the\nadvice was bad.\"\n\nHe couldn\'t disagree, even politely, with that. He hoped it hadn\'t been\nruinously bad. One thing, Leslie wasn\'t trying to pass the buck, and\nconsidering how Ham O\'Brien had mishandled his end of it, he could have\ndone so quite plausibly.\n\n\"I used bad judgment,\" Coombes said dispassionately, as though discussing\nsome mistake Hitler had made, or Napoleon. \"I thought O\'Brien wouldn\'t try\nto use one of those presigned writs, and I didn\'t think Pendarvis would\nadmit, publicly, that he signed court orders in blank. He\'s been severely\ncriticized by the press about that.\"\n\nHe hadn\'t thought Brannhard and Holloway would try to fight a court order\neither. That was one of the consequences of being too long in a seemingly\nirresistible position; you didn\'t expect resistance. Kellogg hadn\'t\nexpected Jack Holloway to order him off his land grant. Kurt Borch had\nthought all he needed to do with a gun was pull it and wave it around. And\nJimenez had expected the Fuzzies to just sit in their cages.\n\n\"I wonder where they got to,\" Coombes was saying. \"I understand they\ncouldn\'t be found at all in the building.\"\n\n\"Ruth Ortheris has an idea. She got away from Science Center before Fane\ncould get hold of her and veridicate her. It seems she and an assistant\ntook some apparatus out, about ten o\'clock, in a truck. She thinks the\nFuzzies hitched a ride with her. I know that sounds rather improbable, but\nhell, everything else sounds impossible. I\'ll have it followed up. Maybe\nwe can find them before Holloway does. They\'re not inside Science Center,\nthat\'s sure.\" His own glass was empty; he debated a refill and voted\nagainst it. \"O\'Brien\'s definitely out, I take it?\"\n\n\"Completely. Pendarvis gave him his choice of resigning or facing\nmalfeasance charges.\"\n\n\"They couldn\'t really convict him of malfeasance for that, could they?\nMisfeasance, maybe, but--\"\n\n\"They could charge him. And then they could interrogate him under\nveridication about his whole conduct in office, and you know what they\nwould bring out,\" Coombes said. \"He almost broke an arm signing his\nresignation. He\'s still Attorney General of the Colony, of course; Nick\nissued a statement supporting him. That hasn\'t done Nick as much harm as\nO\'Brien could do spilling what he knows about Residency affairs.\n\n\"Now Brannhard is talking about bringing suit against the Company, and\nhe\'s furnishing copies of all the Fuzzy films Holloway has to the news\nservices. Interworld News is going hog-wild with it, and even the services\nwe control can\'t play it down too much. I don\'t know who\'s going to be\nprosecuting these cases; but whoever it is, he won\'t dare pull any\npunches. And the whole thing\'s made Pendarvis hostile to us. I know, the\nlaw and the evidence and nothing but the law and the evidence, but the\nevidence is going to filter into his conscious mind through this\nhostility. He\'s called a conference with Brannhard and myself for tomorrow\nafternoon; I don\'t know what that\'s going to be like.\"\n\n\n\n\nXI\n\n\nThe two lawyers had risen hastily when Chief Justice Pendarvis entered; he\nresponded to their greetings and seated himself at his desk, reaching for\nthe silver cigar box and taking out a panatela. Gustavus Adolphus\nBrannhard picked up the cigar he had laid aside and began puffing on it;\nLeslie Coombes took a cigarette from his case. They both looked at him,\nwaiting like two drawn weapons--a battle ax and a rapier.\n\n\"Well, gentlemen, as you know, we have a couple of homicide cases and\nnobody to prosecute them,\" he began.\n\n\"Why bother, your Honor?\" Coombes asked. \"Both charges are completely\nfrivolous. One man killed a wild animal, and the other killed a man who\nwas trying to kill him.\"\n\n\"Well, your Honor, I don\'t believe my client is guilty of anything,\nlegally or morally,\" Brannhard said. \"I want that established by an\nacquittal.\" He looked at Coombes. \"I should think Mr. Coombes would be\njust as anxious to have his client cleared of any stigma of murder, too.\"\n\n\"I am quite agreed. People who have been charged with crimes ought to have\npublic vindication if they are innocent. Now, in the first place, I\nplanned to hold the Kellogg trial first, and then the Holloway trial. Are\nyou both satisfied with that arrangement?\"\n\n\"Absolutely not, your Honor,\" Brannhard said promptly. \"The whole basis of\nthe Holloway defense is that this man Borch was killed in commission of a\nfelony. We\'re prepared to prove that, but we don\'t want our case\nprejudiced by an earlier trial.\"\n\nCoombes laughed. \"Mr. Brannhard wants to clear his client by preconvicting\nmine. We can\'t agree to anything like that.\"\n\n\"Yes, and he is making the same objection to trying your client first.\nWell, I\'m going to remove both objections. I\'m going to order the two\ncases combined, and both defendants tried together.\"\n\nA momentary glow of unholy glee on Gus Brannhard\'s face; Coombes didn\'t\nlike the idea at all.\n\n\"Your Honor, I trust that that suggestion was only made facetiously,\" he\nsaid.\n\n\"It wasn\'t, Mr. Coombes.\"\n\n\"Then if your Honor will not hold me in contempt for saying so, it is the\nmost shockingly irregular--I won\'t go so far as to say improper--trial\nprocedure I\'ve ever heard of. This is not a case of accomplices charged\nwith the same crime; this is a case of two men charged with different\ncriminal acts, and the conviction of either would mean the almost\nautomatic acquittal of the other. I don\'t know who\'s going to be named to\ntake Mohammed O\'Brien\'s place, but I pity him from the bottom of my heart.\nWhy, Mr. Brannhard and I could go off somewhere and play poker while the\nprosecutor would smash the case to pieces.\"\n\n\"Well, we won\'t have just one prosecutor, Mr. Coombes, we will have two.\nI\'ll swear you and Mr. Brannhard in as special prosecutors, and you can\nprosecute Mr. Brannhard\'s client, and he yours. I think that would remove\nany further objections.\"\n\nIt was all he could do to keep his face judicially grave and unmirthful.\nBrannhard was almost purring, like a big tiger that had just gotten the\nbetter of a young goat; Leslie Coombes\'s suavity was beginning to crumble\nslightly at the edges.\n\n\"Your Honor, that is a most excellent suggestion,\" Brannhard declared. \"I\nwill prosecute Mr. Coombes\'s client with the greatest pleasure in the\nuniverse.\"\n\n\"Well, all I can say, your Honor, is that if the first proposal was the\nmost irregular I had ever heard, the record didn\'t last long!\"\n\n\"Why, Mr. Coombes, I went over the law and the rules of jurisprudence very\ncarefully, and I couldn\'t find a word that could be construed as\ndisallowing such a procedure.\"\n\n\"I\'ll bet you didn\'t find any precedent for it either!\"\n\nLeslie Coombes should have known better than that; in colonial law, you\ncan find a precedent for almost anything.\n\n\"How much do you bet, Leslie?\" Brannhard asked, a larcenous gleam in his\neye.\n\n\"Don\'t let him take your money away from you. I found, inside an hour,\nsixteen precedents, from twelve different planetary jurisdictions.\"\n\n\"All right, your Honor,\" Coombes capitulated. \"But I hope you know what\nyou\'re doing. You\'re turning a couple of cases of the People of the Colony\ninto a common civil lawsuit.\"\n\nGus Brannhard laughed. \"What else is it?\" he demanded. \"_Friends of Little\nFuzzy_ versus _The chartered Zarathustra Company_; I\'m bringing action as\nfriend of incompetent aborigines for recognition of sapience, and Mr.\nCoombes, on behalf of the Zarathustra Company, is contesting to preserve\nthe Company\'s charter, and that\'s all there is or ever was to this case.\"\n\nThat was impolite of Gus. Leslie Coombes had wanted to go on to the end\npretending that the Company charter had absolutely nothing to do with it.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThere was an unending stream of reports of Fuzzies seen here and there,\noften simultaneously in impossibly distant parts of the city. Some were\nfrom publicity seekers and pathological liars and crackpots; some were the\nresult of honest mistakes or overimaginativeness. There was some reason to\nsuspect that not a few had originated with the Company, to confuse the\nsearch. One thing did come to light which heartened Jack Holloway. An\nintensive if concealed search was being made by the Company police, and by\nthe Mallorysport police department, which the Company controlled.\n\nMax Fane was giving every available moment to the hunt. This wasn\'t\nbecause of ill will for the Company, though that was present, nor because\nthe Chief Justice was riding him. The Colonial Marshal was pro-Fuzzy. So\nwere the Colonial Constabulary, over whom Nick Emmert\'s administration\nseemed to have little if any authority. Colonel Ian Ferguson, the\ncommandant, had his appointment direct from the Colonial Office on Terra.\nHe had called by screen to offer his help, and George Lunt, over on Beta,\nscreened daily to learn what progress was being made.\n\nLiving at the Hotel Mallory was expensive, and Jack had to sell some\nsunstones. The Company gem buyers were barely civil to him; he didn\'t try\nto be civil at all. There was also a noticeable coolness toward him at the\nbank. On the other hand, on several occasions, Space Navy officers and\nratings down from Xerxes Base went out of their way to accost him,\nintroduce themselves, shake hands with him and give him their best wishes.\n\nOnce, in one of the weather-domed business centers, an elderly man with\nwhite hair showing under his black beret greeted him.\n\n\"Mr. Holloway I want to tell you how grieved I am to learn about the\ndisappearance of those little people of yours,\" he said. \"I\'m afraid\nthere\'s nothing I can do to help you, but I hope they turn up safely.\"\n\n\"Why, thank you, Mr. Stenson.\" He shook hands with the old master\ninstrument maker. \"If you could make me a pocket veridicator, to use on\nsome of these people who claim they saw them, it would be a big help.\"\n\n\"Well, I do make rather small portable veridicators for the constabulary,\nbut I think what you need is an instrument for detection of psychopaths,\nand that\'s slightly beyond science at present. But if you\'re still\nprospecting for sunstones, I have an improved micro-ray scanner I just\ndeveloped, and....\"\n\nHe walked with Stenson to his shop, had a cup of tea and looked at the\nscanner. From Stenson\'s screen, he called Max Fane. Six more people had\nclaimed to have seen the Fuzzies.\n\nWithin a week, the films taken at the camp had been shown so frequently on\ntelecast as to wear out their interest value. Baby, however, was still\navailable for new pictures, and in a few days a girl had to be hired to\ntake care of his fan mail. Once, entering a bar, Jack thought he saw Baby\nsitting on a woman\'s head. A second look showed that it was only a\nlife-sized doll, held on with an elastic band. Within a week, he was\nseeing Baby Fuzzy hats all over town, and shop windows were full of\nlife-sized Fuzzy dolls.\n\nIn the late afternoon, two weeks after the Fuzzies had vanished, Marshal\nFane dropped him at the hotel. They sat in the car for a moment, and Fane\nsaid:\n\n\"I think this is the end of it. We\'re all out of cranks and exhibitionists\nnow.\"\n\nHe nodded. \"That woman we were talking to. She\'s crazy as a bedbug.\"\n\n\"Yeah. In the past ten years she\'s confessed to every unsolved crime on\nthe planet. It shows you how hard up we are that I waste your time and\nmine listening to her.\"\n\n\"Max, nobody\'s seen them. You think they just aren\'t, any more, don\'t\nyou?\"\n\nThe fat man looked troubled. \"Well, Jack, it isn\'t so much that nobody\'s\nseen them. Nobody\'s seen any trace of them. There are land-prawns all\naround, but nobody\'s found a cracked shell. And six active, playful,\ninquisitive Fuzzies ought to be getting into things. They ought to be\nraiding food markets, and fruit stands, getting into places and\nransacking. But there hasn\'t been a thing. The Company police have stopped\nlooking for them now.\"\n\n\"Well, I won\'t. They must be around somewhere.\" He shook Fane\'s hand, and\ngot out of the car. \"You\'ve been awfully helpful, Max. I want you to know\nhow much I thank you.\"\n\nHe watched the car lift away, and then looked out over the city--a vista\nof treetop green, with roofs and the domes of shopping centers and\nbusiness centers and amusement centers showing through, and the angular\nbuttes of tall buildings rising above. The streetless contragravity city\nof a new planet that had never known ground traffic. The Fuzzies could be\nhiding anywhere among those trees--or they could all be dead in some\nman-made trap. He thought of all the deadly places into which they could\nhave wandered. Machinery, dormant and quiet, until somebody threw a\nswitch. Conduits, which could be flooded without warning, or filled with\nscalding steam or choking gas. Poor little Fuzzies, they\'d think a city\nwas as safe as the woods of home, where there was nothing worse than\nharpies and damnthings.\n\nGus Brannhard was out when he went down to the suite; Ben Rainsford was at\na reading screen, studying a psychology text, and Gerd was working at a\ndesk that had been brought in. Baby was playing on the floor with the\nbright new toys they had gotten for him. When Pappy Jack came in, he\ndropped them and ran to be picked up and held.\n\n\"George called,\" Gerd said. \"They have a family of Fuzzies at the post\nnow.\"\n\n\"Well, that\'s great.\" He tried to make it sound enthusiastic. \"How many?\"\n\n\"Five, three males and two females. They call them Dr. Crippen, Dillinger,\nNed Kelly, Lizzie Borden and Calamity Jane.\"\n\nWouldn\'t it be just like a bunch of cops to hang names like that on\ninnocent Fuzzies?\n\n\"Why don\'t you call the post and say hello to them?\" Ben asked.\n\n\"Baby likes them; he\'d think it was fun to talk to them again.\"\n\nHe let himself be urged into it, and punched out the combination. They\nwere nice Fuzzies; almost, but of course not quite, as nice as his own.\n\n\"If your family doesn\'t turn up in time for the trial, have Gus subpoena\nours,\" Lunt told him. \"You ought to have some to produce in court. Two\nweeks from now, this mob of ours will be doing all kinds of things. You\nought to see them now, and we only got them yesterday afternoon.\"\n\nHe said he hoped he\'d have his own by then; he realized that he was saying\nit without much conviction.\n\nThey had a drink when Gus came in. He was delighted with the offer from\nLunt. Another one who didn\'t expect to see Pappy Jack\'s Fuzzies alive\nagain.\n\n\"I\'m not doing a damn thing here,\" Rainsford said. \"I\'m going back to Beta\ntill the trial. Maybe I can pick up some ideas from George Lunt\'s Fuzzies.\nI\'m damned if I\'m getting away from this crap!\" He gestured at the reading\nscreen. \"All I have is a vocabulary, and I don\'t know what half the words\nmean.\" He snapped it off. \"I\'m beginning to wonder if maybe Jimenez\nmightn\'t have been right and Ruth Ortheris is wrong. Maybe you can be just\na little bit sapient.\"\n\n\"Maybe it\'s possible to be sapient and not know it,\" Gus said. \"Like the\ncharacter in the old French play who didn\'t know he was talking prose.\"\n\n\"What do you mean, Gus?\" Gerd asked.\n\n\"I\'m not sure I know. It\'s just an idea that occurred to me today. Kick it\naround and see if you can get anything out of it.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\n\"I believe the difference lies in the area of consciousness,\" Ernst Mallin\nwas saying. \"You all know, of course, the axiom that only one-tenth, never\nmore than one-eighth, of our mental activity occurs above the level of\nconsciousness. Now let us imagine a hypothetical race whose entire\nmentation is conscious.\"\n\n\"I hope they stay hypothetical,\" Victor Grego, in his office across the\ncity, said out of the screen. \"They wouldn\'t recognize us as sapient at\nall.\"\n\n\"We wouldn\'t be sapient, as they\'d define the term,\" Leslie Coombes, in\nthe same screen with Grego, said. \"They\'d have some equivalent of the\ntalk-and-build-a-fire rule, based on abilities of which we can\'t even\nconceive.\"\n\nMaybe, Ruth thought, they might recognize us as one-tenth to as much as\none-eighth sapient. No, then we\'d have to recognize, say, a chimpanzee as\nbeing one-one-hundredth sapient, and a flatworm as being sapient to the\norder of one-billionth.\n\n\"Wait a minute,\" she said. \"If I understand, you mean that nonsapient\nbeings think, but only subconsciously?\"\n\n\"That\'s correct, Ruth. When confronted by some entirely novel situation, a\nnonsapient animal will think, but never consciously. Of course, familiar\nsituations are dealt with by pure habit and memory-response.\"\n\n\"You know, I\'ve just thought of something,\" Grego said. \"I think we can\nexplain that funeral that\'s been bothering all of us in nonsapient terms.\"\nHe lit a cigarette, while they all looked at him expectantly. \"Fuzzies,\"\nhe continued, \"bury their ordure: they do this to avoid an unpleasant\nsense-stimulus, a bad smell. Dead bodies quickly putrefy and smell badly;\nthey are thus equated, subconsciously, with ordure and must be buried. All\nFuzzies carry weapons. A Fuzzy\'s weapon is--still subconsciously--regarded\nas a part of the Fuzzy, hence it must also be buried.\"\n\nMallin frowned portentously. The idea seemed to appeal to him, but of\ncourse he simply couldn\'t agree too promptly with a mere layman, even the\nboss.\n\n\"Well, so far you\'re on fairly safe ground, Mr. Grego,\" he admitted.\n\"Association of otherwise dissimilar things because of some apparent\nsimilarity is a recognized element of nonsapient animal behavior.\" He\nfrowned again. \"That _could_ be an explanation. I\'ll have to think of it.\"\n\nAbout this time tomorrow, it would be his own idea, with grudging\nrecognition of a suggestion by Victor Grego. In time, that would be\nforgotten; it would be the Mallin Theory. Grego was apparently agreeable,\nas long as the job got done.\n\n\"Well, if you can make anything out of it, pass it on to Mr. Coombes as\nsoon as possible, to be worked up for use in court,\" he said.\n\n\n\n\nXII\n\n\nBen Rainsford went back to Beta Continent, and Gerd van Riebeek remained\nin Mallorysport. The constabulary at Post Fifteen had made steel\nchopper-diggers for their Fuzzies, and reported a gratifying abatement of\nthe land-prawn nuisance. They also made a set of scaled-down carpenter\ntools, and their Fuzzies were building themselves a house out of scrap\ncrates and boxes. A pair of Fuzzies showed up at Ben Rainsford\'s camp, and\nhe adopted them, naming them Flora and Fauna.\n\nEverybody had Fuzzies now, and Pappy Jack only had Baby. He was lying on\nthe floor of the parlor, teaching Baby to tie knots in a piece of string.\nGus Brannhard, who spent most of the day in the office in the Central\nCourts building which had been furnished to him as special prosecutor, was\nlolling in an armchair in red-and-blue pajamas, smoking a cigar, drinking\ncoffee--his whisky consumption was down to a couple of drinks a day--and\nstudying texts on two reading screens at once, making an occasional remark\ninto a stenomemophone. Gerd was at the desk, spoiling notepaper in an\neffort to work something out by symbolic logic. Suddenly he crumpled a\nsheet and threw it across the room, cursing. Brannhard looked away from\nhis screens.\n\n\"Trouble, Gerd?\"\n\nGerd cursed again. \"How the devil can I tell whether Fuzzies generalize?\"\nhe demanded. \"How can I tell whether they form abstract ideas? How can I\nprove, even, that they have ideas at all? Hell\'s blazes, how can I even\nprove, to your satisfaction, that I think consciously?\"\n\n\"Working on that idea I mentioned?\" Brannhard asked.\n\n\"I was. It seemed like a good idea but....\"\n\n\"Suppose we go back to specific instances of Fuzzy behavior, and present\nthem as evidence of sapience?\" Brannhard asked. \"That funeral, for\ninstance.\"\n\n\"They\'ll still insist that we define sapience.\"\n\nThe communication screen began buzzing. Baby Fuzzy looked up\ndisinterestedly, and then went back to trying to untie a figure-eight knot\nhe had tied. Jack shoved himself to his feet and put the screen on. It was\nMax Fane, and for the first time that he could remember, the Colonial\nMarshal was excited.\n\n\"Jack, have you had any news on the screen lately?\"\n\n\"No. Something turn up?\"\n\n\"God, yes! The cops are all over the city hunting the Fuzzies; they have\norders to shoot on sight. Nick Emmert was just on the air with a reward\noffer--five hundred sols apiece, dead or alive.\"\n\nIt took a few seconds for that to register. Then he became frightened. Gus\nand Gerd were both on their feet and crowding to the screen behind him.\n\n\"They have some bum from that squatters\' camp over on the East Side who\nclaims the Fuzzies beat up his ten-year-old daughter,\" Fane was saying.\n\"They have both of them at police headquarters, and they\'ve handed the\nstory out to Zarathustra News, and Planetwide Coverage. Of course, they\'re\nCompany-controlled; they\'re playing it for all it\'s worth.\"\n\n\"Have they been veridicated?\" Brannhard demanded.\n\n\"No, and the city cops are keeping them under cover. The girl says she was\nplaying outdoors and these Fuzzies jumped her and began beating her with\nsticks. Her injuries are listed as multiple bruises, fractured wrist and\ngeneral shock.\"\n\n\"I don\'t believe it! They wouldn\'t attack a child.\"\n\n\"I want to talk to that girl and her father,\" Brannhard was saying. \"And\nI\'m going to demand that they make their statements under veridication.\nThis thing\'s a frameup, Max; I\'d bet my ears on it. Timing\'s just right;\nonly a week till the trial.\"\n\nMaybe the Fuzzies had wanted the child to play with them, and she\'d gotten\nfrightened and hurt one of them. A ten-year-old human child would look\ndangerously large to a Fuzzy, and if they thought they were menaced they\nwould fight back savagely.\n\nThey were still alive and in the city. That was one thing. But they were\nin worse danger than they had ever been; that was another. Fane was asking\nBrannhard how soon he could be dressed.\n\n\"Five minutes? Good, I\'ll be along to pick you up,\" he said. \"Be seeing\nyou.\"\n\nJack hurried into the bedroom he and Brannhard shared; he kicked off his\nmoccasins and began pulling on his boots. Brannhard, pulling his trousers\nup over his pajama pants, wanted to know where he thought he was going.\n\n\"With you. I\'ve got to find them before some dumb son of a Khooghra shoots\nthem.\"\n\n\"You stay here,\" Gus ordered. \"Stay by the communication screen, and keep\nthe viewscreen on for news. But don\'t stop putting your boots on; you may\nhave to get out of here fast if I call you and tell you they\'ve been\nlocated. I\'ll call you as soon as I get anything definite.\"\n\nGerd had the screen on for news, and was getting Planetwide, openly owned\nand operated by the Company. The newscaster was wrought up about the\nbrutal attack on the innocent child, but he was having trouble focusing\nthe blame. After all, who\'d let the Fuzzies escape in the first place? And\neven a skilled semanticist had trouble in making anything called a Fuzzy\nsound menacing. At least he gave particulars, true or not.\n\nThe child, Lolita Lurkin, had been playing outside her home at about\ntwenty-one hundred when she had suddenly been set upon by six Fuzzies,\narmed with clubs. Without provocation, they had dragged her down and\nbeaten her severely. Her screams had brought her father, and he had driven\nthe Fuzzies away. Police had brought both the girl and her father, Oscar\nLurkin, to headquarters, where they had told their story. City police,\nCompany police and constabulary troopers and parties of armed citizens\nwere combing the eastern side of the city; Resident General Emmert had\nacted at once to offer a reward of five thousand sols apiece....\n\n\"The kid\'s lying, and if they ever get a veridicator on her, they\'ll prove\nit\", he said. \"Emmert, or Grego, or the two of them together, bribed those\npeople to tell that story.\"\n\n\"Oh, I take that for granted,\" Gerd said. \"I know that place. Junktown.\nRuth does a lot of work there for juvenile court.\" He stopped briefly,\npain in his eyes, and then continued: \"You can hire anybody to do anything\nover there for a hundred sols, especially if the cops are fixed in\nadvance.\"\n\nHe shifted to the Interworld News frequency; they were covering the Fuzzy\nhunt from an aircar. The shanties and parked airjalopies of Junktown were\nfloodlighted from above; lines of men were beating the brush and poking\namong them. Once a car passed directly below the pickup, a man staring at\nthe ground from it over a machine gun.\n\n\"Wooo! Am I glad I\'m not in that mess!\" Gerd exclaimed. \"Anybody sees\nsomething he thinks is a Fuzzy and half that gang\'ll massacre each other\nin ten seconds.\"\n\n\"I hope they do!\"\n\nInterworld News was pro-Fuzzy; the commentator in the car was being\nextremely sarcastic about the whole thing. Into the middle of one view of\na rifle-bristling line of beaters somebody in the studio cut a view of the\nFuzzies, taken at the camp, looking up appealingly while waiting for\nbreakfast. \"These,\" a voice said, \"are the terrible monsters against whom\nall these brave men are protecting us.\"\n\nA few moments later, a rifle flash and a bang, and then a fusillade\nbrought Jack\'s heart into his throat. The pickup car jetted toward it; by\nthe time it reached the spot, the shooting had stopped, and a crowd was\ngathering around something white on the ground. He had to force himself to\nlook, then gave a shuddering breath of relief. It was a zaragoat, a\nthree-horned domesticated ungulate.\n\n\"Oh-Oh! Some squatter\'s milk supply finished.\" The commentator laughed.\n\"Not the first one tonight either. Attorney General--former Chief\nProsecutor--O\'Brien\'s going to have quite a few suits against the\nadministration to defend as a result of this business.\"\n\n\"He\'s going to have a goddamn thundering big one from Jack Holloway!\"\n\nThe communication screen buzzed; Gerd snapped it on.\n\n\"I just talked to Judge Pendarvis,\" Gus Brannhard reported out of it.\n\"He\'s issuing an order restraining Emmert from paying any reward except\nfor Fuzzies turned over alive and uninjured to Marshal Fane. And he\'s\nissuing a warning that until the status of the Fuzzies is determined,\nanybody killing one will face charges of murder.\"\n\n\"That\'s fine, Gus! Have you seen the girl or her father yet?\"\n\nBrannhard snarled angrily. \"The girl\'s in the Company hospital, in a\nprivate room. The doctors won\'t let anybody see her. I think Emmert\'s\nhiding the father in the Residency. And I haven\'t seen the two cops who\nbrought them in, or the desk sergeant who booked the complaint, or the\ndetective lieutenant who was on duty here. They\'ve all lammed out. Max has\na couple of men over in Junktown, trying to find out who called the cops\nin the first place. We may get something out of that.\"\n\nThe Chief Justice\'s action was announced a few minutes later; it got to\nthe hunters a few minutes after that and the Fuzzy hunt began falling\napart. The City and Company police dropped out immediately. Most of the\ncivilians, hoping to grab five thousand sols\' worth of live Fuzzy, stayed\non for twenty minutes, and so, apparently to control them, did the\nconstabulary. Then the reward was cancelled, the airborne floodlights went\noff and the whole thing broke up.\n\nGus Brannhard came in shortly afterward, starting to undress as soon as he\nheeled the door shut after him. When he had his jacket and neckcloth off,\nhe dropped into a chair, filled a water tumbler with whisky, gulped half\nof it and then began pulling off his boots.\n\n\"If that drink has a kid sister, I\'ll take it,\" Gerd muttered. \"What\nhappened, Gus?\"\n\nBrannhard began to curse. \"The whole thing\'s a fake; it stinks from here\nto Nifflheim. It would stink _on_ Nifflheim.\" He picked up a cigar butt he\nhad laid aside when Fane\'s call had come in and relighted it. \"We found\nthe woman who called the police. Neighbor; she says she saw Lurkin come\nhome drunk, and a little later she heard the girl screaming. She says he\nbeats her up every time he gets drunk, which is about five times a week,\nand she\'d made up her mind to stop it the next chance she got. She denied\nhaving seen anything that even looked like a Fuzzy anywhere around.\"\n\nThe excitement of the night before had incubated a new brood of Fuzzy\nreports; Jack went to the marshal\'s office to interview the people making\nthem. The first dozen were of a piece with the ones that had come in\noriginally. Then he talked to a young man who had something of different\nquality.\n\n\"I saw them as plain as I\'m seeing you, not more than fifty feet away,\" he\nsaid. \"I had an autocarbine, and I pulled up on them, but gosh, I couldn\'t\nshoot them. They were just like little people, Mr. Holloway, and they\nlooked so scared and helpless. So I held over their heads and let off a\ntwo-second burst to scare them away before anybody else saw them and shot\nthem.\"\n\n\"Well, son, I\'d like to shake your hand for that. You know, you thought\nyou were throwing away a lot of money there. How many did you see?\"\n\n\"Well, only four. I\'d heard that there were six, but the other two could\nhave been back in the brush where I didn\'t see them.\"\n\nHe pointed out on the map where it had happened. There were three other\npeople who had actually seen Fuzzies; none were sure how many, but they\nwere all positive about locations and times. Plotting the reports on the\nmap, it was apparent that the Fuzzies were moving north and west across\nthe outskirts of the city.\n\nBrannhard showed up for lunch at the hotel, still swearing, but half\namusedly.\n\n\"They\'ve exhumed Ham O\'Brien, and they\'ve put him to work harassing us,\"\nhe said. \"Whole flock of civil suits and dangerous-nuisance complaints and\nthat sort of thing; idea\'s to keep me amused with them while Leslie\nCoombes is working up his case for the trial. Even tried to get the\nmanager here to evict Baby; I threatened him with a racial-discrimination\nsuit, and that stopped that. And I just filed suit against the Company for\nseven million sols on behalf of the Fuzzies--million apiece for them and a\nmillion for their lawyer.\"\n\n\"This evening,\" Jack said, \"I\'m going out in a car with a couple of Max\'s\ndeputies. We\'re going to take Baby, and we\'ll have a loud-speaker on the\ncar.\" He unfolded the city map. \"They seem to be traveling this way; they\nought to be about here, and with Baby at the speaker, we ought to attract\ntheir attention.\"\n\nThey didn\'t see anything, though they kept at it till dusk. Baby had a\nwonderful time with the loud-speaker; when he yeeked into it, he produced\nan ear-splitting noise, until the three humans in the car flinched every\ntime he opened his mouth. It affected dogs too; as the car moved back and\nforth, it was followed by a chorus of howling and baying on the ground.\n\nThe next day, there were some scattered reports, mostly of small thefts. A\nblanket spread on the grass behind a house had vanished. A couple of\ncushions had been taken from a porch couch. A frenzied mother reported\nhaving found her six-year-old son playing with some Fuzzies; when she had\nrushed to rescue him, the Fuzzies had scampered away and the child had\nbegun weeping. Jack and Gerd rushed to the scene. The child\'s story,\njumbled and imagination-colored, was definite on one point--the Fuzzies\nhad been nice to him and hadn\'t hurt him. They got a recording of that on\nthe air at once.\n\nWhen they got back to the hotel, Gus Brannhard was there, bubbling with\nglee.\n\n\"The Chief Justice gave me another job of special prosecuting,\" he said.\n\"I\'m to conduct an investigation into the possibility that this thing, the\nother night, was a frame-up, and I\'m to prepare complaints against anybody\nwho\'s done anything prosecutable. I have authority to hold hearings, and\nsubpoena witnesses, and interrogate them under veridication. Max Fane has\nspecific orders to cooperate. We\'re going to start, tomorrow, with Chief\nof Police Dumont and work down. And maybe we can work up, too, as far as\nNick Emmert and Victor Grego.\" He gave a rumbling laugh. \"Maybe that\'ll\ngive Leslie Coombes something to worry about.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nGerd brought the car down beside the rectangular excavation. It was fifty\nfeet square and twenty feet deep, and still going deeper, with a power\nshovel in it and a couple of dump scows beside. Five or six men in\ncoveralls and ankle boots advanced to meet them as they got out.\n\n\"Good morning, Mr. Holloway,\" one of them said. \"It\'s right down over the\nedge of the hill. We haven\'t disturbed anything.\"\n\n\"Mind running over what you saw again? My partner here wasn\'t in when you\ncalled.\"\n\nThe foreman turned to Gerd. \"We put off a couple of shots about an hour\nago. Some of the men, who\'d gone down over the edge of the hill, saw these\nFuzzies run out from under that rock ledge down there, and up the hollow,\nthat way.\" He pointed. \"They called me, and I went down for a look, and\nsaw where they\'d been camping. The rock\'s pretty hard here, and we used\npretty heavy charges. Shock waves in the ground was what scared them.\"\n\nThey started down a path through the flower-dappled tall grass toward the\nedge of the hill, and down past the gray outcropping of limestone that\nformed a miniature bluff twenty feet high and a hundred in length. Under\nan overhanging ledge, they found two cushions, a red-and-gray blanket, and\nsome odds and ends of old garments that looked as though they had once\nbeen used for polishing rags. There was a broken kitchen spoon, and a cold\nchisel, and some other metal articles.\n\n\"That\'s it, all right. I talked to the people who lost the blanket and the\ncushions. They must have made camp last night, after your gang stopped\nwork; the blasting chased them out. You say you saw them go up that way?\"\nhe asked, pointing up the little stream that came down from the mountains\nto the north.\n\nThe stream was deep and rapid, too much so for easy fording by Fuzzies;\nthey\'d follow it back into the foothills. He took everybody\'s names and\nthanked them. If he found the Fuzzies himself and had to pay off on an\ninformation-received basis, it would take a mathematical genius to decide\nhow much reward to pay whom.\n\n\"Gerd, if you were a Fuzzy, where would you go up there?\" he asked.\n\nGerd looked up the stream that came rushing down from among the wooded\nfoothills.\n\n\"There are a couple more houses farther up,\" he said. \"I\'d get above them.\nThen I\'d go up one of those side ravines, and get up among the rocks,\nwhere the damnthings couldn\'t get me. Of course, there are no damnthings\nthis close to town, but they wouldn\'t know that.\"\n\n\"We\'ll need a few more cars. I\'ll call Colonel Ferguson and see what he\ncan do for me. Max is going to have his hands full with this investigation\nGus started.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nPiet Dumont, the Mallorysport chief of police, might have been a good cop\nonce, but for as long as Gus Brannhard had known him, he had been what he\nwas now--an empty shell of unsupported arrogance, with a sagging waistline\nand a puffy face that tried to look tough and only succeeded in looking\nunpleasant. He was sitting in a seat that looked like an old fashioned\nelectric chair, or like one of those instruments of torture to which\nbeauty-shop customers submit themselves. There was a bright conical helmet\non his head, and electrodes had been clamped to various portions of his\nanatomy. On the wall behind him was a circular screen which ought to have\nbeen a calm turquoise blue, but which was flickering from dark blue\nthrough violet to mauve. That was simple nervous tension and guilt and\nanger at the humiliation of being subjected to veridicated interrogation.\nNow and then there would be a stabbing flicker of bright red as he toyed\nmentally with some deliberate misstatement of fact.\n\n\"You know, yourself, that the Fuzzies didn\'t hurt that girl,\" Brannhard\ntold him.\n\n\"I don\'t know anything of the kind,\" the police chief retorted. \"All I\nknow\'s what was reported to me.\"\n\nThat had started out a bright red; gradually it faded into purple.\nEvidently Piet Dumont was adopting a rules-of-evidence definition of\ntruth.\n\n\"Who told you about it?\"\n\n\"Luther Woller. Detective lieutenant on duty at the time.\"\n\nThe veridicator agreed that that was the truth and not much of anything\nbut the truth.\n\n\"But you know that what really happened was that Lurkin beat the girl\nhimself, and Woller persuaded them both to say the Fuzzies did it,\" Max\nFane said.\n\n\"I don\'t know anything of the kind!\" Dumont almost yelled. The screen\nblazed red. \"All I know\'s what they told me; nobody said anything else.\"\nRed and blue, juggling in a typical quibbling pattern. \"As far as I know,\nit was the Fuzzies done it.\"\n\n\"Now, Piet,\" Fane told him patiently. \"You\'ve used this same veridicator\nhere often enough to know you can\'t get away with lying on it. Woller\'s\nmaking you the patsy for this, and you know that, too. Isn\'t it true, now,\nthat to the best of your knowledge and belief those Fuzzies never touched\nthat girl, and it wasn\'t till Woller talked to Lurkin and his daughter at\nheadquarters that anybody even mentioned Fuzzies?\"\n\nThe screen darkened to midnight blue, and then, slowly, it lightened.\n\n\"Yeah, that\'s true,\" Dumont admitted. He avoided their eyes, and his voice\nwas surly. \"I thought that was how it was, and I asked Woller. He just\nlaughed at me and told me to forget it.\" The screen seethed momentarily\nwith anger. \"That son of a Khooghra thinks he\'s chief, not me. One word\nfrom me and he does just what he damn pleases!\"\n\n\"Now you\'re being smart, Piet,\" Fane said. \"Let\'s start all over....\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nA constabulary corporal was at the controls of the car Jack had rented\nfrom the hotel: Gerd had taken his place in one of the two constabulary\ncars. The third car shuttled between them, and all three talked back and\nforth by radio.\n\n\"Mr. Holloway.\" It was the trooper in the car Gerd had been piloting.\n\"Your partner\'s down on the ground; he just called me with his portable.\nHe\'s found a cracked prawn-shell.\"\n\n\"Keep talking; give me direction,\" the corporal at the controls said,\nlifting up.\n\nIn a moment, they sighted the other car, hovering over a narrow ravine on\nthe left bank of the stream. The third car was coming in from the north.\nGerd was still squatting on the ground when they let down beside him. He\nlooked up as they jumped out.\n\n\"This is it, Jack\" he said. \"Regular Fuzzy job.\"\n\nSo it was. Whatever they had used, it hadn\'t been anything sharp; the head\nwas smashed instead of being cleanly severed. The shell, however, had been\nbroken from underneath in the standard manner, and all four mandibles had\nbeen broken off for picks. They must have all eaten at the prawn, share\nalike. It had been done quite recently.\n\nThey sent the car up, and while all three of them circled about, they went\nup the ravine on foot, calling: \"Little Fuzzy! Little Fuzzy!\" They found a\nfootprint, and then another, where seepage water had moistened the ground.\nGerd was talking excitedly into the portable radio he carried slung on his\nchest.\n\n\"One of you, go ahead a quarter of a mile, and then circle back. They\'re\nin here somewhere.\"\n\n\"I see them! I see them!\" a voice whooped out of the radio. \"They\'re going\nup the slope on your right, among the rocks!\"\n\n\"Keep them in sight; somebody come and pick us up, and we\'ll get above\nthem and head them off.\"\n\nThe rental car dropped quickly, the corporal getting the door open. He\ndidn\'t bother going off contragravity; as soon as they were in and had\npulled the door shut behind them, he was lifting again. For a moment, the\nhill swung giddily as the car turned, and then Jack saw them, climbing the\nsteep slope among the rocks. Only four of them, and one was helping\nanother. He wondered which ones they were, what had happened to the other\ntwo and if the one that needed help had been badly hurt.\n\nThe car landed on the top, among the rocks, settling at an awkward angle.\nHe, Gerd and the pilot piled out and started climbing and sliding down the\ndeclivity. Then he found himself within reach of a Fuzzy and grabbed. Two\nmore dashed past him, up the steep hill. The one he snatched at had\nsomething in his hand, and aimed a vicious blow at his face with it; he\nhad barely time to block it with his forearm. Then he was clutching the\nFuzzy and disarming him; the weapon was a quarter-pound ballpeen hammer.\nHe put it in his hip pocket and then picked up the struggling Fuzzy with\nboth hands.\n\n\"You hit Pappy Jack!\" he said reproachfully. \"Don\'t you know Pappy any\nmore? Poor scared little thing!\"\n\nThe Fuzzy in his arms yeeked angrily. Then he looked, and it was no Fuzzy\nhe had ever seen before--not Little Fuzzy, nor funny, pompous Ko-Ko, nor\nmischievous Mike. It was a stranger Fuzzy.\n\n\"Well, no wonder; of course you didn\'t know Pappy Jack. You aren\'t one of\nPappy Jack\'s Fuzzies at all!\"\n\nAt the top, the constabulary corporal was sitting on a rock, clutching two\nFuzzies, one under each arm. They stopped struggling and yeeked piteously\nwhen they saw their companion also a captive.\n\n\"Your partner\'s down below, chasing the other one,\" the corporal said.\n\"You better take these too; you know them and I don\'t.\"\n\n\"Hang onto them; they don\'t know me any better than they do you.\"\n\nWith one hand, he got a bit of Extee Three out of his coat and offered it;\nthe Fuzzy gave a cry of surprised pleasure, snatched it and gobbled it. He\nmust have eaten it before. When he gave some to the corporal, the other\ntwo, a male and a female, also seemed familiar with it. From below, Gerd\nwas calling:\n\n\"I got one, It\'s a girl Fuzzy; I don\'t know if it\'s Mitzi or Cinderella.\nAnd, my God, wait till you see what she was carrying.\"\n\nGerd came into sight, the fourth Fuzzy struggling under one arm and a\nlittle kitten, black with a white face, peeping over the crook of his\nother elbow. He was too stunned with disappointment to look at it with\nmore than vague curiosity.\n\n\"They aren\'t our Fuzzies, Gerd. I never saw any of them before.\"\n\n\"Jack, are you sure?\"\n\n\"Of course I\'m sure!\" He was indignant. \"Don\'t you think I know my own\nFuzzies? Don\'t you think they\'d know me?\"\n\n\"Where\'d the pussy come from?\" the corporal wanted to know.\n\n\"God knows. They must have picked it up somewhere. She was carrying it in\nher arms, like a baby.\"\n\n\"They\'re somebody\'s Fuzzies. They\'ve been fed Extee Three. We\'ll take them\nto the hotel. Whoever it is, I\'ll bet he misses them as much as I do\nmine.\"\n\nHis own Fuzzies, whom he would never see again. The full realization\ndidn\'t hit him until he and Gerd were in the car again. There had been no\ntrace of his Fuzzies from the time they had broken out of their cages at\nScience Center. This quartet had appeared the night the city police had\nmanufactured the story of the attack on the Lurkin girl, and from the\nmoment they had been seen by the youth who couldn\'t bring himself to fire\non them, they had left a trail that he had been able to pick up at once\nand follow. Why hadn\'t his own Fuzzies attracted as much notice in the\nthree weeks since they had vanished?\n\nBecause his own Fuzzies didn\'t exist any more. They had never gotten out\nof Science Center alive. Somebody Max Fane hadn\'t been able to question\nunder veridication had murdered them. There was no use, any more, trying\nto convince himself differently.\n\n\"We\'ll stop at their camp and pick up the blanket and the cushions and the\nrest of the things. I\'ll send the people who lost them checks,\" he said.\n\"The Fuzzies ought to have those things.\"\n\n\n\n\nXIII\n\n\nThe management of the Hotel Mallory appeared to have undergone a change of\nheart, or of policy, toward Fuzzies. It might have been Gus Brannhard\'s\nthreats of action for racial discrimination and the possibility that the\nFuzzies might turn out to be a race instead of an animal species after\nall. The manager might have been shamed by the way the Lurkin story had\ncrumbled into discredit, and influenced by the revived public sympathy for\nthe Fuzzies. Or maybe he just decided that the chartered Zarathustra\nCompany wasn\'t as omnipotent as he\'d believed. At any rate, a large room,\nusually used for banquets, was made available for the Fuzzies George Lunt\nand Ben Rainsford were bringing in for the trial, and the four strangers\nand their black-and-white kitten were installed there. There were a lot of\ntoys of different sorts, courtesy of the management, and a big view\nscreen. The four strange Fuzzies dashed for this immediately and turned it\non, yeeking in delight as they watched landing craft coming down and\nlifting out at the municipal spaceport. They found it very interesting. It\nonly bored the kitten.\n\nWith some misgivings, Jack brought Baby down and introduced him. They were\ndelighted with Baby, and Baby thought the kitten was the most wonderful\nthing he had ever seen. When it was time to feed them, Jack had his own\ndinner brought in, and ate with them. Gus and Gerd came down and joined\nhim later.\n\n\"We got the Lurkin kid and her father,\" Gus said, and then falsettoed:\n\"\'Naw, Pop gimme a beatin\', and the cops told me to say it was the\nFuzzies.\'\"\n\n\"She say that?\"\n\n\"Under veridication, with the screen blue as a sapphire, in front of half\na dozen witnesses and with audiovisuals on. Interworld\'s putting it on the\nair this evening. Her father admitted it, too; named Woller and the desk\nsergeant. We\'re still looking for them; till we get them, we aren\'t any\ncloser to Emmert or Grego. We did pick up the two car cops, but they don\'t\nknow anything on anybody but Woller.\"\n\nThat was good enough, as far as it went, Brannhard thought, but it didn\'t\ngo far enough. There were those four strange Fuzzies showing up out of\nnowhere, right in the middle of Nick Emmert\'s drive-hunt. They\'d been kept\nsomewhere by somebody--that was how they\'d learned to eat Extee Three and\nfound out about viewscreens. Their appearance was too well synchronized to\nbe accidental. The whole thing smelled to him of a booby trap.\n\nOne good thing had happened. Judge Pendarvis had decided that it would be\nnext to impossible, in view of the widespread public interest in the case\nand the influence of the Zarathustra Company, to get an impartial jury,\nand had proposed a judicial trial by a panel of three judges, himself one\nof them. Even Leslie Coombes had felt forced to agree to that.\n\nHe told Jack about the decision. Jack listened with apparent\nattentiveness, and then said:\n\n\"You know, Gus, I\'ll always be glad I let Little Fuzzy smoke my pipe when\nhe wanted to, that night out at camp.\"\n\nThe way he was feeling, he wouldn\'t have cared less if the case was going\nto be tried by a panel of three zaragoats.\n\nBen Rainsford, his two Fuzzies, and George Lunt, Ahmed Khadra and the\nother constabulary witnesses and their family, arrived shortly before noon\non Saturday. The Fuzzies were quartered in the stripped-out banquet room,\nand quickly made friends with the four already there, and with Baby. Each\nfamily bedded down apart, but they ate together and played with each\nothers\' toys and sat in a clump to watch the viewscreen. At first, the\nFerny Creek family showed jealousy when too much attention was paid to\ntheir kitten, until they decided that nobody was trying to steal it.\n\nIt would have been a lot of fun, eleven Fuzzies and a Baby Fuzzy and a\nblack-and-white kitten, if Jack hadn\'t kept seeing his own family, six\nquiet little ghosts watching but unable to join the frolicking.\n\n * * * * *\n\nMax Fane brightened when he saw who was on his screen.\n\n\"Well, Colonel Ferguson, glad to see you.\"\n\n\"Marshal,\" Ferguson was smiling broadly. \"You\'ll be even gladder in a\nminute. A couple of my men, from Post Eight, picked up Woller and that\ndesk sergeant, Fuentes.\"\n\n\"Ha!\" He started feeling warm inside, as though he had just downed a slug\nof Baldur honey-rum. \"How?\"\n\n\"Well, you know Nick Emmert has a hunting lodge down there. Post Eight\nkeeps an eye on it for him. This afternoon, one of Lieutenant Obefemi\'s\ncars was passing over it, and they picked up some radiation and infrared\non their detectors, as though the power was on inside. When they went down\nto investigate, they found Woller and Fuentes making themselves at home.\nThey brought them in, and both of them admitted under veridication that\nEmmert had given them the keys and sent them down there to hide out till\nafter the trial.\n\n\"They denied that Emmert had originated the frameup. That had been one of\nWoller\'s own flashes of genius, but Emmert knew what the score was and\nwent right along with it. They\'re being brought up here the first thing\ntomorrow morning.\"\n\n\"Well, that\'s swell, Colonel! Has it gotten out to the news services yet?\"\n\n\"No. We would like to have them both questioned here in Mallorysport, and\ntheir confessions recorded, before we let the story out. Otherwise,\nsomebody might try to take steps to shut them up for good.\"\n\nThat had been what he had been thinking of. He said so, and Ferguson\nnodded. Then he hesitated for a moment, and said:\n\n\"Max, do you like the situation here in Mallorysport? Be damned if I do.\"\n\n\"What do you mean?\"\n\n\"There are too many strangers in town,\" Ian Ferguson said. \"All the same\nkind of strangers--husky-looking young men, twenty to thirty, going around\nin pairs and small groups. I\'ve been noticing it since day before last,\nand there seem to be more of them every time I look around.\"\n\n\"Well, Ian, it\'s a young man\'s planet, and we can expect a big crowd in\ntown for the trial....\"\n\nHe didn\'t really believe that. He just wanted Ian Ferguson to put a name\non it first. Ferguson shook his head.\n\n\"No, Max. This isn\'t a trial-day crowd. We both know what they\'re like;\nremember when they tried the Gawn brothers? No whooping it up in bars, no\nexcitement, no big crap games; this crowd\'s just walking around, keeping\nquiet, as though they expected a word from somebody.\"\n\n\"Infiltration.\" Goddamit, he\'d said it first, himself after all! \"Victor\nGrego\'s worried about this.\"\n\n\"I know it, Max. And Victor Grego\'s like a veldbeest bull; he isn\'t\ndangerous till he\'s scared, and then watch out. And against the gang\nthat\'s moving in here, the men you and I have together would last about as\nlong as a pint of trade-gin at a Sheshan funeral.\"\n\n\"You thinking of pushing the panic-button?\"\n\nThe constabulary commander frowned. \"I don\'t want to. A dim view would be\ntaken back on Terra if I did it without needing to. Dimmer view would be\ntaken of needing to without doing it, though. I\'ll make another check,\nfirst.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nGerd van Riebeek sorted the papers on the desk into piles, lit a cigarette\nand then started to mix himself a highball.\n\n\"Fuzzies are members of a sapient race,\" he declared. \"They reason\nlogically, both deductively and inductively. They learn by experiment,\nanalysis and association. They formulate general principles, and apply\nthem to specific instances. They plan their activities in advance. They\nmake designed artifacts, and artifacts to make artifacts. They are able to\nsymbolize, and convey ideas in symbolic form, and form symbols by\nabstracting from objects.\n\n\"They have aesthetic sense and creativity,\" he continued. \"They become\nbored in idleness, and they enjoy solving problems for the pleasure of\nsolving them. They bury their dead ceremoniously, and bury artifacts with\nthem.\"\n\nHe blew a smoke ring, and then tasted his drink. \"They do all these\nthings, and they also do carpenter work, blow police whistles, make eating\ntools to eat land-prawns with and put molecule-model balls together.\nObviously they are sapient beings. But don\'t please don\'t ask me to define\nsapience, because God damn it to Nifflheim, I still can\'t!\"\n\n\"I think you just did,\" Jack said.\n\n\"No, that won\'t do. I need a definition.\"\n\n\"Don\'t worry, Gerd,\" Gus Brannhard told him. \"Leslie Coombes will bring a\nnice shiny new definition into court. We\'ll just use that.\"\n\n\n\n\nXIV\n\n\nThey walked together, Frederic and Claudette Pendarvis, down through the\nroof garden toward the landing stage, and, as she always did, Claudette\nstopped and cut a flower and fastened it in his lapel.\n\n\"Will the Fuzzies be in court?\" she asked.\n\n\"Oh, they\'ll have to be. I don\'t know about this morning; it\'ll be mostly\nformalities.\" He made a grimace that was half a frown and half a smile. \"I\nreally don\'t know whether to consider them as witnesses or as exhibits,\nand I hope I\'m not called on to rule on that, at least at the start.\nEither way, Coombes or Brannhard would accuse me of showing prejudice.\"\n\n\"I want to see them. I\'ve seen them on screen, but I want to see them for\nreal.\"\n\n\"You haven\'t been in one of my courts for a long time, Claudette. If I\nfind that they\'ll be brought in today, I\'ll call you. I\'ll even abuse my\nposition to the extent of arranging for you to see them outside the\ncourtroom. Would you like that?\"\n\nShe\'d love it. Claudette had a limitless capacity for delight in things\nlike that. They kissed good-bye, and he went to where his driver was\nholding open the door of the aircar and got in. At a thousand feet he\nlooked back; she was still standing at the edge of the roof garden,\nlooking up.\n\nHe\'d have to find out whether it would be safe for her to come in. Max\nFane was worried about the possibility of trouble, and so was Ian\nFerguson, and neither was given to timorous imaginings. As the car began\nto descend toward the Central Courts buildings, he saw that there were\nguards on the roof, and they weren\'t just carrying pistols--he caught the\nglint of rifle barrels, and the twinkle of steel helmets. Then, as he came\nin, he saw that their uniforms were a lighter shade of blue than the\nconstabulary wore. Ankle boots and red-striped trousers; Space Marines in\ndress blues. So Ian Ferguson had pushed the button. It occurred to him\nthat Claudette might be safer here than at home.\n\nA sergeant and a couple of men came up as he got out; the sergeant touched\nthe beak of his helmet in the nearest thing to a salute a Marine ever gave\nanybody in civilian clothes.\n\n\"Judge Pendarvis? Good morning, sir.\"\n\n\"Good morning, sergeant. Just why are Federation Marines guarding the\ncourt building?\"\n\n\"Standing by, sir. Orders of Commodore Napier. You\'ll find that Marshal\nFane\'s people are in charge below-decks, but Marine Captain Casagra and\nNavy Captain Greibenfeld are waiting to see you in your office.\"\n\nAs he started toward the elevators, a big Zarathustra Company car was\ncoming in. The sergeant turned quickly, beckoned a couple of his men and\nwent toward it on the double. He wondered what Leslie Coombes would think\nabout those Marines.\n\nThe two officers in his private chambers were both wearing sidearms. So,\nalso, was Marshal Fane, who was with them. They all rose to greet him,\nsitting down when he was at his desk. He asked the same question he had of\nthe sergeant above.\n\n\"Well, Constabulary Colonel Ferguson called Commodore Napier last evening\nand requested armed assistance, your Honor,\" the officer in Space Navy\nblack said. \"He suspected, he said, that the city had been infiltrated. In\nthat, your Honor, he was perfectly correct; beginning Wednesday afternoon,\nMarine Captain Casagra, here, on Commodore Napier\'s orders, began landing\na Marine infiltration force, preparatory to taking over the Residency.\nThat\'s been accomplished now; Commodore Napier is there, and both Resident\nGeneral Emmert and Attorney General O\'Brien are under arrest, on a variety\nof malfeasance and corrupt-practice charges, but that won\'t come into your\nHonor\'s court. They\'ll be sent back to Terra for trial.\"\n\n\"Then Commodore Napier\'s taken over the civil government?\"\n\n\"Well, say he\'s assumed control of it, pending the outcome of this trial.\nWe want to know whether the present administration\'s legal or not.\"\n\n\"Then you won\'t interfere with the trial itself?\"\n\n\"That depends, your Honor. We are certainly going to participate.\" He\nlooked at his watch. \"You won\'t convene court for another hour? Then\nperhaps I\'ll have time to explain.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nMax Fane met them at the courtroom door with a pleasant greeting. Then he\nsaw Baby Fuzzy on Jack\'s shoulder and looked dubious.\n\n\"I don\'t know about him, Jack. I don\'t think he\'ll be allowed in the\ncourtroom.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\" Gus Brannhard told him. \"I admit, he is both a minor child and\nan incompetent aborigine, but he is the only surviving member of the\nfamily of the decedent Jane Doe alias Goldilocks, and as such has an\nindisputable right to be present.\"\n\n\"Well, just as long as you keep him from sitting on people\'s heads. Gus,\nyou and Jack sit over there; Ben, you and Gerd find seats in the witness\nsection.\"\n\nIt would be half an hour till court would convene, but already the\nspectators\' seats were full, and so was the balcony. The jury box, on the\nleft of the bench, was occupied by a number of officers in Navy black and\nMarine blue. Since there would be no jury, they had apparently\nappropriated it for themselves. The press box was jammed and bristling\nwith equipment.\n\nBaby was looking up interestedly at the big screen behind the judges\'\nseats; while transmitting the court scene to the public, it also showed,\nlike a nonreversing mirror, the same view to the spectators. Baby wasn\'t\nlong in identifying himself in it, and waved his arms excitedly. At that\nmoment, there was a bustle at the door by which they had entered, and\nLeslie Coombes came in, followed by Ernst Mallin and a couple of his\nassistants, Ruth Ortheris, Juan Jimenez--and Leonard Kellogg. The last\ntime he had seen Kellogg had been at George Lunt\'s complaint court, his\nface bandaged and his feet in a pair of borrowed moccasins because his\nshoes, stained with the blood of Goldilocks, had been impounded as\nevidence.\n\nCoombes glanced toward the table where he and Brannhard were sitting,\ncaught sight of Baby waving to himself in the big screen and turned to\nFane with an indignant protest. Fane shook his head. Coombes protested\nagain, and drew another headshake. Finally he shrugged and led Kellogg to\nthe table reserved for them, where they sat down.\n\nOnce Pendarvis and his two associates--a short, roundfaced man on his\nright, a tall, slender man with white hair and a black mustache on his\nleft--were seated, the trial got underway briskly. The charges were read,\nand then Brannhard, as the Kellogg prosecutor, addressed the court--\"being\nknown as Goldilocks ... sapient member of a sapient race ... willful and\ndeliberate act of the said Leonard Kellogg ... brutal and unprovoked\nmurder.\" He backed away, sat on the edge of the table and picked up Baby\nFuzzy, fondling him while Leslie Coombes accused Jack Holloway of brutally\nassaulting the said Leonard Kellogg and ruthlessly shooting down Kurt\nBorch.\n\n\"Well, gentlemen, I believe we can now begin hearing the witnesses,\" the\nChief Justice said. \"Who will start prosecuting whom?\"\n\nGus handed Baby to Jack and went forward: Coombes stepped up beside him.\n\n\"Your Honor, this entire trial hinges upon the question of whether a\nmember of the species _Fuzzy fuzzy holloway zarathustra_ is or is not a\nsapient being,\" Gus said. \"However, before any attempt is made to\ndetermine this question, we should first establish, by testimony, just\nwhat happened at Holloway\'s Camp, in Cold Creek Valley, on the afternoon\nof June 19, Atomic Era Six Fifty-Four, and once this is established, we\ncan then proceed to the question of whether or not the said Goldilocks was\ntruly a sapient being.\"\n\n\"I agree,\" Coombes said equably. \"Most of these witnesses will have to be\nrecalled to the stand later, but in general I think Mr. Brannhard\'s\nsuggestion will be economical of the court\'s time.\"\n\n\"Will Mr. Coombes agree to stipulate that any evidence tending to prove or\ndisprove the sapience of Fuzzies in general be accepted as proving or\ndisproving the sapience of the being referred to as Goldilocks?\"\n\nCoombes looked that over carefully, decided that it wasn\'t booby-trapped\nand agreed. A deputy marshal went over to the witness stand, made some\nadjustments and snapped on a switch at the back of the chair. Immediately\nthe two-foot globe in a standard behind it lit, a clear blue. George\nLunt\'s name was called; the lieutenant took his seat and the bright helmet\nwas let down over his head and the electrodes attached.\n\nThe globe stayed a calm, untroubled blue while he stated his name and\nrank. Then he waited while Coombes and Brannhard conferred. Finally\nBrannhard took a silver half-sol piece from his pocket, shook it between\ncupped palms and slapped it onto his wrist. Coombes said, \"Heads,\" and\nBrannhard uncovered it, bowed slightly and stepped back.\n\n\"Now, Lieutenant Lunt,\" Coombes began, \"when you arrived at the temporary\ncamp across the run from Holloway\'s camp, what did you find there?\"\n\n\"Two dead people,\" Lunt said. \"A Terran human, who had been shot three\ntimes through the chest, and a Fuzzy, who had been kicked or trampled to\ndeath.\"\n\n\"Your Honors!\" Coombes expostulated, \"I must ask that the witness be\nrequested to rephrase his answer, and that the answer he has just made be\nstricken from the record. The witness, under the circumstances, has no\nright to refer to the Fuzzies as \'people.\'\"\n\n\"Your Honors,\" Brannhard caught it up, \"Mr. Coombes\'s objection is no less\nprejudicial. He has no right, under the circumstances, to deny that the\nFuzzies be referred to as \'people.\' This is tantamount to insisting that\nthe witness speak of them as nonsapient animals.\"\n\nIt went on like that for five minutes. Jack began doodling on a notepad.\nBaby picked up a pencil with both hands and began making doodles too. They\nlooked rather like the knots he had been learning to tie. Finally, the\ncourt intervened and told Lunt to tell, in his own words, why he went to\nHolloway\'s camp, what he found there, what he was told and what he did.\nThere was some argument between Coombes and Brannhard, at one point, about\nthe difference between hearsay and _res gestae_. When he was through,\nCoombes said, \"No questions.\"\n\n\"Lieutenant, you placed Leonard Kellogg under arrest on a complaint of\nhomicide by Jack Holloway. I take it that you considered this complaint a\nvalid one?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir. I believed that Leonard Kellogg had killed a sapient being.\nOnly sapient beings bury their dead.\"\n\nAhmed Khadra testified. The two troopers who had come in the other car,\nand the men who had brought the investigative equipment and done the\nphotographing at the scene testified. Brannhard called Ruth Ortheris to\nthe stand, and, after some futile objections by Coombes, she was allowed\nto tell her own story of the killing of Goldilocks, the beating of Kellogg\nand the shooting of Borch. When she had finished, the Chief Justice rapped\nwith his gavel.\n\n\"I believe that this testimony is sufficient to establish the fact that\nthe being referred to as Jane Doe alias Goldilocks was in fact kicked and\ntrampled to death by the defendant Leonard Kellogg, and that the Terran\nhuman known as Kurt Borch was in fact shot to death by Jack Holloway. This\nbeing the case, we may now consider whether or not either or both of these\nkillings constitute murder within the meaning of the law. It is now eleven\nforty. We will adjourn for lunch, and court will reconvene at fourteen\nhundred. There are a number of things, including some alterations to the\ncourtroom, which must be done before the afternoon session.... Yes, Mr.\nBrannhard?\"\n\n\"Your Honors, there is only one member of the species _Fuzzy fuzzy\nholloway zarathustra_ at present in court, an immature and hence\nnonrepresentative individual.\" He picked up Baby and exhibited him. \"If we\nare to take up the question of the sapience of this species, or race,\nwould it not be well to send for the Fuzzies now staying at the Hotel\nMallory and have them on hand?\"\n\n\"Well, Mr. Brannhard,\" Pendarvis said, \"we will certainly want Fuzzies in\ncourt, but let me suggest that we wait until after court reconvenes before\nsending for them. It may be that they will not be needed this afternoon.\nAnything else?\" He tapped with his gavel. \"Then court is adjourned until\nfourteen hundred.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nSome alterations in the courtroom had been a conservative way of putting\nit. Four rows of spectators\' seats had been abolished, and the dividing\nrail moved back. The witness chair, originally at the side of the bench,\nhad been moved to the dividing rail and now faced the bench, and a large\nnumber of tables had been brought in and ranged in an arc with the witness\nchair in the middle of it. Everybody at the tables could face the judges,\nand also see everybody else by looking into the big screen. A witness on\nthe chair could also see the veridicator in the same way.\n\nGus Brannhard looked around, when he entered with Jack, and swore softly.\n\n\"No wonder they gave us two hours for lunch. I wonder what the idea is.\"\nThen he gave a short laugh. \"Look at Coombes; he doesn\'t like it a bit.\"\n\nA deputy with a seating diagram came up to them.\n\n\"Mr. Brannhard, you and Mr. Holloway over here, at this table.\" He pointed\nto one a little apart from the others, at the extreme right facing the\nbench. \"And Dr. van Riebeek, and Dr. Rainsford over here, please.\"\n\nThe court crier\'s loud-speaker, overhead, gave two sharp whistles and\nbegan:\n\n\"Now hear this! Now hear this! Court will convene in five minutes--\"\n\nBrannhard\'s head jerked around instantly, and Jack\'s eyes followed his.\nThe court crier was a Space Navy petty officer.\n\n\"What the devil is this?\" Brannhard demanded. \"A Navy court-martial?\"\n\n\"That\'s what I\'ve been wondering, Mr. Brannhard,\" the deputy said.\n\"They\'ve taken over the whole planet, you know.\"\n\n\"Maybe we\'re in luck, Gus. I\'ve always heard that if you\'re innocent\nyou\'re better off before a court-martial and if you\'re guilty you\'re\nbetter off in a civil court.\"\n\nHe saw Leslie Coombes and Leonard Kellogg being seated at a similar table\nat the opposite side of the bench. Apparently Coombes had also heard that.\nThe seating arrangements at the other tables seemed a little odd too. Gerd\nvan Riebeek was next to Ruth Ortheris, and Ernst Mallin was next to Ben\nRainsford, with Juan Jimenez on his other side. Gus was looking up at the\nbalcony.\n\n\"I\'ll bet every lawyer on the planet\'s taking this in,\" he said. \"Oh-oh!\nSee the white-haired lady in the blue dress, Jack? That\'s the Chief\nJustice\'s wife. This is the first time she\'s been in court for years.\"\n\n\"Hear ye! Hear ye! Hear ye! Rise for the Honorable Court!\"\n\nSomebody must have given the petty officer a quick briefing on courtroom\nphraseology. He stood up, holding Baby Fuzzy, while the three judges filed\nin and took their seats. As soon as they sat down, the Chief Justice\nrapped briskly with his gavel.\n\n\"In order to forestall a spate of objections, I want to say that these\npresent arrangements are temporary, and so will be the procedures which\nwill be followed. We are not, at the moment, trying Jack Holloway or\nLeonard Kellogg. For the rest of this day, and, I fear, for a good many\ndays to come, we will be concerned exclusively with determining the level\nof mentation of _Fuzzy fuzzy holloway zarathustra_.\n\n\"For this purpose, we are temporarily abandoning some of the traditional\ntrial procedures. We will call witnesses; statements of purported fact\nwill be made under veridication as usual. We will also have a general\ndiscussion, in which all of you at these tables will be free to\nparticipate. I and my associates will preside; as we can\'t have everybody\nshouting disputations at once, anyone wishing to speak will have to be\nrecognized. At least, I hope we will be able to conduct the discussion in\nthis manner.\n\n\"You will all have noticed the presence of a number of officers from\nXerxes Naval Base, and I suppose you have all heard that Commodore Napier\nhas assumed control of the civil government. Captain Greibenfeld, will you\nplease rise and be seen? He is here participating as _amicus curiae_, and\nI have given him the right to question witnesses and to delegate that\nright to any of his officers he may deem proper. Mr. Coombes and Mr.\nBrannhard may also delegate that right as they see fit.\"\n\nCoombes was on his feet at once. \"Your Honors, if we are now to discuss\nthe sapience question, I would suggest that the first item on our order of\nbusiness be the presentation of some acceptable definition of sapience. I\nshould, for my part, very much like to know what it is that the Kellogg\nprosecution and the Holloway defense mean when they use that term.\"\n\nThat\'s it. They want us to define it. Gerd van Riebeek was looking\nchagrined; Ernst Mallin was smirking. Gus Brannhard, however, was pleased.\n\n\"Jack, they haven\'t any more damn definition than we do,\" he whispered.\n\nCaptain Greibenfeld, who had seated himself after rising at the request of\nthe court, was on his feet again.\n\n\"Your Honors, during the past month we at Xerxes Naval Base have been\nworking on exactly that problem. We have a very considerable interest in\nhaving the classification of this planet established, and we also feel\nthat this may not be the last time a question of disputable sapience may\narise. I believe, your Honors, that we have approached such a definition.\nHowever, before we begin discussing it, I would like the court\'s\npermission to present a demonstration which may be of help in\nunderstanding the problems involved.\"\n\n\"Captain Greibenfeld has already discussed this demonstration with me, and\nit has my approval. Will you please proceed, Captain,\" the Chief Justice\nsaid.\n\nGreibenfeld nodded, and a deputy marshal opened the door on the right of\nthe bench. Two spacemen came in, carrying cartons. One went up to the\nbench; the other started around in front of the tables, distributing small\nbattery-powered hearing aids.\n\n\"Please put them in your ears and turn them on,\" he said. \"Thank you.\"\n\nBaby Fuzzy tried to get Jack\'s. He put the plug in his ear and switched on\nthe power. Instantly he began hearing a number of small sounds he had\nnever heard before, and Baby was saying to him: \"_He-inta sa-wa\'aka; igga\nsa geeda?_\"\n\n\"Muhgawd, Gus, he\'s talking!\"\n\n\"Yes, I hear him; what do you suppose--?\"\n\n\"Ultrasonic; God, why didn\'t we think of that long ago?\"\n\nHe snapped off the hearing aid. Baby Fuzzy was saying, \"Yeeek.\" When he\nturned it on again, Baby was saying, \"_Kukk-ina za zeeva._\"\n\n\"No, Baby, Pappy Jack doesn\'t understand. We\'ll have to be awfully\npatient, and learn each other\'s language.\"\n\n\"_Pa-pee Jaaak!_\" Baby cried. \"_Ba-bee za-hinga; Pa-pee Jaak za zag ga\nhe-izza!_\"\n\n\"That yeeking is just the audible edge of their speech; bet we have a lot\nof transsonic tones in our voices, too.\"\n\n\"Well, he can hear what we say; he\'s picked up his name and yours.\"\n\n\"Mr. Brannhard, Mr. Holloway,\" Judge Pendarvis was saying, \"may we please\nhave your attention? Now, have you all your earplugs in and turned on?\nVery well; carry on, Captain.\"\n\nThis time, an ensign went out and came back with a crowd of enlisted men,\nwho had six Fuzzies with them. They set them down in the open space\nbetween the bench and the arc of tables and backed away. The Fuzzies drew\ntogether into a clump and stared around them, and he stared,\nunbelievingly, at them. They couldn\'t be; they didn\'t exist any more. But\nthey were--Little Fuzzy and Mamma Fuzzy and Mike and Mitzi and Ko-Ko and\nCinderella. Baby whooped something and leaped from the table, and Mamma\ncame stumbling to meet him, clasping him in her arms. Then they all saw\nhim and began clamoring: \"_Pa-pee Jaaak! Pa-pee Jaaak!_\"\n\nHe wasn\'t aware of rising and leaving the table; the next thing he\nrealized, he was sitting on the floor, his family mobbing him and hugging\nhim, gabbling with joy. Dimly he heard the gavel hammering, and the voice\nof Chief Justice Pendarvis: \"Court is recessed for ten minutes!\" By that\ntime, Gus was with him; gathering the family up, they carried them over to\ntheir table.\n\nThey stumbled and staggered when they moved, and that frightened him for a\nmoment. Then he realized that they weren\'t sick or drugged. They\'d just\nbeen in low-G for a while and hadn\'t become reaccustomed to normal weight.\nNow he knew why he hadn\'t been able to find any trace of them. He noticed\nthat each of them was wearing a little shoulder bag--a Marine Corps\nfirst-aid pouch--slung from a webbing strap. Why the devil hadn\'t he\nthought of making them something like that? He touched one and commented,\ntrying to pitch his voice as nearly like theirs as he could. They all\nbabbled in reply and began opening the little bags and showing him what\nthey had in them--little knives and miniature tools and bits of bright or\ncolored junk they had picked up. Little Fuzzy produced a tiny pipe with a\nhardwood bowl, and a little pouch of tobacco from which he filled it.\nFinally, he got out a small lighter.\n\n\"Your Honors!\" Gus shouted, \"I know court is recessed, but please observe\nwhat Little Fuzzy is doing.\"\n\nWhile they watched, Little Fuzzy snapped the lighter and held the flame to\nthe pipe bowl, puffing.\n\nAcross on the other side, Leslie Coombes swallowed once or twice and\nclosed his eyes.\n\nWhen Pendarvis rapped for attention and declared court reconvened, he\nsaid:\n\n\"Ladies and gentlemen, you have all seen and heard this demonstration of\nCaptain Greibenfeld\'s. You have heard these Fuzzies uttering what\ncertainly sounds like meaningful speech, and you have seen one of them\nlight a pipe and smoke. Incidentally, while smoking in court is\ndiscountenanced, we are going to make an exception, during this trial, in\nfavor of Fuzzies. Other people will please not feel themselves\ndiscriminated against.\"\n\nThat brought Coombes to his feet with a rush. He started around the table\nand then remembered that under the new rules he didn\'t have to.\n\n\"Your Honors, I objected strongly to the use of that term by a witness\nthis morning; I must object even more emphatically to its employment from\nthe bench. I have indeed heard these Fuzzies make sounds which might be\nmistaken for words, but I must deny that this is true speech. As to this\ntrick of using a lighter, I will undertake, in not more than thirty days,\nto teach it to any Terran primate or Freyan kholph.\"\n\nGreibenfeld rose immediately. \"Your Honors, in the past thirty days, while\nthese Fuzzies were at Xerxes Naval Base, we have compiled a vocabulary of\na hundred-odd Fuzzy words, for all of which definite meanings have been\nestablished, and a great many more for which we have not as yet learned\nthe meanings. We even have the beginning of a Fuzzy grammar. As for this\nso-called trick of using a lighter, Little Fuzzy--we didn\'t know his name\nthen and referred to him as M2--learned that for himself, by observation.\nWe didn\'t teach him to smoke a pipe either; he knew that before we had\nanything to do with him.\"\n\nJack rose while Greibenfeld was still speaking. As soon as the Space Navy\ncaptain had finished, he said:\n\n\"Captain Greibenfeld, I want to thank you and your people for taking care\nof the Fuzzies, and I\'m very glad you learned how to hear what they\'re\nsaying, and thank you for all the nice things you gave them, but why\ncouldn\'t you have let me know they were safe? I haven\'t been very happy\nthe last month, you know.\"\n\n\"I know that, Mr. Holloway, and if it\'s any comfort to you, we were all\nvery sorry for you, but we could not take the risk of compromising our\nsecret intelligence agent in the Company\'s Science Center, the one who\nsmuggled the Fuzzies out the morning after their escape.\" He looked\nquickly across in front of the bench to the table at the other end of the\narc. Kellogg was sitting with his face in his hands, oblivious to\neverything that was going on, but Leslie Coombes\'s well-disciplined face\nhad broken, briefly, into a look of consternation. \"By the time you and\nMr. Brannhard and Marshal Fane arrived with an order of the court for the\nFuzzies\' recovery, they had already been taken from Science Center and\nwere on a Navy landing craft for Xerxes. We couldn\'t do anything without\nexposing our agent. That, I am glad to say, is no longer a consideration.\"\n\n\"Well, Captain Greibenfeld,\" the Chief Justice said, \"I assume you mean to\nintroduce further testimony about the observations and studies made by\nyour people on Xerxes. For the record, we\'d like to have it established\nthat they were actually taken there, and when, and how.\"\n\n\"Yes, your Honor. If you will call the fourth name on the list I gave you,\nand allow me to do the questioning, we can establish that.\"\n\nThe Chief Justice picked up a paper. \"Lieutenant j.g. Ruth Ortheris, TFN\nReserve,\" he called out.\n\nThis time, Jack Holloway looked up into the big screen, in which he could\nsee everybody. Gerd van Riebeek, who had been trying to ignore the\nexistence of the woman beside him, had turned to stare at her in\namazement. Coombes\'s face was ghastly for an instant, then froze into\ncorpselike immobility: Ernst Mallin was dithering in incredulous anger;\nbeside him Ben Rainsford was grinning in just as incredulous delight. As\nRuth came around in front of the bench, the Fuzzies gave her an ovation;\nthey remembered and liked her. Gus Brannhard was gripping his arm and\nsaying: \"Oh, brother! This is it, Jack; it\'s all over but shooting the\ncripples!\"\n\nLieutenant j.g. Ortheris, under a calmly blue globe, testified to coming\nto Zarathustra as a Federation Naval Reserve officer recalled to duty with\nIntelligence, and taking a position with the Company.\n\n\"As a regularly qualified doctor of psychology, I worked under Dr. Mallin\nin the scientific division, and also with the school department and the\njuvenile court. At the same time I was regularly transmitting reports to\nCommander Aelborg, the chief of Intelligence on Xerxes. The object of this\nsurveillance was to make sure that the Zarathustra Company was not\nviolating the provisions of their charter or Federation law. Until the\nmiddle of last month, I had nothing to report beyond some rather irregular\nfinancial transactions involving Resident General Emmert. Then, on the\nevening of June fifteen--\"\n\nThat was when Ben had transmitted the tape to Juan Jimenez; she described\nhow it had come to her attention.\n\n\"As soon as possible, I transmitted a copy of this tape to Commander\nAelborg. The next night, I called Xerxes from the screen on Dr. van\nRiebeek\'s boat and reported what I\'d learned about the Fuzzies. I was then\ninformed that Leonard Kellogg had gotten hold of a copy of the\nHolloway-Rainsford tape and had alerted Victor Grego; that Kellogg and\nErnst Mallin were being sent to Beta Continent with instructions to\nprevent publication of any report claiming sapience for the Fuzzies and to\nfabricate evidence to support an accusation that Dr. Rainsford and Mr.\nHolloway were perpetrating a deliberate scientific hoax.\"\n\n\"Here, I\'ll have to object to this, your Honor,\" Coombes said, rising.\n\"This is nothing but hearsay.\"\n\n\"This is part of a Navy Intelligence situation estimate given to\nLieutenant Ortheris, based on reports we had received from other agents,\"\nCaptain Greibenfeld said. \"She isn\'t the only one we have on Zarathustra,\nyou know. Mr. Coombes, if I hear another word of objection to this\nofficer\'s testimony from you, I am going to ask Mr. Brannhard to subpoena\nVictor Grego and question him under veridication about it.\"\n\n\"Mr. Brannhard will be more than happy to oblige, Commander,\" Gus said\nloudly and distinctly.\n\nCoombes sat down hastily.\n\n\"Well, Lieutenant Ortheris, this is most interesting, but at the moment,\nwhat we\'re trying to establish is how these Fuzzies got to Xerxes Naval\nBase,\" the chubby associate justice, Ruiz, put in.\n\n\"I\'ll try to get them there as quickly as possible, your Honor,\" she said.\n\"On the night of Friday the twenty-second, the Fuzzies were taken from Mr.\nHolloway and brought into Mallorysport; they were turned over by Mohammed\nO\'Brien to Juan Jimenez, who took them to Science Center and put them in\ncages in a room back of his office. They immediately escaped. I found\nthem, the next morning, and was able to get them out of the building, and\nto turn them over to Commander Aelborg, who had come down from Xerxes to\ntake personal charge of the Fuzzy operation. I will not testify as to how\nI was able to do this. I am at present and was then an officer of the\nTerran Federation Armed Forces; the courts have no power to compel a\nFederation officer to give testimony involving breach of military\nsecurity. I was informed, through my contact in Mallorysport, from time to\ntime, of the progress of the work of measuring the Fuzzies\' mental level\nthere; I was able to pass on suggestions occasionally. Any time any of\nthese suggestions was based on ideas originating with Dr. Mallin, I was\ncareful to give him full credit.\"\n\nMallin looked singularly unappreciative.\n\nBrannhard got up. \"Before this witness is excused, I\'d like to ask if she\nknows anything about four other Fuzzies, the ones found by Jack Holloway\nup Ferny Creek on Friday.\"\n\n\"Why, yes; they\'re my Fuzzies, and I was worried about them. Their names\nare Complex, Syndrome, Id and Superego.\"\n\n\"Your Fuzzies, Lieutenant?\"\n\n\"Well, I took care of them and worked with them; Juan Jimenez and some\nCompany hunters caught them over on Beta Continent. They were kept at a\nfarm center about five hundred miles north of here, which had been vacated\nfor the purpose. I spent all my time with them, and Dr. Mallin was with\nthem most of the time. Then, on Monday night, Mr. Coombes came and got\nthem.\"\n\n\"Mr. Coombes, did you say?\" Gus Brannhard asked.\n\n\"Mr. Leslie Coombes, the Company attorney. He said they were needed in\nMallorysport. It wasn\'t till the next day that I found out what they were\nneeded for. They\'d been turned loose in front of that Fuzzy hunt, in the\nhope that they would be killed.\"\n\nShe looked across at Coombes; if looks were bullets, he\'d have been deader\nthan Kurt Borch.\n\n\"Why would they sacrifice four Fuzzies merely to support a story that was\nbound to come apart anyhow?\" Brannhard asked.\n\n\"That was no sacrifice. They had to get rid of those Fuzzies, and they\nwere afraid to kill them themselves for fear they\'d be charged with murder\nalong with Leonard Kellogg. Everybody, from Ernst Mallin down, who had\nanything to do with them was convinced of their sapience. For one thing,\nwe\'d been using those hearing aids ourselves; I suggested it, after\ngetting the idea from Xerxes. Ask Dr. Mallin about it, under veridication.\nAsk him about the multiordinal polyencephalograph experiments, too.\"\n\n\"Well, we have the Holloway Fuzzies placed on Xerxes,\" the Chief Justice\nsaid. \"We can hear the testimony of the people who worked with them there\nat any time. Now, I want to hear from Dr. Ernst Mallin.\"\n\nCoombes was on his feet again. \"Your Honors, before any further testimony\nis heard, I would like to confer with my client privately.\"\n\n\"I fail to see any reason why we should interrupt proceedings for that\npurpose, Mr. Coombes. You can confer as much as you wish with your client\nafter this session, and I can assure you that you will be called upon to\ndo nothing on his behalf until then.\" He gave a light tap with his gavel\nand then said: \"Dr. Ernst Mallin will please take the stand.\"\n\n\n\n\nXV\n\n\nErnst Mallin shrank, as though trying to pull himself into himself, when\nhe heard his name. He didn\'t want to testify. He had been dreading this\nmoment for days. Now he would have to sit in that chair, and they would\nask him questions, and he couldn\'t answer them truthfully and the globe\nover his head--\n\nWhen the deputy marshal touched his shoulder and spoke to him, he didn\'t\nthink, at first, that his legs would support him. It seemed miles, with\nall the staring faces on either side of him. Somehow, he reached the chair\nand sat down, and they fitted the helmet over his head and attached the\nelectrodes. They used to make a witness take some kind of an oath to tell\nthe truth. They didn\'t any more. They didn\'t need to.\n\nAs soon as the veridicator was on, he looked up at the big screen behind\nthe three judges; the globe above his head was a glaring red. There was a\ntitter of laughter. Nobody in the Courtroom knew better than he what was\nhappening. He had screens in his laboratory that broke it all down into\nindividual patterns--the steady pulsing waves from the cortex, the alpha\nand beta waves; beta-aleph and beta-beth and beta-gimel and beta-daleth.\nThe thalamic waves. He thought of all of them, and of the electromagnetic\nevents which accompanied brain activity. As he did, the red faded and the\nglobe became blue. He was no longer suppressing statements and\nsubstituting other statements he knew to be false. If he could keep it\nthat way. But, sooner or later, he knew, he wouldn\'t be able to.\n\nThe globe stayed blue while he named himself and stated his professional\nbackground. There was a brief flicker of red while he was listing his\npublication--that paper, entirely the work of one of his students, which\nhe had published under his own name. He had forgotten about that, but his\nconscience hadn\'t.\n\n\"Dr. Mallin,\" the oldest of the three judges, who sat in the middle,\nbegan, \"what, in your professional opinion, is the difference between\nsapient and nonsapient mentation?\"\n\n\"The ability to think consciously,\" he stated. The globe stayed blue.\n\n\"Do you mean that nonsapient animals aren\'t conscious, or do you mean they\ndon\'t think?\"\n\n\"Well, neither. Any life form with a central nervous system has some\nconsciousness--awareness of existence and of its surroundings. And\nanything having a brain thinks, to use the term at its loosest. What I\nmeant was that only the sapient mind thinks and knows that it is\nthinking.\"\n\nHe was perfectly safe so far. He talked about sensory stimuli and\nresponses, and about conditioned reflexes. He went back to the first\ncentury Pre-Atomic, and Pavlov and Korzybski and Freud. The globe never\nflickered.\n\n\"The nonsapient animal is conscious only of what is immediately present to\nthe senses and responds automatically. It will perceive something and make\na single statement about it--this is good to eat, this sensation is\nunpleasant, this is a sex-gratification object, this is dangerous. The\nsapient mind, on the other hand, is conscious of thinking about these\nsense stimuli, and makes descriptive statements about them, and then makes\nstatements about those statements, in a connected chain. I have a\nstructural differential at my seat; if somebody will bring it to me--\"\n\n\"Well, never mind now, Dr. Mallin. When you\'re off the stand and the\ndiscussion begins you can show what you mean. We just want your opinion in\ngeneral terms, now.\"\n\n\"Well, the sapient mind can generalize. To the nonsapient animal, every\nexperience is either totally novel or identical with some remembered\nexperience. A rabbit will flee from one dog because to the rabbit mind it\nis identical with another dog that has chased it. A bird will be attracted\nto an apple, and each apple will be a unique red thing to peck at. The\nsapient being will say, \'These red objects are apples; as a class, they\nare edible and flavorsome.\' He sets up a class under the general label of\napples. This, in turn, leads to the formation of abstract ideas--redness,\nflavor, et cetera--conceived of apart from any specific physical object,\nand to the ordering of abstractions--\'fruit\' as distinguished from apples,\n\'food\' as distinguished from fruit.\"\n\nThe globe was still placidly blue. The three judges waited, and he\ncontinued:\n\n\"Having formed these abstract ideas, it becomes necessary to symbolize\nthem, in order to deal with them apart from the actual object. The sapient\nbeing is a symbolizer, and a symbol communicator; he is able to convey to\nother sapient beings his ideas in symbolic form.\"\n\n\"Like \'_Pa-pee Jaak_\'?\" the judge on his right, with the black mustache,\nasked.\n\nThe globe flashed red at once.\n\n\"Your Honors, I cannot consider words picked up at random and learned by\nrote speech. The Fuzzies have merely learned to associate that sound with\na specific human, and use it as a signal, not as a symbol.\"\n\nThe globe was still red. The Chief Justice, in the middle, rapped with his\ngavel.\n\n\"Dr. Mallin! Of all the people on this planet, you at least should know\nthe impossibility of lying under veridication. Other people just know it\ncan\'t be done; you know why. Now I\'m going to rephrase Judge Janiver\'s\nquestion, and I\'ll expect you to answer truthfully. If you don\'t I\'m going\nto hold you in contempt. When those Fuzzies cried out, \'Pappy Jack!\' do\nyou or do you not believe that they were using a verbal expression which\nstood, in their minds, for Mr. Holloway?\"\n\nHe couldn\'t say it. This sapience was all a big fake; he had to believe\nthat. The Fuzzies were only little mindless animals.\n\nBut he didn\'t believe it. He knew better. He gulped for a moment.\n\n\"Yes, your Honor. The term \'Pappy Jack\' is, in their minds, a symbol\nstanding for Mr. Jack Holloway.\"\n\nHe looked at the globe. The red had turned to mauve, the mauve was\nbecoming violet, and then clear blue. He felt better than he had felt\nsince the afternoon Leonard Kellogg had told him about the Fuzzies.\n\n\"Then Fuzzies do think consciously, Dr. Mallin?\" That was Pendarvis.\n\n\"Oh, yes. The fact that they use verbal symbols indicates that, even\nwithout other evidence. And the instrumental evidence was most impressive.\nThe mentation pictures we got by encephalography compare very favorably\nwith those of any human child of ten or twelve years old, and so does\ntheir learning and puzzle-solving ability. On puzzles, they always think\nthe problem out first, and then do the mechanical work with about the same\nmental effort, say, as a man washing his hands or tying his neckcloth.\"\n\nThe globe was perfectly blue. Mallin had given up trying to lie; he was\nsimply gushing out everything he thought.\n\n * * * * *\n\nLeonard Kellogg slumped forward, his head buried in his elbows on the\ntable, and misery washed over him in tides.\n\n_I am a murderer; I killed a person. Only a funny little person with fur,\nbut she was a person, and I knew it when I killed her, I knew it when I\nsaw that little grave out in the woods, and they\'ll put me in that chair\nand make me admit it to everybody, and then they\'ll take me out in the\njail yard and somebody will shoot me through the head with a pistol,\nand--_\n\n_And all the poor little thing wanted was to show me her new jingle!_\n\n * * * * *\n\n\"Does anybody want to ask the witness any questions?\" the Chief Justice\nwas asking.\n\n\"I don\'t,\" Captain Greibenfeld said. \"Do you, Lieutenant?\"\n\n\"No, I don\'t think so,\" Lieutenant Ybarra said. \"Dr. Mallin\'s given us a\nvery lucid statement of his opinions.\"\n\nHe had, at that, after he\'d decided he couldn\'t beat the veridicator. Jack\nfound himself sympathizing with Mallin. He\'d disliked the man from the\nfirst, but he looked different now--sort of cleaned and washed out inside.\nMaybe everybody ought to be veridicated, now and then, to teach them that\nhonesty begins with honesty to self.\n\n\"Mr. Coombes?\" Mr. Coombes looked as though he never wanted to ask another\nwitness another question as long as he lived. \"Mr. Brannhard?\"\n\nGus got up, holding a sapient member of a sapient race who was hanging\nonto his beard, and thanked Ernst Mallin fulsomely.\n\n\"In that case, we\'ll adjourn until o-nine-hundred tomorrow. Mr. Coombes, I\nhave here a check on the chartered Zarathustra Company for twenty-five\nthousand sols. I am returning it to you and I am canceling Dr. Kellogg\'s\nbail,\" Judge Pendarvis said, as a couple of attendants began getting\nMallin loose from the veridicator.\n\n\"Are you also canceling Jack Holloway\'s?\"\n\n\"No, and I would advise you not to make an issue of it, Mr. Coombes. The\nonly reason I haven\'t dismissed the charge against Mr. Holloway is that I\ndon\'t want to handicap you by cutting off your foothold in the\nprosecution. I do not consider Mr. Holloway a bail risk. I do so consider\nyour client, Dr. Kellogg.\"\n\n\"Frankly, your Honor, so do I,\" Coombes admitted. \"My protest was merely\nan example of what Dr. Mallin would call conditioned reflex.\"\n\nThen a crowd began pushing up around the table; Ben Rainsford, George Lunt\nand his troopers, Gerd and Ruth, shoving in among them, their arms around\neach other.\n\n\"We\'ll be at the hotel after a while, Jack,\" Gerd was saying. \"Ruth and I\nare going out for a drink and something to eat; we\'ll be around later to\npick up her Fuzzies.\"\n\nNow his partner had his girl back, and his partner\'s girl had a Fuzzy\nfamily of her own. This was going to be real fun. What were their names\nnow? Syndrome, Complex, Id and Superego. The things some people named\nFuzzies!\n\n\n\n\nXVI\n\n\nThey stopped whispering at the door, turned right, and ascended to the\nbench, bearing themselves like images in a procession, Ruiz first, then\nhimself and then Janiver. They turned to the screen so that the public\nwhom they served might see the faces of the judges, and then sat down. The\ncourt crier began his chant. They could almost feel the tension in the\ncourtroom. Yves Janiver whispered to them:\n\n\"They all know about it.\"\n\nAs soon as the crier had stopped, Max Fane approached the bench, his face\nblankly expressionless.\n\n\"Your Honors, I am ashamed to have to report that the defendant, Leonard\nKellogg, cannot be produced in court. He is dead; he committed suicide in\nhis cell last night. While in my custody,\" he added bitterly.\n\nThe stir that went through the courtroom was not shocked surprise, it was\na sigh of fulfilled expectation. They all knew about it.\n\n\"How did this happen, Marshal?\" he asked, almost conversationally.\n\n\"The prisoner was put in a cell by himself; there was a pickup eye, and\none of my deputies was keeping him under observation by screen.\" Fane\nspoke in a toneless, almost robotlike voice. \"At twenty-two thirty, the\nprisoner went to bed, still wearing his shirt. He pulled the blankets up\nover his head. The deputy observing him thought nothing of that; many\nprisoners do that, on account of the light. He tossed about for a while,\nand then appeared to fall asleep.\n\n\"When a guard went in to rouse him this morning, the cot, under the\nblanket, was found saturated with blood. Kellogg had cut his throat, by\nsawing the zipper track of his shirt back and forth till he severed his\njugular vein. He was dead.\"\n\n\"Good heavens, Marshal!\" He was shocked. The way he\'d heard it, Kellogg\nhad hidden a penknife, and he was prepared to be severe with Fane about\nit. But a thing like this! He found himself fingering the toothed track of\nhis own jacket zipper. \"I don\'t believe you can be at all censured for not\nanticipating a thing like that. It isn\'t a thing anybody would expect.\"\n\nJaniver and Ruiz spoke briefly in agreement. Marshal Fane bowed slightly\nand went off to one side.\n\nLeslie Coombes, who seemed to be making a very considerable effort to look\ngrieved and shocked, rose.\n\n\"Your Honors, I find myself here without a client,\" he said. \"In fact, I\nfind myself here without any business at all; the case against Mr.\nHolloway is absolutely insupportable. He shot a man who was trying to kill\nhim, and that\'s all there is to it. I therefore pray your Honors to\ndismiss the case against him and discharge him from custody.\"\n\nCaptain Greibenfeld bounded to his feet.\n\n\"Your Honors, I fully realize that the defendant is now beyond the\njurisdiction of this court, but let me point out that I and my associates\nare here participating in this case in the hope that the classification of\nthis planet may be determined, and some adequate definition of sapience\nestablished. These are most serious questions, your Honors.\"\n\n\"But, your Honors,\" Coombes protested, \"we can\'t go through the farce of\ntrying a dead man.\"\n\n\"_People of the Colony of Baphomet_ versus _Jamshar Singh, Deceased_,\ncharge of arson and sabotage, A.E. 604,\" the Honorable Gustavus Adolphus\nBrannhard interrupted.\n\nYes, you could find a precedent in colonial law for almost anything.\n\nJack Holloway was on his feet, a Fuzzy cradled in the crook of his left\narm, his white mustache bristling truculently.\n\n\"I am not a dead man, your Honors, and I am on trial here. The reason I\'m\nnot dead is why I am on trial. My defense is that I shot Kurt Borch while\nhe was aiding and abetting in the killing of a Fuzzy. I want it\nestablished in this court that it is murder to kill a Fuzzy.\"\n\nThe judge nodded slowly. \"I will not dismiss the charges against Mr.\nHolloway,\" he said. \"Mr. Holloway had been arraigned on a charge of\nmurder; if he is not guilty, he is entitled to the vindication of an\nacquittal. I am afraid, Mr. Coombes, that you will have to go on\nprosecuting him.\"\n\nAnother brief stir, like a breath of wind over a grain field, ran through\nthe courtroom. The show was going on after all.\n\n * * * * *\n\nAll the Fuzzies were in court this morning; Jack\'s six, and the five from\nthe constabulary post, and Ben\'s Flora and Fauna, and the four Ruth\nOrtheris claimed. There was too much discussion going on for anybody to\nkeep an eye on them. Finally one of the constabulary Fuzzies, either\nDillinger or Dr. Crippen, and Ben Rainsford\'s Flora and Fauna, came\nsauntering out into the open space between the tables and the bench\ndragging the hose of a vacuum-duster. Ahmed Khadra ducked under a table\nand tried to get it away from them. This was wonderful; screaming in\ndelight, they all laid hold of the other end, and Mike and Mitzi and\nSuperego and Complex ran to help them. The seven of them dragged Khadra\nabout ten feet before he gave up and let go. At the same time, an\nincipient fight broke out on the other side of the arc of tables between\nthe head of the language department at Mallorysport Academy and a\nspinsterish amateur phoneticist. At this point, Judge Pendarvis, deciding\nthat if you can\'t prevent it, relax and enjoy it, rapped a few times with\nhis gavel, and announced that court was recessed.\n\n\"You will all please remain here; this is not an adjournment, and if any\nof the various groups who seem to be discussing different aspects of the\nproblem reach any conclusion they feel should be presented in evidence,\nwill they please notify the bench so that court can be reconvened. In any\ncase, we will reconvene at eleven thirty.\"\n\nSomebody wanted to know if smoking would be permitted during the recess.\nThe Chief Justice said that it would. He got out a cigar and lit it. Mamma\nFuzzy wanted a puff: she didn\'t like it. Out of the corner of his eye, he\nsaw Mike and Mitzi, Flora and Fauna scampering around and up the steps\nbehind the bench. When he looked again, they were all up on it, and Mitzi\nwas showing the court what she had in her shoulder bag.\n\nHe got up, with Mamma and Baby, and crossed to where Leslie Coombes was\nsitting. By this time, somebody was bringing in a coffee urn from the\ncafeteria. Fuzzies ought to happen oftener in court.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe gavel tapped slowly. Little Fuzzy scrambled up onto Jack Holloway\'s\nlap. After five days in court, they had all learned that the gavel meant\nfor Fuzzies and other people to be quiet. It might be a good idea, Jack\nthought, to make a little gavel, when he got home, and keep it on the\ntable in the living room for when the family got too boisterous. Baby, who\nwasn\'t gavel-trained yet, started out onto the floor; Mamma dashed after\nhim and brought him back under the table.\n\nThe place looked like a courtroom again. The tables were ranged in a neat\nrow facing the bench, and the witness chair and the jury box were back\nwhere they belonged. The ashtrays and the coffee urn and the ice tubs for\nbeer and soft drinks had vanished. It looked like the party was over. He\nwas almost regretful; it had been fun. Especially for seventeen Fuzzies\nand a Baby Fuzzy and a little black-and-white kitten.\n\nThere was one unusual feature; there was now a fourth man on the bench, in\ngold-braided Navy black; sitting a little apart from the judges, trying to\nlook as though he weren\'t there at all--Space Commodore Alex Napier.\n\nJudge Pendarvis laid down his gavel. \"Ladies and gentlemen, are you ready\nto present the opinions you have reached?\" he asked.\n\nLieutenant Ybarra, the Navy psychologist, rose. There was a reading screen\nin front of him; he snapped it on.\n\n\"Your Honors,\" he began, \"there still exists considerable difference of\nopinion on matters of detail but we are in agreement on all major points.\nThis is quite a lengthy report, and it has already been incorporated into\nthe permanent record. Have I the court\'s permission to summarize it?\"\n\nThe court told him he had. Ybarra glanced down at the screen in front of\nhim and continued:\n\n\"It is our opinion,\" he said, \"that sapience may be defined as differing\nfrom nonsapience in that it is characterized by conscious thought, by\nability to think in logical sequence and by ability to think in terms\nother than mere sense data. We--meaning every member of every sapient\nrace--think consciously, and we know what we are thinking. This is not to\nsay that all our mental activity is conscious. The science of psychology\nis based, to a large extent, upon our realization that only a small\nportion of our mental activity occurs above the level of consciousness,\nand for centuries we have been diagraming the mind as an iceberg,\none-tenth exposed and nine-tenths submerged. The art of psychiatry\nconsists largely in bringing into consciousness some of the content of\nthis submerged nine-tenths, and as a practitioner I can testify to its\ndifficulty and uncertainty.\n\n\"We are so habituated to conscious thought that when we reach some\nconclusion by any nonconscious process, we speak of it as a \'hunch,\' or an\n\'intuition,\' and question its validity. We are so habituated to acting\nupon consciously formed decisions that we must laboriously acquire, by\nsystematic drill, those automatic responses upon which we depend for\nsurvival in combat or other emergencies. And we are by nature so unaware\nof this vast submerged mental area that it was not until the first century\nPre-Atomic that its existence was more than vaguely suspected, and its\nnature is still the subject of acrimonious professional disputes.\"\n\nThere had been a few of those, off and on, during the past four days, too.\n\n\"If we depict sapient mentation as an iceberg, we might depict nonsapient\nmentation as the sunlight reflected from its surface. This is a\nconsiderably less exact analogy; while the nonsapient mind deals,\nconsciously, with nothing but present sense data, there is a considerable\nabsorption and re-emission of subconscious memories. Also, there are\noccasional flashes of what must be conscious mental activity, in dealing\nwith some novel situation. Dr. van Riebeek, who is especially interested\nin the evolutionary aspect of the question, suggests that the introduction\nof novelty because of drastic environmental changes may have forced\nnonsapient beings into more or less sustained conscious thinking and so\ninitiated mental habits which, in time, gave rise to true sapience.\n\n\"The sapient mind not only thinks consciously by habit, but it thinks in\nconnected sequence. It associates one thing with another. It reasons\nlogically, and forms conclusions, and uses those conclusions as premises\nfrom which to arrive at further conclusions. It groups associations\ntogether, and generalizes. Here we pass completely beyond any comparison\nwith nonsapience. This is not merely more consciousness, or more thinking;\nit is thinking of a radically different kind. The nonsapient mind deals\nexclusively with crude sensory material. The sapient mind translates sense\nimpressions into ideas, and then forms ideas of ideas, in ascending orders\nof abstraction, almost without limit.\n\n\"This, finally, brings us to one of the recognized overt manifestations of\nsapience. The sapient being is a symbol user. The nonsapient being cannot\nsymbolize, because the nonsapient mind is incapable of concepts beyond\nmere sense images.\"\n\nYbarra drank some water, and twisted the dial of his reading screen with\nthe other hand.\n\n\"The sapient being,\" he continued, \"can do one other thing. It is a\ncombination of the three abilities already enumerated, but combining them\ncreates something much greater than the mere sum of the parts. The sapient\nbeing can imagine. He can conceive of something which has no existence\nwhatever in the sense-available world of reality, and then he can work and\nplan toward making it a part of reality. He can not only imagine, but he\ncan also create.\"\n\nHe paused for a moment. \"This is our definition of sapience. When we\nencounter any being whose mentation includes these characteristics, we may\nknow him for a sapient brother. It is the considered opinion of all of us\nthat the beings called Fuzzies are such beings.\"\n\nJack hugged the small sapient one on his lap, and Little Fuzzy looked up\nand murmured, \"_He-inta?_\"\n\n\"You\'re in, kid,\" he whispered. \"You just joined the people.\"\n\nYbarra was saying, \"They think consciously and continuously. We know that\nby instrumental analysis of their electroencephalographic patterns, which\ncompare closely to those of an intelligent human child of ten. They think\nin connected sequence; I invite consideration of all the different logical\nsteps involved in the invention, designing and making of their\nprawn-killing weapons, and in the development of tools with which to make\nthem. We have abundant evidence of their ability to think beyond present\nsense data, to associate, to generalize, to abstract and to symbolize.\n\n\"And above all, they can imagine, not only a new implement, but a new way\nof life. We see this in the first human contact with the race which, I\nsubmit, should be designated as _Fuzzy sapiens_. Little Fuzzy found a\nstrange and wonderful place in the forest, a place unlike anything he had\never seen, in which lived a powerful being. He imagined himself living in\nthis place, enjoying the friendship and protection of this mysterious\nbeing. So he slipped inside, made friends with Jack Holloway and lived\nwith him. And then he imagined his family sharing this precious comfort\nand companionship with him, and he went and found them and brought them\nback with him. Like so many other sapient beings, Little Fuzzy had a\nbeautiful dream; like a fortunate few, he made it real.\"\n\nThe Chief Justice allowed the applause to run on for a few minutes before\nusing his gavel to silence it. There was a brief colloquy among the three\njudges, and then the Chief Justice rapped again. Little Fuzzy looked\nperplexed. Everybody had been quiet after he did it the first time, hadn\'t\nthey?\n\n\"It is the unanimous decision of the court to accept the report already\nentered into the record and just summarized by Lieutenant Ybarra, TFN, and\nto thank him and all who have been associated with him.\n\n\"It is now the ruling of this court that the species known as _Fuzzy fuzzy\nholloway zarathustra_ is in fact a race of sapient beings, entitled to the\nrespect of all other sapient beings and to the full protection of the law\nof the Terran Federation.\" He rapped again, slowly, pounding the decision\ninto the legal framework.\n\nSpace Commodore Napier leaned over and whispered; all three of the judges\nnodded emphatically. The naval officer rose.\n\n\"Lieutenant Ybarra, on behalf of the Service and of the Federation, I\nthank you and those associated with you for a lucid and excellent report,\nthe culmination of work which reflects credit upon all who participated in\nit. I also wish to state that a suggestion made to me by Lieutenant Ybarra\nregarding possible instrumental detection of sapient mentation is being\ncredited to him in my own report, with the recommendation that it be given\nimportant priority by the Bureau of Research and Development. Perhaps the\nnext time we find people who speak beyond the range of human audition, who\nhave fur and live in a mild climate, and who like their food raw, we\'ll\nknow what they are from the beginning.\"\n\nBet Ybarra gets another stripe, and a good job out of this. Jack hoped so.\nThen Pendarvis was pounding again.\n\n\"I had almost forgotten; this is a criminal trial,\" he confessed. \"It is\nthe verdict of this court that the defendant, Jack Holloway, is not guilty\nas here charged. He is herewith discharged from custody. If he or his\nattorney will step up here, the bail bond will be refunded.\" He puzzled\nLittle Fuzzy by hammering again with his gavel to adjourn court.\n\nThis time, instead of keeping quiet, everybody made all the noise they\ncould, and Uncle Gus was holding him high over his head and shouting:\n\n\"The _winnah_! By unanimous decision!\"\n\n\n\n\nXVII\n\n\nRuth Ortheris sipped at the tart, cold cocktail. It was good; oh, it was\ngood, all good! The music was soft, the lights were dim, the tables were\nfar apart; just she and Gerd, and nobody was paying any attention to them.\nAnd she was clear out of the business, too. An agent who testified in\ncourt always was expended in service like a fired round. They\'d want her\nback, a year from now, to testify when the board of inquiry came out from\nTerra, but she wouldn\'t be Lieutenant j.g. Ortheris then, she\'d be Mrs.\nGerd van Riebeek. She set down the glass and rubbed the sunstone on her\nfinger. It was a lovely sunstone, and it meant such a lovely thing.\n\nAnd we\'re getting married with a ready-made family, too. Four Fuzzies and\na black-and-white kitten.\n\n\"You\'re sure you really want to go to Beta?\" Gerd asked. \"When Napier gets\nthis new government organized, it\'ll be taking over Science Center. We\ncould both get our old jobs back. Maybe something better.\"\n\n\"You don\'t want to go back?\" He shook his head. \"Neither do I. I want to\ngo to Beta and be a sunstone digger\'s wife.\"\n\n\"And a Fuzzyologist.\"\n\n\"And a Fuzzyologist. I couldn\'t drop that now. Gerd, we\'re only beginning\nwith them. We know next to nothing about their psychology.\"\n\nHe nodded seriously. \"You know, they may turn out to be even wiser than we\nare.\"\n\nShe laughed. \"Oh, Gerd! Let\'s don\'t get too excited about them. Why,\nthey\'re like little children. All they think about is having fun.\"\n\n\"That\'s right. I said they were wiser than we are. They stick to important\nthings.\" He smoked silently for a moment. \"It\'s not just their psychology;\nwe don\'t know anything much about their physiology, or biology either.\" He\npicked up his glass and drank. \"Here; we had eighteen of them in all.\nSeventeen adults and one little one. Now what kind of ratio is that? And\nthe ones we saw in the woods ran about the same. In all, we sighted about\na hundred and fifty adults and only ten children.\"\n\n\"Maybe last year\'s crop have grown up,\" she began.\n\n\"You know any other sapient races with a one-year maturation period?\" he\nasked. \"I\'ll bet they take ten or fifteen years to mature. Jack\'s Baby\nFuzzy hasn\'t gained a pound in the last month. And another puzzle; this\ncraving for Extee Three. That\'s not a natural food; except for the cereal\nbulk matter, it\'s purely synthetic. I was talking to Ybarra; he was\nwondering if there mightn\'t be something in it that caused an addiction.\"\n\n\"Maybe it satisfies some kind of dietary deficiency.\"\n\n\"Well, we\'ll find out.\" He inverted the jug over his glass. \"Think we\ncould stand another cocktail before dinner?\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nSpace Commodore Napier sat at the desk that had been Nick Emmert\'s and\nlooked at the little man with the red whiskers and the rumpled suit, who\nwas looking back at him in consternation.\n\n\"Good Lord, Commodore; you can\'t be serious?\"\n\n\"But I am. Quite serious, Dr. Rainsford.\"\n\n\"Then you\'re nuts!\" Rainsford exploded. \"I\'m no more qualified to be\nGovernor General than I\'d be to command Xerxes Base. Why, I never held an\nadministrative position in my life.\"\n\n\"That might be a recommendation. You\'re replacing a veteran\nadministrator.\"\n\n\"And I have a job. The Institute of Zeno-Sciences--\"\n\n\"I think they\'ll be glad to give you leave, under the circumstances.\nDoctor, you\'re the logical man for this job. You\'re an ecologist; you know\nhow disastrous the effects of upsetting the balance of nature can be. The\nZarathustra Company took care of this planet, when it was their property,\nbut now nine-tenths of it is public domain, and people will be coming in\nfrom all over the Federation, scrambling to get rich overnight. You\'ll\nknow how to control things.\"\n\n\"Yes, as Commissioner of Conservation, or something I\'m qualified for.\"\n\n\"As Governor General. Your job will be to make policy. You can appoint the\nadministrators.\"\n\n\"Well, who, for instance?\"\n\n\"Well, you\'re going to need an Attorney General right away. Who will you\nappoint for that position?\"\n\n\"Gus Brannhard,\" Rainsford said instantly.\n\n\"Good. And who--this question is purely rhetorical--will you appoint as\nCommissioner of Native Affairs?\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nJack Holloway was going back to Beta Continent on the constabulary\nairboat. Official passenger: Mr. Commissioner Jack Holloway. And his\nstaff: Little Fuzzy, Mamma Fuzzy, Baby Fuzzy, Mike, Mitzi, Ko-Ko and\nCinderella. Bet they didn\'t know they had official positions!\n\nSomehow he wished he didn\'t have one himself.\n\n\"Want a good job, George?\" he asked Lunt.\n\n\"I have a good job.\"\n\n\"This\'ll be a better one. Rank of major, eighteen thousand a year.\nCommandant, Native Protection Force. And you won\'t lose seniority in the\nconstabulary; Colonel Ferguson\'ll give you indefinite leave.\"\n\n\"Well, cripes, Jack, I\'d like to, but I don\'t want to leave the kids. And\nI can\'t take them away from the rest of the gang.\"\n\n\"Bring the rest of the gang along. I\'m authorized to borrow twenty men\nfrom the constabulary as a training cadre, and you only have sixteen. Your\nsergeants\'ll get commissions, and all your men will be sergeants. I\'m\ngoing to have a force of a hundred and fifty for a start.\"\n\n\"You must think the Fuzzies are going to need a lot of protection.\"\n\n\"They will. The whole country between the Cordilleras and the West Coast\nRange will be Fuzzy Reservation and that\'ll have to be policed. Then the\nFuzzies outside that will have to be protected. You know what\'s going to\nhappen. Everybody wants Fuzzies; why, even Judge Pendarvis approached me\nabout getting a pair for his wife. There\'ll be gangs hunting them to sell,\nusing stun-bombs and sleepgas and everything. I\'m going to have to set up\nan adoption bureau; Ruth will be in charge of that. And that\'ll mean a lot\nof investigators--\"\n\nOh, it was going to be one hell of a job! Fifty thousand a year would be\nchicken feed to what he\'d lose by not working his diggings. But somebody\nwould have to do it, and the Fuzzies were his responsibility.\n\nHadn\'t he gone to law to prove their sapience?\n\n * * * * *\n\nThey were going home, home to the Wonderful Place. They had seen many\nwonderful places, since the night they had been put in the bags: the place\nwhere everything had been light and they had been able to jump so high and\nland so gently, and the place where they had met all the others of their\npeople and had so much fun. But now they were going back to the old\nWonderful Place in the woods, where it had all started.\n\nAnd they had met so many Big Ones, too. Some Big Ones were bad, but only a\nfew; most Big Ones were good. Even the one who had done the killing had\nfelt sorry for what he had done; they were all sure of that. And the other\nBig Ones had taken him away, and they had never seen him again.\n\nHe had talked about that with the others--with Flora and Fauna, and Dr.\nCrippen, and Complex, and Superego, and Dillinger and Lizzie Borden. Now\nthat they were all going to live with the Big Ones, they would have to use\nthose funny names. Someday they would find out what they meant, and that\nwould be fun, too. And they could; now the Big Ones could put things in\ntheir ears and hear what they were saying, and Pappy Jack was learning\nsome of their words, and teaching them some of his.\n\nAnd soon all the people would find Big Ones to live with, who would take\ncare of them and have fun with them and love them, and give them the\nWonderful Food. And with the Big Ones taking care of them, maybe more of\ntheir babies would live and not die so soon. And they would pay the Big\nOnes back. First they would give their love and make them happy. Later,\nwhen they learned how, they would give their help, too.'"