By that time--over a full week since the day the Shapieron had landed--the liaison bureau had got things fully under control and parties of Ganymeans were already beginning to leave to make visits and attend conferences all over the world. Some groups, in fact, had been gone for some time and news reports were already coming in on how they were faring.
Small parties of eight-foot-tall aliens, together with their ever-vigilant police escorts, had become accepted, if not yet commonplace, sights in Times Square, Red Square, Trafalgar Square and the Champs-Elysйes. They had listened appreciatively to a Beethoven concert in Boston, toured the London Zoo with a mixture of awe and horror, attended lavish receptions in Buenos Aires, Canberra, Cape Town and Washington, D.C., and paid their respects at the Vatican. In Peking their culture had been complimented as the ultimate exemplification of the communist ideal, in New York as that of the democratic ideal, and in Stockholm as that of the liberal ideal. And everywhere the crowds thronged to greet them.
The reports from around the globe told of the aliens' total amazement at the variety of life, color, vitality and exuberance that they saw all around them wherever they went. Everybody on Earth, they said, seemed to be in a hurry to live a whole lifetime each day, as if they feared there might not be sufficient hours in a mortal span to accommodate all the things to be seen and done. The Minervan cities had been bigger in terms of engineering constructions and architecture, but had offered nothing that compared even remotely with the variety, energy and sheer zest for living that teemed day and night in the metropolises of Earth. The Minervan technology had been further advanced, but its rate of advancement was paltry compared to the stupendous mushrooming of human civilization that resulted from the hustling, bustling, restlessness exploding outward from this incredible planet.
Speaking at a scientific conference in Berlin, a Ganymean told his audience: "The Ganymean theory of the origin of the universe describes a steady equilibrium in which matter appears, quietly acts out its appointed role, and then quietly vanishes--a slow, easy-going, evolutionary situation that goes well with our temperament and our history. Only Man could have conceived the catastrophic discontinuity of the Big Bang. I believe that when you have had an opportunity to examine our theories more closely, you will discard your Big Bang ideas. And yet I feel it singularly appropriate that Man should have formulated such a theory. You see, ladies and gentlemen, when Man visualized the cataclysmic expansion of the Big Bang Model, he was not seeing the universe at all; he was seeing himself."
After he had been back on Earth for ten days, Hunt was contacted again by UNSA, who conveyed their hopes that he had enjoyed his leave. But some people at Houston knew him better than he thought and suggested that it might be a good idea if he began thinking about coming back.
More to the point, UNSA had made arrangements through the bureau for a Ganymean scientific delegation to visit Navcomms Headquarters at Houston, primarily to learn more about the Lunarians. The Ganymeans had been expressing a lot of interest in Man's immediate ancestral race for some reason and, since the Lunarian investigations had been controlled from Houston and much of the work had been done there, it was the obvious place to bring them. UNSA suggested that since Hunt was due to return to Houston anyway, he could act as organizer and courier for the delegation and insure their safe arrival in Texas. Danchekker, who was also due to return to Houston to resume his duties at the Westwood Biological Institute, decided to fly with them.
And so, at the end of his second week home, Hunt found himself in a familiar environment: the inside of a Boeing 1017 skyliner, fifty miles up over the North Atlantic and westward bound.
Chapter Twenty
"When I sent you off to Ganymede, I just wanted you to find out a little bit more about the guys. I didn't expect you to come back with a whole shipful of them." Gregg Caldwell chewed on his cigar and looked out across his desk with an expression that was half amusement and half feigned exasperation. Hunt, sprawled in the chair opposite, grinned and took another sip of his scotch. It was good to be back among the familiar surroundings of Navcomms HO again. The inside of Caldwell's luxurious office with its murals and one wall completely dedicated to a battery of view-screens; the panoramic view down over the rainbow towers of Houston--nothing had changed.
"So you've got more than your money's worth, Gregg," he replied. "Not complaining, are you?"
"Hell no. I'm not complaining. You've done another good job by the way things are shaping up. It's just that whenever I set you an assignment, things seem to have this tendency to kinda. . . get outa hand. I always end up with more than I bargained for." Caldwell removed his cigar from his teeth and inclined his head briefly. "But as you say, I'm not complaining."
The executive director studied Hunt thoughtfully for a few seconds. "So. . . what was it like to be away from Earth for the first time?"
"Oh, it was. . . an experience," Hunt answered automatically, but when he looked up he saw from the mischievous twinkle that danced in the eyes below the craggy brows that the question had been more than casual. He should have known. Caldwell never said or did anything without a reason.
"Know thyself," Caldwell quoted softly. "And others too, maybe, huh?" He shrugged as if making light of the matter, but the twinkle still remained in his eyes.
Hunt's brows knitted for a split second, and then his eyes slowly widened as the cryptic message behind this turn in the conversation became clear. It took perhaps two seconds for the details to click into place in his brain. In the early days of the Lunarian investigations, just after Hunt had moved to Houston from England, his relationship with Danchekker had been caustic. Progress toward unraveling the mystery was more often than not hampered because the two scientists dissipated their energies fruitlessly in personal conflicts. But later on, in the wilderness of Luna and out in the void between Earth and Jupiter, all that had somehow been forgotten. It was then that the two scientists had begun to work in harmony, and the difficulties had crumbled before the powerful assault of their combined talents, which was what had been needed to solve the Lunarian problem. Hunt could see that clearly now. Suddenly, he also realized that this state of affairs had not come about through mere accident. He stared at Caldwell with new respect, and slowly nodded ungrudging approval.
"Gregg," he said, in a tone of mock reproach. "You've been pulling strings again. You set us up."
"I did?" Caldwell's voice was suitably innocent.
"Chris and me. It was out there we began to see each other as people and learned to pool our marbles. That's what cracked the Lunarian riddle. You knew it would happen. . ." Hunt pointed an accusing finger across the desk. "That's why you did it."
Caldwell compressed his heavy jowls momentarily into a tight-lipped grin of satisfaction. "So, you got more than your money's worth," he threw back. "Not complaining, are you?"
"Smooth operator," Hunt complimented, raising his glass. "Okay, we've both had a good deal. That's how I think business ought to be. But now to the present and the future--what have you got lined up next?"
Caldwell sat forward and rested his elbows on the desk. He exhaled a long stream of blue smoke. "What about this bunch of alien guys you brought back from Europe; are you still tied up most of the time with looking after them?"
"They've been introduced over at Westwood now," Hunt told him. "They're interested in the Lunarians and particularly want to have a look at Charlie over there. Chris Danchekker is handling that side of things, which leaves me fairly free for a while."