Unlike Veffani, Felless returned the gesture. “I greet you, superior sir,” she said, “for while my formal rank may be somewhat higher, I want to draw once more on your superior expertise. Every meeting with these Tosevites, every analysis of what they do, brings only fresh confusion.”
“If you think I do not suffer from these same symptoms, I fear you run the risk of disappointment,” Ttomalss said. “Each day’s work with the Big Uglies only illuminates the width and breadth of our ignorance.”
“I see that,” Felless said. “I have arranged with Ambassador Veffani to quarter you in the chamber next to mine, that we may confer as conveniently as possible.” Her laugh was rueful. “Or, on the other fork of the tongue, I may simply scream in frustration. If I do, I hope it will not disturb your rest.”
“If you think I have not screamed on account of the Big Uglies-in frustration and in terror-you are mistaken, superior female,” Ttomalss said. “I shall find any screams of yours easy to forgive.”
His chamber proved more spacious and more comfortably appointed than the one aboard the ship from the conquest fleet: easier to find room in a building than in a starship, even an enormous starship. He telephoned Kassquit to make sure his Tosevite fosterling was all right and to let her know he was thinking about her even if his work called him away. He had discovered early on that she needed far more reassurance than a male or female of the Race would have.
Felless gave him a little while to settle in, then asked for admittance. When she entered the chamber, she was carrying a tray full of little sausages. “Try some of these while we work,” she said. “They are very tasty.”
“Bratwurste?” Ttomalss asked.
“Why, yes,” Felless said. “How did you know?”
Ttomalss laughed. “The ambassador already praised them.” He picked one up and popped it into his mouth. “Well, I will say he was not wrong. They are quite good.” He ate several, then turned an eye turret toward Felless. “And now, superior female, what troubles you about the Deutsche?”
“Everything!” Felless said with an emphatic cough. “They administer this not-empire on the basis of a whole series of false concepts. They assume they are superior to all other Tosevites, on the basis of no credible evidence whatever-”
“This is common among groups of Tosevites,” Ttomalss broke in. “The Chinese believe the same thing of themselves.”
“But the Deutsche go further, as you must know,” Felless said. “They maintain that certain other groups-some perhaps genetically differentiated, others simply following a relatively unpopular superstition-are so inferior as to deserve extermination, and they mete it out to these groups in immense numbers.”
“We have been pondering that since our arrival on Tosev 3,” Ttomalss said. “It has, if anything, worked to our advantage. One group they persecute, the Jews, has given us a good deal of aid.”
“So I am told,” Felless said. “That, it strikes me, is as it should be. What is not as it should be is the continued survival and scientific progressivism of the Greater German Reich. How can beings so dedicated to utterly irrational premises at the same time fly spacecraft and control missiles tipped with nuclear weapons?”
“I congratulate you,” Ttomalss said. “You have pierced with your fingerclaw a central perplexity of Tosev 3. Part of the answer, I think, is that they have so recently emerged from complete savagery that a good deal remains just under the scales, so to speak: far more than among us.”
“They drive me mad,” Felless said with another emphatic cough. “One moment, they will be as logical, as rational, and as intelligent in conversation as any member of the Race. The next moment, they will confidently assert the truth of a premise that is, to any eye but their own, at best ludicrous, at worst preposterous. And they will proceed to reason from that premise with the same rigor they use on other, more rational, ones. It is madness, and they cannot see it. And they continue to thrive even though it is madness, and aim to infect all of Tosev 3 with these mad doctrines. How is one to deal with what strikes the unbiased observer as a pathological condition?”
“Superior female, you do not strike me as an unbiased observer toward the Deutsche,” Ttomalss said with amusement.
“Very well, then. I shall revise that: with what strikes the non-Deutsch observer as a pathological condition,” Felless answered tartly. “There. Does that satisfy you? Will you now answer the question? How does one deal with Big Uglies whose ideology is nothing but a systematized delusion?”
“All Big Uglies sophisticated enough to have ideologies have them laced with delusions,” Ttomalss replied. “The Deutsche believe themselves to be biologically superior, as you have mentioned here. The Tosevites of the SSSR believe the workers will rule and then no one will rule, for perfect goodness and equity will come to all Big Uglies.”
“Looking for goodness and equity among the Big Uglies is indeed a systematized delusion,” Felless said.
“Truth,” Ttomalss said with a laugh. “And the Big Uglies of the United States believe that counting the snouts of the ignorant and clever together will somehow automatically create wise policy. Much as I have pondered this, I have never grasped its philosophical underpinnings, if there are any.”
“Madness. Utter madness,” Felless said with yet another emphatic cough. “As one researcher to another, I tell you I am near despair. There have been times when I have been tempted to withdraw to my spacecraft, and other times when I have been even more tempted to indulge in the Tosevite herb that has gained such popularity among the conquest fleet.”
“Ginger? I do not think that would be wise, superior female,” Ttomalss said. “Whatever the pleasures of the herb, it is without a doubt destructive of sound intellect and sensible habits. I have seen no exceptions to this rule.”
“Then it might make me better able to understand Big Uglies, don’t you think?” Felless said. “That in itself could make the herb valuable.” Ttomalss must have shown his alarm, for the female added, “I was but joking.”
“Superior female, I should hope so,” Ttomalss said primly.
9
“Where will it be today, superior sir?” Straha’s Tosevite driver asked him after closing the door to the motorcar. The ex-shiplord had learned to rely on the machine even though it broke down more often than the Race would have tolerated. Los Angeles was not a city wherein it was convenient for even a Big Ugly without a motorcar to travel, let alone a male of the Race.
He gave the driver the address. Like his own residence, it was in the district called the Valley-a place-name that, unlike a lot of the ones the Tosevites used, made perfect sense to him. This part of the city was warmer in summer than the rest, and so endeared itself to the Race. It was also colder in winter, but winter anywhere in Los Angeles was chilly enough to be unpleasant.
Even hereabouts, the air tasted wet and green to Straha on warm days and cold alike. That had amused Sam Yeager, who probably would have failed to be comfortable on the coolest, dampest days Home had to offer. The mere idea that Straha would consider the comfort of a Big Ugly was a telling measure of how far he had fallen since defecting from the conquest fleet.
“May I ask you something, superior sir?” the driver asked.
“Ask,” Straha said resignedly. The Big Uglies never stopped trying to learn this, that, and the other thing from him. He didn’t suppose he could blame them-were he still with the conquest fleet, he would have done the same with any prominent Tosevite defector-but it grew wearisome at times.
“You usually refuse invitations from other males of the Race to functions such as the one tonight,” the driver said. “Why did you choose to accept this one?”