As usual, Kassquit’s face showed nothing. She might have been joyful, furious, gloomy-you couldn’t tell by looking. She said, “I did not think you would want me there, not when you were so busy using your own language.”
“We will speak yours if you do join us.” That wasn’t Jonathan-it was Melanie Blanchard. “We have no problem speaking the Race’s language, even if we are a little more comfortable with our own. The familiar is often welcome, especially when one is far from home.”
“Well, I suppose that could be a truth, if one had known anything resembling a home in one’s past,” Kassquit said. “I have concluded that a cubicle in a starship makes an inadequate substitute.”
“No doubt you are right,” Sam Yeager said, trying to smooth things over. “But if you join us, you may make a closer approach to something homelike than you would with the Race. Or, of course, you may not. But how will you know unless you try the experiment?”
“I do not think I can have a true home either with the Race or with you wild Tosevites,” Kassquit said unhappily. “If there were more Tosevite citizens of the Empire-not Tosevites raised as I was, necessarily, but those who live in the Empire’s culture despite their species-I might find more in common with them than I do with you or the Race.”
“There are probably a fair number of such persons on Tosev 3 now,” Jonathan’s father said. “This, of course, does you no good at all here.”
“Truth,” Kassquit said. “And if I were to go back into cold sleep and seek them out on Tosev 3, who knows how things would change there by the time I arrived? Variability, I think, is the key to Tosevites generally.”
That was undoubtedly how humans seemed from the Race’s point of view-the one Kassquit naturally adopted as her own. But a lot of Lizards refused to see that changes in the way humans did things could affect them. Kassquit didn’t make that mistake, anyhow.
Frank Coffey said, “Do come sit with us, Kassquit.”
“You ask me this?” she said. “Are you certain you desire my company?”
Major Coffey made the affirmative gesture. “Of course I am,” he said, and added an emphatic cough.
Kassquit’s face still showed nothing. But she brought her plate to the table where the Americans were sitting. “Do you mind if I ask what you were talking about before?” she inquired.
“Mostly about the rats that were released here, and about bringing more of them down from the Admiral Peary so we can go on testing food,” Jonathan answered.
“Is that still necessary?” Kassquit asked. “Have the animals found many problems for you? I had no such aids when I woke up on Home, but I have eaten the food here and I am still well.”
“We would rather not take chances we do not have to take,” Dr. Melanie Blanchard said. “We would also rather avoid unpleasant surprises if we can. The Race can eat almost anything we Tosevites can eat on our world, but who would have expected the trouble ginger causes them?”
That seemed only common sense to Jonathan. He thought Kassquit would make the affirmative gesture; she was nothing if not logical. Instead, she let out an audible sniff. “How likely is this?”
Dr. Blanchard shrugged. The motion seemed easier and less of an effort than it would have right after she came down to the surface of Home. Little by little, she was getting reacquainted with gravity. She said, “Who knows? What is certain is that we would like to prevent it if possible. Do you object? Few members of the Race would, not on those grounds. The Race is more cautious than we Tosevites are.”
“I do not object on the grounds of prudence,” Kassquit said. “I do wonder if one of the reasons you wanted to bring rats here was in the hope that they might escape and establish themselves. That would let you pay the Race back for ecological changes caused by creatures from Home on Tosev 3.”
“Not fair,” Jonathan said. “If we had released the rats, you could accuse us of that. But members of the Race did it. We kept the animals caged. We were going to keep them caged, too. We know just what sort of pests they can be.”
Kassquit considered that. At last, reluctantly, she did use the affirmative gesture. “From you, Jonathan Yeager, I will believe this.”
“Why would you not also believe it from Dr. Blanchard?” Jonathan asked. “She knows much more about these things than I do.”
“Yes-why?” Melanie Blanchard echoed. “I mean you no harm, Researcher. In fact, I would like to examine you, if you do not mind. I probably know less about medicine as a whole than a physician from the Race, but I know a lot more about being a Tosevite. I might find something a physician from the Race would miss.”
Had Jonathan been in Kassquit’s shoes, he could have been grateful for that offer. If she got sick, what could the Lizards do about it? Not much, not that he could see. A human doctor, though, had to know how people ticked.
But Kassquit looked at Dr. Blanchard as if she’d just suggested vivisection. “I thank you, but no,” she said. “The Race’s techniques have always been adequate up until now.”
“No doubt,” Dr. Blanchard said. “But then, you have never been very ill, have you? You are still young, and you were never exposed to most Tosevite diseases. You are now beginning to reach the age where your body will show the wear it has accumulated. More regular examinations are a good idea.”
“I thank you, but no,” Kassquit repeated. “I will continue in my present way of doing things until it shows itself to be unsatisfactory.”
“This is not a good idea,” Jonathan told her. “Technicians maintain computers and other machines. You should also maintain yourself.”
“And so I do. And so I shall-with the Race,” Kassquit said. “If this proves inadequate, as I told you, I shall consider other options.”
Her determination was unmistakable. Jonathan scratched his head again. It didn’t add up-not to him, anyway. But Karen whispered in his ear in English: “She doesn’t like the doctor.”
Jonathan blinked. That hadn’t occurred to him. Once his wife pointed it out, though, it seemed so obvious that he wondered why it hadn’t. He also wondered why Kassquit didn’t like the doctor. They’d hardly had anything to do with each other.
Frank Coffey asked, “Would a member of the Race want a Tosevite doctor?”
“Certainly not.” Kassquit didn’t use an emphatic cough, but her tone of voice left no doubt about how she felt.
“All right, then.” Coffey was unperturbed. “Why would you want to use a physician of a different species when you have another choice?”
Kassquit looked at him. “You too would recommend that I trust myself to Dr. Blanchard?” She had a little trouble pronouncing the name, but less than a Lizard would have. When Coffey made the affirmative gesture, Kassquit sprang to her feet. “You are all against me!” she exclaimed, and stormed out of the refectory. The only reason she didn’t slam the glass door behind her was that its mechanism wouldn’t let her.
“What was that all about?” Linda de la Rosa asked in English.
“Is it me she doesn’t want to deal with, or is it because I’m a human being and not a Lizard?” Melanie Blanchard asked in the same language.
I think it may be you, went through Jonathan’s mind. He glanced at his wife, and would have bet she was thinking the same thing. Neither he nor Karen said anything, though. They might have been wrong. Even if they turned out to be right, who could guess why Kassquit felt the way she did? She was a riddle-sometimes, Jonathan suspected, even to herself.
His father said the same thing a different way: “Kassquit takes some getting used to. It’s not her fault she is the way she is, God knows. I do think she’s got a good heart.”
Jonathan nodded. Karen let out a distinct sniff. Among the Americans, though, she found herself outvoted. Snoutcounting, Jonathan thought. He was amused, but knew neither his wife nor Kassquit would have been.