The antiquity of the village only increased the estimate. Honkies had cultivated the blue-clay fields for probably a thousand years. Worshipping the dew-god, and finding bright crystals which looked like solidified dew-drops and reflected the sun as the dew did, surely they would make votive offerings of such crystals!
He wore strings of them upon his headdress! Fahnes had one in his pocket now, dropped by the god when frightened by a flash-bulb! Even the headdress would make Fahnes rich, but it was mathematically certain that for a thousand years every Honkie had devoutly turned over to the temple every rough diamond found in the growing fields. And a thousand years of such devoutness would mean untold wealth.
He fired the flame-gun again from sheer destructiveness, then went snarling into the temple, ready to deal out death to anyone who dared to dispute anything with him.
The tall Honkie squatted on the ground outside the trading-post and worriedly mouthed his few words of Terrestrial speech. Boles listened with an air of indignation.
"Your runner caught up to me an' brought me back," Boles said dogmatically. "Accordin' to regulations I got to help you out any way I can. But this is bad!"
The Honkie struggled again to convey his meaning in Earth language. Then he fell back upon his own tongue.
"Lord," he said with dignity. "It was the dew-god's doing. We do not understand. The man came through our fields, approaching our village. And this was against the Law, so all our people pretended not see, lest he be shamed. Yet he had no shame even in breaking the Law. He shouted at us in the fields. He went to the village, where again those who were present pretended not to see. Then he took an instrument we know not and struck houses with it, destroying everything."
"A flame-gun," said Boles, scowling. "This is goin' to make trouble. He busted regulations."
"He went into the temple of the dew-god," the worried Honkie chieftain went on with dignified emphasis, "and there are bright stones which look like the dew, save that they do not vanish in the sunlight. They are also hard, and we carve our bowls and houses with them. But often, because they are like the dew, we give them to the dew-god. The man seemed to desire them greatly. He tore them from the walls of the temple where they are set. And then he saw the inner part of the temple where the dew-god's holiness stays. We had put the most beautiful of the bright stones there, and the dew-god's holiness covered them. But the man desired the stones so greatly that he threw himself into the dew-god's holiness, and he could not endure it. So he died."
"The dew-god's holiness, eh?" said Boles skeptically.
"The dew-god," said the Honkie chief practically, "shakes the dew from our crops before dawn, so that they do not change color and grow uneatable like the wild things of the jungle. One of us, each morning, carries his headdress and blows his horn for him among the crops. As the dew falls from the leaves it hurries to the dew-god's temple. Each morning dew-drops by millions run into his temple and gather in a great, deep gathering which is the holiness of the dew-god. And we place the brightest stones there to welcome them."
Boles blinked. Then he jumped.
"Holy?" he cried. "The dew's like a rainstorm, shook off all at once, an' you got a drainage system. Sure! You got a dewpond in the temple! A lake! A swimmin'-pool full of shook-off dew. An' bright stones were there?"
"Lord, the bright stones are covered by the holiness for a large space," said the Honkie chieftain apologetically. "And the man seemed to desire them greatly. If we had understood, we would have given them to him. We bring them from a great distance, but it is our religion freely to give one another the things that are most desirable. If it is the custom of men to desire those bright stones, we would surrender them."
Boles looked at the glittering handful of crystals he had taken from the pockets of Fahnes, after the Honkies had brought him back.
"It ain't worth while," he said vexedly. "They' what man call zircons. They' pretty, but there ain't any value to 'em for trade. They' just hard enough to use as tools to cut soapstones. Fahnes thought they were diamonds, I guess. When he saw a swimming-pool carpeted with diamonds on the bottom he went outa his head. He dived for 'em. An' the pool's prob'ly deeper than it looks. He hopped in to grab zircons he thought was diamonds, an' there wasn't any steps like a swimmin'-pool should have, an' he couldn't get out again. So he drowned—on Oryx, where it never rains. Good grief!"
"The dew-god destroyed him because he broke the law," said the Honkie respectfully.
"He died because he was a fool who didn't keep to regulations," said Boles caustically.
There was a booming noise overhead. It grew and grew in volume. It became a monstrous roar. It was so loud that the leaves of the jungle-trees quivered.
The supply-ship descended smoothly, creating a tumult which seemed to shake the very ground. And Boles stood up and clenched his fists in the ultimate of exasperation.
"He musta known this!" Boles cried furiously. "He knew the ship was comin' in ahead of schedule. It was his job to listen on space-radio when news comes through. But he didn't tell me, an' me with no stuff packed for shipment an' due to catch tarnation for holdin' up the ship! Blast him! It's his fault. He shoulda kept to regulations."
The Skit-tree Planet
The communicator-phone set up a clamor when the sky was just beginning to gray in what, on this as yet unnamed planet, they called the east because the local sun rose there. The call-wave had turned on the set and Wentworth kicked off his blankets and stumbled from his bunk in the atmosphere-flier, and went sleepily forward to answer. He pushed the answer-stud and said wearily:
"Hello! What's the trouble? . . . Talk louder, there's some static. . . . Oh. . . . No, there's no trouble. Why should there be? . . . The devil I'm late reporting! Haynes and I obeyed orders and tried to find the end of a confounded skit-tree plantation. We chased our tails all day long, but we made so much westing that we gained a couple of hours light. So it isn't sunrise yet, where we are. . . ." He yawned. "Oh, we set down the flier on a sort of dam and went to sleep. . . . No, nothing happened. We're used to feeling creepy. We thrive on it. Haynes says he's going to do a sculpture group of a skit-tree planter which will be just an eye peeking around a tree-trunk. . . . No! Dammit, no! We photographed a couple of hundred thousand square miles of skit-trees growing in neat rows, and we photographed dams, and canals, and a whole irrigation system, but not a sign of a living creature. . . . No cities, no houses, no ruins, no nothing. . . . I've got a theory, McRae, about what happened to the skit-tree planters." He yawned again. "Yeah. I think they built up a magnificent civilization and then found a snark. . . . Snark! S-N-A-R-K. . . . Yes. And the snark was a boojum." He paused. "So they silently faded away."
He grinned at the profanity that came out of the communicator speaker. Then McRae cut off, back at the irreverently nicknamed Galloping Cow, which was the base ship of the Extra-Solarian Research Institute expedition to this star-cluster. Wentworth stretched, and looked out of the atmosphere-flier's windows. He absently noticed that the static on the communication-set kept up, which was rather odd on an FM receiver. But before the fact could have any meaning, he saw something in motion in the pale gray light of dawn. He squinted. Then he caught his breath.
He stood frozen until the moving object vanished. It moved, somehow, as if it carried something. But it was bigger than the Galloping Cow! Only after it vanished did he breathe again, and then he licked his lips and blinked.