The President laughed too, but he looked at his wife and almost shrugged. "That's all you want? Just some livestock?"
"No, no. I also wish recent publications, on microfiche by choice. Philosophical Transactions, Science, the Journal of Astrophysics, and about one hundred fifty others."
The President's wife said, "We don't have much of that kind of stuff, Jeron. I think we got some copies of Popular Science Monthly down to the Marine dayroom, but they've mostly got pretty tatty by now."
"No, not Science. Or any equivalent journal of recent research in the physical sciences."
The President cleared his throat. "I think you better have a drink after all, son. There's no magazines like that coming out anymore."
"There must be! How else would scientists exchange information about available instruments, for instance?"
The Vice President put her hand on his arm in real sympathy for this young boy who was so evidently feeling frustrated and angry. "I'm real sorry, honey. We don't get any magazines like that—or, tell the truth and shame the devil, most any new magazines at all. Don't need that sort of thing anymore, you know. The only instrumentation we need's maybe a stick to measure how high the water's got."
Jeron scowled, rubbing the area around his navel. The thought of returning to Uncle Shef and Uncle Ski without the journals they had ordered was giving him a stomachache. He said stubbornly, "I just can't believe there isn't any scientific research going on."
"Oh, hell, 'course there is," the President said with pride. "I got over twenty-five people over to the Defense Department, making gunpowder and such, and Mae's got a whole bunch in the Department of Home Economics and Cooking, don't you, hon?"
"Well, yeah. But that's not quite what the young man means, Jimbo. There's none of that fancy stuff here. I don't think there's any of that anywhere in the world—" The Vice President hesitated. "Except maybe in Puget," she finished. "They're more into technology there. I mean, if that's really what you want," she added, catching her husband's chilly eye.
"What she means," the President explained, "is you don't want to mess around with the Pugets. They still take scalps, you know."
The Vice President had never had any children, but all that proved was that nature made some silly mistakes. She was as motherly a type as had ever occupied that high office, and she frowned, leaned forward, and pressed the palm of her hand against Jeron's forehead. "Jimbo," she declared, "this boy doesn't need any more talk of taking scalps and making deals. He's wore out. What he needs is to go right off to bed."
The President looked rebellious, but only for a minute; after all, he would have plenty of other chances. "One last thing," he said jovially. "And I'm gonna insist you put just a drop of this mountain dew in your Coke for it. You and me and Mae here are going to drink a toast. To our eternal friendship between planets! And to our common goal, the reunification of the U. S. of A., and then of the whole doggone world!"
Jeron had a flickering electric light in his room, but all the rest of the furnishings looked ancient. He pulled back the covers, regarded the narrow canvas cot he was supposed to sleep in with distaste, and climbed in. What a place! And what people!
There was hardly a word they said that did not seem to reflect so basic a difference in orientation and desires that communication was almost hopeless. That "toast" of the President's, for instance—was that what the President thought they were here for? To help him "reunify" something that Jeron really thought was a lot less troublesome left fragmented? There was really only one reason they were here—because he and Aunt Eve had idly dreamed up the trip, and Shef and Flo and Ski had seen enough practical value in it for themselves to help build the ship.
He sighed heavily and flounced over in the cot, trying to get comfortable . . . and then sat up.
Someone had opened his door.
"It's only me, Darien McCullough," whispered a female voice.
"How did you get in here? What do you want?" he demanded.
"You always ask at least two questions at once," the woman complained. He could hear her moving around, and then the light went on—she had known, he perceived, exactly where to find it. "Satisfied?" she asked, spreading her hands. "See, no guns, no knives. Now I better turn the light off again, so nobody will come up to see what's going on." As the light went off, she added, "I just wanted you to know. We aren't, and we don't."
"Aren't what? Don't what?" The only illumination now was misty moonlight coming in through the window, but Jeron could see her well enough as she came to sit on the edge of his bed.
"We aren't riddled with VD, and we don't take scalps. Jimbo's a liar, you see."
Jeron said, "Huh." He pulled his ankles up under his thighs and studied her. It was very hard to tell how old these Earthies were. She could have been anything from his own age to Aunt Eve's. Dressed simply in denim slacks and a patterned blouse, her fair hair short and curly, she looked principally female. She smelled that way, too, in ways that none of the women of his experience had ever smelled. Jeron knew it was called "perfume" from reading, but until now his knowledge of it had been entirely theoretical. "I think," he said, "that you could not know that the President had said such things of you unless you used electronic instruments. Is that correct?"
"It's none of your business, Jeron," she said, pleasantly enough. "We do know a lot of what the President says when he doesn't think we're listening. Some of it worries us, and it ought to worry you, too."
There was something about the way she averted her eyes as she spoke that made Jeron suspect he was violating her nudity tabus; he pulled the stiff sheet up over him, and she relaxed. "Jim takes that 'President' stuff pretty seriously," she went on. "He won't be happy until he's President of fifty states again, all the way to Hawaii, and I think you ought to know that he's counting on you to do it for him."
"That's silly," Jeron said dispassionately. "We would not involve ourselves in these petty disagreements."
"You may not have a choice, buster!" Her tone was suddenly sharp, but softened as she went on. "You ought to get out of here while you have the chance," she said seriously. "That's why I came trekking all across the continent. To warn you. And to invite you to Puget."
"Huh," said Jeron, sniffing a little more deeply. The smells of sex he knew and the scents of flowers he knew, but this combination was something new. He moved, and the sheet fell away, and Darien McCullough glanced down.
"Oh, for God's sake," she said, "shame on you. Why, I'm old enough to be your mother."
"So is my mother old enough to be my mother," said Jeron, "but that does not keep me from wanting—"
"I don't want to hear!" She was laughing, but she was embarrassed, too—one more way in which she resembled his mother, Jeron thought. She clung to her subject. "So will you come? To Puget, I mean?"
"Huh." Jeron pulled the sheet up again. "How far is it?"
"About four thousand kilometers, I guess, more or less." He scowled with the effort of trying to imagine four thousand kilometers in a straight line. "We'd have to go in your ship," she added, "but I guess there's room, and anyway you want to get it away from Jimbo as soon as you can. Unless you want to take the road, train, boat, and portage, the way I came?" She stood up, suddenly, and listened for a sound outside. Then, more softly, "I have to go. Think about it, Jeron. It's important. . . ."
When she was gone, leaving behind only that disturbing scent, a shimmer of moonlight told Jeron that he still had company. "I really thought you were going to get laid that time, boy," Uncle Ghost whispered from the draperies over the windows.