The Mote in God's Eye

“If they were that easy to break, they can probably be fixed,” Horvath said soothingly. “Look, we can give you one of the urns from the labs, or have one of our techs— Ah, Miss Fowler, has the alien calmed down? Now, Mr Whitbread? We’re glad you’re here; we’ve been waiting for you, as the only man to have actually communicated with the alien. Here, Commander Cargill, please stay away from the Motie—”

But Cargill was halfway across the room. The alien cringed a bit, but Cargill stayed well out of her reach. He glowered at her as he considered his coffee maker. It had been reassembled.

The Motie pulled away from Sally Fowler. She found a conical plastic container, filled it with tap water, and used it to fill the coffee maker. One of the wardroom stewards sniggered.

The Motie poured in two containers of water, inserted the grounds basket, and waited.

The amused steward looked to Cargill, who nodded. The messboy dug out the tin of ground coffee, used the measuring spoon, and started the urn. The alien watched closely all the while. So did one of the miniatures, despite the distraction of a biologist waving a carrot in her face. “It did that before, watched me make the coffee, sir,” the steward said. “Thought it might want some, but the scientists didn’t offer it none.”

“We may have a godawful mess here in a minute, Ernie. Stand by to clean up.” Cargill turned to Sally. “How good is that monster at putting things together again?”

“Quite good,” Sally told him. “She fixed my pocket computer.”

The percolator bubbled, and the water in the indicator tube turned brown. Cargill hesitantly poured a cup and tasted. “Why, that’s all right,” he said. He handed the cup to the Motie.

She tasted the black, bitter brew, squawled, and threw the cup at the bulkhead.

Sally led Whitbread into the wardroom pantry. “You made the Motie understand you. How?”

“It was only that once,” Whitbread said. “I’ve been wondering if I made a mistake. Could she have decided to let me loose about the time I opened my helmet and screamed?”

Sally scowled. “She just stands

there. She doesn’t even seem to know we’re trying to talk to her. And she never tries to talk back…” She dropped her voice, muttering mostly to herself. “It is a basic characteristic of intelligent species that they attempt to communicate. Whitbread, what’s your first name?”

Whitbread was startled. “Jonathon, my lady.”

“All right, Jonathon, I’m Sally. As man to woman, Jonathon, what in blazes am I doing wrong? Why won’t she try to talk to me?”

“Well, Sally,” Whitbread said tentatively. He liked the taste of the name. And she wasn’t more than a couple of years older than he was— “Sally, I could think of half a dozen reasons. Maybe she reads minds.”

“What would that have to do with—”

“She wouldn’t know about language, would she? What you’re trying to teach wouldn’t make sense. Maybe she can only read our minds when we’re screaming mad, like I was.”

“Or Commander Cargill was—” Sally said thoughtfully. “She did move away from the coffee maker. But not for long. No, I don’t believe it.”

“Neither do I. I think she’s lying.”

“Lying?”

“Playing dumb. She doesn’t know what to tell us, so she tells us nothing. Plays for time. She is interested in our machinery. This gives her time to learn about it.”

Sally nodded slowly. “One of the biologists had the same idea. That she’s waiting for instructions, and learning as much as she can until they come— Jonathon, how would we catch her at it?”

“I don’t think we do,” Whitbread said slowly. “How would you catch an intelligent mouse playing dumb, if you’d never seen a mouse and neither had anyone else?”

“Blazes. Well, we’ll just have to keep on trying.” She frowned, thinking of the Motie’s performance with the coffee maker, then gave Whitbread a long, thoughtful look. “You’re exhausted. Go get some sleep, there’s nothing you need to tell us right away, is there?”

“No.” Whitbread yawned. There was a scampering sound behind him and they both turned quickly, but there was nothing there. “Speaking of mice,” Whitbread said.

“How can they live on a steel ship?” Sally asked.

Whitbread shrugged. “They come aboard with the food supplies, even in personal gear. Once in a while we evacuate portions of the ship, move the crew around, and open up to space, to control them, but we never get them all. This trip, with all the extra personnel aboard, we haven’t even been able to do that.”

“Interesting.” Sally nodded. “Mice can live almost anywhere humans can—you know, there are probably as many mice in the galaxy as people? We’ve carried them to nearly every planet. Jonathon, are the miniatures mice?”

Whitbread shrugged. “She certainly didn’t care about them. Killed all but two—but why bring two aboard? And a randomly selected two at that.”

Sally nodded again. “We watched her catch them.” She laughed suddenly. “And Mr. Renner was wondering if they were baby Moties! Get to sleep, Jonathon. We’ll see you in ten hours or so.”

17. Mr. Crawford’s Eviction