"Yeh," said Barton. "And how about the Filjar?"

"You would have to see. Size, bulk of Filjar is of large part fur and loose folds of skin. Slow movement is not of bulk, but slower racial characteristic of nervous system.

But Filjar minds are fast and keen.

"Filjar with fur removed, loose skin cut away and made tight, are strange to see. The ones I saw did not adjust-they set their minds and, of purpose, died. And they had not lost sex, even-when not of use, it retracts, so Demu did not notice and remove."

"Bully for them." The comment was a conversation stopper and Barton knew it-but what else was there to say? "Well, I guess we all have things to do-right?"

Barton didn't, but he left the table and set out to look for something.

In the control room he (pund Vertan, the Tilaran, in discussion with Vito Scalsa. Both were having difficulty with the language barrier; Barton volunteered to inter- pret.

"What we're working on," said Scalsa, "is coordination and timing. Flight plans-all that."

Barton knew what the problem was. The Tilaran space drive was similar to that of the Demu, but less ef- ficient-it could match the Earth ships in top velocity but not in acceleration, either line-of-flight or turning.

The difficulty was in planning departure times and rout- ings so that all would arrive at rendezvous in Demu territory near-simultaneously.

"When we think we know agreement," Vertan said, "we find we have, one or other, failed to make all num- bers of same kind." Tilaran duodecimal numbering had confused matters before-Barton was surprised that no one had come up with an overall solution. He thought about it-why, hell, it was simple!

"Scalsa, you're good on the computer. Why don't you

189.

program the tin beast to run all calculations parallel- decimal and duodecimal, both? Tag your input 'data whichever it is, and run comparison-conversion checks on your double readouts to catch any glitches. Won't that do it?" Switching to Tilaran, he repeated the pro- posal to Vertan.

Scalsa grinned. "Sure, it'll do it. / should have thought of that." He frowned. "You know why I didn't?" Barton waited. "Because I had the idea I was here to take or- ders, same as back on Earth, working for the Agency."

"Well, from now on you're here to think, too, Scalsa."

Barton saw he had been too abrupt, and added, "No blame-I know how it is." He spoke briefly to Vertan- putting him and Scalsa on their own again-and left them.

He found Limila, in their compartment, packing a suitcase. What the hell? She looked up from the dress she had folded neatly, and smiled. "Hello, Barton."

"Yen, hello. What's going on? You moving out or something?"

"For a time, yes." She stood, came to him and em- braced. "I told you-I am to have TUari teeth again.

Perhaps even breasts, of a sort. And for that-to find out-I must go to a surgical place, what you call a hos- pital. Only a few days-and then we know. Barton, how I am to appear in life for all our time. You do not ob- ject?"

Barton's anxieties collapsed-goddamn my paranoid instincts, he thought. He held her close. "Sure not. Can I come to see you?"

"I would think so. I will ask. Barton .. . ?"

"Yes."

"Good. I will have to change clothes, anyway."

Next day the prospect of meeting Larka-Te and Filjar helped take Barton's mind off Limila's absence. Over breakfast, Tarleton gave him additonal briefing.

"Don't smile at the Larka-Te, any more than you can help-it confuses them." Barton felt himself looking puz- zled. "Among themselves," Tarleton continued, "they con- verse with facial expressions nearly as much as with words-and mostly with variations, or modes, as they call them, of the smile."

"How do they manage talking over a voice circuit?"

"They don't. The Larka-Te never bothered to invent

190.

voice-only communications. Until they had a workable picture-phone, they made do with writing-including a sort of hieroglyphics for the accompanying smile modes.

Used as punctuation, no less."

Barton thought he saw the problem, now. "So if we smile, they think we mean something we don't?"

"Precisely. A Larka-Te may say 'welcome,' and be smiling in anything from the 'my dwelling is yours' mode to the 'I have waited long for vengeance' mode. Re- duced to nothing but words in a foreign language, they have a hard time of it. The ones here on Tilara have had a lot of practice-but still, try to hold it down on the grins."

"I'll keep it in mind," Barton said. "By the way, are they all men? No Larka-Te women?"

"I have no idea-they haven't said. They all dress alike, and the names don't tell me a thing-any more than the Filjar names do."

"Yen-how about our furry friends? Anything in particular to watch out for, there?"

"Nothing special, except don't try to be in a hurry.

You won't have to worry about facial expressions- with all that fur, they don't really have any. And again, I have no idea which ones might be male or female. All that loose skin and bulky fur doesn't tell you much."

"They don't wear clothes?"

"Just a sort of utility harness, with pockets and such.

Several different kinds-according to rank, maybe, or job function-I don't know."

"They don't sound too interesting, somehow."

"Don't sell them short, Barton. They wouldn't be on the same team with the Tilari if they didn't have some- thing on the ball."

"Yeh, I guess so. You ready to go?"

A few preparations later, they left the ship. As usual, a Tilaran driver waited in a silent, oddly shaped ground car, to take them the kilometer or so to the conference building. At the end of the ride, Barton thanked her. She smiled in reply.

Inside, with about half a dozen each of Larka-Te and Filjar added to the usual group, the building seemed crowded-but Barton found that the feeling didn't last long. During the introductions he was somewhat be- mused, wondering how the Larka-Te managed to be so impressive.

191.

They were not tall-the tallest matched Barton's own ^ height, which was average for Earth. But there was a ;'.

lean, proud look to them-hawklike, almost, yet not predatory. Barton caught the name of the first one- Corval-and missed the rest. It was par for the course;

he'd never been good at names. /

There were no discernible sex differences. All the Larka-Te wore snug, bulgeless tunics, brightly colored, f reaching to midthigh. Each had short, light-reddish hair; ^ in the front it fell to cover perhaps half the forehead, f Like a crew cut growing out, thought Barton-or maybe s it was like fur and grew no longer. Or then again, pos- * % sibly the Larka-Te were conformists. Nonetheless, Bar- ton could not ignore the impact of their lean, intense ^ faces. I-

Tarleton was saying the right words; Barton had only f to nod. Then he saw Corval smiling at him, and realized ^ he had let his own face slip. Quickly, he pulled it back to solemnity.

> "You have heard, then." Corval spoke in Tilaran.

Barton signed assent. "Be not of care. Barton-we know you do not share that means of communion, that your face does not mean what it says." Somehow, Corval's nonsmile was most expressive. "Do you know what your face said?"