Страница 12 из 44
“Ben, let’s get these agreements signed,” Grego said. “Then we can give the kids some attention.”
“Where’ll we sign them, in your office?” he asked Rainsford.
“No, sign them right here at the table where everybody can watch. That’s what the party’s about, isn’t it?” Rainsford said.
They cleared a space in front of the Governor-General, putting Fuzzies on the floor or handing them to people farther down on either side. The scrolls, three copies of each agreement, were brought; Rainsford had one of his secretaries read them aloud. The first was the general agreement, by which the Colonial Government agreed to lease, for nine hundred and ninety-nine years, all unseated public lands to the Charterless Zarathustra Company, Ltd., of Zarathustra, excepting the area on Beta Continent set aside as a Fuzzy Reservation, in return for which the said Charterless Zarathustra Company, Ltd., agreed to carry on all the nonprofit public services previously performed by the Chartered Zarathustra Company, and, in addition, to conduct researches and studies for the benefit of the race known as Fuzzy sapiens zarathustra at Science Center. Except for the northern part of Beta Continent, the new Company was getting back, as lessees, everything it had lost as owner by the Pendarvis Decisions.
Rainsford and Grego signed it, with Gus Bra
Rainsford and Grego, and Gus and Leslie Coombes signed it, so did Jack Holloway, as Commissioner of Native Affairs. They picked half a dozen more witnesses who also signed.
“What’s the matter with having a few Fuzzies sign it too?” Grego asked, indicating the crowd that had climbed to the table on both sides to watch what the Big Ones were doing. “It’s their Reservation, and it’s their sunstones.”
“Oh, Victor,” Coombes protested. “They can’t sign this. They’re incompetent aborigines, and legally minor children. And besides, they can’t write. At least, not yet.”
“They can fingerprint after their names, the way any other illiterates do,” Gus Bra
“Chief Justice Pendarvis, give us a guidance-opinion on that,” Coombes said. “I’d like some Fuzzies to sign it, but not if it would impair the agreement.”
“Oh, it would not do that, Mr. Coombes,” Pendarvis said. “Not in my opinion, anyhow. Mr. Justice Janiver, what’s your opinion?”
“Well, as witnesses, certainly,” Janiver agreed. “The Fuzzies are here present and the signing takes place within their observation; they can certainly testify to that.”
“I think,” Pendarvis said, “that the Fuzzies ought to be informed of the purpose of this signing, though.”
“Mr. Bra
“Jack, you try it; you know more about Fuzzies than I do,” Bra
“Well, I can try.” He turned to Diamond and Little Fuzzy and Mamma Fuzzy and a few others closest to him.
“Big Ones make name-marks on paper,” he said. “This means, Big Ones go into woods-place Fuzzies come from — dig holes, get stones, make trade with other Big Ones. Then get nice things, give to Fuzzies. Make name-marks on paper for Fuzzies, Fuzzies make finger-marks.”
“Why make finga’p’int?” Little Fuzzy asked. “Get idee-disko?” He fingered the silver disc at his throat.
“No; just make finga’p’int. Then, somebody ask Fuzzies, Fuzzies say, yes, saw Big Ones make name-marks.”
“But why?” Diamond wanted to know. “Big Ones give Fuzzies nice things now.”
“This is playtime for Big Ones,” Flora said. “Pappy Ben make play like this all the time, make name-mark on paper.”
“That’s right,” Bra
CHAPTER SEVEN
GUS BRANNHARD SAID, “Well, I was wrong. I am most happy to admit it. I’ve been getting the same reports, from all over, and the editorial opinion is uniformly favorable.”
Leslie Coombes, in the screen, nodded. He was in the library of his apartment across the city, with a coffee service and a stack of papers and teleprint sheets on the table in front of him.
“Editorial opinion, of course, doesn’t win elections, but the grass-roots level reports are just as good. Things are going to be just as they always were, and that’s what most people really want. It ought to gain us some votes, instead of losing us any. These people Hugo Ingerma
“Is Victor still in town?”
“Oh, no. He left for Yellowsand Canyon before daybreak. He’s been having men and equipment shifted in there from Big Blackwater for the last week. By this time, they’re probably digging out sunstones by the peck.”
He laughed. Like a kid with a new rifle; couldn’t wait to try it out. “I suppose he took Diamond along?” Grego never went anywhere without his Fuzzy. “Well, why don’t you drop around to Government House for cocktails? Jack’s still in town, and we can talk without as many interruptions, human and otherwise, as last evening.”
Coombes said he would be glad to. They chatted for a few minutes, then broke the co
“The Honorable — technically, of course — Hugo Ingerma
“Well, I’ve been trying to get him ever since I took office,” he said. “Put him on.” Then he snapped on the recorder.
The screen flickered and cleared, and a plump, well-barbered face looked out of it, affable and candid, with i
“Good morning, Mr. Bra
“Good morning indeed, Mr. Ingerma
“Ah, I believe there is something I can do for you, Mr. Bra
“I couldn’t even consider them. You know pleas of guilty to capital charges aren’t admissible.”
Ingerma