carefully when the miracle spoke, and if they believed what he said they would have the power to act.
“Badly served,” Farrari went on, “by deputies who cruelly abuse your people.”
One of the priests leaned forward and asked, “Cruelly abuse—how?”
“By starvation, by the zrilm whip, by the spear.” He touched his own scars. Kru and priests stared until Farrari stirred self-consciously and felt the scars begin to itch.
“What deputies?” the priest asked.
“Your soldiers, your durrlz—all who serve you with your people the olz serve you badly.”
They continued to stare. Farrari waited anxiously for something to happen. There had to be a set formula for concluding an audience with the kru, but IPR had not known what it was. Farrari hoped that it would not apply when the petitioner was a miracle.
Finally he announced, “The kru redresses all just grievances.” He paused. “Redress these!” he snapped. Kru and priests winced as though he had struck them. He bowed again, backed down the ramp, and turned away.
His last exit from this room had been through an eager, enthused crowd that pressed close to look, even to touch. Now all shrank from him. He marched to the door, waited until someone sprang to open it, and waited again until it crashed shut behind him before he resolutely began the long walk out of the city. The IPR specialists had told him that he would probably reach the temple unharmed, but they would make no prediction as to his return.
It was easier, because he no longer had the bread to carry. Again he was an object of curiosity, but there were few pedestrians about and no cavalry, and no one hindered him. He descended the hill, passed the suburb, and abruptly came upon the kru’s army, rank upon rank of mounted soldiers drawn up on either side of the highway, silently awaiting battle. He passed through it, expecting a rain of spears at any moment, but the soldiers sat with spears poised and made no movement.
Spread out on a distant hillside were the olz. They looked like a formidable army until he approached, and then they looked like olz. A messenger, one of the IPR agents, had told them to halt, so they stood indifferently in the hot sun awaiting another order. Farrari worked his way among them to where one of the agents stood. The agent arched an eyebrow inquiringly; Farrari shrugged. Even had they been able to talk he would have had little to say. He had marched an army on Scorv, he had made a miraculous and dramatic reappearance before kru and priests and nobility, and he seemed to have accomplished nothing.
Now he did not know what to do. He was still reluctant to turn back while there remained a possibility that the ol presence might force the rascz to think, but if he waited too long there was every likelihood that the army would charge and very effectively resolve the stalemate. He did not know what to do. The agent, too, was puzzled. He looked about perplexedly, having just worked it out for himself that nothing was happening and they couldn’t stay there forever.
They heard the clicking beat of gril hooves. It was a durrl, final proof, Farrari thought gloomily, that his plea had failed. Immediately he brightened, of course they’d send a durrl, who else could talk with the olz?
The durrl brought his gril to a halt. Farrari resigned himself to an interminable address in two languages because a blast of oratory concerning the kru’s redressment of just grievances would not find enough words in o/ to properly get started. He was also prepared to be amused.
The durrl leaned forward and said something. Abruptly the olz in the front rank turned, those behind them turned, and before Farrari could quite comprehend what had happened his army had done an about face and was marching away, he along with it. The durrl wheeled and rode toward Scory without a backward glance. Farrari was sorely tempted to turn the olz toward Scory again, but he feared that rasc patience might have a breaking point.
At dusk the IPR agents halted the march. Farrari left them in charge of his olz and continued south where a platform picked him up as soon as darkness fell. He was back at base before morning. Base already had the news, and Jorrul and the coordinator were seated in one of the conference rooms discussing it. They’d left word for Farrari to join them.
“The rascz know something we don’t know,” Jorrul announced bluntly.
“Or understand something we don’t?” Farrari suggested.
Coordinator Paul nodded. “They’ve had considerable more experience with the olz than we have. You produced the illusion of a revolution, but evidently the rascz know that the olz won’t revolt. When we study the events of the past few weeks, we’d best start by trying to understand that.”
“You study the events of the past few weeks,” Farrari said. “I’m going to revert to a Cultural Survey Advanced Trainee.”
Jorrul snorted. “There’s no future in that. If I’ve heard you say it once, I’ve heard it a dozen times: the olz have no culture.”
Farrari got to his feet and strode to the observation window. The first light of dawn was touching the bleak mountain landscape. The mountains wore encircling mantles of dusky yellow quarm leaves, and there were, even in midsummer, snowcaps on the highest peaks. He wondered if JPR had chosen this particular location for some obscure psychological purpose: certainly the view was no more formidable than IPR’s problem on Branoff IV.
“The olz have no culture,” Farrari repeated slowly. “If I’ve said it that many times, I should have given some thought to what it meant.”
“Just what do you mean by that?”
“The olz have no culture. Neither do the grilz nor the narmpfz.”
“So? Grilz and narmpfz are animals. You’re expecting animals to produce a culture?”
“No,” Farrari said. “But people should.”
The history section appropriated all the teloid projectors not in use, set up batteries of them wherever space permitted, and operated them continuously with changing shifts of carefully briefed volunteers. As section chief Wally Hargo remarked, IPR had been on Branoff IV long enough to take a lot of teloids.
“Any progress?” Farrari asked him.
Hargo shook his head. “There’s no way to speed up a teloid projection, and we wouldn’t if we could. Whatever we’re looking for is going to be hard to find even if it’s there, which it probably won’t be.”
Peter Jorrul hobbled in using a cane and thundered, “Which one of you miscreants stole my teloid projector?”
“Hargo,” Farrari said. “But you can use it any time you like if you don’t mind looking at his teloids.”
“It isn’t enough that this place is infested with super-specialists,” Jorrul grumbled. “You two have to run a super-teloid production.”
“You’re looking fine,” Farrari told him. “All you needed was a few weeks away from base.”
“Away from the food at base. I can’t let myself be seen, no rasc walks with a cane, but at least at my headquarters I can eat. What are you two looking for?”
