“That is the type of behavior we expect of a loving and responsible Parent.”
Lioren turned all of his eyes on the aging Earth-human, trying vainly to find the words of respect and admiration that were suited to the occasion. Finally, he said, “Your words are not supposition. I believe them to describe the facts of the situation in every important respect. This information will greatly aid my understanding of Hellishomar’s emotional distress. I am truly grateful, sir.”
“There is a way that you can show your gratitude,” O’Mara said.
Lioren did not reply.
O’Mara shook its head and looked past Lioren at the office door. “Before you leave,” it said, “there is information you should have and a question we would like you to ask the patient. Who requested medical assistance for it, and how? The usual communications channels were not used, and telepathy, originating as it does from an organic nondirectional transmitter of very low power, is supposed to be impossible at distances over a few hundred yards. There is also great mental discomfort when a telepath tries to force communication with a nontelepath.
“But the facts,” the Chief Psychologist went on, “are that Captain Stillson, the commander of the orbiting contact ship, reported having a strange feeling. He was the only member of the crew to have this feeling, which he likened to a strong hunch that something was wrong on the planetary surface. Until then nobody had even considered making a landing on Groalter without permission from the natives, but Stillson took his ship down to the precise spot where the injured Hellishomar was awaiting retrieval and arranged to transport the patient without delay to Sector General, all because he had a very strong feeling that he should do these things. The captain insists that at no time was there any outside influence and that his mind remained his own.”
Lioren was still trying to assimilate this new information, and wondering whether or not it should be given to the patient, when O’Mara spoke again.
“It makes me wonder about the mental capabilities of the adult Groalterri,” it said in a voice so quiet that it might have been talking to itself. “If they do not, as now seems evident, communicate with their own young because of the risk of stunting subsequent mental and philosophical development, that must also be the reason they refuse all contact with our supposedly advanced cultures of the Federation.”
CHAPTER 17
LlOREN’s next meeting with Hellishomar was very useful and intensely frustrating. It gave many interesting pieces of information about the life and behavior of the Small, and said that Lioren was free to discuss the material with others, but it seemed to be talking too much about a subject that was not on its mind. The Monitor Corps would be delighted with the details of Groalterri Small society that he was discovering, but Lioren had a strong feeling that the patient was talking to avoid talking about something else. After three hours of listening to information that was becoming repetitious, Lioren lost patience.
During the next pause he said quickly, “Hellishomar, I am pleased and grateful, as will be my colleagues, for this information about your home world. But I would prefer to hear, and
I have the feeling that you would prefer to speak, about yourself.”
The Groalterri stopped talking.
Lioren forced patience on himself and tried to find the right words of encouragement. Speaking slowly and with many pauses, so as to give Hellishomar every chance to interrupt his questions with an answer, he asked, “Are you concerned about your injuries? There is no need because Seldal assures me that the treatment, although delayed because of the size difference between surgeon and patient, is progressing well and your life is no longer threatened by the infection that has penetrated your body. Are you not a skilled Cutter and highly respected by the Small, who will soon welcome you back to continue the work of extending the lives of Parents? Surely these ailing Parents must also hold you in high regard because of the surgical skills that you can still—”
“I have grown too large to help the Parents,” Hellishomar said suddenly, “or to continue as a Cutter. The Small will not want me, either. I am nothing but a failure and an embarrassment to all of them, and I am doubly ashamed because of the great wrong I have done.”
Lioren wished that he had more time to think about the implications of this information, and his need to question Hellishomar more closely about it was like a great hunger in his mind. But he was moving into a sensitive area that had been approached before without success. It was likely that too many questions on this subject might seem to Hellishomar like an interrogation, might even imply a judgment and the apportioning of guilt on Lioren’s part. His instincts told him that this was a time for further encouragement rather than questions.
“But surely you have grown in surgical experience as well as physical size,” Lioren said. “You have said as much yourself. Among many of the peoples of the Federation, an entity who has amassed great knowledge, and who is no longer capable of the physical work involved, makes that knowledge available to the young and less experienced members of its profession. You could become a teacher, Hellishomar. Your knowledge could be passed on to others of the Small who are sure to be grateful to you for it, as would the Parents for the lives you will indirectly have saved. Is this not so?”
Hellishomar’s enormous tentacles moved restively, heaving like great, fleshy waves on an organic ocean. “It is not so, Lioren. The Small will pretend that I do not exist, so that my shame will drive me to the loneliest and most inhospitable part of the swamp that I can find, and the Parents … The Parents will ignore and never speak with their minds to me. There are precedents, thankfully a very few, in Groalterri history for what will happen to me. I will be an outcast for the whole of my very long life, with only my thoughts and my guilt for company, for that is the punishment I deserve.”
The words, thought Lioren with a sudden rush of remembered pain and guilt, were an echo of those he had used so often to himself, and for a moment he could think of nothing but the Cromsaggar. Frantically he tried to return his mind to Hellish-omar’s sin, which could not possibly be as grievous as that of wiping out a planetary population. Perhaps one of the Small, or even a Parent, had died because of something Hellishomar had or had not done. With Lioren’s crime there could be no real comparison.
In an unsteady voice Lioren said, “I cannot know whether or not your punishment is deserved unless you tell me of the crime, or the sin, you have committed. I know nothing of Groalterri philosophy or theology, and I would be pleased to learn of these matters from you if you are allowed to discuss them. But from my recent studies I know that there is one factor common to all the religions practiced throughout the Federation, and that is forgiveness for sins. Are you sure the Parents will not forgive you?”
“The Parents did not touch my mind,” Hellishomar replied. “If they did not do so before I left Groalter, they never will.”
“Are you sure?” Lioren said again. “Did you know that the Parents touched the mind of the officer commanding the ship orbiting your planet? The touch was gentle and almost without trace, and it was the first and only time that a Groalterri made direct contact with an off-worlder, but nevertheless the captain was directed accurately to the place where you were dying.”
Without giving Hellishomar time to respond, Lioren continued. “You have already told me that the Parents are philosophically incapable of inflicting physical damage or pain, and mat even the most skilled Cutters among the Small are too crude and awkward in their methods to undertake surgery on one of their own kind; only the oldest and largest Parents become sick, the Small never. It is certain that your Small colleagues could never equal the delicacy and precision of the work performed by Seldal. You know this to be so, and you know also that if you had not been taken to this hospital you would be dead.
“That being so,” Lioren went on quickly, “is it not possible, indeed is it not a certainty that the Parents responsible for your presence here have already forgiven you? By their willingness to break with Groalterri tradition to ask help from an off-planet species, have they not given proof that they have forgiven you, that they value you and are doing all that they can to help you return to full health?”
While he had been speaking, the patient’s great body had remained absolutely motionless, but it was the stillness of extreme muscular tension rather than repose. Lioren hoped that the Hudlar nurse on the tractor beam was alert to the situation and ready to pull him out.
“They spoke to a strange, Small-minded off-worlder,” Hellishomar said, “but not to me.”
Be careful, Lioren told himself warningly, this might be a very hurt and angry Groalterri. “I had assumed from what you told me earlier that the Parents did not touch the minds of the Small for any reason. Was I mistaken?
