After he took the stand, the clerk of the court looked at him blankly for a moment. Then he turned to Judge Nelson.
“Your Honor, how am I gonna go about swearing him in?” he asked. “What does a z’Srauff swear by, that’s binding?”
The President Judge frowned for a moment. “Does anybody here know Basic well enough to translate the oath?” he asked.
“I think I can,” I offered. “I spent a great many years in our Consular Service, before I was sent here. We use Basic with a great many alien peoples.”
“Administer the oath, then,” Nelson told me.
“Put up right hand,” I told the z’Srauff. “Do you truly say, in front of Great One who made all worlds, who has knowledge of what is in the hearts of all persons, that what you will say here will be true, all true, and not anything that is not true, and will you so say again at time when all worlds end? Do you so truly say?”
“Yes. I so truly say.”
“Say your name.”
“Ppmegll Kkuvtmmecc Cicici.”
“What is your business?”
“I put things made of cloth into this world, and I take meat out of this world.”
“Where do you have your house?”
“Here in New Austin, over my house of business, on Coronado Street.”
“What people do you see in this place that you have made business with?”
Ppmegll Kkuvtmmecc Cicici pointed a three-fingered hand at the Bonney brothers.
“What business did you make with them?”
“I gave them for money a machine which goes on the ground and goes in the air very fast, to take persons and things about.”
“Is that the thing you gave them for money?” I asked, pointing at the exhibit aircar.
“Yes, but it was new then. It has been made broken by things from guns now.”
“What money did they give you for the machine?”
“One hundred pesos.”
That started another uproar. There wasn’t a soul in that courtroom who didn’t know that five thousand pesos would have been a giveaway bargain price for that car.
“Mr. Ambassador,” one of the associate judges interrupted. “I used to be in the used-car business. Am I expected to believe that this … this being … sold that aircar for a hundred pesos?”
“Here’s a notarized copy of the bill of sale, from the office of the Vehicles Registration Bureau,” I said. “I introduce it as evidence.”
There was a disturbance at the back of the room, and then the z’Srauff Ambassador, Gglafrr Ddespttann Vuvuvu, came stalking down the aisle, followed by a couple of Rangers and two of his attachés. He came forward and addressed the court.
“May you be happy, sir, but I am in here so quickly not because I have desire to make noise, but because it is only short time since it got in my knowledge that one of my persons is in this place. I am here to be of help to him that he not get in trouble, and to be of help to you. The name for what I am to do in this place is not part of my knowledge. Please say it for me.”
“You are a friend of the court,” Judge Nelson told him. “An amicus curiae.”
“You make me happy. Please go on; I have no desire to put stop to what you do in this place.”
“From what person did you get this machine that you gave to these persons for one hundred pesos?” I asked.
Gglafrr immediately began barking and snarling and yelping at my witness. The drygoods importer looked startled, and Judge Nelson banged with his gavel.
“That’s enough of that! There’ll be nothing spoken in this court but English, except through an interpreter!”
“Yow! I am sad that what I did was not right,” the z’Srauff Ambassador replied contritely. “But my person here has not as part of his knowledge that you will make him say what may put him in trouble.”
Nelson nodded in agreement.
“You are right: this person who is here has no need to make answer to any question if it may put him in trouble or make him seem less than he is.”
“I will not make answer,” the witness said.
“No further questions.”
I turned to Goodham, and then to Sidney; they had no questions, either. I handed another slip of paper to the bailiff, and another z’Srauff, named Bbrarkk Jjoknyyegg Kekeke took the stand.
He put into this world things for small persons to make amusement with; he took out of this world meat and leather. He had his house of business in New Austin, and he pointed out the three Bonneys as persons in this place that he saw that he had seen before.
“And what business did you make with them?” I asked.
“I gave them for money a gun which sends out things of twenty-millimeters very fast, to make death or hurt come to men and animals and does destruction to machines and things.”
“Is this the gun?” I showed it to him.
“It could be. The gun was made in my world; many guns like it are made there. I am certain that this is the very gun.”
I had a notarized copy of a customs house bill in which the gun was described and specified by serial number. I introduced it as evidence.
“How much money did these three persons give you for this gun?” I asked.
“Five pesos.”
“The customs appraisal on this gun is six hundred pesos,” I mentioned.
Immediately, Ambassador Vuvuvu was on his feet. “My person here has not as part of his knowledge that he may put himself in trouble by what he says to answer these questions.”
That put a stop to that. Bbrarkk Jjoknyyegg Kekeke immediately took refuge in refusal to answer on grounds of self-incrimination.
“That is all, Your Honor,” I said, “And now,” I continued, when the witness had left the stand, “I have something further to present to the court, speaking both as amicus curiae and as Ambassador of the Solar League. This court cannot convict
