Stranger in a Strange Land

Terrifying and beautiful! Why, these people must even now be preparing to abandon the city to its thoughts before it shattered under the strain and became not. And yet, by mere time, the city was only an egg.

Mike looked forward to returning to Washington in a century or two to walk its empty streets and try to grow close to its endless pain and beauty, grokking thirstily until he was Washington and the city was himself—if he were strong enough by then. Then he firmly filed the thought away as he knew that he must grow and grow and grow before he would be able to praise and cherish the city’s mighty anguish.

The Greyhound driver swung far east at one point in response to a temporary rerouting of unscheduled traffic (caused, unknown to Mike, by Mike’s own presence), and Mike, for the first time, saw the sea.

Jill had to point it out to him and tell him that it was water, and Dorcas added that it was the Atlantic Ocean and traced the shore line on the map. Mike was not ignorant: he had known since he was a nestling that the planet next nearer the Sun was almost covered with the water of life and lately he had learned that these people accepted this lavish richness casually. He had even taken, unassisted, the much more difficult hurdle of grokking at last the Martian orthodoxy that the water ceremony did not require water, that water was merely symbol for the essence beautiful but not indispensable.

But, like many a human still virgin toward some major human experience, Mike discovered that knowing a fact in the abstract was not at all the same thing as experiencing its physical reality; the sight of the Atlantic Ocean filled him with such awe that Jill squeezed him and said sharply, “Stop it, Mike! Don’t you dare!”

Mike chopped off his emotion and stored it away for later use. Then he stared at the ocean, stretching out to an unimaginably distant horizon, and tried to measure its size in his mind until his head was buzzing with threes and powers of threes and superpowers of powers.

As they landed Jubal called out, “Now remember, girls, form a square around him and don’t be at all backward about planting a heel in an instep or jabbing an elbow into some oaf’s solar plexus. Anne, I realize you’ll be wearing your cloak but that’s no reason not to step on a foot if you’re crowded. Or is it?”

“Quit fretting, Boss; nobody crowds a Witness—but I’m wearing spike heels and I weigh more than you do.”

“Okay. Duke, you know what to do—but get Larry back here with the bus as soon as possible. I don’t know when I’ll need it.”

“I grok it, Boss. Quit jittering.”

“I’ll jitter as I please. Let’s go.” Harshaw, the four girls with Mike, and Caxton got out; the bus took off at once. To Harshaw’s mixed relief and apprehension the landing flat was not crowded with newsmen.

But it was far from empty. A man picked him out at once, stepped briskly forward and said heartily, “Dr. Harshaw? I’m Tom Bradley, senior executive assistant to the Secretary General. You are to go directly to Mr. Douglas’ private office. He will see you for a few moments before the conference starts.”

“No.”

Bradley blinked. “I don’t think you understood me. These are instructions from the Secretary General. Oh, he said that it was all right for Mr. Smith to come with you—the Man from Mars, I mean—”

“No. This party stays together, even to go to the washroom. Right now we’re going to that conference room. Have somebody lead the way. And have all these people stand back; they’re crowding us. In the meantime, I have an errand for you. Miriam, that letter.”

“But, Dr. Harshaw—”

“I said, ‘No!’ Can’t you understand plain English? But you are to deliver this letter to Mr. Douglas at once and to him personally, and fetch back his receipt to me.” Harshaw paused to write his signature across the flap of the envelope Miriam had handed to him, pressed his thumb print over the signature, and handed it to Bradley. “Tell him that it is most urgent that he read this at once—before the meeting.”

“But the Secretary General specifically desires—”

“The Secretary desires to see that letter. Young man, I am endowed with second sight… and I predict that you won’t be working here later today if you waste any time getting it to him.”

Bradley locked eyes with Jubal, then said, “Jim, take over,” and left, with the letter. Jubal sighed inwardly. He had sweated over that letter; Anne and he had been up most of the night preparing draft after draft. Jubal had every intention of arriving at an open settlement, in full view of the world’s news cameras and microphones—but he had no intention of letting Douglas be taken by surprise by any proposal.