A Matter of Taste

Of course I knew this already. As an independent Claims Adjuster, it goes without saying that I'd checked into the case before teleporting to the planet. Their profit was enormous, and our losses would be proportionately large if the military was invited to come in and spoil trade while saving lives.

Their charter called for exclusive trading rights on any planet they opened for ten years. And they had the usual clause in their Policy against loss by "government" action, meaning the military, even at their own invitation. The military is fast, but it's not neat. The cost could run to billions for us, so my job was to try to find another way.

"Well," he said, "can we send an emergency signal to the Navy?"

"When does the next regular interval expire?" I asked.

He checked the timepiece set into the sleeve of his suit, and then scratched some number in the clean wind-swept surface of snow. His watch kept local time, of course. "In about fourteen Earth hours," he translated at last.

"Then there's no hurry, is there?" I leaned against the gale that was blowing across the clearing. "Why don't we go to your office so you can brief me?"

He turned and stumped his way heavily to a gap at the edge of the clearing, and then along a narrow path that wound its way circuitously among tall, slender, tinkling, half-living ice trees. I strolled lightly beside him, but my bare feet left deep imprints in the crustless snow. In about fifteen minutes we reached the human settlement, with its airlock set modestly into a great mound of snow.

Here we had a little difficulty; the lock was designed to pass bulky protective suits. If I had gone through it bare, I'd have let in some of the poisonous atmosphere into the camp. We solved that, though. Mr. Jones passed a suit out to me through the lock and I put it on. I wore it all the way to his office, and then he rustled me up one of his spare kilts--an ugly purple thing.

"Now, Obadiah," I said, after I'd lighted one of his stogies and settled myself into his most comfortable chair, "why this urgent call for help? Our records show that you've never hollered copper in your life, and you've had two expeditions nearly wiped out around you. You've got the best profit record in your organization."

"It's those Aliens," said Mr. Jones. "They arrived here on Sunder's Pride just a few days behind us. I've always felt that someday we'd come up against some life-form that would be too much for us, and I'm afraid that we've done it at last. They trade us some of the most magnificent works of art that have ever been seen in the universe--you've undoubtedly admired some of them, and I'm sure you know the prices they bring--and they do it as if they were tossing glass beads to savages."

"And if we are such savages, what can we have to trade in return?" I asked.

"They don't seem to be any great shakes with mechanical things," he answered. "They call them 'gadgets,' but they buy them. The only trouble is, that's not all they buy." He was sweating, his face turning as green as the polka dots on his kilt. He mopped his face and chest with a large handkerchief, and then sat there holding it and looking at it as if he'd never seen a bandanna before.

I felt sorry for him. These provincial types have an automatic feeling of horror at the thought of meeting some superior creatures that will replace man in the Galaxy. So I let him sit there for a couple of minutes to recover before I prompted him.

"Well?" I said at last. "The additional stuff they buy--what is it?" This hadn't been part of the reports.

"Oh. Yes. Once every five days they take one man. I may have given you the idea that they killed them. They don't. They ship them off. They say we are very popular, and when there are enough of us on the market to bring the price down, we should make ideal pets. And we can't do a thing to stop them."

I flicked the ash of my cigar delicately onto his carpet. "You can't? What have you tried?"

He leaped to his feet and balled his fists belligerently. "I'm trying to call in the military, but first I've got to get through the red tape of calling in you insurance people. Now will you give me authority to call in a fleet before it's too late?"

I smiled in a superior manner and straightened a pleat on the hideous kilt. "If you feel this way, then why do you worry about money? Why didn't you just call the fleet directly and forfeit your insurance?"

He glared at me through red-rimmed eyes. "I tried that," he said. "If only we had some central government to turn to--but that's impossible in space, of course. So I went to the only centralized force there is. And they said that they have to count on voluntary contributions from the member planets, and they couldn't afford to answer every call for help. They told me to contact my insurance company."

"Which," I commented mildly, "is another centralized force in space, in spite of what you say. It's widespread, it's profit-making, and it gets the job done. Nobody has to try to beg for voluntary appropriations from penurious planetary governments."

"This isn't a crackpot fear of aliens," he said, as soon as I stopped talking. "I've seen aliens before, in all parts of the Galaxy. I don't panic."

"Then you must have tried something else before hollering Uncle," I said. "Like, perhaps, keeping all of your men inside the dome here when the time for another abduction approaches?"

He waved a hand impatiently. "We've tried everything a large group of top-flight minds can think of," he said. "My own organization has an exceptional research staff, as I'm sure you know. The Aliens work by mental control. We've had everyone brought into this building, have double-checked them, and have sealed the doors with a time lock. It turned out that one of the men was missing--we'd only imagined he was among us when we assembled.

"We scoured the planet before we landed and saw no signs of the Aliens. We've seen no Alien ships land since we arrived. We have no idea where they are, except that there's one sizable area not far from here that we can't seem to penetrate. The only evidence we have that the Aliens arrived after we did is that they told us so. Whatever that's worth.

"We've brought in some of mankind's best Mental Control Operators. People like you, who are able to walk around in a poisonous atmosphere in sub-zero weather without any protection or any clothes at all. Every one of them is now among the victims. The Aliens apparently thought it would be a good joke to take them."

He paused. "So you see, we don't expect you to be around very long. Just so you call in the military before the Aliens call you in, we'll try to control our grief when you go."