The Sparrow

28 NAPLES: AUGUST 2060

Relying on vague directions from the porter and dead reckoning, John Candotti worked his way into the bowels of the retreat house to a dimly lit cellar that had been converted to a modern laundry facility in the 1930s, updated almost a hundred years later and never again since. The Society of Jesus, John noted, was willing to commit to interstellar travel on less than two weeks' notice, but it did not rush into things like new laundry equipment. The ultrasonic washers were antiques now but still functional. In sunny weather, the wet wash was still line-dried. The whole setup reminded John of his grandmother's basement except, of course, she'd used a microwave dryer, rain or shine.

He had almost walked past the room when, listening more closely, he realized that he'd just heard Emilio Sandoz humming. Actually, he hadn't been sure it was Sandoz, since John had never before heard Emilio make any sound remotely like humming. But there he was, unshaven and comfortable-looking in somebody else's old clothes, pulling damp bed linen out of one of the washers and piling it into a rattan basket that was probably older than the Vatican.

John cleared his throat. Emilio turned at the sound and looked stern. "I hope you don't expect to walk into my office and see me without an appointment, young man."

John grinned and looked around. "Brother Edward said they'd put you to work down here. Very nice. Kind of Bauhaus."

"Form follows function. Dirty laundry requires this sort of ambience." Emilio held up a wet pillowcase. "Prepare to be dazzled." He managed to fold it remarkably well before tossing it onto the pile in the basket.

"So those are the new braces!" John cried. The hearings had been canceled for a few weeks while Sandoz worked with Paola Marino, the Milanese bioengineer whom the Father General had brought in when Father Singh couldn't correct the defects in the original braces. Sandoz was reluctant to be seen by anyone new, but Giuliani insisted. Things had evidently gone well. "I am dazzled. That's wonderful."

"Yes. I am very flashy with towels as well, but there are limits." Emilio turned back to the machines. "Socks, for example. You guys send them down inside out, they go back upstairs clean but in the same condition."

"Hey, my dad had the same rule at home." John watched Sandoz work. His grip wasn't perfect and he still had to pay close attention to the movement, but the improvement was remarkable. "Those are really good, aren't they."

"They're much easier to control. Lighter. Look: the bruises are clearing up." Emilio turned and held out his arms for John's inspection. The new braces were radically different, less a cage than a set of wrist splints with electronic pickups. The fingers were supported from below with flat bands, jointed but lying close to his hands. There were finer bands that crossed over the top of the phalanges and a set of three flat straps that held the splints to his metacarpals, wrists and forearms. John tried not to notice how atrophied the muscles were and concentrated on the machinery as Sandoz explained the mechanisms.

"My hands and arms ache, but I think it's because I'm using them more," Emilio said, straightening. "Here's the best part. Watch this."

Sandoz went to a big table meant for sorting and folding the laundry and bent to lay one forearm flat against it. He rocked the arm a little to the outside to activate a small switch and the brace popped open, hinged on the side opposite the thumb. He pulled his hand out and then managed to get it back into position without assistance, although it took a certain amount of frowning effort before he toggled the switch again and the brace reclosed.

"I can do it all by myself," Emilio said with a three-year-old's lisp. He added in his own voice, "You cannot imagine what a difference that makes."

John beamed, pleased to see how happy the man seemed. Everyone had underestimated how depressing the hasta'akala had been, he guessed, probably even Sandoz himself. For the first time since being maimed, Emilio was finding new things he could do, instead of new things that were beyond him. As if reading John's mind, Sandoz turned and, with a cocky grin, bent to lift the basket and stood there waiting for comment.

"Very impressive," John said. Sandoz lugged the basket to the screened door, which he pushed open with his back. John followed him out to the clothesline. "That's got to be what? Seven or eight kilos, huh?"

"Better microgearing," Emilio told him and began hanging out the wash. It was slow going. He did okay, but the clothespins were apt to pop sideways out of his grip. "Miss Marino may need to add some friction pads on the thumb and forefinger," he said a little irritably the fourth time it happened.

This was the same man who'd put up with the old braces for months without complaint! It was nice to hear him ease up. There's nothing wrong with this guy that a little honest bitching wouldn't cure, John thought. It was a cheerful oversimplification, he knew, but it was just such a pleasure to see Sandoz do well. "This is going to sound dumb," John warned him, "but those're actually very good looking."

"Italian design," Emilio said admiringly. He held one hand out in front of himself, like a bride gazing at her new ring, and said in an airy English accent, " 'Next year, everyone will be wearing them. »

"Princess Bride!" John cried, identifying the quote immediately.

" 'Ah, I see you're using Bonetti's defense against me, " said Emilio, this time in a bad Spanish accent.

"'Never go up against a Sicilian when death is on the line! " John declared, sitting on the low stone wall that bordered the side yard. They traded lines from the movie for a while, until John leaned back, locking his hands around one knee, and said, "This is great, man. I never thought I'd see you doing so well."

Emilio stopped moving, sheet in hand, realizing with some shock that he was enjoying himself. It brought him up short. He hardly knew what to do with the sensation. There was an almost automatic response: an impulse to turn to God in gratitude. He fought it down, clinging stubbornly to the facts: he was doing laundry and riffing on Princess Bride with John Candotti and he was enjoying himself. That was all. Paola Marino was responsible, not God. And he had helped himself. When he'd realized what an improvement the new braces were, he'd asked to be assigned to the laundry. He needed to work at something, and this would be good mild exercise, he argued, natural therapy for his hands. He ate and slept better for it, got through the nights easier. And he was getting stronger. Sure, he had to stop every now and then, a little winded by the repetitive stooping and reaching overhead, but he was gaining on it—

John left his perch on the stones, disturbed as always by these sudden motionless trances. "Here. I'll help you with this," he said genially, to break the silence, and picked up one of the sheets.

"No!"

John dropped the sheet and backed away.

Sandoz stood there a few moments, breathing hard. "Look. I'm sorry," he said. "I was startled, okay? I didn't expect you to be standing so close. And I don't want help! People keep trying to help! I'm sorry, but I hate it. If you would just do me the courtesy of letting me judge—" He turned away, exasperated and close to tears. Finally, he repeated more quietly, "I'm sorry. You put up with a lot of shit from me. I get confused, John. A lot of things get mixed up in this."

Embarrassed and ashamed of the outburst, Emilio turned and bent to the laundry basket, going back to work. After a few minutes, he said over his shoulder, "Don't just stand there gawking. Give me a hand with this, will you?"

Eyes wide, John shook his head and blew out a breath, but he picked up a pillowcase and hung it on the line.

They finished that basketful in silence and went back into the basement gloom for another load of wash. Setting the basket down, Emilio waited until John joined him and then heaved a sigh, looking at the braces once again. "Yes, these are a great improvement but I still can't play the violin…"

John was halfway through a sympathetic murmur when Emilio's grin stopped him. "Shit," John laughed, and the tension between them evaporated. "I can't believe I fell for that. You never played the violin, right?"

"Baseball, John. All I ever played was baseball." Emilio opened another washer and started dropping towels into the basket, feeling that he was back on top of things again. "Probably too old and beaten up to get around a diamond now anyway. But I had good hands once."

"What position did you play?" John asked.

"Second base, usually. Not enough arm to play outfield. I was pretty consistent at bat, mostly singles and doubles. I wasn't that good but I loved it."

"The Father General claims he's still got a bruise where you took his ankle out sliding in to steal third once. He says you were savage."

"This is slander!" Emilio cried. Indignant, he pushed his way out the door again and carried the basket to the line. "Serious, yes. Barbaric, quite possibly. But savage? Only if the score was close."

They worked their way through the basket together, listening to the late morning sounds, pots and pans banging in the kitchen nearby as Brother Cosimo started on lunch, and now the silence was companionable. "You follow baseball, John?" Emilio asked after a while, his voice coming through the rows of wet fabric.

"Cubs fan," John muttered. The Chicagoan's curse.

Sandoz pushed a towel aside, eyes wide. "How bad?"

"Anybody can have a couple of lousy centuries."

"I guess. Wow." Sandoz let the towel fall back into place. There was a thoughtful silence. "Well, that explains why Giuliani brought you over." Suddenly John heard the Father General's voice saying: "Voelker, I need someone to take care of a hopeless wreck coming back from Rakhat. Get me a Cubs fan!"

"You're not hopeless, Emilio."

"John, I could tell you things about hopeless that even a Cubs fan wouldn't understand."

"Try me."

When Sandoz spoke next from the other side of the laundry, it was to change the subject. "So. How's San Juan doing this year?"

"Three games out of first. They took the Series in 58," John said, pleased to be delivering good news. Emilio reappeared, smiling beatifically, nodded a couple of times and returned to his work, a contented man. John paused in his progress down the clothesline and looked at Sandoz through a gap in the sheets. "Do you know that this is the first time you've asked about current events? Listen, this has been driving me crazy! I mean, you've been gone since before I was born! Don't you wonder how things turned out? What wars are over and who won and stuff like that? Technological revolutions, medical advances? Aren't you even curious?"

Sandoz stared at him, open-mouthed. Finally, he dropped a towel into the basket and backed up a few steps to the stone wall, where he sat down, suddenly exhausted. He laughed a little and shook his head before looking up at John through the veil of black and silver hair that fell over his eyes. "My dear Father Candotti," he said wearily, "allow me to explain something. In the past fifteen years or so, I must have lived in what? Thirty different places? Four continents, two islands. Two planets! An asteroid! Seven or eight ecosystems, from desert to tundra. Dormitories, huts, caves, tents, shacks, hampiys…I have been required to function in over a dozen foreign languages, often three at a time. I have contended with thousands of strangers, in cultures involving three sentient species and perhaps twenty nationalities. I am sorry to disappoint you, but my capacity for curiosity is tapped out." Emilio sighed and put his head in his hands, careful not to tangle the joint mechanisms in his hair. "John, if I had my way, nothing new or interesting would happen to me ever again as long as I live. Laundry is just about my speed. No quick movements, no sudden noises, no intellectual demands."

"And no damned questions?" John suggested ruefully, sitting next to Sandoz on the wall.

"No damned questions," Emilio confirmed. He looked up, eyes on the rocky hills to the east. "And very little potential for death, destruction and degradation, my friend. I've had a couple of rough years."

It no longer came as a surprise to John Candotti that people found him easy to confess to. He was tolerant of human failings and it was rarely difficult for him to say, "Well, you screwed up. Everybody screws up. It's okay." His greatest satisfaction as a priest was to grant absolution, to help people forgive themselves for not being perfect, make amends, and get on with life. This might be the opening, he thought. "Want to tell me about it?"

Sandoz stood and went back to his basket of towels. When it was empty he turned and saw that Candotti was still sitting there. "I can finish this myself," he said curtly and disappeared back into the basement.

Vincenzo Giuliani was not idle during this time, nor did the Rakhat inquiry come to a halt. The Father General used the hiatus to rethink his strategies. The situation required a different tack and more sail, he decided, and called a meeting with Candotti, Behr, Reyes and Voelker. They were charged with two tasks during these hearings, he told them. One was institutional: to gather information about the mission itself and about Rakhat and its inhabitants. But the other was pastoral. A fellow priest had been through an extraordinary experience and needed help, whether he was willing to admit that or not.

"Upon much reflection," the Father General told them, "I have decided to release to you transcripts of the mission reports by Yarbrough and Robichaux, as well as certain private communications from them." He gave them the passwords necessary to unlock the files. "I am sure I don't have to tell you that this information is confidential. You will find as you read that Emilio has been entirely forthcoming about the mission facts. I believe he means to cooperate fully with us in our first task. He will tell us what happened on Rakhat as long as it does not touch on his personal state of mind, past or present. Which brings us to our second task."

Giuliani rose. "It has become clear to me that there is some private theological aspect to Emilio's emotional problems. I am, personally, convinced of the sincerity of his spiritual engagement at the beginning of the mission." Giuliani stopped pacing and came to rest directly across the table from Johannes Voelker. "I do not ask you to be credulous as you read the mission reports, but I ask you to accept as a working hypothesis the accuracy of the statements of his superiors on this subject." Voelker nodded noncommittally and Giuliani resumed his circuit of the room, coming to a halt by the windows. He pushed the gauzy curtain back and looked outside. "Something happened to him. It changed everything. Until we know what that was, we are sailing in the dark."

As the days went on, Giuliani observed and responded to the sea change in Sandoz himself. The man's general health began to improve again, due to some lifting of the depression and to a set of newly implanted semipermeable rods that released steady doses of vitamins C and D as well as calcitonin derivatives and osteoclast inhibitors, directly into his bloodstream. The fatigue gradually lessened, although it was unclear if this was because he felt better and got more exercise or because his physiological status was becoming more normal. Certainly, he bruised less easily. The probability of spontaneous bone breakage began to recede.

On Brother Edward's advice, Sandoz was given direct access to the drugs he used regularly: Prograine and dHE compounds for muscle aches, which were now more often from overuse, as he reclaimed ground, than from the lingering effects of scurvy. Edward felt Sandoz would use the medication responsibly and would feel freer to obtain relief if he didn't have to ask anyone's permission.

Then Sandoz asked about sleeping tablets. The Father General had decided to acquiesce to any reasonable request, but Emilio had mentioned suicide on several occasions and Giuliani could not risk being wrong on this. So he offered a compromise, which Sandoz refused: that he'd be allowed to use the drugs if someone witnessed him swallowing the pills. It was hard to know whether Emilio considered this too humiliating to be borne or only unacceptable because he'd hoped to stockpile the drugs against a future decision to take his own life.

In any case, Sandoz no longer permitted anyone into his room. He found and removed the monitor near his bed. The dreams and their sequelae were his own to manage in privacy. Maybe the sickness had stopped or maybe he had schooled himself to control even that, as he now controlled his hands and face and voice, and vomited in silence, sweating out the nights alone. The only indication that the dreams continued was the hour at which he rose in the morning. If things had gone well, he was up at dawn. If not, it might be ten o'clock before he appeared in the refectory for a small breakfast, which he now insisted on making himself. Brother Cosimo did not offer help after the first morning.

Felipe Reyes inquired about phantom limb syndrome and Sandoz stiffly admitted to this and asked if Reyes dealt with this kind of neuralgia himself. Felipe was fortunate not to, but he knew other amputees who did and he was aware of how bad it could be. For some, Felipe told Sandoz, the pain was unrelenting. This information clearly appalled Emilio, which gave Felipe a measure of the severity of the intermittent problem for Sandoz. Reyes suggested that Emilio simply call a halt to the hearings if he was in distress. A few days later Sandoz asked for and received assurance from the Father General that he could end the sessions at will, without stating any reason. It was, Emilio had evidently decided, preferable to continuing while distracted and taking a chance on the kind of breakdown he'd experienced on the day he broke the cup.

In private, Johannes Voelker was given to understand by the Father General that Sandoz was never again to be accused of malingering. Voelker agreed and admitted that it was not a productive attitude. The others were told as well: when Sandoz balked, no one was to press him. Even gentle handling like John Candotti's drove the man further away.

When the hearings reconvened after this hiatus, there was no mistaking the change. They noticed the outward sign first. Sandoz was able to control a razor better now. The neatly trimmed beard was back, still black in the main, but with unfamiliar stripes of gray bracketing the long line of the mouth, just as the dark and now uninformative eyes had come to be bordered by streaks of silver in his hair.

They now saw, for the most part, whomever Sandoz wished them to see. Sometimes they were dealing with a Spaniard, invulnerable and aristocratic, a man who had rebuilt the castle walls and found some bastion from which to defend his integrity, and whose composure could not be disturbed by pointed questions about beloved children, now dead. Or Mephistopheles, dry-eyed and contained, to whom the lower depths of hell were known and familiar and drained of swampy emotion. Most often, it was Dr. Emilio Sandoz, linguist, scholar, a man of wide experience, attending a dreary colloquium that had some bearing on his specialty, after which his work and that of his colleagues might be published at last.

The sessions under this new regime got started with a question from Professor Reyes, comparative theologian, regarding the likelihood that the Runa had some concept of the soul. Dr. Sandoz, linguist, was on home ground and cited the Runa's grammatical categories for reference to things unseen and nonvisual. Reyes thought this might indicate at least the capacity to understand the concept of soul, even if they had not developed it themselves.

"Quite likely," Sandoz agreed. "In comparison to the Jana'ata or to our own species, the Runa are not notably creative thinkers. Or perhaps I should say, not original. Once a basic idea has been provided, they are often quite creative in elaborating on it."

"It seems to me that this idea of 'heart' that keeps coming up might be analogous to soul," Felipe said.

"Understand that 'heart' is my translation, yes? It might be close to the concept of soul within a living person, but I don't know if the Runa believe the essence of an individual persists beyond death—" He stopped. His body tensed, as though ready to stand, but then the Spaniard spoke. "When deaths occurred, I was not in a position to inquire about the Runa belief system." And Dr. Sandoz resumed a moment later, turning to Giuliani. "Anne Edwards sent back several papers on the subject of 'heart. May I summarize her observations, sir? Or does that constitute a form of premature publication?"

"Nothing said in this room is for publication. Please."

Sandoz turned back to Felipe. "Dr. Edwards believed that the concept of 'heart' and the Runa's theory of illness were closely related and both served as a rather benign means of social control. The Runa are not openly aggressive and claim never to become angry. If, for example, someone was refused a legitimate request or was thwarted or disappointed in some way, the aggrieved person would fall into a state of porai. When you are porai, your heart is sad and you may grow ill or become prone to accidents. Making someone sad is very bad form, yes? If you make someone else porai, you feel considerable social pressure to give in to the request or provide compensation to the supposed victim: apologize or make some gift that restores the victim's heart to happiness."

"There would be a good deal of room for misuse of a concept like that," Voelker commented. "What prevents people from claiming they are porai simply to obtain presents?"

"The Runa are almost never alone. Hardly any social interaction is without witnesses, so it is hard for someone simply to lie about an occurrence. However, there was often disagreement about the seriousness of the victim's state of porai and about the amount or kind of compensation due. If the argument got loud, the participants were told that they were making a fierno—a big noise, yes? If you make a fierno, it supposedly attracts thunderstorms, which can be violent and frightening."

He paused for a sip of water, handling the glass with remarkably improved dexterity, although he had to stop speaking and concentrate on the task. He lifted the glass toward John, as though toasting him. "New friction pads," he pointed out. John nodded appreciatively and Emilio continued. "Parents use thunderstorms as mild threats to teach children not to argue or make fusses to get their way. 'Make your heart quiet, or we'll have a thunderstorm soon. The storms are frequent. It is easy for children to believe there is some connection between their noise and bad weather."

"What if there's a storm when no one's been arguing?" John asked.

Emilio shrugged and made a face that said, This is obvious, surely. "Someone in a nearby village has made a fierno." And they smiled at the neatness of the thing.

"Prior to the appearance of Supaari VaGayjur, did you have any idea that there existed a second sentient species on Rakhat?" Johannes Voelker asked.

It seemed like an abrupt change in topic and the Spaniard turned to him, clearly expecting and prepared to meet an attack. "No." But then he admitted, "There were indications that we failed to recognize. The Runa have ten fingers, but the numbering system was based on six, for example. Which made sense to us once we found out that the Jana'ata hand has only three digits. And from the beginning, Mr. Edwards and Mr. Quinn noted a mismatch between the Runa culture we observed in Kashan and the culture that produced the radio signals that led us to Rakhat."

The Austrian was surprisingly conciliatory. "Yes. As I recall, Father Robichaux attributed the anomaly to cultural differences in economic and technical development," Voelker said. "It occurs to me—this peculiarity of the Runa language, by which things unseen at the moment are grammatically the same as those which are nonvisual at all times? This must have contributed to the surprise. Even if the Runa had told you about Jana'ata, you couldn't have known they were real, not mythical."

Sandoz looked at him for a long time, as if deciding how to take this change in tone. "Yes," he agreed finally. "In fact, we were told to beware of djanada. Obviously, a related word. We considered djanada to be a sort of bogeyman, used to keep children from wandering off. We took it as further evidence that, except for Mr. Quinn, we were not considered adults by the Runa for quite some time."

"Father Yarbrough reported that when you first saw Supaari VaGayjur, you assumed he was a Runao. Are the two species so similar as that? Or was it only because you were not expecting a second species?" Voelker asked.

"Initially, it was because we were unprepared to imagine that the Jana'ata existed. There were many subtle differences, once we knew what to look for. However, male Jana'ata do resemble female Runa in overall appearance and in size."

"How odd! Only the males?" Felipe asked.

"Female Jana'ata are sequestered and guarded. I cannot say how closely they resemble the Runa, male or female. The Runa sexes," Sandoz reminded them, "are quite alike, but the males are on average a good deal smaller. For a long time, we were confused about their gender because of that and because their sex roles did not match our expectations. Robichaux's Madonna and Child, by the way, should perhaps be renamed Saint Joseph and Child. Manuzhai was a male." There was a small burst of laughter and comment as the others admitted how surprised they'd been when they'd read this in the mission reports. "Manuzhai raised Askama and was smaller than his wife," Sandoz continued, "so we believed him female. Chaypas traveled extensively and carried on all the trade, which led us to assume that she was a male. The Runa were equally confused by us."

"If the Runa don't wear much besides ribbons," John said, clearing his throat, "couldn't you, um, see—?"

"Runa sexual organs are inconspicuous unless mating is imminent," Sandoz said and continued blandly, "Along with the dentition and claws, this is one unmistakable difference between male Jana'ata and Runa of either sex. It was not immediately apparent because Jana'ata are generally clothed."

Edward Behr, sitting as usual across the room from Sandoz, suddenly had a coughing fit. It was, the Father General thought, as though Emilio were testing his own strength, seeing how far back into the pit he could go. "We are to infer that male Jana'ata organs are not inconspicuous. Are you trying to shock us, Father Sandoz?" Vincenzo Giuliani asked in a light, bored voice, which he hoped was convincing.

"I wouldn't presume to know what would shock you, sir. I was explaining the limits of the similarity between the species."

"This Supaari VaGayjur," Johannes Voelker said, "he owned the village of Kashan?"

Giuliani looked up. Now who's changing the subject? he thought.

"No. Well, perhaps, in a manner of speaking. He did not actually own the real estate or the Runa villagers." Sandoz shook his head, more certain as he thought it through. "No. My understanding was that he owned the rights to trade with them. If they were dissatisfied, the VaKashani could have solicited another merchant to buy Supaari out, although he would have been given an opportunity to adjust his agreements with the VaKashani to address their concerns. It was in many ways an equitable contractual arrangement."

"How were the Runa paid?" Felipe asked suddenly. "The descriptions of their village seem to indicate that they were not terribly materialistic."

"They obtained manufactured goods in payment for blossom harvesting. Perfumes, boats, ceramics, ribbons and so forth. And there was a system of banking in which profits were accumulated. The income from any given village was pooled. I don't know how they handled things when a family moved from one village to another." Sandoz stopped, apparently struck by the problem for the first time. "I suppose that if a certain village were known to have a large account and if others moved in to benefit from the situation, a lot of hearts would become porai and the freeloaders would be made to feel embarrassed."

"Who enforced the contracts between the Runa and merchants like Supaari?" Giuliani asked.

"The Jana'ata government. There is a hereditary bureaucracy run by second-born sons that sees to the legal aspects of trade and there are special courts for interspecies disputes. The judgments are enforced by the military police, who are first-born Jana'ata."

"And the Runa do all the productive work," John guessed, disgusted.

"Yes. Third-born merchants like Supaari VaGayjur broker trade between the species. Merchants, like Runa village corporations, are taxed to support the Jana'ata population."

"Do the Runa obtain justice in Jana'ata courts?" Felipe asked.

"I had limited opportunity to observe such things. I was told that the Jana'ata value honor and justice highly. They believe themselves to be stewards and guardians of the Runa. They take pride in doing their duty toward their inferiors and dependents." He sat quietly for quite a while and then added, "For the most part. In addition, it should be noted that the Jana'ata comprise only three to four percent of the VaRakhati population. If their rule were to become odious, the Runa could conceivably rise against them."

"But the Runa are nonviolent," Felipe Reyes said. He had developed a mental model of the Runa as peaceful innocents living in Eden, at odds with the reports from the Contact Consortium. This, for Felipe, was one of the overriding puzzles of the mission.

"I have seen the Runa defend their children." There was a pause; Giuliani saw the tension, but Sandoz went on. "From what I have read in the Wu and Isley report, there are Runa who have reached their limit of tolerance. Their only weapon would be their numbers. Jana'ata military police are ruthless. They have to be. They are vastly outnumbered."

This was virgin territory, Giuliani realized. "Emilio, you may recall that Supaari VaGayjur reportedly told Wu and Isley that there had never been trouble between the Jana'ata and the Runa before our mission arrived."

"Supaari may have been pleased to think so. The Runa do not write histories." Sandoz stopped to drink again. He looked up, brows raised, eyes dispassionate. "I speak only from analogy, gentlemen. There were no Taino or Arawak or Carib historians, but there was certainly conflict in the Caribbean. Both before and after the arrival of Columbus."

Voelker broke the silence that fell at that, returning to his earlier theme. "Surely it is unusual for two species to resemble each other so closely. Are they related biologically as well as culturally?"

"Dr. Edwards was able to obtain blood samples for genetic analysis. The two species were almost certainly not related, except distantly, as mammals like lions and zebra are related. She and Father Robichaux thought the similarities might be due to convergence: a natural selection in the evolution of sentience that led the two species to similar morphological and behavioral traits. I think not." He stopped and looked to Giuliani, a scholar whom he expected to understand why he was uncomfortable. "You understand that I speculate, yes? And this is not my field, but—"

"Of course."

Sandoz stood and walked to the windows. "The Jana'ata are carnivores, with a dentition and forelimb adapted for killing. Their intelligence and capacity for complex social organization probably evolved in the context of cooperative hunting. The Runa are vegetarians with a broad range of diet. Their fine motor control likely derived from manipulative skill associated with the exploitation of small seeds, picking blossoms and so forth. Their three-dimensional memories are excellent; they carry very precise mental maps of their environment and the changing array of seasonal resources. This may account for the evolution of their intelligence, but only in part." Sandoz stopped and stared out the window for a few moments. Beginning to tire, Edward Behr thought, but doing well. "The paleontology of our own planet has many examples of predators and prey locked in competition, ratcheting upward in intelligence and sophisticated adaptation. A biological arms race, one might say. On Rakhat, in my opinion, this competition resulted in the evolution of two sentient species."

"Are you saying that the Runa were the prey?" John asked, horrified.

Sandoz turned, face composed. "Of course. I believe that Jana'ata morphology is a form of mimicry, selected for during predation on Runa herds. Even now, Runa prefer to travel in large groups, with the smaller males and young in the center of the troop and the larger adult females on the outside. A hundred, two hundred thousand years ago, the resemblance between the two species was not nearly so striking, perhaps. But Jana'ata who could best blend in with the female Runa at the edges of the herd were the most successful hunters. The Jana'ata foot is prehensile." Sandoz paused, and again Giuliani saw the effort it took to go on. "I imagine the hunters simply fell in step with a female toward the back of the troop, reached out to snare her ankle, and brought her down. The more closely the hunter resembled the prey in appearance and behavior and scent, the more successfully he could stalk and kill her."

"But they cooperate now," Felipe said. "The Jana'ata rule, but they trade with the Runa, they work together—" He didn't know whether to be dismayed by the prehistory or uplifted by the present state of coexistence.

"Oh, yes," Sandoz agreed. "The relationship would certainly have evolved since those days, as would the species themselves. And all that is speculation, although it is consistent with the facts I observed."

Sandoz walked back to the table and sat down. "Gentlemen, the Runa fulfill many roles in Jana'ata culture. They are skilled in crafts and they are traders and servants, laborers, bookkeepers. Even research assistants. Even concubines." He expected the outcry, was prepared for it, had rehearsed his presentation of this topic, and he continued with emotionless thoroughness. "It is a form of birth control. Supaari VaGayjur explained this to me. As stewards of their world, the Jana'ata impose strict population controls. Jana'ata couples may have more than two children but only the first two may marry and establish families; the rest must remain childless. If later-born individuals do breed, they are neutered by law, as are their offspring."

They were speechless. It had seemed perfectly reasonable to Supaari, of course.

"Jana'ata of proven sterility, often neutered thirds, sometimes serve as prostitutes. But cross-species intercourse is, by definition, sterile," Sandoz told them coolly. "Sex with Runa partners carries no risk of pregnancy or even of disease, as far as I know. For this reason, Runa concubines are commonly used as sexual partners by individuals whose families are complete or who are not permitted to breed."

Felipe, shocked, asked, "Do the Runa consent to this?"

It was Mephistopheles who laughed. "Consent is not an issue. The concubines are bred to it." He looked at each of them in turn as they took in the implications and then hit them again. "The Runa are not unintelligent and some are marvelously talented, but they are essentially domesticated animals. The Jana'ata breed them, as we breed dogs."