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and bust his nose-then you can expect him to send a couple gunmen after you
personally. Otherwise, he's so busy with his real imagined grudges that he
won't have time for fancied imagined grudges. It is clear, though, that he
paid these two slobs to do some snooping around over here." Holderman sighed.
"That's why I wish you hadn't blown up both of them, Jack. It would be so much
easier to just sweat a guy down than to do all this deductive reasoning."
"Oh, stow it, Joe," Nunez said. "The important thing is that Jack's still
kicking and that we know Ingermann has dumped a bunch of snoops on our turf.
We '11 snag a live one pretty soon now, then proceed to scare the pants off
him and find out all kinds of wonderful stuff."
As soon as the last of the other guests had departed, George and Ahmed
simultaneously drew up chairs across the coffee table from where Jack was
sitting. With no one else there but George, the Khadras, the van Riebeeks, and
Lynne Andrews , it was perfectly safe to discuss the confidential aspects of
Fuzzy Valley. Jack's eyes grew large as George and Ahmed related their
findings.
"So, I want to take you back up there, Jack, and let you have a look around,"
George finished. "I want the whole thing kept strictly on the quiet, though,
until we know more about what's what."
"I'll second that," Jack said. "In fact, just try to keep me away."
"Good," George said. "How about first thing in the morning?"
Jack nodded.
"Let's take along your microray scanner, too-find out how homogeneous the
geology is and what's under the surface. You'll know more about that than I
will. I could check one out from the equipment stores, but I'd rather not
leave any paperwork tracks that might arouse someone's curiosity."
"We can take Gerd along and detour over to fix his airboat on the way-then go
on up there in ZNPF vehicles," Ahmed said.
"How about taking old Gerd all the way along?" Gerd said. "Old Gerd is pretty
curious about this thing, too."
"He's right," Jack said. "Good idea not to make too much of a ZNPF parade out
of all this."
"I see what you mean," George said.
"We ought to take Little Fuzzy and some of the other Fuzzies along, too," Jack
said. "If there are Fuzzies up there who are not moving south and who won't
come near a Hagga, then we '11 have to make contact with them via Fuzzy
emissaries sooner or later. So, let's make that the 'official' reason for the
trip."
"I don't get it," Sandra said. "If titanium is practically non-existent in the
crust of Zarathustra, why should there be one spot where it's plentiful?"
"Might be more than one spot," Gerd said, "but it's just that we haven't found
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any others yet. That is an area of some active vulcanism-recently active
volcanoes, hot springs, geothermal areas, that sort of thing. Maybe volcanic
activity encourages the formation of titanium."
"Phooey on that," Jack said. "Distribution is the question. Titanium is
distributed all sorts of ways, none of them very exclusive. When it gets hot.
It will combine with just about anything. No, there's something definitely
unusual about Fuzzy Valley."
"I still don't get it," Sandra insisted. "If titanium is so scarce in the
general composition of Zarathustra, how did Fuzzies ever evolve here at all-if
it's such an important component of their morphology?"
"Gerd's theory is that they're living fossils," Ruth said, "that there used to
be a large order of Zarathustran primates. The rest died off. The Fuzzies have
survived this far, because they're the smartest of the bunch, but NFMp is
whittling them down."
Lynne had finished up some things in the kitchen and then joined the group.
"The xeno-paleontologists haven't found any bones yet to hang that theory on,"
she said.
"Well, we've only been here a quarter century," Gerd protested. "We know
nothing about the history of Fuzzies, and almost nothing about the history of
the planet. The xeno-paleontologists haven't found any really ancient Fuzzy
bones, either, but the existence of Fuzzies is self-evident."
Sandra stuck to her point. "I'm not attacking your theory, Gerd, but if it's
correct wouldn't that mean there used to be more titanium on Zarathustra? In
order for Fuzzies to develop this critical need for it in their diet? Are you
saying there used to be more titanium on Zarathustra than there is now? Isn't
there a rule or something about that?"
Gerd thought for a moment, smiling as he felt around for the governing
principle Sandra was referring to. "Oh, no," he said. "Titanium is too heavy
to be carried off as the planet developed. That wouldn't apply to
Zarathustra-the gravity is almost the same as Terra." Suddenly, he realized
what he was saying. "Great galloping holy Dai-Butsu!" he exclaimed. "I've been
digging up the wrong rabbit hole all along! All the titanium ever formed on
Zarathustra is still here, in its crust, and that's damned little. That point
was established very early in comparative extraterrestrial planetography
by-what's his name?-MacKenzie 's Law." "You mean it's constant on all
planets?" Sandra asked. "Sure it is," Jack said.
"Do you remember it, Jack?" Gerd asked. "You're the closest thing here to a
geologist."
"I can't state it mathematically," Jack said, "but I know it. That tells us
beforehand something of what a planet's geology is likely to be all about.
Let's see now-'The rate of escape of a substance from a planetary mass will
vary inversely with the gravity of that mass, varies directly with its
temperature, and-" He scratched his head. "-and varies indirectly with the
boiling or sublimation point of the substance in question.' That's the gist of
it."
"All right, then," Sandra said. "If there's so little titanium on Zarathustra,
how did Fuzzies come to have such a specific need for it in their metabolism?"
"Now, you're getting back toward my specialty," Gerd said. "That point is only
theoretically defined in xeno-biology. Remember Garrett's Theorem? It states
that 'A need for an element does not arise in evolution unless the element is
available in reasonable amounts and in assimilable form.' In other words-in
soluble form." Gerd thought about that for a moment, too, then shook his head. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]