When I reached New York four days later my editor told me that he thought I should abandon the Newton project. I didn’t argue with him. I probably would have suggested it myself.
11
Ellie was fascinated by the porcelain figures. She picked
one up, a little girl dressed in a light blue ballet gown, and turned it over in her hands. “Look at this, Benjy,” she said to her brother. “Someone made this—all by himself.’ *
“That one is actually a copy,” the Spanish shopkeeper said, “but an artist did make the original from which the computer imprint was taken. The reproduction process is now so accurate that even the experts have a hard time telling which ones are the copies.”
“And you collected all these back on Earth?” Ellie waved her hand at the hundred or so figures on the table and in the small glass cases.
“Yes,” Mr. Murillo said proudly. “Although I was a civil servant in Seville—building permits and Slat sort of tiling—my wife and 1 also owned a small shop. We fell in love with porcelain art about ten years ago and have been avid collectors ever since.”
Mrs. Murillo, also in her late forties, came out of a back room where she was still unpacking merchandise.
300 ARTHUR C. CLARKE AND GENTRY LEE
“We decided,” she said, “long before we learned that we had actually been selected as colonists by the ISA, that no matter how restrictive our baggage requirements were for the voyage on die Nina, we would bring our entire collection of porcelain with us.”
Benjy was holding the dancing girl only a few centimeters from his face. “Beau-ti-ful,” he said with a broad smile.
“Thank you,” Mr. Murillo said. “We had hoped to start a collectors’ society in Lowell Colony,” he added. “Three or four of the other passengers on the Nina brought several pieces as well.”
“May we look at them?” Ellie asked. “We’ll be very careful.’ *
“Help yourself,” Mrs. Murillo said. “Eventually, once everything settles down, we will sell or baiter some of the objects—certainly the duplicates. Right now they’re just on display to be appreciated.”
While Ellie and Benjy were examining the porcelain creations, several other people entered the shop. The Mu-rillos had opened for business only a few days before. They sold candles, fancy napkins, and other small household adornments.
“You certainly didn’t waste any time, Carlos,” a burly American said to Mr. Murillo several minutes later. From bis initial greeting it was obvious that he had been a fellow passenger on the Nina.
“It was easier for us, Travis,” Mr. Murillo said. “We had no family and needed only a small place to live.”
“We haven’t even settled into a house yet,” Travis complained. “We’re definitely going to live in this village, but Chelsea and the kids cannot find a house they all like. Chelsea is still spooked by the whole arrangement. She doesn’t believe the ISA is telling us the truth even now.”
“I admit mat it is extremely difficult to accept mat mis space station was built by aliens just so they can observe us … and it would certainly be easier to believe the ISA story if there were pictures from mat Node place. But why would they lie to us?”
“They have lied before. Nobody even mentioned this place until a day before the rendezvous. . . . Chelsea be-
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lieves that we are part of an ISA space colony experiment. She says that we will stay here for a while, and then be transferred to the surface of Mars, so mat the two types of colonies can be compared.”
Mr. Murillo laughed. “I see Chelsea hasn’t changed since we left the Nina.” He became more serious. “You know, Juanita and I had our doubts too, especially after the first week passed and nobody had seen any sign of the aliens. We spent two full days wandering around, talking to other people—we essentially conducted our own investigation. We finally concluded that the ISA story must be true. First of all, it’s just too preposterous to be a lie. Second, that Wakefield woman was very convincing. In her open meeting she answered questions for almost two hours and neither Juanita nor I detected a single inconsistency.”
“It’s hard for me to imagine anyone sleeping for twelve years,” Travis said, shaking his head.
“Of course. It was for us too. But we actually inspected that somnarium where the Wakefield family supposedly slept. Everything was exactly as Nicole had described it in the meeting. The overall building, incidentally, is immense. There are enough berths and rooms to house everyone in the colony, if necessary. … It certainly doesn’t make sense that the ISA would have built such a huge facility to support a lie.”
“Maybe you’re right.”
“Anyway, we’ve decided to make the best of it. At least for the time being. And we certainly can’t complain about our living conditions. All the housing is first rate. Juanita and I even have our own Lincoln robot to give us a hand both at home and around the store.”
Ellie was following the discussion very closely. She remembered what her mother had told her the night before when she had asked if she and Benjy could go for a walk in the village. “I guess so, darling,” Nicole had said, “but if anyone recognizes you as a Wakefield and starts to question you, don’t talk to them. Be polite, and then come home as quickly as you can. Mr. Macmillan does not want us talking to any non-ISA personnel about our experiences just yet.”
302 ARTHUR C. CLARKE AND GENTRY LEE
While Ellie was admiring the porcelain figures and listening intently to the conversation between Mr. Murillo and the man named Travis, Benjy wandered off on his own. When Ellie realized he was not beside her, she started to panic.
“What are you staring at, buddy?” Ellie heard a h^sh male voice say on the other side of the shop.
“Her hair is ve-ry pret-ty,” Benjy replied. He was blocking the aisle, preventing the man and his wife from moving forward. He smiled and reached out his hand toward the woman’s magnificent long blond hair. “May I touch it?” he asked.
“Are you crazy? Of course not. Now get out of — ”
“Jason, I think he’s retarded,” the woman said quietly, catching her husband’s arm before he pushed Benjy.
At Jhat moment Ellie walked up beside her brother. She realized that the man was angry, but she did not know what to do. She nudged Benjy gently on the shoulder. “Look, Ellie,” he exclaimed, slurring his words in excitement, “look at her pret-ty yel-low hair.”
“Is this goon a friend of yours?” the tall man asked Ellie.
“Benjy is my brother,” Ellie answered with difficulty.
“Well, get him out of here. He’s bothering my wife.”
“Sir,” Ellie said after summoning her courage, “my brother doesn’t mean any harm. He’s never seen long blond hair up close before.”
The man’s face wrinkled in anger and puzzlement. “Whaaat?” he said. He glanced at his wife. “What’s with these two? One’s a dummy and the other — ”
“Aren’t you two of the Wakefieid children?” a pleasant female voice behind Ellie interrupted.
The distraught Ellie turned around. Mrs. Murillo stepped between the teenagers and the couple. She and her husband had crossed the shop as soon as they had heard the raised voices. “Yes, ma’am,” Ellie said softly. “Yes, we are.”
“You mean these are two of the children who came from outer space?” the man named Jason asked.
Ellie managed to pull Benjy quickly over to the door of
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the shop. “We’re very sorry,” Ellie said before she and Benjy departed. “We didn’t mean to cause any trouble.” “Freaks!” Ellie heard somebody say as the door closed behind her.
It had been another exhausting day. Nicole was very tired. She stood in front of the mirror and finished washing her face. “Ellie and Benjy had some kind of unpleasant experience down in the village,” Richard said from the bedroom. “They wouldn’t tell me much about it.”
Nicole had spent thirteen long hours that day helping to process the Nina passengers. No matter how hard she and Kenji Walanabe and the others had worked, it seemed as if nobody was ever satisfied and there were always more tasks that needed to be done. Many of the new colonists had been downright petulant when Nicole had tried to explain to mem the procedures that the ISA had established for the allocation of food, living quarters, and working areas.
She had been too many days without enough sleep. Nicole looked at the bags under her eyes. But we must finish with this group before the Santa Maria arrives, she said to herself. They will be far more difficult.
Nicole wiped her face with a towel and crossed into the bedroom, where Richard was sitting up in his pajamas. “How was your day?” she asked.
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