Wordlessly, Ellin agreed, and the two of them went off in opposite directions to get a closer look at Newholmian society.
“Nobody is dancing,” said Gandro Bao, removing his dusty cloak and hanging it neatly by the door of the large and luxurious suite that he, Ellin, and Questioner occupied at Mantelby Mansion. He doffed his wig, also, setting it atop his cloak. “One rumor, about volcanoes, is saying truth, for there is much smoking from the mountains, much agitating among peoples. Other rumor is being unverified. I am seeing no indigenous race.”
“Ah,” murmured the Questioner. “Where have you been?”
“I am going about in the business section. I am asking Men of Business if mountains are blowing up, and they are saying yes, too many, but it is striking me an oddity that no one is standing about looking at mountains. Or at me! I am being stranger, and mountains are being very dramatic, very threatening, but everyone being very busy, not looking.”
“Aah,” murmured Questioner. “Perceptive of you, Gandro Bao. They are not looking because … ?”
“Because they are thinking of something else or are avoiding me. Also, I am asking if people dance, and they are saying no, no dancing at all. Streets are being very dirty. Men are wearing very thick veils. Perhaps those are reasons for no dancing. If I am dancing in such a veil, I am falling over my feet.”
“You say the streets are dirty,” mused Questioner. “Old trash ends up as a kind of sludge in the gutters. You mean dirty like that?”
He shook his head in an effort of memory. “No. No sludge. Just this little trashiness.”
“Ah. Then the streets are usually cleaner, but not now, or they are infrequently cleaned. If you see anyone cleaning the streets, let me know.” Questioner entered the information on her project file, another in the great number of nagging and interesting data she was accumulating on Newholme.
“You can ask them about the painted houses, too,” said Ellin, entering from the hallway. She yawned enormously and threw herself down on the cushioned seat that stretched beneath a pair of wide windows. “I’m so tired! I feel heavy on this world!”
“Heaviness is suitable. Newholme gravity is slightly greater than Earth. What is this about painted houses?” asked Questioner.
“I found them behind places and off courtyards and down little hidden lanes, brightly painted little houses in a style I see nowhere else. I asked, people said servants’ quarters, and there are servants living there, but they don’t fit.”
“Don’t fit how?”
“Too tall for the doors, too long for the floors, and too few for all the rooms. The paint’s fresh on the houses. The walls are clean, the floors also. I’d say someone else lived there up until just recently.”
“Ah,” murmured Gandro Bao, taking a very feminine stance and parading across the floor, fluttering his eyelashes at Ellin, then at Questioner. “So, the people are hiding something.” He seized Ellin by the hand and drew her into a whirling encounter, something between a tango and a duel, the two moving like jointed dolls.
Questioner cogitated, much interested and intrigued by this information. So many of her visits were dull and juiceless, with everything laid out like a pattern for a garment: fabric here, shears there, cut here, sew along the dotted line, and what results is a very dull cloak, one size fits nobody. Or there were visits where she could find no pattern at all. Cut? What means cut? Sew? What means sew?
How interesting to meet a third variation, a false pattern. Everything seemingly right there in plain sight, sew here, cut there, and what results is a surprise. A three-legged trouser. A four-armed coat!
She said sharply, “Stop twirling, you’re making me dizzy.”
Ellin and Bao spun to a stop, drawing apart and bowing to one another, Ellin rather pink and breathing strongly. Obediently, they sat side by side on the windowseat, like two marionettes, awaiting the next twitch on the strings.
Questioner remarked, “Let us assume some other people were here until just recently. If they swept the streets, if they cleaned the houses, chances are they also minded the children, for this is the usual pattern when a culture has cheap labor. So, you should seek out some children, watch them, see what they do and say. Also, it is time we spoke to more ordinary people.