But he must concentrate, not rhapsodize. The discussion was likely to be a long one. The Hearthomers took refuge from the hottest part of the day, but the assembly had gathered in late afternoon, and might well continue throughout the succeeding night. He composed his mind and relayed Chard’s next remarks.
“We have been told that winters grow colder and longer in your land. Since according to our observations the sun is growing brighter and hotter, we are faced with a paradox.”
(“What in the world is he on about?” grunted Sharprong. “It doesn’t make sense!”)
But Wellearn was gripped by Chard’s statement and anxiously awaiting what was to follow.
“We know this because we have carefully calibrated the way in which certain substances change after exposure to concentrated sunlight under identical conditions, that’s to say, on a completely clear day. Cloudless days, of course, are growing fewer”—and several present glanced anxiously at the sky where yet more thunderheads were brewing—”but we keep up our experiments and we can be nineteen-twentieths sure of our conclusions.”
(“Is he ever going to come to a point?” was Strongrip’s acid reaction.)
“We can only deduce that more solar heat causes more clouds to reflect it and more moisture to fall at the poles as snow, which in turn reflects still more light and heat. At my laboratory the possibility can be demonstrated using a burning-glass and a block of white rock half-covered with soot.”
Wellearn had seen that demonstration; he had not wholly understood what he was meant to learn from it, but suddenly a blinding insight dawned on his mind.
(“Come on, boy!” Skilluck rasped. “You’re falling behind!”)
“At a time when mountains here in the equatorial zone can remain snowcapped throughout the year, this is clearly a worrisome situation. Those among us who have never experienced ice and snow may doubt what I say, but I have felt how cold can numb the pads, seen how it affects the plants we here take for granted!”
(“Why does he have to go on so?” growled Strongrip, but Skilluck silenced him with glare.)
“We must therefore anticipate a time when mariners from the far north will arrive, not driven hither by a fortunate storm, but because their home has become uninhabitable. Yet this need not be an unmitigated disaster. For if there is one thing we lack, then … But I’ll leave the rest to Burney.”
(“I’ve been told about him!” Wellearn whispered in high excitement. “He’s the one-who-answers-questions, their most distinguished administrator! But I never saw him before!”)
Burly, yet as tall as his compatriots, Burney expanded to full height as Chard lowered. He uttered a few platitudes about the visitors before picking up Chard’s trail.
(“I know his sort,” Skilluck said contemptuously. “The politer they are, the more you need to brace yourself!”)
“What we lack, and in lacking neglect our duty, is access to the oceans!” Burney stated at the top of his resonant voice. “Oh, we’ve done well by our founders in spreading their teaching across this continent; travel a moonlong overland and you won’t find a child of talking age who doesn’t grasp at least the rudiments of what Jing bequeathed! But we know there’s more to the globe than merely land, don’t we? Proof of the fact is that our visitors came to us from a country which can’t be reached from here dry-padded!”
(“You told them that?” Skilluck snapped at Wellearn. “Oh you threw away a keen prong there!”)
(“I did nothing of the sort!” Wellearn retorted, stung. “Listen and you’ll find out!”)
“Suppose, though, we were to combine the knowledge we’ve garnered with the skills of these strangers,” Burney went on. “Suppose the brave seafarers of the Wego could voyage free from fear of cresh; suppose on every trip they carried the knowledge which Jing instructed us to share with everybody everywhere, so that every one of their briqs was equipped not just with a northfinder—I’m sure you’ve been told of their brilliant development of that creature which can always be relied on to point the same way? Though it does seem,” he added with a touch of condescension, “they don’t realize that if they really had crossed the equator, as Wellearn appears to imagine, it would reverse itself.”