At that point, a man in a dark shirt, with straight hair combed forward and a thick mustache, rose and began talking loudly, pointing a denouncing finger at Hudro and making appealing gestures to the room. He was angry and had maybe taken a bit too much wine. The gist was that he wanted to know why they were talking about helping an alien at all. The aliens were behind the people who sent planes to destroy their villages, and soldiers who took their land. He had lost his farm and his son. Why was this alien here, eating their food and expecting them to save him? Heated words and admonishments followed, with Miguel getting involved and hence failing to keep Cade informed. It ended with the man in the dark shirt stalking from the room.
A clear-skinned boy with deep, dark eyes, probably around fifteen, brought them back to the subject by reminding everyone that next week would be a time of festivals and parades, with devil dancers in costumes designed to exaggerate their height, and masks that covered their heads completely. What better way could there be to disguise the blue giant?
Hudro said something that brought laughs from all around. “What was that?” Cade asked Miguel.
“He says does that mean he has to learn to dance too?”
A woman pointed out that seeing devil dancers in a parade was one thing, but how would you explain one out on the highway or halfway across the Altiplano? Eventually it was conceded that ingenious though the idea was, it had too many difficulties.
As Cade watched and listened, he contrasted the company to the kind he was used to at his own parties. These were just simple, self-sufficient people, asking no more than to live as they chose and be left alone. Nobody was coerced or robbed to provide their needs. Dee had said something to him once about the people who did the really important things, but he hadn’t understood what she’d meant. Now, he did. The people he had known were as incapable of turning wilderness into food, rocks into a home, plants into a coat, or a dead tree into a table as they were of levitating. They depended for their very survival on the knowledge and skills of others. Told that their comfort and affluence arose from their innate excellence and the free interplay of market forces, they were happy to accept it. But Cade had seen what really went on.
As the debate continued, Cade remembered how Vrel had concealed him and Marie in St. Louis. Seizing a moment, and using Miguel again as translator, he told everybody, “If somebody is that conspicuous, then instead of trying to hide him, the thing to do might be to put him out in the open as something everyone would be expecting to see.”
“Such as what?” Miguel asked.
“Would it be possible to get hold of a Hyadean military uniform somehow? Miguel and I dress as Bolivian army. We ride through openly in a jeep or something—a Hyadean officer and two Terran troopers.” Cade looked around. The idea seemed to have merit.
“The uniforms might take some time. . . .” Inguinca said finally. He sounded dubious. “And then a suitable vehicle? . . . I don’t know. That might be more difficult still. You would need papers to get gas. . . .”
More debate followed. Then a girl that Inguinca had introduced earlier as Evita, wearing jeans and a red shirt, her hair woven in braids, said, “Let me be the guide who will take them through. There is no problem with the vehicle. I drive a van for the telephone company, which passes everywhere. Hyadeans work with the telephone people sometimes when they put in special equipment. So he can wear his own clothes.” Evita nodded toward Cade. “The American’s idea is good. Let the Hyadean ride up front with me where everyone can see him. Hiding him in the back would look suspicious if there was a check. Miguel and the American come as workmen. When a pretty girl drives, the soldiers want to be nice guys. It is the best plan.”