“Did they really? Why?”
“God knows; I’m a linguist, not a psychologist,” Magda told her. “Listen, Beth-this is fun, but it isn’t getting my work done.”
Magda bent over her keyboard and began to type her day’s notes into the computer terminal for analysis, programming and storage by the computer experts who would later code them.
A joke is making the rounds in Thendara, she typed. Heard on three occasions in the last five days. Details vary, but it basically concerns two (three, five) Terrans who were on an outdoor escalator on the port, which malfunctioned, stranding the Terrans for several hours (three days in one version) between the first and second level pending repairs. Implications: Terrans are so addicted to mechanical transport that walking down a half flight of unmoving stairs is physically or psychologically impossible. The implications of this: Darkovan concept of Terrans as physically weak, incapable of effort. Secondary implication: envy of Terran access to machinery, the ease of Terran life-styles? The growing frequency of jokes about Terrans, most of which appear to concern our life-style with special reference to its physical ease, would imply . . .
“Magda,” Bethany interrupted, “I just got a flash from Montray; do I tell him you’re here?”
Magda nodded. “I’m still officially on duty.”
Bethany spoke into the communicator, listened a moment and said, “Go on in.”
Inside, Montray frowned irritably at Magda’s Darkovan clothes. “A messenger just brought word from the Comyn Castle,” he said. “One of the Big Names over there-one Lorill Hastur-has just sent for me, and included a request that you-you personally-be brought along to translate. I imagine your friend, the Ardais lady, has been talking about your special skill with the language. So I have a problem.” He frowned. “I know perfectly well that it’s not according to protocol, and probably improper, too, to take along a woman as official translator on the Darkovan side. On the other hand, I understand one simply doesn’t ignore a request from the Comyn. Who are the Hasturs, anyway?”
Magda wondered how Montray could live on Darkover, even in the Terran HQ, for as much as a year, and still not know precisely who the Hasturs were, and why, “The Hasturs are the most prominent of the Comyn families,” she said. “Lorill Hastur is the real power behind the throne. The prince, Aran Elhalyn, is popularly referred to as ‘keeping the throne warm with his royal backside, which is the most useful part ‘of him.’ Most of the Hasturs for the last two hundred years have been statesmen; they used to sit on the throne as” well, but they found it interfered with the serious business of government, so they gave up their ceremonial functions to the Elhalyns. This Lorill is the Chief Councilor-roughly equivalent to a prime minister, with a supreme court judge’s power thrown in.”
“I see. I suppose it’s important not to offend him, then.” Montray scowled at Magda. “You can’t go as an official Terran translator in that outfit, Lome!”
Magda said, “I’m sure it will offend them far less than what I’d normally wear around here. You do know, don’t you, that a Terran woman’s ordinary dress would be considered, on the Darkovan side, indecent even for a prostitute?”
“No, I didn’t know that,” Montray said. “I suppose I’d better take your advice, then; you’re supposed to be the expert on women’s customs.”
But as they went through the great gates, past the black-leathered Spaceforce man on duty, Montray scowled. “See what you’ve let me in for? He probably thinks I’ve picked myself up a Darkovan girlfriend.”
Magda shook her head, reminding him that the Spaceforce guards knew her, and were accustomed to seeing her in Darkovan clothing; she never went into the Old Town without it. But, too late, it occurred to her that she had, perhaps, let Montray in for trouble on the Darkovan side. Terrans were not precisely popular in the Old Town, and the sight of a Terran escorting a respectable Darkovan female could indeed cause v some trouble, if some Darkovan hothead wanted to take advantage of it.
This is idiotic. I know fifteen times as much about Darkover as Montray ever will; yet by strict protocol I’m not even qualified to be an official translator, far less for any position more advanced than that; just because I’m a woman, and Darkover is a world where women don’t hold such positions.