"Nearly twenty-four hours by Earth reckoning," Edri answered. "You
needed it." He leaned over and offered Trehearne a prosaic pack of
American cigarettes. "Smoke?"
Trehearne took one and sat up. He smoked for some time in silence,
remembering. Finally he said, "It all happened, didn't it?"
Edri nodded.
"I know it must have, but I don't believe it." Trehearne shook his
head. "Of all the incredible.... What were you doing there, Edri? How
can you come and go on Earth without anyone knowing? What are the
Vardda, besides--well, mutants?"
"Traders. Merchants. The most commercial race in the galaxy." Edri
lifted the cover off a tray on a small table by the bunk. "I brought
your breakfast. Go ahead and eat while I gabble. How we come and
go is fairly simple. We land at odd intervals, here and there in
the waste spaces of which Earth has a number. We do our business,
and after a while are picked up again. As I told you before, we're
exceedingly careful, and the fact that hardly anyone on Earth would
believe the truth if they were told it is a protection. Of course,
trading in secret that way, we're limited in what we can take, and
Earth exports--the genuine articles and not mere copies--command very
high prices. You'd be amazed at the value of French perfumes, Scotch
whiskey, and American films on planets you never heard of."
"Do you trade with them all in secret?"
"Good Lord, no! Most worlds, even the very primitive ones, we can deal
with quite openly. They might not like us, but they benefit enormously
from our commerce."
"Then why not Earth?"
"Well," said Edri, "I don't like to offend your sensibilities as a
native of the place, but Earth is a crazy planet. Oh, it's not the
only one. There's a number of them scattered about, and we avoid open
contact with all of them. You see, Trehearne, most worlds develop,
or remain undeveloped, more or less homogeneously in the matter of
civilization. I don't mean they're entirely peaceful, because they're
not, but in the long run their populations are more predictable, more
stable than on the Earth-type worlds that have grown up all out of
joint. You know what I mean--on one side of the world atomic power,
on the other the wooden plough and the blowgun. Too big a gap, and
it makes trouble all down the line. Now, a primitive society regards
war as a sport and takes an honest pleasure in it. A society in a
high state of culture regards it as something outgrown and obsolete
as hunting game for food. Everybody knows where they are. But when
you get a world with great big overlapping mobs of population, every
one of them in a different stage of cultural development and every
one of them subject to a constant bombardment of outside stimuli
they can't assimilate, you have got a mixture that keeps exploding
in all directions. We have a healthy desire not to get blown up, and
besides, it's impossible to establish any profitable trade with a world
continually torn by wars. So--does that answer your question?"
"I take it," Trehearne said sourly, "that the Vardda don't think much
of Earth."
"It's a good world. It'll settle down some day. Nobody can fight
forever. They either knock themselves back into barbarism again, or
they grow up."
Trehearne put down the fork on the empty plate, and looked at Edri,
rather angrily. "Don't the Vardda ever fight?" he demanded. "I gather
there's a vast commercial empire. There must be trade wars, battles
over markets and rights. No empire was ever built without them."
"No other empire was ever built," said Edri quietly, "without any
competition. I think you still don't quite understand. We have an
absolute, complete, and unbreakable monopoly on interstellar flight.
Only the Vardda ships go between the stars, and only the Vardda men can
fly them. You know the reason, you proved it in yourself. We don't have
to fight."
Trehearne let go a long, low whistle. "And we thought we had monopolies
on Earth! But I don't see why, if you could mutate, others couldn't do
it, too. How do you hold them down?"
"We don't hold anybody down. We don't rule, influence, or interfere
with any world but our own. We learned long ago that it was bad
business. As to the mutation, it's impossible. The secret of the
process was lost with Orthis, some thousand years ago." He rose
abruptly from the chair where he had been sitting, and pointed to some
garments in the locker. "I think those will fit you. Get dressed, and
I'll show you around."
Trehearne looked doubtfully at the clothes, a tunic of dark green silk,
dark trousers, a modestly jewelled belt, and sandals. Edri grinned.
"You'll get used to them. And you won't feel half as peculiar as you
would look going about in those ridiculous tweeds."
Trehearne shrugged, and put them on. He had to admit they were
comfortable. There was a mirror set inside the locker door, and he
studied himself in it. He was startled to see how changed he was in the
Vardda dress. The last vestige of Earth was gone.