The Man Who Counts by Poul Anderson

Author:Poul Anderson [Anderson, Poul]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: sf_space
Published: 2011-04-28T20:37:01+00:00

V

“First,” said Wace, “you must understand that the world is shaped like a ball.”

“Our philosophers have known it for a long time,” said Delp complacently. “Even barbarians like the Lannach’honai have an idea of the truth. After all, they cover thousands of obdisai every year, migrating. We’re not so mobile, but we had to work out an astronomy before we could navigate very far.”

Wace doubted that the Drak’honai could locate themselves with great precision. It was astonishing what their neolithic technology had achieved, not only in stone but in glass and ceramics; they even molded a few synthetic resins. They had telescopes, a sort of astrolabe, and navigational tables based on sun, stars, and the two small moons. However, compass and chronometer require iron, which simply did not exist in any noticeable quantity on Diomedes.

Automatically, he noted a rich potential market. The primitive Tyrlanians were avid for simple tools and weapons of metal, paying exorbitantly in the furs, gems, and pharmaceutically useful juices which made this planet worth the attention of the Polesotechnic League. The Drak’honai could use more sophisticated amenities, from clocks and slide rules to Diesel engines — and were able to meet proportionately higher prices.

He recollected where he was: the raft Gerunis, headquarters of the Chief Executive Officer of the Fleet; and that the amiable creature who sat on the upper deck and talked with him was actually his jailer.

How long had it been since the crash — fifteen Diomedean days? That would be more than a week, Terrestrial reckoning. Several per cent of the Earthside food was already eaten.

He had lashed himself into learning the Drak’ho tongue from his fellow-prisoner Tolk. It was fortunate that the League had, of necessity, long ago developed the principles by which instruction could be given in minimal time. When properly focused, a trained mind need only be told something once. Tolk himself used an almost identical system; he might never have seen metal, but the Herald was semantically sophisticated.

“Well, then,” said Wace, still haltingly and with gaps in his vocabulary, but adequately for his purposes, “do you know that this world-ball goes around the sun?”

“Quite a few of the philosophers believe that,” said Delp. “I’m a practical (?) one myself, and never cared much one way or another.”

“The motion of your world is unusual. In fact, in many ways this is a freak place. Your sun is cooler and redder than ours, so your home is colder. This sun has a mass… what do you say?… oh, call it a weight not much less than that of our own; and it is about the same distance. Therefore Diomedes, as we call your world, has a year only somewhat longer than our Earth’s. Seven hundred eighty-two Diomedean days, isn’t it? Diomedes has more than twice the diameter of Earth, but lacks the heavy materials found in most worlds. Therefore its gravity — hell! — therefore I only weigh about one-tenth more here than I would at home.”

“I don’t understand,” said Delp.

“Oh, never mind,” said Wace gloomily.

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