"Gordon R. Dickson - Jean Dupres" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dickson Gordon R)

said that the post-senior Klahari were grouping and they might begin raiding the planters' places in as little
as three weeks' time. Jean corrected me, gravely.
"Oh, no, Sergeant," he said. "Not for the rest of this season."
"Who told you that?" I said-snorted, perhaps. I was expecting to hear it had been his father's word on
the subject.
"The Klahari," he said. "When I talk to them."
I stared at him.
"You talk to them?" I said. He ducked his head, suddenly a little embarrassed, even a little
guilty-looking.
"They come to the edge of the fields," he said. "They want to talk to me."
"Want to talk to you? To you? Why?"
 "TheyтАж" He became even more guilty-looking. He would not meet my eyes, "want to knowтАж
things."
"What things?"
"IfтАж" he was miserable, "I'm aтАж man."
All at once it broke on me. Of course, there could only be a few children like this boy, who had never
seen Earth, who had been born here, and who were old enough by now to be out in the fields. And none
of the other children would be carrying riflesтАФreal ones. The natural assumption of the Klahari would of
course be that they were young versions of human beingsтАФexcept that in Jean's case, to a Klahari there
was one thing wrong with that. It was simply unthinkableтАФno, it was more than that; it was
inconceivableтАФto a Klahari that anyone of Jean's small size and obvious immaturity could carry a
weapon. Let alone use it. At Jean's age, as I told you, the Klahari thought only of brotherhood.
"What do you tell them?"
"That I'mтАж almost a man." Jean's eyes managed to meet mine at last and they were wretchedly
apologetic for comparing himself with me, or with any other adult male of the human race. I saw his
father's one-track, unconsciously brutal mind behind that.
"Well," I said harshly. "You almost areтАФanyone who can handle a scanner and a rifle like that."
But he didn't believe me. I could see from his eyes that he even distrusted me for telling such a
bald-faced lie. He saw himself through Pelang's eyesтАФDeBaraumer, scanner, and ability to talk with the
Klahari notwithstanding.
It was time for me to goтАФthere was no time to waste getting on to the next planter with my warnings.
I did stay a few minutes longer to try and find out how he had learned to talk Klahari. But Jean had no
idea. Somewhere along the line of growing up he had learned itтАФin the unconscious way of children that
makes it almost impossible for them to translate word by word from one language to another. Jean
thought in English, or he thought in Klahari. Where there were no equal terms, he was helpless. When I
asked him why the Klahari said that their large bands would not form or attack until the end of the
season, he was absolutely not able to tell me.
So I went on my way, preaching my gospel of warning, and skirmishing with the larger bands of
Klahari I met, chivvying and breaking up the smaller ones. Finally I finished the swing through my district
and got back to Regional Installation to find myself commissioned lieutenant and given command of a half
company. I'd been about seventy percent successful in getting planters to pull back with their families into
protected areasтАФthe success being mainly with those who had been here more than seventeen years.
But of those who hesitated, more were coming in every day to safety, as local raids stepped up.
However, Jean turned out to be right. It was the end of the season before matters finally came to a
head with the nativesтАФand then it happened all at once.
I was taking a shower at Regional Installation, after a tour, when the general alarm went. Two hours
later I was deep in the jungle almost to the edge of the desert, with all my command and with only a
fighting chance of ever seeing a shower again.
Because all we could do was retreat, fighting as we went. There had been a reason the Klahari
explosion had held off until the end of the seasonтАФand that was that there never had been such an