Cum Grano Salis, Page 3

and he washungry.

  Besides, this was his pet detail, and he liked it. He had been going outwith the technicians ever since the base had been finished, a couple ofweeks before, and he was used to the work. The biotechnicians came outto gather specimens, and it was his job, along with four others, toguard them--make sure that no wild animal got them while they were goingabout their duties. It was a simple job, and one well suited toMacNeil's capacities.

  He kept an eye on the technicians. They were working on a bush of somekind that had little thorny-looking nuts on it, clipping bits off hereand there. He wasn't at all sure what they did with all those littlepieces and bits, but that was none of his business, anyway. Let thebrains take care of that stuff; his job was to make sure they weren'tinterrupted in whatever it was they were doing. After watching the threetechnicians in total incomprehension for a minute or so, he turned hisattention to the surrounding forest. But he was looking for a plant, notan animal.

  And he finally saw what he was looking for.

  The technicians paid him no attention. They rarely did. They had theirjob, and he had his. Of course, he didn't want to be caught breakingregulations, but he knew how to avoid that catastrophe. He walkedcasually toward the tree, as though he were only slightly interested init.

  He didn't know what the name of the tree was. He'd asked a technicianonce, and the tech had said that the tree didn't have any name yet.Personally, MacNeil thought it was silly for a thing not to have a name.Hell, _everything_ had a name.

  But, if they didn't want to tell him what it was, that was all rightwith him, too. He called it a banana-pear tree.

  Because that's what the fruit reminded him of.

  The fruit that hung from the tree were six or eight inches long, fat inthe middle, and tapering at both ends. The skin was a pale chartreuse incolor, with heliotrope spots.

  MacNeil remembered the first time he'd seen one, the time he'd asked thetech what its name was. The tech had been picking some of them andputting them into plastic bags, and the faint spark of MacNeil's dimcuriosity had been brought to feebly flickering life.

  "Hey, Doc," he'd said, "whatcha gonna do with them things?"

  "Take 'em to the lab," said the technician, engrossed in his work.

  MacNeil had digested that carefully. "Yeah?" he'd said at last. "Whatfor?"

  The technician had sighed and popped another fruit into a bag. He hadattempted to explain things to Broderick MacNeil before and given it upas a bad job. "We just feed 'em to the monkeys, Mac, that's all."

  "Oh," said Broderick MacNeil.

  Well, that made sense, anyhow. Monkeys got to eat _something_, don'tthey? Sure. And he had gazed at the fruit in interest.

  Fresh fruit was something MacNeil missed. He'd heard that fresh fruitwas necessary for health, and on Earth he'd always made sure that he hadplenty of it. He didn't want to get sick. But they didn't ship freshfruit on an interstellar expedition, and MacNeil had felt vaguelyapprehensive about the lack.

  Now, however, his problems were solved. He knew that it was strictlyagainst regulations to eat native fruit until the brass said so, butthat didn't worry him too much. He'd heard somewhere that a man can eatanything a monkey can, so he wasn't worried about it. So he'd tried one.It tasted fine, something like a pear and something like a banana, anddifferent from either. It was just fine.

  Since then, he'd managed to eat a couple every day, so's to get hisfresh fruit. It kept him healthy. Today, though, he needed more thanjust health; he was hungry, and the banana-pears looked singularlytempting.

  When he reached the tree, he turned casually around to see if any of theothers were watching. They weren't, but he kept his eye on them while hepicked several of the fruit. Then he turned carefully around, and, withhis back to the others, masking his movements with his own body, hebegan to munch contentedly on the crisp flesh of the banana-pears.

  * * * * *

  "Now, take this one, for instance," said Dr. Pilar. He was holding up anative fruit. It bulged in the middle, and had a chartreuse rind withheliotrope spots on it. "It's a very good example of exactly what we'reup against. Ever since we discovered this particular fruit, we've beeninterested in it because the analyses show that it should be anexcellent source of basic food elements. Presumably, it even tastesgood; our monkeys seemed to like it."

  "What's the matter with it, then?" asked Major Grodski, eying the fruitwith sleepy curiosity.

  Dr. Pilar gave the thing a wry look and put it back in the specimen bag."Except for the fact that it has killed every one of our testspecimens, we don't know what's wrong with it."

  Colonel Fennister looked around the laboratory at the cages full ofchittering animals--monkeys, white mice, rats, guinea pigs, hamsters,and the others. Then he looked back at the scientist. "Don't you knowwhat killed them?"

  Pilar didn't answer; instead, he glanced at Dr. Smathers, the physician.

  Smathers steepled his fingers over his abdomen and rubbed his fingertipstogether. "We're not sure. Thus far, it looks as though death was causedby oxygen starvation in the tissues."

  "Some kind of anemia?" hazarded the colonel.

  Smathers frowned. "The end results are similar, but there is no drop inthe hemoglobin--in fact, it seems to rise a little. We're stillinvestigating that. We haven't got all the answers yet, by any means,but since we don't quite know what to look for, we're rather hampered."

  The colonel nodded slowly. "Lack of equipment?"

  "Pretty much so," admitted Dr. Smathers. "Remember, we're just here forpreliminary investigation. When the ship brings in more men andequipment--"

  His voice trailed off. Very likely, when the ship returned, it wouldfind an empty base. The first-string team simply wasn't set up forexhaustive work; its job was to survey the field in general and mark outthe problems for the complete team to solve.

  Establishing the base had been of primary importance, and that was thesort of equipment that had been carried on the ship. That--and food. Thescientists had only the barest essentials to work with; they had noelectron microscopes or any of the other complex instruments necessaryfor exhaustive biochemical work.

  Now that they were engaged in a fight for survival, they felt like agang of midgets attacking a herd of water-buffalo with penknives. Evenif they won the battle, the mortality rate would be high, and theirchances of winning were pretty small.

  The Space Service officers and the scientists discussed the problem forover an hour, but they came to no promising conclusion.

  At last, Colonel Fennister said: "Very well, Dr. Pilar; we'll have toleave the food supply problem in your hands. Meanwhile, I'll try to keeporder here in the camp."

  * * * * *

  SM/2 Broderick MacNeil may not have had a top-level grade ofintelligence, but by the end of the second week, his conscience wasnagging him, and he was beginning to wonder who was goofing and why.After much thinking--if we may so refer to MacNeil's painful cerebralprocesses--he decided to ask a few cautious questions.

  Going without food tends to make for mental fogginess, snarling tempers,and general physical lassitude in any group of men. And, while quarterrations were not quite starvation meals, they closely approached it. Itwas fortunate, therefore, that MacNeil decided to approach Dr. Pilar.

  Dr. Petrelli's temper, waspish by nature, had become positively virulentin the two weeks that had passed since the destruction of the major foodcache. Dr. Smathers was losing weight from his excess, but hisheretofore pampered stomach was voicelessly screaming along his nervepassages, and his fingers had become shaky, which is unnerving in asurgeon, so his temper was no better than Petrelli's.

  Pilar, of course, was no better fed, but he was calmer than either ofthe others by disposition, and his lean frame didn't use as much energy.So, when the big hulking spaceman appeared at the door of his officewith his cap in his hands, he was inclined to be less brusque than hemight have been.

  "Yes? What is it?" he asked. He ha
d been correlating notes in hisjournal with the thought in the back of his mind that he would neverfinish it, but he felt that a small respite might be relaxing.

  MacNeil came in and looked nervously around at the plain walls of thepre-fab plastic dome-hut as though seeking consolation from them. Thenhe straightened himself in the approved military manner and looked atthe doctor.

  "You Dr. Piller? Sir?"

  "Pi_lar_," said the scientist in correction. "If you're looking for themedic, you'll want Dr. Smathers, over in G Section."

  "Oh, yessir," said MacNeil quickly, "I know that. But I ain't sick." Hedidn't feel _that_ sick, anyway. "I'm Spaceman