The Collected Stories of Frank Herbert (28 page)

Part 1

Intergalactic Department of Fusion, Bureau of Cultural Affairs

Domen 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26: 7102

(New Calendar)

Printed for the use of the Committee on Galactic Fusion, Dispersion, Migration and Settlement

TEAM 579 OF THE BUREAU OF CULTURAL AFFAIRS, DEPARTMENT OF FUSION.

Interviewer Simsu Yaggata
: Here we are in the home of Mr. and Mrs. Presby Kilkau in the village of Lauh, Gomeisa III. We are here to interview Hilmot Gustin, the gentleman seated across from me beside his niece, Mrs. Kilkau. Mr. Gustin is one of the few surviving pioneers to Gomeisa III, and he has kindly agreed to tell us some of the things he experienced first-hand in those early days. I want to thank you, Mrs. Kilkau, for your hospitality in inviting me here today.

Mrs. Kilkau
: It is we who are honored, Mr. Yaggata.

Gustin
: I still think this is a lot of frip-frap, Bessie. I was supposed to go bilker fishing today.

Mrs. Kilkau
: But, Uncle Gus.

Gustin
: How about you, Mr. Yaggata? Wouldn't you rather go fishing?

Yaggata
: I'm sorry, sir. Our schedule doesn't permit me the time.

Gustin
: Too bad. The bilker are biting like a flock of hungry fangbirds.

Yaggata
: I wonder if we could begin by having you tell us when you first came to Gomeisa III?

Gustin
: That was in '64.

Yaggata
: That would be 6864?

Gustin
: Yes. I was just a wicky boy then. My pap moved us from Procyon IV in the second wave.

Yaggata
: I understand you come from a long line of pioneers, sir.

Gustin
: My folks never did stay put after Mars. We spent five generations on Mars—then, just like boomer seeds: spang! all over creation!

Yaggata
: You came out in the Mars Migration?

Gustin
: That was when my grandfather went to Procyon IV. My pap was born enroute. I was born on Procyon.

Yaggata
: And what motivated your father to migrate here to Gomeisa III?

Gustin
: He heard it was green. Procyon's nothing but one big sandstorm.

Yaggata
: And what did he say when he found the vegetation was purple?

Gustin
: He said anything was better than yellow dust.

Yaggata
: And this is a very beautiful planet.

Gustin
: One of the prettiest in the whole universe!

Yaggata
: Now, sir, we're interested in the details of your life as it was in those early days. How did you find conditions when you arrived?

Gustin
: Rougher than a chigger's … Are you recording now, Mr. Yaggata?

Yaggata
: Yes, I am.

Gustin
: We found it pretty rough.

Yaggata
: How soon after arrival did you take up your own claim?

Gustin
: Ten or fifteen days we waited in the bracks with all the other chums. Then we came directly to Lauh. There were two other families in the district: the Pijuns and the Kilkaus. Bessie's husband is a grandson of old Effus Kilkau.

Yaggata
: What did it look like around here in those days?

Gustin
: Nothing but fritch brush and wally bugs, an occasional tiger snake and some duka-dukas, and, of course, those danged fangbirds.
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Yaggata
: Most of the universe is familiar with the terrible fangbirds, sir. We can all be thankful they've been exterminated.

Gustin
: They haven't been exterminated! They're just waiting in some hidden valley for the day when …

Mrs. Kilkau
: Now, Uncle Gus!

Gustin
: Well, they are!

Yaggata
: The duka-dukas—those are the little fuzzy doglike creatures, aren't they?

Gustin
: That's right. Their fuzz is stiff as wire and barbed. Scratch worse than a fritch thorn.

Yaggata
: What was the first thing you did when you came here?

Gustin
: We took sick with the toogies!

Yaggata
: The toogies?

Gustin
: The medics call it Fremont's boils after old Doc Fremont who was in the first wave. He's the one discovered they were caused by the micro-pollen of the fritch flowers.

Yaggata
: I see. Did you build a house immediately?

Gustin
: Well, sir, in between scratching the toogies we threw up a sod shelter with a shake roof, and piled fritch brush around for a compound to keep out the duka-dukas.

Yaggata
: That must have been exciting—listening to the weird screams of the fangbirds, the whistling calls of the duka-dukas.

Gustin
: We all had too much work to do, and no time to feel excited.

Yaggata
: Most of the early pioneers have their names attached to some element of this planet, sir. Was your family so honored?

Gustin
: Heh, heh! Gustin swamp! That's what we've got! I'll tell you, Mr. Yaggata, Bessie wanted me to make out like our family was a pack of heroes, but the truth is we weren't anything but dirt farmers, and with a swamp making up about two-thirds of our dirt.

Yaggata
: But you certainly must've had some interesting experiences while carving a ranch out of that wilderness.

Gustin
: It's a funny thing, mister, but what some folks call
interesting experiences
aren't anything but labor and misery to those who're having them.

Yaggata
: Wasn't there anything to lighten the load? Something amusing, perhaps?

Gustin
: Well, sir, there was the time pap bought the rollit
2
and he …

Mrs. Kilkau
: Oh, now, Uncle Gus! I'm sure Mr. Yaggata wouldn't be interested in a silly old commercial transaction like…”

Gustin
: You see here, Bessie! I'm the one's being interviewed!

Mrs. Kilkau
: Of course, Uncle Gus, but …

Gustin
: And I think that story about the rollit has a real lesson for everyone!

Yaggata
: It certainly wouldn't do any harm to hear the story, sir.

Gustin
: You understand, mister, we weren't anything but lean chums
3
with the little kit.
4
Our power pack was busy all the time just producing bare essentials. So when old Effus Kilkau advertised that he had a draft animal for sale, pap was all for buying it.

Yaggata
: Advertised? How was that done?

Gustin
: On the checker net.
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Old Effus advertised that he had one rollit for sale cheap, weight 2500 kilos, trained to plow.

Yaggata
: Some of those who will use this record will not be familiar with the genus rollitus sphericus, Mr. Gustin. Would you mind setting the record clear?

Gustin
: In due time, son. Don't light a short fuse. The point is, my pap didn't know a rollit from a bowling ball, either, and he was too darned proud to admit it.

Yaggata
: Ha, ha, ha. Wouldn't anyone enlighten him?

Gustin
: Well, old Effus suspected pap was ignorant about rollits, and Effus thought it'd be a good joke just to let him have it cold.

Yaggata
: I see. How was the transaction completed?

Gustin
: All done on the checker net, and confirmed at base where they credited Effus with the seventy galars.

Yaggata
: Your father bought it sight unseen?

Gustin
: Oh, certainly! There was no question of hanky-panky in those days. People had to help each other … and they had to be honest because their lives depended on it. It's only after we get civilized that we feel free to cheat. Besides, we lived so far apart in those days that we'd have lost more going to look at the beast than just having it shipped over.

Yaggata
: That certainly makes sense, sir. But didn't your father kind of feel around to find out specifically what it was that he was buying?

Gustin
: Oh, he probed around some. But pap was afraid of appearing the sag.
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I do remember he asked how the rollit was to feed. Old Effus just said that this rollit was trained to a whistle call, and could be turned loose to graze off the country. About then, somebody else chimed in on the net and said seventy galars was certainly cheap for a 2500-kilo rollit, and if pap didn't want the beast, then he'd take it. So pap closed the deal right then and there.

Yaggata
: How did they deliver it?

Gustin
: Well, the Kilkaus were some better off than we were. They had a freight platform null to 6000 kilos. They just put the rollit on that platform and flew it over.

Yaggata
: What did your father say when he saw it?

Gustin
: You mean about harness?

Yaggata
: Yes.

Gustin
: Well, sir, I don't think pap even thought about the harness problem. We'd had a ciget on Procyon, and pap'd made his own harness with good long traces so he could stay away from the stink of it. He just figured he'd have another set of harness to make.

Yaggata
: Didn't he say
anything
about harness?

Gustin
: No. He didn't have a chance to say anything. You see, the rollit was a little spooky from the flight. As soon as they let it down it rolled all over the landscape, and it made one pass and rolled right over me.

Yaggata
: Galumpers! To someone who'd never seen a rollit before, I imagine that was quite frightening!

Gustin
: It's a good thing Maw didn't see it. She'd have passed dead away. You know, a 2500-kilo rollit develops about 1500 kilos of forward thrust from a standing start, and once it gets moving it can really roll. They're deceptive, too. They look like a kind of giant amœba flowing over the landscape, and all of a sudden they're right on top of you—literally!

Yaggata
: Weren't you frightened when it ran over you?

Gustin
: Well, it knocked me down, there was a second of darkness and a kind of warm, firm pressure—then it was gone. You know, a rollit won't hurt you. In fact, they're really very friendly. There was a case of a fellow over in Mirmon County who was saved from a fangbird by his rollit. The rollit just sat on this fellow until the fangbird gave up.

Yaggata
: I'll bet that was an experience!

Gustin
: Sure was. You know, a rollit's ninety percent mobile fluid and pump muscles, and the rest a hide like flexible armor plate. An adult rollit's practically immune to physical attack—even from a fangbird—and there's nothing like being indestructible to make you a friend of everyone.

Yaggata
: What was your reaction to being run down by that big animated ball of flesh?

Gustin
: After the first shock, I wanted to try it again. I thought it was fun. But pap was so shaken by it, that he rushed me indoors. It took old Effus a half hour to convince pap that a rollit wouldn't hurt anyone, that it distributed its weight over such a large area that it was just like a good massage.

Yaggata
: Ha, ha, ha. So there was your father with a rollit and no idea how to harness it.

Gustin
: That's right. He didn't even think about it until after lunch. Old Effus was gone by then. The rollit was outside just rolling around, browsing off the fritch brush, clearing quite an area of it, at that. Good brush buckers, rollits are.

Yaggata
: How did your father approach the problem?

Gustin
: He just walked up to the rollit, clucked at it and whistled like ole Effus had told him. He led the rollit over to the shed where we had our imperv plow. It was a three-gang plow with a two and a half foot bite.

Yaggata
: How was it supposed to be towed?

Gustin
: By a power pack rotor. But we only had the one pack, and we didn't want to go into three-ball for a rotor.

Yaggata
: What did your father say?

Gustin
: He said, “Well, let's figure out how to hook this beast to the front of that there…” And then it hit him. How do you put harness on a beast that rolls its whole body, and moves by shifting its center of gravity? That was a real stinker of a problem.

Yaggata
: I've seen the diagrams. They appear quite obvious. Didn't it occur to your father right away how it had to be done?

Gustin
: Sometimes the obvious isn't so obvious until someone's showed it to you, mister. Remember, pap had never seen anything even remotely like a rollit before. His whole concept of draft animals was tied up in something like a ciget—a creature with a specific number of legs and a body that would accommodate some kind of harness. The rollit was a different breed of beast entirely.

Yaggata
: Certainly, but …

Gustin
: And what you've been used to seeing can tie your mind up in little knots so tight you can't see anything else.

Yaggata
: Why didn't your father just call up a neighbor and ask how to hitch a rollit to a plow?

Gustin
: Pap was too proud. He wasn't going to ask and look foolish, and he wasn't going to give up. For about a week it was a regular ten-ring scrag fight around out compound. We learned later that old Effus and half his clan were up in the hills with binoculars laughing themselves silly. They ran bets on what we'd try next.