The Colors of Space

The staircase moved slowly, and Bart had plenty of time to see

everything. On the step immediately in front of him, two Lhari were

standing; with their backs turned, they might almost have been men.

Unusually tall, unusually thin, but men. Then Bart amended that

mentally. The Lhari had two arms, two legs and a head apiece--they were

that much like men. Their faces had two eyes, two ears, and a nose and

mouth, all in the right places. But the similarity ended there.

They had skin of a curious pale silvery gray, and pale, pure-white hair

rising in what looked like a feathery crest. The eyes were long and

slanting, the forehead high and narrow, the nose delicately thin and

chiseled with long vertically slit nostrils, the ears long, pointed and

lobeless. The mouth looked almost human, though the chin was abnormally

pointed. The hands would almost have passed inspection as human

hands--except for the long, triangular nails curved over the fingertips

like the claws of a cat. They wore skin-tight clothes of some metallic

silky stuff, and long flowing gleaming silvery capes. They looked

unearthly, elfin and strange, and in their own way they were beautiful.

The two Lhari in front of Bart had been talking softly, in their fast

twittering speech; but as the hum of the crowds on the upper levels grew

louder, they raised their voices, and Bart could hear what they were

saying. He was a little surprised to find that he could still understand

the Lhari language. He hadn't heard a word of it in years--not since his

Mentorian mother died. The Lhari would never guess that he could

understand their speech. Not one human in a million could speak or

understand a dozen words of Lhari, except the Mentorians.

"Do you really think that human--" the first Lhari spoke the word as

if it were a filthy insult--"will have the temerity to come in by this

ship?"

"No reasonable being can tell what humans will do," said the second

Lhari. "But then, no reasonable being can tell what our own Port

Authorities will do either! If the message had only reached us sooner,

it would have been easier. Now I suppose it will have to clear through a

dozen officials and a dozen different kinds of formalities."

The younger Lhari sounded angry. "And we have only a description--no

name, nothing! How do they expect us to do anything under those

conditions? What I can't understand is how it ever happened, or how the

man managed to get away. What worries me is the possibility that he may

have communicated with others we don't know about. Those bungling fools

who let the first man get away can't even be sure--"