The Complete Stories_ Volume 1 - Isaac Asimov [44]
It wouldn't be so bad if he'd let a tax man work on the forms with him, but he insists on doing it himself and it makes him a bitter man. By April 14, he isn't approachable.
So it's too bad the flying saucer landed on April 14, 1956.
I saw it land. My chair was backed up against the wall in the sheriff's office, and I was looking at the stars through the windows and feeling too lazy to go back to my magazine and wondering if I ought to knock off and hit the sack or keep on listening to Cameron curse real steady as he went over his columns of figures for the hundred twenty-seventh time.
It looked like a shooting star at first, but then the track of light broadened into two things that looked like rocket exhausts and the thing came down sweet, steady and without a sound. An old, dead leaf would have rustled more coming down and landed thumpier. Two men got out.
I couldn't say anything or do anything. I couldn't choke or point; I couldn't even bug my eyes. I just sat there. Cameron? He never looked up.
There was a knock on the door which wasn't locked. It opened and the two men from the flying saucer stepped in. I would have thought they were city fellows if I hadn't seen the flying saucer land in the scrub. They wore charcoal-gray suits, with white shirts and maroon four-in-hands. They had on black shoes and black homburgs. They had dark complexions, black wavy hair and brown eyes. They had very serious looks on their faces and were about five foot ten apiece. They looked very much alike.
God, I was scared.
But Cameron just looked up when the door opened and frowned. Ordinarily, I guess he'd have laughed the collar button off his shirt at seeing clothes like that in Twin Gulch, but he was so taken up by his income tax that he never cracked a smile.
He said, "What can I do for you, folks?" and he tapped his hand on the forms so it was obvious he hadn't much time. One of the two stepped forward. He said, "We have had your people under observation a long time." He pronounced each word carefully and all by itself.
Cameron said, "My people? All I got's a wife. What's she been doing?"
The fellow in the suit said, "We have chosen this locality for our first contact because it is isolated and peaceful. We know that you are the leader here."
"I'm the sheriff, if that's what you mean, so spit it out. What's you trouble?"
"We have been careful to adopt your mode of dress and even to assume your appearance."
"That's my mode of dress?" He must have noticed it for the first time.
"The mode of dress of your dominant social class, that is. We have also learned your language." You could see the light break in on Cameron. He said, "You guys foreigners?" Cameron didn't go much for foreigners, never having met many outside the army, but generally he tried to be fair.
The man from the saucer said, "Foreigners? Indeed we are. We come from the watery place your people call Venus."
(I was just collecting up strength to blink my eyes, but that sent me right back to nothing. I had seen the flying saucer. I had seen it land. I had to believe this! These men—or these somethings—came from Venus.)
But Cameron never blinked an eye. He said, "All right. This is the U.S.A. We all got equal rights regardless of race, creed, color, or nationality. I'm at your service. What can I do for you?"
"We would like to have you make immediate arrangements for the important men of your U.S.A., as you call it, to be brought here for discussions leading to your people joining our great organization." Slowly, Cameron got red. "Our people join your organization. We're already part of the U.N.