The Draco Tavern - Larry Niven [79]
“Wonderful,” Cheri Kaylor said.
“Lettuce,” I said. “David? When you get a minute, get me any kind of salad. I haven’t eaten anything normal since ... I still can’t tell.”
Magliocco hadn’t said anything this whole time, but now he was looking at me like some sort of strange bug. He said, “It should have been me.”
Cheri gave him a look: Idiot! He ignored her. “I’ve got credentials in cosmology and astronomy. He showed you sights the rest of the human race might never know. I might even have figured out what he was doing! Why a bartender?”
“I was the wrong man,” I admitted. “You, Dr. Kaylor, any human being in here would have been a better choice. I just hate being lost.”
I looked around at the evening crowd, a dozen assorted sizes and shapes, a whispering background of alien buzzes and clicks and screeching, seven or eight species from hundreds of light-years around. “I’m glad to be home.”
LOSING MARS
The latest crop of visitors to Earth came rolling across the tundra: four shapeless bean bags glowing like psychedelic rainbows. They formed a queue and rolled through one of the low-and-wide airlocks, into the Draco Tavern. Two Chirpsithra turned from the bar and watched them approach.
It had been a quiet afternoon.
I spoke to the first bag to reach the bar. “Welcome to the Draco Tavern. What can I do for you?”
An insert on the bag spoke in the soft accents of a standard Chirpsithra translator system. “We seek to speak to any representative of the United Nations.”
“There aren’t any in tonight,” I said. There rarely were, though it’s not unheard of. “Is this urgent?”
“Of huge import, but our timeline is flexible,” said another of the bags. “Rick Schumann the barkeep, can you contact the United Nations for us?”
“I can find somebody.” I still had phone and e-mail codes for Cheri Kaylor and Carlos Magliocco.
“That is well. The Chirpsithra have demanded too high a fee as mediators. Would you accept two-to-the-twentieth part of what we deal for?”
Less than a millionth? “I have no idea. What are we dealing for?”
“Mars.”
I tapped out what Dr. Kaylor had scrawled on her card, and got her voice mail. “Cheri Kaylor. Leave your name, number, and vital statistics. An Arab slavemaster will contact you shortly.”
That could hardly be her business office, I thought. “Rick Schumann, Draco Tavern. Some of my visitors have a strong interest in talking United Nations business—”
“Worth a trip to Siberia?” Dr. Kaylor had picked up.
“Worth more than that, I gather. I don’t have the full details yet. Shall I call Mr. Magliocco too?”
“No, hold up, Rick. I’m actually in Siberia, in a bathtub at the Mount Forel Hotel. We can get Carlos involved if this looks interesting. Who’s talking? What do they look like? Where are they from?” She sounded cheerful and intrigued.
“They haven’t said. They’re in full pressure gear. I think they’re fish.”
“Give me half an hour. I’ll have an Irish coffee.”
I hung up, wondering why she didn’t want Magliocco. A bit of work-related rivalry?
Until the first alien lander came down thirty-six years ago, the United Nations had spent most of its time in internal bickering and grand theft. These days they presented more of a united front. Cheri Kaylor and Carlos Magliocco dealt with people like me, people who dealt directly with aliens.
The life-support bags were arrayed at a big table with two Chirpsithra and a bearlike creature who had walked down from the lander with not even an extra coat. Wen Goldsmith took their orders. The bags wanted water, any interesting flavor.
Okay, I’d guessed they were water dwellers. I poured them pitchers of tap water and glacier water to get them started, and I joined the circle. “Mars,” I said.
“We are not involved,” one of the Chirpsithra said. The other said, “We may be asked to judge.”
One of the bags said, “We should wait for an official, should we not?”
“Dr. Kaylor will be here shortly,” I said.