Omnilingual | Page 7

same kind of vocal sounds we do."
"Oh, yes, we do," Ivan Fitzgerald contradicted, safe on his own ground. "I haven't seen
any actual Martian skulls--these people seem to have been very tidy about disposing of
their dead--but from statues and busts and pictures I've seen. I'd say that their vocal
organs were identical with our own."
"Well, grant that. And grant that it's going to be impressive to rattle off the names of
Martian notables whose statues we find, and that if we're ever able to attribute any
placenames, they'll sound a lot better than this horse-doctors' Latin the old astronomers
splashed all over the map of Mars," Lattimer said. "What I object to is her wasting time
on this stuff, of which nobody will ever be able to read a word if she fiddles around with
those lists till there's another hundred feet of loess on this city, when there's so much real
work to be done and we're as shorthanded as we are."
That was the first time that had come out in just so many words. She was glad Lattimer
had said it and not Selim von Ohlmhorst.
"What you mean," she retorted, "is that it doesn't have the publicity value that digging up
statues has."
For an instant, she could see that the shot had scored. Then Lattimer, with a side glance at
Chamberlain, answered:
"What I mean is that you're trying to find something that any archaeologist, yourself
included, should know doesn't exist. I don't object to your gambling your professional
reputation and making a laughing stock of yourself; what I object to is that the blunders
of one archaeologist discredit the whole subject in the eyes of the public."
That seemed to be what worried Lattimer most. She was framing a reply when the

communication-outlet whistled shrilly, and then squawked: "Cocktail time! One hour to
dinner; cocktails in the library, Hut Four!"
* * * * *
The library, which was also lounge, recreation room, and general gathering-place, was
already crowded; most of the crowd was at the long table topped with sheets of glasslike
plastic that had been wall panels out of one of the ruined buildings. She poured herself
what passed, here, for a martini, and carried it over to where Selim von Ohlmhorst was
sitting alone.
For a while, they talked about the building they had just finished exploring, then drifted
into reminiscences of their work on Terra--von Ohlmhorst's in Asia Minor, with the
Hittite Empire, and hers in Pakistan, excavating the cities of the Harappa Civilization.
They finished their drinks--the ingredients were plentiful; alcohol and flavoring extracts
synthesized from Martian vegetation--and von Ohlmhorst took the two glasses to the
table for refills.
"You know, Martha," he said, when he returned, "Tony was right about one thing. You
are gambling your professional standing and reputation. It's against all archaeological
experience that a language so completely dead as this one could be deciphered. There
was a continuity between all the other ancient languages--by knowing Greek,
Champollion learned to read Egyptian; by knowing Egyptian, Hittite was learned. That's
why you and your colleagues have never been able to translate the Harappa hieroglyphics;
no such continuity exists there. If you insist that this utterly dead language can be read,
your reputation will suffer for it."
"I heard Colonel Penrose say, once, that an officer who's afraid to risk his military
reputation seldom makes much of a reputation. It's the same with us. If we really want to
find things out, we have to risk making mistakes. And I'm a lot more interested in finding
things out than I am in my reputation."
She glanced across the room, to where Tony Lattimer was sitting with Gloria Standish,
talking earnestly, while Gloria sipped one of the counterfeit martinis and listened. Gloria
was the leading contender for the title of Miss Mars, 1996, if you liked big bosomy
blondes, but Tony would have been just as attentive to her if she'd looked like the Wicked
Witch in "The Wizard of Oz." because Gloria was the Pan-Federation Telecast System
commentator with the expedition.
"I know you are," the old Turco-German was saying. "That's why, when they asked me to
name another archaeologist for this expedition, I named you."
He hadn't named Tony Lattimer; Lattimer had been pushed onto the expedition by his
university. There'd been a lot of high-level string-pulling to that; she wished she knew the
whole story. She'd managed to keep clear of universities and university politics; all her
digs had been sponsored by non-academic foundations or art museums.
"You have an excellent standing: much better than my own, at your age. That's why it

disturbs me to see you jeopardizing it by this insistence that the Martian language can be
translated. I can't, really, see how