Robert A Heinlein - Stranger in a Strange Land

NOTICE:

All men, gods; and planets in this story are imaginary,

Any coincidence of names is regretted.

Part One HIS MACULATE ORIGIN, 5

Fart Two HIS PREPOSTEROUS HERITAGE, 81

Fart Three HIS ECCENTRIC EDUCATION, 261

Part Four HIS SCANDALOUS CAREER, 363

Part Five HIS HAPPY DESTINY, 425

Preface

IF YOU THINK that this book appears to be thicker and contain more words

than you found in the first published edition of Stranger in a Strange Land,

your observation is correct. This edition is the original one-the way Robert

Heinlein first conceived it, and put it down on paper.

The earlier edition contained a few words over 160,000, while this one

runs around 220,000 words. Robert's manuscript copy usually contained about 250

to 300 words per page, depending on the amount of dialogue on the pages. So,

taking an average of about 275 words, with the manuscript running 800 pages, we

get a total of 220,000 words, perhaps a bit more.

This book was so different from what was being sold to the general public,

or to the science fiction reading public in 1961 when it was published, that the

editors required some cutting and removal of a few scenes that might then have

been offensive to public taste.

The November 1948 issue of Astounding Science Fiction contained a letter

to the editor suggesting titles for the issue of a year hence. Among the titles

was to be a story by Robert A. Heinlein-"Gulf."

In a long conversation between that editor, John W. Campbell, Jr., and

Robert, it was decided that there would be sufficient lead time to allow all the

stories that the fan had titled to be written, and the magazine to come out in

time for the November 1949 date. Robert promised to deliver a short story to go

with the title. Most of the other authors also went along with the gag. This

issue came to be known as the "Time Travel" issue.

Robert's problem, then, was to find a story to fit the title assigned to

him.

So we held a "brainstorming" session. Among other unsuitable notions, I

suggested a story about a human infant, raised by an alien race. The idea was

just too big for a short story, Robert said, but he made a note about it. That

night he went into his study, and wrote some lengthy notes, and set them aside.

For the title "Gulf" he wrote quite a different story.

The notes sat in a file for several years, at which time Robert began to

write what was to be Stranger in a Strange Land. Somehow, the story didn't quite

jell, and he set it aside. He returned to the manuscript a few times, but it was

not finished until 1960: this was the version you now hold in your hands.

In the context of 1960, Stranger in a Strange Land was a book that his

publishers feared-it was too far off the beaten path. So, in order to mini~ mize

possible losses, Robert was asked to cut the manuscript down to 150,000 words-a

loss of about 70,000 words. Other changes were also requested, before the editor

was willing to take a chance on publication.

To take out about a quarter of a long, complicated book was close to an

impossible task. But, over the course of some months, Robert accomplished it.

The final word count came out at 160,087 words. Robert was convinced that it was

impossible to cut out any more, and the book was accepted at that length.

For 28 years it remained in print in that form.

In 1976, Congress passed a new Copyright Law, which said, in part, that in

the event an author died, and the widow or widower renewed the copyright, all

old contracts were cancelled Robert died in 1988, and the following year the

copyright for Stranger in a Strange Land came up for renewal.

Unlike many other authors, Robert had kept a copy of the original

typescript, as submitted for publication~ on file at the library of the

University of California at Santa Cruz, his archivists. I asked for a copy of

that manuscript, and read that and the published versions side by side. And I

came to the conclusion that it had been a mistake to cut the book.

So I sent a copy of the typescript to Eleanor Wood, Robert's agent.

Eleanor also read the two versions together, and agreed with my verdict. So,

after the notification to the publisher, she presented them with a copy of the

new/old version.

No one remembered the fact that such drastic cutting had been done on this

book; over the course of years all the editors and senior officers at the

publishing house had changed. So this version was a complete surprise to them.

They decided to publish the original version, agreeing that it was better

than the cut one.

You now have in your hands the original version of Stranger in a Strange

Land, as written by Robert Anson Heinlein.

The given names of the chief characters have great importance to the plot.

They were carefully selected: Jubal means "the father of all," Michael stands

for "Who is like God?" I leave it for the reader to find out what the other

names mean.

-Virginia Heinlein Carmel, California

part one

HIS MACULATE ORIGIN

I

ONCE UPON A TIME when the world was young there was a Martian named Smith.

Valentine Michael Smith was as real as taxes but he was a race of one.

The first human expedition from Terra to Mars was selected on the theory

that the greatest danger to man in space was man himself. At that time, only

eight Terran years after the founding of the first human colony on Luna, any

interplanetary trip made by humans necessarily had to be made in weary free-fail

orbits, doubly tangent semi-ellipses--from Terra to Mars, two hundred fifty-

eight days, the same for the return journey, plus four hundred fifty-five days

waiting at Mars while the two planets crawled slowly back into relative

positions which would permit shaping the doubly-tangent orbit-a total of almost

three Earth years.

Besides its wearing length, the trip was very chancy. Only by refueling at

a space station, then tacking back almost into Earth's atmosphere, could thi5

primitive flying coffin, the Envoy, make the trip at all. Once at Mars she might

be able to return-if she did not crash in landing, if water could be found on

Man to fill her reaction-mass tanks, if some sort of food could be found on

Mars, if a thousand other things did not go wrong.

But the physical danger was judged to be less important than the

psychological stresses. Eight humans, crowded together like monkeys for almost

three Terran years, had better get along much better than humans usually did. An

all-male crew had been vetoed as unhealthy and sociaily unstable from lessons

learned earlier. A ship's company of four married couples had been decided on as

optimum, if the necessary specialties could be found in such a combination.

The University of Edinburgh, prime contractor, sub-contracted crew

selection to the Institute for Social Studies. After discarding the chaff of

volunteers useless through age, health, mentality, training, or temperament, the

Institute still had over nine thousand candidates to work from, each sound in

mind and body and having at least one of the necessary special skills. It was

expected that the Institute would report several acceptable four-couple crews.

No such crew was found. The major skills needed were astrogator, medical

doctor, cook, machinist, ship's commander, semantician, chemical engineer,

electronics engineer, physicist, geologist, biochemist, biologist, atomics

engineer, photographer, hydroponicist, rocket engineer. Each crew member would

have to possess more than one skill, or be able to acquire extra skills in time.

There were hundreds of possible combinations of eight people possessing these

skills; there turned up three combinations of four married couples possessing

them, plus health and intelligence.-but in all three cases the group-dynamicists

who evaluated the temperament factors for compatibility threw up their hands in

horror.

The prime contractor suggested lowering the compatibility figure-ofmerit;

the Institute stiffly offered to return its one dollar fee. In the meantime a

computer programmer whose name was not recorded had the machines hunt for three-

couple rump crews. She found several dozen compatible combinations, each of

which defined by its own characteristics the couple needed to complete it. In

the meantime the machines continued to review the data changing through deaths,

withdrawals, new volunteers, etc.

Captain Michael Brunt, M.S., Cmdr. D. F. Reserve, pilot (unlimited

license), and veteran at thirty of the Moon run, seems to have had an inside

track at the Institute, someone who was willing to look up for him the names of

single female volunteers who might (with him) complete a crew, and then pair his

name with these to run trial problems through the machines to determine whether

or not a possible combination would be acceptable. This would account for his

action in jetting to Australia and proposing marriage to Doctor Winifred Coburn,

a horse-faced spinster semantician nine years his senior. The Carlsbad Archives

pictured her with an expression of quiet good humor but otherwise lacking in

attractiveness.

Or Brant may have acted without inside information, solely through that

trait of intuitive audacity necessary to command an exploration. In any case

lights blinked, punched cards popped out, and a crew for the Envoy had been

found:

Captain Michael Brant, commanding-pilot, astrogator, relief cook, relief

photographer, rocketry engineer;

Dr. Winifred Coburn Brant, forty-one, semantician, practical nurse, stores

officer, historian;

Mr. Francis X. Seeney, twenty-eight, executive officer, second pilot,

astrogator, astrophysicist, photographer~

Dr. Olga Kovalic Seeney, twenty-nine, cook, biochemist, hydroponicist;

Dr. Ward Smith, forty-five, physician and surgeon, biologist;

Dr. Mary Jane Lyle Smith, twenty-six, atomics engineer, electronics and

power technician;

Mr. Sergei Rimsky, thirty-five, electronics engineer, chemical engineer,

practical machinist & instrumentation man, cryologist;

Mrs. Eleanora Alvarez Rimsky, thirty-two, geologist and selenologist,

hydroponicist.

The crew had a well-rounded group of skills, although in some cases their

secondary skills had been acquired by intensive coaching during the last weeks

before blast-off. More important, they were mutually compatible in their

temperaments.

Too compatible, perhaps.

The Envoy departed on schedule with no mishaps. During the early part of

the voyage her daily reports were picked up with ease by private listeners. As

she drew away and signals became fainter, they were picked up and rebroadcast by

Earth's radio satellites. The crew seemed to be both healthy and happy. An

epidemic of ringworm was the worst that Dr. Smith had to cope with-the crew

adapted to free fall quickly and no antinausea drugs were used after the first

week. If Captain Brant had any disciplinary problems, he did not choose to

report them to Earth.

The Envoy achieved a parking orbit just inside the orbit of Phobos and

spent two weeks in photographic survey. Then Captain Brant radioed:

"We will attempt a landing at 1200 tomorrow GST just south of Lacus Soli." No

further message was ever received.

II

IT WAS A QUARTER of an Earth century before Mars was again visited by humans.

Six years after the Envoy was silent, the drone probe Zombie, sponsored jointly

by the Geographic Society and La Société Astronautique Internationale, bridged

the void and took up an orbit for the waiting period, then returned. The

photographs taken by the robot vehicle showed a land unattractive by human

standards; her recording instruments confirmed the thinness and unsuitability of

the Arean atmosphere to human life.

But the Zombie's pictures showed clearly that the "canals" were

engineering works of some sort and there were other details which could only be

interpreted as ruins of cities. A manned expedition on a major scale and without

delay surely would have been mounted had not World War III intervened.

But the war and the delay resulted eventually in a much stronger, safer

expedition than that of the lost En my. The Federation Ship Champion, manned by

an all-male crew of eighteen experienced spacemen and carrying more than that

number of male pioneers, made the crossing under Lyle Drive in only nineteen

days. The Champion landed just south of Lacus Soli, as Captain van Tromp

intended to search for the Envoy. The second expedition reported to Earth by

radio daily, but three despatches were of more than scientific interest. The

first was:

"Rocket Ship Envoy located. No survivors."

The second worldshaker was: "Mars is inhabited."

The third was: "Correction to despatch 23-105: One survivor of Envoy

located."

III

CAPTAIN WILLEM VAN TROMP was a man of humanity and good sense. He radioed ahead:

"My passenger must not, repeat, must not be subjected to the strain of a public

reception. Provide low-gee shuttle, stretcher and ambulance service, and anned

guard."

He sent his ship's surgeon Dr. Nelson along to make sure that Valentine

Michael Smith was installed in a suite in Bethesda Medical Center, transferred

gently into a hydraulic bed, and protected from outside contact by marine

guards. Van Tromp himself went to an extraordinary session of the Federation

High Council.

At the moment when Valentine Michael Smith was being lifted into bed, the

High Minister for Science was saying testily, "Granted, Captain, that your

authority as military commander of what was nevertheless primarily a scientific

expedition gives you the right to order unusual medical service to protect a

person temporarily in your charge, I do not see why you now presume to interfere

with the proper functions of my department. Why, Smith is a veritable treasure

trove of scientific information!"

"Yes. I suppose he is, sir."

"Then why-" The science minister broke off and turned to the High Minister

for Peace and Military Security. "David? This matter is obviously now in my

jurisdiction. Will you issue the necessary instructions to your people? After

all, one can't keep persons of the caliber of Professor Kennedy and Doctor

Okajima, to mention just two, cooling their heels indefinitely. They won't stand

for it."

The peace minister did not answer but glanced inquiringly at Captain van

Tromp. The captain shook his head. "No, sir."

"Why not?" demanded the science minister. "You have admitted that he isn't

sick."

"Give the captain a chance to explain, Pierre," the peace minister

advised. "Well, Captain?"

"Smith isn't sick, sir," Captain van Tromp said to the peace minister,

"but he isn't well, either. He has never before been in a one-gravity field. He

now weighs more than two and one half times what he is used to and his muscles

aren't up to it. He's not used to Earth-normal air pressure. He's not used to

anything and the strain is likely to be too much for him. Hell's bells,

gentlemen, I'm dog tired myself just from being at one-gee again-and I was born

on this planet."

The science minister looked contemptuous. "If acceleration fatigue is all

that is worrying you, let me assure you, my dear Captain, that we had

anticipated that. His respiration and heart action will be watched carefully. We

are not entirely without imagination and forethought. After all, I've been out

myself. I know how it feels. This man Smith must-"

Captain van Tromp decided that it was time to throw a tantrum. He could

excuse it by his own fatigue-very real fatigue, he felt as if he had just landed

on Jupiter-and he was smugly aware that even a high councilor could not afford

to take too stiff a line with the commander of the first successful Martian

expedition.

So he interrupted with a snort of disgust. "link! 'This man Smith-' This

'man!' Can't you see that that is just what he is not?"

"Eh?"

"Smith ... is . . . not . . . a . . . man."

"Huh? Explain yourself, Captain."

"Smith is not a man. He is an intelligent creature with the genes and

ancestry of a man, but he is not a man. He's more a Martian than a man. Until we

came along he had never laid eyes on a human being. He thinks like a Martian, he

feels like a Martian. He's been brought up by a race which has nothing in common

with us. Why, they don't even have sex. Smith has never laid eyes on a woman-

still hasn't if my orders have been carried out. He's a man by ancestry, a

Martian by environment. Now, if you want to drive him crazy and waste that

'treasure trove of scientific information,' call in your fat-headed professors

and let them badger him. Don't give him a chance to get well and strong and used

to this madhouse planet. Just go ahead and squeeze him like an orange. It's no

skin off me; I've done my job!"

The ensuing silence was broken smoothly by Secretary General Douglas

himself. "And a good job, too, Captain. Your advice will be weighed, and be

assured that we will not do anything hastily. If this man, or manMartian, Smith,

needs a few days to get adjusted, I'm sure that science can wait-so take it

easy, Pete. Let's table this part of the discussion, gentlemen, and get on to

other matters. Captain van Tromp is tired."

"One thing won't wait," said the Minister for Public Information.

"Eh, Jock?"

"If we don't show the Man from Mars in the stereo tanks pretty shortly,

you'll have riots on your hands, Mr. Secretary."

"Hmm- You exaggerate, Jock. Mars stuff in the news, of course. Me

decorating the captain and his brave crew-tomorrow, that had better be. Captain

van Tromp telling of his experiences-after a night's rest of course, Captain."

The minister shook his head.

"No good, Jock?"

"The public expected the expedition to bring back at least one real live

Martian for them to gawk at. Since they didn't, we need Smith and need him

badly."

"'Live Martians?'" Secretary General Douglas turned to Captain van Tromp.

"You have movies of Martians, haven't you?"

"Thousands of feet."

"There's your answer, Jock. When the live stuff gets thin, trot on the

movies of Martians. The people will love it. Now, Captain, about this

possibility of extraterritoriality: you say the Martians were not opposed to

it?"

"Well, no, sir-but they were not for it, either."

"I don't follow you?"

Captain van Tromp chewed his lip. "Sir, I don't know just how to explain

it. Talking with a Martian is something like talking with an echo. You don't get

any argument but you don't get results either."

"Semantic difficulty? Perhaps you should have brought what's-hisname, your

semantician, with you today. Or is he waiting outside?"

"Mahmoud, sir. No, Doctor Mahmoud is not well. A-a slight nervous

breakdown, sir." Van Tromp reflected that being dead drunk was the moral

equivalent thereof.

"Space happy?"

"A little, perhaps." These damned groundhogs!

"Well, fetch him around when he's feeling himself. young man Smith should

be of help as an interpreter."

"Perhaps," van Tromp said doubtfully.

This young man Smith was busy at that moment just staying alive. His body,

unbearably compressed and weakened by the strange shape of space in this

unbelievable place, was at last somewhat relieved by the softness of the nest in

which these others had placed him. He dropped the effort of sustaining it, and

turned his third level to his respiration and heart beat.

He saw at once that he was about to consume himself. His lungs were

beating almost as hard as they did at home, his heart was racing to distribute

the influx, ail in an attempt to cope with the squeezing of space-and this in a

situation in which he was smothered by a poisonously rich and dangerously hot

atmosphere. He took immediate steps.

When his heart rate was down to twenty per minute and his respiration

almost imperceptible, he set them at that and watched himself long enough to

assure himself that he would not inadvertently discorporate while his attention

was elsewhere. When he was satisfied that they were running properly, he set a

tiny portion of his second level on guard and withdrew the rest of himself. It

was necessary to review the configurations of these many new events in order to

fit them to himself, then cherish and praise them-lest they swallow him up.

Where should he start? When he had left home, enfolding these others who

were now his own nestlings? Or simply at his arrival in this crushed space? He

was suddenly assaulted by the lights and sounds of that arrival, feeling it

again with mind-shaking pain. No, he was not yet ready to cherish and embrace

that configuration-back! back! back beyond his first sight of these others who

were now his own. Back even before the healing which had followed his first

grokking of the fact that he was not as his nestling brothers . . . back to the

nest itself.

None of his thinkings had been in Earth symbols. Simple English he had

freshly learned to speak, but much less easily than a Hindu uses it to trade

with a Turk. Smith used English as one might use a code book, with tedious and

imperfect translation for each symbol. Now his thoughts, pure Martian

abstractions from half a million years of wildly alien culture, traveled so far

from any human experience as to be utterly untranslatable.

In the adjoining room an inteme, Dr. "Tad" Thaddeus, was playing cribbage

with Tom Meechum, Smith's special nurse. Thaddeus had one eye on his dials and

meters and both eyes on his cards; nevertheless he noted every heart beat of his

patient. When a flickering light changed from ninety-two pulsations per minute

to less than twenty, he pushed the cards aside, jumped to his feet, and hurried

into Smith's room with Meechum at his heels.

The patient floated in the flexible skin of the hydraulic bed. He appeared

to be dead. Thaddeus swore briefly and snapped, "Get Doctor Nelson!"

Meechum said, "Yessir!" and added, "How about the shock gear, Doe? He's

far gone."

"Gel Doctor Nelson!"

The nurse rushed out. The interne examined the patient as closely as

possible but refrained from touching him. He was still doing so when an older

doctor came in, walking with the labored awkwardness of a man long in space and

not yet adjusted to high gravity. "Well, Doctor?"

"Patient's respiration, temperature, and pulse dropped suddenly, uh, about

two minutes ago, sir."

"What have you done for him, or to him?"

"Nothing, sir. Your instructions-"

"Good." Nelson looked Smith over briefly, then studied the instruments

back of the bed, twins of those in the watch room. "Let me know if there is any

change." He started to leave.

Thaddeus looked startled. "But, Doctor-" He broke off.

Nelson said grimly, "Go ahead, Doctor. What is your diagnosis?"

"Uh, I don't wish to sound off about your patient, sir."

"Never mind. I asked for your diagnosis."

"Very well, sir. Shock-atypical, perhaps," he hedged, "but shock, leading

to termination."

Nelson nodded. "Reasonable enough. But this isn't a reasonable case.

Relax, son. I've seen this patient in this condition half a dozen times during

the trip back. It doesn't mean a thing. Watch." Nelson lifted the patient's

right arm, let it go. It stayed where he had left it.

"Catalepsy?" asked Thaddeus.

"Call it that if you like. Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it one. Don't

worry about it, Doctor. There is nothing typical about this case. Just keep him

from being bothered and call me if there is any change." He replaced Smith's

arm.

When Nelson had left, Thaddeus took one more look at the patient, shook

his head and joined Meechum in the watch room. Meechum picked up his cards and

said, "Crib?"

"No."

Meechuin waited, then added, "Doc, if you ask me, that one in there is a

case for the basket before morning."

"No one asked you."

"My mistake."

"Go out and have a cigarette with the guards. I want to think."

Meechum shrugged and left. Thaddeus opened a bottom drawer, took out a

bottle and poured himself a dose intended to help his thinking. Meechum joined

the guards in the corridor; they straightened up, then saw who it was and

relaxed. The taller marine said, "Howdy, pal. What was the excitement just now?"

"Nothing much. The patient just had quintuplets and we were arguing about

what to name them. Which one of you monkeys has got a butt? And a light?"

The other marine dug a pack of cigarettes out of a pocket. "How're you

fixed for Suction?" he asked bleakly.

"Just middlin'. Thanks." Meechum stuck the cigarette in his face and

talked around it. "Honest to God, gentlemen, I don't know anything about this

patient. I wish I did."

"What's the idea of these orders about 'Absolutely No Women'? Is he some

kind of a sex maniac?"

"Not that I know of. All that I know is that they brought him in from the

Champion and said that he was to have absolute quiet."

"'The Champion!' "the first marine said. "Of course! That accounts for

it."

"Accounts for what?"

"It stands to reason. He ain't had any, he ain't seen any, he ain't

touched any-for months. And he's sick, see? If he was to lay hands on any,

they're afraid he'd kill hisself." He blinked and blew out a deep breath. "I'll

bet I would, under similar circumstances. No wonder they don't want no bims

around him."

Smith had been aware of the visit by the doctors but he had grokked at

once that their intentions were benign; it was not necessary for the major part

of him to be jerked back from where he was.

At the hour in the morning when human nurses slap patient's faces with

cold, wet cloths under the pretense of washing them, Smith returned from his

journey. He speeded up his heart, increased his respiration, and again took note

of his surroundings, viewing them with serenity. He looked the room over, noting

without discrimination and with praise all its details, both important and

unimportant. He was, in fact, seeing it for the first time, as he had been

incapable of enfolding it when he had been brought there the day before. This

commonplace room was not commonplace to him; there was nothing remotely like it

on all Mars, nor did it resemble the wedge-shaPed~ metal-walled compartments of

the Champion. But, having relived the events linking his nest to this place, he

was now prepared to accept it, commend it, and in some degree to cherish it.

He became aware that there was another living creature in the room with

him. A granddaddy longlegs was making a futile journey down from the ceiling,

spinning as it went. Smith watched it with delight and wondered if it were a

nestling form of man.

Doctor Archer Frame, the interne who had relieved Thaddeus, walked in at

that moment. "Good morning," he said. "How do you feel?"

Smith turned the question over in his mind. The first phrase he recognized

as a formal sound, requiring no answer but which could be repeated-or might not

be. The second phrase was listed in his mind with several possible translations.

If Doctor Nelson used it, it meant one thing; if Captain van Tromp used it, it

was a formal sound, needing no reply.

He felt that dismay which so often overtook him in trying to communicate

with these creatures-a frightening sensation unknown to him before he met men.

But he forced his body to remain calm and risked an answer. "Feel good."

"Good!" the creature echoed. "Doctor Nelson will be along in a minute.

Feel like some breakfast?"

All four symbols in the query were in Smith's vocabulary but he had

trouble believing that he had heard them rightly. He knew that he was food, but

he did not "feel like" food. Nor had he had any warning that he might be

selected for such an honor. He had not known that the food supply was such that

it was necessary to reduce the corporate group. He was filled with mild regret,

since there was still so much to grok of these new events, but no reluctance.

But he was excused from the effort of translating an answer by the

entrance of Dr. Nelson. The ship's doctor had had little rest and less sleep; he

wasted no time on speech but inspected Smith and the array of dials in silence.

Then he turned to Smith. "Bowels move?" he asked.

Smith understood this; Nelson always asked about it. "No, not yet."

"We'll take care of that. But first you eat. Orderly, fetch in that tray."

Nelson fed him two or three bites, then required him to hold the spoon and

feed himself. It was tiring but gave him a feeling of gay triumph, for it was

the first unassisted action he had taken since reaching this oddly distorted

space. He cleaned out the bowl and remembered to ask, "Who is this?" so that he

could praise his benefactor.

"What is this, you mean," Nelson answered. "It's a synthetic food jelly,

based on amino acids-and now you know as much as you did before. Finished? All

right, climb out of that bed."

"Beg pardon?" It was an attention symbol which he had learned was useful

when communication failed.

"I said get out of there. Sit up. Stand up. Walk around. You can do it.

Sure, you're weak as a kitten but you'll never put on muscle floating in that

bed." Nelson opened a valve at the head of the bed; water drained out. Smith

restrained a feeling of insecurity, knowing that Nelson cherished him. Shortly

he lay on the floor of the bed with the watertight cover wrinkled around him.

Nelson added, "Doctor Frame, take his other elbow. We'll have to help him and

steady him."

With Dr. Nelson to encourage him and both of them to help him, Smith stood

up and stumbled over the rim of the bed. "Steady. Now stand up on your own,"

Nelson directed. "Don't be afraid. We'll catch you if necessary."

He made the effort and stood alone-a slender young man with underdeveloped

muscles and overdeveloped chest. His hair had been cut in the Champion and his

whiskers removed and inhibited. His most marked feature was his bland,

expressionless, almost babyish face-set with eyes which would have seemed more

at home in a man of ninety.

He stood alone for a moment, trembling slightly, then tried to walk. He

managed three shuffling steps and broke into a sunny, childlike smile. "Good

boy!" Nelson applauded.

He tried another step, began to tremble violently and suddenly collapsed.

They barely managed to break his fall. "Damn!" Nelson fumed. "He's gone into

another one. Here, help me lift him into the bed. No-fill it first."

Frame did so, cutting off the flow when the cover skin floated six inches

from the top. They lugged him into it, awkwardly because he had frozen into the

foetal position. "Get a collar pillow under his neck," instructed Nelson, "and

call me when he comes out of it. No-let me sleep, I need it. Unless something

worries you. We'll walk him again this afternoon and tomorrow we'll start

systematic exercise. In three months I'll have him swinging through the trees

like a monkey. There's nothing really wrong with him."

"Yes, Doctor," Frame answered doubtfully.

"Oh, yes, when he comes out of it, teach him how to use the bathroom. Have

the nurse help you; I don't Want him to fall."

"Yes, sir. Uh, any particular method-I mean, how-"

"Eh? Show him, of course! Demonstrate. He probably won't understand much

that you say to him, but he's bright as a whip. He'll be bathing himself by the

end of the week."

Smith ate lunch without help. Presently a male orderly came in to remove

his tray. The man glanced around, then came to the bed and leaned over him.

"Listen," he said in a low voice, "I've got a fat proposition for you."

"Beg pardon?"

"A deal, a bargain, a way for you to make a lot of money fast and easy."

'Money?' What is 'money'?"

"Never mind the philosophy; everybody needs money. Now listen I'll have to

talk fast because I can't stay in here long-and it's taken a lot of fixing to

get me in here at all. I represent Peerless Features. We'll pay you sixty

thousand for your exclusive story and it won't be a bit of trouble to

you-we've got the best ghost writers in the business. You just talk and answer

questions; they put it together." He whipped out a piece of paper. "Just read

this and sign it. I've got the down payment with me."

Smith accepted the paper, stared thoughtfully at it, holding it upside

down. The man looked at him and muffled an exclamation. "Lordyl Don't you read

English?"

Smith understood this well enough to answer. "No."

"Well- Here, I'll read it to you, then you just put your thumb print in

the square and I'll witness it. 'I, the undersigned, Valentine Michael Smith,

sometimes known as the Man from Mars, do grant and assign to Peerless Features,

Limited, all and exclusive rights in my true-fact story to be titled I Was a

Prisoner on Mars in exchange for-"

"Orderly!"

Dr. Frame was standing in the door of the watch room; the paper

disappeared into the man's clothes. "Coming, sir. I was just getting this tray."

"What were you reading?"

"Nothing."

"I saw you. Never mind, come out of there quickly. This patient is not to

be disturbed." The man obeyed; Dr. Frame closed the door behind them. Smith lay

motionless for the next half hour, but try as he might he could not grok it at

all.

IV

GILLIAN BOARDMAN WAS CONSIDERED professionally competent as a nurse; she was

judged competent in wider fields by the bachelor internes and she was judged

harshly by some other women. There was no harm in her and her hobby was men.

When the grapevine carried the word that there was a patient in special suite K-

12 who had never laid eyes on a woman in his life, she did not believe it. When

detailed explanation convinced her, she resolved to remedy it. She went on duty

that day as floor supervisor in the wing where Smith was housed. As soon as

possible she went to pay a call on the strange patient.

She knew of the "No Female Visitors" rule and, while she did not Consider

herself to be a visitor of any sort, she sailed on past the marine guards

without attempting to use the door they guarded-marines, she had found, had a

stuffy habit of construing their orders literally. Instead she went into the

adjacent watch room. Dr. "Tad" Thaddeus was on duty there alone.

Robert A Heinlein - Stranger in a Strange Land - Original Ve

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