He hadn’t minded, for he had already left the place where the incident had occurred. But he wanted no hue and cry raised here. Although under other conditions he would have minded their hostility no more than their indifference, he knew that hostility now might very seriously limit his freedom to act.
He listed the things he had to do. He had to find food and shelter, learn their language and customs, and as quickly as possible, their alphabet. He had to acquire their manner of thought and feeling so well that he could blend with them not only superficially, but psychologically as well. He had to—
A rough shoulder caught him on the chest and spun him half around. A rough voice, more a snarl than anything else, said, “Whatsa matter, ya blind?”
The way the words were run together confused him, but he had listened keenly, and he knew the phrase that was required in such situations. He said politely, but almost unintelligently, “Excuse. I sorry.”
“Foreigner, huh? Why don’t ya go back where ya came from?”
This was the first person who had spoken to him in his new world. The encounter left him angry and contemptuous, but it was not to be long before he learned that the individual he had been privileged to meet was not wholly typical.
He moved along, alert to observe and to learn, but entirely without aim so far as an ultimate destination was concerned. He noted that the nature of the streets he traversed changed subtly with every intersection. The primitive, but well constructed buildings that had lined them soon gave way to even more primitive, dilapidated, and filthy structures. It was clear that they had rich and poor here, and that he was approaching the dwellings of the poor.
He heard a rhythmic sound in the street, as of a percussion instrument, and following it, found a female of the prevailing species, dressed somewhat differently from the other females, and pounding on a hollow cylinder of fairly large diameter. Other, more piercing instruments, added sounds of their own, and then voices were lifted in song. He lingered, fascinated, and wished only that he had a sound-recorder to take permanent note of the strange music.
He was not the only one who lingered. Half a dozen dilapidated males had gathered, attracted like him by the rhythmic noise, and after a female had ended a strange exhortation which he did not fully understand, they all followed the company of musicians into a ramshackle building. Inside, he listened to other exhortations, and then had food thrust upon him.