"Well ..." Rob Cantrell sighed. "There goes that presidential citation you were yapping about—with bonus. We'll be lucky if we keep our rating!"
"Oh, it won't be that bad," Harris predicted cheerfully. "I mean, nobody could expect us to form a trade-alliance with a bunch of hot-heads like that! Graven images! Tricked-up spies!" He spat disgustedly. "And all because we wanted one shipload of lousy sola!..."
Cantrell nodded bitterly. "And we could have done so much for them in return. A new world, I think you said!..." He emitted a short laugh, edged with cynicism. "Well ... Terra-Government can't afford to ship from a hostile planet. Too damn expensive. We'll just have to equip another expedition and start looking again...."
Harris nodded absently, his eyes thoughtful. "Uh-huh.... But if we could only have understood those little monkeys! Maybe they didn't mind our taking the sola. Maybe it was something else.... Rob," he blurted, "one of the junior ethnologists has a theory; did you hear? He...."
"Junior ethnologists have always got a theory!" the captain snorted. "Lack of experience!"
"Yeah, but ..." Harris pursued. "This kid says he thinks those little S'zetnurs were a cult of beauty-worshippers. You know? Like they used to have on Venus? Eugenic mating—killing off the imperfect ones. He says they just don't understand about nutrition; that's why it's so tragic that they're all deformed and diseased now. None of them are beauties any more, and they don't know why. But when they saw us...."
"Nuts!" said Cantrell rudely.
"Yeah, but.... The doll. Maybe it was an image of the way they used to be. A sort of pattern for them to remember.... And you know how that poor joe kept ... looking at us? The one all tricked-up in flowers? This ethno thinks they sent him to be mated with one of our women...."
"Good God!" the pilot laughed.
"... and that poor slob of a woman, who acted so upset when you strapped your spacewatch around her wrist. The kid thinks you marked her for death, and...."