"Eric Frank Russell - Basic Right" - читать интересную книгу автора (Russell Eric Frank)

"In what way?"
Heisham sought around for an easily explainable example, said, "If I were to push you it would be
natural for you to oppose my push and to push back. But if you push a Terran he grabs your wrists and
pulls the same way. He helps you. It is extremely difficult to fight a willing helper. It means that everything
you try to do is immediately taken farther than you intended."
"The answer is easy," scoffed Zalumar. "You give up pushing. You pull him instead."
"If you change from pushing to pulling, he promptly switches from pulling to pushing," Heisham
answered. "He's still with you, still helping. There's no effective way of controlling it except by adopting
the same tactics."
"It sounds crazy to me. However, it is nothing unusual for aliens to have cockeyed ways of doing
things. All right, Heisham, you may go away and coddle your hard-won prize. But don't encourage any of
the others to follow your bad example. We are losing men too rapidly already."
He waited until Heisham had gone, then fixed attention on Fox.
"Fox, I have known you for quite a time. I have found you consistently obedient, frank and truthful.
Therefore you stand as high in my esteem as any mere Terran can."
"Thank you, sire," said Fox, showing gratitude.
"It would be a pity to destroy that esteem and plunge yourself from the heights to the depths. I am
relying upon you to give me candid answers to one or two questions. You have nothing to fear and
nothing to lose by telling the absolute truth."
"What do you wish to know, sire?"
"Fox, I want you to tell me whether you are waiting, just waiting."
Puzzled, Fox said, "I don't understand."
"I want to know whether you Terrans are playing a waiting game, whether you are biding your time
until we die out."
"Oh, no, not at all."
"What prevents you?" Zalumar inquired.
"Two things," Fox told him. "Firstly, we suppose that other and probably stronger Raidan forces will
replace you sometime. Obviously they won't leave you here to the end of your days."
Hah, won't they? thought Zalumar. He smiled within himself, said, "Secondly?"
"We're a Raidan colony. That means you're stuck with the full responsibilities of ownership. If anyone
else attacks us, you Raidans must fight to keep us—or let go. That suits us quite well. Better the devil we
know than the devil we don't."
It was glib and plausible, too glib and plausible. It might be the truth—but only a tiny fragment of it.
For some reason he couldn't define Zalumar felt sure he wasn't being told the whole of it. Something vital
was being held back. He could not imagine what it might be, neither could he devise an effective method
of forcing it into the open. All that he did have was this vague uneasiness. Maybe it was the after-effect of
Lakin's persistent morbidity. Damn Lakin, the prophet of gloom.
For lack of any better tactic he changed the subject. "I have an interesting report from one of our
experts named Marjamian. He is an anthropologist or a sociologist or something. Anyway, he is a
scientist, which means that he'd rather support an hypothesis than agree with an idea. I want your
comments on what he has to say."
"It is about we Terrans?"
"Yes. He says your ancient history was murderous and that you came near to exterminating
yourselves. In desperation you reached accord on the only item about which everyone could agree. You
established permanent peace by mutually recognizing the basic right of every race and nation to live its
own life in its own way." He glanced at his listener. "Is that correct?"
"More or less," said Fox, without enthusiasm.
"Later, when you got into free space, you anticipated a need to widen this understanding. So you
agreed to recognize the basic right of every species to live its own life in its own way." Another glance.
"Correct?"