Easton was unlike anything he had ever before tackled. The six months
of Navajo had been rough going, but he had done it, and done it well
enough to earn the praise of Old Comas, his informant. Surely, he
thought, after mastering a language like that, one in which the
student must not only learn to imitate difficult sounds, but also
learn a whole new pattern of thought--

Pattern of thought. Jonathan sat very still, as though movement would
send the fleeting clue back into the corner from which his mind had
glimpsed it.

A whole new frame of reference. Suppose, he toyed with the thought,
suppose the Martian language, whatever it was, was structured along
the lines of Navajo, involving clearly defined categories which did
not exist in English.

"Murv," he said aloud. "I murv a lesson, but I blikkel a language."

Eagerly, Jonathan reached again for the switch. Categories clearly
defined, yes! But the categories of the Martian language were not
those of the concrete or the particular, like the Navajo. They were of
the abstract. Where one word "understand" would do in English, the
Martian used two--

Good Lord, he realized, they might use hundreds! They might--

Jonathan turned on the machine, sat back and made notes, letting the
recorder run uninterrupted. He made his notes, this time, on the
feelings he received from the words Easton used. When the first tape
was done, he put on the second.

Margery tapped at the door just as the third tape was ending. "In a
minute," he called, scribbling furiously. He turned off the machine,
put out his cigarette and went to lunch, feeling better than he had in
weeks.

Richie was at the kitchen sink, washing his hands.

"And next time," Margery was saying, "you wash up before you sit
down."

Richie blinked and watched Jonathan seat himself. "Daddy didn't wash
his hands," he said.

Margery fixed the six-year-old with a stern eye. "Richard, don't be
rude."

[Illustration]

"Well, he didn't." Richie sat down and reached for his glass of milk.

"Daddy probably washed before he came in," said Margery. She took the
cover off a tureen, ladled soup into bowls and passed sandwiches,
pretending not to see the ink-stained hand Jonathan was hiding in his
lap.

Jonathan, elated by the promise of success, ate three or four
sandwiches, had two bowls of soup and finally sat back while Margery
went to get coffee.

Richie slid part way off his chair, remembered, and slid back on
ag