Striking the Balance

“Exalted Fleetlord,” Moishe Russie said. He was getting used to these sessions with Atvar. He was even coming to look forward to them. The more useful Atvar thought him now, the less likely he and his family were to have to pay for his earlier strokes against the Lizards. And guessing with the diplomats of the great powers was a game that made chess look puerile. He was, apparently, a better guesser than most of the Lizards. That kept the questions coming, and let him find out how the negotiations fared, which had a fascination of its own: he was privy to knowledge only a handful of humans possessed.

Atvar spoke in his own language. Zolraag turned these words into the usual mix of German and Polish: “You are of course familiar with the Tosevite not-emperor Hitler, and hold no good opinion of him-I take it this remains correct?”

“Yes, Exalted Fleetlord.” Moishe added an emphatic cough.

“Good,” Atvar said. “I judge you more likely, then, to give me an honest opinion of his actions than you would those of, say, Churchill: solidarity with your fellow Big Uglies will be less of an issue in Hitler’s case. Is this also correct?”

“Yes, Exalted Fleetlord,” Moishe repeated. Thinking of Hitler as his fellow human being did not fill him with delight. Whatever you had to say against them, the Lizards had shown themselves to be far better people than Adolf Hitler.

“Very well,” Atvar said through Zolraag. “Here is my question: how do you judge the conduct of Hitler and von Ribbentrop when the latter summoned me to announce the detonation of an atomic bomb and the resumption of warfare by Deutschland against the Race, when in fact no such detonation and no such warfare-barring a few more cease-fire violations than usual-in fact took place?”

Moishe stared. “This really happened, Exalted Fleetlord?”

“Truth,” Atvar said, a word Russie understood in the Lizards’ language.

He scratched his head as he thought. For all he knew, that might have made him uncouth in Atvar’s eyes. But then, he was a Big Ugly, so was he not uncouth in Atvar’s eyes by assumption? Slowly, he said, “I have trouble believing von Ribbentrop would make such a claim knowing it to be untrue and knowing you could easily learn it was untrue.”

“That is perceptive of you,” the fleetlord said. “When the spokesmale for Hitler did make the claim, I immediately investigated it and, finding it false, returned to inform him of the fact. The unanimous opinion of our psychologists is that my statement took him by surprise. Here: observe him for yourself.”

At Atvar’s gesture, Zolraag activated one of the little screens in the chamber. Sure enough, there stood von Ribbentrop, looking somewhere between arrogant and afraid. A Lizard the screen did not show spoke to him in hissing English. The German foreign minister’s eyes widened, his mouth dropped open, a hand groped for the edge of the table.

“Exalted Fleetlord, that is a surprised man,” Moishe declared.

“So we thought,” Atvar agreed. “This raises the following question: is the delivery of false information part of some devious scheme on Hitler’s part, or was the information intended to be true? In either case, of course, von Ribbentrop would have believed it accurate as he delivered it.”

“Yes.” Moishe scratched his head again, trying to figure out what possible benefit Hitler might have derived by deliberately deceiving his foreign minister into threatening the Lizards. For the life of him, he couldn’t come up with any. “I have to believe the Germans intended to attack you.”

“This is the conclusion we have also drawn, although we warned them they would suffer severely if they made any such attacks,” Atvar said. “It is unsettling, distinctly so: somewhere on our frontier with Hitler’s forces, or perhaps beyond that frontier, there is probably a nuclear weapon that for whatever reason has failed of ignition. We have searched for such a weapon, but have not discovered it After El Iskandariya, it is by no means certain we would discover it Now: will Hitler be willing to accept failure and resume talks, or will he seek to detonate the bomb after all?”

Being asked to peer inside Hitler’s brain was rather like being asked to debride gangrenous tissue: revolting but necessary. “If the Germans find any way to detonate the bomb, my guess is that they will,” Moishe said. “I have to say, though, that’s only a guess.”

“It accords with the predictions our researchers have made,” Atvar said. “Whether this makes it accurate, only time will show, but I believe you are giving me your best and most reasoned judgment here.”

“Truth, Exalted Fleetlord,” Moishe said in the language of the Race.

“Good,” the Lizard answered. “I am of the opinion that we previously tried to exploit you too broadly, and, as with any misused tool, this caused difficulties we would not have had if we kept you within limits appropriate to your situation. This appears to be the source of a large portion of your enmity toward us and your turning against us.”