Babel-17 Read Online Free

the time he was three steps toward me, and he shook my hand like he was afraid it would break."
    T'mwarba's smile turned into laughter. "He fell in love with you!"
    She nodded.
    "But why in the world should that upset you? I think you should be flattered."
    "Oh, I was!" She leaned forward. "I was flattered. And I could follow the whole thing through his head. Once, when he was trying to get his mind back on the code, Babel-17, I said exactly what he was thinking, just to let him know I was so close to him. I watched the thought go by that perhaps I was reading his mind—"
    "Wait a minute. This is the part I don't understand. How did you know exactly what he was thinking?"
    She raised her hand to her jaw. "He told me here. I said something about needing more information to crack the language. He didn't want to give it to me. I said I had to have it or I couldn't get any farther, it was that simple. He raised his head just a fraction—to avoid shaking it. If he had shaken his head, with a slight pursing of the lips, what do you think he would have been saying?"
    Dr. T'mwarba shrugged. "That it wasn't as simple as you thought?"
    "Yes. Now he made one gesture to avoid making  that one. What does that mean?"
    T'mwarba shook his head.
    "He avoided the gesture because he connected its not being that simple with my being there. So he raised his head instead."
    "Something like: If it were that simple, we wouldn't need you," T'mwarba suggested.
    "Exactly. Now, while he raised his head, there was a slight pause halfway up. Don't you see what that adds?"
    "No."
    "If it were that simple—now the pause—if only it were that simple, we wouldn't have called you in about it." She turned her hands up in her lap. "And I said it back to him; then his jaw clenched—"
    "In surprise?"
    "—Yes. That's when he wondered for a second if I could read his mind."
    Dr. T'mwarba shook his head. "It's too exact, Rydra. What you're describing is muscle-reading, which can be pretty accurate, especially if you know the logical area the person's thoughts are centered on. But it's still too exact. Get back to why you were upset by the business. Your modesty was offended by the attention of this . . . uncouth stellarman?"
    She came back with something neither modest nor couth.
    Dr. T'mwarba bit the inside of his-lip and wondered if she saw.
    "I'm not a little girl," she said. "Besides, he wasn't thinking anything uncouth. As I said, I was flattered by the whole thing. When I pulled my little joke, I was just trying to let him know how much in key we were. I thought he was charming. And if he had been able to  see as clearly as I could he would have known I had nothing but good feeling for him. Only when he left—''
    Dr. T'mwarba heard roughness work back into her voice.
    "—when he left, the last thing he thought was, ‘She doesn't know; I haven't communicated a thing to her.' "
    Her eyes darkened—no, she bent slightly forward and half dropped her upper lids so that her eyes looked darker. He had watched that happen thousands of times since the scrawny autistic twelve year old girl had been sent to him for neuro-therapy, which had developed into psychotherapy, and then into friendship. This was the first time he'd understood the mechanics of the effect. Her precision of observation had inspired him before to look more closely at others. Only since therapy had officially ended had it come full circle and made him look more closely at her. What did the darkening signify other than change? He knew there were myriad marks of personality about him that she read with a microscope- Wealthy, worldly, he had known many people equal to her in reputation. The reputation did not awe him. Often she did."
    “He thought I didn't understand. He thought nothing had been communicated. And I was angry. I was hurt. All the misunderstandings that tie the world up and keep people apart were quivering before me at once, waiting for me to untangle them, explain them, and I