"Yes," the Guest said. Its voice was sibilant and weak but clearly understandable. It lowered itself to the floor and stood uncertainly beside the low table. Its lower limbs—legs—were jointed in reverse, yet not like a dog's or horse's hind legs, where the "knee" is the analog of a human wrist. The Guest's articulation was quite original, each joint actually reversed, with the limb's lower half dropping smoothly, gracefully, to split into three thick extensions, the tip of each extension splayed into two broad "toes." The legs made up much of its height, its rhinoceros-hide "trunk" occupying only about half a meter of its full meter and a half. The end of the long head, thrust forward on a thick, short neck, dropped a few centimeters below the juncture of legs and trunk. The arms rose from each side of the trunk like the folded manipulators of a mantis.

Harry scowled and shook his head, temporarily unable to speak. He waved a hand in front of his mouth, glancing at Arthur, and coughed.

"We don't know quite what to say to you," Arthur finally managed. "We've been waiting a long time for someone to visit the Earth from space."

"Yes." The Guest's head swung back and forth, the jewel-bright, moist, sherry-colored eyes fully revealed. "I wish I could bring better words on such an important occasion."

"What . . .ah, what words do you bring?" Harry asked.

"Are you related?" the Guest asked in turn.

"I'm sorry—related?"

"There is a question about my communication?"

"We are not of the same family—not siblings, brother or father and son or . . . whatever," Arthur said.

"You have a social relationship."

"He's my boss," Harry said, pointing to Arthur. "My hierarchical superior. We're friends, also."

"And you are not the same individuals in different form as the individuals behind you?"

"No," Harry said.

"Your forms are steady."

"Yes."

"Then ..." The Guest made a sharp, high-pitched whistling noise, and the long crest above the level of the shoulders appeared to inflate slightly. Arthur could not see a mouth or nose near the eyes, and surmised such openings might be on the head below the neck and facing the chest, in the area corresponding—if such correspondences were at all useful—to a long "chin." "I will relate my bad news to you, as well. Are you placed highly in your group, your society?"

"Not the highest, but yes, we are highly placed," Harry said.

"The news I bring is not happy. It may be unhappy for all of you. This I have not spoken before in detail." Again the whistling noise. The head lifted and Arthur spotted slitlike openings on the underside. "If you have the ability to leave, you will wish to do so soon. A disease has entered your system of planets. There is little time left for your world."