The Alternative Detective (Hob Draconian) by Robert Sheckley Page B

way. He wasn’t hurrying, because it wouldn’t do to hurry in Ibiza where time is measured by weeks and months rather than minutes and hours. But he was feeling a little edgy because he did have a message to deliver, and the indolent charm of Ibiza stood in his way of getting the job done.
    Harry came to the filled-up parking lot on the edge of town, walked through it, cut between buildings and reached the central promenade, the Calle del Kiosko. It was called this because at its upper end was an outdoor café where you sat and met your friends, or your enemies, or just plain anybody, Ibiza being that sort of place.
    Harry had no time for pleasantries right then, although he had to engage in them, because no emergency was so great in Ibiza, not even your house burning down, that you would ignore the pleasantries. He nodded to the señora who did his shirts; he exchanged greetings with Irish Alec who ran El Caballo Negro, the bar where he mostly hung out. And at last he reached the telephone kiosko.
    The telephone kiosko was the most recent sign of modernization in Santa Eulalia. Until a few years ago there was no public telephone in Ibiza. You had to get permission at one of the bars or restaurants or hotels if you wanted to make a call. But then La Compañía Telefónico de España put in a telephone exchange, a prefab cubicle about the size of a small trailer. Six telephone booths take up two walls. On your left as you enter is the desk where you place your calls. On the other side, a wooden bench where you can wait.
    Don’t bother taking out your telephone card. These phones don’t even have a slot you can put it into. Here long distance calls are made the old-fashioned way, by having your operator talk to another operator and then seeing if between them they can locate your party.
    In summer, in peak calling hours, this could become high comedy. The international telephone exchange was Santa Eulalia’s introduction to high stress and modern living. There were people in it all day long, mostly foreigners, clamoring at José in the incomprehensible syllables of their unknown tongues. José, short, barrel chested, broad faced, a cheerful yet serious man, was not at all intimidated by the situation. Like many Spaniards, he loved an emergency and was able to take control instantly and get the job done. There was only one proviso: you shouldn’t question his way of doing things, and above all don’t tell him it’s taking too long.
    José coped, solving each problem as it came along. He spoke no language other than Spanish, but that has never stopped a Spaniard from making himself understood. One way or another, all the calls went through. From time to time José sent his little son Joselito out to get him an ice cream cone. It was hot work, placing international phone calls from Santa Eulalia in June.
    Harry and José were friends. Harry spoke a crude Spanish set entirely in the present tense and employing the infinitive exclusively. He was understood by everyone.
    Harry didn’t mention that his call was urgent. He had been in Spain long enough to know that that attitude gets you nowhere. Tell a Spaniard that something is urgent and his mind goes on vacation. Urgent? Has someone been killed? That is the Spaniard’s idea of urgent.
    “Paris,” José said, looking at the number Harry had written down. “Must be important, no?”
    Harry shrugged his shoulders to show that this call was really a matter of no concern to him, so unimportant that he could scarcely understand why he had bothered getting out of bed to make it. Then he reflected; yes, maybe it did have some slight importance. He said, grudgingly, “ Bastante. ”
    Bastante means “enough,” or “sufficiently.” It is a seemingly inexpressive little word that can mean a great deal in the right corner of the Spanish-speaking world. Harry had learned that it was a word more decisive than the urgencias and rápidos of the Spanish language. Harry had learned