 Why did Gwayne ask the alien leader about barmaids and puppies?
They were something more—and something less—they were, in short, humanity's hopes for survival! The Starship Pandora creaked and groaned as her landing pads settled unevenly in the mucky surface of the ugly world outside. She seemed to be restless to end her fool's errand here, two hundred light years from the waiting hordes on Earth. Captain Gwayne cursed and rolled over, reaching for his boots. The starlanes between Earth and her potential colonies were rough on the men who traveled them now. Lieutenant Jane Corey looked up, nodding a blonde head at him as he moved toward the ever-waiting pot of murky coffee. Gwayne swore softly to himself. Earth couldn't turn out enough starmen in the schools, so promising kids were being shipped out for training as cadets on their twelfth birthday. The two he'd drawn, Kaufman and Pinelli, seemed to be totally devoid of any sense of caution. But something had happened to the exploration party fifteen years back, and to the more recent ship under Hennessy that was sent to check up. The Sol-type sun must be rising, since there was a dim light. Earth had ordered him to detour here, after leaving his load of deep-sleep stored colonists on Official World 71, to check on any sign of Hennessy. It was too far to see clearly, but Gwayne grabbed the microphone, yelling into the radio toward the cadets. One seemed to be almost eight feet tall, leading the others directly toward the spacesuited cadets.
 To test if he was Hennessy.
 To see if he spoke English.  To test if he was Hennessy.  To test if he was familiar with Earth culture.  To get him to speak so he could listen to the sound of his voice.