The Rival Rigelians

VIII

At the decade’s end, once again the representatives of the Genoese team were first in the Pedagogue’s lounge. Mayer sat at the officers’ table, Martin Gunther at his right. Jerry Kennedy leaned against the ship’s bar, sipping appreciatively at a highball in a tall glass; the drink was inordinately dark.

They could hear the impact of the spaceboat from Texcoco when it slid into its bed.

“Poor piloting,” Gunther mused. “Whoever’s doing that flying doesn’t get enough practice.”

They could hear the ports opening and then the sound of approaching feet. The footsteps had a strangely military ring, for a group of scientists and technicians.

Joe Chessman entered, followed immediately by Barry Watson, Dick Hawkins and Natt Roberts. They were all dressed in heavy uniform, complete with colorful decorations. Behind them were four Texcocans, including Reif and his teen-age son, Taller, also in uniform, though the other two Tulans wore civilian dress.

Mayer scowled at them in the way of greeting. “Where’s Plekhanov?” he snapped. “The agreement was that the heads of teams meet each decade.”

“Leonid Plekhanov is no longer with us,” Chessman said sourly. “Under pressure his mind evidently snapped and he made decisions that would have meant the collapse of the expedition. He resisted when we reasoned with him.”

The four members of the Genoese team stared without speaking. Jerry Kennedy put down his glass at last. “You mean you had to restrict him? Why didn’t you bring him back to the ship?”

Barry Watson said slowly, “He was put under guard. We were in combat. The men who guarded him disappeared in the fray. Leonid evidently died with them. We are lucky any of us survived.”

“You should have taken more efficient steps to protect him,” Mayer snapped. “I had my differences with Leonid Plekhanov, but, after all, he was second in command of this expedition. I am not at all sure, now that he is gone, who I will appoint to take his place.”

Dick Hawkins chuckled softly.

Chessman took a chair at the table. The others assumed standing positions behind him. He said coldly, “I am afraid we’ll have to reject your views on the subject. Twenty years ago this expedition split into two groups. My team will accomplish its original mission, its tasks. Your opinons are not needed.”

Amschel Mayer glared at the others in hostility but when he spoke again it was on a different subject. He said, “You have certainly come in force this time.”

Chessman said flatly, “Save for Mrs. Chessman, that is, Doctor Sanchez, and Steve Cogswell, who have been left behind to hold things together, this is all of us, Mayer.”

“All of you? Where are Stevens and MacBride?”

Barry Watson said, “Plekhanov’s fault. Lost in the battle that broke the back of the rebels. At least they died in good cause.”

Joe Chessman looked at his military chief. “I’ll act as team spokesman, Barry.”

“Broke the back of the rebels,” Jerry Kennedy mused. “That opens all sorts of avenues, doesn’t it?”

Chessman growled. “I suppose that in the past twenty years your team had no obstacles. Not a drop of blood shed. Come on, the truth. How many of your team has been lost in this peaceful program of yours?”

Mayer shifted in his chair. “Possibly your point is well taken. Nick Rykov fell into the hands of a group of malcontents, some of the barons and Temple monks who oppose our reforms. Our reports indicate he is dead.”

“Only one man lost, eh?”

Mayer stirred uncomfortably then flushed at the other’s tone. “Something has happened to Buchwald and MacDonald. They must be insane. They’ve broken off contact with me, are amassing personal fortunes in the eastern hemisphere.”

Hawkins laughed abruptly. “Free competition,” he said.

Barry Watson leaned forward and said to Kennedy, rather than to Amschel Mayer. “How is, uh, Doctor Wieliczka? Why didn’t she come?”

Kennedy cocked his head questioningly but said, “Too busy. She’s got a whole string of medical universities and hospitals under her care. However, she sent you a message.”

Watson looked at him. “Well?”

Kennedy said slowly, “She said, give him my love…”

Barry Watson flushed.

“…if he still wants it.”

Chessman growled. “Let’s halt this bickering and jabber and get to business. First, let me introduce Reif, Texcocan State Army Chief of Staff and his son Taller.”

Reif and his son came to a formal salute. The Earthmen from Genoa nodded acknowledgment, uncomfortably.

Chessman said, “And these other Texcocans are Wiss and Foken, both of whom have gone far in the sciences.”

The two Tulan scientists shook hands, Earth style, but then stepped to the rear again where they followed the conversation without comment.

Mayer said, “You think it wise to introduce natives to the Pedagogue? Last time it was armed guards. This time prominent officials and scientists.”

“Of course,” Chessman said. “Following this conference I am going to take Foken and Wiss into the library. What are we here for if not to bring these people up to our level as rapidly as possible?”

“Very well,” Mayer conceded grudgingly. “And now I have a complaint. When the Pedagogue first arrived we had only so many weapons aboard. However, both teams have evidently run into more physical violence than was at first expected. And you have taken more than half of the ship’s weapons in the past two decades.”

Chessman shrugged it off. “We’ll return the greater part to the ship’s arsenal. At this stage, we are producing our own.”

“I’ll bet you are,” Jerry Kennedy said. “Look, any of you fellows want a real Earthside whiskey? When we were crewing this expedition, why didn’t we bring someone with a knowledge of distilling, brewing and fermenting?”

Mayer snapped at him. “Jerry, you drink too much.”

“The hell I do,” the other said cheerfully. “Not near enough.”

Barry Watson said easily, “A drink wouldn’t hurt. Why’re we so stiff? This is the first get-together for ten years. Jerry, you’re putting on weight.”

Kennedy looked down at his rounded stomach. “Don’t get enough exercise,” he said, then reversed the attack. “You look older, Barry. Are you taking your rejuvenation treatments?”

Barry Watson grimaced. “Sure, but I’m working under pressure. It’s been one long campaign.”

Kennedy passed around the drinks, thoughtfully refilling his own glass.

Dick Hawkins laughed. “It’s been one long campaign, all right. Barry has a house as big as a castle and six or eight—I don’t think he knows himself—women in his harem.”

Watson flushed, but obviously without displeasure.

Martin Gunther, of the Genoese team, cocked his head. “Harem?”

Joe Chessman said impatiently, “Man adapts to circumstances, Gunther. The wars have lost us a lot of men. Women are consequently in a surplus. If the population curve is to continue upward, it is necessary that a man serve more than one woman. Polygamy is the obvious answer.”

Gunther cleared his throat smoothly. “So a man in Barry’s position will have as many as eight wives, eh? You must have lost a good many men.”

Watson grinned modestly. “Everybody doesn’t have that many. It’s according to your ability to support them, and, also rank has its privileges, as always. Besides, we figure it’s a good idea to spread the best seed around. By mixing our blood with the Texcocans we improve the breed.”

Behind him, Taller, the Tulan boy, stirred without notice. One of the two scientists looked at his colleague from the side of his eyes, but the faces of both remained expressionless.

Kennedy finished off his highball and began to build another, immediately. He said, “Here we go again. The big potatoes coming to the top.”

Watson flushed. “What do you mean by that, Kennedy?”

“Oh, come off it, Barry,” Kennedy laughed, “just because you’re in a position to push these people around doesn’t make you the prize stud on Texcoco.”

Watson elbowed Dick Hawkins to one side in his attempt to get around the table at the other.

Chessman rapped, “Watson! That’s enough. Knock it or I’ll have you under arrest.” The Texcocan team head turned abruptly to Mayer and Kennedy. “Let’s stop this nonsense. We’ve come to compare progress. Let’s begin.”

The three members of the Genoese team glared back in antagonism, but then Gunther said grudgingly, “He’s right. There is no longer amiability between us, so let’s forget it Perhaps when the fifty years are up, things will be different. Now let’s merely be businesslike.”

“Well,” Mayer said, “our report is that progress accelerates. Our industrial potential expands at a rate that surprises even us. In the near future, we’ll introduce the internal combustion engine. Our universities still multiply and are turning out technicians, engineers and scientists at an even quicker rate. In several nations, illiteracy is practically unknown and per capita production increases almost everywhere.” Mayer paused in satisfaction, as though awaiting the others to attempt to top his report.

Joe Chessman said sourly, “Ah, almost everywhere per capita production increases. Why almost?”

Mayer snapped. “Obviously, in a system of free competition, all cannot progress at once. Some go under.”

“Whole nations?”

“Temporarily, whole nations can receive setbacks as a result of defeat in a war, or perhaps due to lack of natural resources. Some nations progress faster than others.”

Chessman said in dour satisfaction, “The whole Texcocan State is one great unit. Everywhere the gross product increases. Within the foreseeable future, the standard of living will be excellent.”

Jerry Kennedy, an alcoholic lisp in his voice now, said, “You mean you’ve accomplished the planet-wide government you were telling us about at the last meeting?”

“Well, no. Not as yet.” Chessman’s sullen voice had an element of chagrin in it. “However, there are no strong elements left that oppose us. We are now pacifying the more remote areas.”

“Sounds like a rather bloody program—especially if Barry Watson, here, winds up with eight women,” Martin Gunther said.

Watson started to retort to that, but Chessman held up a restraining hand. “The Texcocan State is too strong to be resisted, Gunther. It is mostly a matter of getting around to the more remote peoples. As soon as we bring in a new tribe, we convert it into a commune.”

“Commune!” Kennedy blurted.

Joe Chessman raised his thick eyebrows at the other. “The most efficient socio-economic unit at this stage of development. Tribal society is perfectly adapted to fit into such a plan. The principal differences between a tribe and a commune is that under the commune you have the advantage of a State above in a position to give you the benefit of mass industries, schools, medical assistance. In return, of course, for a certain amount of taxes, a military levy and so forth.”

Martin Gunther said softly, “I recall reading of the commune system as a student, but I fail to remember the supposed advantages.”

Chessman growled. “They’re obvious. You have a unit of tens of thousands of persons. Instead of living in individual houses, each with a man working while the woman cooks and takes care of the home and the children, all live in community houses and take their meals in a messhall. The children are cared for by trained nurses. During the season all able adults go out en masse to work the fields. When the harvest has been taken in, the farmer does not hole up for the winter but is occupied in local industrial projects, or in road or dam building. The commune’s labor is never idle.”

Kennedy shuddered involuntarily.

Chessman looked at him coldly. “It means quick progress. Meanwhile, we go through each commune and from earliest youth, locate those members who are suited to higher studies. We bring them into state schools where they get as much education as they can assimilate—more than is available in commune schools. These are the Texcocans we are training in the sciences.”

“The march to the anthill,” Amschel Mayer muttered.

Chessman eyed him scornfully. “You amuse me, old man. You with your talk of building an economy with a system of free competition. Our Texcocans are sacrificing today but their children will live in abundance. Even today, nobody starves, no one goes without shelter or medical care.” Chessman twisted his mouth. “We have found that hungry, cold or sick people cannot work efficiently.”

He stared challengingly at the Genoese leader. “Can you honestly say the same? That there are no starving people in Genoa? No inadequately housed, no sick without hope of medicine? Do you have economic setbacks in which poorly planned production goes amuck and depressions follow with mass unemployment?”

“Nevertheless,” Mayer said, with unwonted calm, “our society is still far ahead of yours. A mere handful of your bureaucratic and military chiefs enjoy the good things of life. There are tens of thousands on Genoa who have them. Free competition has its weaknesses, perhaps, but it provides a greater good for a greater number of persons.”

Joe Chessman came to his feet. “Well see,” he said stolidly. “In ten years, Mayer, we’ll consider the positions of both our planets once again.”

“Ten years it is,” Mayer snapped back at him.

Jerry Kennedy saluted with his glass. “Cheers,” he said.

On the return to Genoa, Amschel Mayer looked his disgust at his right hand man. Kennedy was not piloting the small craft, as usual. Martin Gunther was at the controls.

Mayer said, “Are you sober enough to assimilate something serious?”

Jerry Kennedy shook his head to achieve clarity. “Sure, chief, of course. That Earthside liquor is just a little stronger than what I’m used to these days, I guess. Sneaks up on you.”

Mayer grunted contempt but said, “Well then, begin taking the steps necessary for us to place a few men on Texcoco in the way of, ah, intelligence agents.”

“You mean some of our team?” Kennedy said, startled.

Gunther looked over from the space launch’s controls and raised his eyebrows.

Mayer said impatiently, “No, no of course not. We can’t spare them, and, besides, there’d be too big a chance of recognition and exposure. We’ll have to use some of our more trusted Genoese. Make the reward enough to attract their services.” He looked from one of his lieutenants to the other significantly. “I think you’ll agree that it might not be a bad idea to keep our eyes on the developments on Texcoco.”

Martin Gunther thought about it. “Well, perhaps, but there’s another aspect, Amschel. Thus far, we’ve kept the secret of the Pedagogue’s existence from anybody we come in contact with on Genoa. Not even such close business associates as Mannerheim have been told about the real nature of our mission.”

“Ummm,” Kennedy said glumly. “And as soon as you start organizing an espionage mission to Texcoco, the fat will be in the fire.”

Mayer said, “It will be a top secret. Only a few very trusted, very dependable men will be used. You can ferry them over in this craft. Over there, perhaps, they can make contact with those elements in revolt against Chessman and his team. They can infiltrate one or more of these so-called communes, and keep in touch with whatever real progress Joe and his men are making—if any.”

Jerry Kennedy muttered. “One person can keep a secret, sometimes even two can. From then on the likelihood goes down in a geometric progression, and this project will involve dozens before we’re through.”

Mayer stared at him. “Just who is in command of this expedition, Jerome Kennedy?”

On the way back to Texcoco, Barry Watson said to his chief, “What do you think of putting some security men on Genoa, just to keep tabs?”

“Why?”

Watson looked at his fingers, nibbled at a hangnail. “It just seems to me it wouldn’t hurt any.”

Chessman snorted.

Dick Hawkins said thoughtfully, “I think Barry’s right. Mayer and his gang can bear watching. Besides, in another decade or so they’ll realize we’re going to beat them in this competition. Mayer’s ego isn’t going to take that. He’d go to just about any extreme to keep from losing face back on Earth.”

Natt Roberts said worriedly, “I think they’re right, Joe. Certainly it wouldn’t hurt to have a few security men over there. My department could train them, then one of us could pilot them over. Spot a few on each of the three continents. Thing to do would be send men with families. Guarantee that there’d not be any defections.”

“Well, you never know. There might be opportunities over there.”

“I’ll make the decisions around here,” Chessman growled at them. “Don’t forget who Number One is. I’ll think about it. It’s just possible that you’re right, though.”

Seated in the stern of the space lighter were the three adult Tulans and Taller, the teenager. Reif let his eyes go from one face to another, but he said nothing.

Natalie Wieliczka looked out over the large audience which crowded the auditorium with a certain modest pride. She said, “Very well. That concludes my lecture. Are there any questions?”

One of her listeners came to his feet.

There was a sly element in his voice. “In all your speech today, Honorable Doctor, you have dealt with new methods of controlling the diseases that have ravaged the world for so long, for whatever reason that the Supreme has seen fit in his wisdom. However, never have you mentioned the Temple which has always traditionally been the recourse of the ill. These new methods are other than those utilized by the Temple monks. You say nothing of the holy incantations necessary to supplement medication and other therapy. Is there, then, no place in your teachings for the Supreme?”

There was a snicker that went through the audience which was composed almost exclusively of graduate medical students. Inwardly, Natalie winced at it. The questioner was a plant. That she knew. She was being deliberately provoked.

She tried to brazen it out. She carefully chose her words.

“The Temple deals primarily with your immortal soul, with your relationship with your god, though, of course Temple monks often participate in other matters of interest to the community. Our field, with which we are exclusively concerned, as doctors, is medicine, which deals with the health of the people, on this plane of existence. As doctors, no matter how religious we may be as individuals, we do not deal with the soul or the hereafter.”

He was still standing.

He said, “But do you not think it is necessary to have present a Temple monk at any sick bed, in order to invoke the aid of the Supreme?”

Natalie Wieliczka ran the tip of her tongue over her lower lip. “Let us say that it can never do harm to have a representative of the Temple present while a trained doctor of medicine is administering to a patient.”

“But is it necessary?”

There was a stirring in the audience. A young student called to the questioner: “Sit down, you flat!’

But most of them watched her. Watched her carefully Waited tensely for her words.

She was at a crossroads and knew it. Now, all bets were down. It had been building for some time and she had long avoided it.

Natalie Wieliczka said very slowly, “No, it is not necessary for a Temple monk to be present.” She took a deep breath. “Incantations are not necessary to cure the sick.”

“That, Honorable Doctor, is blasphemy!”

She shook her head. The die was cast now. “It is not meant to be.”

“Honorable Doctor,” the man shouted, “it is well known that you never attend the Temple.”

“I am too busy with my work.”

“Honorable Doctor, are you afraid to attend the Temple?”

“Certainly not! Are there any other questions?”

A black cloaked figure who had been sitting inconspicuously in the last row of seats, came to his feet. He said, his voice seemingly low, but still it rolled out over the auditorium, “The holy books say that it is impossible for a witch to enter the house of the Supreme without suffering immediate death.”

Natalie winced but bit out: “I am not a witch. I am a doctor of medicine. I have never seen a witch.” She took a deep breath. “I do not believe that such things as witches exist.”

The man in black rumbled. “The holy books also say that the faithful shall not suffer a witch to live.”