"Certainly it was. Why didn't you answer?"
Monroe-Alpha said nothing, looked at him dully, and looked away. "Snap out of it, man," Hamilton snapped, by now exasperated. "Come to life. The putsch failed. You know that, don't you?"
"Yes." Then he added, "I'm ready."
"Ready for what?"
"You've come to arrest me, haven't you?"
"Me? Great Egg! I'm no monitor."
"It's all right. I don't mind."
"Look here, Cliff," Hamilton said seriously. "What's gotten into you? Are you still filled up with the guff McFee dished out? Are you determined to be a martyr? You've been a fool-there's no need to be a damned fool. I've reported that you were an agent of mine." (In this he anticipated a decision he had made at the moment; he would carry it out later-if necessary.) "You're all in the clear. Well, speak up. You didn't get in on the fighting, did you?"
"No."
"I didn't think you would, after the hypno pills I stuffed down you. One more and you would have listened to the birdies. What's the trouble, then? Are you still fanatical about this damned Survivors Club tommyrot?"
"No. That was a mistake. I was crazy."
"I'll say you were crazy! But see here-you don't rate it, but you're getting away with it, cold. You don't have to worry. Just slide back in where you were and no one's the wiser."
"It's no good, Felix. Nothing's any good. Thanks, just the same." He smiled briefly and wanly.
"Well, for the love o'-I've a good mind to paste you right in the puss, just to get a rise out of you." Monroe-Alpha did not answer. His face he had let sink down into his hands; he showed in no way that he had even heard. Hamilton shook his shoulder.
"What's the matter? Did something else happen? Something I don't know about."
"Yes." It was barely a whisper.
"Do you want to tell me about it?"
"It doesn't matter." But he did start to tell of it; once started he went on steadily, in a low voice and without raising his head. He seemed to be talking only to himself, as if he were repeating over something he wished to learn by heart.
Hamilton listened uneasily, wondering whether or not he should stop him. He had never heard a man bare his secret thoughts as Monroe-Alpha was doing. It seemed indecent.
But he went on and on, until the whole pitiful, silly picture was mercilessly sharp. "And so I came back here," he concluded. He said nothing further, nor did he look up.
Hamilton looked amazed. "Is that all?"
"Yes."
"You're sure you haven't left anything out?"
"No, of course not."
"Then what, in the Name of the Egg, are you doing here?"
"Nothing. There wasn't anyplace else to go."
"Cliff, you'll be the death of me, yet. Get going. Get started. Get up off that fat thing you're sitting on and get a move on."
"Huh? Where?"
"After her, you bubble-brained idiot! Go find her."
Monroe-Alpha shook his head wearily. "You must not have listened. I tell you I tried to burn her."
Hamilton took a deep breath, let it out, then said, "Listen to me. I don't know much about women, and sometimes it seems like I didn't know anything about them. But I'm sure of this-she won't let a little thing like you taking a pot shot at her stand in the way if you ever had any chance with her at all. She'll forgive you."
"You don't really mean that, do you?" Monroe-Alpha's face was still tragic, but he clutched at the hope.
"Certainly I do. Women will forgive anything." With a flash of insight he added, "Otherwise the race would have died out long ago."
CHAPTER ELEVEN
"-then a man is something more than his genes!"
"I CANNOT say," remarked the Honorable Member from Great Lakes Central, "that I place high evaluation on Brother Mordan's argument that this project be taken up to get young Hamilton's consent to propagate. It is true that I am not entirely familiar with the details of the genetic sequence involved-"
"You should be," Mordan cut in somewhat acidly, "I supplied full transcript two days ago."
"I beg your pardon, brother. In those forty-eight hours I have held hearings steadily. The Mississippi Valley matter, you know. It's rather urgent."
"I'm sorry," Mordan apologized. "It's easy for a layman to forget the demands on a Planner's time."
"Never mind. No need for finicky courtesy among ourselves. I scanned the brief and the first sixty pages while we were assembling; that, with such previous knowledge of the case as I had, gives me a rough idea of your problem. But tell me, am I correct in thinking that Hamilton holds nothing exclusively in his chart? You have alternative choices?"
"Yes."
"You expected to finish with his descendent generation- how many generations would be required, using alternative choices?"
"Three additional generations."
"That is what I thought, and that is my reason for disagreeing with your argument. The genetic purpose of the sequence is, I think, of greater importance to the race, but a delay of a hundred years, more or less, is not important-not sufficiently important to justify an undertaking as major as a full effort to investigate the question of survival after death."
"I take it," put in the Speaker for the Day, "that you wish to be recorded as opposing Brother Mordan's proposal?"
"No, Hubert, no. You anticipate me-incorrectly. I am supporting his proposition. Notwithstanding the fact that I consider his reasons, though good, to be insufficient, I evaluate the proposal as worthwhile in itself. I think we should support it fully."
The Member from the Antilles looked up from the book he was reading (not rudeness; everyone present knew that he had parallel mental processes and no one expected him to waste half the use of his time out of politeness) and said, "I think George should amplify his reason."
"I will. We policy men are like a pilot who is attempting to do a careful job of conning his ship without having any idea of his destination. Hamilton has put his finger on the weak point in our whole culture-he should be a planner himself. Every decision that we make, although it is based on data, is shaped by our personal philosophies. The data is examined in the light of these philosophies. How many of you have an opinion about survival-after-death? I ask for a show of hands. Come now, be honest with yourselves." Somewhat hesitantly they put their hands up-men and women alike, every one of them. "Now," the Great Lakes member continued, "the hands of those who are sure that their opinions are correct."
All of the hands went down, save that of the Member from Patagonia. "Bravo!" Rembert of the Lakes called out. "I should have guessed that you would be sure."
She took the cigar out of her mouth, said rather sharply, "Any fool knows that one," and went back to her needlework. She was over a hundred years old, and the only control natural in the Board. Her district had confirmed her tenure regularly for more than fifty years. Her eyesight was thought to be failing, but she had all of her own yellow teeth. Her wrinkled, mahogany features showed more evidence of Indian blood than Caucasian. They all claimed to be a little afraid of her.
"Garvala," Rembert said to her, "perhaps you can cut the matter short by giving us the answer?"
"I can't tell you the answer-and you wouldn't believe me if I did." She was silent for a moment, then added, "Let the boy do as he pleases. He will anyway."
"Do you support or oppose Mordan's proposition?"
"Support. Not that you're likely to go at it right." There was a short silence. Every member in the chamber was hastily trying to recall when, if ever, Carvala had been proven to be on the wrong side of a question-in the long run.