«I’ve read about it,» Brenner said. «Men won in the end. Eskimos, who had the right technology for the place. Europeans, later, with sheer power of machinery. We, our race, we’ll lick Sibylla yet, one way or another. But it’s taken the first battle. In such cases, a good general retreats.»
D’Indre had recovered his poise. «I also know the history,» he said. «Captain Simić’s report was exhaustive. I wished, however, to add a personal encounter to my data store before deciding what disposal of this affair I should advise.»
Brenner folded his arms and waited.
«As a matter of fact,» d’Indre said, «Captain Simić has already proposed a solution which seems viable to me. Parts of Earth remain empty because development has been economically unfeasible. The tropical deserts, for example, the Sahara or the Rub’ al-Qali. Sand, stone, drought, low water table or none, fierce heat and light, no worthwhile minerals. Converting them by machine would tie up too much capital equipment and skilled personnel that are badly needed elsewhere. Theoretically, the task could be accomplished by minimal robotic and maximal hand labor. But who among the proles combines the necessary attitude and hardihood? It will be interesting to see if the Sibyllans do.»
Briefly, humanness broke through him. «I am sorry, especially for the children,» he said. «But under present circumstances, this is the best that anyone can give you.»
Brenner remained steady. «I sort of expected it,» he said. «The captain dropped a few hints on our way down here. What about us, uh, conspirators?»
D’Indre spread his hands. «Your colony will need leadership. I daresay the Director will rule that providing such leadership is an acceptable expiation.»
Brenner’s own right hand crashed on the desk. Laughter roared from him. «Why, man!» he cried. «After what we’ve been up against, you think a nice kind Earthside desert’s going to be any problem?»
Discussion dragged on. I took small part. My mind wandered and wondered. I didn’t speak, lest I jeopardize the solution that was being hammered out. But take these people, I thought. A world battled them for generations. What those now alive had experienced was of no importance compared to what their germ plasm had experienced. With that natural selection in their past, what would they do with their future?
Ten thousand of them among billions—set down in the worst lands on Earth—could make a difference? Nonsense!
I got rid of the notion. I took command of my ship and went off on a voyage. I came home after eighty-five years and found that I had not thought nonsense after all.
EVENTIDE
Gone sunset amberful, the lake
Lies mirror-quiet for the pines
That ring it round with shadow heights
Through which a ghost of golden shines
To burnish blue those metal bits
Above the water, wing and wing,
ENOUGH ROPE
Hurulta, Arkazhik of Unzuvan, fitted his own personality. A magnificent specimen of Ulugani malehood, two and a half meters tall, so broad that he seemed shorter, he dwarfed the thin red-haired human before him. His robes were a barbaric shout of color, as if he were draped in fire and rainbows, and the volume of his speaking made the fine crystal ornaments in the audience chamber tremble and sing, ever so faintly. But the words were hard and steady and utterly cold.
«Our will in this matter is unshakable,» he said curtly. «If the League wants to go to war over it, that will be the League’s misfortune.»
Wing Alak of Sol III and the Galactic League Patrol looked up into the hairless blue face and ventured an urbane smile. The Ulugani were humanoid to several degrees of classification—six fingers to a hand, clawed feet, pointed ears, and the rest meant little when you dealt with the fantastic variety of intelligent life making up Alak’s compatriots. This race looked primitive—small head, beetling eyebrow ridges, flat nose and prognathous jaw—but inside, they were as bright as any other known species.
Too bright!
«It would be straining the obvious, your excellency,» said Alak, «to point out that the Unzuvan Empire comprises just one planetary system of which only Ulugan is habitable, whereas the Galactic League embraces a good million stars. It cannot have been omitted from all calculation. But I must say that, under these circumstances, I am puzzled; perhaps your excellency would condescend to enlighten me with regard to your attitude on this disparity.»
Hurulta snorted, showing a formidable mouthful of teeth. During the years in which Alak, as chief representative of the League and its Patrol, had been visiting Ulugan—off and on—and particularly during the past several months of mounting crisis during which Alak had been here continuously, he had learned to regard the Solarian as a weak, wordy, and pedantic bumbler. Now one huge blue fist crashed into the palm of the other hand and he grinned contemptuously.
«Let us not bandy words,» he said. «The nearest border of the League is almost a thousand light-years away, which would make your lines of communication ridiculously long if you tried to attack. Also, in spite of this distance, we have had our own agents in your territory for years. We know that the temper of the League population is… well, let us not say decadent, let us be kindly and say pacific. It would not react favorably to a war which could only mean expense and grief for it. Moreover, the Patrol is a minimal force, designed merely to keep order within the bounds of the League itself. Policemen! We have built up a war machine.»
He shrugged massively. «Why go on?» he rumbled. «It is only our intention to claim the natural rights of Ulugan. You go your way, we will go ours; we do not wish to fight you, but neither do we feel bound to respect the morals of an altogether different civilization. You can, at best, only be a nuisance if you try to stop us; and if the nuisance becomes too great, we are not afraid of fighting a thousand-year war to exterminate it. We are a warrior race and you are not: there is the essential difference, and mere statistics will not change it.»
He sat down behind his desk and fiddled absently with a jeweled dagger. His voice was remote, uninterested. «You may inform your government that Ulugan is already commencing the occupation of Tukatan and the other planets in its system. That is all. You may go.»
To dismiss an ambassador thus was like a slap. Alak had to fight himself for an instant before self-control came. Then his gaunt sharp face smoothed itself out, and his tone was unctuous.
«As your excellency wishes, so be it. Good day.»
He bowed and backed out of the magnificent room.
Scene: An upper office in the League Patrol Intelligence—Sol Sector—building, Britn, Terra. A sparsely furnished room, a few relaxers, a desk, the control-studded board of a robofile. One wall is transparent, opening on a serene landscape of rolling, wooded hills, a few private dwelling-units, the distant bulk of a food factory. Overhead, the sky is full of white clouds and sunshine, now and then the metal gleam of an airboat. It all seems incredibly remote from the troubled world of Galactic politics.
Characters: Myrn Kaltro, sector chief, a big gray-haired man in the iridescent undress uniform of a human Patrol officer. Jorel Meinz, sociotechnic director of the Solar System, small, dark, intense, conservatively dressed in gold and crimson. Wing Alak, unattached field agent, enough of a dandy to wear the latest fashion in civilian clothes—plain gray and blue. But then, he has been away from home for a good many years.
Background: In a civilization embracing nearly a million separate intelligent races, most of them with independent governments of their own, a civilization which is growing almost daily, it is impossible for even a well-informed administrator to keep track of all significant events. Jorel Meinz has hardly heard the name «Ulugan» before today; now he is being asked to authorize an action which may change Galactic history.