This time the hesitation was longer, but the question was still the expected one anybody, knowing she was a reporter, would ask. She smiled ruefully, and said, “What else? And you?”
He projected embarrassment. “My job is supposed to be kind of secret. Orders are not to discuss it with anybody.”
She laughed, obviously not caring. “I’ll have to worm it out of you. Probably make a good newstape.”
He grunted self-deprecation. “Hardly. Worst luck. It must be something, being with Interplanetary News. You must meet a lot of interesting people.”
She looked at him, as though wondering if he were kidding. However, no matter how much of a yoke, he was probably better than no companionship at all, and it was a long trip. Besides, he knew at least something about what had happened to her during her twenty-four hour blackout.
“Well, yes,” she drew out. “I suppose so. There’s a lot of fun being on the inside of everything.” She was wondering how she could get around to asking just what the circumstances were under which he had met her. Perhaps the blunt approach would do it. He didn’t seem to be particularly stute, not to say devious. At most, there seemed to be a kind of sad sensitivity about him, as though he felt something in life was passing him by.
“How about a drink?” he suggested, looking down at the wine list in the chair’s arm. He winced at the prices, as he knew an ordinary traveling salesman type might do.
“In space? Good heavens.”
“I’ll put it on the expense account,” he said, with an air of gallantry. “Oiling up the press, or whatever they call it.”
They settled for John Brown’s Bodies, and he told her the one about feeling like you were moldering in your grave, came morning.
Then he said, “How do you mean, on the ‘inside’ of everything?”
She considered that. “Well, back when I was in school I decided that there were two kinds of people throughout the worlds. Those who were on the inside pertaining to everything that really counts, and those who were on the outside, and didn’t have a clue. And I decided, then and there, I wanted to be an insider.”
He sipped his drink and looked at her, his eyes guileless. “I’ll bet you were in your sophomore year, when you thought that up,” he said.
“Why… as a matter of fact, I suppose I was,” she said. “How did you know?”
“I used to work in statistics,” he said meaninglessly. He covered over. “But what is an example of being on the inside?”
She touched the tip of her slightly freckled nose, in a young girl’s gesture, slightly incongruous on the part of an experienced news-hen. “Well, let’s take one of the early examples. Have you ever heard of a man named Hearst?”
He had, but he said no.
“Well, Hearst was the owner of a newspaper chain back about the turn of the 20th Century. At that time, he supported a group that believed the United States was getting into the colony-grabbing game too late. He beat the drums for intervention in Cuba, where a great deal of American capital was invested, against Spain. The story is that he sent a photographer down to take pictures of the war. The photographer cabled that there wasn’t any war. And Hearst cabled back, You supply the photos, I’ll supply the war . And he continued to beat the drums. Not long after, the American battleship Maine was sunk in Havana harbor.”
Ronny nodded. “I’ve often wondered who sank the Maine,” he said.
She looked at him.
He said reasonably, “Obviously, it had to be one of three groups, the Cubans, the Spanish or the Americans. No one else was involved. Of them all, the Spanish had the least reason to sink it. The sad excuse for a war that followed was ample proof that they wanted to provoke no such scrap.” He paused; then added thoughtfully, “I wonder if the ship was well insured.”
“Look,” she demanded, “who’s being cynical here, you or me?”
He laughed, as though embarrassed. “Go on.”
“So, pushed by Hearst and other drum beaters, President McKinley got increasingly tougher. Unfortunately, the Spanish didn’t cooperate. Their queen ordered Cuban hostilities suspended, in an attempt to placate the Americans. They were doing all they could to keep the war from happening. However, Hearst and the other drum beaters hardly mentioned her efforts. And McKinley ignored the fact that the potential enemy had already offered capitulation, when he addressed Congress asking for war measures. To wind it all up, the Spanish were clobbered. It was like taking candy from babes.”
Ronny attempted to portray dismay. “So that’s what it’s like be be on the inside. You mean the press can actually influence the news.”
She laughed at him in scorn. “My dear Citizen Smythe, the press today makes the news. We shape it to fulfill our own needs, to realize our own ideals, to build a better race.”
He looked at her, wide-eyed, in complete sympathy. “The way you put it, it’s absolutely inspiring.”
She had his admiring interest now, and responded. “Take for instance,” she explained, “some planet of which we don’t approve. Suppose that three news items came out of there one day. The first mentions a new cure for cancer; the second, some startling statistics on industrial progress being made; the third mentions a riot by high school children, who overturn some copter-cabs in the streets and throw stones through some windows. What story do you think we put on the interplanetary broadcasts?”
“You mean the last one? Only the last one?”
“Why should we mention the other two?” she said reasonably.
“Well, doesn’t it kind of involve freedom of speech, or of the press, or something?”
She scoffed at him. “It’s our press, isn’t it? The freedom consists of printing what we wish.”
“Well, that isn’t the way I should have put it. I mean, the right of the public to know… or something.”
She scoffed again. “Let’s have another of these. What did you call them? This time we’ll put it on Interplanetary News’ swindle sheet.” She dialed the drinks. “It’s up to us, we who are on the inside, to decide what the public ought to know. They’re a bunch of yokes, not up to making decisions.”
Ronny thought about it. “Well, possibly the reason they’re yokes, like you say, incapable of making competent decisions, is because they’re improperly informed. But, anyway, that’s the reason you’re going to Phrygia, eh? Something really inside is going on.”
She sipped the potent drink and scowled at him. “As a matter of fact, I don’t know what’s going on. But it’s something very big. It involves Baron Wyler himself.”
“Who’s Baron Wyler?” Ronny said, trying to look as though he were trying to look interested.
She was stung by the fact that she didn’t seem to be impressing him. “I can see you’re not one of those insiders. The Baron is the most aggressive single man in UP. He’s Supreme Commandant of Phrygia and Phrygia is the most aggressive planet in the system.”
Ronny snorted. “What good does it do to be aggressive these days? Under United Planets, no member planet is allowed to interfere with any other. Where can your aggressiveness, go, besides inward?”
She opened her mouth to retort, then closed it suddenly. She looked into her drink. “These are strong, aren’t they, Jerry?”
“Pretty strong, all right. In the auto-bars, they usually have a sign—only one to a customer.”
She cocked her head to one side. “Oh, listen. That song.” She wagged her head to it, setting her blonde ponytail a-swing. It was coming from the Tri-Di stage at the other end of the lounge. “Do you dance?” she said.
“Well, a little. I’m not very good at this rock’n’swing stuff.”
She stood up. “Neither am I. Let’s try this, it’s an old favorite of mine.”