“What makes you think,” demanded Bertram Hardy, “that they’ll let us man the ship anyhow?”
“Bert,” Lazarus said coldly, “address the chair when you want to sound off. You’re not even a Family delegate. Last warning.”
“As I was saying,” Barstow continued, “there is an appropriateness in the long-lived exploring the stars. A mystic might call it our true vocation.” He pondered. “As for the ship Lazarus suggested; perhaps they will not let us have that … but the Families are rich. If we need a starship-or ships-we can build them, we can pay for them. I think we had better hope that they will let us do this … for it may be that there is no way, not another way of any sort, out of our dilemma which does not include our own extermination.”
Barstow spoke these last words softly and slowly, with great sadness. They bit into the company like damp chill. To most of them the problem was so new as not yet to be real; no one had voiced the possible consequence of failing to find a solution satisfactory to the shortlived majority. For their senior trustee to speak soberly of his fear that the Families might be exterminated-hunted down and killed-stirred up in each one the ghost they never mentioned.
“Well,” Lazarus said briskly when the silence had grown painful, “before we work this idea over, let’s hear what other plan anyone has to offer. Speak up.”
A messenger hurried in and spoke to Zaccur Barstow. He looked startled and seemed to ask to have the message repeated. He then hurried across the rostrum to Lazarus, whispered to him. Lazarus looked startled. Barstow hurried out.
Lazarus looked back at the crowd. “We’ll take a recess,” he announced. “Give you time to think about other plans and time for a stretch and a smoke.” He reached for his pouch.
“What’s up?” someone called out.
Lazarus struck a cigarette, took a long drag, let it drift out. “We’ll have to wait and see,” he said. “I don’t know. But at least half a dozen of the plans put forward tonight we won’t have to bother to vote on. The situation has changed again-how much, I couldn’t say.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well,” Lazarus drawled, “it seems the Federation Administrator wanted to talk to Zack Barstow right away. He asked for him by name … and he called over our secret Families’ circuit.”
“Huh? That’s impossible!”
“Yep. So is a baby, son.”
Chapter 4
ZACCUR BARSTOW TRIED to quiet himself down as he hurried into the phone booth.
At the other end of the same videophone circuit the Honorable Slayton Ford was doing the same thing-trying to calm his nerves. He did not underrate himself. A long and brilliant public career crowned by years as Administrator for the Council and under the Covenant of the Western Administration had made Ford aware of his own superior ability and unmatched experience; no ordinary man could possibly make him feel at a disadvantage in negotiation.
But this was different.
What would a man be like who had lived more than two ordinary lifetimes? Worse than that-a man who had had four or five times the adult experience that Ford himself had had? Slayton Ford knew that his own opinions had changed and changed again since his own boyhood; he knew that the boy he had been, or even the able young man he had been, would be no match for the mature man he had become. So what would this Barstow be like? Presumably he was the most able, the most astute, of a group all of whom had had much more experience than Ford could possibly have-how could he guess such a man’s evaluations, intentions, ways of thinking, his possible resources?
Ford was certain of only one thing: he did not intend to trade Manhattan Island for twenty-four dollars and a case of whisky, nor sell humanity’s birthright for a mess of pottage.
He studied Barstow’s face as the image appeared in his phone. A good face and strong … it would be useless to try to bully this man. And the man looked young-why, he looked younger than Ford himself! The subconscious image of the Administrator’s own stern and implacable grandfather faded out of his mind and his tension eased off. He said quietly, “You are Citizen Zaccur Barstow?”
“Yes, Mister Administrator.”
“You are chief executive of the Howard Families?”
“I am the current speaker trustee of our Families’ Foundation. But I am responsible to my cousins rather than in authority over them.”
Ford brushed it aside. “I assume that your position carries with it leadership. I can’t negotiate with a hundred thousand people.”
Barstow did not blink. He saw the power play in the sudden admission that the administration knew the true numbers of the Families and discounted it. He had already adjusted himself to the shock of learning that the Families’ secret headquarters was no longer secret and the still more upsetting fact that the Administrator knew how to tap into their private communication system; it simply proved that one or more Members had been caught and forced to talk.
So it was now almost certain that the authorities already knew every important fact about the Families.
Therefore it was useless to try to bluff-just the same, don’t volunteer any information; they might not have all the facts this soon.
Barstow answered without noticeable pause. “What is it you wish to discuss with me, sir?”
“The policy of the Administration toward your kin group. The welfare of yourself and your relatives.”
Barstow shrugged. “What can we discuss? The Covenant has been tossed aside and you have been given power to do as you like with us-to squeeze a secret out of us that we don’t have. What can we do but pray for mercy?”
“Please!” The Administrator gestured his annoyance. “Why fence with me? We have a problem, you and I. Let’s discuss it openly and try to reach a solution. Yes?”
Barstow answered slowly, “I would like to … and I believe that you would like to, also. But the problem is based on a false assumption, that we, the Howard Families, know how to lengthen human life. We don’t.”
“Suppose I tell you that I know there is no such secret?”
“Mmm … I would like to believe you. But how can you reconcile that with the persecution of my people? You’ve been harrying us like rats.”
Ford made a wry face. “There is an old, old story about a theologian who was asked to reconcile the doctrine of Divine mercy with the doctrine of infant damnation. ‘The Almighty,’ he explained, ‘finds it necessary to do things in His official and public capacity which in His private and personal capacity He deplores.’”
Barstow smiled in spite of himself. “I see the analogy. Is it actually pertinent?”
“I think it is.”
“So. You didn’t call me simply to make a headsman’s apology?”
“No. I hope not. You keep in touch with politics? I’m sure you must; your position would require it.” Barstow nodded; Ford explained at length:
Ford’s administration had been the longest since the signing of the Covenant; he had lasted through four Councils. Nevertheless his control was now so shaky that he could not risk forcing a vote of confidence-certainly not over the Howard Families. On that issue his nominal majority was already a minority. If he refused the present decision of the Council, forced it to a vote of confidence, Ford would be out of office and the present minority leader would take over as administrator. “You follow me? I can either stay in office and try to cope with this problem while restricted by a Council directive with which I do not agree … or I can drop out and let my successor handle it.”