And Earth itself, with its vastly elaborate Terrestrial Board of Inquiry, sniffed at all the Settlements indiscriminately. Earth was fishing, and Fisher, appropriately enough, was one of the fishermen.
Wyler said slowly, ‘We've put what we've got together and I gather it's enough. We'll be able to have hyper-assisted travel. And I'm thinking we'll go out to the Neighbor Star. Wouldn't you want to be on that trip when it goes out there?’
‘Why do I want to be on it, Garand? If there's going to be such a trip, which I doubt.’
‘I'm pretty sure there will be. I can't give you my source, but take my word for it, it's reliable. And, of course, you'll want to make the trip. You might see your wife. Or if not her - your kid.’
Fisher moved restlessly. It seemed to him he spent half his days now trying not to think of those eyes. Marlene would be six years old now, talking in a quiet deliberate way - like Roseanne. Seeing through people - like Roseanne.
He said, ‘You're talking nonsense, Garand. Even if there were such a flight, why would they let me be on it? They would send specialists of one sort or another. Besides, if there's one person the Old Man will keep off, it's me. He may have let me get back into the Office and given me assignments, but you know how he is about failures, and I certainly failed him on Rotor.’
‘Yes, but that's the very point. That's what makes you a specialist. If he's going after Rotor, how can he fail to include the one Earthman who lived on Rotor for four years? Who would understand Rotor better and who would know better how to deal with them? Ask to see him. Point this out, but remember, you're not supposed to know that we have hyper-assistance. Just talk possibilities, make use of the subjunctive. And don't drag me into it in any way. I'm not supposed to know about it either.’
Fisher's brow furrowed in thought. Was it possible? He dared not hope.
30The next day, while Fisher was still wondering whether to risk asking for an interview with Tanayama, the decision was taken out of his hands. He was summoned.
A simple agent is rarely summoned by the Director. There are plenty of deputies to grind away at them. And if an agent is summoned by the Old Man, it is almost never good news. So Crile Fisher prepared himself with grim resignation for an assignment as an inspector of the fertilizer factories.
Tanayama looked up at him from behind his desk. Fisher had seen him only rarely and briefly in the three years since Earth's discovery of the Neighbor Star, and he seemed unchanged. He had been small and shriveled for so long that there seemed no room for any further physical change. The sharpness of his eyes had not abated either, nor the withered grim set of his lips. He might even be wearing the same garments he had worn three years before. Fisher could not tell.
But if the harsh voice, too, was the same, the tone was surprising. Apparently, in the face of astronomical odds, the Old Man had called him in for the purpose of praising him.
Tanayama said in his queer, and not altogether unpleasant, distortion of Planetary English, ‘Fisher, you have done well. I want you to hear that from me.’
Fisher, standing (he had not been invited to sit down), managed to suppress his small start of surprise.
The Director said, ‘There can be no public celebration of this, no laser-beam parade, no holographic procession. It is not in the nature of things. But I tell you this.’
‘That is quite enough, Director,’ said Fisher. ‘I thank you.’
Tanayama stared fixedly at Fisher out of his narrow eyes. Finally, he said, ‘And is that all you have to say? No questions?’
‘I presume, Director, you will tell me what I need to know.’
‘You are an agent, a capable man. What have you found out for yourself?’
‘Nothing, Director. I do not seek to find out anything but what I am instructed to find out.’
Tanayama's small head nodded very slightly. ‘An appropriate answer, but I seek inappropriate ones. What have you guessed?’
‘You seem pleased with me, Director, and it may therefore be that I have brought in some information that has proved useful to you.’
‘In what respect?’
‘I think nothing would prove more useful to you than having obtained the technique of hyper-assistance.’
Tanayama's mouth made a noiseless: ‘Ah-h-h.’ He said, ‘And next? Assuming this to be so, what are we to do next?’
‘Travel to the Neighbor Star. Locate Rotor.’
‘Nothing better than that? That is all there is to do? You see no farther?’
And at this point, Fisher decided it would be foolish not to gamble. He could not possibly be handed a better opportunity. ‘One thing better: that, when the first Earth vessel goes out of the Solar System by means of hyper-assistance, I be on it.’
Fisher had scarcely said that when he knew his gamble was lost - or at least not won. Tanayama's face darkened. He said in a sharply imperative tone, ‘Sit down!’
Fisher could hear the soft movement of the chair behind him, rolling toward him at the words of Tanayama, words that its primitive computerized motor could understand.
Fisher sat down, without looking behind him to make certain the chair was there. To have done so would have been insulting and, at the present moment, there was no room to insult Tanayama.
Tanayama said, ‘Why do you want to be on the vessel?’
With an effort, Fisher kept his voice level. ‘Director, I have a wife on Rotor.’
‘A wife you abandoned five years ago. Do you think she would welcome you back?’
‘Director, I have a child.’
‘She was one year old when you left. Do you think she knows she has a father? Or cares?’
Fisher was silent. These were points that he had thought about himself, over and over.
Tanayama waited briefly, then said, ‘But there will be no flight to the Neighbor Star. There will be no vessel for you to be on.’
Again, Fisher had to suppress surprise. He said, ‘Forgive me, Director. You did not say we had hyper-assistance. You said, “Assuming this to be so-” I should have noted your choice of words.’
‘So you should have done. So you should always do. Nevertheless, we do have hyper-assistance. We can now move through space, just as Rotor has done; or at least we will, once we build a vehicle and are sure the design is adequate, and all its features workable - which may take a year or two. But then what? Are you seriously suggesting we take it to the Neighbor Star?’
Fisher said cautiously, ‘Surely that is an option, Director.’
‘A useless one. Think it out, man. The Neighbor Star is over two light-years away. No matter how skillfully we make use of hyper-assistance, it will take us more than two years to arrive there. Our theoreticians now tell me that while hyper-assistance will allow a ship to go faster than light for brief periods of time - the faster, the briefer - the end result is always that it cannot reach any point in space faster than a ray of light would have, if the two had started from the same point of origin.’
‘But if that is so-’
‘If that is so, you would be forced to remain on a spaceship in close quarters with several other crewpeople for over two years. Do you think you can endure that? You know very well that small ships have never made long trips. What we need is a Settlement, a structure large enough to provide a reasonable environment - like Rotor. How long will that take?’
‘I couldn't say, Director.’
‘Perhaps ten years if all works well - if there are no hitches or mishaps. Remember, we haven't built a Settlement in nearly a century. All the recent Settlements have been built by other Settlements. If, suddenly, we begin building one, we will attract the attention of all the Settlements that already exist, and that must be avoided. Then, too, if such a Settlement can be built, and outfitted with hyper-assistance, and sent to the Neighbor Star in over a two-year flight, what will it do when it gets there? As a Settlement, it will be vulnerable and easy to destroy if Rotor has warships, as it certainly will have. Rotor will have more warships than we could possibly carry on our traveling Settlement. After all, they have been there for three years already, and may be there for twelve more years before we get there. They will blow our Settlement out of space on sight.’