President Gandhi personally welcomed us. He was a small, gnome-like man, still quite young, with an infectious smile. In recent years he had devoted quite a lot of his energies to attracting what remained of the West's skilled and talented people to Bantustan. He dreamed of a sane and tranquil world in which all that was best in mankind might flourish. It was his regret that he needed to maintain a strong military position (and thus in his opinion waste resources) in order to guard against attack from outside, but he managed it gracefully enough and felt, he told us at the private dinner to which Korzeniowski and myself were invited, that there was some chance of setting an example to men like Cicero Hood.
'Perhaps he will begin to see how wasteful his schemes are, how his talents could be better put to improving the world and making it into a place where all races live in equality and peace together.'
I am not sure that, presented with these ideas in my own world, I could have agreed wholeheartedly with President Gandhi, but the proof of what he said lay all around us. O'Bean had thought that-material prosperity was enough to abolish strife and fear, but Gandhi had shown that a clear understanding of the subtler needs of mankind was also necessary - that a moral example had to be made, that a moral life had to be led without compromise - that hypocrisy (albeit unconscious) among a nation's leaders led to cynicism and violence among the population. Without guile, without deceiving those he represented, President Gandhi had laid the foundations for lasting happiness in Bantustan.
'This is, indeed, a haven of civilization you have here,' Captain Korzeniowski said approvingly, as we sat on a wide veranda overlooking the great city of Cape Town and smoked excellent local cigars, drinking a perfect home-produced port. 'But you are so rich, President Gandhi. Can you protect your country from those who would possess your wealth?'
And then the little Indian gave Korzeniowski and myself a shy, almost embarrassed look. He fingered his tie and stared at the roof-tops of the nearby buildings, and he sounded a trifle sad. 'It is something I wished to speak of later,' he said. 'You are aware, I suppose, that Bantustan has never spilled blood on behalf of its ideals.'
'Indeed we are!' I said emphatically.
'It never shall,' he said. 'In no circumstances would I be responsible for the taking of a single human life.'
'Only if you were attacked,' I said. 'Then you would have to defend your country. That would be different.'
But President Gandhi shook his head. 'You have just taken service in a navy, gentlemen, which exists for only one reason. It is effective only while it succeeds in dissuading those we fear from invading us. It is an expensive and impressive scarecrow. But it is, while I command it, as capable of doing harm as any scarecrow you will find erected by a farmer to frighten the birds away from his fields. If we are ever invaded, it will be your job to take as many people aboard as possible and evacuate them to some place of relative safety. This is a secret that we share. You must guard it well. All our officers have been entrusted with the same secret.'
The enormity of President Gandhi's risk in revealing this plan took my breath away. I said nothing.
Korzeniowski frowned and considered this news carefully before replying. 'You place a heavy burden on our shoulders, President.'
'I wish that I did not have to, Captain Korzeniowski.'
'It would only take one traitor…' He did not finish bis sentence.
Gandhi nodded. 'Only one and we should be attacked and overwhelmed in a few hours. But I rely on something else, Captain Korzeniowski. People like General Hood cannot believe in pacifism. If a traitor did go to him and inform him of the truth, there is every chance that he would not believe it.' He grinned like a happy child. 'You know of the Japanese method of fighting called Jui-Jit-Sui? You use your opponent's own violence against him. Hopefully, that is what I do with General Hood. Violent men believe only in such concepts as "weakness" and "cowardice". They are so deeply cynical, so rooted in their own insane beliefs, that they cannot even begin to grasp the concept of "pacifism". Suppose you were a spy sent by General Hood to find out my plans. Suppose you left here now and went back to the Black Attila and said to him, "General, President Gandhi has a large, well-equipped army, an air-fleet and a navy, but he does not intend to use it if you attack him." What would General Hood do? He would almost certainly laugh at you, and when you insisted that this was a fact he would probably have you locked up or executed as a fool who had ceased to be of use to him.' President Gandhi grinned again. 'There is less danger, gentlemen, in living according to a set of high moral principles than most politicians believe.'
And now our audience was over. President Gandhi wished us happiness in our new life and we left his quarters in a state of considerable confusion.
It was only when we got to our own ship and crossed the gangplank to go aboard, seeing the hundred or so similar craft all about us, that Korzeniowski snorted with laughter and shook his head slowly from side to side.
'Well, Bastable, what does it feel like to be part of the most expensive scarecrow the world has ever known?'
7. A LEGEND IN THE FLESH
A peaceful year passed in Bantustan - peaceful for us, that is, for reports continued to reach us of the ever-increasing conquests of the Black Attila. We learned that he had raised his flag over the ruins of London and left a token force there, but had met with no real resistance and seemed, as we had guessed, content (as the Romans had once been before him) to claim the British Isles as part of his new Empire without, at this moment in time, making any particular claims upon the country. Our friends in the Outer Hebrides would be safe for at least a while longer. Our most strenuous duties were to take part in occasional naval manoeuvres, or to escort cargo ships along the coasts of Africa. These ships were crewed entirely by Negroes and we rarely had sight of land, for it was regarded as politic for whites not to reveal themselves, even though Hood knew that they were not discriminated against in Bantustan.
We had a great deal of leisure and spent it exploring President Gandhi's magnificent country. Great game reserves had been made of the wild veldt and jungle and silent airboats carried one over them so that one could observe all kinds of wildlife in its natural state without disturbing it. There was no hunting here, and lions, elephants, zebra, antelope, wildebeest, rhinoceri roamed the land unharmed by Man. I could not help, sometimes, making a comparison with the Garden of Eden, where Man and Beast had lived side by side in harmony. Elsewhere we found model farms and mines, worked entirely by automatic machinery, continuing to add to the wealth of the country and, ultimately, the dignity of its inhabitants. Processing plants - for food as well as minerals -lay close to the coast where the food in particular was being stockpiled. Bantustan had more than enough to serve her own needs and the surplus was being built up or sold at cost to the poorer nations. I had begun to wonder why so much food was being stored in warehouses when President Gandhi called a meeting of a number of his air- and sea-officers and told us of a plan he had had for some time.
'All over the world there are people reduced to the level of savage beasts,' he said. 'They are brutes, but it is no fault of their own. They are brutes because they are hungry and because they live in fear. Therefore, over the last few years I have been putting aside a certain percentage of our food and also medical supplies - serums which my chemists have developed to cope with the various plagues still lingering in Europe and parts of Asia. You all know the function of your fleets is chiefly to give Bantustan security, but it has seemed a shame to waste so much potential, and now I will tell you of my dream.'