The other hovelists gathered to assist him, passing his suitcases from hand to hand, to the conveyer belt that serviced the hovel below the surface. Even if he was not interested in preserving his former goods they were; they had a knowledge superior to his.
“You learn to get by from day to day,” Sam Regan said sympathetically to him. “You never think in longer terms. Just until dinner or until time for bed; very finite intervals and tasks and pleasures. Escapes.”
Tossing his cigarette away, Barney reached for the heaviest of his suitcases. “Thanks.” It was profound advice.
“Excuse me,” Sam Regan said with polite dignity and went to pick up the discarded cigarette for himself.
Seated in the hovel-chamber adequate to receive them all, the collective members, including new Barney Mayerson, prepared to solemnly vote. The time: six o’clock, Fineburg Crescent reckoning. The evening meal, shared as was customary, was over; the dishes now lay lathered and rinsed in the proper machine. No one, it appeared to Barney, had anything to do now; the weight of empty time hung over them all.
Examining the collection of votes, Norm Schein announced, “Four for Chew-Z. Three for Can-D. That’s the decision, then. Okay, who wants the job of telling Impy White the bad news?” He peered around at each of them. “She’s going to be sore; we better expect that.”
Barney said, “I’ll tell her.”
Astonished, the three couples who comprised the hovel’s inhabitants in addition to himself stared at him. “But you don’t even know her,” Fran Schein protested.
“I’ll say it’s my fault,” Barney said. “That I tipped the balance here to Chew-Z.” They would let him, he knew; it was an onerous task.
Half an hour later he lounged in the silent darkness at the lip of the hovel’s entrance, smoking and listening to the unfamiliar sounds of the Martian night.
Far off some lunary object streaked the sky, passing between his sight and the stars. A moment later he heard retrojets. Soon, he knew; he waited, arms folded, more or less relaxed, practicing what he intended to say.
Presently a squat female figure dressed in heavy coveralls trudged into view. “Schein? Morris? Well, Regan, then?” She squinted at him, using an infrared lantern. “I don’t know you.” Warily, she halted. “I have a laser pistol.” It manifested itself, pointed at him. “Speak up.”
Barney said, “Let’s move off out of earshot of the hovel.”
With extreme caution Impatience White accompanied him, still pointing the laser pistol menacingly. She accepted his ident-pak, reading it by means of her lantern. “You were with Bulero,” she said, glancing up at him appraisingly. “So?”
“So,” he said, “we’re switching to Chew-Z, we at Chicken Pox Prospects.”
“Why?”
“Just accept it and don’t push any farther here. You can check with Leo at P.P. Or through Conner Freeman on Venus.”
“I will,” Impatience said. “Chew-Z is garbage; it’s habit forming, toxic, and what’s worse leads to lethal, escape-dreams, not of Terra but of—” She gestured with the pistol. “Grotesque, baroque fantasies of an infantile, totally deranged nature. Explain to me why this decision.”
He said nothing; he merely shrugged. It was interesting, however, the ideological devotion on her part; it amused him. In fact, he reflected, its fanaticism was in sharp contrast to the attitude which the girl missionary aboard the Terra—Mars ship had shown. Evidently subject matter had no bearing; he had never realized this before.
“I’ll see you tomorrow night at this same time,” Impatience White decided. “If you’re being truthful, fine. But if you’re not—”
“What if I’m not?” he said slowly, deliberately. “Can you force us to consume your product? After all, it is illegal; we could ask for UN protection.”
“You’re new.” Her scorn was enormous. “The UN in this region is perfectly aware of the Can-D traffic; I pay a regular stipend to them, to avoid interference. As far as Chew-Z goes—” She gestured with her gun. “If the UN is going to protect them, and they’re the coming thing—”
“Then you’ll go over to them,” Barney said.
She did not answer; instead she turned and strode off. Almost at once her short shape vanished into the Martian night; he remained where he was and then he made his way back to the hovel, orienting himself by the looming, opaque shape of a huge, apparently discarded tractortype farm machine parked close by.
“Well?” Norm Schein, to his surprise, said, meeting him at the entrance. “I came up to see how many holes she had lasered in your cranium.”
“She took it philosophically.”
“Impy White?” Norm laughed sharply. “It’s a millionskin business she runs—’philosophically’ my ass. What really happened?”
Barney said, “She’ll be back after she gets instructions from above.” He began to descend into the hovel.
“Yeah, that makes sense; she’s small-fry. Leo Bulero, on Terra—”
“I know.” He saw no reason to conceal his previous career; in any case it was public record; the hovelists would run across the datum eventually. “I was Leo’s Pre-Fash consultant for New York.”
“And you voted to switch to Chew-Z?” Norm was incredulous. “You had a falling-out with Bulero, is that right?”
“I’ll tell you sometime.” He reached the bottom of the ramp and stepped out into the communal chamber where the others waited.
With relief Fran Schein said, “At least she didn’t stew you with that little laser pistol she waves around. You must have outstared her.”
“Are we rid of her?” Tod Morris asked.
“I’ll have that news tomorrow night,” Barney said.
Mary Regan said to him, “We think you’re very brave. You’re going to give this hovel a great deal, Mr. Mayerson. Barney, I mean. To mix a metaphor, a good swift goose to our morale.”
“My, my,” Helen Morris mocked. “Aren’t we getting a little inelegant in our dithering attempt to impress the new citizen?”
Flushing, Mary Regan said, “I wasn’t trying to impress him.”
“Flatter him, then,” Fran Schein said softly.
“You, too,” Mary said with anger. “You were the first to fawn over him when he stepped off that ramp—or anyhow you wanted to; you would have, if we hadn’t all been here. If your husband especially hadn’t been here.”
To change the subject, Norm Schein said, “Too bad we can’t translate ourselves tonight, get out the good old Perky Pat layout one final time. Barney might enjoy it. He could at least see what he’s voted to give up.” Meaningfully, he gazed from one of them to the next, pinning each down. “Now come on… surely one of you has some Can-D you’ve held back, stuffed in a crack in the wall or under the septic tank for a rainy year. Aw, come on; be generous to the new citizen; show him you’re not—”
“Okay,” Helen Morris burst in, flushed with sullen resentment. “I have a little, enough for three-quarters of an hour. But that’s absolutely all, and suppose that Chew-Z isn’t ready for distribution in our area yet?”
“Get your Can-D,” Norm said. As she departed he said, “And don’t worry; Chew-Z is here. Today when I was picking up a sack of salt from that last UN drop I ran into one of their pushers. He gave me his card.” He displayed the card. “All we need do is light a common strontium nitrate flare at 7:30 P.M. and they’ll be down from their satellite—”
“Satellite!” Everyone squawked in amazement. “Then,” Fran said excitedly, “it must be UN-sanctioned. Or do they have a layout and the disc jockeys on the satellite advertise their new mins?”
“I don’t know, yet,” Norm admitted. “I mean, at this point there’s a lot of confusion. Wait’ll the dust settles.”