The High Ones and Other Stories

by Poul Anderson

  There was one offhand saying of his which got Langford started on another round of worries. In proof of his own far-sighted humanitarianism, Taruz explained that he was investing most of his company's pay in large American corporations doing vital reconstruction work.

  The money wasn't being taken out of the world, it was staying right here in the good old U.S.A. Why, you needed only to look at the next new building or the next big rubble-clearing bulldozer to see the benefits you were getting from it.

  "The big industrialists will love him for that," said Langford wryly, "especially since all his money is tax free. That's written into the contract, you know. Fine print. And the people are conditioned to follow the businessmen's lead. Also, I happen to know that he's hired the three biggest public-relations outfits in the country to put himself over."

  "Well, what of it?" I said. "It serves his own interests, sure, he makes a whopping profit, but it serves us too. Suppose he simply used the money to buy our machinery and oil and whatnot, and shipped it out into space. Where'd we be then? As it is, we get the use of the stuff."

  "And he gets the control of it," said Langford. "Money is power, especially in so rigidly frozen an economy as ours now is."

  "General Motors or General Taruz—does it matter who owns title to the machines?" I persisted. "It's not you or me or Joe Smith in either case."

  "There's a hell of a big difference," said Langford. "But never mind. The pattern is beginning to emerge, but so far I don't see just what to do about it."

  The United Nations met in Stockholm about Christmas time, and went into an interminable debate over revising the charter. I think even the delegates knew by then that the UN had become a pious mummery. Without universal disarmament and an international army to enforce peace, it could only handle secondary matters.

  The smaller countries were eager for such an arrangement, and the United States, the only remaining world power, could have brought it about with one word. Samuels stumped hard for the idea prior to the meeting, but then he died—heart attack—and the man we did send was as stiff-necked as the Russians had ever been. Even had Samuels lived, there would probably have been no difference.

  America was in no mood to surrender her authority. You heard a lot of talk about not being able to trust any foreign country because sooner or later, it would turn on you. We had paid a bitter price for dominion, and would not sell it for peanuts.

  What we did do was make the new Russian Republic disarm and renounce war—something tried in Japan after World War Two. The newly liberated countries of Europe were too hungry and enfeebled to matter.

  About that time I was able to quit working for the government, something I'd wanted for a long time. The old atmosphere of witch hunting before the war had been bad enough. But because I'd liked my work and believed in its importance I'd kept my mouth shut and stayed in. But now the new tight-lipped, puritanical notion that we alone could save civilization was just too much.

  Langford retired too, to accept a professorship at M.I.T., without giving up all his connections in Richmond. I got a position with an electronics firm in Boston, so we still saw a lot of each other. The next year I got married and began to settle down into the not uncomfortable creeping-up of middle age.

  In the third year, the last Communist army surrendered, but there was no celebration because war was not yet ended. Order had to be restored to lands running wild with a dozen fanatic new creeds, whipped on by hunger and despair. We were fighting Neonihilists in the Balkans and Whiteslayers in Africa and Christomoslems in Southwest Asia. Taruz was a big help, but I wondered if it would ever end.

  At least, I was free to wonder.

  V

  Langford glanced up from his newspaper as I came into his home. "Hello, there," he said. "Seen the latest?"

  "The new war?" I asked, for the struggle between Portugal and South Africa had just begun, when the semi-fascist government of the latter tried to take over Portuguese Angola.

  "No. The editorial. 'Any war, anywhere, may become another world conflagration. It is past time that we, for our own safety, laid down the law to nations which seem to know no law.' "

  "That's an old idea," I said, easing myself into a chair.

  "Yes, but this is a conservative and influential paper. The idea is beginning to spread."

  I sighed. "What's so bad about it? A Pax Americana may not be the sort of thing I dreamed of once, but it's better than nothing."

  "But what will we gain? Safety at the price of mounting guard on an entire planet … read your Roman history."

  "Rome could have lasted if it had been a little smarter," I said. "Suppose they'd conquered Germany, Arabia, and southern Russia while they were in their heyday. That was where all their enemies eventually came from. The Empire might be with us yet."

  "Yes," said Langford. "I'm afraid that something similar is about to happen. I never did like the Romans."

  The natives of Angola, who knew very well what would happen to them under South African rule, rallied behind Portugal and licked the hell out of the invaders. Then India came in on Portugal's side, alleging mistreatment of Indian minorities—true enough, but an old excuse. They just wanted territory, Goa as the price of help and chunks of Africa as loot. This inspired uprisings in Spanish Morocco. One thing led to another, and Spain marched on Portugal.

  Being more closely tied to the latter, we got involved, and from our Iberian bases soon quelled the Falangists. Then we proceeded to write the peace without consulting either Portugal or India. Such was our national temper at the time. Can you blame us after all we had suffered?

  Taruz accepted the third installment of his pay and continued to serve us. Economic controls remained in effect, to keep inflation from depreciating his money, but things looked up a bit for the average taxpayer. You began to see some new cars and some clothes that were not shoddy. Langford showed me certain reports: Taruz was not only operating shrewdly as a major stockholder in established corporations, he was founding his own.

  "But isn't that against the antitrust laws?" I asked.

  "If so, nobody is prosecuting," answered Langford. "Nobody is saying a word. We're too dependent on him by now."

  He nodded grimly, and left me.

  I noticed sentiment for the Pax Americana growing day by day. It seemed the only logical course to insure that we would not again be laid in ashes. Right now we were invincible; best to consolidate that position while we could.

  There would be a new President this year. The incumbent party selected James, a previously obscure man—dynamic type, good speaker, good record as governor and senator, but nothing spectacular.

  "Smoke-filled back rooms, eh?" I asked Langford. "How did he get picked? There were more obvious candidates."

  "Money will do a lot," said Langford, "and I don't mean crude bribery— I mean influence, lobbying, publicity. Taruz has money."

  "You mean this is … Taruz' man?"

  "Of course. Why not? The Thashtivarians have a vested interest in us. It's up to them to preserve it. Not that James is their puppet; he just agrees with them on important issues, and thinks along predictable lines. That's all which is necessary."

  I voted against James, mostly because Langford had disquieted me. But I was in the minority.

  "I think," said Langford the night of the election, "it's time for me to stop croaking doom and start doing something."

  "What?" I asked. "You claim Taruz is putting us in his pocket, and maybe you're right, but how do you make the average man see it?"

  "I write a book," said Langford. "I give the facts and figures. They're all available, nothing is classified. It's just that no one else has waded through that mess of data and seen its meaning. I'll have SEC reports to show how much he owns and how much more he controls, the Congressional Record to show laws that are being ignored and new laws passed in his favor, the lobbyist registry to show how many hired agents he has, the assembled news releases and white papers to show how bit by bit he
's gotten virtual command of the military—

  "Oh, yes. A few thousand people will actually read the book, and they'll get alarmed and convince the rest."

  "You could—get into trouble," I said.

  "It might be fun," he grinned. "It just might be."

  Having reached a decision, Langford looked happier and healthier than I'd seen him for a long time. "The Thashtivarians can't conquer us. There aren't enough of them, as was pointed out long ago. So simple a thing as a world-wide sit-down strike could get rid of them, merely by making Earth unprofitable."

  He got a year's leave of absence from the Institute and went down to Richmond to gather his facts. I had to stay where I was.

  The year passed, beginning with sporadic war over the world but material conditions rapidly improving at home. Some of the most irritating government controls were lifted, which made people think we were getting somewhere.

  Taruz appeared again on TV and remarked that he thought we were far enough ahead now to start thinking about raising wages. Within a month, a bill permitting that had become law. In the general excitement and cheering, few of us seemed to notice that Taruz, the alien, the hired soldier, had in effect told us what we could do.

  The news from abroad remained bad. China and India didn't like us, and said so. They formed an alliance. Some sharp questions were being asked in the British House of Commons, and Argentina was getting downright insulting. A lot of talk arose abroad about allying against a United States, whose hand was increasingly heavy.

  That it was. We had to have bases, and we had to requisition supplies, and all too often we had to dictate internal policy. There was no help for it, if we were to survive in an ugly world. But our satellites and protectorates didn't like it. I think only the fear of Taruz prevented a general war against us.

  That fear was breaking down, though. It was being pointed out that the Thashtivarians couldn't be everywhere at once, that the destruction of the thinly spread American forces would leave them virtually without an employer and ready to bargain, that—et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Only later did it occur to me how much of that talk must have been started by Taruz' own pawns.

  In September, hell broke lose again. An H-bomb rubbed out most of Chicago. Its force screens had been turned off long ago in the confidence that there would be no more raids. The blame was laid on the Sino-Indian alliance. They denied it, and to this day I'm not sure if they might not have told the truth. But two million dead Americans left us in no mood to listen. We went into all-out war again.

  My factory shifted back to military production, and I worked pretty hard for two years. Protection was given to all our major cities, of course, and the civilian population was organized in a quasi-military manner, so things went smoothly and efficiently at home. The Thashtivarians labored hard for our side, and the Alliance surrendered in a few months. The war dragged on because by that time nobody in this country argued against the Pax idea, and it had to be stuffed down the rebellious throat of an unwilling planet.

  It was. In two years, no country on Earth but us had any armed forces except local police. Every government was our puppet, and our garrisons and inspectors were everywhere. We still called our proconsuls "Ambassadors in chief" and our occupying armies "protective alliances."

  But nobody was fooled or intended to be fooled. This could not be worked by democratic means, so a Constitutional amendment went through which virtually scrapped the Constitution. Congress retained certain powers, but the balance was now with the executive.

  I waited for the secret police and the marching uniforms, but they didn't come. There was still a wide latitude of free speech, provided you didn't criticize the fundamentals or the top leaders. There were comparatively few political arrests, and little if any brutality in such cases.

  As dictatorships go, this was a gentle one. And it showed considerable statesmanship in many ways, such as the international currency reforms, increased freedom of travel, and work to rehabilitate the devastated parts of the world.

  It wasn't Utopia, but I wondered if it might not be better than we deserved.

  VI

  Langford had been called back to government service during the war—Intelligence this time—and for a while after, so I didn't see him for nearly three years. Then he came back to resume his professorship, and I went around to welcome him home.

  We sat by the fire, with no other lights, sipping a good red wine and speaking slowly. The flames glowed, and danced, and whispered at us in thin dry voices; shadows moved huge in the corners, here and there lifting from an old picture or a dark massive piece of furniture. Outside, a winter wind muttered at the door. It was good, and snug, and very human.

  "Did you see much of Taruz during the war?" I asked.

  "Yes," said Langford. The red light wove across his hawk face with an oddly gentle effect. "Sometimes we worked together pretty closely. He knew what I thought, but didn't care as long as my actions remained loyal—in fact, I think he rather likes me. He's not such a bad sort. Not a fiend at all; just a smart adventurer."

  "I suppose your book will never be written, though," I said.

  "Hardly." Langford's laugh was small and sad. "Not because it's forbidden, but because it's too late. The Thashtivarians could not have conquered Earth, but—divide and rule!—they got us to conquer it for them."

  "And now they own us, who own the world," I murmured.

  "Not that simple. It's more accurate to say that they hold the reins. You'll see a gradual change in the next decade or so, shifting more and more of the power over to them, but it won't be obtrusive. Taruz is too clever for that."

  "And what will he do with us?"

  "Rule us. What else? I don't believe he's power-mad. I think he and his immediate successors will be rather easy-going and tolerant. What reason would they have to be otherwise? Ruling Earth is a profitable business. It means big estates and luxurious homes and lots of human servants and general high living—not ideological tyranny of the Hitler-Stalin sort."

  He added after a moment: "Another shipload of Thashtivarian immigrants arrived last week. There must be a million of them here by now. But there won't ever be any great number, because they'll be the aristocracy, and an aristocracy must be kept small."

  "You don't sound as bitter about it as you once did," I said.

  "What's the use of being bitter about an accomplished fact? As a scientist, I've learned to live with facts. And to get moral about it, Taruz is no more than mankind had coming. A united world could have laughed at him. A peaceful world would never have hired him."

  "The real situation was different," I protested. "You can't condemn your whole race just because Taruz arrived at an unlucky moment."

  "True enough. But even with that setup, the free world could have stayed free. We might have averted war altogether by making it clear in advance that if we hired Taruz our only orders to him would be to get the hell off Earth.

  "Or maybe we should have turned his services over to one of the small, neutral but democratic nations. Or if all this sounds too unrealistic, we had a chance to unite all our race at the Stockholm meeting. World government, a human world army, and Taruz would have been superfluous. He wouldn't even have tried to take over then, knowing it would never pay.

  "But we had to be clever, and realistic. We had to look out for Number One. Si monumentum requiris, circumspice." Langford laughed harshly.

  "Can't we do something, even now?" I wondered.

  "No, we can't. Who's interested? Ask yourself, Hillyer. You have a family, a good job, a nice home, security and a chance for advancement. Does the fact that someday you'll be saying 'sir' to every Thashtivarian warrant throwing all that away to die on the barricades?"

  I shook my head.

  "It could be worse," went on Langford. "Taruz played his cards ruthlessly. His poker chips were human lives in the millions, but now that he's here to stay we'll get some benefits. No more war, which means a gigantic economic surplus of which m
an will get at least part; maybe, eventually, no more poverty. Perhaps we can learn a lot of their science, especially when they start getting lazy and training human technicians to man their machines for them. We lost our freedom because we couldn't get together as a race. Now the unity is forced on us, and it will last."

  "But we have lost our freedom," I said. "The decisions may be wiser from now on, but they'll be made for us. Enter that on the debit side."

  "Quite so. That's a fact we'll have to live with for centuries."

  Langford stared into the fire, and a little smile played about his mouth. "It's an old pattern of history. Rome, Roman Britain—the hired soldiers were called in to help and ended by taking over. But there's another part of the pattern too. Conquerors are culturally assimilated, like the Normans in England; or they decay and can be overthrown at last, like the Hyksos in Egypt. Mankind can wait for one thing or another to happen. Our many-greats grandchildren will be united and free. It's up to us to start laying the foundation for them. Right now."