by Isaac Asimov
Ponyets smiled and meditated on the uses of a religious education.
5
Another week rubbed away before the meeting with Pherl was arranged. Ponyets felt the tension, but he was used to the feeling of physical helplessness now. He had left city limits under guard. He was in Pherl’s suburban villa under guard. There was nothing to do but accept it without even looking over his shoulder.
Pherl was taller and younger outside the circle of Elders. In nonformal costume, he seemed no Elder at all.
He said abruptly, “You’re a peculiar man.” His close-set eyes seemed to quiver. “You’ve done nothing this last week, and particularly these last two hours, but imply that I need gold. It seems useless labor, for who does not? Why not advance one step?”
“It is not simply gold,” said Ponyets, discreetly. “Not simply gold. Not merely a coin or two. It is rather all that lies behind gold.”
“Now what can lie behind gold?” prodded Pherl, with a down-curved smile. “Certainly this is not the preliminary of another clumsy demonstration.”
“Clumsy?” Ponyets frowned slightly.
“Oh, definitely.” Pherl folded his hands and nudged them gently with his chin. “I don’t criticize you. The clumsiness was on purpose, I am sure. I might have warned his Veneration of that, had I been certain of the motive. Now had I been you, I would have produced the gold upon my ship, and offered it alone. The show you offered us and the antagonism you aroused would have been dispensed with.”
“True,” Ponyets admitted, “but since I was myself, I accepted the antagonism for the sake of attracting your attention.”
“Is that it? Simply that?” Pherl made no effort to hide his contemptuous amusement. “And I imagine you suggested the thirty-day purification period that you might assure yourself time to turn the attraction into something a bit more substantial. But what if the gold turns out to be impure?”
Ponyets allowed himself a dark humor in return. “When the judgment of that impurity depends upon those who are most interested in finding it pure?”
Pherl lifted his eyes and stared narrowly at the trader. He seemed at once surprised and satisfied.
“A sensible point. Now tell me why you wished to attract me.”
“This I will do. In the short time I have been here, I have observed useful facts that concern you and interest me. For instance, you are young—very young for a member of the council, and even of a relatively young family.”
“You criticize my family?”
“Not at all. Your ancestors are great and holy; all will admit that. But there are those that say you are not a member of one of the Five Tribes.”
Pherl leaned back. “With all respect to those involved,” and he did not hide his venom, “the Five Tribes have impoverished loins and thin blood. Not fifty members of the Tribes are alive.”
“Yet there are those who say the nation would not be willing to see any man outside the Tribes as Grand Master. And so young and newly-advanced a favorite of the Grand Master is bound to make powerful enemies among the great ones of the State—it is said. His Veneration is aging and his protection will not last past his death, when it is an enemy of yours who will undoubtedly be the one to interpret the words of his Spirit.”
Pherl scowled. “For a foreigner you hear much. Such ears are made for cropping.”
“That may be decided later.”
“Let me anticipate.” Pherl stirred impatiently in his seat. “You’re going to offer me wealth and power in terms of those evil little machines you carry in your ship. Well?”
“Suppose it so. What would be your objection? Simply your standard of good and evil?”
Pherl shook his head. “Not at all. Look, my Outlander, your opinion of us in your heathen agnosticism is what it is—but I am not the entire slave of our mythology, though I may appear so. I am an educated man, sir, and, I hope, an enlightened one. The full depth of our religious customs, in the ritualistic rather than the ethical sense, is for the masses.”
“Your objection, then?” pressed Ponyets, gently.
“Just that. The masses. I might be willing to deal with you, but your little machines must be used to be useful. How might riches come to me, if I had to use—what is it you sell?—well, a razor, for instance, only in the strictest, trembling secrecy. Even if my chin were more simply and more cleanly shaven, how would I become rich? And how would I avoid death by gas chamber or mob frightfulness if I were ever once caught using it?”
Ponyets shrugged. “You are correct. I might point out that the remedy would be to educate your own people into the use of nucleics for their convenience and your own substantial profit. It would be a gigantic piece of work; I don’t deny it; but the returns would be still more gigantic. Still that is your concern, and, at the moment, not mine at all. For I offer neither razor, knife, nor mechanical garbage disposer.”
“What do you offer?”
“Gold itself. Directly. You may have the machine I demonstrated last week.”
And now Pherl stiffened and the skin on his forehead moved jerkily. “The transmuter?”
“Exactly. Your supply of gold will equal your supply of iron. That, I imagine, is sufficient for all needs. Sufficient for the Grand Mastership itself, despite youth and enemies. And it is safe.”
“In what way?”
“In that secrecy is the essence of its use; that same secrecy you described as the only safety with regard to nucleics. You may bury the transmuter in the deepest dungeon of the strongest fortress on your furthest estate, and it will still bring you instant wealth. It is the gold you buy, not the machine, and that gold bears no trace of its manufacture, for it cannot be told from the natural creation.”
“And who is to operate the machine?”
“Yourself. Five minutes teaching is all you will require. I’ll set it up for you wherever you wish.”
“And in return?”
“Well,” Ponyets grew cautious. “I ask a price and a handsome one. It is my living. Let us say,—for it is a valuable machine—the equivalent of a cubic foot of gold in wrought iron.”
Pherl laughed, and Ponyets grew red. “I point out, sir,” he added, stiffly, “that you can get your price back in two hours.”
“True, and in one hour, you might be gone, and my machine might suddenly turn out to be useless. I’ll need a guarantee.”
“You have my word.”
“A very good one,” Pherl bowed sardonically, “but your presence would be an even better assurance. I’ll give you my word to pay you one week after delivery in working order.”
“Impossible.”
“Impossible? When you’ve already incurred the death penalty very handily by even offering to sell me anything. The only alternative is my word that you’ll get the gas chamber tomorrow otherwise.”
Ponyet’s face was expressionless, but his eyes might have flickered. He said, “It is an unfair advantage. You will at least put your promise in writing?”
“And also become liable for execution? No, sir!” Pherl smiled a broad satisfaction. “No, sir! Only one of us is a fool.”
The trader said in a small voice, “It is agreed, then.”
6
Gorov was released on the thirtieth day, and five hundred pounds of the yellowest gold took his place. And with him was released the quarantined and untouched abomination that was his ship.
Then, as on the journey into the Askonian system, so on the journey out, the cylinder of sleek little ships ushered them on their way.
Ponyets watched the dimly sun-lit speck that was Gorov’s ship while Gorov’s voice pierced through to him, clear and thin on the tight, distortion-bounded ether-beam.
He was saying, “But it isn’t what’s wanted, Ponyets. A transmuter won’t do. Where did you get one, anyway?”
“I didn’t,” Ponyets’ answer was patient. “I juiced it up out of a food irradiation chamber. It isn’t any good, really. The power consumption is prohibitive on any large scale or the F
oundation would use transmutation instead of chasing all over the Galaxy for heavy metals. It’s one of the standard tricks every trader uses, except that I never saw an iron-to-gold one before. But it’s impressive, and it works—very temporarily.”
“All right. But that particular trick is no good.”
“It got you out of a nasty spot.”
“That is very far from the point. Especially since I’ve got to go back, once we shake our solicitous escort.”
“Why?”
“You yourself explained it to this politician of yours.” Gorov’s voice was on edge. “Your entire salespoint rested on the fact that the transmuter was a means to an end, but of no value in itself; that he was buying the gold, not the machine. It was good psychology, since it worked, but—”
“But?” Ponyets urged blandly and obtusely.
The voice from the receiver grew shriller. “But we want to sell them a machine of value in itself; something they would want to use openly; something that would tend to force them out in favor of nuclear techniques as a matter of self-interest.”
“I understand all that,” said Ponyets, gently. “You once explained it. But look at what follows from my sale, will you? As long as that transmuter lasts, Pherl will coin gold; and it will last long enough to buy him the next election. The present Grand Master won’t last long.”
“You count on gratitude?” asked Gorov, coldly.
“No—on intelligent self-interest. The transmuter gets him an election; other mechanisms—”
“No! No! Your premise is twisted. It’s not the transmuter, he’ll credit—it’ll be the good, old-fashioned gold. That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”
Ponyets grinned and shifted into a more comfortable position. All right. He’d baited the poor fellow sufficiently. Gorov was beginning to sound wild.
The trader said, “Not so fast, Gorov. I haven’t finished. There are other gadgets already involved.”
There was a short silence. Then, Gorov’s voice sounded cautiously, “What other gadgets?”
Ponyets gestured automatically and uselessly. “You see that escort.”
“I do,” said Gorov shortly. “Tell me about those gadgets.”
“I will,—if you’ll listen. That’s Pherl’s private navy escorting us; a special honor to him from the Grand Master. He managed to squeeze that out.”
“So?”
“And where do you think he’s taking us? To his mining estates on the outskirts of Askone, that’s where. Listen!” Ponyets was suddenly fiery. “I told you I was in this to make money, not to save worlds. All right. I sold that transmuter for nothing. Nothing except the risk of the gas chamber and that doesn’t count towards the quota.”
“Get back to the mining estates, Ponyets. Where do they come in?”
“With the profits. We’re stacking up on tin, Gorov. Tin to fill every last cubic foot this old scow can scrape up, and then some more for yours. I’m going down with Pherl to collect, old man, and you’re going to cover me from upstairs with every gun you’ve got—just in case Pherl isn’t as sporting about the matter as he lets on to be. That tin’s my profit.”
“For the transmuter?”
“For my entire cargo of nucleics. At double price, plus a bonus.” He shrugged, almost apologetically. “I admit I gouged him, but I’ve got to make quota, don’t I?”
Gorov was evidently lost. He said, weakly, “Do you mind explaining?”
“What’s there to explain? It’s obvious, Gorov. Look, the clever dog thought he had me in a foolproof trap, because his word was worth more than mine to the Grand Master. He took the transmuter. That was a capital crime in Askone. But at any time he could say that he had lured me on into a trap with the purest of patriotic motives, and denounce me as a seller of forbidden things.”
“That was obvious.”
“Sure, but word against simple word wasn’t all there was to it. You see, Pherl had never heard nor conceived of a microfilm-recorder.”
Gorov laughed suddenly.
“That’s right,” said Ponyets. “He had the upper hand. I was properly chastened. But when I set up the transmuter for him in my whipped-dog fashion, I incorporated the recorder into the device and removed it in the next day’s overhaul. I had a perfect record of his sanctum sanctorum, his holy-of-holies, with he himself, poor Pherl, operating the transmuter for all the ergs it had and crowing over his first piece of gold as if it were an egg he had just laid.”
“You showed him the results?”
“Two days later. The poor sap had never seen three-dimensional color-sound images in his life. He claims he isn’t superstitious, but if I ever saw an adult look as scared as he did then, call me rookie. When I told him I had a recorder planted in the city square, set to go off at midday with a million fanatical Askonians to watch, and to tear him to pieces subsequently, he was gibbering at my knees in half a second. He was ready to make any deal I wanted.”
“Did you?” Gorov’s voice was suppressing laughter. “I mean, have one planted in the city square.”
“No, but that didn’t matter. He made the deal. He bought every gadget I had, and every one you had for as much tin as we could carry. At that moment, he believed me capable of anything. The agreement is in writing and you’ll have a copy before I go down with him, just as another precaution.”
“But you’ve damaged his ego,” said Gorov. “Will he use the gadgets?”
“Why not? It’s his only way of recouping his losses, and if he makes money out of it, he’ll salve his pride. And he will be the next Grand Master—and the best man we could have in our favor.”
“Yes,” said Gorov, “it was a good sale. Yet you’ve certainly got an uncomfortable sales technique. No wonder you were kicked out of a seminary. Have you no sense of morals?”
“What are the odds?” said Ponyets, indifferently. “You know what Salvor Hardin said about a sense of morals.”
PART V
THE MERCHANT
PRINCES
TRADERS— . . . With psychohistoric inevitability, economic control of the Foundation grew. The traders grew rich; and with riches came power. . . .
It is sometimes forgotten that Hober Mallow began life as an ordinary trader. It is never forgotten that he ended it as the first of the Merchant Princes. . . .
ENCYCLOPEDIA GALACTICA
1
Jorane Sutt put the tips of carefully manicured fingers together and said, “It’s something of a puzzle. In fact—and this is in the strictest of confidence—it may be another one of Hari Seldon’s crises.”
The man opposite felt in the pocket of his short Smyrnian jacket for a cigarette. “Don’t know about that, Sutt. As a general rule, politicians start shouting ‘Seldon crisis’ at every mayoralty campaign.”
Sutt smiled very faintly. “I’m not campaigning, Mallow. We’re facing nuclear weapons, and we don’t know where they’re coming from.”
Hober Mallow of Smyrno, Master Trader, smoked quietly, almost indifferently. “Go on. If you have more to say, get it out.” Mallow never made the mistake of being overpolite to a Foundation man. He might be an Outlander, but a man’s a man for a’ that.
Sutt indicated the trimensional star-map on the table. He adjusted the controls and a cluster of some half-dozen stellar systems blazed red.
“That,” he said quietly, “is the Korellian Republic.”
The trader nodded. “I’ve been there. Stinking rathole! I suppose you can call it a republic but it’s always someone out of the Argo family that gets elected Commdor each time. And if you ever don’t like it—things happen to you.” He twisted his lip and repeated, “I’ve been there.”
“But you’ve come back, which hasn’t always happened. Three trade ships, inviolate under the Conventions, have disappeared within the territory of the Republic in the last year. And those ships were armed with all the usual nuclear explosives and force-field defenses.”
“What was the last word heard from the ships?”
> “Routine reports. Nothing else.”
“What did Korell say?”
Sutt’s eyes gleamed sardonically, “There was no way of asking. The Foundation’s greatest asset throughout the Periphery is its reputation of power. Do you think we can lose three ships and ask for them?”
“Well, then, suppose you tell me what you want with me.”
Jorane Sutt did not waste his time in the luxury of annoyance. As secretary to the mayor, he had held off opposition councilmen, jobseekers, reformers, and crackpots who claimed to have solved in its entirety the course of future history as worked out by Hari Seldon. With training like that, it took a good deal to disturb him.
He said methodically, “In a moment. You see, three ships lost in the same sector in the same year can’t be accident, and nuclear power can be conquered only by more nuclear power. The question automatically arises: if Korell has nuclear weapons, where is it getting them?”
“And where does it?”
“Two alternatives. Either the Korellians have constructed them themselves—”
“Far-fetched!”
“Very! But the other possibility is that we are being afflicted with a case of treason.”
“You think so?” Mallow’s voice was cold.
The secretary said calmly, “There’s nothing miraculous about the possibility. Since the Four Kingdoms accepted the Foundation Convention, we have had to deal with considerable groups of dissident populations in each nation. Each former kingdom has its pretenders and its former noblemen, who can’t very well pretend to love the Foundation. Some of them are becoming active, perhaps.”
Mallow was a dull red. “I see. Is there anything you want to say to me? I’m a Smyrnian.”
“I know. You’re a Smyrnian—born in Smyrno, one of the former Four Kingdoms. You’re a Foundation man by education only. By birth, you’re an Outlander and a foreigner. No doubt your grandfather was a baron at the time of the wars with Anacreon and Loris, and no doubt your family estates were taken away when Sef Sermak redistributed the land.”
