The 34th Golden Age of Science Fiction: C.M. Kornbluth

by C. M. Kornbluth

  “Can we get their thorium quota back to A.D.M.P.?” Holland asked.

  “No. I’d be afraid to try it. McGovern’s been talking about a bigger quota, to serve notice on me that he’s not going to be whittled down. And I live in fear that the Navy will find out about it and demand a thorium allotment of their own. That’s why I was so damned secretive about it—the fewer people know about these deals, the better. Maybe we ought to have Raw Materials set up a new group to expedite thorium-ore procurement and refining—but my point was, no; the Air Force has got it and they won’t let go. We’ve got to get along with the military, Dan. You know that. They can make us look awfully bad if they’ve a mind to.”

  “Well,” said Holland, “that’s that. I’ll get you a report you can show Interior by tomorrow morning. Were there any other points for me?”

  “Gentlemen?” asked the chairman, looking around the table. There were no other points, and the general manager left them.

  The third commissioner said: “I’m a little worried about Holland. He seems to be going cynical on us.”

  The chairman said: “He’s a little stale from overwork. He refuses to take a vacation.”

  “Like an embezzler,” said the ex-banker, and they laughed.

  “He doesn’t see the big picture,” said the second commissioner, and they nodded thoughtfully and got up to go their various ways:

  The chairman to weigh the claims of two areas pleading to be the site of the next big A.E.C. plant;

  The first commissioner to polish a magazine article on “Some Lessons of Aquinas for the Atomic Age”;

  The second commissioner to lobby three congressmen in connection with the appropriations bill coming up in eight months;

  The third commissioner to confer with the Secretary of State on the line that State’s overseas propaganda broadcasts should take concerning A.D.M.P. as proof of America’s peace-loving nature.

  * * * *

  Holland, in the privacy of his office, took four soda-mint tablets and burped luxuriously. He phoned his assistant Weiss, and passed him the job of drafting tomorrow morning’s report for the Secretary of the Interior.

  His “While You Were Out” pad said:

  “12:15—Senator Hoyt’s office called for an appointment ‘as soon as possible.’ Said I would call back.

  “12:20—Mr. Wilson Stuart called from Los Angeles and asked you to call back today ‘on the private number.’

  “12:45—Senator Hoyt’s office called again. Said I would call back.

  “12:48—the Associated Press called asking for an interview at your convenience. I said you were occupied for the coming week and referred them to the P. & T.I. Office.

  “1:15—Senator Hoyt’s office called again. Said I would call back.”

  He sighed and knocked down an intercom button. “Charlie, tell Hoyt’s people he can come right over. Get me Stuart on—no, I’ll place it.”

  “Yes, Mr. Holland.”

  The general manager didn’t have a phone on his desk, but he did have one in a drawer. It had a curiously thickened base, the result of some wire-pulling in A.T. & T. The curiously thickened base housed a “scrambler” of the English type which matched one in Wilson Stuart’s bedroom phone. It was a fairly effective measure against wire taps. He pulled out the phone and placed the call.

  His old friend must have been waiting by his own phone in the big white Beverly Hills house. “Hello?” said the voice of Wilson Stuart.

  “Hello, Wilson. How is everything?”

  “Let’s scramble.”

  “All right.” Holland pushed a button on the phone. “Can you hear me all right?”

  “I hear you.” The quality of the transmission had taken an abrupt drop—the result of Wilson Stuart’s voice being torn into shreds by his scrambler, hurled in that unintelligible form across the continent, and reassembled by Holland’s device. “Dan, things are going sour out here. They’re trying to take Western Air away from me—a nice little phony stockholders’ revolt. One of my rats in the Oklahoma Oil crowd tipped me today. I don’t know how far they’ve got in lining up their proxies, but it could be bad.”

  “What’s the squawk?”

  “I stand accused of running the board of directors like a railroad—which, God knows, I do, and a good thing for Western. Also, and this is the part that scares me, I’m supposed to be squandering the company’s resources.”

  “Um. It isn’t a real rank-and-file thing, is it?”

  “Act your age, Dan! It’s the old Bank of California programme: kick Stuart out of Western Air and integrate it with their other holdings. This time they’ve met Oklahoma Oil’s terms.”

  “Who’s fronting?”

  “That’s the only cheerful part. They’ve got some squirt Air Force two-star general named Reeves. He commands Great Falls A.F.B. in Montana. They’ve sounded him out and he’s supposed to be willing to take over as board chairman after I get the boot. Such patriotism.”

  “I can do something about that. Know Austin?”

  “I was thinking of him—he’d put the screws on the fly-boy. Will you get in touch with him?”

  “Sure. Fast.”

  “Another thing… I’ll be in a lot stronger position for the showdown if I can pull a big, big A.E.C. contract out of my hat. What have you got?”

  Holland thought for a moment. “Well, Reactor Programme’s got some big orders coming up. Die-cast one-inch rods, aluminum cans, and some complicated structural members. It might all come to twenty-five million dollars. You set up for die-casting?”

  “Hell no, but what’s the difference? We can subcontract it to anybody who is set up. All I want is the money to show those monkeys on the board.”

  “You’ll get it. How’s Amy?”

  “No complaints. She brought Clifton’s widow home. Too bad about that. You never knew the guy, but he used to work for me—a real character.”

  “That so? Tell Amy to drop in and say hello next time she’s East. I haven’t seen her for months.”

  “I sure will, Dan. Take care of yourself. And the fly-boy. And the contract. Good-bye.”

  Holland hung up and put the phone back in its drawer. He said over his intercom: “Tell Fallon from Reactor Programme Procurement that I want to see him. And get me Undersecretary Austin on the phone—the Air Force Austin.”

  The Air Force Austin was only an acquaintance, but he had a low boiling point, and handles that stuck out a yard. There were many things that he hated, and one of them was military men who used their service careers as springboards to high-pay civilian jobs.

  “Naturally I don’t want to meddle in your area, Austin,” Holland was telling him a minute later, “but we’re all working for the same boss. Can you tell me anything about a Major General Reeves—Great Falls A.F.B.?”

  Austin’s suspicious New England voice said: “Supposed to be a brilliant young man. I don’t know him personally. What about him?”

  “I hear he’s getting involved in a big-business crowd. If you want me to stop talking and forget about it, just say so.”

  Austin snapped: “Not at all. I’m glad you called me. What exactly did you hear?”

  “The people are supposed to be Oklahoma Oil and Bank of California. The way the story went, they want to hire him as a front for the reorganization of some aircraft company or other.”

  “Nothing illegal? No hint of cumshaw?”

  “None whatsoever. Just the usual big-salary bait.”

  “Glad of that. Thanks, Holland. If Reeves thinks he can use the Air Force, he’s got a great deal to learn. I’ll have this investigated very thoroughly. If you’re right, he’ll be A.F. Liaison officer in Guam before he knows what hit him.”

  Holland grimaced at the thought. It was punishing a man for exercising his freedom of contract; as a lawyer he couldn’t be happy about it.
Unfortunately, Austin was right too. Industry cheerfully fished the armed-forces and civil-service pond for able and underpaid executives; it had to be discouraged. Carry the process far enough and industry would hire away the best military and Government brains, leaving the nation—and itself—defended by an army of knuckleheads and administered by a bureaucracy of nincompoops…

  And of course there were other reasons for lowering the boom on Reeves.

  “Mr. Fallon to see you,” said his secretary.

  “Send him in.” Fallon was in his early thirties, but there was something about him that made him look younger to Holland. The general manager thought he could guess what it was. “Is this your first public-service job, Fallon?”

  “Yes, Mr. Holland.”

  “What did you do before this?”

  “I was with General Motors. Up in Detroit Purchasing, assistant to the department head.”

  “That was a good job. Why’d you leave it for us?”

  He knew why. The itch you can only scratch with service, the uncomfortable feeling that they needed you, the half-conscious guilt that you owed more than your taxes. He knew why. It had ridden him all his life. Fallon tried to put it into words, and didn’t succeed. There were glib hacks who could talk your ear off about it, and there were sincere guys like this who couldn’t make themselves a case. “I guess I just thought I’d be happier here, Mr. Holland.”

  “Well. I wanted to talk to you about the upcoming contracts for breeder cans, moderator rods, and retaining-wall members. Five-nineteen, twenty, and twenty-one, I believe. Are you going to invite Western Aircraft to bid?”

  Fallon was puzzled. “I’d swear they haven’t got die-casting facilities on that scale, Mr. Holland. I wasn’t figuring on it, but of course I’ll include them if they can swing it.”

  “They can handle part of it as prime contractor and subcontract the rest.”

  “But the procurement policy is—”

  “This is a special case. I want you to understand that their bid may seem high, but that they deserve very serious consideration. It’s essential that we have no holdup on these castings, and I’ve practically decided that Western Air can do a better job of seeing them through to delivery than any other outfit that’s likely to bid. They’re a very able, deadline-minded outfit, and the over-all picture at this time indicates that we need their talent.”

  Fallon was getting upset. “But we’ve never had any trouble with Inland Steel or G.E., to name just two fabricators who might bid, Mr. Holland. They come through like clockwork, they know our procedure, we know the people there, they know us—it greases the ways.”

  “Really, Fallon, I think my suggestion was clear enough. I can’t be expected to fill you in on the reasons for it. Some of them are military secrets, others are policy matters, and none of them is any particular business of yours.”

  Fallon looked at him, no longer wide-eyed. “Sure,” he said woodenly. “How is Mr. Stuart? I hear he’s a good friend of yours.”

  Well, this was it. The cat was clawing at the bag; the beans were about to spill. Coldly Holland channelled the fear that was exploding through him into artificial rage. He was on his feet, and his chair crashed to the floor behind him. In one stride he was towering over Fallon in the deskside chair. Holland thrust his face almost into the face of the man from Purchasing. His voice was a low, intense growl.

  “Watch your language, son. I’ve been taking a beating for twenty-eight years in public service.” Talk. Keep him off balance, make him feel young and raw, make him ashamed, make him unhappy. “They’ve called me a Communist and a fascist and a bureaucrat and a bungler but they’ve never called me a crook. My worst enemies admit that if I wanted money I’ve got the brains to get it honestly. If I wanted money, I could quit A.E.C. today, open a law office tomorrow and have half a million dollars in retainers by next month.”

  Fallon was beginning to squirm. “I didn’t—”

  “Shut up. If you think you’ve turned up evidence of dishonesty, I’ll tell you what to do. Pick up your hat and run right over to the Senate Office Building. There’s a crowd there that’s been trying to nail my hide to the wall ever since you were in knee pants. Maybe you’ve succeeded where they failed.”

  “I meant—”

  “Shut up, Fallon. You told me what you meant. You meant that I’ve got nothing to show for twenty-eight years of trying to help run the purest democracy left in the world. That was news to me. I’ve known for a long time that I wasn’t going to get rich out of the Government service. I decided long ago that I couldn’t marry, because either the marriage or the work would suffer. I know I haven’t got any pride left; I stand ready at any hour of the day or night to get my teeth kicked in by those county-ring Solons up on the Hill. But I thought I had the loyalty of my own kind of people. It seems I was wrong.”

  “Mr. Holland—”

  He didn’t interrupt, but the youngster didn’t go on. Holland stared him down and then straightened to sit on the edge of his desk. “Go on over to the Senate Office Building, Fallon,” he said quietly. “Get your name in the paper. I can stand one more kicking-around and you can use the publicity. Maybe they’ll ghostwrite a series of articles for you in the Bennet rags.”

  But Fallon was almost blubbering. “That’s not fair!” he wailed. “I tried to tell you I was sorry. I can’t help it if I have an Irish temper and a big mouth. I know what your record is, Mr. Holland. It’s a—it’s a wonderful record.” He pulled himself together and got up. “Mr. Holland,” he said formally and mournfully, “I feel I should submit my resignation.”

  Holland slugged him on the bicep and said gruffly: “Not accepted. I could use a hundred more like you. I’ve got a thick hide—usually. Just that crack… but don’t let it worry you. Clear about that bid?”

  “Clear at last, Mr. Holland,” Fallon said with a melancholy smile. “I’ll try not to make a damned fool of myself again. You have troubles enough.”

  When he was alone, the general manager set up the kicked-over chair, leaned back, and lit a cigarette with fingers that shook. It had been a very near thing. Lord, how long could a man be expected to keep this up? The perpetual sweat about wire tappers, loose talkers, shrewd newsmen who might put two and two together, the political opposition relentlessly stalking every hint of irregularity.

  Once in T.V.A. he had turned in a friend and classmate for trying to recruit him into a footling little Communist industrial-espionage apparatus. The revelation had been shattering; his duty had seemed clear. But that had been a long time ago…

  His intercom said: “Senator Hoyt is here, Mr. Holland.”

  “Send him in, Charlie.” He sprang from behind his desk to shake the senator’s hand. “Good to see you again, Bob,” he burbled cheerfully.

  The senator’s meaty face broke into an actor’s smile. “Mighty nice of you to find time for us, Dan,” he said. It was a reminder that he’d had to wait on Holland’s convenience to make the appointment and a threat that some day Holland would sweat for it. The senator did not forget slights, real or imaginary.

  “How’re you, Mary?” asked Holland, a little dampened.

  “So—so,” Mary Tyrrel, the senator’s secretary, said vaguely. It was odd that she was Hoyt’s five-thousand-per secretary, because until last year she had been a twenty-thousand-per Washington by-liner for the Bennet newspapers. But lots of odd things happen in Washington.

  “Well, Bob, what can I do for you?”

  “I’m collecting a little information, Dan. Normally my investigating staff would handle it. But out of respect for your high position I thought I ought to ask you straight out myself.”

  Cat and mouse, thought Holland. What’s he got?

  The senator lit a cigar deliberately. “I like to consider myself a member of the loyal opposition,” he said. “Our democracy has kept its vigour because of constant, intransigent
criticism and pressure by reformers—realistic, practical reformers—against the abuses of an entrenched bureaucracy. I’ve been in some good scraps, Dan, and I’ve loved them. I fought the A.E.C. when it tried to give jobs to foreigners of doubtful loyalty. I’ve fought when you people tried to give moral lepers and degenerates control of our most precious military secrets. I’ve fought to root out loose-tongued drunkards from the A.E.C.”

  “It hasn’t done you any harm, Bob,” Holland said.

  The senator wasn’t thrown off his stride. “No,” he said. “It hasn’t. I’ve enjoyed the rewards of good citizenship. I have the respect of my constituents, and on a national scale I have the backing of a great chain of patriotic newspapers. But Dan, I’m on the track of something that—God willing—will lead to the highest office in the land.”

  “Dewey didn’t make it,” Holland said.

  The senator waved his cigar expansively. “He got to be governor at least. If he didn’t have the imagination to make the jump to the presidency, it was his fault. Of course in his day the techniques weren’t as developed as they are now. I know you take the old-fashioned, strict-construction view of politicking: work hard, improve yourself in knowledge and skill, one day you’ll get the nomination on a silver platter. With all respect to you as a student of government, Dan, that theory is as dead as the Lincoln-Douglas debates.

  “This is an era of high-level energy in science, industry—government. The nervous tensions under which we all live and work rules out leisurely reflection on the claims of this candidate or that. You’ve got to electrify people. Make them know who you are. Keep dinning your name at them so it drowns out any other candidate’s name. Immerse them in your personality. Have it drummed at them twenty-four hours a day, inescapably. The standing machinery of the press and broadcasting will do it for you if you just give them a news peg to hang it on.”