Other

by Gordon R. Dickson

  Bleys smiled. Cuslow smiled back, slightly. It was not the quick quirk of Henry’s smile, but it was very like it.

  “You mustn’t judge our military by the militia on our two home worlds, First Elder,” said Cuslow, in a slightly lower voice. “I say that privately, for your ear only; but please be reassured on that point. If something like our own Friendly Militia were opposing us, we’d go through them like a knife through soft goat cheese—even if they were comparable to us in having uniform weapons and with a unified command, plus all the equipment we have that they don’t.”

  “I’m very pleased to hear that,” Bleys said. “Well, now, I’ve something I wanted to ask of you—a rather small matter, but an important one. I’m going to be having a meeting here some time in the next few days, and there’s a group I’d like to bring to that meeting. Their situation’s like the one we were in, when we landed at the spaceport.”

  “I see,” said Cuslow. “You mean local authorities might make the mistake of interfering with them?”

  “Yes. I’d like them picked up by an escort of your troops at Other Headquarters here on New Earth, whenever I give you the word that it’s time to bring them to my suite here. Of course, I suppose that means you’re going to have to have soldiers standing by around the clock, because I don’t know exactly when the meeting would be held; and your notice would simply be a call from one of my aides, like Antonia Lu, the person who just brought us this tray.”

  “It can all be done quite easily,” Cuslow said. “I’ll take care of it as soon as I’m back at my Headquarters—or I can even call there now, if it’s urgent.”

  “No urgency just yet. I’ll try to give you advance warning, but the warning might be merely a call, to get them over here as safely and quickly as possible. I suppose your headquarters aren’t too far from this hotel?”

  “About eight minutes. I’ve an HQ force there all the time. We’ll have no trouble making room for the added number it will take to bring these people when you call.”

  “Good,” Bleys said. “How exactly would an escort like that be armed, and what would it consist of—in the way of officers and men?”

  They discussed the nature and size of the escort, and from there went on to talk of Cuslow’s soldiers in general; their organization, proportion of officers to men, and more general information about Cuslow’s Headquarters’ organization, about which Bleys’s curiosity wanted to be satisfied.

  Still, it was only another ten to fifteen minutes before they reached an end to their talk and Cuslow took his leave. Bleys saw him to the main lounge of his suite, where three other middle-aged officers were sitting, waiting for him. They said good-bye to each other cordially, and Bleys went back to the lounge where he had been talking to Toni, Henry and Dahno.

  He had expected to find the room empty and to call the rest from wherever they had gone off on their own activities.

  But when he stepped into the lounge, he found Dahno and Henry still there, evidently not having left but stayed put to listen to his conversation with Cuslow; and Toni joined them almost on Bleys’s heels.

  “By the way, and before you get back to what you were talking about, Bleys,” she said as soon as they were all seated. “Both the CEOs and the Guilds called while you were talking to the Marshal. I imagine they were told he was here as soon as he showed up, and that was what triggered their calls. They both wanted you to come to their buildings for dinner and conversation. I explained to them that, now you were First Elder, you couldn’t go to them even if you wanted to. For reasons of protocol, it would be necessary they come to you. Both of them told me then that they’d have to talk over doing that among themselves and get back to me. That was the total conversation, in both cases.”

  “I expect,” said Bleys, “we’ll hear from them in the next two days, then; maybe even early tomorrow. They’re going to end by agreeing to come here. They don’t have any choice. They’ll both want to establish relations with me as soon as possible, now I’m back. Did you tell them they’d be meeting each other when they came to see me?”

  “Not specifically,” Toni said. “On the other hand, I rather emphasized the protocol element in any such meeting. They’d have to be remarkably dense if it didn’t occur to them that protocol would also insist that, since they were two separate organizations, each tied into governmental control of this world, the demands of interstellar statesmanship would require you to meet with them equally—and very probably at the same time. If I’d said that in so many words, they might have had to find that situation a sticking point interfering with their being able to come to talk to you. But if they don’t know it officially, then they can take part in such a meeting with easy consciences.”

  “Good,” said Bleys. “As a matter of fact, I’m glad they called and you told us just now because meeting them was what I was going to talk about next. Henry, since the Friendly soldiers are going to be continuing their guard of this hotel and my suite, I’d like to pull the Soldiers of God in as much as possible. Have them ready. Off duty, but in the hotel and reachable at a moment’s notice. It’s best if there’s to be any confrontation, particularly one involving any kind of force, that it be the Friendly soldiers and the local people who are involved, rather than our people and the locals.”

  “Yes, Bleys,” Henry said. “I was thinking that myself. In fact, I’ve already told the Soldiers to stay put in their rooms for the moment, and I’ll be letting them know whether they’ll have the freedom of the rest of the hotel before today’s out.”

  “I should have known you’d be ahead of me, Uncle,” said Bleys. “At any rate—back to what I’ve got planned for meeting them. I want to bring together not only the Guild’s top people and the CEOs’ top people, but also the leaders of the People of the Shoe. If the Guild doesn’t want to agree officially to going to a meeting at which the CEOs are present and vice versa, you can imagine how they’d both have trouble with the idea of sitting down with the People of the Shoe. On the other hand, just as the Guild and CEOs will put up with each other if they can claim that they didn’t know it was going to happen and it was sprung on them by me—so they’ll also put up with the People of the Shoe if they simply find them here. They’ve got too much to lose by getting up and walking out, any of them. That includes the People of the Shoe, by the way.”

  “What do you think you’ll gain from the People of the Shoe?” Dahno asked. “Would you spell it out for us?”

  “The People of the Shoe as an organization are simply one more organization on a world full of them,” said Bleys. “But they’re the closest thing to representatives of the general mass of New Earth people—the jobholders, as Anjo calls them. The jobholders are actually the main body of opinion on the planet; and it’s what they want and need that will determine which way the planet’s history builds. Of the three organizations—CEOs, Guilds and Shoe-people—only the Shoe-people really have the ear of the general populace.”

  “Yes,” Dahno said, nodding. “I think you’re right. So, speaking of the general populace, let’s see what I can find about public opinion here for you, out on the street tonight and early tomorrow morning.”

  “If you don’t mind, Dahno,” said Bleys, “I’d like all three of you to stick as close as the Soldiers are going to be doing. In fact, even closer. Any one of you would make a rather valuable hostage for any of those three organizations, you know.”

  “Bleys,” said Dahno, “I wouldn’t say this in front of anybody else but Toni and Henry, but you know you have this bad habit of relying on—what can I call it? Momentum. To borrow a term from physics, you’re a mass in motion as far as public opinion goes; and I’ve always felt you were a little bit too ready to take a chance on that momentum carrying you over a gap in your planning—the way a mag-lev vehicle might jump over a crumbled-away gap in a mountain trafficway, if it was traveling fast enough. You may need what I can find out for you out in the city.”

  “Maybe you’re right, Dahno,” Bleys said. “Bu
t against that, there’s the fact that I might need your opinion—or Toni’s or Henry’s—on the spur of the moment, anytime in the next few days. Keep in mind that this meeting I’m talking about is the climax of all I’ve been working toward, since we left Association on this tour. I’m not so afraid of anything happening to you if you’re taken hostage, though things like that can always turn dangerous. I’m afraid of being left without the counsel of any of you, at a time when I could need it, in the next few days. In fact, I’d like you to stay—all three of you—even closer than the Soldiers. Your suites all connect with each other and mine without needing to step out into the hotel corridor. I’d like you not to leave your suite or any of our combined suites if you don’t mind; at least until I feel it’s safe for you to do so. Would you do this much for me?”

  “I’ll think about it,” Dahno said. He was clearly not happy.

  Chapter 43

  Neither the CEO Club nor the Guilds called back that afternoon; but in the evening, as Bleys and Toni were in his private lounge, talking about the arrangements for the meeting the following day, the doorbell rang unexpectedly.

  “Just a second—” said Toni.

  She got up and answered it.

  And admitted Anjo, controlling a cart with food and drink on it, into the lounge. The door closed behind him.

  “There’s a forged order from your room, for this,” he said, abandoning it. “It’s just part of the arrangement to get me in here. I thought you’d rather talk to me than someone else from the People of the Shoe.”

  “You’re right,” Bleys said. “Sit down. I want Dahno and Henry here with us for this.”

  He lifted his control pad to his lips and called them. Henry answered immediately and said he would be right over. Curiously, Dahno’s phone did not answer, but took a message. Bleys left word for him to call and come immediately.

  Sitting therefore with only Toni and Henry in Bleys’s private lounge, both they and Anjo surrounded by the security blue bubble made by the Newtonian device that Dahno had acquired, Bleys turned to Anjo.

  “It looks like we’ll just have to go with three of us and you.” he said. “But, come to think of it, don’t you have some questions for me, first?”

  “I do,” Anjo said. “Your message said you wanted to see our leaders, in company with some other New Earth people. I took that to mean the top men and women in the CEOs and the Guilds. Was I right?”

  “Yes,” Bleys said.

  “Then the first thing I need to know is how many of our leaders you want, and which ones in particular. You can’t mean those who lead every separate group among us. There’s several hundred different organizations in the People of the Shoe—they were separate organizations, originally. We formed what might be called a coalition only about eight years ago. It’s gradually become a more unified, single outfit; but the leaders of the groups that make it up still have a strong voice in what’s done by the whole organization, and considerable influence. You understand?”

  He looked hard at Bleys.

  “So,” Anjo went on, “it’ll make for hard feelings to leave out any of them; but it’ll have to be done. Also, it’ll be dangerous for the few I can bring. There’s nothing the Guilds and the CEOs would like better than to snap up any one of us and squeeze us for whatever information we can give them about the Shoe.”

  “No, I don’t want more than three or four,” said Bleys. “Including you, of course.”

  “I can promise you me,” Anjo said grimly; “I’m official head of the whole organization, after all—if only because I was the only candidate for the post that the others could agree on. But since I’ve been in, of course, those who want to displace me, or those who disagree with me—and there’s a number of those, either because it’s their duty to think of their own first, or they never did want me in office. They’ve got together and built their influence so that they’re now perfectly capable of voting—the leaders, that is—not to come to your meeting at all. Or they might agree to send only four representatives, but with a list of demands against the CEOs and the Guilds that would make a shambles of the meeting.”

  “They’ll be cutting their own throats if they do,” said Bleys; and was jarred by the unexpected harshness of his own voice. “I’d suspected that sort of problem with your people, but not on the scale you mention—”

  He was interrupted by the small chime from Anjo’s wrist control pad, announcing a call for him. It kept chiming until Anjo touched the stud and the sound was cut off suddenly.

  “Forgive me,” he said, “but I’ve got only a few minutes to talk to you here. I had to borrow the number and job of one of the regular waiters. He’s hiding. But that was another room-service delivery, and one of us has to take it. So—in brief: I can produce three other leaders for you; but I don’t know what to do about their list of demands. In a situation like this, I’ll just be one of the four. Technically the other three will be in a position to override any opposition I make to forcing the demands on the meeting. I’ll try to squash that, of course. Maybe you can think of a way around that.”

  “Tell them,” said Bleys, “if they insist on that, no one from the Shoe will be allowed at the meeting.”

  “You’d do that?” Anjo said.

  “I would.” said Bleys.

  Anjo was silent for a second.

  “The only other thing I can think of,” he said, standing up from his float and stepping back toward the door, speaking as he went, “would be to suggest to the other leaders tonight that we elect you in my place as head of the organization of the Shoe. If it was you holding my office, none of them would oppose you in anything you wanted at the meeting. I can promise you, in the end they’ll all follow you. But that’s all I can promise. Think about it between now and tomorrow. I’ll have four representatives, all right, myself included, at your Other Headquarters early tomorrow; and we’ll just sit tight there until you call us, even if it’s several days. But think about what those other leaders might want.”

  “I will,” said Bleys, “and I really think there’s a solution. Don’t suggest anything to the other leaders yourself. My experience is there’s always a solution with a lower price tag, if you think for a while. I’ll do that. You just pick and bring who you can—but come yourself, in any case—”

  His own wristpad chimed.

  “Just a minute—don’t leave just yet,” he said to Anjo. Touching the stud that would put his conversation on hush, he lifted the wristpad to his lips and heard Dahno’s voice by bone conduction in his inner ear.

  “Bleys?” it said. Bleys touched a stud on his wristpad to carry his voice to the phone through bone conduction.

  “I’m here, Dahno,” he said silently, sub-vocally. “Anjo’s with us. What I talked about earlier is true. This is a moment in which I could have used you with me. I’m glad you called. Where are you?”

  “Oh, just a few minutes from you. In fact, I’m on my way to you right now,” said Dahno, “Have Anjo wait.”

  “He can’t, unfortunately,” Bleys said. “So you went out after all. I thought you’d told me you’d stay in.”

  “I said I’d think about it,” said Dahno. “But in any case you ought to know that my business for a long time has been one where lies are useful tools. I was right: I needed to go out and sample public opinion here. I’ve got something of importance for you. But it’ll have to wait until I’m there. Get Anjo to wait, one way or another.”

  “I’ll try,” Bleys said.

  He lifted his head from the wristpad and looked over at Anjo standing almost poised by the not-yet-opened door to the hallway.

  “Anjo,” he said, “Dahno is due here in just minutes. Are you sure you can’t—”

  “No,” Anjo said. “The last thing you need is for me to be picked up and questioned here in this hotel. That’d be practically as good as telling both the Guild and the CEO everything you want done and what I’m up against in helping you, because they’d get the information out of me. I’
ve got to go, and I’m going. I’m sorry—goodbye.”

  He turned, the door opened behind him. He went through it and it closed again.

  “He’s gone, Dahno,” said Bleys, releasing the bone-conduction stud and speaking aloud. “Come as quickly as you can. Toni, Henry and I’ll wait here for you. We’re in the first lounge.”

  “So,” said Henry, “he went out in spite of what you told him.”

  “I knew he would,” Toni said.

  “I was afraid of it myself,” Bleys said. “But we all are what we are; and each one of us makes our own rules when it comes down to a final decision. Dahno is Dahno. He said he was only minutes away. We should see him shortly.”

  “Then we wait,” said Henry.

  They waited.

  “—So you see,” Bleys said, as soon as Dahno had arrived and Bleys had briefed him on what Anjo had told them, “Anjo knows as well as I do that my present appointment as First Elder would rule out my doing any such thing as taking office as leader of an organization on New Earth; a world where I’m not only not a citizen, but we’re engaged in renting it half a hundred thousand soldiery. As a matter of fact, my not being a citizen alone would be a bar to accepting such a local office under New Earth law, let alone the laws of our Friendly Worlds.”

  “I don’t see why he even suggested it,” said Henry.

  “To you, Toni, Dahno and me,” said Bleys, “it’s unthinkable. But of course he thinks differently. He himself is an outlaw; effectively in arms against his own government. He could be feeling that if he can put himself in that position, I ought to be willing to do so, too. What he doesn’t take into account is, even if I wanted to— ignoring my rank as First Elder and turning against my own government—all my plans and, consequently, the only real chance I have of resolving this situation the way I want it, would be gone. I told him I thought I could think of something—or we could think of something. In line with that, Dahno, what did you find out, outside the hotel?”