Jefferson stiffened. “Madam, they are of a standard size, and I only asked for two to be put aside, not anticipating a second enthusiast.”
Sy handed Jefferson the menu. “We’ll take one each. Thank you.” She waited until he had left. “Don’t mind him. The evenings are quite casual, but before four o’clock, you wouldn’t get in without a necktie.” Sy turned her attention to the window.
The sky had darkened in the few minutes since we entered the café. Lights came on.
Sy turned to me. “You can ask, if you like.”
“Ask what?”
“You know what.”
I dropped my menu. “Sy, that test hurt. How many passed?”
She settled back. “You’ll get the results sometime next week. And in the meantime, you won’t need to look for any more jobs.”
Jefferson arrived with our coffees and muffins. Fortunately, I hadn’t asked for sugar-free. He walked to the far end of the café and, with his foot, flicked a switch on the wall.
A machine that had been idle began to play loud music, which, judging from Jefferson’s expression, was not to his taste. He nodded to Sy as he passed our table. “Good afternoon, Ms. Heyho.” As he left, several couples took to the floor and began to gyrate.
I sipped my coffee. The chatter of voices around me became a hum. The electronic music, with its close harmony and angst, settled into the background of my mind.
Sy gazed out the window. Her strong jaw clenched as she examined each group of pedestrians. Something about her features suggested past struggles. Great determination. Great strength.
Her eyes turned toward my reflection. “Lemuel, I’m sure you remember your high-school optics, if that’s the word. When the outside light fades, the light reflected from a window starts to compete with that coming from the outside. And yours will always be the first face to show. It’s the palest on the planet.”
I reached for my muffin. I had finished it.
Sy looked at her empty plate. “How can he call that standard size?” She pushed it away. “Tell me, what do you do with your evenings?”
There wasn’t much to tell. I’d been on the planet for only three days. Sy thought I was joking when I told her about the juggling club.
“I’m serious. I’m good enough to teach amateurs, and it’s a way to meet people, even ex-alcoholics. Also, I’ve started to follow the daily newspapers. Are there just the three?”
Sy’s eyebrows arched. “Do you have a favorite?”
“The Wider View seems somewhat unconventional.”
She laughed. “Excellent. A good friend of mine works there. Dick Ovid, drunkard and cynic. You two would get on.”
I didn’t follow her reasoning, but her tone was good-natured. “I read something of his yesterday. What was it? Something about land sales, I think.”
“Right, one of his pet themes. Corruption in high places. And what did you think of it?”
At the time, it impressed me as disrespectful of the country’s rulers. “It seemed harsh. A senator—”
“J. B. Wellar, senator for equality.”
“—set up a consortium to trade in land on Elysium. Isn’t Eden at war with Elysium?”
Sy shook her head. “As Dick would say, ‘There’s war, and there’s commerce.’”
Something outside the window took her attention. She jumped to her feet. For a moment, she engaged in an animated, mimed conversation with two young women outside, then she sat again. “Friends. You’ll like them. Superficial perhaps, but they’ll introduce you around.”
Sy waved as they hurried to our table. “Come, meet Lemuel. He’s new to town and doesn’t know anyone.” She introduced them as Polly Dang from Payroll and Candice Ankova from the mailroom.
I stood to let Polly, blond almost to the roots and dressed to emphasize her curves, squeeze past me.
She made no attempt to minimize the contact. “Lemuel, you need more sunshine.”
Candice, slimmer and more serious, sat opposite me.
Both smelled of tobacco. Neither was more than seventeen years old.
Polly wriggled on the seat. “Do you like fun, Lemuel?”
“I’m new to this planet. What is there to do?”
Polly smiled. “Parties.”
Sy stood. “I’ve got to get back to work. You might want to check out Dick’s closing comments. He has a habit of getting it right.”
I held out a hand. “Will I see you again?”
She touched the back of her hand against mine. “We’ll be working in the same building.”
Had she asked me to the café just to meet the girls? A kind gesture, but not what I had hoped.
For a few minutes, Polly and I chatted about something, with an occasional word from Candice. Then I remembered I had to be somewhere else.
Respite, with its open lands and unfiltered air, gave me contact with a natural environment for the first time in my life. My daily walks around Cragglemouth, a habit I chose to develop, felt like a journey to Earth’s wilder days—more grass than cobble, more trees than doors or walls.
Exploring the social and economic structure was less straightforward. The national news, as revealed by an archaic radio in my room and the three daily newspapers, concentrated on minor crimes, with the disposables often assumed to be responsible.
I sat by Dempster’s living room table, the Wider View spread out in front of me. Fading sunlight and the flickering light from their television were enough to read by. I found the article about Senator Wellar’s land consortium.
Tucked into the middle of the penultimate paragraph were the words What does the senator know that we don’t? I hadn’t noticed them before—a clear hint at corruption. If he could say such a thing in print, how widespread was the knowledge?
Another article in the same newspaper covered the campaigns for a forthcoming election. Both of Eden’s main parties promised to clear the streets of homeless children, one by building secure homes and the other by encouraging citizens to offer custody to a child or two.
The Wider View supported the need for action:
This evil situation must be brought to an end, but how can we stop politicians making empty promises?
Unequivocal and chilling. Those in power had no interest in clearing waifs from the streets. But why? Such an obvious blight on a civilized nation, those children were tolerated for a reason, and not to make the streets safer for others. Somehow, there was a connection between their existence and the corruption that also blighted Eden.
Before disposing of the papers, I tore those articles out and put them in a drawer in my room. My collection of clippings had begun.
I took my scarf from its hook and sat by the desk.
With precise folds, I quartered its red pseudowool and aligned its contact points. The cloth pad stiffened as I withdrew my hands.
Currents immeasurable to the local technology rippled through nanocircuitry, giving me access to the most powerful artificial mind on the planet. Empowered by batteries too small to see, they flowed along hybrid strands that gave the machine form.
In the course of five heartbeats, the object transformed into a round base, and an oval screen of great clarity turned to me.
Newton’s face, or at least the one I had allocated to him, appeared. “Lemuel, unless you have an urgent need, listen.”
I listened.
“The craft was discovered early this morning. Now there is a guard in the clearing.”
“Armed?”
“I believe so.”
An overhead view showed the site. Beside a tent in the clearing, a single guard sat by an open fire.
A circle appeared around the guard. “He is too close for me to move without causing him serious injury. What do you suggest?”
Cause for concern? Maybe not, but it was a development I couldn’t ignore. Posting a guard had been an immediate reaction to the discovery. What if the craft were tipped over or moved? “This could be serious. You need to lift as soon as you can, b
ut then we couldn’t keep in contact.” I sat back and put my hands behind my head. “How about a geostatic orbit over Cragglemouth?”
Newton pursed his lips. “Lemuel, geostatic orbits have to be equatorial, but I could position myself within line of sight.”
The day had taken many twists, from the morning interview to the evening news of my craft’s discovery. It wouldn’t take the authorities of Respite long to link my name with the alien artifact. Then what?
Why hadn’t I listened to Dempster? I slept little that night.
Twenty-two days after entering Cragglemouth, I started work for Draco Trading. Four others, including Beau Mergle, started on the same day. We were given a tour of the building, introduced to some key personnel, none of whom I could name an hour later, and led to a training room. A lectern and whiteboard at one end faced a scattering of wooden chairs and tables.
Giltstein, unshaven and with his dark hair flopping over his forehead, strolled into the room. Not until he had taken up position behind the lectern did he raise his eyes to us.
“In case you’ve forgotten me, I’m Booby Giltstein. I’ll be your instructor for the next two weeks. During that time, I shall expect you to master the programming language DL-2. It isn’t difficult if your logic is good. And from the fact you are here, I assume it is.” He looked from face to face. “Questions?”
One young man raised a hand. “Can we smoke?”
“Only during breaks, and you’ll do it outside. Any more?”
There were none.
“For an hour, I’ll go over the basics. What is a computer? What is an AND gate? An OR gate? A central processing unit? Do you need to know these things? Probably not, but it puts what follows into context.
“You’ll learn the role of the various peripherals—punch-card readers, paper-tape readers and writers, magnetic tapes, even the newfangled discs. Then to the heart of your role, the coding sheet and the code. By the end of tomorrow, you’ll each be writing simple programs.”
The day raced by. I’d expected the basics to be dull, but it fascinated me to learn how simple an early computer was. No doubt the same primitive machines once calculated payrolls and recorded criminal records on Earth.
Next day, I was the first to arrive in the lecture room. An envelope bearing my name and the address of Draco Trading lay on top of my coding pad. Opening the envelope, a task I hadn’t undertaken before, proved less difficult than I anticipated. Its seal was weak.
I withdrew five sheets—a letter on the headed paper of the Eden Broadcasting Corporation.
Dear Mysterious Earthman, Lemuel Oneway,
Ronnie Bile, entertainer of excellence, friend to the most powerful, requests the pleasure of your company for an interview. The suggested date: Sunday, August 23, 2626. Transport will be provided.
The interview is unlikely to last more than half an hour and will be edited at our absolute discretion. You will need to keep the day free.
Standard fee for a first interview: twenty-two cupros, cash on satisfaction.
—Ronnie Bile, FCP
More than a week’s wage for one day’s work? Difficult to resist. And a chance to meet a friend of the most powerful.
There were four other pages. The first explained the great merits of R. Bile, charity worker on behalf of abused pets and homeless children. The rest contained instructions about appropriate clothing and a list of topics that I couldn’t mention. I folded the letter and put it into my pocket.
Ronnie Bile, children’s entertainer. I knew the name. On my first evening, his face had appeared on Dempster’s television. Why? A legal case, against one of the newspapers. I couldn’t remember the details.
What harm could a short interview do?
The money would help, and there might be an opportunity to get in a few words about the disposables, despite their presence on the forbidden list.
The training, like the test that got me there, grew tougher as it progressed, but we all made it through. Midday on the second Friday, we were led to the back of the building into a walled garden, where a buffet of meats and salads, better than anything available in the staff canteen, lay spread across a trestle table.
We ate beneath a cloudless sky in the warmth of Respite’s midsummer. Our usual half-hour break stretched to an hour, after which we were taken back to the training room.
Booby Giltstein, freshly shaved and with his scraggle of hair gathered once again into braids, rested his arms on the lectern. “I’m going to tell you what happens now.” He glanced from face to face. “You get to meet the chairman. He’s scary, although I’m not allowed to say that. Mr. Hector Bandstorm likes to look over what he refers to as the new meat. That’s you. Any stories you’ve heard about him are probably true, except he never wrestled a rumpard. No rumpard would dare let him get close enough. Are you ready? Coats on, I’m sorry to say.”
I felt ready before Giltstein’s words, less so after them.
Giltstein took us to the main stairs down two flights to a basement garage. Then, after listing our names for an armed guard to check, he led us into an elevator that rose rapidly to the fourth floor. It opened to a corridor luxuriously carpeted and paneled with polished wood. Like the elevator, it was air-conditioned.
Two more security guards, each with a firearm at her side, blocked the way. Once they too had checked their lists, we were allowed to walk on.
On a dark, carved wooden door, in silver letters six inches high, the legend “Hector Bandstorm—Chairman” showed we had arrived. Beneath the silverwork, in white wooden inlay, were the words “Knock and Enter.”
Giltstein raised a hand. “A word of warning. One thing Mr. Bandstorm hates more than anything is timidity. Speak up.” He rapped hard on the door and pushed it open. “Hello, Fifi.”
We entered. Ms. Fifi Pikowood—secretary to the chairman, according to her nameplate—sat behind a desk. The desk itself was plain, but the orderliness with which it was decorated gave an insight into the secretary’s mind. In perfect symmetry were the In tray to her left and the Out tray to her right. Piles of paper aligned with the desk’s edges. Even the typewriter conformed to regimentation.
Beyond her was another door simply marked chairman.
Ms. Pikowood—white-haired, petite, and severe—glared at Giltstein. “The chairman calls me by my first name, Mr. Giltstein. No one else does.” She gave Giltstein a moment to consider her words. “Mr. Bandstorm will see you when he’s ready.”
Giltstein persevered. “Shouldn’t you let him know we’re here?”
“Mr. Giltstein, the chairman asked you to bring your charges at two thirty. It is now two twenty-nine. Had you not been here, that would have been worthy of mention.”
Forty minutes later, a buzzer sounded. After a few muttered words, Ms. Pikowood instructed us to go through.
I reached the chairman’s door first. I raised a hand to knock, but a stifled cry from the secretary made me stop.
She glared at me. “I don’t know who you are, not-so-young man, but you do not knock when Mr. Bandstorm instructs you to enter. Not if you wish to stay in his employment.”
“Oh.” I lowered my hand. “What should I do?”
Giltstein stretched out an arm and pushed the door open. “You enter.”
Bandstorm’s inner office, an immense room bathed in light from a central skylight, with a tiled floor and a few rugs around a desk, smelled of cigar smoke. An elevator door on the far wall suggested a private entrance that bypassed security.
The chairman, seated behind his desk in the middle of the office, dominated the room. Tall, broad, hard-eyed and flabby, he faced Giltstein. Thick black curls tumbled over his shoulders. A smile twisted his thick lips, but his eyes lacked emotion. He nodded. “Well done, Bobby. Five out of five.” His booming voice echoed off the tiled walls.
Booby Giltstein shuffled his feet, but he didn’t correct the chairman. “They’re a good group, sir.”
Six seats formed a semicircle in front of the desk. F
ive men and one woman stood behind them. I remembered Giltstein’s final warning before we entered. “Sir, shall we sit?”
Bandstorm waved a hand in invitation. When we were seated, he took a cigar from a box on his desk. Giltstein leaped from his chair and soon had a flaming match in hand.
Bandstorm settled back against the solid wood of his throne-like chair. He drew on the cigar, letting the smoke out in a steady stream. “You trainees are now a part of one of the most successful companies this world has known. Draco Trading thrives on the instability of commodity markets. We grow rich from fluctuations in the price of land and cotton and coffee, or whatever. We succeed by anticipating those fluctuations.
“When I took over this company back in ninety-nine, market pressures ruled us. Such nonsense. Now, we rule the market. We make the market. We control the fluctuations, and we do it my way.”
From those few words, I learned more about the machinations of Respite’s rich than a month of following the news had taught me. To the chairman at least, morality had no place in commerce.
He continued. “I made Draco what it is today. I get things done, and I don’t tolerate people who stand in my way. I expect the same from my employees. Don’t come to me with problems; come with solutions. You’ll make mistakes. I have no difficulty with that, but put them right, one way or another. Do you understand?”
My “Yes, sir” was accompanied by a general grunt of confirmation. He wasn’t a man I would choose to oppose.
Bandstorm looked from trainee to trainee. “Which of you could run this empire when the time comes? Which of you has the strength? Effective people do well here. Weak ones stagnate at the bottom rung, if they stay. Questions?” He waited a moment then turned to Giltstein. “Which one had the perfect test result?”
Giltstein pointed to me. “That’s the one, sir. Lemuel Oneway. He also excelled during training.”
Bandstorm scrutinized me through a swirl of smoke. “Good. The one with a voice. The rest of you, leave.”
When I had companions in the room, it was just another office, grander than any I had seen before but not sinister. Alone with the chairman, I found it difficult to relax.
A Gluttony of Plutocrats (The Respite Trilogy Book 1) Page 5
