Utopia - Caliban 03

by Roger MacBride Allen

  Tonya felt frustrated. The time had been when her people could have worked up a complete dossier on a fellow like Lentrall no time at all. There had been an odd sort of freedom for her spies and intelligence operatives, in the old, confrontational days. Back then, relations between the Settlers and the Spacers had been so bad it didn’t much matter if they got worse. In fact it was difficult to see how they could have gotten worse. Cinta Melloy, the head of the SSS, could have, and had, used all sorts of dirty tricks--taps on comm calls and databanks, bribes, agents tailing a subject, the whole works--in order to develop information.

  But now everyone had to be very respectful and polite, on both sides. Over the past few years, the SSS had developed a very close working relationship with Justen Devray’s Combined Inferno Police. They shared intelligence and assisted each other in enforcement work. It would not do to jeopardize all that with a flurry of ham-handed snooping around. In some ways, peace was a lot more complicated than confrontation.

  Tonya looked back over at Gubber. Speaking of relationships, theirs, Tonya’s and Gubber’s, had caused more than a small stir, back when the secret got out. The hard-as-nails leader of the Settlers on Inferno, quite literally in bed with the quiet, retiring, soft-spoken Spacer roboticist. It had been a tremendous scandal.

  Tonya realized she was missing a bet. Even if it was unlikely that Gubber had heard anything, it couldn’t hurt to ask. Besides, scientists tended to know each other. Maybe Glibber would know something useful about Lentrall ‘ s background, even if he wasn’t up to date on the latest rumors

  “Gubber?” she asked in a casual tone of voice.

  “Hmmm?” He looked up from his reading, a vague sort of smile on his face. “What is it?”

  “Do you happen to know a man named Davlo Lentrall?”

  Gubber thought for a moment. “I know of him, at least slightly,” he said. “I ran into him at some sort of joint studies conference. A very young fellow. He’s some sort of assistant researcher in the department of astrophysics over at the university. I don’t pay much attention to those backwater space science disciplines. I can’t say I know much about him.”

  Tonya nodded thoughtfully. There was not much impetus for basic space research on the Spacer worlds, and hence not much research. “What did you think of him?” she asked. “What sort of impression did he make?”

  “Oh, I don’t think we got past the hello, pleased-to-meet-you stage, so I can’t say I formed much of an opinion. Pleasant enough, I suppose, but very rushed and abrupt. Everything is always a top priority. You know the sort. Why do you ask?”

  “Well, no special reason,” she said. “To tell you a little more than I should, our people spotted him going into the governor’s office, and we were wondering what he was doing there.”

  Gubber frowned. “I’m sure I don’t know,” he said. “But he does seem rather a junior sort of person to be meeting with the planetary governor.”

  “I quite agree,” Tonya said.

  “Well, I’m sure you’ll find some perfectly dull explanation in a day or so,” Gubber said, and went back to his reading.

  “Maybe,” said Tonya. “Maybe.” Gubber was probably right. But she could not let go of it. What the devil did a junior astrophysicist have to do with terraforming? Tonya had an unpleasantly strong hunch she was not going to like the answer.

  SIMCOR BEDDLE. LEADER of the Ironhead party, leaned forward into the lectern and pounded it with his fist. “No more!” he shouted out to his audience. “We won’t take anymore!” he half shouted in order to be heard over the wild cheers and applause from the audience. Or would it be more accurate to call that mass of his wild-eyed followers a mob? No matter. They were his. They fed on him, and he fed on them.

  He wiped the sweat from his brow with a pristine white handkerchief and went into his wind-up, the crowd shouting louder, his voice growing stronger and more angry with each demand. “No more delay in returning our robots from their illegal government seizure! No more coddling of those so-called New Law robots that threaten the stability of our society! No more Settlers shoved down our throat!” By now the crowd noise was so deafening there was no longer any point in attempting to be heard. But he shouted at the top of his lungs, not so much to make his voice audible, but in order to make it possible for his followers to read his lips. “No more!” he cried out. “No more!”

  “NO MORE!” the crowd shouted back, and the chant had begun. “NO MORE! NO MORE! NO MORE!”

  Simcor Beddle grinned broadly and spread his arms wide, waving to them all, drinking in the cheers and the shouts and the anger. They were still there, and they were still his. The sea of faces roaring its approval might not have been quite as large as it once had been, but it was still there, and he still controlled it. It was a great pleasure, and a great relief, to know that. The Ironheads held these meetings to keep up the enthusiasm of the rank-and-file, but there was no doubt in Beddle’s mind that they did him a great deal of good as well.

  He raised his arms a bit higher, and grinned a bit more broadly. That got the crowd shouting and cheering louder. He nodded to them, waved, and made his exit to the stage right wings.

  Jadelo Gildern was waiting for him there. Beddle nodded to him as a serving robot handed Beddle a large glass of fruit juice to quench his thirst and ease his throat. “How big was the crowd?” Beddle asked as his took the juice and drank it down greedily. Rabble-rousing was thirsty work.

  “Five thousand two hundred and thirty-three,” Gildern replied. “We’re holding on to more of them than I had expected. But sooner or later, we’re going to have to do something.”

  He nodded toward the still-cheering crowd out there. “That lot out there expects action. If they don’t get it from you soon, they’ll look elsewhere.”

  “Let’s just be thankful they don’t have anyplace else to go,” said Beddle as he handed the empty glass to the robot and took a big towel to his face. He rubbed his face and his scalp vigorously. It might not be as decorous as a handkerchief, but it did a better job of drying off the sweat.

  “Let’s get you home and in and out of the refresher,” Gildern said. “There’s something we need to talk about.”

  “That informant that walked in earlier today?”

  “That’s the one,” said Gildern. “You ordered us to pursue it, and we have. We’ve don’t have much just yet, but you said you wanted to be kept informed.”

  “Then let’s go,” said Beddle. He followed Gildern out of the auditorium, leaving the still-cheering crowd behind.

  Forty-five minutes later, Simcor Beddle was at his desk, reading a file prepared by Gildern, and learning the name of Davlo Lentrall.

  He studied the file carefully. Once Gildern’s agents had been tipped off by the informant Ardosa, they had to set to work at once. They had procured a full summary of Lentrall’s career to date, but it did not make very informative reading. He was born, he went to school, he studied astronomy. None of it made for shocking revelations. So what was so important about Lentrall? Was their informant playing some sort of game with them?

  “This tells us very little,” Beddle said to Jadelo, who sat in one of the chairs in front of his desk. “Do you still think this is something big?”

  “Yes, I do. I’ve worked with this particular informant for quite some time. He has been a reliable small-time operative for us. His information has always been good. And as best I can tell, he is either behaving exactly the way a small-timer should when big, dangerous information drops in his lap, or else he is one of the best actors I have ever met.”

  “Hmmmph.” Beddle glared at the file in front of him, as if he could force more information out of it by sheer force of personality. “Lentrall has something, or knows something, that is causing a lot of turmoil. I find it intriguing, but we need more. Maybe it’s just some arcane academic dispute.”

  “I doubt it. Whatever it is, it’s gotten him in to see a whole series of government officials--and gotten him in to see Govern
or Kresh in a private interview,” Gildern pointed out. “But that’s all we’ve been able to get.”

  “You’re saying we’re stuck. I don’t like being stuck.” Simcor Beddle was a man of action, a man given to straight-ahead action, not to waiting.

  “We’ll get more information,” Gildern said. “But when we do, I have a feeling that we’re going to have to act on it fast.”

  “I agree. The government seems to moving with unseemly haste. It’s going to be something with a time element to it.” Beddle gestured toward the file on his desk. “Take it away,” he said, and the robot by his side leaned in toward the desk, closed the file folder, and removed it. Beddle stood up, and a second robot stepped in from the rear to pull back his chair. Beddle stepped around his desk, leaving it to the two robots to get out of his way. That was the Ironhead way. One required absolutely perfect service of one’s robots, and then paid them no mind. One assumed the robot would do what was required, and that was all. The Infernals followed the Spacer convention of ignoring robots. But Ironheads took the convention to its extreme.

  An Ironhead might be awakened, washed, dressed, fed and served by a whole platoon of robots during the day--but never acknowledge their existence, or even be consciously aware of seeing them. Someone had described the ideal Ironhead lifestyle as being waited upon hand and foot by a legion of ghosts, and that was not far from the truth.

  Beddle came around to sit in one of the two big, comfortable armchairs reserved for visitors, easing his considerable bulk into it with a surprising grace. “What do you make of it?” he asked of the man in the other chair.

  Jadelo Gildern smiled, displaying a set of pointed-looking teeth. Beddle had recently promoted Gildern to second-in-command of the Ironhead party, while instructing him to keep his euphemistically titled post as Director of Research and Information--a polite way of saying Gildern ran the Ironhead spy network.

  Gildern was a small, thin, sallow-faced man. His thinning pale-blond hair was cut very short, and his face was long and narrow. Today he was wearing a very plain, loose-fitting outfit of gray pants and a gray tunic. All his clothes always seemed to be a bit too large for him. “I think it’s important, but I don’t know what it is,” he said. “We have only had a very few hours to examine the situation.” Gildern’s voice was low, and almost musical in tone. Beddle felt certain that Gildern could credit that voice as being at least half of what had gotten him to where he was. “It would of course be a relatively simple matter to infiltrate Lentrall’s office and have a look around, and thus learn more about what he is doing. However, the odds of our operatives getting caught would be moderately high, and the odds that Lentrall or the university would be able to detect the intrusion quite high. The university has a surprisingly competent security system. I’d be even more reluctant to try breaking into Lentrall’s computer files there. We haven’t had much luck cracking into Settler computers. Even if we could get in, the odds are very much against our avoiding detection.”

  “Tea,” said Beddle, seemingly to the open air. One of the serving robots responded with remarkable speed, and took all of ten seconds to produce a steaming hot cup of tea, made precisely the way Beddle liked it. Beddle took the cup and saucer from the robot, but otherwise paid it no attention. “I take it you don’t think that the information we might uncover would be worth the risk of getting caught, or the risk of putting Lentrall on his guard.”

  “No, sir, I do not. I expect that we will learn more in a day or two, without the need to go to such lengths. Lentrall does not strike me as the sort who is much good at--or much interested in--keeping secrets. But, might I ask, what is the basis for your interest in Lentrall?”

  “I am interested in Lentrall for two reasons,” he said, pausing to take a sip of tea. “One is that he seems to interest others, and I want to know why. Second--well, you came close to saying it at the rally. We need a crisis, and I am always on the watch for a situation that might produce one. The Ironheads don’t do so well when people are safe. We do best when the times are tumultuous. Our talent lies in using events, crises, situations--even those produced by our opponents--against our opponents. We have not had much chance for activity recently, but every now and again something or someone pops up quite suddenly out of nowhere--such as friend Lentrall. The Davlo Lentralls of the world are the raw material for our work. And right now we need raw material.”

  “You think our work has not been going well of late,” said Gildern. It was not a question.

  “No, it has not,” Beddle said, and took a last sip of tea before handing the half -empty cup to the empty air and letting it go. The robot by his side plucked the cup and saucer out of midair before they could drop a millimeter. “Or to put it better, we have not been given any work to do. And we need work, if we are to survive. Attendance at the rallies is still slipping a bit.” He leaned back in his chair, and thought for a moment. “You know, Gildern, I work very hard to maintain the proper appearance of a leader. Do you believe I achieve it?”

  Simcor Beddle was short and fat, but that description, while accurate, did not do him justice. There was nothing small or soft or flabby about him. It often seemed as if the sheer strength of his will added ten centimeters to his height. His face was pallid and round, but the skin was taut over his jaw. It was hard to know the exact color of his eyes were, but they were gimlet hard, jewel bright. His hair was jet-black, and he wore it combed straight back. He was wearing a subdued version of his usual military-style uniform. No decoration on it for a late-evening conversation in private, none of the epaulets or braid or ribbons or insignia he had worn at the rally. Just a dull black tunic and dull black trousers of military cut. But then, understatement often proved most effective.

  “Yes, sir. Yes I do,” Gildern replied.

  “I like to think so,” said Beddle. “And yet what good is it all if there is no chance for me to lead?” He moved forward in the seat, lifted his foot and looked down at it. “I’m like one of these boots. Look at them. Steel-toed, jet-black--they look as if they could kick in any door ever made. But what good is that if there is nothing for them to kick in? If I leave them unused for long enough, people will cease to believe I can use them. The Ironheads can last on appearances for only so long. We need something that can move us forward.”

  “Your point is well taken, sir,” said Gildern. “You’re saying that recent history has not followed the pattern prescribed by our philosophy.”

  The Ironhead philosophy was simplicity itself--the solution to every problem was more and better robots. Robots had liberated humanity--but not completely, because there were not enough robots. The basic product of robotic labor was human freedom. The more robots there were, and the more they worked, the more humans were free to follow other pursuits. Simcor Beddle believed--or at least had managed to convince himself, and quite a number of other people--that the whole terraforming crisis was a fraud, or at best nothing more than a convenient excuse for seizing robots from private citizens, and thus restricting their freedom.

  Chanto Grieg’s original seizure of private robots for use in the terraforming project had been the single greatest recruitment tool in the history of the Ironheads. People had rushed to the Ironhead standard. The seizure seemed to be the fulfillment of every one of Simcor Beddle’s most dire warnings. It was the beginning of the end, the moment that would mark the collapse of Spacer civilization on Inferno, the next move in the Settler plot to take over the planet.

  But when those disasters failed to materialize, many of the new recruits--and many of the old stalwarts--began to drift away from the organization. In the past half-decade, Alvar Kresh had done a better job of advancing Grieg’s program than Grieg himself had done. Kresh had delivered five years of good, solid government, five years of measurable, meaningful movement forward in the reterraforming project.

  And, worst of all, people had discovered they could survive with fewer robots. The Ironheads could produce all the statistics they liked showing ho
w the standard of living was falling, how incomes were on the decline, how levels of hygiene were declining while accident rates were on the increase. But somehow, none of it seemed to matter. There were certainly plenty of people grumbling over the situation, but they were not impassioned. They were, at least some of them, annoyed or frustrated. But they were not angry. And the Ironheads could not long survive without angry people.

  “Quite right,” said Beddle. “Events have not followed our philosophy. We need things to start going wrong once again.” Beddle realized he had not put it quite right. He had better watch himself. That was the sort of gaffe that could have raised merry hell if he had made it in public. “No, more accurately, we need to make people see, once again, that things are going wrong now. We need some image, some symbol, some idea, to rally the masses once again.”

  “And you think that Davlo Lentrall might be such a symbol?” Gildern asked. “Or, perhaps, that he might at least lead us to such a symbol?”

  “I have not the faintest idea,” said Simcor Beddle. “But he represents a possibility, and we must pursue all such.”

  “As you say, sir. We will keep up a discreet watch on our new friend.”

  “Good,” said Beddle. “Now let us move on. What can you tell me about, ah, the other project you had underway?”

  Gildern smiled, showing all his sharp-looking teeth. “It is a long-term project, of course. But we make slow, steady progress in our search, in spite of the roadblocks put in our way. The day will come when we can strike.”

  Beddle smiled happily. “Excellent,” he said. “Excellent. When that day comes, I hope, and expect, brother Gildern, that our friends will never know what hit them.”

  “With a little luck, sir, the New Law robots will not even survive long enough to realize they have been hit.”

  Beddle laughed out loud, a brazen, harsh noise that clearly made Gildern uncomfortable. But that didn’t matter. And it was good to know that, even if Lentrall caused them all a major headache, there were other ways for the Ironheads to manufacture events.