O Pioneer!

by Frederik Pohl

  When he checked on what the factory was currently making, he got another surprise. All the screen had to say on the subject was a legend: Currently under manual control.

  That didn't make any sense at all. Autofactories weren't ever run by manual control, except maybe in the brief periods when someone like Giyt's father was teaching the machines how to assemble a particular device. Assuming the polar factory was that quaintly old-fashioned. Which Giyt couldn't really believe it was.

  Then he discovered another curious thing. Checking the production runs of the last month's output he noticed that the factories seemed to have been idle for quite a lot of the time.

  That was, at the least, an inefficient use of facilities. If nothing else, the factory might as well have been churning out more clocks and toy airplanes to go back to Earth. But there it was. Production was apparently halted for days on end, more than once, though raw materials seemed to have continued to flow in.

  He leaned back, taking a sip from a cup of cold coffee, regarding the screen. Maybe Shura Kenk had been on to something. Was something odd really happening at the Pole? And whatever it was, who was doing it? Hagbarth was the leading candidate, of course; but what was the man up to?

  Just for curiosity's sake—and because he was stabbing into the files at random, anyway—he spent a quarter of an hour trying to find out what some of the eeties might be doing with their own factories at that moment. He chose the Petty-Primes, because he had already broken their basic protocols, but all he found out was that they were making 512 of one listed item and 4,096 of another, but what those items actually were he had no idea.

  Still . . .

  The numbers made him think of those other cryptic inventory numbers he had observed long ago. He searched for that file again, and when he found it he glumly regarded the lists of tarbabies and grabbags and rutabagas and copts. They meant no more to him than they had the first time he saw them. But numbers were numbers, so Giyt did what he had done successfully so many times before. He set up a program to look for coincidences anywhere in the files of Ex-Earth, in the stats from the factories themselves, in the personnel files of Hagbarth and his wife—anagrams, birthdays, anniversaries—anything that might match the numbers.

  When fatigue finally drove him to lie down for a little rest he let the program run. He had trouble getting to sleep. He didn't seem to be getting anywhere. But he had no place else to go.

  When Rina woke him to tell him that his presence was requested to greet the incoming Kalkaboo delegation, she had two other items of news. The Slugs had finished repairing their drains, and now they could use their own toilet again. And Hagbarth's petition seemed to have plateaued out: "He's stuck at eighty-nine signatures," she said with satisfaction. "He needs eleven more, and I don't think he's getting them."

  It didn't take long to see that the Kalkaboos were officially greeted—only a small ceremony, with minimal fireworks—and then, almost immediately, the next delegation was due.

  They were the Petty-Primes. There were a lot of them—eighty or more, Giyt guessed, so that it took three portals full to get them all to Tupelo. The Responsible One and his entire family were joyously bustling around, affectionately greeting every one of the scores of arrivals by name. It took forever. Mrs. Brownbenttalon seemed amused. The Delt General Manager and the Kalkaboo High Champion were stolidly patient and the Principal Slug, of course, was a Slug. It was only Giyt who fretted over the length of the proceedings; and then, when all three batches of VIPs had arrived, the Responsible One had something else to keep everyone there. There was a meter-high platform, more like a picnic bench than a stage, and the Responsible One lined up fourteen of the most important members of the delegation on it as a sort of receiving line. One by one, every non-Petty-Prime in the crowd was walked past. There wasn't any hand-shaking, exactly—too much danger of crippling a tiny Petty-Prime paw in a huge human fist or sharp Centaurian claw. So they merely touched digits and exchanged greetings.

  It was the kind of meaningless event that Giyt would have done his best to avoid. He didn't want to hurt the Responsible One's feelings, though. The little creature had been kind. Besides, exchanging a few meaningless courtesies took very little conscious thought. Giyt went right on thinking about the polar factories as he patiently plodded along the line. For a moment he considered taking the Responsible One aside—or Mrs. Brownbenttalon or one of the other mayors—and asking if they had heard anything, well, peculiar about human goings-on in the polar complex. But it might be an embarrassing question for them. Anyway, what could they know?

  As he left the line he saw Hoak Hagbarth and his wife just entering it, between a Centaurian female and a pair of Delts.

  That gave Giyt a new thought. The trouble with the Pole, with all its mines and autofactories, was that it was nearly nine thousand kilometers away. He thought of Hagbarth's amiable offer, made back in those long-ago days when Hagbarth was still being amiable, to fly him up there on the suborbital rocket for a sightseeing trip. He wondered if he could find anything useful if he went there in person. Then he wondered if that offer was still open. Probably not. Besides, it would mean leaving Rina alone to face whatever nastinesses the Hagbarths might think up next.

  He nodded his farewells to the eeties he knew and went home, his mind still turning over all the questions and worries that did not seem to find any solution. And when he sat down at his screen he found that at last he had been given a break.

  Something had turned up in the program he had left to run. When all the numbers had been crunched, it turned out that the number of the things code-named copts was precisely the difference between the number of chiplets reported on hand at the beginning of the month and the number reported as used in the manufacture of all the items the factory produced that month.

  There was no doubt about it. Far more chiplets were being imported than ever went back into the dolls and gadgets the Earth human polar factory ever shipped out, and the numbers were not small.

  Someone was stealing. And that someone could only be Hoak Hagbarth.

  Giyt sat back, considering what to do next.

  If this had been one of the great corporations he had occasionally worked for on Earth, his job would have ended right at that point. All that would have been left for him to do was to turn the information over to the head of security. Chiplets were smaller than sequins, but they cost money. Big money; some formerly trusted employee would soon be facing a spell in jail.

  The trouble was that it didn't add up.

  True, the fiscal systems for the human colony had been pretty badly designed and worse run. That was why Giyt had had to fix them, and ultimately why he became mayor. But what was Hagbarth going to do with a couple thousand stolen chiplets?

  He could re-export them to Earth and sell them there, sure. They would be worth quite a lot. But that meant having confederates in the Ex-Earth organization on Earth. And anyway the sloppiness in the fiscal systems that let him cover up that theft could just as easily have been subverted in some simpler way—say, to divert credit balances to a dummy account like Giyt's own.

  Rina came in, yawning, to bid him good night, and then got a good look at him. She came alert. "Shammy, what is it?"

  "Minute," he said, double-checking, just to make sure. The machines were surpassingly good at arithmetic, but you never knew.

  He did know. There were no mistakes. "Look at this," he commanded, and when. Rina had taken in what was being displayed on the screen she looked less triumphant than puzzled.

  "Why, Shammy? Why would he go to all that trouble when he could just steal the money the same way you—well, you know what I mean."

  "I do. I thought the same thing myself, but there it is. What I don't know is what to do about it."

  "Why,"' she said, stooping to kiss him good night, "sure you do, hon. You're the mayor. Mayors are supposed to up hold the law. So do it."

  Do it.

  She was right. Apart from any personal satisfaction he
might get out of it, Hoak Hagbarth was a criminal and he ought to be brought to justice.

  But brought to justice how?

  That was a harder question. He could report the matter to Ex-Earth. But who would he be reporting to? Almost certainly Hagbarth had confederates back there on Earth, probably in Ex-Earth itself, and wasn't it likely they would be the ones to receive the report? Perhaps he could spread the word to the American law-enforcement agencies. But what would they care about something that happened on Tupelo?

  So he had some very valuable information, but who could he tell it to?

  Just as he was puzzling over this, another message appeared on his screen. The Earth delegates were arriving. There would be six of them, the notice informed him, and when he checked the names he saw that only one of them was an American. That, of course, was because this time it was the old United Nations, not Ex-Earth, who had supplied these ambassadors.

  But that one American was Dr. Emilia Patroosh, the woman who had gone with him to Energy Island; and so Giyt had his answer to at least one question.

  He got to the portal just as its golden glow collapsed. Besides the obligatory eetie mayors, twenty or thirty Earth humans were waiting to greet them. Most of them, he saw with some surprise, seemed to come from the fire company, both Hagbarths among them. Olse glanced at Giyt as he arrived and gave him a small, reproving shake of the head.

  But she didn't speak, because both the Hagbarths had more important things on their minds. As soon as the transmission was complete, Hagbarth leaped down from his post in the control loop and advanced on the six Earth delegates, all smiles, hand outstretched to reach any other hand it could reach. He wasn't the only one. A dozen of the other Earth humans, Olse included, were moving purposefully to greet the newcomers.

  The plenipotentiaries were an oddly assorted lot for Tupelo. One was a tall, mournful-looking woman with purple-black skin and a bright bandanna over her head—a Maasai from Kenya, according to what the roster had said. There was an elderly Swiss man and an even older Korean one; one Egyptian, one New Zealander . . . and Dr. Patroosh.

  She was the one who counted. Giyt tried to push his way toward her . . .

  And got nowhere. A large hand gripped his arm and a voice from behind said, "Want to do something useful for a change, Giyt? Give us a hand with the goddamn baggage."

  It was Wili Tschopp, looking unfriendly. Giyt tried to pull his arm free, without success, as Tschopp was tugging him toward the stack of bags and cases. "Let go," Giyt said. "I want to talk to Dr. Patroosh."

  "But she don't want to talk to you, Giyt," Tschopp said reasonably. "Look, she's gone already."

  And she just about was; Hagbarth was deferentially helping her into one of the waiting carts and getting in beside her. Most of the other ambassadors were boarding carts as well, except for the tall Maasai woman, searching through the baggage for something of her own, pausing to look at them curiously. "What's the trouble?" she asked, her voice surprisingly deep.

  "Nothing," Tschopp said while Giyt simultaneously said:

  "I'm the mayor here. I've got something important to say to Dr. Patroosh."

  "Oh," said the woman, peering down at his face. "Yes, I've heard of you."

  "Then help me—"

  But she was shaking her head. "I do not think I can," she said. "We're here to represent our whole planet, Mr. Giyt; we can't get involved in local disputes like this recall question. Dr, Patroosh shouldn't talk to you at all, and neither should I."

  XXIII

  This is your overnight weather report. Farm areas west of the central massif will experience occasional showers, growing heavier by daybreak. East of the massif, upper levels, possible showers and windy; at town level, partly cloudy with a high of twenty-four degrees; near shore, warmer but dry. The polar station has a 90 percent probability of a major snow event, as the hurricane which narrowly missed the islands has moved north by northeast and appears to be joining a circumpolar low, possibly creating near-blizzard conditions.

  —TUPELO WEATHER SERVICE

  Evesham Giyt wasn't in the habit of taking no for an answer; especially when the no came from someone other than the person he wanted to ask. Although it was the middle of the night, as soon as he got home he tried calling Dr. Patroosh. She didn't answer, neither on her personal access code nor the one for the house she had been assigned. When the fourth or fifth call wasn't answered he put his clothes back on, called for a cart, and had himself driven over to the house. It was as dark as all the others around it, both human and eetie, and no one responded to his knock.

  Frowning, Giyt went home again. There had to be a way to reach the Earth delegate, but what was it? With Rina softly snuffling—you couldn't call it snoring—in the next room, he sat down at the screen again.

  There wasn't much for him there, either. When Giyt tried to access the polar manufacturing program again, he once again got the manual control legend.

  That was highly improbable. It was also what he had more or less expected. Something was definitely fishy at the polar factories, and try as he would he could not find a way into the mystery.

  The answers were either on Earth or at the Pole itself. Going to Earth wasn't an option, if only because his departure would be a victory for Hoak Hagbarth. Should he go to the Pole, then? When he checked the schedules he found the suborbital rocket was on the island, due to return to the Pole the next day. He could bully his way onto it as mayor, he thought.

  But he wanted to know what was happening on Earth, too.

  It didn't take Evesham Giyt long to find an answer to that. He set about creating a super-scout, the most complicated of his career, to sniff through the entire net until it found just what Hagbarth and his gang were up to.

  It took time. It would take more time than that to produce any data that would be any use to him; he encoded it to go to Earth in the next transmission, but then, even after it had found out what he wanted to know—if it did—it would have to wait for another transmission to report back to him.

  At least it was a tangible step. When weariness finally drove Giyt to bed he felt he had accomplished something.

  Dawn was lightening in the east when the din of Kalkaboo fireworks woke him. They seemed louder than usual; some of them must be expiating particularly nasty sins, Giyt thought, maybe to impress the delegates from their home planets. By the time he was dressing after his shower the noise had stopped, the sun was well and truly up, and Rina stuck her head in their bedroom to remind him that there was a note on his screen. The Centaurians were arriving.

  Giyt had more or less got used to the arrival of these foreign dignitaries without quite knowing what was going to happen at any of them. Each was different. This time, although it was hardly more than dawn, what looked like every Centaurian on Tupelo was there before him. in the first rank he recognized Mrs. Brownbenttalon and her newly elevated daughter, Mrs. Whitenose. There might have been others he knew, but he couldn't pick them out in the mass of several hundred of the great females, with their smaller males and young romping around among them. When they saw Giyt they made way for him to join the other mayors in the front row, but he detoured as he caught sight of Hoak Hagbarth lurking by the portal.

  "Hagbarth!" he called. "Wait a minute."

  The Ex-Earth man had already hastily turned to take his place at the control switch, but he was blocked by a dozen Centaurian females crowding toward the portal. "Listen," Giyt panted, catching up to him. "I really need to talk to Dr. Patroosh."

  "But she doesn't want to talk to you, Giyt."

  "I'll believe that when I hear it from herself. Mind telling me where she is?"

  "I do mind, and, listen, Giyt, even if I didn't, don't you think the lady would like to be left alone? Considering what time those poor people finally got to bed? Considering they got a full day's work ahead of them? Now would you please let me get this bunch in?"

  There was no arguing with that. The Delt in the control group was already screeching furiou
sly at Hagbarth to join them. Disgruntled, Giyt took his place in the rank of mayors. He hardly noticed when the chime sounded, the portal began to glow, the door opened, and the four Centaurian VIP females, their husbands peering excitedly out of their fur, emerged. He was considering his next action. Perhaps Patroosh was staying at the Hagbarth house; he could go there and demand entrance—preferably before Hagbarth himself got there.

  He didn't linger any longer than protocol absolutely demanded, but as he was heading for a cart a tiny Centaurian male scuttled through the crowd, calling, his name. "Large Male Giyt! This is I here, principal husband of Mrs. Brownbenttalon, you recall me? Be waiting briefly, please!"

  "I'm in kind of a hurry—"

  "Yes, surely. Deeply regret interrupting, but esteemed wife ask me to inform you. You wish find Earth female Patroosh, she say, having overhear you talk with Large Male Hagbarth person, correct? She say good idea go see New Zealand Large Male. Thank you. Now must return instantly for completing of welcoming high-ranking co-species persons."

  It took a lot of knocking and ringing to get anyone to answer the New Zealander's door, and when the man showed up, half dressed, he looked seriously annoyed.. Even more so when Giyt announced that he wanted to see Dr. Patroosh. "Who the hell are you?" he demanded. "The mayor? Oh, right, the bloke that wanted to bring weapons into Tupelo. What the hell did you want weapons for?"

  "It wasn't my idea. Can we talk about it some other time? I just need to see Dr. Patroosh."

  The New Zealander looked suddenly suspicious. "What've you been hearing about her and me?"

  "Nothing. I just need to talk to her."

  The New Zealander studied him for a moment, then shrugged. "Well, why don't you come on in? I think she's probably out of bed by now."