The Best from Fantasy & Science Fiction 8 - [Anthology]

by Edited by Alfred Bester

  ‘Can’t expect a star London show at the back of beyond,’ said the Cockney.

  ‘My dear fellow,’ said his colleague, ‘isn’t the thing perfectly obvious? What kind of woman, without force, is going to come and live in this ghastly place—on rations—and play doxy to half a dozen men she’s never seen? The Good Time Girls won’t come because they know you can’t have a good time on Mars. An ordinary professional prostitute won’t come as long as she has the slightest chance of being picked up in the cheapest quarter of Liverpool or Los Angeles. And you’ve got one who hasn’t. The only other who’d come would be a crank who believes all that blah about the new ethicality. And you’ve got one of that too.’

  ‘Simple, ain’t it?’ said the Cockney.

  ‘Anyone,’ said the other, ‘except the Fools at the Top could of course have foreseen it from the word go.’

  ‘The only hope now is the Captain,’ said Dickson.

  ‘Look, mate,’ said the Cockney, ‘if you think there’s any question of our taking back returned goods, you’ve ‘ad it. Nothing doin’. Our Captain’ll ‘ave a mutiny to settle if he tries that. Also ‘e won’t. ‘E’s ‘ad ‘is turn. So’ve we. It’s up to you now.’

  ‘Fair’s fair, you know,’ said the other. ‘We’ve stood all we can.’

  ‘Well,’ said Dickson. ‘We must leave the two chiefs to fight it out. But discipline or not, there are some things a man can’t stand. That bloody schoolmarm—’

  ‘She’s a lecturer at a Redbrick university, actually.’

  ‘Well,’ said Dickson after a long pause, ‘you were going to show me over the ship. It might take my mind off it a bit.’

  ~ * ~

  The Fat Woman was talking to the Monk. ‘…and oh, Father dear, I know you’ll think that’s the worst of all. I didn’t give it up when I could. After me brother’s wife died…’e’d ‘av ‘ad me ‘ome with ‘im, and money wasn’t that short. But I went on, Gawd ‘elp me, I went on.’

  ‘Why did you do that, daughter?’ said the Monk. ‘Did you like it?’

  ‘Well not all that, Father. I was never partikler. But you see—oh, Father, I was the goods in those days, though you wouldn’t think it now…and the poor gentlemen, they did so enjoy it.’

  ‘Daughter,’ he said, ‘you are not far from the Kingdom. But you were wrong. The desire to give is blessed. But you can’t turn bad bank notes into good ones just by giving them away.’

  ~ * ~

  The Captain had also left the table pretty quickly, asking Ferguson to accompany him to his cabin. The Botanist had leaped after them.

  ‘One moment, sir, one moment,’ he said excitedly. ‘I am a scientist. I’m working at very high pressure already. I hope there is no com­plaint to be made about my discharge of all those other duties which so incessantly interrupt my work. But if I am going to be expected to waste any more time entertaining those abominable females—’

  ‘When I give you any orders which can be considered ultra vires,’ said the Captain, ‘it will be time to make your protest.’

  ~ * ~

  Paterson stayed with the Thin Woman. The only part of any woman that interested him was her ears. He liked telling women about his troubles; especially about the unfairness and unkindness of other men. Unfortunately the lady’s idea was that the interview should be devoted either to Aphrodisio-Therapy or to instruction in psychology. She saw, indeed, no reason why the two operations should not be carried out simultaneously; it is only untrained minds that cannot hold more than one idea. The difference between these two conceptions of the conversation was well on its way to impairing its success. Paterson was becoming ill-tempered; the lady remained bright and patient as an iceberg.

  ‘But as I was saying,’ grumbled Paterson, ‘what I do think so rotten is a fellow being quite fairly decent one day and then—’

  ‘Which just illustrates my point. These tensions and maladjust­ments are bound, under the unnatural conditions, to arise. And pro­vided we disinfect the obvious remedy of all those sentimental or—which is quite as bad—prurient associations which the Victorian Age attached to it—’

  ‘But I haven’t yet told you. Listen. Only two days ago—’

  ‘One moment. This ought to be regarded like any other injection. If once we can persuade—’

  ‘How any fellow can take a pleasure—’

  ‘I agree. The association of it with pleasure (that is purely an adolescent fixation) may have done incalculable harm. Rationally viewed—’

  ‘I say, you’re getting off the point.’

  ‘One moment—’

  The dialogue continued.

  ~ * ~

  They had finished looking over the spaceship. It was certainly a beauty. No one afterwards remembered who had first said, ‘Anyone could manage a ship like this.’

  Ferguson sat quietly smoking while the Captain read the letter he had brought him. He didn’t even look in the Captain’s direction. When at last conversation began there was so much circumambient happiness in the cabin that they took a long time to get down to the difficult part of their business. The Captain seemed at first wholly occupied with its comic side.

  ‘Still,’ he said at last, ‘it has its serious side too. The impertinence of it, for one thing! Do they think—’

  ‘Ye maun recall,’ said Ferguson, ‘they’re dealing with an abso­lutely new situation.’

  ‘Oh, new be damned! How does it differ from men on whalers, or even on windjammers in the old days? Or on the North West Frontier? It’s about as new as people being hungry when food was short.’

  ‘Eh mon, but ye’re forgettin’ the new light of modern psychology.’

  ‘I think those two ghastly women have already learned some newer psychology since they arrived. Do they really suppose every man in the world is so combustible that he’ll jump into the arms of any woman whatever?’

  ‘Aye, they do. They’ll be sayin’ you and your party are verra abnormal. I wadna put it past them to be sending you out wee packets of hormones next.’

  ‘Well, if it comes to that, do they suppose men would volunteer for a job like this unless they could, or thought they could, or wanted to try if they could, do without women?’

  ‘Then there’s the new ethics, forbye.’

  ‘Oh stow it, you old rascal. What is new there either? Who ever tried to live clean except a minority who had a religion or were in love? They’ll try it still on Mars, as they did on Earth. As for the majority, did they ever hesitate to take their pleasures wherever they could get them? The ladies of the profession know better. Did you ever see a port or a garrison town without plenty of brothels? Who are the idiots on the Advisory Council who started all this nonsense?’

  ‘Och, a pack o’ daft auld women (in trousers for the maist part) who like onything sexy, and onything scientific, and onything that makes them feel important. And this gives them all three pleasures at once, ye ken.’

  ‘Well, there’s only one thing for it, Ferguson. I’m not going to have either your Mistress Overdone or your Extension lecturer here. You can just—’

  ‘Now there’s no manner of use talkin’ that way. I did my job. Another voyage with sic a cargo o’ livestock I will not face. And my two lads the same. There’d be mutiny and murder.’

  ‘But you must, I’m—’

  At that moment a blinding flash came from without and the earth shook.

  ‘Ma ship! Ma ship!’ cried Ferguson. Both men peered out on empty sand. The spaceship had obviously made an excellent take-off.

  ‘But what’s happened?’ said the Captain. ‘They haven’t—’

  ‘Mutiny, desertion, and theft of a government ship, that’s what’s happened,’ said Ferguson. ‘Ma twa lads and your Dickson are awa’ hame.’

  ‘But good Lord, they’ll get Hell for this. They’ve ruined their careers. They’ll be—’

  ‘Aye. Nae dout. And they think it cheap at the price. Ye’ll be seeing why, maybe, before ye are a fortnight older.’

/>   A glearn of hope came into the Captain’s eyes. ‘They couldn’t have taken the women with them?’

  ‘Talk sense, mon, talk sense. Or if ye hanna ony sense, use your ears.’

  In the buzz of excited conversation which became every moment more audible from the main room, female voices could be intolerably distinguished.

  ~ * ~

  As he composed himself for his evening meditation the Monk thought that perhaps he had been concentrating too much on ‘needing less’ and that must be why he was going to have a course (advanced) in ‘loving more’. Then his face twitched into a smile that was not all mirth. He was thinking of the Fat Woman. Four things made an exquisite chord. First the horror of all she had done and suffered. Secondly, the pity—thirdly, the comicality—of her belief that she could still excite desire; fourthly, her bless’d ignorance of that utterly different loveliness which already existed within her and which, under grace, and with such poor direction as even he could supply, might one day set her, bright in the land of brightness, beside the Magdalene. But wait! There was yet a fifth note in the chord. ‘Oh, Master,’ he murmured, ‘forgive—or can you enjoy?—my absurdity also. I had been supposing you sent me on a voyage of forty million miles merely for my own spiritual convenience.’

  <>

  ~ * ~

  POUL ANDERSON

  As you know by now from many stories, it’s impossible for the lively speculative intellect of Poul Anderson to touch the most familiar theme without transmuting it into a new and provocative notion. This time the theme is the patronizing admission of a retarded Earth into a million-year-old Galactic civilization. . . .

  BACKWARDNESS

  As a small boy he had wanted to be a racket pilot—and what boy didn’t in those days?—but learned early that he lacked the aptitudes. Later he decided on psychology, and even took a bachelor’s degree cum laude. Then one thing led to another, and Joe Husting ended up as a confidence man. It wasn’t such a bad life; it had challenge and variety as he hunted in New York, and the spoils of a big killing were devoured in Florida, Greenland Resort, or Luna City.

  The bar was empty of prospects just now, but he dawdled over his beer and felt no hurry. Spring had reached in and touched even the East Forties. The door stood open to a mild breeze, the long room was cool and dim, a few other men lazed over midafternoon drinks and the TV was tuned low. Idly, through cigaret smoke, Joe Husting watched the program.

  The Galactics, of course. Their giant spaceship flashed in the screen against wet brown fields a hundred miles from here. Copter view . . . now we pan to a close-up, inside the ring of UN guards, and then back to the sightseers in their thousands. The announcer was talking about how the captain of the ship was at this moment in conference with the Secretary-General, and the crewmen were at liberty on Earth. “They are friendly, folks. I repeat, they are friendly. They will do no harm. They have already exchanged their cargo of U-235 for billions of our own dollars, and they plan to spend those dollars like any friendly tourist. But both the UN Secretariat and the President of the United States have asked us all to remember that these people come from the stars. They have been civilized for a million years. They have powers we haven’t dreamed of. Anyone who harms a Galactic can ruin the greatest—”

  Husting’s mind wandered off. A big thing, yes, maybe the biggest thing in all history. Earth a member planet of the Galactic Federation! All the stars open to us! It was good to be alive in this year when anything could happen . . . hm. To start with, you could have some rhinestones put in fancy settings and peddle them as gen-yu-wine Tardenoisian sacred flame-rocks, but that was only the beginning. He grew aware that the muted swish of electrocars and hammering of shoes in the street had intensified. From several blocks away came a positive roar of excitement. What the devil? He left his beer and sauntered to the door and looked out. A shabby man was hurrying toward the crowd. Husting buttonholed him. “What’s going on, pal?”

  “Ain’t yuh heard? Galactics! Half a dozen of ‘em. Landed in duh street uptown, some kinda flying belt dey got, and went inna Macy’s and bought a million bucks’ wortha stuff! Now dey’re strolling down dis-a-way. Lemme go!”

  Husting stood for a while, drawing hard on his cigaret. There was a tingle along his spine. Wanderers from the stars, a million-year-old civilization embracing the whole Milky Way! For him actually to see the high ones, maybe even talk to them ... it would be something to tell his grandchildren about if he ever had any.

  He waited, though, till the outer edge of the throng was on him, then pushed with skill and ruthlessness. It took a few sweaty minutes to reach the barrier.

  An invisible force-field, holding off New York’s myriads— wise precaution. You could be trampled to death by the best-intentioned mob.

  There were seven crewmen from the Galactic ship. They were tall, powerful, as handsome as expected: a mixed breed, with dark hair and full lips and thin aristocratic noses. In a million years you’d expect all the human races to blend into one. They wore shimmering blue tunics and buskins, webby metallic belts in which starlike points of light glittered—and jewelry! My God, they must have bought all the gaudiest junk jewelry Macy’s had to offer, and hung it on muscular necks and thick wrists. Mink and ermine burdened their shoulders, a young fortune in fur. One of them was carefully counting the money he had left, enough to choke an elephant. The others beamed affably into Earth’s milling folk.

  Joe Husting hunched his narrow frame against the pressure that was about to flatten him on the force screen. He licked suddenly dry lips, and his heart hammered. Was it possible—could it really happen that he, insignificant he, might speak to the gods from the stars?

  ~ * ~

  Elsewhere in the huge building, politicians, specialists, and vips buzzed like angry bees. They should have been conferring with their opposite numbers from the Galactic mission—clearly, the sole proper way to meet the unprecedented is to set up committees and spend six months deciding on an agenda. But the Secretary-General of the United Nations owned certain prerogatives, and this time he had used them. A private face-to-face conference with Captain Hurdgo could accomplish more in half an hour than the councils of the world in a year.

  He leaned forward and offered a box of cigars. “I don’t know if I should,” he added. “Perhaps tobacco doesn’t suit your metabolism?”

  “My what?” asked the visitor pleasantly. He was a big man, running a little to fat, with distinguished gray at the temples. It was not so odd that the Galactics should shave their chins and cut their hair in the manner of civilized Earth. That was the most convenient style.

  “I mean, we smoke this weed, but it may poison you,” said Larson. “After all, you’re from another planet.”

  “Oh, that’s OK,” replied Hurdgo. “Same plants grow on every Earth-like planet, just like the same people and animals. Not much difference. Thanks.” He took a cigar and rolled it between his fingers. “Smells nice.”

  “To me, that is the most astonishing thing about it all. I never expected evolution to work identically throughout the universe. Why?”

  “Well, it just does.” Captain Hurdgo bit the end off his cigar and spat it out onto the carpet. “Not on different-type planets from this, of course, but on Earth-type it’s all the same.”

  “But why? I mean, what process—it can’t be coincidence!”

  Hurdgo shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m just a practical spaceman. Never worried about it.” He put the cigar in his mouth and touched the bezel of an ornate finger ring to it. Smoke followed the brief, intense spark.

  “That’s a ... a most ingenious development,” said Larson. Humility, yes, there was the line for a simple Earthman to take. Earth had come late into the cosmos and might as well admit the fact.

  “A what?”

  “Your ring. That lighter.”

  “Oh, that. Yep. Little atomic-energy gizmo inside.” Hurdgo waved a magnanimous hand. “We’ll send some people to show you how to make our stuff. Len
d you machinery till you can start your own factories. We’ll bring you up to date.”

  “It—you’re incredibly generous,” said Larson, happy and incredulous.

  “Not much trouble to us, and we can trade with you once you’re all set up. The more planets, the better for us.”

  “But . . . excuse me, sir, but I bear a heavy responsibility. We have to know the legal requirements for membership in the Galactic Federation. We don’t know anything about your laws, your customs, your—”

  “Nothing much to tell,” said Hurdgo. “Every planet can pretty well take care of itself. How the hell you think we could police fifty million Earth-type planets? If you got a gripe, you can take it to the, uh, I dunno what the word would be in English. A board of experts with a computer that handles these things. They’ll charge you for the service—no Galactic taxes, you just pay for what you get, and out of the profits they finance free services like this mission of mine.”