The Mack Reynolds Megapack

by Mack Reynolds

  “I see,” Balt Haer said. “And other examples?”

  Holland shrugged. “The Chinese Mandarins utilized possibly the most unique method of a governing class perpetuating itself ever known, certainly one of the most gentle.”

  Haer was scowling at him, obviously out of his depth, as was Joe Mauser for that matter.

  Holland said crisply, “The mandarins devised a written language so complicated that it took at least ten years to master reading and writing, thus assuring that only the very well-to-do could afford to educate their sons. When invaded, as so often China has been invaded, only the mandarins were in the position to serve the conquerors by carrying on the paperwork so vital to any advanced society. So, still in control of the machinery of government, they continued to perpetuate themselves, and shortly—as history is reckoned—we found the conquerors assimilated and the mandarins still in power.”

  Balt Haer said impatiently, “I seem to be under the impression that you were speaking of more current times, when I entered, Mr. Holland.”

  From the door, Nadine said, “Good heavens, Balt, are you badgering my guests again?”

  The three men faced her.

  Balt said nastily, “I am astonished that you persist in bringing members of the lower orders into my home, Nadine.”

  “Our home, Balt. In fact, if you must bring up such matters before outsiders, you will recall that you converted your portion of the family estate into continental Hovercraft stock, shortly before father met Baron Zwerdling’s forces in the recent fracas. No wonder you dislike Major Mauser. Through his efforts, our company won, rather than losing as you had expected.”

  Her brother, who could have been only slightly her senior, was obviously enraged. “Are you suggesting that I am not welcome to stay in this, our family home, simply because the property is in your name?”

  “Not at all,” she sighed. “You are always at home here, Balt, I simply demand that you exercise common courtesy to my guests.”

  He turned and walked stiff kneed from the room.

  * * * *

  “Sorry,” Joe said to Nadine.

  “Why?” she said simply. “The fact of the matter is that Balt and I are continually at each other. He is quite the active member of the Nathan Hale society.”

  Joe frowned his ignorance and looked at Holland.

  Holland chuckled. “An ultra-conservative—reactionary might be the better term—organization devoted to witch hunting and such in its efforts to maintain the status quo, major. Once again, history repeats itself. Such groups invariably evolve when basic change threatens a socio-economic system.” He looked at Nadine. “I must be going, my dear. My, how charming you look. If this is the customary garb whilst going a-gliding, I shall have to take up the sport.”

  “Why Phil, inane words of flattery from serious old you?”

  Joe squirmed inwardly, wondering again upon what basis was the friendship of Nadine Haer and Philip Holland.

  The butler entered and said, “A call for Major Mauser, if you please.”

  Only Max Mainz, his batman during his last fracas and now permanently attached to Joe, knew that he might be found at this address. Joe said to Nadine, “Would you pardon me for a moment? I assume it’s something important, or I wouldn’t be disturbed.”

  She said, demurely, “Undoubtedly one of the feminine members of a Joe Mauser buff club.”

  He snorted amusement and followed the butler to the library and the tele-screen.

  Max Mainz’s face loomed in the viewing screen. As soon as Joe appeared, he said, “Major, sir, the marshal’s been trying to get hold of you ever since you left the hotel.”

  “The marshal?” Joe scowled.

  “Marshal Cogswell. That one they call Stonewall Cogswell. And when he wants somebody, he really wants ’em, and I got a feeling it’s a good idea to come on the double.”

  Joe laughed. “Stonewall Cogswell’s a tough one all right, Max.”

  “You ain’t just a countin’ down, major, sir. He says when I get hold of you to come on over to his headquarters soonest.”

  “All right, Max, thanks.” Joe flicked the set off.

  Actually, Max was right. You didn’t ignore a summons from Marshal Cogswell. Not if you were in the Category Military and ambitious. The date with Nadine was off. And just when he was beginning to detect signs of her meeting him on his own level.

  VI

  It was the common practice among Category Military mercenaries of highest rank to maintain skeleton staffs between those periods when they were under hire by corporations or unions. That of Marshal Stonewall Cogswell was one of the most complete, he habitually keeping upward of a hundred officers in his private uniform. It paid off, for with such a skeleton force of highly skilled professionals as a cadre, the marshal could enlist veterans for his rank and file and whip together a trained fighting force in a fantastically short period.

  And nothing was so of the essence as time, in the present Category Military. For when two corporations sued for permission to meet on a military reservation for trial by combat to settle their commercial differences, the sums involved were staggering. Joe Mauser had been correct in saying that the fracas had grown, even in his memory, from skirmishes involving a company or two of men, to full fledged battles with a division or even more on either side, forty thousand men at each other’s throats.

  So a commanding officer became noted not only for his abilities in the field, but also those of cutting financial corners, recruiting his force of mercenaries, whipping them into a unit and getting them into the action. In fact, corporations, these days, invariably stated the period of time to be involved when they petitioned the Category Military Department. Perhaps a month, three weeks of which would be used for recruiting and drill, the last week for the fracas itself. Nobody could excel Marshal Cogswell in using the three weeks to best advantage.

  Major Joe Mauser came to attention before the desk of the lieutenant colonel of Marshal Cogswell’s staff who was acting as receptionist before the sanctum sanctorum of the field genius. He saluted and snapped, “Joseph Mauser, sir. Category Military, Rank Major. On request to see the marshal.”

  Lieutenant Colonel Paul Warren answered the salute, but then came to his feet and grinned while extending his hand to be shaken. He said, “Good to see you again, Mauser. Hope you’re in this one with us.” His grin turned rueful. “That trick of yours with the glider cost me a pretty penny. I’d made the mistake of wagering heavily on Hovercraft. But the marshal is waiting. Right through that door, major. See you later.”

  Evidently, Joe decided, the marshal was recruiting for another fracas. Which was why Joe had been summoned, although when a field officer of Cogswell’s stature was gathering officers to command a force, he seldom called upon them; they clamored for permission to serve with him. You weren’t apt to find yourself in the dill, under Cogswell, and you practically never failed to collect your victory bonus. Victory was a habit.

  Marshal Cogswell looked up from the desk at which he sat scowling at a military chart stretched before him. The scowl disappeared and his strong face lit with pleasure. The craggy marshal was a small man but strongly built, clipped of voice and with a tone that would suggest he had been born to command, had always commanded.

  Joe snapped to the salute which the marshal acknowledged with a flick of his baton, then stood to shake hands. “Ah, Major Mauser. Bit of trouble locating you.” His eyes narrowed momentarily. “Trust you are not at present affiliated with any company colors.” He took in Joe’s uniform and scowled vaguely, not placing it.

  Joe said in self-deprecation, “This is my own devising, sir. I thought if I was going to have to present myself to be killed, for a living, that I might as well show up before the screens as distinctively as possible. I’ve been told that ultimately the fracas buffs make or break you, in our category.”

  The marshal frowned, as though unhappy and possibly surprised at Joe’s words, however, he sat down again and repeated h
is question by merely looking at the other.

  “No, sir, I’m free,” Joe said. “However, frankly, I wasn’t looking for a commission right at this time.”

  Cogswell stared at him. Mauser was a good junior officer and they’d been through half a dozen fracases together over the years, not always on the same side.

  “Why not?” Cogswell barked. “Are you convalescing, major? Surely you didn’t manage to cop one in that last farce?”

  “Personal reasons, sir.”

  “Very well,” Cogswell growled. “However, I’m going to attempt to sway you, major. Would seem that I am up against it, if I don’t, and, in a manner it’s your fault.”

  Joe was bewildered. “My fault, sir?”

  The older man’s voice went brisk. “This is the situation. I have been approached by the United Miners to command their forces in their trial by combat with Carbonaceous Fuel. Same old issues, of course. Contract between the union and corporation is usually for only two years. Each time it comes up again, the union officials try to get a larger cut of the pie and the hereditary heads of Carbonaceous Fuel resist. Automatically, the Category Military Department issues a permit. The fracases they’ve been fighting prove so popular that there’d be riots if the permit was refused. Frankly, I’m no great admirer of the group in control of United Miners, but—”

  Joe was surprised enough to say, “Why not, sir?” Old pro mercenaries seldom concerned themselves as to the issues or principles involved in a fracas. They chose their side by more mundane considerations.

  * * * *

  Marshal Cogswell looked at him testily. “Sit down, Joe. You’re not on my staff, as yet, at least. Zen take the formality!” When Joe had accepted the chair, he growled again. “Suppose you didn’t know I was born into Category Mining?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Well, I was. But even as a boy this new industrial revolution was cutting the number of employees involved in the category each year that went by.”

  “That’s happened in every field, sir. Including my original one.” Joe Mauser was thinking, so what?

  “Of course,” Cogswell rapped. “My objection is what happened to the union. Unions were originally founded as an instinctive gathering together of employees to achieve as high a pay as they could get from the employer, with the strike as their weapon. But whatever the original purpose, and its virtue or lack of it, the union grew into something entirely different by the early and middle twentieth century. Such unions as the United Miners grew to such a size that they, themselves, became some of the largest business organizations in the country. And eventually they came to be run, like any other business, for the benefit of those who owned or controlled them. The professional labor leader evolved, motivated by his own interests and finally becoming, in his despotic control of the union, backed by goon squads and gangsters, as powerful a man as was to be found in the country. Seldom were strikes any longer held to better the condition of the individual union members. Instead, the issues were contracts which allowed for fabulous sums to go into the union coffers where they were at the disposal of the union officials.”

  The marshal grunted sourly. “Now that the whole industry of mining is all but completely automated and only a few thousands employed actively, there are confounded few miners not on the unemployed list, but the union officials wax as fat as ever, what with the percentages of each ton mined going into so-called welfare funds, and such.”

  He looked at Joe, evidently conscious that he had made an inordinary long speech for the supposedly taciturn Stonewall Cogswell. He cleared his throat and said, “Not that it’s my affair. I switched categories to Military, in my youth. Let us get to the point. I’ve been caught napping, Joe.”

  That was an unlooked for confession to come from Stonewall Cogswell. Joe said nothing, waiting for more.

  The marshal shook his baton at the younger officer. “By utilizing that confounded glider of yours as a reconnaissance craft, you revolutionized present warfare, major. Act of absolute ingenuity, and I admired it. Unfortunately, I failed to realize the speed with which every professional in our category would jump upon the bandwagon and secure gliders for himself.”

  Joe saw light.

  “Been caught short,” Cogswell rapped. “Short of gliders. Short of even one glider. And within a few weeks I’m committed to a divisional size fracas.” He pushed back his chair, angrily. “General McCord is in command of the Carbonaceous Fuel forces. Met him before, and always brought up victory only by the skin of my teeth. But this time he has two gliders. I have none.”

  “But, sir, surely you can either buy or rent several craft on the market.”

  “Confound it! It’s not the machines that are unavailable, but the trained pilots to operate them. The sport hasn’t been popular in half a century. Not overly so, even then.”

  “But training a pilot—”

  “Training a pilot, nonsense!” the marshal was shaking his baton at him again, in indignation. “A pilot won’t do. He must also be a trained reconnaissance man. Must be able to follow terrain from the air. Identify military forces both in nature and number. I needn’t tell you this, major. You above all know the problem.”

  It hadn’t occurred to Joe, but the other was obviously right. There couldn’t be more than a few dozen men in Category Military who could hold down both the job of pilot and reconnaissance officer. In another six months, the situation would have changed. Officers would quickly be trained. But now? As Cogswell said, he was caught short.

  Joe came to his feet. “Sir, I’ll have to consider the commission. Frankly, my plans were otherwise.”

  Cogswell started at him grimly. “Mauser, you’ve always been one of the best. An old pro, in every sense of the word. However, there have been some rumors going around about your ambitions.”

  Joe said stiffly, “Sir, my ambitions are my own business, whatever these rumors.”

  “Didn’t say I believed them, major. We’ve been together too often when the situation has pickled for me to judge you without more evidence than gossip. What I was leading up to, is this. There’s nothing wrong with ambition. If you see me through in this, I’ll do what I can toward pushing your promotion.”

  Joe came to the salute again. “Thank you, sir. I’ll consider the commission and let you know by tomorrow.”

  Cogswell flicked the baton, in his nonchalant answer to salute. “That will be all, then, major.”

  VII

  Freddy Soligen wasn’t at home when Joe Mauser called. The Category Military officer was met, instead, by young Sam Soligen, clothed this day in the robes of a novitiate of the Temple. Joe remembered now that Freddy had mentioned the boy in training in Category Religion.

  Sam led him back into the living room, switching off the Telly screen which had been tuned in on one of the fictionalized fracases of the past. Poor entertainment, when compared to the real thing, for any fracas buff, but better than nothing. In fact, it was even contended by some that if you got yourself properly tranked you could get almost as much emotion from a phony-fracas, as they were called, as for the genuine.

  “Gee, sir,” Sam said, “Papa was supposed to be back by now. I don’t know where he is. If you wanta wait—”

  Joe shrugged and picked himself a chair. He took in Sam’s robes and made conversation. “Studies tough in the Temple schools?” he asked.

  The teen-ager realized it was a make-talk question. He said, “Aw, not much. A lot of curd about rituals and all. You hafta memorize it.”

  “Curd, yet,” Joe laughed. “You don’t sound particularly pious, Sam. Come to think of it, I suppose any child of Freddy’s could hardly be.”

  Sam said, his young voice urgent, “Papa said you were on your way up, Major Mauser. Just like us. Gee, how come you chose Category Military, instead of Religion?”

  Joe Mauser looked at the other. It was his policy to treat young people either as children or adults. If he was to deal with a teen-ager as an adult, he didn’t believe in p
ulling punches any more than had he been dealing with a person of sixty. He said, flatly, “I’ve never had much regard for those categories in which a man makes his living battening on human sorrow or fear, Sam. That includes in my book such fields as religion, undertakers and their affiliates, and even most doctors, for that matter.” He added, to explain the last inclusion, “They profit too much from illness, for my satisfaction.”

  Major Mauser was enough of a current celebrity for practically anything he said to be impressive to young Sam Soligen. That youngster blinked. He said, “Well, gee, don’t you believe in any gods at all? If you believe in any god at all, you gotta have a religious category, and that means priests.”

  “Why?” Joe said. Inwardly, he was amused at himself for getting into a debate with this youngster and even a trifle ashamed of needling the boy about his chosen field. But he said, “If there are gods, I doubt if they’d intrust a priesthood to threaten their created humanity with hellfire.”

  Sam was taken aback. “Well, why not?”

  “Gods couldn’t be bothered with such triviality. In fact, I’d think it unlikely they could be bothered with priests. If I was a god, certainly I couldn’t.”

  The boy’s face was intent, its youthfulness somewhat ludicrous in view of the dark robes he wore. He leaned forward, “Yeah, you talk about priests and undertakers and all battening on human sorrow, but how about you? How about the Category Military? How many men you killed, major?”

  Joe winced. “Too many,” he said abruptly. The tic was at the side of his mouth, unbeknownst to him. He added, “But mercenaries have deliberately chosen their path. They know what they’re going into and they do it willingly, they haven’t been drafted.”

  He thought a moment, and Phil Holland’s talk about the Roman ludi came back to him. He said, “It’s like the difference between throwing a bunch of Christians to some wild bulls in a Roman arena, to being a torero in Spain, a matador who has chosen his profession and enters the bullring to make money.”