by Andre Norton
“You’re looking well,” Fuller commented genially. “I hear that spaceline of yours is growing fast.”
He looks just the same, thought Ramsay. As if he just finished licking that mustache after swallowing the canary. And not one gold-plated hair of his head out of place!
Aloud, he remarked on the excellence of communication.
“Oh, this is not a relay,” said Fuller. “I really am on Bormek V, only two light-years away. Having a little vacation.”
“Hope you’re having a good time,” Ramsay ventured warily. “Well, I was, but something . . . ah, came up.”
“Uh-huh!” Ramsay grunted.
He pressed both palms against the edge of the shiny black desk and braced his shoulders against the imitation Cagsan lizard skin of his chair, for the sake of feeling something at his back.
“Not exactly business of the Bureau,” Fuller went on blithely, “but the Bormekians asked me to look into it.”
“Don’t tell me your Bureau of Slick Tricks doesn’t have an agent around Delthig!”
Ramsay thought he knew of at least four, not counting the elderly gentleman in charge of the Bureau’s local information service. Fuller waved one hand in a broad gesture, as if to imply that he would hardly make such a bald claim to an intelligent and sophisticated intimate like Ramsay.
“I fear I shall require . . . him, for other tasks,” he said blandly. “So, naturally, I thought of you.”
“Naturally,” said Ramsay, glumly. “Glad to help if I can.”
“Excellent!” Fuller beamed. “I knew you would be eager to cooperate. You are hardly one to miss noticing that we have been throwing a little influence behind you occasionally.”
The spaceman’s gaze wavered momentarily. He had wondered a few times how he had managed to expand so rapidly. Hauling refined metals from the mines on Delthig II was standard, but out-system freighting from the fourth planet competed with some powerful interstellar companies.
Of course, the B.S.T. had power too, reflecting that which Terra had acquired by being at a spatial crossroads between the interior of the galaxy and the stars near the Edge. Ramsay usually thought of Fuller as lurking beside that crossroads, the biggest highwayman of all the Bureau.
“Now, then,” continued the blond agent, “what can you tell me about Delthig III and its natives? I want to check our files.”
“Well,” said Ramsay, “the average Delthigan is half a foot taller than I am, wasp-waisted, with roundish, heavy shoulders. Arms and legs skinny but knotty, four each and three sections where we have two. Three mutually opposing digits for hands.”
“Yes, I have the right file,” agreed Fuller, checking.
“He’d have a sort of warty skin, gray with greenish tints. Three eyes, air vents like gills across the front of his face over a big shark mouth. Flappy ears set low on the side of his head, far back.”
“What I’m interested in,” said Fuller, “is political and economic information.”
“Frankly,” said Ramsay, “they won’t have much to do with us. They’re totalitarians, you know, and they make a point of resenting our having two planets in the system. Guess they have their troubles keeping every John Doe at least half-fed and spinning the grindstone with all four floppy hands.”
“Overpopulated?”
“Badly. Local guess is five or six billion.”
“Other planets?”
“Nothing of use to them except ours, the fourth. Delthig II has good mines, but it’s dead rock like the first. V and VI are little ice-balls circling way out back somewhere.”
“So that they might be attracted to our colony?”
Ramsay hesitated, but decided that Fuller was quite capable of knowing a rumor from a trend.
“Talk is,” he said, “that not only are they planning to throw us out, but they also are talking about spreading out-system.”
“How much fact is in it?” asked Fuller, watching intently.
“I’m ready to sell out and leave,” the spaceman told him simply. “Never saw a fat Delthigan yet; they’re all run ragged keeping their glorious Planetary State in what they call ‘readiness for activity.’ ”
“The old, old story,” agreed Fuller. “Well, Tom, that does interest me. Their neighbors in space, Bormek, Ronuil, and other stars, are all good customers of Terra. The Bureau will have to do something. Letting Delthig import a few of the necessities of life might save a lot of trouble later.”
Ramsay judiciously kept his mouth shut. Fuller’s alert blue eyes studied him.
“In fact,” said the B.S.T. man, “we are arranging a trade conference. Since you are practically on the spot, I knew you wouldn’t mind hopping over to Delthig III to represent us—would you?”
“Oh . . . no . . . of course not,” muttered Ramsay, unable to think of an excuse that would be good enough to fool Fuller.
That seemed to settle it. He tried various afterthoughts, stressing the fact the Delthigans had few manufactures except space cruisers and primitive projectile weapons, and that they considered themselves short of raw materials. Their money was a joke and their credit nonexistent, he pointed out, so that a del could hardly be spent at whatever discount anywhere but on Delthig III.
“They don’t know what they’re up against in the galaxy,” he said, “but they have five billion down-trodden ‘citizens’ to expend in finding out. Not even the B.S.T. is going to buy them off!”
“No?” said Fuller. “Well, try it anyway. You never can tell what’s for sale.”
Leaving Ramsay groping for further objections, he smiled genially and cut off.
Six days later, that smile returned to haunt Ramsay, as he viewed it again on a film recording of further instructions Fuller had sent to the brand-new spaceport on Chika, the large inner room of Delthig Ill’s trio.
The spaceman had boarded one of his own ships a few hours after his talk with Fuller, bag, baggage, and secretary, leaving word for his general manager to divert all his other ships to Delthig III. In space, a message had reached him, warning that while the Delthigans had agreed to an unofficial discussion, they had forbidden any Terran visit to the surface of their planet. Hence the hastily erected plastic domes beside a flat plain on Chika, where Ramsay landed and found the spare, white-haired man formerly of the B.S.T. information service on IV.
“Hane is the name, Mr. Ramsay. Heard you were to be in charge here. Your office and our quarters are in this pre-fab building, and this bubble over it is the main dome.”
“What could you get in the secondary ones?” grunted Ramsay.
“Not much except barracks and space for storage. We had quite a time getting Terran workers over here from II in time to get this much laid out. The Delthigan representative is expected shortly.”
Ramsay introduced Marie Furman, who was togged out in plaid slacks and jacket as if a trip to Chika were a sporting event. He glanced through the transparent plastic wall at the other domes. Beyond them were low hills, tinted green by traces of scanty vegetation.
“There is some air out there,” Hane remarked, “but not enough for anything but mosses and a few other growths. By the way, we recorded a message for you from Mr. Fuller.”
The instructions, Ramsay saw when he projected the film in the office set aside for him, consisted mainly of advice and a list of exotic exports Fuller was prepared to send to Delthig. Some, Hane had reported, had already arrived and been stored under the domes.
“So find out,” Fuller’s image advised near the end of the film, “what the Delthigans need and what they can give in return. Be liberal; the Bureau wants to establish cordial relations.”
This won’t work, you know,” Ramsay muttered gloomily to himself as the film talked on. “You can’t buy off that bunch. They’ll take, but they won’t pay. When they think they’re strong enough to make trouble, out they’ll come, like a swarm of bees!”
Fuller was reviewing some of his “bargains.”
“. . . And that new energy projector d
eveloped on Bormek V might have a military use that would make them happy. And don’t forget the patents for the plastic pre-fab house, and the automatic kitchen, or the couple of hundred tons of bright dyes from Fegash—that last ought to get them if their culture is as dull and routine as you say.”
Ramsay silently agreed as the picture of Fuller peered more closely at his list.
“Oh, yes,” said the B.S.T. man, “I would personally be very happy to unload those twenty million cheap, one-channel telescreens from Vozaal VII that I had to take for . . . diplomatic reasons. They’re a big bulge on my account, and—”
“Huh!” snorted Ramsay, turning off the projector with a disgusted flip of his finger. “Marie!”
His secretary appeared in the doorway to her small office.
“As soon as those techs get through to Fuller, remind me to tell him his pet gyp scheme is no good. The Delthigans have no television yet. Hane did say, didn’t he, that we have a subspace set that will reach Bormek?”
“Yes, Mr. Ramsay. They promised to—”
A flare of light seeped in through the window of the one-story building. Ramsay rose, but found that the window was not designed to be opened. As he was craning his neck in a vain attempt to see the landing field, Hane entered.
“That will be the ship from Delthig,” he said, rubbing his bristling chin. “Wish I’d got rid of this stubble, but we’d better see to them immediately, Mr. Ramsay. Officials of that government down there are apt to be impatient.”
Ramsay nodded sourly, reminding himself that he was representing someone else and therefore expected to be prudent about taking personal offense. He followed Hane to a chamber at the other end of the building in which the air pressure and moisture content was a compromise between that of Delthig and conditions favored by Terrans. He found it too dry for comfort.
Presently, three Delthigans were ushered in, and escorted by Hane to places at the high table. They did not use chairs, so Ramsay perforce stood facing them.
Not very fair, he thought, seeing that they have four feet each against my two. Otherwise, though, they’re a seedy-looking bunch!
The Delthigans were dressed in tunics of dull-colored, sleazy material, belted at their narrow waists with bands of something resembling straw. Their three-toed feet were wrapped in cloth puttees, but on the middle sections of their arms all wore several bands of metal enameled in bright colors. The spaceman guessed these to be insignia of rank.
During Hane’s introductions, Marie slipped in with her notebook. Ramsay stared unhappily at the Delthigans, each of whom examined him suspiciously, first with one eye, then another, then yet another, turning his small, roundish head from side to side in the process. Ramsay noticed that his guests had vestigial crests of thickened skin atop their grayish skulls.
He breathed a sigh of relief when it developed that one of them, Puag Tukhi by name, spoke fair Terran, though with a hissing, clicking accent.
Marie brought Ramsay a list transcribed from Fuller’s filmed message. He mentioned one or two items, but Puag Tukhi was bluntly direct.
“We see first new powder-maker from Bormek,” he stated forthrightly, fluttering two or three hands at the list.
“I . . . uh, described it, so to speak,” murmured old Hane.
“Arrange a demonstration?” muttered Ramsay behind his hand.
“Oh, Mr. Fuller gave instructions for that. We have an old emergency rocket wire as a drone target. The Bormekian ship mounting the thing has been cruising an orbit around Chika. I . . . ah, alerted them.”
“Just what does it do?” asked Ramsay.
“You’ll see. We can watch on the telescreen over there.”
Ramsay passed the invitation on, and they gathered around the instrument in the corner of the room. He noticed that the gray-green skin of the Delthigan beside him showed traces of quite humanoid perspiration, although he himself found the air dry enough to foreshadow a sore throat if he had to talk a great deal. Then Hane had a message sent out to the cruising ship, and Ramsay forgot personal discomfort for a time.
He supposed later that the Delthigans must have been fascinated, though they managed to repress any undue show of interest. As Hane explained it, the field projected by the new weapon drastically affected the affinity for each other of the molecules of any substance within its range. Its range, he read from notes in a small memo book, had not yet been successfully measured. It did not by any means cause actual disintegration, but any supplementary disturbance—a projectile or even a sudden acceleration—might produce disorganization.
They were treated to a clearly focused view of the target rocket as it entered the field, just as Hane finished remarking that the latter was ineffective if used too close to a sun.
“Watch, now!” he added. “They are going to attempt hitting it with a bullet from a modified rifle.”
This, in space, required some doing. Eventually, however, as the Delthigans began to shuffle their many feet like a barnful of restless horses, the nose of the rocket seemed to spread out into a cloud of smoke.
“They promised, if that worked,” said Hane, “that they would signal the radio controls to change course.”
Sure enough, the stern jets of the little rocket flared briefly a moment later. Briefly, because the entire hull of faintly gleaming metal expanded into amorphous swirls of dust, some drifting off in what was to have been the new course but most continuing along the old curve.
“And what if it nothing disturpt while field on it?” asked Puag Tukhi.
“Probably be all right,” guessed Ramsay. “Maybe a few air leaks.”
Hane switched off the telescreen and they regrouped at the conference table. Ramsay attempted to turn the talk to his list of possible imports—the thought of such a weapon in the hands of beings known to be contemplating military adventure gave him a chill.
Puag Tukhi, however, insistently brought the discussion back at every opportunity to one point: he was willing to “consider accepting” a number of the Bormekian “powder-makers” if suitable terms could be arranged. Suitable terms, he seemed to think, included Delthigan currency.
As time went on, he gradually modified these offers until they further included supplying Delthigan labor for the Terran mines on the second planet and the purchase of other items. Ramsay’s throat got drier and drier while he strove to avoid concluding the agreement.
“You not want gif us only what you want!” exclaimed the Delthigan finally, working his toothy shark-mouth unpleasantly.
“Not at all!” denied the Terran. “I merely wish you to appreciate all the possibilities.”
“Appressshiate? Not know wordt.”
“I want you to see all the best things. Look—suppose we have a little pause here, so each side can talk things over! We’ll regulate the air in another room for you to be more comfortable in, and take it up again in half an hour or so.”
After only two repetitions, the Delthigan got the drift and agreed reluctantly to a recess. The Terrans retreated to Ramsay’s office, Marie pausing at her own desk.
His first action was to demand that the station operators get him a face-to-face call to J. Gilbert Fuller, on Bormek V.
“I don’t like it a bit!” he said to the old man while they waited for the call to go through. “Let them have enough of those gadgets, and we’ll find ourselves in the mines of Delthig II one fine day, and these squids out to conquer the stars.”
“Dear, dear!” muttered Hane. “I do imagine they have something of the sort in mind. Still, Mr. Fuller ought to know what he means to do.”
“That’s the one thing that keeps me here at all,” admitted the spaceman. “He’s sharp, I know. And yet . . . he’s never been in this system. Looking over the data on Bormek V is one thing; but it’s another to see that self-perpetuating clique down there sweat-shopping their whole planet into an armed camp.”
Marie Furman entered from her office, carrying a drinking glass and a small bottle.
�
�You’d better gargle with this, Mr. Ramsay,” she said sympathetically.
He accepted gratefully and moved toward the small lavatory adjoining the office. As soon as he had his mouth full, his brunette secretary informed him that the operators had reached the Bormek station, only to learn that J. Gilbert Fuller had gone off on business of his own with no word except that he would be back presently.
Ramsay choked, as was doubtless intended, he realized. By the time he was physically capable of voicing the expressions that rose to his lips, he had regained a measure of censoring self-control.
“That’s fine!” he groaned. “What’ll I tell these squids?”
“Well . . . this is just a personal opinion, mind,” said Hane, “but perhaps it would be best to strike a bargain with them.”
“But those projectors!” objected the spaceman.
“Projector,” Hane corrected. “Only one has arrived, so far.”
“You could promise more, then sort of forget about them,” suggested the girl.
“Too dishonest,” Ramsay vetoed. “Not only that, but I don’t want to be here when they yell ‘foul.’ Those octopuses are too touchy now. Imagine if they thought they’d been swindled!”
“True,” agreed Hane. “I can’t think of any excuse to turn them down.”
Ramsay paced the office several laps without locating any inspiration.
“All right,” he sighed finally. “I’ll go back in there and try to palm off on them Fuller’s precious telescreens and every other equivalent of glass beads he’s sending. Maybe they’ll draw the line at some of the junk. Then I can get insulted and back out!”
It seemed to Ramsay that the ensuing session with Puag Tukhi lasted one or two normal lifetimes. Long before the close, Marie had frankly curled up in a chair by the wall and gone to sleep. Hane retired to a seat by the telescreen in the corner an hour later, where he maintained a precarious position by jerking upright from time to time when his chin touched his chest. Even one of the Delthigans, despite censorious glares from his chief, rested his round head on the table and kept only one heavy-lidded eye open.