First Lensman (25 page)

"I see. Could be, at that. Throw the Lensmen out, put his own stooges in. Wonder how he'll go about it? A tour de force? No. The next election, would be my guess. If so, that will be the most important election in history."

"If they decide to wait for the election, yes. I'm not as sure as you seem to be that they will not act sooner."

"They can't," Kinnison declared. "Name me one thing they think they can do, and I'll shoot it fuller of holes than a target."

"They can, and I am very much afraid that they will," Samms replied, soberly. "At any time he cares to do so, Morgan—through the North American Government, of course—can abrogate the treaty and name his own Council."

"Without my boys—the backbone and the guts of North America as well as of the Patrol? Don't be stupid, Virge. They're
loyal
."

"Admitted—but at the same time they are being paid in North American currency. Of course, we will soon have our own Galactic credit system worked out, but …"

"What the hell difference would
that
make?" Kinnison wanted savagely to know. "You think they'd last until the next pay-day if they start playing that kind of ball? What in hell do you think
I'd
be doing? And Clayton and Schweikert and the rest of the gang? Sitting on our fat rumps and crying into our beers?"

"You would do nothing. I could not permit any illegal …"

"Permit!" Kinnison blazed, leaping to his feet. "Permit—hell! Are you loose-screwed enough to actually think I would ask or need your permission? Listen, Samms!" The Port Admiral's voice took on a quality like nothing his friend had ever before heard. "The first thing I would do would be to take off your Lens, wrap you up—especially your mouth—in seventeen yards of three-inch adhesive tape, and heave you into the brig. The second would be to call out everything we've got, including every half-built ship on Bennett able to fly, and declare martial law. The third would be a series of summary executions, starting with Morgan and working down. And if he's got any fraction of the brain I credit him with, Morgan knows damned well
exactly
what would happen."

"Oh." Samms, while very much taken aback, was thrilled to the center of his being. "I had not considered anything so drastic, but you probably would …"

"Not 'probably'," Kinnison corrected him grimly. "Certainly!"

"… and Morgan does know … except about Bennett, of course … and he would not, for obvious reasons, bring in his secret armed forces. You're right, Rod, it will be the election."

"Definitely; and it's plain enough what their basic strategy will be." Kinnison, completely mollified, sat down and lit another cigar. "His Nationalist party is now in power, but it was our Cosmocrats of the previous administration who so basely slipped one over on the dear pee-pul—who betrayed the entire North American Continent into the claws of rapacious wealth, no less—by ratifying that unlawful, unhallowed, unconstitutional, and so on, treaty. Scoundrels! Bribe-takers! Betrayers of a sacred trust!
How
Rabble-Rouser Morgan will thump the tub on that theme—he'll make the welkin ring as it never rang before."

Kinnison mimicked savagely the demagogue's round and purple tones as he went on: "Since they had no mandate from the pee-pul to trade their birthright for a mess of pottage that nefarious and underhanded treaty is,
a prima vista
and
ipso facto
and
a priori
, completely and necessarily and positively null and void. People of Earth, arise! Arise! Rise in your might and throw off this stultifying and degrading, this paralyzing yoke of the Monied Powers—throw out this dictatorial, autocratic, wealth-directed, illegal, monstrous Council of so-called Lensmen! Rise in your might at the polls! Elect a Council of your own choosing—not of Lensmen, but of ordinary folks like you and me. Throw off this hellish yoke, I say!'—and here he begins to positively froth at the mouth—'so that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the Earth!'

"He has used that exact peroration, ancient as it is, so many times that practically everybody thinks he originated it; and it's always good for so many decibels of applause that he'll keep on using it forever."

"Your analysis is vivid, cogent, and factual, Rod—but the situation is not at all funny."

"Did I act as though I thought it was? If so, I'm a damned poor actor. I'd like to kick the bloodsucking leech all the way from here to the Great Nebula in Andromeda, and if I ever get the chance I'm going to!"

"An interesting, but somewhat irrelevant idea." Samms smiled at his friend's passionate outburst. "But go on. I agree with you in principle so far, and your viewpoint is—to say the least—refreshing."

"Well, Morgan will have so hypnotized most of the dear pee-pul that they will think it their own idea when he renominates this spineless nincompoop Witherspoon for another term as President of North America, with a solid machine-made slate of hatchet-men behind him. They win the election. Then the government of the North American Continent—not the Morgan-Towne-Isaacson machine, but all nice and legal and by mandate and in strict accordance with the party platform—abrogates the treaty and names its own Council. And right then, my friend, the boys and I will do our stuff."

"Except that, in such a case, you wouldn't. Think it over, Rod."

"Why not?" Kinnison demanded, in a voice which, however, did not carry much conviction.

"Because we would be in the wrong; and we are even less able to go against united public opinion than is the Morgan crowd."

"We'd do something—I've got it!" Kinnison banged the desk with his fist. "That would be a strictly unilateral action. North America would be standing alone."

"Of course."

"So we'll pull all the Cosmocrats and all of our friends out of North America—move them to Bennett or somewhere—and make Morgan and Company a present of it. We won't declare martial law or kill anybody, unless they decide to call in their reserves. We'll merely isolate the whole damned continent—throw a screen around it and over it that a microbe won't be able to get through—one that would make that iron curtain I read about look like a bride's veil—and we'll keep them isolated until they beg to join up on our terms. Strictly legal, and the perfect solution. How about me giving the boys a briefing on it, right now?"

"Not yet." Samms' mien, however, lightened markedly. "I never thought of that way out … It
could
be done, and it would probably work, but I would not recommend it except as an ultimately last resort. It has at least two tremendous drawbacks."

"I know it, but …"

"It would wreck North America as no nation has ever been wrecked; quite possibly beyond recovery. Furthermore, how many people, including yourself and your children, would like to renounce their North American citizenship and remove themselves, permanently and irrevocably, from North American soil?"

"Um … m … m. Put that away, it doesn't sound so good, does it? But what the hell else can we do?"

"Just what we have been planning on doing. We must win the election."

"Huh?" Kinnison's mouth almost fell open. "You say it easy. How? With whom? By what stretch of the imagination do you figure that you can find anybody with a loose enough mouth to out-lie and out-promise Morgan? And can you duplicate his machine?"

"We can not only duplicate his machine; we can better it. The truth, presented to the people in language they can understand and appreciate, by a man whom they like, admire, and respect, will be more attractive than Morgan's promises. The same truth will dispose of Morgan's lies."

"Well, go on. You've answered my questions, after a fashion, except the stinger. Does the Council think it's got a man with enough dynage to lift the load?"

"Unanimously. They also agreed unanimously that we have only one. Haven't you any idea who he is?"

"Not a glimmering of one." Kinnison frowned in thought, then his face cleared into a broad grin and he yelled: "What a damn fool I am—you, of course!"

"Wrong. I was not even seriously considered. It was the consensus that I could not possibly win. My work has been such as to keep me out of the public eye. If the man in the street thinks of me at all, he thinks that I hold myself apart and above him—the ivory tower concept."

"Could be, at that; but you've got my curiosity aroused. How can a man of that caliber have been kicking around so long without me knowing anything about him?"

"You do. That's what I've been working around to all afternoon. You."

"Huh?" Kinnison gasped as though he had received a blow in the solar plexus. "Me? ME? Hell's-Brazen-Hinges!"

"Exactly. You." Silencing Kinnison's inarticulate protests, Samms went on: "First, you'll have no difficulty in talking to an audience as you've just talked to me."

"Of course not—but did I use any language that would burn out the transmitters? I don't remember whether I did or not."

"I don't, either. You probably did, but that would be nothing new. Telenews has never yet cut you off the ether because of it. The point is this: while you do not realize it, you are a better tub-thumper and welkin-ringer than Morgan is, when something—such as just now—really gets you going. And as for a machine, what finer one is possible than the Patrol? Everybody in it or connected with it will support you to the hilt—you know that."

"Why, I … I suppose so … probably they would, yes."

"Do you know why?"

"Can't say that I do, unless it's because I treat them fair, so they do the same to me."

"Exactly. I don't say that everybody likes you, but I don't know of anybody who doesn't respect you. And, most important, everybody—all over space—knows 'Rod the Rock' Kinnison, and why he is called that."

"But that very 'man on horseback' thing may backfire on you, Virge."

"Perhaps—slightly—but we're not afraid of that. And finally, you said you'd like to kick Morgan from here to Andromeda. How would you like to kick him from Panama City to the North Pole?"

"I said it, and I wasn't just warming up my jets, either. I'd like it." The big Lensman's nostrils flared, his lips thinned. "By God, Virge, I will!"

"Thanks, Rod." With no display whatever of the emotion he felt, Samms skipped deliberately to the matter next in hand. "Now, about Eridan. Let's see if they know anything yet …

The report of Knobos and DalNalten was terse and exact. They had found—and that finding, so baldly put, could have filled and should fill a book—that Spaceways' uranium vessels were, beyond any reasonable doubt, hauling thionite from Eridan to the planets of Sol. Spy-rays being useless, they had considered the advisability of investigating Eridan in person, but had decided against such action. Eridan was closely held by Uranium, Incorporated. Its population was one hundred percent Tellurian human. Neither DalNalten nor Knobos could disguise himself well enough to work there. Either would be caught promptly, and as promptly shot.

"Thanks, fellows," Samms said, when it became evident that the brief report was done. Then, to Kinnison, "That puts it up to Conway Costigan. And Jack? Or Mase? Or both?"

"Both," Kinnison decided, "and anybody else they can use."

"I'll get them at it." Samms sent out thoughts. "And now, I wonder what that daughter of mine is doing? I'm a little worried about her, Rod. She's too cocky for her own good or strength. Some of these days she's going to bite off more than she can chew, if she hasn't already. The more we learn about Morgan, the less I like the idea of her working on Herkimer Herkimer Third. I've told her so, a dozen times, and why, but of course it didn't do any good."

"It wouldn't. The only way to develop teeth is to bite with 'em. You had to. So did I. Our kids have got to, too. We lived through it. So will they. As for Herky the Third…" He thought for moments, then went on: "Check. But she's done a job so far that nobody else could do. In spite of that fact, if it wasn't for our Lenses I'd say to pull her, if you have to heave the insubordinate young jade into the brig. But with the Lenses, and the way you watch her … to say nothing of Mase Northrop, and he's a lot of man … I can't see her getting in either very bad or very deep. Can you?"

"No, I can't." Samms admitted, but the thoughtful frown did not leave his face. He Lensed her: finding, as he had supposed, that she was at a party; dancing, as he had feared, with Senator Morgan's Number One Secretary.

"Hi, Dad!" she greeted him gaily, with no slightest change in the expression of the face turned so engagingly to her partner's. "I have the honor of reporting that all instruments are still dead-centering the green."

"And have you, by any chance, been paying any attention to what I have been telling your"

"Oh, lots," she assured him. "I've collected reams of data. He could be almost as much of a menace as he thinks he is, in some cases, but I haven't begun to slip yet. As I have told you all along, this is just a game, and we're both playing it strictly according to the rules."

"That's good. Keep it that way, my dear." Samms signed off and his daughter returned her full attention—never noticeably absent—to the handsome secretary.

The evening wore on. Miss Samms danced every dance; occasionally with one or another of the notables present, but usually with Herkimer Herkimer Third.

"A drink?" he asked. "A small, cold one?"

"Not so small, and
very
cold," she agreed, enthusiastically.

Glass in hand, Herkimer indicated a nearby doorway. "I just heard that our host has acquired a very old and very fine bronze—a Neptune. We should run an eye over it, don't you think?"

"By all means," she agreed again.

But as they passed through the shadowed portal the man's head perked to the right. "
There's
something you really ought to see, Jill!" he exclaimed. "Look!"

She looked. A young woman of her own height and build and with her own flamboyant hair, identical as to hair-do and as to every fine detail of dress and of ornamentation, glass in band, was strolling back into the ball-room!

Jill started to protest, but could not. In the brief moment of inaction the beam of a snub-nosed P-gun had played along her spine from hips to neck. She did not fall—he had given her a very mild jolt—but, rage as she would, she could neither struggle nor scream. And, after the fact, she knew.