Stranger in a Strange Land (6 page)

She felt better when she snuggled into his arms. Ben was such a dear—maybe she should marry him. When she tried to speak he put a hand over her mouth, whispered, “Don't talk. I may be wired.”

She nodded, got out the recorder, handed it to him. His eyebrows went up but he made no comment. Instead he handed her a copy of the afternoon
Post
.

“Seen the paper?” he said in a natural voice. “You might glance at it while I wash up.”

“Thanks.” As she took it he pointed to a column, then left, taking with him the recorder. The column was Ben's own:

There was more of the same; Jill could see that Ben was baiting the administration, trying to force them into the open. She felt that Caxton was taking serious risk in challenging the authorities, but she had no notion of the size of the danger, nor what form it might take.

She thumbed through the paper. It was loaded with stories on the
Champion
, pictures of Secretary General Douglas pinning medals, interviews with Captain van Tromp and his brave company, pictures of Martians and Martian cities. There was little about Smith, merely a bulletin that he was improving slowly from the effects of his trip.

Ben came out and dropped sheets of onionskin in her lap. “Here's another newspaper.” He left again.

Jill saw that the “newspaper” was a transcription of what her first wire had picked up. It was marked “First Voice,” “Second Voice,” and so on, but Ben had written in names wherever he had been able to make attributions. He had written across the top: “All voices are masculine.”

Most items merely showed that Smith had been fed, washed, massaged and that he had exercised under supervision of a voice identified as “Doctor Nelson” and one marked “second doctor.”

One passage had nothing to do with care of the patient. Jill reread it:

Doctor Nelson: How are you feeling, boy? Strong enough to talk?

Smith: Yes.

Doctor Nelson: A man wants to talk to you.

Smith: (pause) Who? (Caxton had written: All of Smith's speeches are preceded by pauses.)

Nelson: This man is our great (untranscribable guttural word—Martian?). He is our oldest Old One. Will you talk with him?

Smith: (very long pause) I am great happy. The Old One will talk and I will listen and grow.

Nelson: No, no! He wants to ask you questions.

Smith: I cannot teach an Old One.

Nelson: The Old One wishes it. Will you let him ask you questions?

Smith: Yes.

(Background noises)

Nelson: This way, sir. I have Doctor Mahmoud standing by to translate.

Jill read “New Voice.” Caxton had scratched this out and written in: “Secretary General Douglas! ! !”

Secretary General: I won't need him. You say Smith understands English.

Nelson: Well, yes and no, Your Excellency. He knows a number of words, but, as Mahmoud says, he doesn't have any cultural context to hang them on. It can be confusing.

Secretary General: Oh, we'll get along, I'm sure. When I was a youngster I hitchhiked all through Brazil, without a word of Portuguese when I started. Now, if you will introduce us—then leave us alone.

Nelson: Sir? I had better stay with my patient.

Secretary General: Really, Doctor? I'm afraid I must insist. Sorry.

Nelson: And I am afraid that
I
must insist. Sorry, sir. Medical ethics—

Secretary General: (interrupting) As a lawyer, I know something of medical jurisprudence—so don't give me that “medical ethics” mumbo-jumbo. Did this patient select you?

Nelson: Not exactly, but—

Secretary General: Has he had opportunity to choose physicians? I doubt it. His status is ward of the state. I am acting as next of kin,
de facto
—and, you will find,
de jure
as well. I wish to interview him alone.

Nelson: (long pause, then very stiffly) If you put it that way, Your Excellency, I withdraw from the case.

Secretary General: Don't take it that way, Doctor. I'm not questioning your treatment. But you wouldn't try to keep a mother from seeing her son alone, now would you? Are you afraid I might hurt him?

Nelson: No, but—

Secretary General: Then what is your objection? Come now, introduce us and let's get on with it. This fussing may be upsetting your patient.

Nelson: Your Excellency, I will introduce you. Then you must select another doctor for your . . . ward.

Secretary General: I'm sorry, Doctor, I really am. I can't take that as final—we'll discuss it later. Now, if you please?

Nelson: Step over here, sir. Son, this is the man who wants to see you. Our great Old One.

Smith: (untranscribable)

Secretary General: What did he say?

Nelson: A respectful greeting. Mahmoud says it translates: “I am only an egg.” More or less that, anyway. It's friendly. Son, talk man-talk.

Smith: Yes.

Nelson: And you had better use simple words, if I may offer a last advice.

Secretary General: Oh, I will.

Nelson: Good-by, Your Excellency. Good-by, son.

Secretary General: Thanks, Doctor. See you later.

Secretary General: (continued) How do you feel?

Smith: Feel fine.

Secretary General: Good. Anything you want, just ask for it. We want you to be happy. Now I have something I want you to do for me. Can you write?

Smith: “Write”? What is “write”?

Secretary General: Well, your thumb print will do. I want to read a paper to you. This paper has a lot of lawyer talk, but stated simply it says that you agree that in leaving Mars you have abandoned—I mean, given up—any claims that you may have there. Understand me? You assign them in trust to the government.

Smith: (no answer)

Secretary General: Well, let's put it this way. You don't own Mars, do you?

Smith: (longish pause) I do not understand.

Secretary General: Mmm . . . let's try again. You want to stay here, don't you?

Smith: I do not know. I was sent by the Old Ones. (Long untranscribable speech, sounds like a bullfrog fighting a cat.)

Secretary General: Damn it, they should have taught him more English by now. See here, son, you don't have to worry. Just let me have your thumb print at the bottom of this page. Let me have your right hand. No, don't twist around that way.
Hold still!
I'm not going to hurt you . . .
Doctor!
Doctor Nelson!

Second Doctor: Yes, sir?

Secretary General: Get Doctor Nelson?

Second Doctor: Doctor Nelson? But he left, sir. He said you took him off the case.

Secretary General: Nelson said that?
Damn
him! Well,
do
something. Give him artificial respiration. Give him a shot. Don't just stand there—can't you see the man is dying?

Second Doctor: I don't believe there is anything to be done, sir. Just let him alone until he comes out of it. That's what Doctor Nelson always did.

Secretary General: Blast Doctor Nelson!

 

The Secretary General's voice did not appear again, nor that of Doctor Nelson. Jill could guess, from gossip she had picked up, that Smith had gone into one of his cataleptiform withdrawals. There were two more entries. One read: No need to whisper. He can't hear you. The other read: Take that tray away. We'll feed him when he comes out of it.

Jill was rereading it when Ben reappeared. He had more onionskin sheets but he did not offer them; instead he said, “Hungry?”

“Starved.”

“Let's go shoot a cow.”

He said nothing while they went to the roof and took a taxi, still kept quiet during a flight to Alexandria platform, where they switched cabs. Ben picked one with a Baltimore number. Once in the air he set it for Hagerstown, Maryland, then relaxed. “Now we can talk.”

“Ben, why the mystery?”

“Sorry, pretty foots. I don't
know
that my apartment is bugged—but if I can do it to them, they can do it to me. Likewise, while it isn't likely that a cab signaled from my flat would have an ear in it, still it might have; the Special Service squads are thorough. But this cab—” He patted its cushions. “They can't gimmick thousands of cabs. One picked at random should be safe.”

Jill shivered. “Ben, you don't think they would . . .” She let it trail off.

“Don't I, now! You saw my column. I filed that copy nine hours ago. You think the administration will let me kick it in the stomach without kicking back?”

“But you have always opposed this administration.”

“That's okay. This is different; I have accused them of holding a political prisoner. Jill, a government is a living organism. Like every living thing its prime characteristic is the instinct to survive. You hit it, it fights back. This time I've
really
hit it.” He added, “But I shouldn't have involved you.”

“I'm not afraid. Not since I turned that gadget back to you.”

“You're associated with me. If things get rough, that could be enough.”

Jill shut up. The notion that she, who had never experienced worse than a spanking as a child and an occasional harsh word as an adult, could be in danger was hard to believe. As a nurse, she had seen the consequences of ruthlessness—but it could not happen to
her.

Their cab was circling for a landing before she broke the moody silence. “Ben? Suppose this patient dies. What happens?”

“Huh?” He frowned. “That's a good question. If there are no other questions, the class is dismissed.”

“Don't be funny.”

“Hmm . . . Jill, I've been awake nights trying to answer that. Here are the best answers I have: If Smith dies, his claim to Mars vanishes. Probably the group the
Champion
left on Mars starts a new claim—and almost certainly the administration worked out a deal before they left Earth. The
Champion
is a Federation ship but it is possible that such a deal leaves all strings in the hands of Secretary General Douglas. That could keep him in power a long time. On the other hand, it might mean nothing at all.”

“Huh? Why?”

“The Larkin Decision might not apply. Luna was uninhabited, but Mars
is—
by Martians. At the moment, Martians are a legal zero. But the High Court might take a look at the political situation and decide that human occupancy meant nothing on a planet inhabited by non-humans. Then rights on Mars would have to be secured from the Martians.”

“But, Ben, that would be the case anyhow. This notion of a single man
owning
a planet . . . it's fantastic!”

“Don't use that word to a lawyer; straining at gnats and swallowing camels is a required course in law schools. Besides, there is precedent. In the fifteenth century the Pope deeded the western hemisphere to Spain and Portugal and nobody cared that the real estate was occupied by Indians with their own laws, customs, and property rights. His grant was effective, too. Look at a map and notice where Spanish is spoken and where Portuguese is spoken.”

“Yes, but—Ben, this isn't the fifteenth century.”

“It is to a lawyer. Jill, if the High Court rules that the Larkin Decision applies, Smith is in a position to grant concessions which may be worth millions, more likely billions. If he assigns his claim to the administration, then Secretary Douglas controls the plums.”

“Ben, why should anybody want that much power?”

“Why does a moth fly toward light? But Smith's financial holdings are almost as important as his position as nominal king-emperor of Mars. The High Court could knock out his squatter's rights but I doubt if anything could shake his ownership of the Lyle Drive and a chunk of Lunar Enterprises. What happens if he dies? A thousand alleged cousins would pop up, of course, but the Science Foundation has fought off such money-hungry vermin for years. It seems possible that, if Smith dies without a will, his fortune reverts to the state.”

“Do you mean the Federation or the United States?”

“Another question to which I have no answer. His parents come from two countries of the Federation and he was born outside them all . . . and it will make a crucial difference to some people who votes that stock and licenses those patents. It won't be Smith; he won't know a stock proxy from a traffic ticket. It is likely to be whoever can grab him and hang on. I doubt if Lloyd's would insure his life; he strikes me as a poor risk.”