The Outward Urge (20 page)

‘But how did you do it?’ Troon wanted to know, later on, when they were alone together.

‘Less difficult than you might think,’ Jayme told him. ‘We put parties aboard the two mothballed Satellites six months ago, and prepared them for action which we hoped would not be necessary. We infiltrated undercover groups both here and on the Moon Station. The rest was mostly a matter of suitable timing.

‘I made a mistake over Jorge, though. Perhaps I did not tell him enough. If he had had a better idea of the scale he’d very likely have played straight with us. However, its only effect was to delay the next phase of the operation; we did not want an alarm raised for fear the
Santa Maria
should be diverted, and we need her intact.

‘The radio operators were the key men in the takeover. A week ago, the one here, on Primeira, put over the internal speaker system a message announcing that the Moon Garrison had mutinied, imprisoned its officers, and called upon the Primeira crew to do the same. The moon operator put over a similar message, transposing the places. Both of them put their radios temporarily out of action, for safety, but continued to announce previously concocted messages over the internal system. During this stage, small shuttle-type rockets that we have been holding at the other Satellites appeared close to Primeira, and one landed close to the Moon Station.

‘Well, as you know, the Space Force was shot through with disaffection. Our undercover groups had worked on the men, and not found it very difficult. They were organized and ready, and were able to take over with very little trouble. Those who wouldn’t join us have been transported to one of the mothball Satellites pro tem. The only thing that had gone wrong was at your end. The
Santa Maria
was on the way back here. If we made an announcement she would be diverted; in which case we should lose not only your valuable selves, but a very valuable ship. So we made no announcement. We reopened radio communications with excuses about electrical interference, and resumed routine messages as though nothing had happened. We have been bluffing for a week while we waited for you and the
Santa Maria
- and during that time we have acquired a couple of shuttles of provisions as well.

‘But in an hour or so now, the news will be broadcast. Camarello and our cousin Jorge have gone over to join the rest of the unpersuadables on the minor Satellite where they will remain until their government sends a ship to fetch them. The exact date and time for that will depend on how long it takes to sink into the official Rio minds that Space is no longer a Province of Brazil.’

Troon thought the position over silently for some moments, then he said:

‘I had no idea you were brewing anything on such a scale as this, Jayme.’

‘Perhaps I should apologize to you for that, George, but it seemed wise to keep the compartments of the plan separate, as far as possible. And I think it was - it spared you the necessity of acting, and the need to watch yourself for slips.’

‘But now the operation is complete, and you are all set to spring it on them that space has become a State of Australia - ‘

‘A State of Australia!’ exclaimed Jayme. ‘Good God, man, do you think I want to start a war between Brazil and Australia? Certainly not! Space will declare itself an independent territory - if the use of the word “territory” is valid in the circumstances.’

Troon stared at him.

‘Independent! For heaven’s sake, Jayme, space is - well, I mean, out here, in nothing, like this. I never - why, it’s utterly impossible, Jayme! ‘

Jayme Gonveia smiled gently, and shook his head.

‘On the contrary, George. If you will consider the original
raison d’êt
re of the Satellites and the Moon Station, I think you will see that space, as an entity, is in an excellent position to propose terms. One day it may be in a position to do a useful trade, but until then, it can at least be the policeman of the world - and a policeman is worthy of his hire.’ George Troon continued to gaze reflectively at the floor for a full minute. When he looked up, his expression had lost its incredulity. He did not speak, but Jayme Gonveia replied as if he had.

‘Yes, George,’ he said. ‘From today, your gnat-voices are just a little closer.’

Authors note: The “space story” (the one science caught up with) was originally concerned with the techniques of space travel - with our ability to manufacture and control what we now call “the hardware” of space flight. The “planet story” has traditionally been rollicking-romance-adventure (prototypically. Burroughs’ “
Princess of Mars
.”) Both of these varieties dealt primarily with man’s effect on the environments of space. A third type, and indeed the earliest one, has been the philosophic novel, in which the space (or, most usually. Moon, setting) was essentially a stage for a passion play; in these there was no real interaction; the voyageur was primarily an observer.

Now, more and more, writers confronted by the imminence of space travel, are considering the effects of the trip into the unknown on mankind. One hears the old phrase, the “conquest of space,” less frequently now. That there will be immediate and perhaps profound effects on us, physiologically and culturally, is clear; equally obvious, but much less clear-cut, are the potential effects on our psychology, philosophy, religion, and mystique.

My first visit to New Caledonia was in the summer of 2199. At that time an exploration party under the leadership of Gilbert Troon was cautiously pushing its way up the less radio-active parts of Italy, investigating the prospects of reclamation. My firm felt that there might be a popular book in it, and assigned me to put the proposition to Gilbert. When I arrived, however, it was to find that he had been delayed, and was now expected a week later. I was not at all displeased. A few days of comfortable laziness on a Pacific island, all paid for and counting as work, is the kind of perquisite I like.

New Caledonia is a fascinating spot, and well worth the trouble of getting a landing permit - if you can get one. It has more of the past - and more of the future, too, for that matter - than any other place, and somehow it manages to keep them almost separate.

At one time the island, and the group, were, in spite of the name, a French colony. But in 2044, with the eclipse of Europe in the Great Northern War, it found itself, like other ex-colonies dotted all about the world, suddenly thrown upon its own resources. While most mainland colonies hurried to make treaties with their nearest powerful neighbours, many islands such as New Caledonia had little to offer and not much to fear, and so let things drift.

For two generations the surviving nations were far too occupied by the tasks of bringing equilibrium to a half-wrecked world to take any interest in scattered islands. It was not until the Brazilians began to see Australia as a possible challenger of their supremacy that they started a policy of unobtrusive, and tactfully mercantile, expansion into the Pacific. Then, naturally, it occurred to the Australians, too, that it was time to begin to extend their economic influence over various island-groups.

The New Caledonians resisted infiltration. They had found independence congenial, and steadily rebuffed temptations by both parties. The year 2144, in which Space declared for independence, found them still resisting; but the pressure was now considerable. They had watched one group of islands after another succumb to trade preferences, and thereafter virtually slide back to colonial status, and they now found it difficult to doubt that before long the same would happen to themselves when, whatever the form of words, they should be annexed - most likely by the Australians in order to forestall the establishment of a Brazilian base there, within a thousand miles of the coast.

It was into this situation that Jayme Gonveia, speaking for Space, stepped in 2150 with a suggestion of his own. He offered the New Caledonians guaranteed independence of either big Power, a considerable quantity of cash, and a prosperous future if they would grant Space a lease of territory which would become its Earth headquarters and main terminus.

The proposition was not altogether to the New Caledonian taste, but it was better than the alternatives. They accepted, and the construction of the Spaceyards was begun.

Since then the island has lived in a curious symbiosis. In the north are the rocket landing and dispatch stages, warehouses and engineering shops, and a way of life furnished with all modem techniques, while the other four-fifths of the island all but ignores it, and contentedly lives much as it did two and a half centuries ago. Such a state of affairs cannot be preserved by accident in this world. It is the result of careful contrivance both by the New Caledonians who like it that way, and by Space which dislikes outsiders taking too close an interest in its affairs. So, for permission to land anywhere in the group, one needs hard-won visas from both authorities. The result is no exploitation by tourists or salesmen, and a scarcity of strangers.

However, there I was, with an unexpected week of leisure to put in, and no reason why I should spend it in Space-Concession territory. One of the secretaries suggested Lahua, down in the south at no great distance from Noumea, the capital, as a restful spot, so thither I went.

Lahua has picture-book charm. It is a small fishing town, half-tropical, half-French. On its wide white beach there are still canoes, working canoes, as well as modern. At one end of the curve a mole gives shelter for a small anchorage, and there the palms that fringe the rest of the shore stop to make room for a town.

Many of Lahua’s houses are improved-traditional, still thatched with palm, but its heart is a cobbled rectangle surrounded by entirely untropical houses, known as the Grande Place. Here are shops, pavement cafes, stalls of fruit under bright striped awnings guarded by Gauguinesque women, a state of Bougainville, an atrociously ugly church on the east side, a
pissoir
, and even a
mairie
. The whole thing might have been imported complete from early twentieth-century France, except for the inhabitants - but even they, some in bright sarongs, some in European clothes, must have looked much the same when France ruled there.

I found it difficult to believe that they are real people living real lives. For the first day I was constantly accompanied by the feeling that an unseen director would suddenly call ‘Cut’, and it would all come to a stop. On the second morning I was growing more used to it. I bathed, and then with a sense that I was beginning to get the feel of the life, drifted to the place, in search of aperitif. I chose a cafe on the south side where a few trees shaded the tables, and wondered what to order. My usual drinks seemed out of key. A dusky, brightly saronged girl approached. On an impulse, and feeling like a character out of a very old novel I suggested a pernod. She took it as a matter of course.

‘Un pernod? Certainement, monsieur,’
she told me.

I sat there looking across the Square, less busy now that the dejeuner hour was close, wondering what Sydney and Rio, Adelaide and Sao Paulo had gained and lost since they had been the size of Lahua, and doubting the value of the gains....

The pernod arrived. I watched it cloud with water, and sipped it cautiously. An odd drink, scarcely calculated, I felt, to enhance the appetite. As I contemplated it a voice spoke from behind my right shoulder.

‘An island product, but from the original recipe,’ it said. ‘Quite safe, in moderation, I assure you.’

I turned in my chair. The speaker was seated at the next table; a well-built, compact, sandy-haired man, dressed in a spotless white suit, a panama hat with a coloured band, and wearing a neatly trimmed, pointed beard. I guessed his age at about thirty-four though the grey eyes that met my own looked older, more experienced, and troubled.

‘A taste that I have not had the opportunity to acquire,’ I told him. He nodded.

‘You won’t find it outside. In some ways we are a museum here, but little the worse, I think, for that.’

‘One of the later Muses,’ I suggested. ‘The Muse of Recent History. And very fascinating, too.’

I became aware that one or two men at tables within earshot were paying us - or rather me - some attention; their expressions were not unfriendly, but they showed what seemed to be traces of concern.

‘It is - ‘ my neighbour began to reply, and then broke off, cut short by a rumble in the sky.

I turned to see a slender white spire stabbing up into the blue overhead. Already, by the time the sound reached us, the rocket at its apex was too small to be visible. The man cocked an eye at it.

‘Moon-shuttle,’ he observed.

‘They all sound and look alike to me,’ I admitted.

‘They wouldn’t if you were inside. The acceleration in that shuttle would spread you all over the floor - very thinly,’ he said, and then went on: ‘We don’t often see strangers in Lahua. Perhaps you would care to give me the pleasure of your company for luncheon? My name, by the way, is George.’

I hesitated, and while I did I noticed over his shoulder an elderly man who moved his lips slightly as he gave me what was without doubt an encouraging nod. I decided to take a chance on it.

‘That’s very kind of you. My name is David - David Myford, from Sydney,’ I told him. But he made no amplification regarding himself, so I was left wondering whether George was his forename, or his surname.

I moved to his table, and he lifted a hand to summon the girl.

‘Unless you are averse to fish you must try the bouillabaisse -
spécialité de la maison
,’ he told me.

I was aware that I had gained the approval of the elderly man, and apparently of some others as well, by joining George. The waitress, too, had an approving air. I wondered vaguely what was going on, and whether I had been let in for the town bore, to protect the rest.

The ‘From Sydney,’ he said reflectively. ‘It’s a long time since I saw Sydney. I don’t suppose I’d know it now.’