Hoddan stared blankly at nothing. As an event, it was preposterous, and yet it was wholly natural. When in the course of human events somebody does something that puts somebody else to the trouble of adjusting the numb routine of his life, the adjustee is resentful. The richer he is and the more satisfactory he considers his life, the more resentful he is at any change, however minute. And of all the changes which offend people, changes which require them to think are most disliked. The high bra.s.s on the Power Board considered that everything was moving smoothly. There was no need to consider new devices.
Hoddan"s drawings and plans had simply never been bothered with, because there was no recognized need for them. And when he forced acknowledgment that his receptor worked, the unwelcome demonstration was highly offensive in itself. It was natural, it was inevitable, it should have been infallibly certain that any possible excuse for not thinking about the receptor would be seized upon. And a single dead man found near the operating demonstrator . . . Now, if one a.s.sumed that the demonstrator had killed him, why one could react emotionally, feel vast indignation, frantically command that the device and its inventor be suppressed together-and then go on living happily without doing any thinking or making any other change in anything at all.
Hoddan was appalled. Now that it had happened, he could see that it had to. The world of Walden was at the very peak of human culture. It had arrived at so splendid a plane of civilization that n.o.body could imagine any improvement; unless a better tranquilizer could be designed to make the boredom more endurable. n.o.body can want anything he doesn"t know exists, or that he can"t imagine to exist. On Walden n.o.body wanted anything, unless it was relief from the tedium of ultra-civilized life. Hoddan"s electronic device did not fill a human need, only a technical one. It had, therefore, no value that would make anybody hospitable to it.
And Hoddan would spend his life in jail for failing to recognize this fact soon enough.
He revolted immediately.Hewanted something! He wanted out. He set about designing his escape. He put his mind to work on the problem, simply and directly. And this time he would not make the mistake of furnishing other people with what they did not want. He took the view that he mustseem,at least, to give his captors and jailers and-as he saw it-his persecutors, what they wanted.
They would be pleased to have him dead, provided their consciences were clear. He built on that as a foundation.
Very shortly before nightfall he performed certain cryptic actions. He unraveled threads from his shirt and put them aside. There would be a vision-lens in the ceiling of his cell, and somebody would certainly notice what he did. He turned on a light. He put the threads in his mouth, set fire to his mattress, and lay down calmly upon it. The mattress was of excellent quality. It would smell very badly as it smoldered.
It did. Lying flat, he kicked convulsively for a few seconds. He looked like somebody who had taken poison. Then he waited.
It was a long time before his jailer came down the corridor, dragging a fire hose. Hoddan had been correct in a.s.suming that he was watched. His actions had been those of a man who"d antic.i.p.ated a possible need to commit suicide, and who"d had poison in a part of his shirt for convenience. The jailer did not hurry, because if the inventor of a death ray committed suicide, everybody would feel better.
Hoddan had been allowed a reasonable time in which to die.
He seemed impressively dead when the jailer opened his cell door, dragged him out, removed the so-far-unscorched other furniture, and set up the fire hose to make an aerosol fog which would put out the fire. He went back to the corridor to wait for the fire to be extinguished.
Hoddan crowned him with a stool, feeling an unexpected satisfaction in the act. The jailer collapsed.
He did not carry keys. The system was for him to be let out of this corridor by a guard outside. Hoddan took the fire hose. He turned its nozzle back to make a stream instead of a mist. Water came out at four hundred pounds pressure. He smashed open the corridor door with it. He strolled through and bowled over a startled guard with the same stream. He took the guard"s stun-pistol. He washed open another door leading to the courtyard. He marched out, washed down two guards who sighted him, and took the trouble to flush them across the pavement until they wedged in a drain opening. Then he thoughtfully reset the hose to fill the courtyard with fog, climbed into the driver"s seat of a parked truck, started it, and smashed through the gateway to the street outside. Behind him, the courtyard filled with dense white mist.
He was free, but only temporarily. Around him lay the capital city of Walden-the highest civilization in this part of the galaxy. Trees lined its ways. Towers rose splendidly toward the skies, with thousands of less ambitious structures in between. There were open squares and parkways and malls, and it did not smell like a city at all. But he wasn"t loose three minutes before the communicator in the truck squawked the all-police alarm for him.
It was to be expected. All the city would shortly be one enormous man trap, set to catch Bron Hoddan.
There was only one place on the planet, in fact, where he could be safe. And ironically, he wouldn"t have been safe there if he"d been officially charged with murder. But since the police had tactfully failed to mention murder, he could get at least breathing-time by taking refuge in the Interstellar Emba.s.sy.
He headed for it, bowling along splendidly. The police truck hummed on its way until the great open square before the emba.s.sy became visible. The emba.s.sy was not that of a single planet, of course. By pure necessity every human-inhabited world was independent of all others, but the Interstellar Diplomatic Service represented humanity at large upon each individual globe. Its amba.s.sador was the only person who Hoddan could even imagine as listening to him, and that because he came from off-planet, as Hoddan did. But he mainly counted upon a breathing-s.p.a.ce in the emba.s.sy, during which to make more plans as yet unformed and unformable. He began, though, to see some virtues in the simple, lawless, piratical world on which he had spent his childhood.
Another police truck rushed frantically toward him down a side street. Stun-pistols made little pinging noises against the body of his vehicle. He put on more speed, but the other truck overtook him. It ranged alongside, its occupants bellowing stern commands to halt. And then, just before they swerved to force him off the highway, he swung instead and they crashed thunderously. One of his own wheels collapsed.
He drove on with the crumpled wheel producing an up-and-down motion that threatened to make him seasick. Then he heard yelling behind him. The cops had piled out of the truck and were in pursuit on foot.
The tall, stone wall of the emba.s.sy was visible, now, beyond the monument to the first settlers of Walden. He leaped to the ground and ran. Stun-pistol bolts, a little beyond their effective range, stung like fire. They spurred him on.
The gate of the emba.s.sy was closed. He bolted around the corner and scrambled up the conveniently rugged stones of the wall. He was well aloft before the cops spotted him. Then they fired at him industriously and the charges crackled all around him.
But he"d reached the top and had both arms over the parapet before a charge hit his legs and paralyzed them. He hung fast, swearing at his bad luck.
Then hands grasped his wrists. A white-haired man appeared on the other side of the parapet. He took a good, solid grip, and heaved. He drew Hoddan over the top of the wall and helped him down to the walkway.
"A near thing, that!" said the white-haired man pleasantly. "I was taking a walk in the garden when I heard the excitement. I got to the wall just in time." He paused, and added, "I do hope you"re not just a common murderer, we can"t offer asylum to such. But if you"re a political offender . . ."
Hoddan began to try to rub sensation and usefulness back into his legs. Feeling came back, and was not pleasant.
"I"m the Interstellar Amba.s.sador," said the white-haired man politely.
"My name," said Hoddan bitterly "is Bron Hoddan and I"m guilty of trying to save the Power Board millions of credits a year." Then he said more bitterly, "If you want to know, I ran away from Zan to try to be a civilized man and live a civilized life. It was a mistake. Now I"m to be permanently jailed for using my brains!"
The amba.s.sador c.o.c.ked his head thoughtfully to one side.
"Zan?" he said. "The name Hoddan fits with that somehow . . . Oh, yes! s.p.a.ce-piracy! They say the people of Zan capture and loot a dozen or so ships a year, only there"s no way to prove it on them. And there"s a man named Hoddan who"s supposed to head a particularly ruffianly gang."
"My grandfather," said Hoddan defiantly. "What are you going to do about it? I"m outlawed! I"ve defied the planetary government! I"m disreputable by descent, and worst of all I"ve tried to use my brains!"
"Deplorable!" said the amba.s.sador mildly. "I don"t mean outlawry is deplorable, you understand, or defiance of the government, or being disreputable. But trying to use one"s brains is bad business! A serious offense! Are your legs all right now? Then come on down with me and I"ll have you given some dinner and some fresh clothing. Offhand," he added amiably, "it would seem that using one"s brains would be cla.s.sed as a political offense rather than a criminal one on Walden. We"ll see."
Hoddan gaped up at him.
"You mean there"s a possibility that-"
"Of course!" said the amba.s.sador in surprise. "You haven"t phrased it that way, but you"re actually a rebel. A revolutionist. You defy authority and tradition and governments and such things. Naturally the Interstellar Diplomatic Service is inclined to be on your side. What do you think it"s for?"
Chapter 2.
In something under two hours Hoddan was ushered into the amba.s.sador"s office. He"d been refreshed, his torn clothing replaced by more respectable garments, and the places where stun-pistols had stung him, soothed by ointments.
But, more important, he"d worked out and firmly adopted a new point of view.
He"d been a misfit at home on Zan. He was not contented with the humdrum and monotonous life as a member of a s.p.a.ce-pirate community. Piracy was a matter of dangerous take-offs in cranky rocket ships, to be followed by weeks or months of tedious and uncomfortable boredom in highly unhealthy re-breathed air. No voyage ever contained more than ten seconds of satisfactory action. All fighting took place just out of the atmosphere of the embattled planet. Regardless of the result of the fight, the pirates had to get away fast when it was over, lest overwhelming forces swarm up from the nearby world. It was intolerably devoid of anything an ambitious young man would want.
Even when one had made a good prize-with the life-boats of the foreign ship darting frantically for ground-and even after one got back to Zan with the captured ship, even then there was little satisfaction to a pirate"s career. Zan had not a large population. Piracy couldn"t support a large number of people.
Zan couldn"t attempt to defend itself against even single, heavily armed ships that sometimes came in pa.s.sionate resolve to avenge the disappearance of a rich freighter or a fast, new liner. So the people of Zan, to avoid being hanged, had to play innocent. They had to be convincingly simple, harmless folk who cultivated their fields and lived quiet, blameless lives. They might loot, but they couldn"t use their loot where investigators could find it. They had to build their own houses and make their own furniture and grow their own food. So life on Zan was dull. Piracy was not profitable in the sense that one could live well by it. It simply wasn"t a trade for anybody like Hoddan.
So he"d abandoned all that. He"d studied electronics in books looted from pa.s.senger-ship libraries.
Within months after his arrival on a law-abiding planet, he was able to earn a living at electronics as an honest trade.
And that was unsatisfactory, too. Law-abiding communities were no more thrilling or rewarding than piratical ones. A payday now and then did not make up for the tedium of earning. Even when one had money there was not much to do with it. On Walden, to be sure, the level of civilization was so high that most people took to psychiatric treatments so they could stand it, and the neurotics vastly out-numbered the more normal folk. But on Walden, electronics was only a way to make a living, like piracy, and there was no more fun to be had out of being civilized.
What Hoddan craved, of course, was a sense of achievement. Technically, there were opportunities all about him. He"d developed one, and it would save millions of credits a year if it were adopted. But it did not happen to be anything that anybody wanted. He"d tried to force its use and he was in trouble. Now he saw clearly that a law-abiding world was no more satisfactory than a piratical one.
The amba.s.sador received him with a cordial wave of the hand.
"Things move fast," he said cheerfully. "You weren"t here half an hour before there was a police captain at the gate. He explained that an excessively dangerous criminal had escaped jail and been seen climbing the emba.s.sy wall. He very generously offered to bring some men in and capture you and take you away-with my permission, of course. He was shocked when I declined."
"I can understand that," said Hoddan.
"By the way," said the amba.s.sador. "Young men like yourself . . . Ah . . . is there a girl involved in this?"
Hoddan considered.
"A girl"s father," he acknowledged, "is the real complainant against me."
"Does he complain," asked the amba.s.sador, "because you want to marry her, or because you don"t?"
"Neither," Hoddan told him. "She hasn"t quite decided that I"m worth defying her rich father for."
"Good!" said the amba.s.sador. "It can"t be too bad a mess while a woman is being really practical. I"ve checked your story. Allowing for differences of viewpoint, it agrees with the official version. I"ve ruled that you are a political refugee, and so ent.i.tled to sanctuary in the emba.s.sy. And that"s that."
"Thank you, sir," said Hoddan.
"There"s no question about the crime," observed the amba.s.sador, "or that it is primarily political. You proposed to improve a technical process in a society which considers itself beyond improvement. If you"d succeeded, the idea of change would have spread, people now poor would have gotten rich, people now rich would have gotten poor, and you"d have done what all governments are established to prevent. So you"ll never be able to walk the streets of this planet again in safety. You"ve scared people."
"Yes, sir," said Hoddan. "It"s been an unpleasant surprise to them, to be scared."
The amba.s.sador put the tips of his fingers together.
"Do you realize," he asked, "that the whole purpose of civilization is to take the surprises out of life, so one can be bored to death? That a culture in which nothing unexpected ever happens is in what is called its "golden age"? That when n.o.body can even imagine anything happening unexpectedly, that they later fondly refer to that period as the "good old days"?"
"I hadn"t thought of it in just those words, sir."
"It is one of the most avoided facts of life," said the amba.s.sador. "Government, in the local or planetary sense of the word, is an organization for the suppression of adventure. Taxes are, in part, the insurance premiums one pays for protection against the unpredictable. And your act has been an offense against everything that is the foundation of a stable, orderly and d.a.m.nably tedious way of life-against civilization, in fact."
Hoddan frowned.
"Yet, you"ve granted me asylum."
"Naturally!" said the amba.s.sador. "The Diplomatic Service works for the welfare of humanity. That doesn"t mean stuffiness. A golden age in any civilization is always followed by collapse. In ancient days savages came and camped outside the walls of super-civilized towns. They were unwashed, unmannerly, and unsanitary. Super-civilized people refused even to think about them! So presently the savages stormed the city walls and another civilization went up in flames."
"But now," objected Hoddan, "there are no savages."
"They invent themselves," the amba.s.sador told him. "My point is that the Diplomatic Service cherishes individuals and causes which battle stuffiness and complacency and golden ages and monstrous things like that. Not thieves, of course. They"re degradation, like body-lice. But rebels and crackpots and revolutionaries who prevent hardening of the arteries of commerce and furnish wholesome exercise to the body politic-they"re worth cherishing!"
"I think I see, sir," said Hoddan.
"I hope you do," said the amba.s.sador. "My action on your behalf is pure diplomatic policy. To encourage the dissatisfied is to insure against the menace of universal satisfaction. Walden is in a bad way. You are the most encouraging thing that has happened here in a long time. And you"re not a native."
"No-o-o," agreed Hoddan. "I come from Zan."
"Never mind." The amba.s.sador turned to a stellar atlas. "Consider yourself a good symptom, and valued as such. If you could start a contagion, you"d be doing a service to your fellow citizens. Savages can always invent themselves. But enough . . . let us set about your affairs." He consulted the atlas. "Where would you like to go, since you must leave Walden?"
"Not too far, sir."
"The girl, eh?" The amba.s.sador did not smile. He ran his finger down a page. "The nearest inhabited worlds are Krim and Darth. Krim is a place of lively commercial activity, where an electronics engineer should easily find employment. It is said to be progressive and there is much organized research."
"I wouldn"t want to be a kept engineer, sir," said Hoddan apologetically. "I"d rather-well-putter on my own."
"Impractical, but sensible," commented the amba.s.sador. He turned a page. "There"s Darth. Its social system is practically feudal. It"s technically backward. There"s a landing-grid, but s.p.a.ce-exports are skins and metal ingots and practically nothing else. There is no broadcast power. Strangers find the local customs difficult. There is no town larger than twenty thousand people, and few approach that size. Most settled places are mere villages near some feudal castle, and roads are so few and bad that wheeled transport is rare."
He leaned back and said in a detached voice: "I had a letter from there a couple of months ago. It was rather arrogant. The writer was one Don Loris, and he explained that his dignity would not let him make a commercial offer, but an electronic engineer who put himself under his protection would not be the loser. Are you interested? No kings on Darth, just feudal chiefs."
Hoddan thought it over.
"I"ll go to Darth," he decided. "It"s bound to be better than Zan, and it can"t be worse than Walden."
The amba.s.sador looked impa.s.sive. An emba.s.sy servant came in and offered an indoor communicator.
The amba.s.sador put it to his ear. After a moment he said: "Show him in." He turned to Hoddan. "You did kick up a storm! The Minister of State, no less, is here to demand your surrender. I"ll counter with a formal request for an exit permit. I"ll talk to you again when he leaves."
Hoddan went out. He paced up and down the other room into which he was shown. Darth wouldn"t be in a golden age! He was wiser now than he"d been just this morning. He recognized that he"d made mistakes. Now he could see rather ruefully how completely improbable it was that anybody could put across a technical device merely by proving its value, without first making anybody want it. He shook his head regretfully at the blunder.
The amba.s.sador sent for him.
"I"ve had a pleasant time," he told Hoddan genially. "There was a beautiful row. You"ve really scared people, Hoddan. You deserve well of the republic. Every government and every person needs to be thoroughly terrified occasionally. It limbers up the brain."
"Yes, sir," said Hoddan. "I"ve-"
"The planetary government," said the amba.s.sador with relish, "insists that you have to be locked up with the key thrown away. It seems you know how to make death rays. I said it was nonsense, and you were a political refugee in sanctuary. The Minister of State said the Cabinet would consider removing you forcibly from the emba.s.sy if you weren"t surrendered. I said that if the emba.s.sy were violated, no ship would clear for Walden from any other civilized planet. They wouldn"t like losing their off-planet trade!
Then he said that the government would not give you an exit permit, and that he would hold me personally responsible if you killed everybody on Walden, including himself and me. I said he insulted me by suggesting that I"d permit such shenanigans. He said the government would take an extremely grave view of my att.i.tude, and I said they would be silly if they did. Then he went off with great dignity-but shaking with panic-to think up more nonsense."
"Evidently," said Hoddan in relief, "you believe me when I say that my gadget doesn"t make death rays."
The amba.s.sador looked slightly embarra.s.sed.
"To be honest," he admitted, "I"ve no doubt that you invented it independently, but they"ve been using such a device for half a century in the Cetis cl.u.s.ter. They"ve had no trouble."
Hoddan winced.
"Did you tell the minister that?"
"Hardly," said the amba.s.sador. "It would have done you no good. You"re in open revolt and have performed overt acts of violence against the police. It was impolite enough for me to suggest that the local government was stupid. It would have been most undiplomatic to prove it."
Hoddan did not feel very proud, just then.
"I"m thinking that the cops-quite unofficially-might try to kidnap me from the emba.s.sy. They"ll deny that they tried, especially if they manage it. But I think they"ll try."
"Very likely," said the amba.s.sador. "We"ll take precautions."
"I"d like to make something-not lethal-just in case," said Hoddan. "If you can trust me not to make death rays, I"d like to make a generator of odd-shaped microwaves. They"re described in textbooks.
They ionize the air where they strike. That"s all. They make air a high-resistance conductor. Nothing more than that."
The amba.s.sador said: "There was an old-fashioned way to make ozone . . ." When Hoddan nodded, a little surprised, the amba.s.sador said, "By all means go ahead! You should be able to get parts from your room vision-receiver. I"ll have some tools given you." Then he added, "Diplomacy has to understand the things that control events. Once it was social position. For a time it was weapons. Then it was commerce. Now it"s technology. But I wonder how you"ll use the ionization of air to protect yourself from kidnapers?