Ferdias up to?'
I haven't any idea,” Birrel said. “But I hope to find out.'
'Politics,” said Brescnik disgustedly. “That's what it always is. You'll see.'
A flitter, with an orderly for pilot, took Birrel away from the base toward the big city in the distance, and on the way Birrel thought of what Brescnik had said. Brescnik's attitude was typical of most officers and men of the squadrons, including himself. It was also typical of a great many other people, and that was why the legislature was wary of opposing a popular governor like Ferdias. It had been called “the star-ship psychology,” this general, underlying feeling that one-man leadership was best in big affairs. The theory was that in the two hundred-year spread-out from Earth, the feeling of a ship commander, who was responsible for the safety of all on board, had carried over into the matter of government. And that feeling had been reinforced by the historical example of the United Worlds, whose headless council had soon lost control over the wider sphere.
Birrel looked down at the city. This was Old Town, a place of graceful, white roofs and cupolas and golden yellow trees and grass, and rambling, quaint (and dirty, he had to admit it) narrow streets. The native Vegans, Lyllin's people, had built it and it showed how far they had come from their fierce tribalistic-war state of centuries before. They might have got further on their own as time went on, but then the universe had crashed in upon them, the great wave that had started long ago from Earth and that was still rolling, not Earthmen only now, but all sorts of people from many worlds and of many blood-strains, all part of the space explosion. It was these newcomers who had built New Town, whose gleaming miles of metalloy and glass dwarfed the older quarter.
They had also built the enormous, massive structure he was going toward, the governmental buildings that flashed and glittered in the blue-white sunshine. A new building was being added to the nexus, Birrel noted. The place was always getting bigger, just as the Sector was always growing out into new star-fields, wherever it could do so. That thought brought the worry back into his mind, the uneasy apprehension that the rivalry between Sectors was getting dangerous, and his face lengthened.
He was landed on the roof of one of the buildings, and a lift took him down to a middle floor. He went through the corridors until, finally, efficient secretaries shunted him smoothly and quickly into a room few people ever entered.
It always seemed to Birrel a very tiny room to be the center of government of so many stars. For this, not the halls of the legislators, was the real center and everyone knew it.
'Stop saluting, Jay,” said Ferdias. “You know you're at ease when you step in here.'
Ferdias came around the desk. He limped, from the crash of a Class Nine trainer long ago. That crash had had fateful results. It had washed Ferdias out of the service, shattering his ambitions. He had had to turn all his terrific energy and drive into other channels, and he had chosen political ones. Everything other men thought necessary, a wife, a home, friends and fun, Ferdias had ignored, driving toward his goal. Birrel thought that he himself had done pretty well, to be leading a squadron at thirty-seven, but Ferdias was only six years older than that.
He was a small man. But, somehow, you never remembered that fact, nor his limp. You saw only his face and the searching, light-colored eyes, and, when you saw them, you began to understand why, at the age of forty-three, he was one of the five great Governors.
He held out his hand, smiling. Birrel sometimes felt that he was one of the few real friends Ferdias had, though why he should be he did not know. Anyway, he was not sure of it, you were never absolutely sure of anything with Ferdias.
'Now let's have it, Jay,” he said.
Birrel let him have it, the full story of the trap in the cluster. And Ferdias’ face got just a trifle tighter.
He said, finally, “You took foolhardy chances going in there alone. But since you got out all right, I'm glad you did it. For I'm sure now of what I only suspected before. In his eagerness to find out how much I know, Solleremos has told me what I wanted to know.'
Birrel, frankly puzzled, said, “I just don't get it. What is Ferdias planning to do about Earth? What in the world would you plan about it? Don't answer, if I'm out of line asking.'
Ferdias did not answer, not at once. He limped back to his chair and sat down, and then looked up keenly as he spoke.
'Jay, you're more than half Earth-blood, aren't you?'
Birrel nodded. “Three-quarters, to be exact. My father was straight Earth. My mother's parents were Earth and Capellan.'
And again, as so many times, he felt a passing sadness when he mentioned her. His father had died in that pile-up so long ago that he could hardly remember him, but he wished that his mother could have lived to see him commanding the Fifth. Somehow, even when you got what you most wanted, it never came out quite the way you expected.
Ferdias’ voice cut into his thoughts. “Tell me, how do you feel about Earth?'
Birrel stared. “What do you mean, feel about it?'
'Just that.'
Birrel shrugged. “Why, I've never been there. You know that — I was born in a transport off Arcturus and I've never been farther back in than Procyon.'
Ferdias persisted. “I know all that, yes. But what do you think about Earth?'
Birrel frowned, then made a gesture. “Just what everybody thinks, I suppose. It was an important place, once. Starflight began there — even we ourselves began there, in a way, those of us who have Earth blood. But that's all long ago. It hasn't rated for much since its United Worlds council tried to hold all the galaxy in one government and failed. No wonder they failed. It's hard enough to hold a Sector together, let alone the whole galaxy.'
'Suppose one of the Sectors decided to go back there and take over Earth,” said Ferdias.
Birrel felt a shock of astonishment. “Why, no Sector would touch the UW's little federal district for—” He stopped, looking at Ferdias, and then he said, “Or would they?'
'Solleremos would like to,” said Ferdias.
Birrel was so astounded that, for a moment, he just looked. “You mean, he wants to take Earth into Orion Sector?'
'He wants to very much indeed,” said the other. “Listen, Jay. Solleremos’ pressure on our borders recently has only been cover-up. Earth is his real objective.'
'But why in the world? It's a big name in history, but after all it's only one unimportant little star-system now.
'Is it so unimportant?” Ferdias’ eyes, hot and glaring now, fascinated Birrel. “Materially, maybe it is a wornout, third-rate planet. But psychologically, it's a very important world indeed. Think of the Earth-blood mingled in all the galaxy races now. All those people have, perhaps without altogether realizing it, about the same feeling toward Earth you have. They know it no longer directs things, they know the UW council and fleet are just a shadowy sham, but still it's Earth, it's the ancient center of things, the old heart-world. Suppose one of the other governors gets Earth into his Sector, and speaks from there hereafter?'
Birrel saw it now, and he also realized, not for the first time, that when it came to galactic intrigue he was a babe in arms. It would indeed give any of the rival governors a colossal psychological advantage, to make the old center of things his seat of government. Commands that came from Earth would have a psychological potency that would be hard to withstand.
He liked the shape of it less and less, as he thought about it. He looked at Ferdias, and said, I take it that you're not going to let Solleremos get away with this?'
'No, Jay. I don't want Earth. But I'm not going to let Orion Sector grab it, either.'
Ferdias went on, in his quick, incisive way. “Solleremos knows very well that I'll try to stop him. That's why he had Tauncer, his right-hand man, set that little trap in the cluster for you. They're quite aware that I trust you and they hoped I'd have told you just how I plan to block them.'
But he hadn't, Birrel could not help thinking. Ferdias had not told him a whisper of all this until now, when it was necessary. He had let him go into the cluster without knowing the real situation, and that had been wise because what he did not know he could not tell. But, in a way, it was an epitome of their years of relationship. He trusted Ferdias, all the way. But Ferdias, knowing that, still always held his own reservations, his own secrets.
It made Birrel feel a sudden resentment. But his irritation faded when he reflected that he did exactly the
