Ronny chuckled wryly. “The term is
He earned their disbelieving stares.
Phil Birdman blurted, “Why didn’t you slap one of them across the chops? That would have got a rise.”
Ronny looked at him. “I didn’t think of that.” He paused. Then, “You wouldn’t have, either. Somehow, there’s a no-touch feeling in the air.”
“Why didn’t you put the lift on one of the converters, or whatever they are?”
Ronny scowled, “I don’t know. The no-touch atmosphere entered into that, too.”
Takashi said, “There is the Phrygian ship.”
They brought it into the large screen.
“No sign of a fight, or anything,” Phil Birdman said. The space yacht was at rest in a lovely dell. Voids looked at the Section G operatives. Ronny took a breath and said, “All right. Set down next to them.” He looked at the
The young ensign was embarrassed. “Yes, sir. Sorry about our earlier difficulties, sir.”
Ronny said, “Richardson and I will go over and case the situation. I’ll keep my communicator on, and in constant touch. Anything goes wrong, you take off. Birdman will be in charge. Does Wyler know that Citizeness Daniels is aboard?”
“I talked with Uncle Max,” she said worriedly. “Can’t I go with you?”
“Not yet,” he said apologetically. “I’m afraid you’re still a hostage. I doubt if he’ll attack the
Rita shook her head. “He wouldn’t attack it, anyway. Something terrible has happened.”
“We’ll see,” Ronny said. “Come on, Ensign.” Takashi saw them through the lock, and closed it behind. They crossed the seemingly neatly trimmed grass to the other craft. Ronny looked it over. A luxurious, highly powered yacht, probably as fast as anything UP could produce. And, obviously, well-armed to boot.
He had expected to be met by well disciplined, nattily uniformed spacemen of the Phrygian space forces, but instead, Count Fitzjames was the only one at the lock to greet them.
Ronny made a brief introduction, not hiding the fact that he was holding his communicator up. His right hand was ready for a quick draw.
Count Fitzjames said, the usual worry in his voice, “The Supreme Commandant is in his lounge. This way.”
Baron Wyler was indeed in the lounge. He was sprawled, as though exhausted, in a deep chair. His eyes were wide and unseeing, and there was despair in his face. Ronny stood before him and he looked up. There was no more of the hail-fellow-well-met tone of voice. No friendly projection of personality, no all-embracing charm of the born leader of men.
Ronny and Ensign Richardson had seen no others on their way through the ship. It came to Ronny that whatever had happened, this was no trap. Neither Wyler nor Fitzjames were shamming. Somehow, their expedition had become a cropper.
“All right,” Ronny said. “What happened? What did you mean when you radioed us for help?”
The Baron said wearily, “I can’t navigate this craft, nor can the Count. We have no way of getting back.”
Ronny stared at him. “Where’s your crew?”
“They’ve evidently been sacrificed to the gods—or something along that line. Cutting the heart out with what looked like an obsidian knife!” A spasm of horror went over the former strongman’s face.
The Baron didn’t seem to be particularly coherent. Ronny sat himself down and looked at the scholarly Count. “Suppose you bring me up to date.”
“I am not sure I can, in complete detail; but I have a theory.”
“All right, take your time. Richardson, take a look through the ship.”
Richardson left.
“The Count said unhappily, “I am not quite sure where to start.” He looked into Ronny’s face. “Citizen Bronston, has it ever occurred to you that perhaps primitive man, say Cro-Magnon man, might have been more intelligent than modern man?” He hurried on before getting an answer. “Don’t confuse intelligence with accumulated knowledge. You can take a man with an I.Q. of ninety and fill him with a great deal of accumulated knowledge. Keep at it long enough and you can get him a doctor’s degree. On the other hand, you can take a man with an I.Q. of 150 and place him in the right—or rather, the wrong—surroundings and he’ll wind up with very little education at all. He’ll be smart, but will possess little accumulated knowledge.
“In primitive times, if a man was slow in the head, he died. The race needed better brains and bred for them. But as we solved the problems of defense against other animals and against nature, as we learned to feed, clothe and shelter ourselves, the need became less pressing. Our less intelligent survived, and lived to breed. Finally we achieved to the point where there was an abundance of everything for all, and the need of having superior brains fell away. No longer were the most brainy in the community given the best food, the best women—the best the community could offer in all desirable things. They were no longer at a premium.”
“What in Zen are you driving at?” Ronny asked impatiently.
“One of my theories is that these Dawnmen are the end product of having an abundance for all for a megayear or so. They don’t
Ronny took a breath. “All right, and what are some more of your theories?” Through this, the Baron was sitting, staring into emptiness again.
Fitzjames said, “If I am correct, in the Dawnworld culture, the form of their early industrial revolution differed from ours on Earth. Remember my using the example of the caste system in India? Well, on the first Dawnworld, wherever it was, automation didn’t finally take over, conformity did. What it became was a very high industrial level, beehive-type culture. The individual workers are genetically predisposed to particular kinds of endeavor, and very readily and rapidly learn that specialty… but can’t learn anything else.
“They’re a contented people, a happy people. Everybody is happy—or he’s a genetic defective, and disposed of. Because he
Ronny was staring at him. The scholar cleared his throat and went on. “They are evidently not aggressive or warlike. But they’re insect-like in the all-out-and-no-counting-the-casualties defense of their territories and their ways of doing things. They probably can’t be aggressive, because they’re one hundred percent ritualistic, and they have no ritual for aggression, nor for exploiting a new planet. Their expanding to new planets probably ended megayears ago.
“We were at first amazed, when we landed, that they ignored our presence. But they couldn’t do anything else, because they don’t have any rituals that acknowledge our existence. They haven’t any rituals that take strangers, whatever their business, into account at all.”
The Baron looked up. He sighed deeply and said, “Tell him, Fitzjames. I grow weary of your pedantic talk.”
The count hurried on. “They do have rituals that concern treatment of criminals. Steal something from them, and you come under those rituals and your classification as
“Tell him,” the Baron said petulantly.
“Their defectives are killed in a human sacrifice ceremony, which must have religious aspects going back to the very dawn of their culture.”
Ronny looked from one of them to the other. “You sent out your men to grab any of their devices not nailed down.”
“Yes,” the Baron said.
The count continued. “My theory is that the little aliens, whose planets were destroyed by changing their atmospheres, did much the same. They took a longer time. They charted a considerable number of the star systems the Dawnmen occupy. They photographed. They operated very slowly, evidently fascinated. But then they took their steps and tried to appropriate some of the devices these Dawnmen use. Perhaps they tried to trade for them, buy them, loan them, or whatever, but there was no possible way to do so. The Dawnmen are simply not interested in any contact whatsoever with any alien race. So the little aliens finally resorted to theft— and that was their
