“The march to the anthill,” Amschel Mayer muttered.
Chessman eyed him scornfully. “You amuse me, old man. You with your talk of building an economy with a system of free competition. Our Texcocans are sacrificing today but their children will live in abundance. Even today, nobody starves, no one goes without shelter or medical care.” Chessman twisted his mouth. “We have found that hungry, cold or sick people cannot work efficiently.”
He stared challengingly at the Genoese leader. “Can you honestly say the same? That there are no starving people in Genoa? No inadequately housed, no sick without hope of medicine? Do you have economic setbacks in which poorly planned production goes amuck and depressions follow with mass unemployment?”
“Nevertheless,” Mayer said, with unwonted calm, “our society is still far ahead of yours. A mere handful of your bureaucratic and military chiefs enjoy the good things of life. There are tens of thousands on Genoa who have them. Free competition has its weaknesses, perhaps, but it provides a greater good for a greater number of persons.”
Joe Chessman came to his feet. “Well see,” he said stolidly. “In ten years, Mayer, we’ll consider the positions of both our planets once again.”
“Ten years it is,” Mayer snapped back at him.
Jerry Kennedy saluted with his glass. “Cheers,” he said.
On the return to Genoa, Amschel Mayer looked his disgust at his right hand man. Kennedy was not piloting the small craft, as usual. Martin Gunther was at the controls.
Mayer said, “Are you sober enough to assimilate something serious?”
Jerry Kennedy shook his head to achieve clarity. “Sure, chief, of course. That Earthside liquor is just a little stronger than what I’m used to these days, I guess. Sneaks up on you.”
Mayer grunted contempt but said, “Well then, begin taking the steps necessary for us to place a few men on Texcoco in the way of, ah, intelligence agents.”
“You mean some of our team?” Kennedy said, startled.
Gunther looked over from the space launch’s controls and raised his eyebrows.
Mayer said impatiently, “No, no of course not. We can’t spare them, and, besides, there’d be too big a chance of recognition and exposure. We’ll have to use some of our more trusted Genoese. Make the reward enough to attract their services.” He looked from one of his lieutenants to the other significantly. “I think you’ll agree that it might not be a bad idea to keep our eyes on the developments on Texcoco.”
Martin Gunther thought about it. “Well, perhaps, but there’s another aspect, Amschel. Thus far, we’ve kept the secret of the
“Ummm,” Kennedy said glumly. “And as soon as you start organizing an espionage mission to Texcoco, the fat will be in the fire.”
Mayer said, “It will be a top secret. Only a few very trusted, very dependable men will be used. You can ferry them over in this craft. Over there, perhaps, they can make contact with those elements in revolt against Chessman and his team. They can infiltrate one or more of these so-called communes, and keep in touch with whatever real progress Joe and his men are making—if any.”
Jerry Kennedy muttered. “One person can keep a secret, sometimes even two can. From then on the likelihood goes down in a geometric progression, and this project will involve dozens before we’re through.”
Mayer stared at him. “Just who is in command of this expedition, Jerome Kennedy?”
On the way back to Texcoco, Barry Watson said to his chief, “What do you think of putting some security men on Genoa, just to keep tabs?”
“Why?”
Watson looked at his fingers, nibbled at a hangnail. “It just seems to me it wouldn’t hurt any.”
Chessman snorted.
Dick Hawkins said thoughtfully, “I think Barry’s right. Mayer and his gang can bear watching. Besides, in another decade or so they’ll realize we’re going to beat them in this competition. Mayer’s ego isn’t going to take that. He’d go to just about any extreme to keep from losing face back on Earth.”
Natt Roberts said worriedly, “I think they’re right, Joe. Certainly it wouldn’t hurt to have a few security men over there. My department could train them, then one of us could pilot them over. Spot a few on each of the three continents. Thing to do would be send men with families. Guarantee that there’d not be any defections.”
“Well, you never know. There might be opportunities over there.”
“I’ll make the decisions around here,” Chessman growled at them. “Don’t forget who Number One is. I’ll think about it. It’s just possible that you’re right, though.”
Seated in the stern of the space lighter were the three adult Tulans and Taller, the teenager. Reif let his eyes go from one face to another, but he said nothing.
Natalie Wieliczka looked out over the large audience which crowded the auditorium with a certain modest pride. She said, “Very well. That concludes my lecture. Are there any questions?”
One of her listeners came to his feet.
There was a sly element in his voice. “In all your speech today, Honorable Doctor, you have dealt with new methods of controlling the diseases that have ravaged the world for so long, for whatever reason that the Supreme has seen fit in his wisdom. However, never have you mentioned the Temple which has always traditionally been the recourse of the ill. These new methods are other than those utilized by the Temple monks. You say nothing of the holy incantations necessary to supplement medication and other therapy. Is there, then, no place in your teachings for the Supreme?”
There was a snicker that went through the audience which was composed almost exclusively of graduate medical students. Inwardly, Natalie winced at it. The questioner was a plant. That she knew. She was being deliberately provoked.
She tried to brazen it out. She carefully chose her words.
“The Temple deals primarily with your immortal soul, with your relationship with your god, though, of course Temple monks often participate in other matters of interest to the community. Our field, with which we are exclusively concerned, as doctors, is medicine, which deals with the health of the people, on this plane of existence. As doctors, no matter how religious we may be as individuals, we do not deal with the soul or the hereafter.”
He was still standing.
He said, “But do you not think it is necessary to have present a Temple monk at any sick bed, in order to invoke the aid of the Supreme?”
Natalie Wieliczka ran the tip of her tongue over her lower lip. “Let us say that it can never do harm to have a representative of the Temple present while a trained doctor of medicine is administering to a patient.”
“But is it
There was a stirring in the audience. A young student called to the questioner: “Sit down, you flat!’
But most of them watched her. Watched her carefully Waited tensely for her words.
She was at a crossroads and knew it. Now, all bets were down. It had been building for some time and she had long avoided it.
Natalie Wieliczka said very slowly, “No, it is not necessary for a Temple monk to be present.” She took a deep breath. “Incantations are not necessary to cure the sick.”
“That, Honorable Doctor, is blasphemy!”
She shook her head. The die was cast now. “It is not meant to be.”
“Honorable Doctor,” the man shouted, “it is well known that you never attend the Temple.”
“I am too busy with my work.”
“Honorable Doctor, are you afraid to attend the Temple?”
“Certainly not! Are there any other questions?”
A black cloaked figure who had been sitting inconspicuously in the last row of seats, came to his feet. He said, his voice seemingly low, but still it rolled out over the auditorium, “The holy books say that it is impossible for a witch to enter the house of the Supreme without suffering immediate death.”
