suggested we meet in my quarters. A dormitory or clubroom is too unprivate, an office too austere. What would you like?”
Donald Conway sat down under the arm-pressure. “I… whatever the captain wishes, thank you, sir,” he gulped.
Dejerine stood over him and smiled. “Do fall free. Forget rank. We’re strictly alone, and I’m not a lot older than you. What is your age—?”
“Nineteen—I mean twenty-one, sir.”
“Still used to Ishtarian years, are you? Well, last month I had my thirtieth birthday, terrestrial. No yawning gap, true?”
Conway eased a trifle. His nervousness had not taken away candor from a gaze which now grew thoughtful, regarding his host. Dejerine was medium-sized, slender, his hands and feet small, his movements catlike; he had been a championship tumbler in Academy days. His features were regular and fine-boned, complexion olive, nose short, lips full, eyes as brawn as the sleek hair and neat mustache. He was in mufti, blouse, sash, flared slacks of iridescent cloth, tabi and zori. His class ring was standard, but the tiny gold circlet in his right earlobe bespoke a measure of brashness.
“Mainly,” he continued, “I became a cadet at sixteen and have stayed in the service. You reached Earth two years ago, enlisted when war began, and have barely hatched out of hurry-up training.” He shrugged. “What of it? Later you will finish your studies, and go on to become a distinguished professor of fine arts, and be president of a major university when I am beached at half pay. So, what is your pleasure?” He moved to the minibar. “I am for cognac and a timid hint of soda.”
“The same, then, thank you, sir,” Conway said. “I haven’t had much chance to learn, uh, the science of drinking.”
“You have no large choice on Ishtar?”
“No, mostly homebrew beer and local wine.” Conway forced loquacity on himself. “They taste different enough from Earth’s that many lifetimers don’t care for what little import we get. We’re self-sufficient, our agriculture flourishes, but, well, everywhere else is a whole other ecology to affect the soil, plus weather and radiation and—Anyhow, a few people operate stills, but they admit what they produce is nothing to brag about.”
“You see, already you’ve helped me,” Dejerine laughed. “I’ve been warned to stock up before departure.”
While he prepared the refreshments, Conway glanced around. Though not an admiral’s suite, the chamber was large and well furnished for Tsiolkovsky Base. However commodious in peacetime, facilities here grew overloaded when men were shunted in by the thousands for ready transport to scenes of action. They must be doubled into barracks; power shortages developed till interior Earthweight generators must be shut down; that meant everybody must suffer tedious extra hours of exercise; on liberty they must stand in line for a chance at sightseeing crawlers, climbing outfits, slide-ski slopes, or catch a train to Apollo and hope not to get very badly rooked… A half-wall transparency, dimmed against glare, showed majestic desolation. A cargo ship crossed the view, backing down on gravs toward an auxiliary field hastily scraped from the basalt.
This room held few personal traces of its occupant. You travel light through space, barebones in wartime. Some printouts lay on a table: a book about Anubelea, a girlie periodical, a mystery novel, the collected poems of Garcia Lorca. Beside them stood a humidor.
“Here you are.” Dejerine handed Conway his drink. “And would you care for a cigar?… No? I suppose tobacco also turns peculiar on Ishtar? Well, I’ll ignite if you don’t mind.” He settled into the facing seat and lifted his own glass. “Salud.”
“Uh, cheers,” Conway responded.
Dejerine chuckled. “That’s right. You are becoming your true self-I expected you would.”
“You checked me out, sir?”
“Nothing more than your open file-I don’t pry. What I did was ask the bank for data on personnel from Ishtar whom I might contact. Your name appeared. According to the entries, you were born there and never got off the planet until lately. I doubt if a coward or incompetent would have been tolerated that long, assuming he survived. Then in spite of growing up among—what is the figure?—about five thousand scientists, technics, and their children, more than three hundred parsecs from Sol and seldom visited—you showed such promise in visual art that you were offered a scholarship here. And then, when the war broke out, you didn’t continue safe in your studies, you enlisted, in one of the toughest branches at that. I need no more information to know you fairly well.”
Conway flushed, took a considerable sip, and ventured:
“Obviously you’ve been assigned there, sir, and you’d like to hear what I can tell you. Isn’t that surprising, for a man with your record? The assignment, that is.”
Dejerine frowned a bit. “Such things happen.”
“I mean, well, after your message I used the bank too.” The brandy had no doubt gone fast to Conway’s unpracticed head, for his words came rapid and heedless—not flattery, Dejerine judged, but a gauche attempt at responding to the senior’s amicable overtures. “You were my age when you got the Diamond Star for a rescue off Caliban. You went on to be exec of a blastship, captain of a ranger, operations chief for constructing a base on Gea. Quite a variety, even if the Navy does like to rotate jobs; and you’re quite young for your rank.” He checked himself. His cheeks reddened. “I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t mean to be forward.”
“That’s all right.” Dejerine waved his cigar in dismissal. Discontent remained on his mouth.
“If I may guess, sir—Gea has natives who’re pretty strange by our lights. I found no mention of them registering any complaints against you. Which must mean you treated them right, wisely, cleverly, kindly. Maybe Cincpeace figures you’re our best representative to the Ishtarians.”
“Then why aren’t you posted back there?” Dejerine demanded. He took a savage puff of smoke. “You’ve lived in their midst. Your community has for a hundred years.”
Conway hesitated, glanced aside, finally said low:
“Well, it isn’t a place for my kind of unit, unlikely as combat is. And… whether Staff thought of it or not… I’d be none too good on Ishtar. Emotional conflicts—You see, my family, parents, sisters, my old friends… they’re against the war. Many are really bitter.”
Dejerine smoothed his countenance. “How do you feel about it?” he asked.
Conway met his look square on. “I enlisted, didn’t I? Oh, sure, rights and wrongs on both sides. But—humans have been attacked. Their presence has been challenged, on real estate they made theirs with blood and sweat. If we don’t stop that kind of thing early, we’ll be in a bad way later. I recall the Alerion affair.”
Dejerine smiled. “You don’t, son,” he replied. “I myself was busy getting born that year.” His humor faded. “But, yes, we try to learn lessons from history. Besides, speaking as an individual, I’ve seen the Welfare and Backworld misery on Earth—been there in person, felt it, smelled it—and I’ve seen people who left it for Eleutheria, and what they’ve done and what they hope for—
“Well, I am not being sent to help themI’m bound a thousand light-years in the opposite direction!”
He drained his glass, rose in a single motion, and sought the bar. “Are you ready for a refill?” he asked quietly.
“No, thanks.” Conway searched for words. “Captain, Cincpeace must have reasons. Suppose the Naqsans did make a long surprise move and occupy Ishtar. It has resources. Or I suppose it has more hostage value, less in those few people of ours than in all the high-powered man-years we’ve got invested for scientific knowledge that’s finally begun to pour in. Come negotiations, Ishtar could be a mighty good bargaining counter for Naqsa.”
“Do you truly think so?” Dejerine brightened a trifle. “My orders just are to establish a reconnaissance base against the possibility, remote but still a possibility, that action may move toward that volume of space.”
Conway nodded. “And unless it’s well done, it’s a waste of effort. That’s why you’re in charge, sir. Once you’ve got it running, I’ll bet my Y chromosome you’ll be reassigned—to the front—if we haven’t finished the war before then.”
Dejerine laughed anew. “
“I hope not.”
“Well, naturally. If anybody likes the idea of war, any war, past, present, or future, let him speak forth so we
