places: a bunch of corporations, as you’d expect; an amazing number of individuals; even a school science club. But none of it was like what we were looking for.” Brose looked at him sourly, as if asking why he had bothered bringing it up if that were the case. Stell went on, “But the way they were going about it says to me that they don’t deal with anyone in the government anyway.”
“How do you mean?” Brose asked.
Stell showed his hands and turned from side to side in an appeal to the others that he wasn’t making this up. “When we asked them about procedures, they started telling us that their biggest problem is arguing grants down to
“That’s insane.”
Amelia Jonkin, another of the Exorelations staff, looked from one to another as if inviting any better
ideas before voicing the only one she could come up with. “Maybe they’re a second-rate outfit. It could be an indication of lack of self-esteem there, or that they have an inferior image of themselves.” She didn’t sound as if she really believed it.
“The stuff they were doing looked right-on to me,” Stell said. “And Dransel Howess who was with us thought so too. Nuc-cat is his line, and he was big-time impressed.”
Duggan shifted in his seat. He had been quiet for a long time. “I saw the same thing when I was down in Ferrydock,” he told the room. “They’ve got a marketplace there in the town, and people haggle. Except they try to sell lower and buy higher. I tried getting some of them to explain it, but nobody could. They couldn’t understand what was so strange that needed explaining.”
“It just shows that they’re all simpletons,” somebody from the Planning Group said. “We can’t let people like that get the better of us, surely.” The tone was facetious.
“Perhaps we should look for the big houses,” Amelia mused. “The real rulers in any society always live in the biggest houses.”
And that seemed to exhaust the suggestions. Brose looked around for further comment. After a second or two of more silence, it came from the commander of the mission’s military contingent, General Rhinde, who was sitting in and so far had maintained silence with visibly rising impatience.
“This nonsense has gone on long enough. You’re not going to get anywhere creeping around like tourists frightened of giving offence, and asking polite questions.” He glowered around, challenging anyone to disagree. Nobody dared. “The people you’re talking about will be all office clerks, anyway, even if you find them. The true government of a country, planet, whatever, is whoever defends it. The way you find them is make them come to you. Just march in, say you’re taking over, and wait to see who appears. If nobody does, then you know who the government is anyway. It’s you.”
Nobody was prepared to argue. But at the same time, it was clear to everyone except Rhinde that nothing that drastic was a candidate for the time being. Ever the able and resourceful organization man, Brose tabled the proposal for further consideration and appointed someone to form a subcommittee to look into it.
After the meeting adjourned, Duggan approached Brose privately in his office at the Executive Suites end of the Planetary Department. “I’d like approval to roam around freely down there, without escorts,” he said. “There isn’t any threat, and the presence of weapons inhibits the Tharleans. It’s a barrier to further progress in getting through to them.”
“You really think it’s likely to make much difference?” Brose queried. His conviction seemed distinctly far short of total. “I mean, what progress at all is there to take further? Have_you, for instance, met anyone who looks even remotely capable of being gotten through to?”
“I think so, maybe. Yes.”
“Hm.” Brose sniffed. “And what if we have to scrape you up out of an alley one morning, and it gets back that I waived regulations. How would I be supposed to explain it?”
“Well, we’d better come up with something before Rhinde gets his way and ends up starting a war,” Duggan said. “Would you rather have to explain that?”
Duggan got his request approved—on signing a disclaimer that it was at his own instigation, and against the advice of his superior. “I’m doing it to give you a chance to rack up some points for promotion to subsection supervisor when we get back,” Brose murmured confidentially as he signed the paper. “I think you’d be more suited to it, Paul.” Duggan had little doubt that Brose was saying similar things to Stell too, who was also a candidate for the slot. Fostering a healthy competitive spirit between rivals was encouraged as part of the Department’s management style. It was considered the astute way to develop human resources. They were what at one time had been called “people.”
“I’ll be coming back down tomorrow,” Duggan told Tawna when he called her a half hour later. “No guards to get in the way this time, so we can have that talk. Tell me a good place to meet.”
The bronzed, orangey-haired face on the screen looked genuinely pleased. “That’s wonderful! Then you can tell me all about Earth.” She must have caught a hint of a reaction in his face. “And talk about other things too, naturally. What did you want to do down here?”
Duggan frowned, realizing that he had been unprepared. He thought rapidly. “I want to find out who lives in the biggest houses,” he told her.
They met and had breakfast in a cafe by the river, on a terrace at the rear, overlooking the water. It was a fair, sunny day, and there were a lot of small boats about—some sporty and powered, others curvy and delicate with strange-shaped sails, reminiscent in ways of Arab dhows. It was the same incongruous blend of ancient and new existing happily side-by-side that Duggan had been noticing everywhere. A large blimp passed overhead, heading south, maybe following the coast. Tawna explained that on days when the weather permitted, those who could afford it often preferred them to regular jets. By this time, Duggan was surprised to hear that for once the price of something should actually reflect how it was valued. It turned out that what Tawna meant was those who could afford the time.
As he listened, Duggan found himself being captivated by her openness. She played none of the mind games that he was accustomed to in this kind of situation, no jockeying for one-up points to decide who had a controlling advantage. And in a way that he realized was a new concept to him, her absence of deviousness absolved him from any need to reciprocate. He could actually be himself and say what he thought, without having to calculate implications and consequences. It felt liberating and refreshing. Yes, there had been a man that she’d lived with for a while when she moved to Ferrydock. His name had been Lukki. But in the end it hadn’t worked out. No, there was no one in particular at present.
The people they were going to meet were called Jazeb and Maybel Wintey, and kept what Tawna described as a “huge” house in a foothill region of the mountains northeast of Ferrydock. She didn’t know them personally but had known of them for a long time, and contacted them through an agent in town who provided their domestic staff. Hardly surprisingly, a mention that somebody from the Earth ship wanted to meet them was all it had taken. In her non-questioning, accepting way, Tawna hadn’t asked Duggan why he wanted to know who lived in the big houses. When Duggan inquired casually what Wintey did, Tawna replied in an uncharacteristically vague kind of way, that he “collected things.” It didn’t sound much like what Duggan had been hoping for. But he could hardly change his mind now.
Back outside the front of the cafe, Tawna stopped to run her eye over the assortment of vehicles in the parking area. Tharlean ground autos were generally simpler and less ostentatious than Terran designs, though with the same proclivity for curviness that was evident in the architecture and the boats; a couple looked almost like Aladdin slippers on wheels. She led the way across to a pale blue, middle-of-the-range model, unpretentious but comfortably roomy for two. As they got in, Duggan commented that he’d thought she wasn’t sure which car was hers. It wasn’t hers, he discovered, but belonged to a common pool that anyone could use, rather like a public comlink booth back home. She started it by inserting a plastic tag that seemed to combine the functions of pay card and driver’s license. People who needed to owned their own, but most didn’t bother, Tawna said—adding that it was the kind of thing Jazeb Wintey would do. She seemed to find it humorous. Duggan wasn’t sure why.
They drove out of the town to an airport that Duggan knew of from
