The government of either Phansure or Thyker would have considered it acceptable merely to refer the matter to Authority. Mysore Hobbs, however, had no intention of involving Authority. Whenever one invoked Authority, one invoked, by association, that unliving army stored away on the moon Enforcement, just waiting to be called up. Authority and Enforcement were two words for a single idea, like bread and jam or roast grom with kotopek. If a hundred or so Baidee could make such a mess of a simple raid which had been largely unopposed, consider what unthinking destruction such an army might accomplish! Mysore Hobbs shuddered to think of it. No, he did not intend to involve Authority.
Instead, Hobbs sent for his operations manager, who communicated with the other Hobbs agricultural projects. Food scheduled for shipment to Thyker was to be rerouted to Ahabar or Phansure or the supply center for the Celphian Rings. No food was to be shipped to Thyker from any Hobbs Transystem Foods source except from Hobbs Land itself.
• On Thyker, at the main receiving station outside Serena, where the day shift of warehousemen and transport workers had been waiting since early morning, a shift supervisor was attempting to explain to a higher-up in Chowdari that no foodstuffs had arrived from any of the Belt worlds, that his complaint to Hobbs Transystem had been greeted with the information that all future shipments were to come from Hobbs Land only, but that the supervisor had been unable to reach Hobbs Land.
“Can’t reach Hobbs Land?” asked the higher-up with a sinking feeling.
“Something wrong with their Doors! I sent messages through all three of them. All I get is sparks!”
“I’ll have Chowdari try and call you back.”
Chowdari was also greeted with sparks and the warning howl that meant system malfunction. A message sent from Chowdari to Fenice upon Ahabar, asking Fenice to attempt to reach Hobbs Land, had similar results.
Maintenance of Doors was an Authority responsibility. The Bureau of Doors, unlike other Authority subdivisions, had a well-earned reputation for actually working. Its people were trained to a fare-thee-well, and they liked to be kept busy. By noon the station outside Serena had been informed by the Bureau that Hobbs Land had no functioning Doors and was therefore unavailable. By midway in the afternoon, the import center at Chowdari was aware that Thyker was under embargo.
“I don’t understand!” screamed the Thykerian shipping manager, who really did not understand. “What have we done?”
A Phansuri employee of Hobbs Foods enlightened him.
The shipping manager went personally to the temple and demanded to see whoever was in charge at the Scrutator level. He got, not by chance, Holorabdabag Reticingh.
“They say they’re going to what?” demanded Reticingh for the third time. “They really say that?” He was rejecting the idea, hoping against hope it wasn’t so. Still, he could not pretend he was surprised. Mysore Hobbs was not a patient man. The Scrutators should have seen him when he arrived on Thyker. It had been a mistake not to do so. Mysore Hobbs intended to hold their feet to the fire.
Reticingh reflected sadly that something of this kind had been almost inevitable ever since Shan Damzel returned from Hobbs Land. Something of this kind had been brewing, in fact, ever since Shan, bursting with pride in his own strength and stability, had chosen to do research among the Porsa. Two guards were sent to fetch Shan, who returned with them in a sullen and un-forthcoming mood.
“Three hundred dead,” said Reticingh. “In Hobbs Land. Late yesterday, I suppose, our time.”
Shan blinked in honest astonishment. Churry had assured him there would be no killing.
“They have one Baidee in custody,” said Reticingh. “The clothing, the armament, the equipment, all Baidee. They were seen by hundreds of people. Think of it, Shan. Baidee, from Thyker, made an assault upon the religion of the people of Hobbs Land and killed hundreds of innocent, inoffensive people in the process. Several Baidee, perhaps ten or twelve, were killed by the Hobbs Landers, defending themselves, but the bodies were removed by the invaders.”
“I was here yesterday,” protested Shan. “I was meditating. I haven’t been sleeping well.”
“I know damned well where you were,” roared Reticingh. “What I want to know is where were you before that, and who did you talk to.”
Shan shut his mouth stubbornly and looked out the window, across the drill ground.
“Does this tie into that ‘lost platoon’ out there on the desert?” demanded Reticingh.
“I don’t know,” said Shan, who considered that he didn’t know for sure. “I don’t think so.”
“Well, Shan Damzel, perhaps you’d like to think about the following. Less than one-third of the food we need on Thyker is raised here on the planet. The rest comes from the Belt worlds. As of this morning, Mysore Hobbs has shut us down to receiving any food at all, except from Hobbs Land.”
“That ought to be plenty. There aren’t that many of us, and it’s a very productive farm world,” said Shan in a slightly surprised voice.
“Except that the Baidee raiders blew the Doors on Hobbs Land,” said Reticingh in an ominously soft voice, “So there’s nothing coming out. The Phansuri our import manager talked to seems to think there’s some other way for Hobbs Land food to get to Thyker, but he didn’t tell us what it was. He suggested the import man ask around. The import man came to me, so I’m asking around, Shan. We very much need to find that alternate way, Shan, or there are going to be a few million very hungry people informed that they’re hungry because of the Damzel and Churry clans. I can imagine what your mother will say. Think that over.”
Shan was taken under supervision, which is what the Baidee called putting someone in a small room with no access to the outside. After he had had time to think, Shan admitted he had “suggested” to Howdabeen Churry that the
