Foundation

“Promised for the last year.”

“But one—just one—can blast that Foundation into stinking rubble. Just one! One, to sweep their little pygmy boats out of space.”

“I couldn’t attack their planet, even with a dozen.”

“And how long would their planet hold out with their trade ruined, and their cargoes of toys and trash destroyed?”

“Those toys and trash mean money,” he sighed. “A good deal of money.”

“But if you had the Foundation itself, would you not have all it contained? And if you had my father’s respect and gratitude, would you not have more than ever the Foundation could give you? It’s been three years—more— since that barbarian came with his magic sideshow. It’s long enough.”

“My dear!” The Commdor turned and faced her. “I am growing old. I am weary. I lack the resilience to withstand your rattling mouth. You say you know that I have decided. Well, I have. It is over, and there is war between Korell and the Foundation.”

“Well!” The Commdora’s figure expanded and her eyes sparkled. “You learned wisdom at last, though in your dotage. And now when you are master of this hinterland, you may be sufficiently respectable to be of some weight and importance in the Empire. For one thing, we might leave this barbarous world and attend the viceroy’s court. Indeed we might.”

She swept out, with a smile, and a hand on her hip. Her hair gleamed in the light.

The Commdor waited, and then said to the closed door, with malignance and hate, “And when I am master of what you call the hinterland, I may be sufficiently respectable to do without your father’s arrogance and his daughter’s tongue. Completely—without!”

17

The senior lieutenant of the Dark Nebula stared in horror at the visiplate.

“Great Galloping Galaxies!” It should have been a howl, but it was a whisper instead. “What’s that?”

It was a ship, but a whale to the Dark Nebula’s minnow; and on its side was the Spaceship-and-Sun of the Empire. Every alarm on the ship yammered hysterically.

The orders went out, and the Dark Nebula prepared to run if it could, and fight if it must,—while down in the hyperwave room, a message stormed its way through hyperspace to the Foundation.

Over and over again! Partly a plea for help, but mainly a warning of danger.

18

Hober Mallow shuffled his feet wearily as he leafed through the reports. Two years of the mayoralty had made him a bit more housebroken, a bit softer, a bit more patient,—but it had not made him learn to like government reports and the mind-breaking officialese in which they were written.

“How many ships did they get?” asked Jael.

“Four trapped on the ground. Two unreported. All others accounted for and safe.” Mallow grunted. “We should have done better, but it’s just a scratch.”

There was no answer and Mallow looked up. “Does anything worry you?”

“I wish Sutt would get here,” was the almost irrelevant answer.

“Ah, yes, and now we’ll hear another lecture on the home front.”

“No, we won’t,” snapped Jael, “but you’re stubborn, Mallow. You may have worked out the foreign situation to the last detail but you’ve never given a care about what goes on here on the home planet.”

“Well, that’s your job, isn’t it? What did I make you Minister of Education and Propaganda for?”

“Obviously to send me to an early and miserable grave, for all the co-operation you give me. For the last year, I’ve been deafening you with the rising danger of Sutt and his Religionists. What good will your plans be, if Sutt forces a special election and has you thrown out?”

“None, I admit.”

“And your speech last night just about handed the election to Sutt with a smile and a pat. Was there any necessity for being so frank?”

“Isn’t there such a thing as stealing Sutt’s thunder?”

“No,” said Jael, violently, “not the way you did it. You claim to have foreseen everything, and don’t explain why you traded with Korell to their exclusive benefit for three years. Your only plan of battle is to retire without a battle. You abandon all trade with the sectors of space near Korell. You openly proclaim a stalemate. You promise no offensive, even in the future. Galaxy, Mallow, what am I supposed to do with such a mess?”

“It lacks glamor?”

“It lacks mob emotion-appeal.”

“Same thing.”

“Mallow, wake up. You have two alternatives. Either you present the people with a dynamic foreign policy, whatever your private plans are, or you make some sort of compromise with Sutt.”

Mallow said, “All right, if I’ve failed the first, let’s try the second. Sutt’s just arrived.”

Sutt and Mallow had not met personally since the day of the trial, two years back. Neither detected any change in the other, except for that subtle atmosphere about each which made it quite evident that the roles of ruler and defier had changed.

Sutt took his seat without shaking hands.

Mallow offered a cigar and said, “Mind if Jael stays? He wants a compromise earnestly. He can act as mediator if tempers rise.”

Sutt shrugged. “A compromise will be well for you. Upon another occasion I once asked you to state your terms. I presume the positions are reversed now.”

“You presume correctly.”

“Then these are my terms. You must abandon your blundering policy of economic bribery and trade in gadgetry, and return to the tested foreign policy of our fathers.”

“You mean conquest by missionary?”

“Exactly.”

“No compromise short of that?”

“None.”

“Um-m-m.” Mallow lit up very slowly and inhaled the tip of his cigar into a bright glow. “In Hardin’s time, when conquest by missionary was new and radical, men like yourself opposed it. Now it is tried, tested, hallowed, —everything a Jorane Sutt would find well. But, tell me, how would you get us out of our present mess?”

“Your present mess. I had nothing to do with it.”

“Consider the question suitably modified.”

“A strong offensive is indicated. The stalemate you seem to be satisfied with is fatal. It would be a confession of weakness to all the worlds of the Periphery, where the appearance of strength is all-important, and there’s not one vulture among them that wouldn’t join the assault for its share of the corpse. You ought to understand that. You’re from Smyrno, aren’t you?”

Mallow passed over the significance of the remark. He said, “And if you beat Korell, what of the Empire? That is the real enemy.”

Sutt’s narrow smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. “Oh, no, your records of your visit to Siwenna were complete. The viceroy of the Normannic Sector is interested in creating dissension in the Periphery for his own benefit, but only as a side issue. He isn’t going to stake everything on an expedition to the Galaxy’s rim when he has fifty hostile neighbors and an emperor to rebel against. I paraphrase your own words.”

“Oh, yes he might, Sutt, if he thinks we’re strong enough to be dangerous. And he might think so, if we destroy Korell by the main force of frontal attack. We’d have to be considerably more subtle.”