CHAPTER VI
The three spider ships waited in the late evening darkness. Only a few spectators loitered. The television cameras were quiet. Army sentries patroled the area to keep the starmen inside and the curious out. Norma's heels clicked sharply on the runway as she approached. At the ropes she stopped and showed the guard the entry permit her brother had obtained for her.
"Come under," the guard said, lifting the rope.
"The one called Herb?"
"He's in that one over there."
She moved in the indicated direction. A moment before, the night had been warm. Now an uncomfortably chill breeze whispered around her as she moved into the starship's shadow. The thought of the distance it had come, the countless millions of miles of space its hull had shed, was enough to dwarf her into less than insignificance. She wanted to run back to the guard, and to the protection of the familiar.
The ladder was down, and when she reached it, the door above opened and a starman looked out.
"I'd like to come up."
The starman went away. In a moment, he was back with one of the three who could speak English.
"I'd like to come up," Norma repeated.
"We've already given the official tour for today."
"I have an authorization from our government. I'd like to talk to Herb. You tell him I'm from Senator Council. It's about the report."
"Just a moment." He disappeared inside. Norma teetered nervously back and forth. Wonderingly she put out her hand to touch the hard, icy metal of the ladder.
"Come up."
She began to climb toward the opening. Looking behind her, she saw Washington, real and solid and reassuring.
The starman at the top helped her inside.
Herb was coming down the narrow corridor. She smiled at him. "Hello."
"Hello...."
"I want to talk to you a moment."
He gestured her inside.
In the first room off the main corridor, Herb stopped. Several starmen hovered nearby to listen.
"Can I talk to you for just a couple of seconds alone?"
"Why—why, yes, I guess." He looked around for permission.
The Oligarch, towering imperiously on the fringe of the group, said, "Why don't you interview her in my office, Herb?"
"Come along," Herb said.
In contrast to the Spartan plainness of the rest of the ship, the Oligarch's office was richly furnished. Its private corridor led past the messhall and opened upon the main corridor that led forward to the second level: it was strategically located; from its doorway, one could interdict entrance and escape.
It was the first time Herb had been in the room. Automatically his eyes searched the walls.
"Senator Council asked me to talk to you," Norma said. "He wants you to understand about the report. You've heard? It's going to the full Senate tomorrow. We'd like you to...."
"I'm only a technician, Miss."
"My name is Norma."
"Norma." His emotions were tangled beyond solution. He wanted to say, 'I'll stay behind when the others leave, will that make everything all right, you won't blame me, you won't blame me for it if I stay behind, will you?' His mind hurt with the confusion.
"We thought, if you'd go away, if the people thought we'd actually lost you...."
"It's not for me to make any kind of decision. I'll have to ask. Would that be all right, sir?"
Norma blinked. She did not understand to whom the question was addressed. Her eyes followed his to the wall, a concealed microphone? She felt a little prickle of fear.
The Oligarch stood in the doorway behind her. "That will be agreeable with us."
She whirled guiltily.
"Bud wanted to, to see Herb tonight...." Norma felt resentment against this man in the doorway. "I was told to bring Herb."
"I will be able to speak for my government."
"I was told to bring Herb," Norma said stubbornly. Bud had not specified, but she told herself that she would not yield to a stranger. She did not consider Herb a stranger. "Isn't it all right to take him?"
"He may come, too, if you wish." He smiled. "Whatever you wish."
His voice was not reassuring. "Thank you." She modified her tone. Some of the iciness went out of it. "I'll leave now. Bud will send two C.I.D. men over for you."
Sitting at his desk in his Georgetown apartment, Bud looked through a stack of letters.
Norma, waiting, tried to become interested in a Saturday Evening Post story and failed. She put the magazine aside.
The knock they were waiting for came.
Bud rose and crossed quickly to the door.
"Ah, hello," he said with a genial smile. "If you gentlemen will wait downstairs, I'll call you when they are ready to leave." The C.I.D. men withdrew. "Hello, young fellow. Herb, I believe? And?"
"George.... How would George be?"
"George," the Senator said, pumping the Oligarch's hand and drawing him across the threshold. "I like your people's way of using first names. Very democratic. Just call me Bud."
They arranged themselves around the room.
"I don't suppose you'd care for a drink?"
"I'd be delighted," George said.
Bud, solemn faced, mixed the drinks, talking over his shoulder. "I hope you haven't taken our Committee report as a rejection of your generous offer.... You understand? I want to explain my position—what we, you and I, can do.... There we are." He turned from his labors and handed the drinks around.
"Norma, Herb. I wonder if you'd mind if George and I stepped in there?"
"It's all right with us," Norma said.
Bud and the Oligarch went into the study. Bud closed the door.
"Now," he said. Ambition was a sickness in him. This is the boy I've got to sell, he thought. That's all I've got to do: sell him. Once he's sold, the rest will follow. Ambition was like a hunger, and success hung in the air like smoke. "We can have a nice, private talk. I'm sure you'll appreciate my rather delicate position."
George swirled ice and smiled.
"Norma tells me you can speak for your government?"
George nodded.
"Let's sit down."
"Thank you."
"Now here's the way I feel about it. I'm on your team. We're both on the same team. I want to help you all I can, and I know you'll want to help me."
George nodded.
"I was thinking: if you would leave. Not tell anybody. Leave tonight. I don't mean for good, but make it look that way. You see?"
"Our leaving would serve as an emotional shock?"
"Yes, exactly. Your leaving might be just what the people need to wake them up and get them on our team. I don't need to tell you that the Senate is likely to reject your offer. I mean, right now. The way things stand now. My first mail is coming in. It's predominantly unfavorable. But some telegrams I've gotten, I think the people are coming around. But they're still not around yet. We need a couple of weeks. My idea is, I'd like to be the one that—more or less—handles it."
"You want us to work through you?"
"You have put your finger on it, George. If there's just one Earthman you can trust and work through, who knows the ropes...."
"I believe I understand."
"And when you come back, you make it plain that it was Bud Council who brought you back—it was Bud Council who really convinced you to return."
"You and I," George said, "will probably be able to work out a deal."
Jubilation rang in Bud's ears. This was it. The talk of working out a deal was an assurance of victory. President Bud—no, perhaps it would be better, more dignified, to be President Phil. He would write it out and see which looked best: President Philip Council or President Bud Council.... History lay heavily upon his thoughts.... For the first time he actually felt at home with a starman.
"Perhaps you would do something for us?" George said.
Bud found himself looking deep into George's eyes. Instinctively he knew that George knew him better than he knew himself, and that George had carefully studied him according to no one could tell what alien science.
"Why, why, yes, yes, of course."
"Well," George said, rising and going to Bud and dropping a hand across his shoulder, "just to be sure that you really are on our team, perhaps you could give us a little token of loyalty."
Bud grew cold in anticipation. But the crowds cheering and the banners waving.... No! Not now, they couldn't snatch it away now! What was it George wanted? Money? A signed agreement? Patronage? "Why, yes, naturally."
George's hand tightened in friendly reassurance. He knew that he had found his man. "Your brother's head. I believe his name is Frank. His head. We'll expect you to have it for us when we return in two weeks. Two weeks from tomorrow."
He no longer needed to count on Herb.