"I know. And you've been seeing Telly shows all your life showing how an
orderly conducts himself in the presence of his superior." Joe took
another pull and yawned. "Well, forget about it. With any man who goes
into a fracas with me, I like to be on close terms. When things pickle,
I want him to be on my side, not nursing some peeve brought on by his
officer trying to give him an inferiority complex."
The little man was eying him in surprise.
Joe finished his highball and came to his feet to get another one. He
said, "On two occasions I've had an orderly save my life. I'm not taking
any chances but that there might be a third opportunity."
"Well, yessir. Does the captain want me to get him--"
"I'll get it," Joe said.
When he'd returned to his chair, he said, "Why did you join up with
Baron Haer, Max?"
The other shrugged it off. "The usual. The excitement. The idea of all
those fans watching me on Telly. The share of common stock I'll get.
And, you never know, maybe a promotion in caste. I wouldn't mind making
Upper-Lower."
Joe said sourly, "One fracas and you'll be over that desire to have the
buffs watching you on Telly while they sit around in their front rooms
sucking on tranks. And you'll probably be over the desire for the
excitement, too. Of course, the share of stock is another thing."
"You aren't just countin' down, captain," Max said, an almost surly
overtone in his voice. "You don't know what it's like being born with no
more common stock shares than a Mid-Lower."
Joe held his peace, sipping at his drink, taking this one more slowly.
He let his eyebrows rise to encourage the other to go on.
Max said doggedly, "Sure, they call it People's Capitalism and everybody
gets issued enough shares to insure him a basic living all the way from
the cradle to the grave, like they say. But let me tell you, you're a
Middle and you don't realize how basic the basic living of a Lower can
be."
Joe yawned. If he hadn't been so tired, there would have been more
amusement in the situation.
Max was still dogged. "Unless you can add to those shares of stock, it's
pretty drab, captain. You wouldn't know."
Joe said, "Why don't you work? A Lower can always add to his stock by
working."
Max stirred in indignity. "Work? Listen, sir, that's just one more field
that's been automated right out of existence. Category Food Preparation,
Sub-division Cooking, Branch Chef. Cooking isn't left in the hands of
slobs who might drop a cake of soap into the soup. It's done automatic.
The only new changes made in cooking are by real top experts, almost
scientists like. And most of them are Uppers, mind you."
Joe Mauser sighed inwardly. So his find in batmen wasn't going to be as
wonderful as all that, after all. The man might have been born into the
food preparation category from a long line of chefs, but evidently he
knew precious little about his field. Joe might have suspected. He
himself had been born into Clothing Category, Sub-division Shoes, Branch
Repair--Cobbler--a meaningless trade since shoes were no longer
repaired but discarded upon showing signs of wear. In an economy of
complete abundance, there is little reason for repair of basic
commodities. It was high time the government investigated category
assignment and reshuffled and reassigned half the nation's population.
But then, of course, was the question of what to do with the
technologically unemployed.
* * * * *
Max was saying, "The only way I could figure on a promotion to a higher
caste, or the only way to earn stock shares, was by crossing categories.
And you know what that means. Either Category Military, or Category
Religion and I sure as Zen don't know nothing about religion."
Joe said mildly, "Theoretically, you can cross categories into any field
you want, Max."
Max snorted. "Theoretically is right ... sir. You ever heard about
anybody born a Lower, or even a Middle like yourself, cross categories
to, say, some Upper category like banking?"
Joe chuckled. He liked this peppery little fellow. If Max worked out as
well as Joe thought he might, there was a possibility of taking him
along to the next fracas.
Max was saying, "I'm not saying anything against the old time way of
doing things or talking against the government, but I'll tell you,
captain, every year goes by it gets harder and harder for a man to raise
his caste or to earn some additional stock shares."
The applejack had worked enough on Joe for him to rise against one of
his pet peeves. He said, "That term, the old time way, is strictly Telly
talk, Max. We don't do things _the old time way_. No nation in history
ever has--with the possible exception of Egypt. Socio-economics are in a
continual flux and here in this country we no more do things in the way
they did fifty years ago, than fifty years ago they did them the way the
American Revolutionists outlined back in the Eighteenth Century."