nearly as great as their own. These people had an intelligence and drive
which rivaled that of their human antecedents, whose minds had been
transferred to the Gizl's hardy, cumbersome bodies.
* * * * *
Rezar paused. His intelligent eyes seemed misplaced in his heavy animal
body.
"What attracted you to Superior, of all places?" Alis asked.
Rezar seemed to smile. "Two things. Cavalier and bubble gum."
"What?" Alis said. "You're kidding!"
"No," Rezar said. "It's true. Bubble gum because after generations of
subsistence on capsule food our teeth had weakened and loosened, and
bubble gum strengthened them. Nourishment, no. Exercise, yes. And
Cavalier Institute because here were men who spoke in terms which
paralleled the secret of our spacedrive."
Alis laughed. "This would make Father expire of joy," she said. "But now
you know he's just a phony."
"Alas," Rezar said. "Yes, alas. But he was so close. Magnology.
Cosmolineation. It's jargon merely, as we learned in time. Osbert Garet
is mad. Harmless, but mad."
Don asked Rezar, "But if this built-in morality of yours is so strong,
why didn't it prevent you from taking off with Superior?"
Rezar replied, "There are factions among us now. An evolution of a sort,
I suppose. Nothing is static. One faction"--he tapped his chest--"is
completely bound by the injunction. But in the other, self-preservation
places a limit on the injunction."
The explanation seemed to be that the other faction, which grew in
strength with every failure to find a world of their own, felt that on a
planet such as Earth, with a history of men warring against men,
required the Gizls to be no more moral than the human inhabitants
themselves.
"The Good Gizls versus the Bad Gizls?" Alis asked.
Rezar seemed to smile. The Bad Gizls, led by one called Kaliz, had got
the upper hand for a time and elevated Superior, intending to join it to
the bits and pieces of other planets they had previously collected and
stored in the asteroid belt. But Rezar's influence had persuaded them
not to head directly into space--at least not until they had solved the
problem of how to put Superior's inhabitants "ashore" first.
Don, unaccustomed to his new role of interplanetary arbitrator, said
tentatively:
"I can't authorize you to take Superior, even if you do put us all
ashore, but there must be a comparable piece of Earth we could let you
have."
"But Superior is not all," Rezar said. "To use one of your nautical
expressions, Superior merely represents a shake-down cruise. Our ability
to detach such a populated center had shown the feasibility of raising
other typical communities--such as New York, Magnitogorsk and
Heidelberg--each a different example of Earth culture."
Don heard a gasp from the Pentagon--or it might have come from the White
House.
"You mean you've burrowed under each one of those 'communities'?" Don
asked.
Rezar shrugged. "Kaliz's faction," he said, as if to dissociate himself
from the project of removing some of Earth's choicest property. "They
aim at a history-museum of habitable worlds."
"Interplanetary souvenirs," Alis said. "With quick-frozen inhabitants?
Don, what are you going to do?"
Don didn't even know what to say. His eyes met Hector's.
"Don't look at me," Hector said. "I definitely abdicate."
"Look," Don said to Rezar, "how far advanced are these plans? I mean, is
there a deadline for this mass levitation?"
"Twenty-four hours, your time," Rezar said.
"Can't you stop them? Aren't you the boss?"
The alien turned Don's question back on him. "Are _you_ the boss?"
Don had started to shake his head when Foghorn Frank's voice boomed out.
"Yes, by thunder, he _is_ the boss! Don, raise your right hand. I'm
going to make you a brigadier general. No, blast it, a full general.
Repeat after me...."
* * * * *
General Don Cort squared his shoulders. He was almost getting used to
these spot promotions.
"Now negotiate," Fogarty said. "You hear me, Mr. Gizl-Rezar? The United
States of America stands behind General Cort." There was no audible
objection from the White House. "Who stands behind you?"
"A democratic government," Rezar said. "Like yours."
"You represent them?" Fogarty asked.
"With my council, yes."
"Then we can make a deal. Talk to him, Don. I'll shut up now."
Don said to Rezar, "Was it your decision to burrow under New York and
Magnitogorsk and Heidelberg?"
"I agreed to it, finally."
"But you agreed to it in the belief that the Earth-people were a warring
people and that your old prohibitions did not apply. But we are not a
warring people. Earth is at peace."
"Is it?" Rezar asked sadly. "Your plane warred on the submarine."
"In self-defense," Don said. "Don't forget that we defended you, too.
And we'd do it again--but not unless provoked."
Rezar looked thoughtful. He tapped his long fingernails on the table.
Finally he said, "I believe you. But I must talk to my people first, as
you have talked to yours. Let us meet later"--he seemed to be making a
mental calculation--"in three hours. Where? Here?"
"How about Cavalier?" Alis suggested. "It would be the first important
thing that ever happened there."
* * * * *
For the first time since Superior took off, all of the town's elected or
self-designated representatives met amicably. They gathered in the
common room at Cavalier Institute as they waited for Rezar and his
council to arrive for the talks which could decide, not only the fate of
Superior, but of New York and two foreign cities as well.
Apparently the Pentagon expected Don to pretend he had authority to
speak for Russia and Germany as well as the United States. But could he
speak for the United States constitutionally? He was sure that Bobby
Thebold, comprising exactly one percent of that great deliberative body,
the Senate, would let him know if he went too far, crisis or no crisis.
The Senator, reunited with Geneva Jervis, sat holding her hand on a sofa
in front of the fireplace in which logs blazed cheerfully. Thebold
looked untypically placid. Jen Jervis, completely sober and with her
hair freshly reddened, had greeted Don with a cool nod.
Thebold had been chagrined at learning that Don Cort was not the yokel
he had taken him for. But he recovered quickly, saying that if there was
any one thing he had learned in his Senate career it was the art of
compromise. He would go along with the duly authorized representative of
the Pentagon, with which he had always had the most cordial of
relations.
"Isn't that so, sweetest of all the pies?" he said to Jen Jervis.
Jen looked uncomfortable. "Please, Bobby," she said. "Not in public."
The Senator squeezed her hand.
Professor Garet, whose wife and daughter were serving tea, stood with Ed
Clark near the big bay window, through which they looked occasionally to
see if the Gizls were coming. Maynard Rubach sat in a leather armchair
next to Hector Civek, who had discarded his ermine and wore an old heavy
tweed suit. Doc Bendy sat off in a corner by himself. He was untypically
quiet.
Don Cort, despite his four phantom stars, was telling himself he must
not let these middle-aged men make him feel like a boy. Each of them had
had a chance to do something positive and each had failed.
"Gentlemen," Don said, "my latest information from Washington confirms
that the Gizls have actually tunneled under the cities they say their
militant faction wants to take up to the asteroid belt, just as they dug
in under Superior before it took off. So they're not bluffing."
"How'd we find out about Magnitogorsk?" Ed Clark asked. "Iron curtain
getting rusty?"
Don told him that the Russians, impressed by the urgency of an
unprecedented telephone call from the White House to the Kremlin, had
finally admitted that their great industrial city was sitting on top of
a honeycomb. The telephone conversation had also touched delicately on
the subject of the submarine that had been sunk in mid-Atlantic, and
there had been tacit agreement that the sub commander had exceeded his
authority in firing the missiles and that the sinking would not be
referred to again.
Maynard Rubach turned away from the window. "Here they come. Three of
them. But they're not coming from the direction of the McFerson place."
"They could have come up from under the grandstand." Don said. "Miss
Jervis and I found one of their tunnels there. Remember, Jen?"
Jen Jervis colored slightly and Don was sorry he'd brought it up. "Yes,"
she said. "I fainted and Don--Mr. Cort--General Cort--helped me."
"I'm obliged to the general," Senator Thebold said.
Professor Garet went to the door. The three Gizls followed him into the
room. Everyone stood up formally. There was some embarrassed scurrying
around because no one had remembered that the Gizls required backless
chairs to accommodate their tails.
The Gizls, looking remarkably alike, sat close together. Don tentatively
addressed the one in the middle.
"Gentlemen," he said, "first it is my privilege to award to you in the
name of the President, the Medal of Merit in appreciation of your quick
action in saving uncounted lives during the submarine incident. The
actual medal will be presented to you when we re-establish physical
contact with Earth."
Rezar, who, it turned out, was the one in the middle, accepted with a
grave bow. "Our regret is that we were unable to prevent the loss of
many valuable objects as well," he said.
"Mr. Rezar," Don said, "I haven't been trained in diplomacy so I'll
speak plainly. We don't intend to give up New York. Contrary to general
belief, there are about eight million people who _do_ want to live
there. And I'm sure the inhabitants of Heidelberg and Magnitogorsk feel
the same way about their cities."
"Then you yield Superior," Rezar said.
"I didn't say that."
"Yield Superior and we will guarantee safe passage to Earth for all its
inhabitants. We only want its physical facilities."
"We'll yield the bubble gum factory to help your dental problem--for
suitable reparations," Don said.
"Payment will be made for anything we take. Give us Superior intact,
including the factory and Cavalier Institute, and we will transport to
any place you name an area of equal size from the planet Mars."
"Mars?" Don said. "That'd be a very valuable piece of real estate for
the researchers."
"Take it," Don heard Frank Fogarty say from the Pentagon.
Professor Garet spoke up. "If Cavalier goes, I go with it. I won't leave
it."
"And I won't leave you, Osbert," his wife said. "Will there be air up
there among the asteroids?"
"We are air-breathers like you," Rezar said. "When we have assembled our
planet there will be plenty. You will be welcome, Professor and Mrs.
Garet."
"Hector?" Don said. "You're still mayor of Cavalier. What do you think?"
"They can have it," Hector said. "I'll take a nice steady civil service
job with the Federal Government, if you can arrange it."
"Hector," Ed Clark said, "I think that sums up why you've never been a
howling success in politics. You don't give a damn for the people. All
you care about is yourself."
Hector shrugged. "You needn't be so holy-sounding, Eddie-boy," he said.
"Why isn't the _Sentry_ out this week? I'll tell you why. Because you've
been so busy filing to the Trimble-Grayson papers on Thebold's private
radio that you haven't had time for anything else. How much are they
paying you?"
Ed Clark, deflated, muttered, "News is news."
"Is that what you were doing in Senator Thebold's Gripe Room on the
midway?" Don asked Clark. "Making this deal?"
"Now, General," Thebold said. "Would you deprive the people of their
right to know? Throughout my Senate career I have carried the torch
against government censorship, which is the path to a totalitarian
state."
"I'm sure part of the deal was that Clark's copy didn't make you
anything less than a hero," Don said.
"Don't be too righteous, young man," Thebold said. "'Lest ye be
judged,' as they say. Are you not at this moment bargaining away a piece
of a sovereign State of the sovereign United States? I don't happen to
represent Ohio, but if I did I would rise in the upper chamber to demand
your court-martial."
"At ease, Senator!" Don ordered. "You're not in the upper chamber now.
You're on an artificial satellite which at any moment is apt to take off
into outer space."
Doc Bendy spoke for the first time: "Oops-a-daisy! You tell 'im,
Donny-boy. Soo-perior--the town everybody looks up to."
Don frowned at him. Bendy had sunk deep into his chair in his corner. He
acknowledged Don's look with a broad smile that vanished in a hiccup.
"Y' don't have to say it, Donny. I been drinkin'. Ever since Superior
looped the looperior and flung me feet over forehead into the bee-yond.
Shatterin' experience to have nothin' but a kangaroo-hop between you and
eternity. Yop, ol' Bendy's been on a bender ever since. But you carry
on, boy. Y' doin' a great job."
"Thanks," Don said in irony. "I guess that completes the roster of those
qualified to speak for Superior. Oh, I'm sorry, Dr. Rubach. Did you have
something to say?"
But all the portly president of Cavalier had to say, though he said it
at great length, was that if Cavalier were taken as part of a package
deal, its trustees would have to receive adequate compensation.
Professor Garet tugged at his sleeve and said, "Sit down, Maynard.
They've already said they'll pay."
Fogarty's voice rumbled at Don: "Let's try to speed things up, General.
Close the deal on Superior, at least, before the press get there."
"The press?"
"The rest of the papers couldn't let the Trimble-Grayson chain keep
their exclusive. Clark's going to have lots of company soon. The boys
have hired a vertiplane. First one off the assembly line. You've seen
it. Lands anywhere."
"Okay, I'll try to hurry it up." To the Gizls Don said, "All right. You
take Superior, minus its people, and bring us a piece of Mars."
"Agreed," Rezar said. It was as easy as that. Nobody objected. Too many
of Superior's self-proclaimed saviors had been caught with their motives
showing.
"You've got to give up New York, though," Don said. He felt as if he
were playing a game of interplanetary Monopoly. "Well give you a chunk
of the great central desert instead, if Australia's willing. (Would that
come under the South East Asia Treaty Organization, Mr. Secretary?)
Complete with kangaroos and assorted wallabies, if you want them."
"Agreed," said Rezar.
Don sighed quietly to himself. It should be smooth sailing now that the
hurdle of New York was past.
But Kaliz, the one Alis had called the Bad Gizl, shook his head
violently and spoke for the first time. "No," he said firmly. "We must
have New York. It is by far the greatest of our conquests and I will not
yield it."
Rezar said sharply, "We have foresworn conquest."
"I am tired of your moralizing," Kaliz said. "We are dealing with beings
whose greatest respect is for power. If we temporize now we will lose
their respect. They will think our new world weak and itself open to
conquest. We have the power--let us use it. I say take New York _and_
its people and hold them hostage. The city is ready for lifting."
"No!" Don said. "You can't have New York."
Kaliz seemed to smile. "We already have it. It's merely a question of
transporting it." He put a long-fingered hand to his furry chest where,
almost hidden in the blue-gray fur, was a flat perforated disk. He said
into it, "Show them that New York is ours!"
"Wait!" Rezar said.
"Merely a demonstration," Kaliz told him, "for the moment at least."
Frank Fogarty's voice, alarmed, said urgently, "Tell him we believe him.
New York's reporting an earthquake, or something very like it. For God's
sake tell him to put it back while we reorient our thinking."
Kaliz nodded in satisfaction. "The city is as it was. Our people under
New York raised it a mere fraction of an inch. It could as easily have
been a mile. Do not underestimate our power."
Rezar was agitated. "We came in peace," he said to his fellow Gizl. "Let
us not leave in war. There's power on both sides, capable of untold
destruction. Neither must use it. We are a democratic people. Let us
vote. I say we must not take New York."
"And I say we must," Kaliz told him, "in self-interest."
They turned to the third of their people, who had been looking from one
to the other, his eyes reflecting indecision.
Kaliz barked at him: "Well, Ezial? Vote!"
Ezial said, "I abstain."
Deadlock.
Don was sweating. He looked at the others in the room. They were tense
but silent, apparently willing to leave it up to Don and his link with
the Defense Department.
Frank Fogarty's voice said:
"SAC has been airborne in total strength for half an hour, General. It
was a purely precautionary alert at the time."
Don started to interrupt.
"I know they hear me," the Secretary of Defense said. "I intend that
they should. We don't want to fight but we will if we must. Son ..." The
rough voice faltered for a moment. "If necessary, we'll destroy Superior
to kill this alien and save New York. As a soldier, I hope you
understand. It's the lives of three thousand people against the lives of
eight million."
Only Don and the Gizl had heard. Don looked across the room and into
Alis' eyes. She gave him a tentative smile, noting his grave expression.
"Yes, sir," Don said finally.
Rezar spoke. "This is folly." He touched the disk in the fur of his own
chest.
"No!" Kaliz cried.
"It is time," Rezar said. "We are beginning to fail in our mission." He
spoke reverently into the disk, "My lord, awake."
Kaliz said quickly, "Raise New York! Take it up!"
"They will not obey you now," Rezar said. "I have invoked the counsel of
the Master."
* * * * *
The man was frail and incredibly old. He had sparse white hair and a
deeply lined face, but his eyes were alert and wise. He wore a
cloak-like garment of soft, warm-looking material. His expression was
one of kindliness but strength.
The doorbell had rung and Mrs. Garet had answered it. The old man had
walked slowly into the room, followed respectfully by two Gizls.
"My lord," said Rezar. He got to his feet and bowed, as did the other
Gizls. "I had hoped to let you sleep until your new world had been
prepared for you. But the risk was great that, if I delayed, your world
would never be. Forgive me."
"You did well," the old man said.
Don stood up too, feeling the sense of awe that this personage inspired.
"How do you do, sir," he said.
"How do you do, General Cort."
"You know my name?"
"I know many things. Too many for such a frail old body. But someone had
to preserve the heritage of our people, and I was chosen."
"Won't you sit down, sir?"
"I'll stand, thanks. I've rested long enough. Generations, as a matter
of fact. Shall I answer some of your obvious questions? I'd better say a
few things quickly, before Foghorn Frank hits the panic button."
Don smiled. "Can he hear you or shall I repeat everything?"
"Oh, he hears me. I've got gadgets galore, even though I'm between
planets at the moment. I must say it's a pleasure to be among people
again." He nodded pleasantly around the room.
Mrs. Garet smiled to him. "Would you like a cup of tea?"
"Later, perhaps, thank you. First I must assure you and everyone of
Earth that no one will be harmed by us and that we want nothing for our
new world that you are not willing to give."
"That's good to hear," Don said. "I gather you've been in some kind of
suspended animation since you left your old world. So I wonder how
you're able to speak English."
"Everything was suspended but the subconscious. That kept perking along,
absorbing everything the Gizls fed into it. And they've been absorbing
your culture for ten years, so I'm pretty fluent. And I certainly know
enough to apologize for all the inconvenience my associates have caused
you in their zeal to re-establish the human race of Gorel-zed. In the
case of Kaliz, of course, it was excessive zeal which will necessitate
his rehabilitation."
"Your pardon, Master," Kaliz said humbly.
"Granted. But you'll be rehabilitated anyway."
Don asked, "Did I understand you to say you plan to re-establish your
race? Do you mean there are more of you, aside from the
kangaroo-people?"
"Oh, yes. Young people. The youngest of all from Gorel-zed. They were
put to sleep like me, to be ready to carry on when their new world is
built. I won't wake them till then. I hope to live that much longer."
"I'm sure you will, sir."
"Kind of you. But let's get on with the horse trading. Of course we
won't take New York, or the two other cities." (There was a collection
of sighs of relief from Washington.) "But we would like some of your
uninhabited jungle land--the lusher the better, to help us out in the
oxygen department. We'd also like some of your air, if you can spare
it. We've got a planet to supply now, not just ships."
"How would you get air across space?" Don asked.
"At the moment," the Master said, "I'm afraid we're not prepared to
barter our scientific knowledge."
"I didn't mean to pry. It just didn't seem to be something you could do.
Do you think we could spare some air, Mr. Secretary?"
"I'll have to ask the science boys about that one," Frank Fogarty said.
"Meanwhile it's okay with Australia on the desert. But your Gizl friends
have to agree to relocate the aborigines from that tract, and they must
take every last rabbit or it's no deal."
"Agreed," the Master said with a smile. "But please ask their stockmen
to hold their fire. My friends only _look_ like kangaroos."
* * * * *
As Don and the Master were making arrangements for Superior to touch
down so its people could be transferred to Earth, a blaze of light
stabbed down from the sky. Through the window they saw the vertiplane
settling slowly to the campus.
"It sure beats a blimp," Senator Thebold said in admiration.
Professor Garet got up to look. "It's the press," he said to his wife.
"You might as well invite them in. I hope we have enough tea."
The vertiplane's door opened and the first wave of reporters spilled
out.
XIII
As Superior headed back across the Atlantic, the Earth-people were given
a farewell tour. For the first time they had an authorized look at the
underground domain of the Gizls, which they reached through the tunnel
that led below from under Cavalier's grandstand.
The observation room which Don and Jen Jervis had found was connected by
a hidden elevator to a vast main chamber. A control console formed the
entire wall of one end of it. Half a dozen Gizls stood at the base of
the console. From time to time one of them would launch himself upward
with his powerful legs, grab a protruding rung, make an adjustment, then
drop lightly back to the floor.
Don and Alis stood for a moment watching Professor Garet, who was
tugging at his beard as he became aware of the magnitude of the
operation which drove Superior through the skies and was soon to take it
across space to the asteroid belt.
"Poor Father," Alis whispered to Don. "Magnology in action, after all
these years--and he didn't have a thing to do with it."
"Is that why he wants to go with the Master?"
"I imagine so. If he stayed on Earth he'd have nothing. He's too old to
start again. It's kind of them to take him--and Mother. In a way, I
suppose, his going is justification for his years of work. He'll at
least be close to the things he might have developed in the right
circumstances."
"He certainly won't be lonely," Don said. "Have you noticed the rush to
emigrate? Cheeky McFerson's decided to stick with his bubble gum
factory. He says the Gizls are a ready-made market. He saw one of them
cram five Super-Bubs into his mouth, at one time. That's twenty-five
cents right there."
Alis giggled. "And half of the student body of Cavalier wants to go.
You'd think they'd be disillusioned with Father, but they're not. I
guess they had to be crazy to enroll in the first place."
"Senator Thebold's started campaigning to be named U.S. Ambassador to
Superior. I heard him talking to the man from the _New York Times_. I
suspect they'll give it to him--they'll need his influence to get Senate
approval of the treaty with the Gizls."
"I had a little talk with Jen Jervis," Alis said. "She's radiant, have
you noticed? The Senator finally asked her to marry him. That's all that
was the matter with her--Bobby the Bold had left her hanging by her
thumbs too long."
"I guess he did." Don sought a way to get the conversation away from Jen
Jervis. "Where's Doc Bendy? He certainly turned out to be a
disappointment."