Prince-Counselor--Gaklar. He and Prince-Counselor Dorflay would get
along famously. The Lord Marshal of Durendal was replying to some
objection somebody had made:
[Illustration]
"No, nothing of the sort. We hold the view that every civil or political
right implies a civil or political obligation. The citizen has a right
to protection from the Realm, for instance; he therefore has the
obligation to defend the Realm. And his right to participate in the
government of the Realm includes his obligation to support the Realm
financially. Well, we tax only property; if a nonworker acquires taxable
property, he has to go to work to earn the taxes. I might add that our
nonworkers are very careful to avoid acquiring taxable property."
"But if they don't have votes to sell, what do they live on?" a
Counselor asked in bewilderment.
"The nobility supports them; the landowners, the trading barons, the
industrial lords. The more nonworking adherents they have, the greater
their prestige." And the more rifles they could muster when they
quarreled with their fellow nobles, of course. "Beside, if we didn't do
that, they'd turn brigand, and it costs less to support them than to
have to hunt them out of the brush and hang them."
"On Aditya, brigandage does not exist."
"On Aditya, all the brigands belong to the Secret Police, only on Aditya
they don't call them Secret Police, they call them Servants of the
People, Ninth Category."
A shadow passed quickly over the pavilion, and then another. He glanced
up quickly, to see two long black troop carriers, emblazoned with the
Sun and Cogwheel and armored fist of Security, pass back of the Octagon
Tower and let down on the north landing stage. A third followed. He rose
quickly.
"Please remain seated, gentlemen, and continue with the luncheon. If you
will excuse me for a moment, I'll be back directly." I hope, he added
mentally.
* * * * *
Captain-General Dorflay, surrounded by a dozen officers, Thoran and
human, had arrived on the lower terrace at the base of the Octagon
Tower. They had a full Thoran rifle company with them. As he went down
to them, Dorflay hurried forward.
"It has come, Your Majesty!" he said, as soon as he could make himself
heard without raising his voice. "We are all ready to die with Your
Majesty!"
"Oh, I doubt it'll come quite to that, Harv," he said. "But just to be
on the safe side, take that company and the gentlemen who are with you
and get up to the mountains and join the Crown Prince and his party.
Here." He took a notepad from his belt pouch and wrote rapidly, sealing
the note and giving it to Dorflay. "Give this to His Highness, and place
yourself under his orders. I know; he's just a boy, but he has a good
head. Obey him exactly in everything, but under no circumstances return
to the Palace or allow him to return until I call you."
"Your Majesty is ordering me away?" The old soldier was aghast.
"An emperor who has a son can be spared. An emperor's son who is too
young to marry can't. You know that."
Harv Dorflay was only mad on one subject, and even within the frame of
his madness he was intensely logical. He nodded. "Yes, Your Imperial
Majesty. We both serve the Empire as best we can. And I will guard the
little Princess Olva, too." He grasped Paul's hand, said, "Farewell,
Your Majesty!" and dashed away, gathering his staff and the company of
Thorans as he went. In an instant, they had vanished down the nearest
rampway.
The emperor watched their departure, and, at the same time, saw a big
black aircar, bearing the three-mooned planet, argent on sable, of
Travann, let down onto the south landing stage, and another troop
carrier let down after it. Four men left the aircar--Yorn, Prince
Travann, and three officers in the black of the Security Guard. Prince
Ganzay had also left the table: he came from one direction as Prince
Travann advanced from the other. They converged on the emperor.
"What's happening here, Prince Travann?" Prince Ganzay demanded. "Why
are you bringing all these troops to the Palace?"
"Your Majesty," Prince Travann said smoothly, "I trust that you will
pardon this disturbance. I'm sure nothing serious will happen, but I
didn't dare take chances. The students from the University are marching
on the Palace--perfectly peaceful and loyal procession; they're bringing
a petition for Your Majesty--but on the way, while passing through a
nonworkers' district, they were attacked by a gang of hooligans
connected with a voting-bloc boss called Nutchy the Knife. None of the
students were hurt, and Colonel Handrosan got the procession out of the
district promptly, and then dropped some of his men, who have since been
re-enforced, to deal with the hooligans. That's still going on, and
these riots are like forest fires; you never know when they'll shift and
get out of control. I hope the men I brought won't be needed here.
Really, they're a reserve for the riot work; I won't commit them,
though, until I'm sure the Palace is safe."
He nodded. "Prince Travann, how soon do you estimate that the student
procession will arrive here?" he asked.
"They're coming on foot, Your Majesty. I'd give them an hour, at least."
"Well, Prince Travann, will you have one of your officers see that the
public-address screen in front is ready; I'll want to talk to them when
they arrive. And meanwhile, I'll want to talk to Chancellor Khane,
Professor Dandrik, Professor Faress and Colonel Handrosan, together. And
Count Tammsan, too; Prince Ganzay, will you please screen him and invite
him here immediately?"
"Now, Your Majesty?" At first, the Prime Minister was trying to suppress
a look of incredulity; then he was trying to keep from showing
comprehension. "Yes, Your Majesty; at once." He frowned slightly when he
saw two of the Security Guard officers salute Prince Travann instead of
the emperor before going away. Then he turned and hurried toward the
Octagon Tower.
* * * * *
The officer who had gone to the aircar to use the radio returned and
reported that Colonel Handrosan was bringing the Chancellor and both
professors from the University in his command-car, having anticipated
that they would be wanted. Paul nodded in pleasure.
"You have a good man there, Prince," he said. "Keep an eye on him."
"I know it, Your Majesty. To tell the truth, it was he who organized
this march. Thought they'd be better employed coming here to petition
you than milling around the University getting into further mischief."
The other officer also returned, bringing a portable viewscreen with him
on a contragravity-lifter. By this time, the Bench of Counselors and the
three off-planet guests had become anxious and left the luncheon
pavilion in a body. The Counselors were looking about uneasily,
noticing the black uniformed Security Guards who had left the troop
carrier and were taking position by squads all around the emperor. First
Citizen Yaggo, and King Ranulf and Lord Koreff, also seemed uneasy. They
were avoiding the proximity of Paul as though he had the green death.
The viewscreen came on, and in it the city, as seen from an aircar at
two thousand feet, spread out with the Palace visible in the distance,
the golden pile of the Octagon Tower jutting up from it. The car
carrying the pickup was behind the procession, which was moving toward
the Palace along one of the broad skyways, with Gendarmes and Security
Guards leading, following and flanking. There were a few Imperial and
planetary and school flags, but none of the quantity-made banners and
placards which always betray a planned demonstration.
Prince Ganzay had been gone for some time, now. When he returned, he
drew Paul aside.
"Your Majesty," he whispered softly, "I tried to summon Army troops, but
it'll be hours before any can get here. And the Militia can't be
mobilized in anything less than a day. There are only five thousand Army
Regulars on Odin, now, anyhow."
And half of them officers and noncoms of skeleton regiments. Like the
Navy, the Army had been scattered all over the Empire--on Behemoth and
Amida and Xipetotec and Astarte and Jotunnheim--in response to calls for
support from Security.
"Let's have a look at this rioting, Prince Travann," one of the less
decrepit Counselors, a retired general, said. "I want to see how your
people are handling it."
The officers who had come with Prince Travann consulted briefly, and
then got another pickup on the screen. This must have been a regular
public pickup, on the front of a tall building. It was a couple of miles
farther away; the Palace was visible only as a tiny glint from the
Octagon Tower, on the skyline. Half a dozen Security aircars were
darting about, two of them chasing a battered civilian vehicle and
firing at it. On rooftops and terraces and skyways, little clumps of
Security Guards were skirmishing, dodging from cover to cover, and
sometimes individuals or groups in civilian clothes fired back at them.
There was a surprising absence of casualties.
"Your Majesty!" the old general hissed in a scandalized whisper. "That's
nothing but a big fake! Look, they're all firing blanks! The rifles
hardly kick at all, and there's too much smoke for propellant-powder."
"I noticed that." This riot must have been carefully prepared, long in
advance. Yet the student riot seemed to have been entirely spontaneous.
That puzzled him; he wished he knew just what Yorn Travann was up to.
"Just keep quiet about it," he advised.
* * * * *
More aircars were arriving, big and luxurious, emblazoned with the arms
of some of the most distinguished families in Asgard. One of the first
to let down bore the device of Duklass, and from it the Minister of
Economics, the Minister of Education, and a couple of other Ministers,
alighted. Count Duklass went at once to Prince Travann, drawing him away
from King Ranulf and Lord Koreff and talking to him rapidly and
earnestly. Count Tammsan approached at a swift half-run.
"Save Your Majesty!" he greeted, breathlessly. "What's going on, sir? We
heard something about some petty brawl at the University, that Prince
Ganzay had become alarmed about, but now there seems to be fighting all
over the city. I never saw anything like it; on the way here we had to
go up to ten thousand feet to get over a battle, and there's a vast
crowd on the Avenue of the Arts, and----" He took in the Security
Guards. "Your Majesty, just what _is_ going on?"
"Great and frightening changes." Count Tammsan started; he must have
been to a psi-medium, too. "But I think the Empire is going to survive
them. There may even be a few improvements, before things are done."
A blue-uniformed Gendarme officer approached Prince Travann, drawing him
away from Count Duklass and speaking briefly to him. The Minister of
Security nodded, then turned back to the Minister of Economics. They
talked for a few moments longer, then clasped hands, and Travann left
Duklass with his face wreathed in smiles. The Gendarme officer
accompanied him as he approached.
"Your Majesty, this is Colonel Handrosan, the officer who handled the
affair at the University."
"And a very good piece of work, colonel." He shook hands with him.
"Don't be surprised if it's remembered next Honors Day. Did you bring
Khane and the two professors?"
"They're down on the lower landing-stage, Your Majesty. We're delaying
the students, to give Your Majesty time to talk to them."
"We'll see them now. My study will do." The officer saluted and went
away. He turned to Count Tammsan. "That's why I asked Prince Ganzay to
invite you here. This thing's become too public to be ignored; some sort
of action will have to be taken. I'm going to talk to the students; I
want to find out just what happened before I commit myself to anything.
Well, gentlemen, let's go to my study."
Count Tammsan looked around, bewildered. "But I don't understand----" He
fell into step with Paul and the Minister of Security; a squad of
Security Guards fell in behind them. "I don't understand what's
happening," he complained.
An emperor about to have his throne yanked out from under him, and a
minister about to stage a _coup d'etat_, taking time out to settle a
trifling academic squabble. One thing he did understand, though, was
that the Ministry of Education was getting some very bad publicity at a
time when it could be least afforded. Prince Travann was telling him
about the hooligans' attack on the marching students, and that worried
him even more. Nonworking hooligans acted as voting-bloc bosses ordered;
voting-bloc bosses acted on orders from the political manipulators of
Cartels and pressure-groups, and action downward through the nonworkers
was usually accompanied by action upward through influences to which
ministers were sensitive.
* * * * *
There were a dozen Security Guards in black tunics, and as many
Household Thorans in red kilts, in the hall outside the study,
fraternizing amicably. They hurried apart and formed two ranks, and the
Thoran officer with them saluted.
Going into the study, he went to his desk; Count Tammsan lit a cigarette
and puffed nervously, and sat down as though he were afraid the chair
would collapse under him. Prince Travann sank into another chair and
relaxed, closing his eyes. There was a bit of wafer on the floor by
Paul's chair, dropped by the little dog that morning. He stooped and
picked it up, laying it on his desk, and sat looking at it until the
door screen flashed and buzzed. Then he pressed the release button.
Colonel Handrosan ushered the three University men in ahead of
him--Khane, with a florid, arrogant face that showed worry under the
arrogance; Dandrik, gray-haired and stoop-shouldered, looking irritated;
Faress, young, with a scrubby red mustache, looking bellicose. He
greeted them collectively and invited them to sit, and there was a brief
uncomfortable silence which everybody expected him to break.
"Well, gentlemen," he said, "we want to get the facts about this affair
in some kind of order. I wish you'd tell me, as briefly and as
completely as possible, what you know about it."
"There's the man who started it!" Khane declared, pointing at Faress.
"Professor Faress had nothing to do with it," Colonel Handrosan stated
flatly. "He and his wife were in their apartment, packing to move out,
when it started. Somebody called him and told him about the fighting at
the stadium, and he went there at once to talk his students into
dispersing. By that time, the situation was completely out of hand; he
could do nothing with the students.
"Well, I think we ought to find out, first of all, why Professor Faress
was dismissed," Prince Travann said. "It will take a good deal to
convince me that any teacher able to inspire such loyalty in his
students is a bad teacher, or deserves dismissal."
"As I understand," Paul said, "the dismissal was the result of a
disagreement between Professor Faress and Professor Dandrik about an
experiment on which they were working. I believe, an experiment to fix
more exactly the velocity of accelerated subnucleonic particles. Beta
micropositos, wasn't it, Chancellor Khane?"
Khane looked at him in surprise. "Your Majesty, I know nothing about
that. Professor Dandrik is head of the physics department; he came to
me, about six months ago, and told me that in his opinion this
experiment was desirable. I simply deferred to his judgment and
authorized it."
"Your Majesty has just stated the purpose of the experiment," Dandrik
said. "For centuries, there have been inaccuracies in mathematical
descriptions of subnucleonic events, and this experiment was undertaken
in the hope of eliminating these inaccuracies." He went into a lengthy
mathematical explanation.
"Yes, I understand that, professor. But just what was the actual
experiment, in terms of physical operations?"
* * * * *
Dandrik looked helpless for a moment. Faress, who had been choking back
a laugh, interrupted:
"Your Majesty, we were using the big turbo-linear accelerator to project
fast micropositos down an evacuated tube one kilometer in length, and
clocking them with light, the velocity of which has been established
almost absolutely. I will say that with respect to the light, there were
no observable inaccuracies at any time, and until the micropositos were
accelerated to 16.067543333-1/3 times light-speed, they registered much
as expected. Beyond that velocity, however, the target for the
micropositos began registering impacts before the source registered
emission, although the light target was still registering normally. I
notified Professor Dandrik about this, and----"
"You notified him. Wasn't he present at the time?"
"No, Your Majesty."
"Your Majesty, I am head of the physics department of the University. I
have too much administrative work to waste time on the technical aspects
of experiments like this," Dandrik interjected.
"I understand. Professor Faress was actually performing the experiment.
You told Professor Dandrik what had happened. What then?"
"Why, Your Majesty, he simply declared that the limit of accuracy had
been reached, and ordered the experiment dropped. He then reported the
highest reading before this anticipation effect was observed as the
newly established limit of accuracy in measuring the velocity of
accelerated micropositos, and said nothing whatever in his report about
the anticipation effect."
"I read a summary of the report. Why, Professor Dandrik, did you omit
mentioning this slightly unusual effect?"
"Why, because the whole thing was utterly preposterous, that's why!"
Dandrik barked; and then hastily added, "Your Imperial Majesty." He
turned and glared at Faress; professors do not glare at galactic
emperors. "Your Majesty, the limit of accuracy had been reached. After
that, it was only to be expected that the apparatus would give erratic
reports."
"It might have been expected that the apparatus would stop registering
increased velocity relative to the light-speed standard, or that it
would begin registering disproportionately," Faress said. "But, Your
Majesty, I'll submit that it was not to be expected that it would
register impacts before emissions. And I'll add this. After registering
this slight apparent jump into the future, there was no proportionate
increase in anticipation with further increase of acceleration. I wanted
to find out why. But when Professor Dandrik saw what was happening, he
became almost hysterical, and ordered the accelerator shut down as
though he were afraid it would blow up in his face."
* * * * *
"I think it has blown up in his face," Prince Travann said quietly.
"Professor, have you any theory, or supposition, or even any wild guess,
as to how this anticipation effect occurs?"
"Yes, Your Highness. I suspect that the apparent anticipation is simply
an observational illusion, similar to the illusion of time-reversal
experienced when it was first observed, though not realized, that
positrons sometimes exceeded light-speed."
"Why, that's what I've been saying all along!" Dandrik broke in. "The
whole thing is an illusion, due----"
"To having reached the limit of observational accuracy; I understand,
Professor Dandrik. Go on, Professor Faress."
"I think that beyond 16.067543333-1/3 times light-speed, the
micropositos ceased to have any velocity at all, velocity being defined
as rate of motion in four-dimensional space-time. I believe they moved
through the three spatial dimensions without moving at all in the
fourth, temporal, dimension. They made that kilometer from source to
target, literally, in nothing flat. Instantaneity."
That must have been the first time he had actually come out and said it.
Dandrik jumped to his feet with a cry that was just short of being a
shriek.
"He's crazy! Your Majesty, you mustn't ... that is, well, I
mean--Please, Your Majesty, don't listen to him. He doesn't know what
he's saying. He's raving!"
"He knows perfectly well what he's saying, and it probably scares him
more than it does you. The difference is that he's willing to face it
and you aren't."
The difference was that Faress was a scientist and Dandrik was a science
teacher. To Faress, a new door had opened, the first new door in eight
hundred years. To Dandrik, it threatened invalidation of everything he
had taught since the morning he had opened his first class. He could no
longer say to his pupils, "You are here to learn from me." He would have
to say, more humbly, "_We_ are here to learn from the Universe."
It had happened so many times before, too. The comfortable and
established Universe had fitted all the known facts--and then new facts
had been learned that wouldn't fit it. The third planet of the Sol
system had once been the center of the Universe, and then Terra, and
Sol, and even the galaxy, had been forced to abdicate centricity. The
atom had been indivisible--until somebody divided it. There had been
intangible substance that had permeated the Universe, because it had
been necessary for the transmission of light--until it was demonstrated
to be unnecessary and nonexistent. And the speed of light had been the
ultimate velocity, once, and could be exceeded no more than the atom
could be divided. And light-speed had been constant, regardless of
distance from source, and the Universe, to explain certain observed
phenomena, had been believed to be expanding simultaneously in all
directions. And the things that had happened in psychology, when
psi-phenomena had become too obvious to be shrugged away.
"And then, when Dr. Dandrik ordered you to drop this experiment, just
when it was becoming interesting, you refused?"
"Your Majesty, I couldn't stop, not then. But Dr. Dandrik ordered the
apparatus dismantled and scrapped, and I'm afraid I lost my head. Told
him I'd punch his silly old face in, for one thing."
"You admit that?" Chancellor Khane cried.
"I think you showed admirable self-restraint in not doing it. Did you
explain to Chancellor Khane the importance of this experiment?"
"I tried to, Your Majesty, but he simply wouldn't listen."
"But, Your Majesty!" Khane expostulated. "Professor Dandrik is head of
the department, and one of the foremost physicists of the Empire, and
this young man is only one of the junior assistant-professors. Isn't
even a full professor, and he got his degree from some school away
off-planet. University of Brannerton on Gimli."
"Were you a pupil of Professor Vann Evaratt?" Prince Travann asked
sharply.
"Why, yes, sir. I----"
"Ha, no wonder!" Dandrik crowed. "Your Majesty, that man's an
out-and-out charlatan! He was kicked out of the University here ten
years ago, and I'm surprised he could even get on the faculty of a
school like Brannerton, on a planet like Gimli."
"Why, you stupid old fool!" Faress yelled at him. "You aren't enough of
a physicist to oil robots in Vann Evaratt's lab!"
"There, Your Majesty," Khane said. "You see how much respect for
authority this hooligan has!"
On Aditya, such would be unthinkable; on Aditya, everybody respects
authority. Whether it's respectable or not.
Count Tammsan laughed, and he realized that he must have spoken aloud.
Nobody else seemed to have gotten the joke.
"Well, how about the riot, now?" he asked. "Who started that?"
"Colonel Handrosan made an investigation on the spot," Prince Travann
said. "May I suggest that we hear his report?"
"Yes indeed. Colonel?"
Handrosan rose and stood with his hands behind his back, looking fixedly
at the wall behind the desk.
[Illustration]
"Your Majesty, the students of Professor Faress' advanced subnuclear
physics class, postgraduate students, all of them, were told of
Professor Faress' dismissal by a faculty member who had taken over the
class this morning. They all got up and walked out in a body, and
gathered outdoors on the campus to discuss the matter. At the next class
break, they were joined by other science students, and they went into
the stadium, where they were joined, half an hour later, by more
students who had learned of the dismissal in the meantime. At no time
was the gathering disorderly. The stadium is covered by a viewscreen
pickup which is fitted with a recording device; there is a complete
audio-visual of the whole thing, including the attack on them by the
campus police.