Vovo went on. "You know better than that, Jim. The only way my
organization can keep in power is by continually beating the drums,
keeping our people stirred up to greater and greater sacrifices by using
you as a threat. Didn't the old Romans have some sort of maxim to the
effect that when you're threatened with unease at home stir up trouble
abroad?"
"You're being even more frank than usual," Jim said. "But that's one of
the pleasures of these get-togethers, neither of us resorts to
hypocrisy. But you can't keep up these tensions forever."
"You mean _we_ can't keep up these tensions forever, Jim. And when they
end? Well, personally I can't see my organization going out without a
blood bath." He grimaced sourly, "And since I'd probably be one of the
first to be bathed, I'd like to postpone the time. It's like having a
tiger by the tail, Jim. We can't let go."
"Happily, I don't feel in the same spot," Jim said. He got up and went
to the picture window that took up one entire wall. It faced out over a
mountain vista. He looked soberly into the sky.
Vovo joined him, glass in hand.
"Possibly your position isn't exactly the same as ours but there'll be
some awfully great changes if that military based economy of yours
suddenly had peace thrust upon it. You'd have a depression such as
you've never dreamed of. Let's face reality, Jim, neither of us can
afford peace."
"Well, we've both known that for a long time."
* * * * *
They both considered somberly, the planet Earth blazing away, a small
sun there in the sky.
Jim said, "I sometimes think that the race would have been better off,
when man was colonizing Venus and Mars, if it had been a joint
enterprise rather than you people doing one, and we the other. If it had
all been in the hands of that organization ..."
"The United Nations?" Vovo supplied.
"... Then when Bomb Day hit, perhaps these new worlds could have gone on
to, well, better things."
"Perhaps," Vovo shrugged. "I've often wondered how Bomb Day started. Who
struck the spark."
"Happily there were enough colonists on both planets to start the race
all over again," Jim said. "What difference does it make, who struck the
spark?"
"None, I suppose." Vovo began to button his collar, readjust his
clothes. "Well, shall we emerge and let the quaking multitudes know that
once again we have made a shaky agreement? One that will last until the
next summit meeting."