Imperial Stars 2-Republic and Empire (12 page)

"Pop! Sir!" It was Wong, rushing into the office. "Turn on the TV! Xanthil's been kidnapped, being held as hostage!"

Scarcely surprised, Chap Foey Rider clicked on the small portable discreetly hidden away in a filing cabinet.

It was true. For reasons best known to himself, Xanthil had elected to swing through Central Africa. The newly-emerged nation of Xenophobia was locked in the throes of civil war: supported by the West were the Arab Blacks; supported by the East were the Black Arabs. They had joined sides long enough to mount a joint commando operation to Chad, where the commandos had gunned down the Ambassador's entourage and taken refuge with their hostage in the American Embassy. The Arab Blacks demanded 100 million dollars and the release of seven commandos convicted in Johannesburg of exploding a DC-10 in full flight; the Black Arabs demanded 100 million dollars and the release of three commandos convicted in Teheran of firebombing a hospital.

The images relayed by satellite were sharp and clear: the dust-colored American Embassy; the broken windows; the tanks and milling soldiers surrounding the building. A figure stumbled through a window and onto a second-story balcony: Xanthil, grasped by three of his captors. Moments later he was pulled back into the building.

The hours dragged by. An ultimatum by the commandos was released. They were not barbarians; mere foot-soldiers in the fight for freedom. Xanthil was unharmed and comfortable in the code room. If, on the other hand, their most reasonable requests were not acceded to within the next three hours . . .

The world was informed by CBS that the finest military minds of sixteen nations were working on the problem of securing Ambassador Xanthil's safe release.

Chap Foey Rider's lips tightened, and his gaze fell upon his four sons. They were young, well-coordinated, husky; all had fought in various of his country's wars. He sighed.

Four unregistered pistols were found in the filing drawer marked Miscellaneous. Chap Foey Rider led the way to the mailroom. The transparent carton from the stars was still there. It was a tight fit, but John, Chong, Chan, and Wong were crushed in and the lid replaced.

Using a red Magic-Marker, Chap Foey Rider carefully addressed the package on its transparent surface: Code Room, American Embassy, Chad. Fragile, Emergency Routing Via Mandator's Office, Sagittarius. Official Service of the Mandator, Prepaid.

As he drew the final "d" there was a soft implosion and the package vanished. So. His reasoning
had
been correct. Displacement equipment
was
focused on the mailroom. Psionically activated? Possibly. Who cared?

Chap Foey Rider paced the mailroom nervously, lighting and stubbing out cigarettes in rapid succession.

Forty-seven minutes later the package reappeared. His four sons emerged.

"Xanthil?" snapped Chap Foey Rider.

"No sweat, sir," said John. "He's fine. There was a guard in the code room we had to take care of, which alerted the others. It took twenty minutes to mop them up, by which time the army had broken in. Xanthil's diplomatic skills were needed to dissuade them from shooting us on the spot. Eventually he quite kindly readdressed the package for us, and here we are. The Ambassador expresses his most sincere thanks and will tender them personally before returning to Sagittarius. In the meantime,
noblesse oblige
requires him to carry on with his sightseeing tour of Central Africa."

Chap Foey Rider mopped his brow with a silken bandanna pulled from his right sleeve. "Excellent. Well done. And now, if you will straighten your garb, there is a gentleman from Caracas . . ."

". . . and so," said Ambassador Xanthil to the General Assembly, "I must confess that second thoughts are frequently wrong; that one's initial impression is the most trustworthy and reliable . . .

"The unfortunate Xenophobian incident is, of course, irrelevant. Personal feelings must not be allowed to intrude into the smooth workings of commerce and trade, of course . . .

"It is my pleasure to inform you that I shall shortly be recommending to His Excellency the Mandator that a permanent postal branch be established on Earth, one which will promote . . .

"You may find it odd, perhaps, that the initial contracts are not with any of the great sovereign members of this splendid body . . .

"I am sure, however, that as trading skills are honed, worldwide participation in intragalactic commerce will shortly follow and . . ."

"Well, Rider," rasped the Secretary of Commerce, "are you quite content?" State merely glared, too choked with emotion to utter.

"Content?" said Chap Foey Rider, his brow furrowed. "Of course I'm content. I have achieved a lifelong ambition."

"Grrrr," said Transportation, inarticulately but forcefully. Boeing had fallen back to 2-1/4.

"A lifelong ambition, I say. Everybody talks about the weather, and now I've done something about it."

"The weather!" cried State. "What are you raving about?"

Chap Foey Rider blinked. "You haven't heard the details of the small trade I've worked out? Why, it's simplicity itself. Not only does it provide for the cost of installing the Postal Union, it generates sufficient foreign exchange to permit the purchase of goods and services—"

"Kindly get on with it," sighed Treasury. "You can crow later."

"Since you insist. You may have noticed that Ambassador Xanthil initially found our air unpleasantly full of pollutants? No? Ah. In any case, worldwide air-scrubbing machinery was mentioned, which implied that our own smog is by no means a phenomenon confined to Earth. A corollary immediately suggested itself: surely, out of 27,000 galactic members, some worlds have solved their problem of air pollution not by scrubbing, but by evolution. The air-cleansers came too late: the inhabitants
enjoy
breathing smog."

"What!" cried Environment. "That's ridiculous!"

"Not at all," disclaimed Chap Foey Rider. "The Galactic Chamber of Commerce was kind enough to place me in contact with reputable businessmen and financiers on 2,600 such worlds. With the help of my computer, we have mailed out some 89,000 aerosol cans and bottled samples of choice
grand cru
smogs from Los Angeles, Tokyo, Sao Paulo, and dozens of others of our magnificently polluted cities. Mostly to travel agencies and purveyors of gourmet foods and choice wines, of course. The response has been overwhelming, if I may say so. The first tours to hotels and resorts will be starting shortly. The revenue derived will—"

"Hotels and resorts and apartment houses which
you
own, Rider!" shouted CIA. "All over the world you've been—"

"Well, certainly," said Chap Foey Rider, puzzled. "How else could I generate capital to—"

"Battening on the miseries of the world," hissed State. "
Hyena
is the word generally—"

"—generate capital to purchase the anti-pollution controls and devices which within the decade will enable the world to scrub its air and keep it forever clean?" concluded Chap Foey Rider blandly. "The equipment
is
expensive, you know. And, no doubt, I've been sadly overcharged by unscrupulous traders. Ah, well, a businessman's plaint: I won't pass my own commercial shortcomings along to the rest of the world. No, a modest one percent service charge is all that Rider Factoring will add to the landed CIF price. Look upon it as a gift, gentlemen, to the world."

"A gift! One percent of how many billions comes to what? And what about the millions you'll make with your guided tours and your bottles of"—Treasury shuddered—"of canned smog for the fine food trade?"

Chap Foey Rider sniffed delicately at an aerosol can. "Ah, Bangkok, City Hall Plaza, 3:30 p.m., February 13. A vintage day, gentlemen, a vintage day. A choice connoisseur's item, would you care for a sniff. No? To answer your questions. It is not obvious that my small, temporary windfall is self-liquidating in nature? Modest to start with, as the air-cleansing machinery is put into operation it will become ever more modest. Two or three years from now the skies of Los Angeles will be so clear that only the most undiscriminating lover of smog will be visiting. In ten years the trade will be gone forever. Likewise the bottled and canned exports of smog. No more raw material."

Chap Foey Rider spread wide his hands. "Frankly, gentlemen, your opprobrium oppresses me. I, a small, insignificant trader, a benefactor of mankind even, some might say, in an unassuming and humble—"

"Oh, very well," sighed the President of the United States, waving Chap Foey Rider toward the door. "What's done is done. I can see you plainly lack the makings of a statesman."

That was true, Chap Foey Rider reflected, as he left the White House by the East Entrance. A statesman he would never be. Fortunate it was that in his old age he would be able to fall back upon his carefully laid-down cellars of millions and millions of bottles and cans of the choicest
grands crus
of fine smog and pollution. And as the winds of Earth were remorselessly cleansed, surely their value on the galactic market, ten or fifteen years from now, would be well (he smiled apologetically), astronomical.

It is said that after the Revolution of 1848, when Metternich was leaving the Schoenbrun Palace of Vienna for the last time, one of his aides looked at the acres and acres of clerks still seated at their desks.

"My Prince, what will they do?"

Metternich smiled. "You and I go. Perhaps His Majesty will go. But these—
Das Buros
are eternal."

Kipling wouldn't have been much surprised to find that the Galactic Confederation was a bureaucracy.

 
Twelve hundred million men are spread
About this Earth, and I and You
Wonder, when You and I are dead,
"What will those luckless millions do?"
"None whole or clean." we cry, "or free from stain
Of favour." Wait awhile, till we attain
The Last Department where nor fraud nor fools,
Nor grade nor greed, shall trouble us again.
Fear, Favour, or Affection
—
what are these
To the grim Head who claims our services?
I never knew a wife or interest yet
Delay that
pukka
step, miscalled "decease";
When leave, long overdue, none can deny;
When idleness of all Eternity
Becomes our furlough, and the marigold
Our thriftless, bullion-minting Treasury
Transferred to the Eternal Settlement,
Each in his strait, wood-scantled office pent,
No longer Brown reverses Smith's appeals,
Or Jones records his Minute of Dissent.
 

And One, long since a pillar of the Court,
As mud between the beams thereof is wrought;
And One who wrote on phosphates for the crops
Is subject-matter of his own Report.
These be the glorious ends whereto we pass—
Let Him who Is, go call on Him who Was;
And He shall see the
mallie[1]
steals the slab
For currie-grinder, and for goats the grass.
A breath of wind, a Border bullet's flight,
A draught of water, or a horse's fright—
The droning of the fat
Sheristadar[2]
Ceases, the punkah stops, and falls the night
For you or Me. Do those who live decline
The step that offers, or their work resign?
Trust me, To-day's Most Indispensables,
Five hundred men can take your place or mine.
[1]The cemetery gardener.
[2]Clerkofthe Court.

The late John W. Campbell, Jr. dominated science fiction for thirty years. More: he influenced the thinking of a generation of readers and writers both through his story selections and editorials. Trained largely as an engineer, Campbell had boundless faith in rational thought and the ability of the human race to act rationally.

He also believed that his editorials spoke to the potential leadership of the world. He was right, of course: many of the best and brightest did read
Astounding Science Fiction
. Most of them were technically oriented, and went to engineering schools rather than liberal arts, but that wouldn't have disturbed Campbell a bit. As far as he was concerned, the engineers were the truly important people of the West, and if they would only organize, something might come of that.

Mankind has been drawing up pictures of The Good Society for five thousand years. Plato's
Republic
attempts to define the harmonious state, and Plato wasn't the first to try it. Since him there have been literally thousands of others: intellectuals such as Michael Harrington and Marseglio of Padua; dried-out old lizards sunning themselves in Santa Barbara as they rewrite the Constitution of the United States; poets such as Dante; experienced statesmen such as Machiavelli and Sir Thomas More; irresponsible literary gadflies such as Jean Jacques Rousseau.

Given all that talent focused on the question, one might think there is little new to say, but that never daunted Campbell, who rejects most of what has been written before, then turns Acton's dictum about power on its head.

In effect, Campbell says that the form of government doesn't matter: monarchy, aristocracy, empire, republic, democracy—all will work if the rulers are wise and benevolent; none will if they are not.

The key, according to Campbell, is that whoever governs must be
responsible
. It is not absolute power that corrupts, it is absolute immunity from the consequences of abusing that power that turns one into a Kurtz or a Stalin.

The standard operating procedure for the Utopia-inventor is to describe his Utopia in terms of how he
wants
it to work. That is, he describes what he considers the goal-ideal of a society should be, and how he thinks that goal-ideal will be achieved, in terms of how happy, healthy and wise citizens of Utopia co-operate beautifully to produce wonderful music together. Usually, there's no crime, because, says the author, in so perfect and happy a state no one wants for anything.