Chapter II

He looked after the dwindling cab a moment, then walked quickly along the concrete toward the elevators. To his left, a procession of assorted vehicles hurried in either direction through the tunnel. Occasional cabters, long-cars, and congyribles pulled up to openings in the railing to let out passengers who approached one or another of the elevator doors. Herl passed three clumps of people waiting for transportation to other floors and noticed that the panels beside the doors, which listed the offices to be found on the ninth, eighth, and seventh floors respectively, were all listings of headquarters of some sort of civil control ... health insurance, building permits, fire inspection, inoculations, etc.

There were both men and women among those waiting, most of them in what Earth would call informal dress (a pair of simple trousers and knitted shirt in gray or brown, often topped off with a heavy furred cape or swathing capelike coat); and most of them were much more warmly dressed than the driver of his cab. Apparently there was not such a shortage of heat-holding fabrics as he had assumed.

As he reached the fourth elevator, the door opened and the group was sucked into its recesses. Herl joined it and the doors closed. "Express to the sixth floor: face the rear of the car please," said the tinny voice from an overhead speaker. Twenty people stood glumly motionless as the car glided up with the faintest of vibrations but with a heavy pressure against the soles of Captain Hofner's feet.

A door opened at the rear of the elevator chamber and the crowd pushed out and spread wide in the large lobby ahead. Herl Hofner shifted his case to his left hand and looked around for some clue to the whereabouts of Crawford's office. That worthy might have the whole floor, but he must have his particular sanctum at some particular place.

Most of the lobby was filled by comfortable looking upholstered couches and chairs, and these in turn were filled by what Herl judged to be a couple of hundred people talking, reading pamphlets, or glancing preoccupiedly through pages of forms that looked like the ones he'd filled out earlier. In a chair near him, Herl saw an old man gazing blankly ahead and approached him.

"I wonder if you would be so good as to tell me where I could find Commissioner Crawford," he requested hopefully.

"What say?" the man blinked and turned his gaze on the red uniform jacket at about the level of Herl's floating ribs.

"Where would I find Commissioner Crawford?"

"Down that way somewhere, I suppose." The man's voice was toneless as he indicated direction with one elbow.

Yes, almost at the corner of the room was a broad paneled door on which the stencilled name Mr. Commissioner A. G. Crawford became legible as Herl approached it. He knocked briskly just below the letters; and the door swung slowly inward to admit him.

Inside sat a receptionist at a switchboard. She looked up at Herl's entrance; and he could see that she was a homely brunette with dull skin and a shapeless figure. Her glance at his trim scarlet uniform was approving and she said, "You're Captain Hofman from Galactic Information, aren't you?"

"Hofner, from Coordination," he corrected. "May I see the Commissioner? I believe he's expecting me."

"The Commissioner is in conference at the moment with some of the men he wants you to talk to. If you could wait in the lobby a few minutes, I'm sure he'll be ready to see you soon."

"Can't I wait in here?"

"I'm afraid not," she replied reluctantly. "It's a rule that no one can wait in the offices. They'd be filling the place to the ceiling if we let them get in this far. Not," she added with what she seemed to think was a fascinating smile, "that you'd try to get in ahead of your turn ... but some would."

* * * * *

Herl retreated with his case of papers to the lobby and took the nearest of two vacant chairs about fifteen feet from Crawford's door. He sat down and pulled a stilo and permanote pad from his breast pocket. Using his case as a writing desk he noted down several questions he wanted to ask somebody. There were vacant planets in his catalogue: maybe he had a market for one of those: and while there wasn't any commission on such a 'sale', there was usually a lot of kudos.

He glanced up at Crawford's door again, and a motion on his left drew his eye. There was someone in the chair next to him only ten feet away ... a woman, no, a girl. The thought flitted through his mind that she was a quiet one to slip into the chair without his noticing. She was looking at him, and he turned his head to look directly at her.

Shock like a heavy charge of electricity gripped and tingled in him. This was no girl, it was a ... a ... a ... who knows what. Wrapped in a thin golden haze, she sat, as if in the midst of an incandescent cloud, through which her face shone as if it, too, were illumined from inside. One bare arm lay along the upholstered arm of the chair, but not quite touching it, as though the cloud gave a little support; but the perfect arm was merely the lower frame for the exquisitely lovely face with its blue eyes that seemed to penetrate his awareness to its depths and the smile that smoothed his irritation at another tedious wait into nothingness.

Herl sat and regarded her a long instant, a foreverness of perhaps ten seconds. Then he came fumblingly to himself and smiled back at her. "Waiting for Crawford, too?" he asked lamely.

The tones of her voice were rippling water, a chord on a stringed instrument. "No."

Herl had a moment of ridiculous longing to stand up and see over the thick arm of the chair to find out what the rest of her looked like. Then embarrassment came and he lowered his eyes. "Excuse me," he apologized, "I'm a stranger to Delight. I didn't mean to pry."

The voice was two tones of a flute. "I know."

"By the uniform?" He raised his eyes again to look at hers.

"By everything." The smile faded, replaced by a look of sober gravity.

Questions raced through Herl's mind: who she was; what the cloud was; what she knew about him; even what she was wearing, for the cloud thickened near the shoulder and neck and he could glimpse only a few shining strands of waving amber hair through the concealing haze.

"You may ask me," she said.

"Ask you what?" he returned, surprised.

"Any of those questions. I will tell you."

Crawford's door opened and the receptionist came toward them. One thought rose imperatively in Herl's mind.

"Will you be here when I come out?"

"No."

He grasped his case and got up. He could see now that she was literally wearing nothing but the half-concealing haze that left her slim legs and bare feet visible. "Will I ... can I ... see you again?"

"Yes."

Herl turned his head toward the receptionist.

"Commissioner Crawford can see you now," she smirked.

He looked back to ask the vision when and how he would find her but the chair was as empty as when he came out of the office.

* * * * *

Confused, like a man suddenly awakened from a fascinating dream, Herl walked after the receptionist through the outer door and to the inner one. She returned to her switchboard and he went on toward the door, which slid into the wall at his approach. He gave his head a quick clearing shake and looked inside the long, austere, uncarpeted office, with its one window at the far end.

Directly ahead of him was a group of men sitting on both sides of a long conference table ... little men, serious-faced, important, earnest. At the far end, a man faced him ... a small, pleasant, but harried-looking middle-aged man, almost bald. Herl identified his outline against the window as that of Commissioner Crawford of the vizor call.

"Come in, Captain Hofner," the Commissioner invited cordially.

Herl did so and looked curiously at the sober faces of the men at the table while the door slid shut behind him.

"Come and sit down," Crawford indicated with his palm the empty chair at Herl's end of the table. His voice was still mellow and cordial. "We are all ready to discuss your officers and see your samples. You will find that we are accustomed to doing business promptly on Delight ... an agreeable feature of our culture, I think you'll find."

Herl smiled, pulled out the heavy chair and sat, pulling it back to the table as he did so. Promptness would indeed be an agreeable feature after those deaf mutes. He put his case upon the table.

"I didn't bring the tapes and films with me from the ship, gentlemen," he apologized. "They seem to have exceeded the weight limit which I could bring into town without special permission. I suppose I shall have to have all these papers approved before I can show you what we have to sell." He opened the case and slipped out the stack of applications. "However, I can make a preliminary survey of your needs and what you have that you'd like an extra-planetary market for." He reached into his jacket pocket for stilo and pad.

A bell sounded beyond the door, which opened; and the receptionist stuck her head into the room.

"Miss Haulwell, would you be good enough to get a special messenger to take these papers around to the proper offices and get 'em stamped?" Crawford gestured to the stack. He scribbled on a pad by his hand, tore off the sheet and held it out. "This will give my authorization for complete clearance."

The shapeless Miss Haulwell came meekly around the table and took the note, then returned to the other end to pick up the pile of applications, handling them almost reverently. "Yes, Commissioner. Will there be anything else, Commissioner?"

"No, not at the moment."

She retreated silently to her anteroom and the door closed.

Just as the door clicked shut, Herl saw the golden haze thickening slowly behind the seated Crawford ... thickening and then fading to nothing as if a cloud had changed its mind about coming into being. Staring beyond the man, Herl missed the beginning of the sentence, but picked it up before the meaning was lost.

"... have been discussing some of the things we need. We'd be interested in seeing any electronic calculating equipment developed in the last eighty years. And our requirements for reducing and storing records, particularly photographic records, have so far exceeded our production of file and development chemicals that we are definitely in the market for such ... or any different improved methods. That's right, isn't it, Mr. Jerrip? (Mr. Jerrip is our Commissioner of Records.)"

A man down the table on Herl's left nodded agreement. "Exactly right, Mr. Commissioner." His tone was most respectful.

Herl made a note on his pad. "Those are some of the most popular numbers in our new listing. What next?"

"Well, we've been discussing the matter of permitting the use of plastic housing materials and if we can come to some agreement, we may be in the market for some plastic formulae and construction plans."

One of the men on Hofner's right grunted an objection.

"Housing Commissioner Ferguson, here, feels that as long as we can continue to supply the expressed demand, there is no need to plan any expansion."

Herl nodded agreeably toward Ferguson and suggested, "Since delivery on heavy items like hot molds for plastics can't be guaranteed in less than ten earth years, you might like to see what we have and reconsider your needs in terms of the next fifty. Our department is trying to get us sears-monkeys around more often than that, but we can't be sure of doing it unless planet-hopping becomes a lot more popular with the boys of the galaxy."

Ferguson grunted again. "In fifty years we probably won't need anything but barracks for Eyefers."

Most of the men at the table laughed, a little self-consciously, it seemed to Herl.

"How about those Eyefers?" Herl opened tentatively. "I don't quite understand about them but I gather they're something of a drag on your culture. We have a number of vacant planets. Would you be interested in sending off a gang of them to colonize? Would they be interested in going?"

* * * * *

A tall man next to Ferguson spoke to Crawford. "How about it, Bert? My household would get along more smoothly with about six less mouths to feed and six less backs to cover."

A fat bearded man directly on Herl's left shook his head rapidly several times. "No, no, no, no!"

Crawford spoke noncommittally. "Commissioner Guildris of Health and Welfare objects."

Guildris stood up. "I certainly do. Not only are the Eyefers hardly competent to colonize anything, but the whole success of our cultural and genetic experiment hinges on their being here among us as an example of what we must avoid if we are to succeed as a race!" He sat down, plumph, on the air-cushion of his chair.

Crawford turned to Herl. "I can explain about the Eyefers while we are waiting for your things from the ship," he assured Herl. "They are really quite important in our scheme of things, as Guildris says."

Herl was startled. "You mean you're sending somebody for my things?" he wanted to know.

"Certainly, if you like. If you don't trust a man to get them, I'll go along with you and we can talk then."

Herl relaxed. "There may be a good many things you'll be interested in when you see the pictures," he said.

The members of the group suddenly seemed a little tense.

"For instance," Herl looked round the ring of faces so sober and intent, "how about entertainment and entertainers? There are nightclub bleepers, and grand opera troupes, carnivals, dancers, magicians, and bocko teams, theatrical companies, acrobats, and several thousand individual artists of various talents ... all good, or Galactic Coordination wouldn't be listing them. What's your preference, gentlemen?"

Commissioner Guildris rose again, a heavy frown on his heavy features. Looks of disapproval were obvious on several other faces also, although one or two commissioners raised their eyebrows questioningly at Crawford.

"I would not presume, Captain Hofner," Guildris stated, "to condemn light entertainment for the peoples of the galaxy. It is, however, an occupation from which we have been able to shield our people for the time being. We have our own approved methods of relaxation and of temporary escape from the pressures of daily living; but these are mostly in the nature of solitary meditation and mechanical music."

Herl winced inwardly. These people would have been better approached by a non-humanoid robot than a red-blooded terran boy. Six feet six of healthy hungry handsome salesman was wasted here. And Guildris would hardly go off on an extended sermon to a machine.

But a human audience was fair game for the paunchy commissioner. "The danger to our citizens, you understand, is not in escapism, even though that may have its own dangers. It is in the approval and possible emulation of individuals ... individuals who, though talented, might not be truly fitted for survival here. We cannot tolerate ... I repeat, we cannot tolerate public distress and public pressure when a public figure fails in his civic duties. Entertainers would be loved. The public would want to forgive them their lapses. This we cannot have."

Herl glanced with a ghost of a smile at one of the men who had raised his eyebrows at Crawford. "No dancers?" he said.

"No dancers," Crawford replied firmly, without giving the other a chance to answer.

Herl returned equally firmly to his task. "And how do you plan to pay for what you buy ... by Galactic Credits ... by man hours of assigned labor ... or by barter? In other words, what do you want to sell among the stars?"

A suave looking man with oily hair and an oilier manner looked at Crawford. "May I, Mr. Commissioner?"

Crawford nodded. "Mr. Applegate, Commissioner of Raw Materials (and that includes labor of course) will answer that."

Applegate turned to smirk at Herl.

"We have on Delight, Captain Hofner, a rich supply of natural fuels, several strains of high-oxygen producing plants, and a most remunerative taxation system. We can sell or barter or even pay for our few needs, whichever proves most satisfactory to Galactic Coordination. We have an untapped reservoir of unskilled labor in our Eyefers, whom we have heretofore avoided exploiting but whom we can use if it seems desirable for the good of our planet. Does that answer your question?"

Herl nodded, surprised that such a prosperous people hadn't gone straight to Coordination for what they wanted years before.

Guildris of Health and Welfare added, "We are most fortunate in being a completely self-sustaining planet. In our abundance of natural foods and textile rawstuffs, we are probably capable of supporting twice our present numbers. That is why we are able to make progress with the great genetic experiment now in progress here. Because it works actual hardship on no one!" he added proudly.

Herl looked at Crawford. "I suppose this experiment will be one of the things you'll tell me about when we go to get my things?"

"Of course," blandly.

"Another matter you might be considering while we are getting the tapes and films," Herl offered, "is transport. Have you enough home-owned space tonnage to carry your exports and imports; or would you be interested in purchase, rental, or simple contract for haulage? You will get your orders much more quickly, I hardly have to tell you, if you use your own ships; but there are a number of haulage companies around the galaxy which would be very glad of your business. And if you cared to send a representative to the nearest coordination center, he could bring you our listings every couple of earth years and return with your orders, so that you could be in much closer touch with what the galaxy has to offer in the way of raw materials, manufactured goods, technological advance, and markets." Herl looked inquiringly around the table.

The rotund Guildris stood up again. "I believe I may speak for all of us when I say that we are not overly anxious for increased contact with the galaxy at this point in our social development. A great deal of thought by some of our wisest men," he bowed to his colleagues pompously, "has been expended on making Delight a self-sufficient independent unit for the most worthy of purposes, the eventual improvement of our race. In a few more generations, we may have something to offer the galaxy ... not to sell but to offer to the need of all other planets ... a strain of _homo sapiens_ so selected as to be a hardy, keen, responsible and intelligent race of administrators and leaders of the galaxy. Because we have dedicated ourselves to this purpose, we must necessarily cut ourselves off from the pleasant interdependence of thriving trade until we are ready to market the noble fruits of our projected garden."

Guildris remained standing a moment, while a gentle handclapping from both sides of the table indicated that his remarks were, indeed, the opinion of all those present.

Herl kept a grave face with the greatest effort. Going to run the galaxy in a few generations, were they? These little two-for-a-credit bureaucrats? Wanted a few little calculators to make themselves the final bosses of everything. He had seen a giant calculator ... an electronic multi-brain, with fifty men coding information for it, preparatory to making the selection of a minor planetary economic advisor. It would be an interesting day when these little men came to Earth to take over. All this flashed through his mind while Crawford was rising to his feet.

"We shall be perfectly satisfied," said Crawford genially, "to have delivery of our small order made by any means you care to contract: but as you have heard, we are not interested in opening up Delight as a trade center, so we have no need for regular shipping service. Now I don't want to take these gentlemen's time with discussion of things they already know," he looked around the table, "so if that's all we can do now, I propose that we disband and meet again at sundown. That will give us two hours to go out to the ship and back. Are there any objections?"

The men were rising from their chairs.

Herl said, almost plaintively, "Doesn't anybody eat around here? Couldn't we add time for a meal?"

Crawford laughed. "I forgot you didn't have your ration card yet. Make that time one hour dark. If your papers aren't cleared yet, I'll stand you to a meal."

Herl stood also, and the men filed past him, shaking his hand as they went. Six commissioners who had not spoken during the meeting added their names and positions. The last to go was a Commissioner of Psychology and Psychiatry, to whom Herl said, "I'd like to see you before I leave here, Commissioner. I think I've been having hallucinations."

The man halted, still holding Herl's hand. "What sort of visions, my boy?"

Herl grinned. "A pretty girl in a golden fog. Probably just the result of months alone in a space ship."

The man sighed, relieved. "Oh, just a goddess. A local phenomenon. Think nothing more of it. Commissioner Crawford will tell you all about that, too." He followed the others out.

A local phenomenon! Maybe that girl was the 'noble fruit' Guildris was talking about. If so, these people might have something after all.