“Four and a half Earth years.”
Seth’s gaze turned to Gleed.
“Three Earth years.”|
“Not long,” Seth commented. “I didn’t expect you would have much time left. It’s a safe bet that any ship penetrating this deeply into space has a crew composed mostly of old-timers getting near the end of their terms. The practiced hands get picked for the awkward jobs. By the day your boat lands again on Terra it will be the end of the trail for many of them, won’t it?”
“It will for me,” Gleed admitted, none too happy at the thought.
“Time—the older you get the faster it goes. Yet when you leave the service you’ll still be comparatively young.” He registered a faint, taunting smile. “I suppose you’ll then obtain a private space vessel and continue roaming the cosmos on your own?”
“Impossible,” declared Gleed. “The best a rich man can afford is a Moon-boat. Puttering to and fro between a satellite and its primary is no fun when you’re used to Blieder-zips across the galaxy. The smallest space-going craft is far beyond reach of the wealthiest. Only governments can afford them.”
“By ‘governments’ you mean communities?”
“In a way.”
“Well, then, what are you going to do when your space-roving days are over?”
“I’m not like Big Ears here.” Gleed jerked an indicative thumb at Harrison. “I’m a trooper and not a technician. So my choice is limited by lack of qualifications.” He rubbed his chin, looked wistful. “I was born and brought up on a farm. I still know a good deal about farming. So I’d like to get a small one of my own and settle down.”
“Think you’ll manage it?” asked Seth, watching him.
“On Falder or Hygeia or Norton’s Pink Heaven or some other undeveloped planet. But not on Terra. My savings won’t extend to that. I don’t get half enough to meet Earth costs.”
“Meaning you can’t pile up enough obs?”
“I can’t,” agreed Gleed, lugubriously. “Not even if I saved until Fd got a white beard four feet long.”
“So there’s Terra’s reward for a long spell of faithful service—forego your heart’s desire or get out?”
“Shut up!”
“I won’t,” said Seth. He leaned nearer. “Why do you think two hundred thousand Gands came to this world, Doukhobors to Hygeia, Quakers to Centauri B., and all the others to their selected haunts? Because Terra’s reward for good citizenship was the peremptory order to knuckle down or get out. So we got out.”
“It was just as well, anyway,” Elissa interjected. “According to our history books, Terra was badly overcrowded. We went away and relieved the pressure.”
“That’s beside the point,” reproved Seth. He continued with Gleed. “You want a farm. It can’t be on Terra much as you’d like it there. Terra says, ‘No! Get out!’ So it’s got to be someplace else.” He waited for that to sink in, then, “Here, you can have one for the mere taking.” He snapped his fingers. “Like that!”
“You can’t kid me,” said Gleed, wearing the expression of one eager to be kidded. “Where are the hidden strings?”
“On this planet, any plot of ground belongs to the person in possession, the one who is making use of it Nobody disputes his claim so long as he continues to use it. All you need do is look around for a suitable piece of unused territory—of which there is plenty—and start using it. From that moment it’s yours. Immediately you cease using it and walk out, it’s anyone else’s, for the taking.”
“Zipping meteors!” Gleed was incredulous.
“Moreover, if you look around long enough and strike really lucky,” Seth continued, “you might stake first claim to a farm someone else has abandoned because of death, illness, a desire to move elsewhere, a chance at something else he liked better, or any other excellent reason. In that case, you would walk into ground already part-prepared, with farmhouse, milking shed, bams and the rest. And it would be yours, all yours.”
“What would I owe the previous occupant?” asked Gleed.
“Nothing. Not an ob. Why should you? If he isn’t buried, he has got out for the sake of something else equally free. He can’t have the benefit both ways, coming and going.”
“It doesn’t make sense to me. Somewhere there’s a snag. Somewhere I’ve got to pour out hard cash or pile up obs.”
“Of course you do. You start a farm. A handful of local folks help you build a house. They dump heavy obs on you. The carpenter wants farm produce for his family for the next couple of years. You give it, thus killing that ob. You continue giving it for a couple of extra years, thus planting an ob on him. First time you want fences mending, or some other suitable task doing, along he comes to kill that ob. And so with all the rest, including the people who supply your raw materials, your seeds and machinery, or do your trucking for you.”
“They won’t all want milk and potatoes,” Gleed pointed out.
“Don’t know what you mean by potatoes. Never heard of them.”
“How can I square up with someone who may be getting all the farm produce he wants from elsewhere?”
“Easy,” said Seth. “A tinsmith supplies you with several chums. He doesn’t want food. He’s getting all he needs from another source. His wife and three daughters are overweight and dieting. The mere thought of a load from your farm gives them the horrors.”
“Well?”
“But this tinsmith’s tailor, or his cobbler, have got obs on him which he hasn’t had the chance to kill. So he transfers them to you. As soon as you’re able, you give the tailor or cobbler what they need to satisfy the obs, thus doing the tinsmith’s killing along with your own.” He gave his usual half-smile, added, “And everyone is happy.”
Gleed stewed it over, frowning while he did it. “You’re tempting me. You shouldn’t ought to. It’s a criminal offense to try to divert a spaceman from his allegiance. It’s sedition. Terra is tough with sedition.”
“Tough my eye!” said Seth, sniffing contemptuously. “We’ve Gand laws here.”
“All you have to do,” suggested Elissa, sweetly persuasive, “is say to yourself that you’ve got to go back to the ship, that it’s your duty to go back, that neither the ship nor Terra can get along without you.” She tucked a curl away. “Then be a free individual and say, ‘I won’t!’ ”
“They’d skin me alive. Bidworthy would preside over the operation in person.”
“I don’t think so,” Seth offered. “This Bidworthy—whom I presume to be anything but a jovial character—stands with you and the rest of your crew at the same junction. The road before him splits two ways. He’s got to take one or the other and there’s no third alternative. Sooner or later hell be hell-bent for home, eating his top lip as he goes, or else he’ll be running around in a truck delivering your milk—because, deep inside himself, that’s what he’s always wanted to do.”
“You don’t know him like I do,” mourned Gleed. “He uses a lump of old iron for a soul.”
