Brian Stableford - Hooded Swan 4 - The Paradise Game

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Brian Stableford
The Paradise Game
1
In the course of my long and somewhat arduous career as a galactic parasite I
have often had occasion to feel that everybody hated me. Only once, however, have I
had the occasion to take particular delight in such a state of affairs. That was on
Pharos.
The day we made the drop I wandered into the shanty town that the Caradoc
crew had knocked together for their convenience. It was mostly slot-together plastic
huts, but the foremen and the managers and organisers had more impressive edifices
made of cuprocarbon in order to emphasise the difference in status. As a town, it was
a distinctly sloppy job, but no doubt they would get around to turning it into a pathetic
imitation of civilised suburbia in due course. The spacefield, of course, was the
number one priority, and that was where all the attention was being lavished at the
present time.
I strolled around the streets, getting my feet muddy, with no particular purpose
in mind, for
half an hour or so, simply taking inward note of the layout. The important
part—the stores, the bars, and the nerve centre of the operation—was in a crescent to
the north, with the social focuses at one end, the administrative buildings at the other,
and the commercial element in the middle. Facing the concave arc of the crescent was
a solitary hut above whose door someone had scrawled the words NEW ROME. The hut
had presumably been supplied and sited by Caradoc, which would also have flown the
representative of justice in from the nearest outpost of official law and order. Caradoc
had a thriving private police force, naturally enough, which would be much better
accommodated in the admin cluster. I didn't bother looking for it.
Feeling in the need of some sustenance after a long flight out from New
Alexandria, I went into one of the bars. It was early evening, but Caradoc was taking
things easy and only working one shift per day, so it was free time and the place was
pretty crowded.
The moment I walked through the door I got the feeling that I was unwelcome.
I can't say that every eye in the place was suddenly turned upon me, or that I managed
to stop the current of conversation dead in its tracks. But I was noticed. Not only that,
but I was obviously expected. Word had gone around that the Hooded Swan had
downed and the pilot of the Hooded Swan was very well known to the Caradoc
Company. At one time, I had been a standing joke, thanks to Axel Cyran's mean
streak and a small matter of a large salvage fee. But the matter of the Lost Star and
four Caradoc ships that went bang had turned that particular joke sick and sour in no
time at all.
—How does it feel to be popular? asked the wind.
Don't you know? I countered.
I walked up to the bar, feeling unpopular but cocksure, and asked for
something that I could watch being poured out of a branded bottle. It's not that I
suspected the barman of harbouring any evil intentions toward me, simply that I didn't
want Caradoc's home-brew.
I gave the man a note, made sure he didn't short-change me, and then I turned
around slowly to survey the motley contents of the room, like they always do in
Western films. Some of them were still looking at me, but most of them had
apparently decided to ignore me. It was the safest course. I smiled nastily at all and
sundry.
This job, I said to the wind, I think I am going to like.
—Bastard, said the wind, with implied disgust at the attitude I was taking.
Besides, he added, it's not your job. You're only along for the ride this time.
I was only along for the ride on Rhapsody as well, I reminded him. But I sort
of got involved.
—Well, if you sort of get involved here, said the wind, you could be in
trouble. I imagine this lot is boiling with rage about Charlot's being sent in to sort out
their nasty little mess, without you interfering as well.
We're being paid to interfere, I pointed out.
—Charlot is being paid to interfere, he corrected me. Strictly speaking, the
Library is being paid to interfere. You only fly the ship.
Want a bet? I asked him. Charlot's going to need a lot of help sorting this lot
out. He's brought Eve with him to monitor, and he's bound to co-opt Nick as an errand
boy. He'll find something for me to do. He won't want me sitting- around all day
while he's paying exorbitant sums for my services. I'm an expert on alien
environments, remember.
—Just because you've spent most of your life grubbing about in them doesn't
make you an expert.
It sure as hell beats education, I told him.
Which was, of course, true. Nothing teaches you aliens better than trying to
make a living off them. I hadn't got Lapthorn's touch by any means—Lapthorn had
the empathy, he could play it all by ear—but I got by. Low cunning, I guess, and a
calculating mind.
I was in fairly high spirits, because this particular job really appealed to me.
Not just because it gave me a chance to stroll around Caradoc property kicking Cara-
doc cats in the knowledge that nobody dared call me any dirty names, but because it
seemed Eke a sound, safe, time-consuming mission. Anything which made the time
go by was all right by me. Every day brought me nearer to the time when I'd be my
own master again.
Pharos hadn't been on Titus Charlot's agenda, of course —it was just one of
those things which tend to crop up now and again. One of the penalties of being one
of the most respected and responsible men in the galaxy. Even if he was mad.
In actual fact, it struck me as a slightly dumb move on the part of New
Alexandria to stick Charlot with the job of arbitrating in a dispute which involved the
Caradoc Company, after the coup he brought off at its expense in the Halcyon Drift,
which was less than a year ago. But God and the Librarians—particularly the latter—
move in mysterious ways. Maybe New Alexandria had good reason for riling
Caradoc.
What had happened on Pharos was that Caradoc had adopted it as part of its
big Paradise drive. Its initial survey teams, for one reason and another, had somehow
overlooked a few million indigenes, and when the natives wandered out of the forest
to watch the Caradoc bulldozers clearing ground, Caradoc had been strangely remiss
about amending its official claims. Word finally filtered out despite the publicity
blanket, and volunteers from a self-appointed protection agency called Aegis had sud-
denly started making a big song and dance about it. By the time they flew in a team of
investigators and agitators, however, Caradoc had produced what it claimed was an
agreement with the natives swearing eternal harmony with Caradoc and all its works.
Allegations and counter allegations soon buried the processes of New Rome in red
tape, and New Rome had called in New Alexandria to arbitrate in the dispute. The
Library sent Charlot, who was, of course, its number one expert on alien/human
understanding. Caradoc's operations were, in the mean time, severely restricted. So
here we all were. Four or five hundred Caradoc operatives—crack planet-tamers—
kicking their heels and tending their machinery; a dozen assorted Aegis freaks stirring
things; one solitary New Rome rep; plus the crew of the Hooded Swan. All very cosy.
And could there be a nicer place to sort it all out than Paradise?
From where I was standing, of course, it didn't look at all like Paradise. The
inside of a bar is a long way away from anybody's idea of Paradise, except for a few
un-rehabilitated juicies. I admit to being prejudiced against Caradoc, but I'd far rather
have seen anyone else but it in charge of the Paradise racket, if there had to be a Para-
dise racket in the first place. And I guess there had. It's one of the facts of life.
There was a game of cards going on in one corner of the room, and I wandered
over to get a look at it. After all, I was going to have to do something to keep me sane
while I was here. As I moved, I drew attention to myself again. People looked to see
where I was going and why. I'd never known so many people interested in my move-
ments since some comedian had looted a church on Jim-sun, and Lapthorn and I were
the number one suspects. (They did eventually catch up with the real culprits.) As I
said, the room was crowded, but the way before me cleared as I crossed the room. I
never had to say "excuse me" once. It's nice when people show you a little
consideration, even if you do feel called upon to suspect their motives.
I kibitzed for a while, holding my half-empty glass in my hand without
bothering to sip it to the dregs. Nobody was going to offer to buy me another one, and
it was expensive stuff. Caradoc made its employees pay for their vices.
They were playing Doc Pepper, which was a good sign, because Doc Pepper is
a game with a reasonable modicum of skill attached to it. It testified to the amount of
time these boys had to spare, because usually labour camps specialise in games where
the money moves faster and the rules are simpler. Company men like to gamble rather
than play games, unless they have enough time on their hands that betting pure and
simple becomes a bit of a drag, in which case the purists among them will always turn
to something with more bark than bite.
They seemed to be pretty orthodox players, which was a pity. It's always
easier to take money off people who believe in luck. They didn't offer to let me join
in. They didn't even make a nasty comment about kibitsers. They just carried on,
looking up at me occasionally with passive expressions.
My eyes wandered toward the door. It was ajar, and there was a face peeping
through it. It was pretty dark outside by now, and the face was just a blur. At first I
thought it was a woman—a company whore—but then I realised that it was just a
little bit too grey. It was an alien. A native. I didn't know much about the natives ex-
cept that they were humanoid, curious, gullible, and all female. Judging by the silence
which fell as other people began to notice the strange presence and eyes fixed
themselves upon the crack, none of the Caradoc men knew much more. Somebody
leaned over and pushed the door open gently. The native stared in with obvious
curiosity. The Caradoc crew stared back, with equally obvious curiosity. I'd thought
my entrance was a good one, but it paled into insignificance alongside this new
encounter.
"Come on in," called somebody from the far corner, in a tone of heavily
sarcastic welcome. The silence dissolved.
"Step right this way."
"What'll you have?"
"Wipe your feet."
The last remark brought forth a laugh. The laugh died as the alien moved
forward slowly, coming into the full glare of the electric lights.
Her skin was covered in light grey fur. Her face reminded me of an owl, with
huge, large-lidded eyes. The eyelids moved slowly up and down, so that one moment
the whole of the eyes were exposed, the next only a half or three-quarters. She had a
sort of mane of lighter fur or hair descending down her back from the crown of her
head, starting off in between her small, pointed ears. Her arms were thin and short,
and she walked with her legs permanently crooked. She was naked, but thick hair cov-
ered her loins.
The man who'd pushed the door open now closed it behind her. He didn't have
to move in front of it. The gesture was sufficient. She didn't look back. She just
carried on looking at the people in the room. I could sense their trying to decide what
attitude to adopt. What was company policy? Did my presence make any difference?
It was obvious that we were dealing with an unprecedented situation.
There were more than forty people in the room. In forty people, there just had
to be one. Usually, there are more. And I knew full well that when the son-of-a-bitch
who was going to try something showed up, it was going to have to be me who sided
with the alien. Under different circumstances, the company men would probably have
kept their own house in order, unless what the Aegis people kept screaming about
atrocities had some truth in it, which seemed unlikely to me. But with me there it was
all different. I was the outsider, the interfering bastard. They were bound to leave it to
me to interfere. They wanted to watch me in action. A bit of good, old-fashioned
conflict. It sure beat Doc Pepper.
For a few moments, the room was preternaturally silent and motionless. Then
the self-appointed Caradoc champion stepped out into the limelight. He was built like
a bear, but he had a face like a pig. For all I knew he might have an I.Q. in the one-
eighties, but he looked every inch a cretin, and I could figure how much he suffered
for that. He was a hater. He hated me, and he hated the native—probably all natives,
of whatever kind.
He stood up and he put his right foot up onto his chair, and he leaned on his
knee.
"Come into town to have a look at us, have you?" he said. It was carefully
phrased. He knew full well she didn't understand. He was talking at me.
She turned slightly to stare at him. That was understandable, as he was the
only thing that was obviously happening. She stood quite still, apparently completely
relaxed. Not the slightest sign of fear.
"I tell you what, honey," he said, his voice slow and measured, with an edge like a
knife "You come upstairs with me, and I'll really show you something." As the sen-
tence progressed he began to spit the words out. He was drunk enough to tell himself
that he should go ahead and lose control, but he was drunk enough to know exactly
what he was doing. He stepped forward from his chair, and walked up to the alien. He
put out his hand, and he said: "My name's Varly."
And she reached out, and took his hand in hers. For a moment, he seemed
shocked, and almost recoiled in horror from the touch. But then he gripped his
prejudices in both hands and squeezed her hand, not very hard.
"Step right this way," he said, with a horrible, lopsided mock-grin all over his
face, which was pointed at me so that I could savour the full effect.
There wasn't much point in hesitating any further.
After all, I wasn't in any doubt. I reached out sideways and borrowed the card
dealer's spare hand. I lifted it up and pressed my drink into it
"Hold that," I said. It was just to let them all know that I was on my way. I
went forward. I was very glad to see Varly drop the. girl's hand as he turned toward
me to present me with a head-on view of his vast, and no doubt hairy, chest. If he'd
kept hold I might have had problems.
My eyes locked with Varly's, and I walked right up to him. His eyes gleamed
as he poured willpower into the staring match. Then I turned away, to face the native.
I took the hand that Varly had dropped, and I propelled her gently toward the door.
Unostentatiously, I inserted myself between her and the big man. The guy who'd
closed the door didn't move a muscle. His eyes were fixed on my face, but I didn't
spare him a glance. I opened the door, and she stepped through it without a moment's
hesitation.
Then she turned around, just as I dropped her hand again.
"Go home," I said, before I could stop myself because it was a silly thing to
say and would spoil my big act.
She just stood there, looking at me out of her big eyes. It suddenly struck me
how silly the whole thing was. I'd been through it all before, almost to the letter.
Grainger, knight-errant. I shudder to think of all the advice I used to give Lapthorn
about just such occasions.
I pointed in the direction that I thought would take her out of the town in the
minimum possible time. She didn't move. I flapped my hand, suddenly feeling that it
might not work. Finally, she began to back away. I watched her until she turned her
back on me, twenty yards down the street, and then walked on, still unhurried and
unworried. A couple of company men passed her on the street. They looked, but they
didn't touch. I figured she'd be safe enough, and I turned back inside.
Varly was waiting for me. He hadn't stood rooted to the spot, like an idiot.
He'd come up behind me, quietly. He was breathing down my neck, waiting for me to
turn around and look up into his ugly face. When I did, I was quite calm, and showed
no surprise. I hadn't heard him, but I knew he was there because of the smell.
There wasn't room for me to close the door. All he had to do was push, and I'd
be out in the dark street, all set up for pulverising. He had about five inches height and
a good kilo and a half in hand of me. He was big.
But first he wanted to insult me.
"Damned slug-lover," he said.
I could almost have laughed at the ineptitude of it. But it was deliberately
crude and ridiculous. His idea of the etiquette of the situation was that bestial
coarseness was called for rather than oratorical elegance. After all, come morning he
was going to have to explain to his superiors that he was blind drunk and didn't even
know what he was doing, let alone who he was doing it to.
I wished that I was near enough to the lintel to be able to lean back on it with
some semblance of casualness. But my position demanded that I stand on my own
two feet. I waited for him to carry on. There was more yet.
"I'm gonna kill you..." he began. There was a lot more, but I didn't bother to
listen to it. Instead, I picked out his eyes with mine, and I used his abusive interlude to
reinstate the staring match I'd abandoned earlier. He finished up with some comment
to the effect that "...you better protect your hands because it's them that you'll be
crawlin' home on. I'm gonna break your legs."
"No you won't," I said, without moving a muscle.
The comment made him hesitate. He realised that I was staring at him, and
suddenly he couldn't meet the stare. He almost hit me then, but he'd lost his stride. I
think he felt a wave of genuine drunkenness then, because he seemed very uncertain.
Doubt washed all over his pig-like features.
I just kept on staring, feeling fairly sure by now that he wasn't going to hit me.
His fight-starting rhythm had broken down. The fake drunken stupor which—a few
moments before—had been his excuse now became his refuge. With a slurred curse,
he dropped his head and lurched forward. He shoved me sideways with a savage
sweep of his arm that was half a punch, and staggered out into the night.
The blow sent me sideways into the lintel and I paralysed my arm temporarily
jabbing my elbow into the edge of the door, but I didn't let the pain show. After all, I
had my dignity to think of.
I heard Varly's voice drifting back from the middle distance, saying "damned
slugs" or something similar. I hoped fervently that he didn't run into any, though by
now he would have forced himself into drunken oblivion.
Nobody said anything to me as I walked back to the Doc Pepper game. They
all eased themselves back into the pattern of existence they'd been following before
the alien made her entrance.
My drink was sitting on the card table. The dealer didn't look up when I
retrieved it.
I looked around at the men standing nearest to me, until one actually permitted
me to catch his eye. I raised my drink to him, slightly. He did likewise.
"I know when I'm not wanted," I said to him quietly, draining my glass. "But I
usually stick around anyway." The latter sentence I muttered, almost under my breath,
but I think he caught the implication. My exit wasn't nearly as impressive as my
entrance.
It was a warm night. Naturally.
What a welcome, I commented inwardly.
—You were looking for it, said the wind. Don't kid yourself that happened to
you. You were just crazy to throw your weight about. You knew they couldn't afford
to start trouble.
Thanks a lot, I said. I wish I knew everything too.
2
The stars were really beautiful, and the air tasted like...
And it just felt good. All of it. Nothing in particular, nothing special. I felt at
home there. It was a kind of infant Earth. The night wasn't alien, not at all.
I felt as sick as a dog.
It was all so sweet and nice and sickly. It was offensive, the way that world
took hold of me like that. It was an insult. I remained apart from myself even while I
was busy reacting to it. I could sit back inside my skull, confident that no matter what
that walk back to the space-field made me feel, it couldn't touch me. I was above it all.
I could afford to be cynical.
They built the town a fair way from the spacefield, of course. It was only a
small port—nothing like the miles and miles of New York port or any of the port
cities on the core worlds. Landing ships here would be like dropping footballs on a
postage stamp. They had to build the town a mile or two off or no one would be able
to stand the noise of the big babies—the ramrods and supply ships—manoeuvring for
landing.
So I had a fair walk back to the Hooded Swan. Long enough to get a real feel
of Pharos by night.
It was easy to see why Pharos was a pawn in the Paradise Game. It was a sugary
version of Earth. It was mostly ocean, and it tumbled in its orbit so that its season-cy-
cle was so short it was virtually meaningless. The weather, so rumour had it, could get
pretty fierce at times but the climate was wonderful. A few planetary engineers, a
couple of botanical beauty surgeons, and a few billion dollars could turn the place into
heaven in no time at all. In a galactic economy, the sheer abundance of everything
makes tangibles almost worthless. The real fortunes, the fortunes that buy and sell
worlds and suns and peoples—and there are such fortunes, for the difference between
very rich and very poor is measured in galactic terms—are not founded upon the
trading of things but on dealing in services.
New Alexandria was the most powerful world in the galaxy, because it dealt in
knowledge. New Rome was vastly powerful because it sold law (in the guise of jus-
tice). The Paradise Game was a golden stairway to galactic power because it sold
ways of life. A rich man can't take his worldly wealth to the Kingdom of Heaven (so
it's said), but he can use it to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to him. In this day and
age, Muhammad would definitely not have to go to the mountain. Assuming, that is,
he had money.
New Alexandria had a monopoly on its kind of power because knowledge
only becomes vital when you have enough of it. New Rome had a monopoly on its
kind of power almost by definition—it made the rules that gave it the monopoly. But
everybody could play the Paradise Game. You just hop into your ship and you go
looking. That's easy.
The tough part of the Paradise Game comes when you've found it. Then you
have to use it.
Personally, I don't believe in it. I can understand it, but I don't believe in it The
recipe is a fairly simple one. Tastes vary, but not much. You don't fail to recognise
Paradise when you find it. It's a world about so big, about so far from a star that could
be Sol's twin sister. It's usually got a lot of ocean, a lot of vegetation, and not too
much microfauna (though that can always be arranged). It has an oxygen-nitrogen
atmosphere, with possibly just a hint more oxygen than Earth. It looks, in fact, like a
young, unspoiled Earth. It sounds horribly unimaginative and prosaic. It is. That's why
I don't believe in it. The Paradise Game panders to the lightest and most superficial of
daydreams. The contents of its packages aren't worth the gaudy shadows they're
wrapped up in. But the packages sell.
Do you want to buy a ticket to Paradise?
First class only.
Not for me. Sure it was beautiful. Pharos was the incarnation of that which
we're all conditioned to think of as beautiful, to revere and to dream of—the
unpolluted Earth. Come to Pharos and be conned by your own senses, betrayed by
your own emotions. Come to Pharos and live in the perfect environment, tailored to
your needs, your wants, your dreams. Come to Pharos and don't ever ask what life in
Paradise is for. Come to Pharos and die.
Like I said, I felt as sick as a dog. It was only a mood. I knew it would pass. In
the morning, I might feel that it was all worthwhile. I might settle down to enjoying
myself. But I knew that as long as we were here, the whole nature of the problem that
Charlot was trying to sort out was going to sour my outlook on life just that important
little bit.
It was a bad time for Charlot to accost me, but he was waiting for me back at
the field. He intercepted me while I was heading for the Swan and took me aside into
the "office" that Caradoc had very kindly made available to him for the duration of his
stay on Pharos.
It was a three-room shack, with plastic furniture, plastic filing cabinets, and
plastic fittings. It also had carpets, which signified that the Caradoc people were
trying to put a brave face on the poverty of their facilities.
I was expecting the Spanish Inquisition, but he didn't even bother to ask where
I'd been, let alone who I'd been upsetting. Nobody else was around, so I knew it
wasn't a mass briefing session.
"I'm going to need your help," he said. Life is full of surprises. Either this was
a new exercise in humility, or a new ploy for handling errant employees. I let him
carry on.
"We're pressed for time," he said. "We've got to find out all there is to know
about these aliens in a matter of days. I stand no chance on my own. You're the only
other man on the planet who has any chance of reaching an understanding with them."
"What's the panic?" I asked him.
"We have to find a convincing reason for expelling Caradoc from this world,
and we have to publicise that reason as widely as possible, before Caradoc decides to
throw Aegis, Keith Just, and ourselves off the world and just get on with it."
"I thought that arbitrators were supposed to find out all the facts before they
made their decisions," I said.
"We already know enough facts," said Charlot. "What we're dealing in now is
diplomatic excuses. Caradoc has its treaty. We all know it's worthless, but Caradoc
might just be prepared to overlook that and go ahead anyway. We have to come up
with an excuse of our own before the Caradoc people decide to act."
"What difference does it make if they do act, if we can decide they aren't
entitled to?"
Charlot made a gesture of impatience. "Caradoc is too big to push around
without any effort," he said, as if it ought to be patently obvious to a child of three. "If
it seizes this world there's damn all we can do about it, there's damn all New Rome
can do about it, and there's damn all anyone else can do about it, short of starting a
war. We don't want a fight, and we don't want a precedent. We can't force Caradoc to
back out, so we have to exert the only pressure we can. That's political pressure and
moral pressure. We have to find a very good reason for telling Caradoc to go to hell,
and we have only days to do it."
I almost winced at his tone of voice—I wished that he wouldn't talk to me like
that. For a politician he was certainly an expert at putting my back up. But I couldn't
really find it in my heart to be too resentful. I'd put his back up quite a bit in my time.
In addition, of course, I appreciated what he was saying. I got the message. I could
hardly fail to get the message after my little encounter with Varly. Charlot wanted to
do what I'd done, on a somewhat larger scale. I sympathised. I was on his side. I
doubted that our motives were the same, but what we wanted to see done was the
same kind of justice.
"You better pray that this place isn't bugged," I told him. "Because if Caradoc
catches on to what you just said it'll be on the move right now."
He laughed shortly. He never laughed because something was funny, only
because something was wrong.
"It's no secret," he said. "Caradoc must know which side of the line the axe
will fall. They can't be a hundred percent certain that the decision's already been
taken, but they'd be fools to think that it might eventually come out in their favour.
The only friends they've got are those fools from Aegis."
That surprised me.
"You mean the Aegis people are plants?"
"Of course not. Just idealists. But their kind of opposition is a lot easier for
Caradoc to deal with than ours. Caradoc's dearest wish is for this conflict to appear in
the public eye as one between itself and Aegis. That, it can handle. We have to make it
over into a conflict between Caradoc and the aliens. We have to prove that Caradoc's
mode of exploitation is ipso facto bad. What Caradoc is hoping for is a chance to
establish that its intentions are no worse than anyone else's. While Aegis is 'anyone
else' it has a chance."
"What do you want me to do?"
"Find me something I can use. Anything."
"What kind of anything?" I wanted to know.
"Prove that it would be a disaster for the aliens to play host to Caradoc's
Paradise gang. Prove that the aliens were coerced into signing that treaty. Prove that
Caradoc is importing diseases that will kill off the native population. Anything. But
prove it."
I thought back to that alien. Absolutely trusting. Absolutely friendly. No fear,
no aggression. What did she have against Caradoc? Nothing. She just didn't know.
But would it make any difference if she did?
"I'll do what I can," I promised him. "But I don't know if there's anything I can
do. And to be quite honest, I just don't see how we're going to stop Caradoc anyhow. I
don't see what's stopping them now."
"What's stopping them now," he said, "is not knowing how far they can go and
get away with it. They don't know how much money will flow with the morality."
It was my turn to laugh.
"You can afford to be cynical," said Charlot. "You don't have a profit margin
to worry about. They're gambling with more worlds than this one. It's a tough game.
It's easier for you to play than for Frank Capella or his bosses. Their fortunes and their
futures are tied up in this gamble. There's no way they can calculate the answers."
If in doubt, I thought, hesitate.
I stood up. "I better get some sleep," I said, "if I'm going to be working
tomorrow."
He didn't make any move to follow me. Apparently, he still had some thinking
to do. Planning strategy, or just plain worrying.
He didn't bother to say thank you, either.
3
Eve shook me awake. It didn't feel as though I'd been asleep very long, but I
didn't bother with useless and meaningless questions like "What time is it?" Short
sleeping is all part of adjusting to local.
"Are we in a hurry?" I asked her. She seemed to be in a particularly brisk
mood.
"Suddenly, you're popular," she said. "The boss wants to see you right away.
Not the rest of us—just you. What did you do?"
"Nothing," I assured her.
"What didn't you do?"
I answered "Nothing" to that, too. She didn't seem particularly surprised, but I
could tell that she was interested. It wasn't unknown for Charlot to deputise Nick to
help him on a job, but even when he co-opted all of us en-masse into his little
schemes, his advice to me usually only went so far as "Stay out of trouble."
Obviously, Eve didn't know about the little tête-à-tête Titus and I had had the night
before. I wondered whether she knew what Titus had told me about the whole
operation being a put-up job. As my head cleared, I realised that she almost certainly
didn't. As official monitor on the mission, everything she saw or heard might later
become important as an official legal record. It would hardly pay our side to prejudice
our position in the record.
She had breakfast all ready for me. I practically threw it down—not, of course,
because I was mad keen to get on, but because that's the least arduous way to transfer
gruel from outside to in.
Titus apparently couldn't wait. He appeared in the doorway of the cabin while
I was still sipping at my coffee.
He glanced at Eve, who was still sitting on the bunk waiting for me, though
she ought to have had better things to do, and then he pitched in.
"I've got to go out and see the natives right away," he said. "No time to waste!
Holcomb—he's the Aegis man— and Capella both want to pester me with their cases.
Nick will look after Capella, but Holcomb might actually have something to tell us.
Can you take care of him?"
"Sure," I said.
"It shouldn't take too long. A couple of hours, if you can keep him off
polemics and on evidence."
"That won't be easy," I pointed out.
"You'll manage," he said, with touching confidence.
"What about me?" asked Eve.
Charlot hesitated for the barest instant. "It's going to take time making any sort
of progress with the natives," he said. "There are bound to be extreme communication
difficulties."
"Won't the Caradoc people have interpreters?" she asked innocently.
"Those are the communication difficulties he means," I interrupted dryly.
Charlot looked at me as if I were a scorpion in the bedclothes. I got the message. I
was an unbiased investigator, a seeker after truth. Capella's hypothetical bugs could
safely be ignored, but the delicate, shell-like ears of the monitor had to be protected. I
tried to signify with a nod and a twitch of my facial muscles that I understood and
would be careful.
Charlot turned back to Eve. "I think you'd better go with Grainger," he told
her. "After all, Holcomb stirred up this mess—better have what he has to say on the
摘要：

BrianStablefordTheParadiseGame1InthecourseofmylongandsomewhatarduouscareerasagalacticparasiteIhaveoftenhadoccasiontofeelthateverybodyhatedme.Onlyonce,however,haveIhadtheoccasiontotakeparticulardelightinsuchastateofaffairs.ThatwasonPharos.ThedaywemadethedropIwanderedintotheshantytownthattheCaradoccre...

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