Happiness: A Planet (21 page)

“Not so far as I know. But neither do they normally remove moons. Possibly, realising we have a Space settlement there, and realising that we would investigate the moon’s sudden disappearance, they have chosen to delay that investigation and so are holding Happiness incommunicado. I don’t know.”

Eldon was rotating his hands,

“In this circle of their spread now...” he frowned with the effort of expressing himself. “Exactly how many suitable planets are there?”

“I’ve gone back, in detail, only over the last twelve decades,” Tulla said. “For every three planets in one forty year circle they take four in the next. That’s an average. At that rate of expansion, though, they were two short in this present forty year circle. During the next two circles, the next eighty years, they’ll more than make up for it. Incidentally, I believe that these forty year spreads indicate that they are not capable of travelling any greater distance. If that is the case then they don’t know what lays ahead of them in the next eighty years, where there is an abundance of suitable planets. If they’d known that I can’t see them having bothered with Happiness.”

Inspector Eldon Boone was shaking his shaggy head, more at his own failure to understand rather than a refusal to believe what she was telling him.

“What I don’t get,” he said, “is why no-one else has noticed this spread?”

“Easy to answer that one Inspector,” Jorge assured him, “they probably have. Somebody probably suggested this years ago. And somebody else, somewhere else, has probably been sitting on that information ever since. Or it got tagged into some obscure file and has been as good as forgotten. So far as Service records go forty years is a long time buried. You agree Nero?”

“It could also be,” Nero sought to flatter Tulla, “the novel presentation that Miss Yorke has now given the facts. Though,” Nero made a grimace of glum certainty, “your original explanation is most likely the case.”

After only five days of Jorge Arbatov’s company Nero had acquired some of Jorge’s cynicism concerning the Service; and Nero was beginning to enjoy knocking down some of his old idols, was getting some small satisfaction avenging himself on the ungrateful powers-that-be.

At the same time Nero feared Jorge’s cavalier utterances, and trembled before his own temerity in imitating them. Yet he could not desist, found himself, as if mesmerised, speaking against his will. Because Jorge Arbatov’s indiscriminate disregard for everyone and everything fascinated Nero, with the same fascination that any potentially dangerous object, such as a gun, has for the rest of us. Even news of Nautili within his Department hadn’t seemed to have unduly bothered Jorge. Nero knew of others who’d have been hiding under their desks by now — himself included. But like Jorge had said, “Don’t be afraid of decisions. The worst that can happen is that you’ll get it wrong.”

“Actually,” Tulla said, “when I worked it out I couldn’t understand why no-one else had seen it earlier, hadn’t warned us. It’s so obvious. Look,” she began tapping at her case.

The three men rose and examined the screens as Tulla called up star charts. Those planets the Nautili were known to inhabit she had marked in red, those she deemed suitable for Nautili colonisation were coloured blue. She guided the three men through the forty year time spans, varying the projections, until they came to Happiness. Happiness was marked in red. When the charts were shown for the next eighty years the expansion was ringed with blue. The eighty years beyond that, though, displayed very few blue spots.

“What,” Jorge asked her, “are the criteria for a planet suitable for Nautili?”

“It has to be approximately a hundred and forty million kilometres from its sun, surface temperatures suitable for us, and, of course, no moon. It also has to have at least one landlocked sea. Or two separate oceans. Those planets where the oceans are joined by river systems, by ancient canals, by lowland marshes even, they haven’t colonised. One ocean on all their planets has to be completely isolated. And, on Happiness, there is just such an inland sea in the Northern Hemisphere.”

“How many planets will they need here?” Eldon pointed to the band eighty years hence.

“Ninety two,” Tulla said, “There are only three there. But look beyond that eighty year stretch,” she tapped buttons, “and there are hundreds. Somehow we’ve got to help them leap that eighty year gap. Or, purely from a selfish viewpoint, if they start removing moons in there there’s no knowing what mischief they might cause. Because in that barren eighty year stretch there are seven cities. That’s why we’ve got to be so careful now. Why I don’t want us to make enemies of them.”

Jorge, Tulla and Nero resumed their seats. Eldon remained staring at the screens.

Watched by the others he worked his way back down through the projections, up again. On the screen the red circles covered part of one galaxy, encroached on another.

“If they can’t travel great distances,” Eldon asked Tulla, “how do you account for this leap between galaxies?”

“I can’t,” Tulla said. “I’m just making deductions from the observations. Yours, anyone’s, could be contrary to mine and as valid.”

“I do not wish to make this your responsibility,” Jorge addressed her, “but, from what you’ve said, I suspect that you have a plan.”

Tulla sized up Jorge Arbatov. On first seeing him she had thought him an old fogey wheeled in as an interim measure. He used their language. However, as much by what he didn’t say — a notable lack of protestations — as by what he had said, Tulla was beginning to realise that Jorge Arbatov was no run of the mill Service personnel. No ordinary Director would have invited his Sub into his confidence. Nor was his casual disparagement of individuals and institutions of a piece with Service tact. Nor had he once attempted to prevaricate or to pass the buck. His questions and his comments had all been to the point. He seemed to be treating the problem on its own merits.

Tulla decided to trust him, to try a direct approach rather than, as she had intended, leading them to make the decision she wanted them to make,

“The first thing we have to do is to keep police reinforcements away from here. If we should provoke the Nautili now, if we should get them into the habit of firing on police ships, we are going to be at war with them for the next hundred and sixty years. With who knows what consequences.”

“Where are our police ships now?” Jorge asked Eldon.

“Both here.”

Eldon was still leaning over the desk. He turned to Tulla,

“Why don’t they try to stop ships going to the planet? Only from leaving it?”

“Who knows,” Tulla shrugged. “Maybe they just don’t want anyone to send for help. Want to keep their colonisation a secret. Would fit with their blocking of our transmissions. Maybe they’re as frightened of us as we are of them. On the other hand their blocking of our transmissions and removing the moon could be mere side effects of some other larger plan.”

“I’m certainly frightened of them. If we fight them we’ll have to engage them along this front here,” Eldon’s blunt forefinger indicated a quarter arc of the screen. “And we don’t have ships or trained personnel enough. So I’m all for avoiding conflict. There’ll be no extra ships drafted in by me. Unless the situation drastically changes.”

“Good,” Tulla said. “I honestly don’t think they intend us any harm. And a sudden concentration of police ships could provoke them to attack in pre-emptive defence. See that,” she pointed to a dense red area. “There are two cities in there. Unharmed. We already have thirteen other planets where settlers co-exist peacefully with the Nautili. Nor do I believe that we could stop them even if we tried. Imperialism carries its own momentum. Our civilisation has met with many obstacles; and we have, so far, resolutely overcome every single one. The Nautili, though, are no obstacle. After all we’re not in competition with them. They have the seas. We have the land and Space. It’s just a matter of working around one another.”

“I too,” Jorge said, “will advise against the sending of more police ships. That will be to my superiors’ taste. They can proceed to do nothing with a clear conscience.”

“Thank you,” Tulla inclined her head.

“So what is your plan?” Jorge smiled at her.

“We have to communicate with them.”

“They’re invisible at the moment,” Jorge said. “How?”

“I believe that this is the perfect opportunity, possibly our only opportunity. Because, over the next eighty years, they’ll have no real need of us. But here and now we can be of use to them.”

“How?”

Jorge’s question again went unanswered. The phone rang. Nero sprang to answer it. For the phone to ring during a meeting the caller had to have a high priority. All awaited the answers to Nero’s brief questions. When he put the phone down it was with a smile of undisguised relief that he turned to face them.

“There’s a City Senate Member here. Hambro Harrap. He wants to see you about the Nautili on the planet Happiness.”

“Petre,” Tulla said, a friendship betrayed.                    

To Eldon Boone’s and Tulla Yorke’s surprise, and to Nero Porsnin’s alarm, Jorge Arbatov greeted Hambro Harrap with the demand to know by what authority he came within his Department to, uninvited and without prior consultation, conduct unspecified research on a planet whose inhabitants had not received even the courtesy of a formal request for such research.

“This is in the nature of an emergency,” Hambro Harrap suavely attempted to soothe what he took to be an irascible petty official jealous of his authority.

“Then I shall declare a State of Emergency,” Jorge said.

“I don’t think,” Hambro smiled placatingly, “that would be wise. We don’t want to cause a panic, do we?”

“If the City Senate believes this to be an Emergency then I shall declare a State of Emergency.” Jorge held out his thin-skinned hand, “May I see the Senate records on this.”

“There hasn’t been time enough to fully consult the Senate.” Hambro adopted a sombre expression, “This situation requires...”

“This situation,” Jorge interrupted Hambro, “requires a considered approach. I’m having no opportunistic politician go blundering in and making matters ten times worse. Now, if you don’t mind, we’re busy.” Jorge turned from Hambro to the screens,  “And should you go anywhere near that planet I will have the police there arrest you on landing. Goodbye.”

This obstreperous old man was not the usual obsequious Service type that Hambro Harrap had come to expect. More especially Hambro had fully expected to be greeted here as a saviour, at the very least to carry the day with the respect due his position.

Accustomed to people letting him have his say he was for the moment at a loss, looked to the large ginger Inspector, who was regarding his discomfiture with some small amusement; to the spiky haired blonde woman, who he guessed was the astrophysicist; to a small bald man simpering anxiously at him, as if trying to disassociate himself from the old fogey of a Director while at the same time remaining mutely loyal to him. A possible ally there, Hambro noted, but he still couldn’t think of a stratagem to overcome the old man’s dismissal. Tevor Cade came to his rescue.

Save that he was thinner Tevor Cade was of the same stamp as Hambro Harrap. Grey hair cut artfully to the curl, he looked substantial, prosperous.

“I believe,” he advanced on Jorge, “you’ll find all the authentication you’ll need here.”

Jorge looked him up and down,

“Who are you?”

“Doctor Tevor Cade.” Tulla winced at the title: she too had doctorates. “I specialise in Nautili.”

“What’s he to do with it?” Jorge asked him, signifying Hambro Harrap.

“He’s a majority contributor to my research funds.”

Jorge nodded, then walked to the door and jerked it open,

“And him?”

Outside stood a small man with shaggy black hair, cameras hung around his neck. Eldon Boone glanced to the screens: Jorge had been studying Tevor Cade’s bill of lading. Eldon was warming to Jorge Arbatov, who now dramatically slammed the door on the cameraman’s lens.

“Tell me,” Jorge asked Tevor Gade, “what you need a cameraman for? Or did he come along to film the hero here?”

Hambro instantly puffed up,

“I think I’ve...”

“Shut up,” Jorge offhandedly told him. Nero’s mouth fell open. Tulla bit her lips.

Tevor Cade’s turn to take stock,

“He came at Mr Harrap’s request.”

“Good. Straight talking at last. Now tell me what you hope to achieve on Happiness. And why Happiness?”

“As you will note,” Jorge was running Tevor Cade’s record onto his screens, “I am licensed to investigate any planet which the Nautili have colonised. No matter what the local situation. There are proscriptions of course, but none, so far as I can see, that apply here.”

“Unless I declare a State of Emergency.”

“Quite. You asked why Happiness. The simple answer is that it is the closest. And, straight talking, it is the planet that I agreed to investigate when I accepted the funds from Senator Harrap.”

“As you agreed to take him and his cameraman along with you?”

“Quite.”

“I can abrogate that agreement, if you so wish, and hold them both here.”