Amazon Planet

II

Guy Thomas seemed to adapt easily to the routine of life aboard a spaceborne passenger freighter—the Guy Thomases of life drift easily along the buoy marked way, not for them to venture this way or that into unpathed waters.

Had any of the ship’s officers or crew been called upon to make a snap judgement of Guy Thomas, to be expressed in one word, surely it would have been average. For Guy was all but unbelievably average; in height, in weight, in countenance, in color of hair and eyes, in clothing. It was necessary to meet Guy Thomas a half dozen times before one could remember the man.

Following Earth Basic Time, he arose as late as possible in the morning still able to have his breakfast. He spent the next few hours either reading borrowed fiction tapes of the most bland variety, or taking in the Tri-Di shows they had brought along. After lunch he often idled around the ship, making a nuisance of himself, staring at officers and crew at their duties, managing from time to time to get into compartments off bounds to passengers, so that he had to be ordered away wearily—albeit respectfully, since he was a paying passenger—by engineer or signalman, ship’s cook or navigator.

Largely, he seemed impressed by these men of space. For all but a few, such as Happy Harrison, it was far more than a job. It was a sharing in the big dream that man was currently embarked upon. The big dream of achieving his destiny, his explosion into the stars, his releasing of the bounds that had for so long tied him to Mother Earth. Out here were the stars, and the officers and crew of the Spaceship Schirra were participating in their conquest.

Colorless, perhaps innocuous would be better, though he might be, he was company, and on more than one occasion he sat in the copilot’s acceleration chair with the deck officer who was standing easy watch. Easy, since there is so very little do do when a vessel is in underspace. Guy Thomas proved a good listener and a means to break the boredom of a watch when no watch is truly needed in this era of automation.

He sat and listened to it all, dropping occasionally only the affirmations, questions or answers, that were needed to keep the conversation flowing, indicating that his attention was focused on the other’s biographical discourse, romances, opinion of United Planet’s affairs, bigoted beliefs, off-color jokes, wistful descriptions of family at home, or spaceman’s, dreams.

They told him of far planets with offbeat cultures that would make even Amazonia pale by comparison. They commented upon the fact that nowhere in all his explorations had man found other intelligent life. They told of shipwrecks and of rescues, and of shipwrecks without rescue. And always he listened, as though fascinated by every word.

He didn’t exactly avoid the firey Pat O’Gara, but in the presence of that aggressive feminist, usually let others bounce the ball of argumentation. Seldom did he get in a word, on either side of the almost continual controversy that Citizeness O’Gara managed to keep astir. But seldom, obviously, did he wish to add his own small supply of fuel to the source of heat.

Once or twice he was unable to avoid participation at the salon table, or afterwards during the evening’s leisure hours, when Pat and Rex Ravelle, her usual opponent, had it out. He suspected, as would have anyone, that the second officer was debating more out of amusement than sincere conviction; only his opponent was so blinded by her own earnest belief as not to realize her leg was being pulled.

Over coffee, following dinner one evening, Rex had typically slipped her the needle.

“All right, suppose I concede women are just as competent to handle government, although I’ll be a funker if I can think of any historic—”

She let him get no further than that. “I assume you’ve never heard of Elizabeth the First, of Cleopatra, of Zenobia, of Catherine the Great!”

“Touché,” Guy murmered.

Rex grinned. “Okay, I’ll take that. There’ve been exceptions. But that’s not the point. Suppose we’d admit women are potentially as competent to handle state affairs as men. But why should we think they can handle them any better? There’s no proof, and no reason to believe it would develop that way.”

Pat O’Gara said testily, her face pinking as usual in verbal combat, “It’s unfortunate, Ravelle, that you’re so uninformed on the subject. Otherwise, we’d be able to discuss the matter on a higher level.”

The ship’s officer continued to smile mockingly, “Aw, you can’t get by with that, you know.”

“The fact is,” she said contemptuously, “that such government as existed during the overwhelmingly greater period of man’s existence was predominantly in the hands of the women. It has only been in comparative recent history that man usurped the female position of control of society.”

“Hey, wait a minute,” Jerry Muirhead, the third deck officer protested. “I got lost somewhere. What’s all this about women running the shooting match for most of history?”

“What do they teach you in the Space Academy when it comes to primitive society and anthropology?” she scoffed.

Guy Thomas said apologetically, “As a matter of fact, Jerry, it seems to me that I have read that earliest man did trace his descent through the matrilineal line. But…”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Rex said. He grinned around at the other deck and engine officers seated in the salon cum messhall. “I think we’ve got a traitor among us, men.”

Guy said quietly, “It means that the children of a relationship between a man and woman took the woman’s name.”

Pat snorted her superiority again. “Which means, in turn, that women dominated the family. That in case of a ‘divorce’ the children remained in her clan, not that of the father’s. That property, such as there was in those days, was inherited by her relatives, remaining in her clan and that of her children on death or split-up of a relationship.”

Jerry twisted his youthful face. “Well, I don’t know about that, but whether or not kids were named after their mothers or fathers, it was the men who really ran the tribe.”

“If you mean they did the hunting and the fighting, largely you may be right,” Pat said overbearingly. “Although even in those fields the women had a great deal more to say about nomination of chiefs and the deposing of them. You should read Bachofen’s Das Mutterrecht.”

“Das what?” Rex scowled.

“It’s been translated into Earth Basic,” Pat said. “The Motherright. It’s possibly the first serious work on gyneocracy.”

They looked at her.

She said, smugly, “Or would you rather, gynarchy? They mean approximately the same thing. Rule by women. Why even as recently in time as the Iroquois Confederation, women were the great power among the clans and didn’t hesitate when occasion required to ‘knock off the horns’ as it was technically called, from the head of a chief and send him back to the ranks of the warriors. The original nomination of the chiefs also rested with them.”

Rex Ravelle said, “It’s not quite the picture of braves and squaws that I’ve been familiar with, Pat, my dear.”

Patricia said firmly, “Then you’re the victim of a false picture that male propagandists and pseudo-historians have painted. There was, admittedly, division of labor among the primitives and ancients. Men made superior hunters and warriors. The women did the just as important agricultural work, raised the children and maintained the long houses or the adobe community houses. But they also dominated in such government of the tribe as was necessary.”

Rex said impatiently, “All right, suppose we take that. But what it amounts to is you’re admitting that back when women ran tribal affairs the race was nothing but a bunch of savages. It wasn’t until man took over that we started gettting anywhere.”

“Hear, hear,” the chief engineer called from another table. “Well put, for a deck man.”

“It’s according to what you mean by getting anywhere,” Pat said, with unwonted mildness. “I wouldn’t deny that when descent and government changed, institutions changed.” She pursed her generous mouth. “For instance, war became one of the new institutions.”

Guy Thomas cleared his throat at that one. “I was of the opinion that war we have always had with us.”

She turned on him. “Then you are mistaken. War, as we still know it on some of the more backward member planets of UP, is a comparatively modern development and didn’t evolve until man’s domination of government.”

Captain Dave Buchwald seldom entered into the discussion. He was a taciturn man, heavy, straight of eye, and long used to command. So used, perhaps, that he seldom found need to issue orders. He expected his officers and men to handle the workings of the Schirra with such competence that his presence and decisions were seldom needed for the smooth operation of the ship.

But he said now, voice low and courteous, “Without disrespect of your scholarly attainments, Citizeness, I would like to ask how far back in man’s history we must go to find this rule of the gentler sex. I confess, I too have been of the opinion that we have always had conflict with us.”

“Conflict, yes,” Pat said quickly. “But war, in the modern sense, no. I understand, for instance, that in the past the bull gorilla would defend his little patch of ground which he and his family needed for sustenance against the encroachments of other gorillas or other animals in general. In such defense he might engage in combat, but I would hardly call this war. Any more than I would call two stag deer fighting for a doe’s affections, warfare.”

Rex chortled, “Okay, define your terms as that old time comedian was always saying in the Tri-Di comedy we watched after lunch today.”

Pat O’Gara reserved her sharpest tone for the second officer. “Raids, semi-organized skirmishes between tribes disputing over hunting grounds or whatever, personal feuds, and such, have certainly existed, even under matriarchal society, but war in the modern sense, no.”

“Some examples, Citizeness?” the Captain rumbled.

“Well, take the impact of the Spanish upon the Mexicans. To the very end, the Aztecs never quite figured out what it was the Conquistadors wanted. They had no concept of war as their European contemporaries knew it, and they were the most militaristically inclined of the New World tribes. When they fought, they dashed valiantly forth as individuals and it was considered much more valorous to capture an enemy than to kill one. Their conflicts were conducted for the purpose of securing victims for sacrifices to their gods, or for simple loot. So far as war was concerned, they never got to the point of waging it for the purpose of acquiring some other tribe’s territory and enslaving its people. It just never occured to them. Confused Spanish historians to the contrary, there was never any such thing as an Aztec empire, they never even completely dominated the valley of Mexico, an area about the size of the old state of Rhode Island.”

She went on wryly, “In a way, it was pathetic, this conflict between the civilized white men and the Amerinds. Why, as late as the battle of the Little Big Horn, some of the Sioux of Crazy Horse and Gall rode into the fire of repeating rifles armed solely with coup sticks, since it was a far greater honor in the tribes to count coup on a man by touching him without harming him, than it was to kill. The so-called wars the Indians waged from King Philip to Geronimo were actually no more than raids. They had no concept of war as the white man saw it.”

Guy Thomas said uncomfortably, “This isn’t my field, but do you count the Trojan War as one of these, uh, raids, or was it a full scale military expedition? And, where does it fit in on your time scale? Had the men taken over as yet?”

“That was a period of transition,” she said. “Some peoples were still matrilineal, some patrilineal. But read your Homer well, and you’ll see that the Trojan War was a sad example of warfare by any modern standard. The heroes, the champions, would spend most of their time standing around yelling boasts and insults at each other. Occasionally a couple would dash out before their respective hosts and fight man to man, as often throwing huge stones at each other as using weapons. And when one or the other was killed or injured, then the big wrestling match was brought on by each side trying to seize the corpse for its armor. Troy was never really under siege. It was just suffering a ten year series of raids against itself and its neighboring towns and allied cities. Siege weapons such as catapults and battering rams were as unknown as fighting in ranks. Later the Mycenaean Greeks were to learn, when the Doric tribes came in from the north with their patriarchal society and its institutions.”

The captain grunted non-committally.

But Pat O’Gara was in full voice. She concentrated on Guy Thomas. “So far as this war-we-have-always-had-with-us bit is concerned, that’s one of the inevitable stances of the misinformed—they think that institutions with which they are familiar are unchangeable, have always been and will always be. Actually, nothing is so prone to change as institutions, socioeconomic, cultural, religious, or whatever.

Jerry entered into the fray.

“I don’t know about that. Some have been under observation for a long time. Take the Judeo-Christian religion. It can be traced back without unreasonable change for thousands of years.”

She overrode him. “Oh, can it? Or has it been changed over and over again down through the centuries to suit the current situation? Take the Laws of Moses, supposedly the direct word of Jehova to humanity. Who among your Jews or Christians have followed them for centuries past? Who could? Time after time, the religious books of the great religions are edited, to update them. Sometimes a fragment remains which must puzzle the less than scholarly. For instance, let me remember, yes, 1 Kings XV.12 and 2 Kings XXI 11.7 of the Old Testament. Over the years it must have proved somewhat puzzling for the faithful to read of the expulsion of the sodomistic priests from the Temple in Jerusalem. What sodomistic priests? they must have wondered, not knowing that the worship of the pagan goddess Cybele was widespread among the supposedly monotheistic Hebrews up until just before the Exile. Cybele’s worship was one of the most gruesome of the ancient world. Her male devotees tried to achieve ecstatic union with her by emasculating themselves and dressing like women. All this, of course, has been edited out of the holy book now perused by the followers of this faith.”

Guy Thomas was looking at her in some surprise. She was the only woman aboard, but that restrained her not at all when it came to argumentation dealing with her beliefs.

She pressed after Jerry. “Unchanging? Jesus, as a Jew, celebrated the Sabbath on Saturday, as did Mary, Joseph and all the disciples and early saints. His followers don’t; they celebrate Sunday, the Day of the Sun, of the pagans. Why? Or take Jesus’ supposed birthday. Early Christians considered January 6th the date of the Nativity, but about the beginning of the 4th Century, December 25th was adopted. By coincidence it was also the winter sostice which people were used to observing, and the birthday of the rival god Mithra, who at the time was racing neck and neck with the Christians to secure dominance of the Roman Empire.” The fact was, Pat O’Gara seldom lost an argument, if only because she was willing to stick it out, hours on end, if need be, until her opponent wearied of the debate, or had to stand his watch.

Evidently, she wasn’t overly worried about her lack of visas. And, ordinarily, she would have been right. The visa was a permission to land, seldom required on most of the member worlds of the United Planets. And even less often was an exit visa needed for a citizen of one world to leave that planet for another. Most usually, only the more backward, the more reactionary of governments required the bureaucratic red tape involved in the issuing of visas, or even the possession of a UP passport. Only a minority of worlds were afraid that their institutions would be subverted, their sometimes extreme religious beliefs held up to scorn or their sociopolitical system threatened, if outsiders were allowed to come among them.

But Amazonia? Pat O’Gara simply couldn’t believe that the world of her dreams could possibly be serious about the requirement for a landing visa for visitors from any other UP planet.

The captain, when the matter had been brought before him by Rex Ravelle, had shrugged and had had a few words to say to his second officer on his not having checked the passengers’ passports before burn off of the Schirra. He was not going to upset his schedule to return Citizeness O’Gara to Earth, but if the Amazonian immigration authorities prevented her landing, he was going to have no alternative but to continue with her until they reached far Phyrgia and then returned to Earth. If such was necessary, Citizeness O’Gara was going to be held responsible for the full fare.

She tossed her head at that. “I have no funds, Captain Buchwald. I told you I was a refugee from my home planet. I used my last credit to exchange for my ticket to Amazonia.”

He looked at her in bafflement. Captain Buchwald was not used to being baffled, his life was so organized as to avoid such upsets.

“But what did you plan to do, if they refused to allow you to land, Citizeness O’Gara?” he asked in bewilderment.

“I planned to argue with them,” she said defiantly.

Rex Ravelle chortled in the background. They arrived off Amazonia during the sleeping hours and went into orbit around the destination of the passengers while those two were asleep, not having been informed by the ship’s officers that their goal was so near. It was not deliberate. Each had assumed that someone else had notified the travelers.

They awoke, then, to find the ship’s personnel hurrying through an abbreviated breakfast so as to be ready to receive port officials.

Guy had come into the salon first, looking over his shoulder at Jerry Muirhead who had brushed hurriedly past him, a piece of toast still in hand.

“What’s the emergency?” Guy said to the steward.

Happy Harrison shifted his little eyes about. For the present the lounge was empty. He sneered, “These deck officers—nothing to do with themselves, week on end—when something comes up they gotta charge around showing how-important-like, they are. I shoulda gone in for deck, instead of this nardy steward department.”

“What’s up?” Guy repeated.

“Them big mopsies are coming alongside. What’d’ya think? Customs and immigration and all that curd.” Rex Ravelle came bearing in, grabbed up a cup of coffee, took a deep swallow, popped his eyes as though he was about to spit it all out again. He got the coffee down and glared at the steward.

“Harrison, damn your cloddy soul. As long as we’re in space the coffee is too cold to drink. But come up with a hurry and it’s so boiling hot you’d crisp yourself drinking it.”

“Always complaints on this kettle,” Happy whined. “I don’t know why I’ze ever so flat as to sign up on the Schirra”

Guy said to Rex Ravelle, “When are they coming aboard? These are the Amazonian authorities, eh?”

“Right as rain, fella,” Rex told him, blowing on his coffee. He cocked his head to one side as though he had heard a sound that hadn’t come through to the other. “That’s contact. They’ll be here in a couple of minutes. Happy, Holy Jumping Zen, get a move on. Get some refreshments on the table. Some guzzle, some sandwich things.”

“Guzzle,” the steward said indignantly. “You know there ain’t supposed to be no alcohol in space, Second.”

“Knock it, we’re not legally in space. We’re in planet orbit. These mopsies are two-fisted bottle babies. Get some guzzle on the table. You got to butter these curves up. It’s not like most planets. Amazonians don’t want you to be coming around. Doing business here’d like to drive you drivel-happy.”

Happy, grumbling, got about it.

A few minutes later the second officer set down his coffee and faced the entry.

“Ah, welcome aboard, Major.”

Guy Thomas did a double take.

Through the entry strode a figure straight out of the historical fiction Tri-Di shows. It took a fraction of a second for him to realize that it was a woman.

Not that…well, not that it didn’t look like a woman. It was a woman, all right. It was just that…

She was probably about five foot ten. It was the high boots, which had an effect of looking like greaves, that gave her the added inch or two of height, and then the helmet, which wasn’t really gold, on quick second scrutiny, also exaggerated her size. Nor was she as brawny as first impression gave out. That was attained by the cuirass she wore, and partly by the heavy military cloak that hung from her shoulders almost to her ankles. Strictly out of a Tri-Di historical, Guy Thomas decided all over again, and so were the others who pressed behind her, somewhat less ostentatiously dressed, but in the same tradition.

“Morning,” she snapped to Rex Ravelle. Her eyes went around the small salon, touched on Happy Harrison, who had shrunk back into his pantry corner, touched on Guy Thomas, and went on.

There were four of them in all. The major, as Rex had ranked her, alone was weaponless. Her three assistants bore quick draw holsters on one hip, a decorative short sword, or possibly heavy dagger would be the better term, on the other. Their helmets were a pseudo-silver, rather than gold. They looked remarkably efficient. All, including the major, wore their hair short in what would have been called page-boy bobs in an earlier age, and all wore a type of heavy shorts, reminiscent of the pedal-pushers of the past.

Rex said hospitably, “The skipper suggested you might like a bit of refreshment before coming up to his office for business.”

One of the younger women caught up a bottle of pseudo-whiskey from the table where Harrison had laid it out along with sandwich meats, cheese and other cold table spread.

“Artimis!” she chuckled. “Earthside guzzle!” She stuck the bottle to her mouth and gurgled.

Happy Harrison’s face expressed pain.

The major gruffed, half humorously, “Easy, Lysippe, you wouldn’t want to get drenched on this nice men’s ship!”

The other two Amazons crowded up to get at the food and drink. “The Goddess forbid!” one roared, rather than spoke. “Lysippe’s a mean drunk if there ever was one.” However, she too took up a full bottle, rather than bothering with the time-consuming amenity of a glass.

Guy Thomas was sitting a bit beyond at a smaller table.

One of the girls, busy building a king-size sandwich, looked over at him and winked. “Hi, Cutey,” she said. “That’s a pretty little suit you’re wearing.”

Guy Thomas blinked.

Rex said, “Dig in, ladies.”

“Ladies!” the one called Lysippe guffawed. “That’s a good one. Hey, Minythyia, did ya hear that?” She took another hefty swig from her bottle.

The major was working a cork from a champagne bottle. She said to Rex, who was standing back a few feet, watching them, a half twist on his mouth, “What’s this about a passenger?”

He nodded. “Yes, I have the papers here.” He half lifted a hand which held his heavy envelope. “In fact, there’s two. This is one of them. From Earth. Citizen Guy Thomas.” He motioned toward Guy with the envelope.

“Guy Thomas!” the major blurted. “Guy Thomas! We’ve issued no entry visa for a Guy Thomas.”

Guy came to his feet. “But…but there must be some mistake.”

“Minythyia! Hand me that damned directive! Minythyia, the slightest in build and evidently the youngest of the four, dropped her imbibbing and enthusiastic eating long enough to deliver a paper from the heavy leather wallet she had slung over one shoulder.

The major ripped it from her hand and glared at it. “We have records to show only one passenger, and the entry visa was issued to Gay Thomas, not Guy Thomas.”