Monument (novel)

10

Talitha and Aric Hort despondently faced each other across a table in the embassy’s dining room. The autoserver loomed nearby, but nothing it could offer on this morning tempted either of them.

Finally Talitha burst out angrily, “A biological research laboratory could develop a specific for that disease in a couple of hours.”

Hort’s response matched her bitterness. “I don’t happen to have one with me.”

“Any competent doctor with training in bioanalysis—”

“If you run into one on the beach, send him up here and I’ll put him to work.”

“Does it cause many deaths?”

“Dabbi’s is the third this month. The last two months there weren’t any; the month before that, eight. Not many in terms of the total population. The bacteria has to be present, and there has to be a fairly deep flesh wound. When the two happen together, the mortality is a hundred per cent.”

Wembling entered. He nodded pleasantly, and when they did not respond, he suddenly remembered. “The child died?” Neither of them answered. “Pity,” he said. “Too bad they’ve no conception of medical science.”

He strode to the autoserver, consulted the breakfast list, punched buttons, and accepted a steaming tray. He carried it to their table and seated himself, and he was taking his first mouthful of food when he noticed that they weren’t eating. He asked, “Finished breakfast already?”

“I may never eat again,” Talitha said.

The rest of the staff strolled in, gave them a chorus of greetings, and gathered about the autoserver.

“Isn’t it time you reprogrammed this thing?” Sela Thillow asked Renold. “Everything is starting to taste the same, and it was a lousy menu to begin with.”

“See if you can coax it into putting out some of that native koluf,” Hirus Ayns said.

They took their trays to another table. Talitha said to her uncle, “Did you ever have the agony of watching a child die?” He stared at her. “A death like that is absolutely unnecessary,” she went on.

Wembling nodded. “Of course. Health always is a problem where medical facilities are primitive. Living on such a world is dangerous—something like that could happen to any of us.” He shrugged to show how oblivious he was to danger and went on spooning his breakfast.

“Uncle Harlow!” Talitha exclaimed. “You’re wasting your time trying to build a reputation with drainage ditches. Give the natives a medical center!”

Wembling shook his head. “That’d only give me a reputation for being rich—which I already have. Anyway, it’d cost more than the publicity would be worth.”

“What’s so expensive about a small clinic?”

“The staff. No medic is going to leave a comfortable situation to work on a primitive world unless he’s offered an enormous salary. He’ll also want lavish support in the way of assistants and laboratory and research facilities. It’d cost a fortune annually to finance that kind of operation. Hirus?”

Ayns had been listening. He always was listening. He said, “Depends on what you want to accomplish. The kind of medical center found on civilized worlds would be impossibly expensive to duplicate here. On the other hand, a small clinic, bring in an unsuccessful doctor who’d jump at a steady salary—”

Wembling was shaking his head. “No good. That kind of setup wouldn’t accomplish a thing except find alternate ways of killing the natives. To do the job adequately would cost a fortune. It’d certainly cost a lot more than I’d be willing to spend.”

“Then get governmental support,” Talitha said.

“Can’t be done. Langri is an independent world, which means that its health problems are its own business. If it were dependent, the government might be coaxed into putting a medical station here.”

“Then change its classification.”

“Perhaps the natives think their independence worth more than a medical station,” Hort remarked.

Talitha ignored him. “Why not offer those doctors and technicians a free vacation if they’ll work part time in the medical center? ‘Vacation in Paradise’—that ought to fetch a few doctors.”

Wembling found that amusing. “A long trip with a part-time job at the end is no vacation. No, there won’t be a medical station on Langri until the government can support one, and I can’t imagine where it would get the money. A world can’t amass exchange credits unless it has something someone else wants, and Langri—”

For a suspenseful moment Wembling stared at Talitha. Then he scrambled to his feet and dashed for the door. Talitha hesitated, exchanged glances with Aric Hort, and then she followed her uncle. Hort hurried after her. The staff had left off eating for a moment when Wembling got to his feet, but none of them moved to follow him. When Wembling wanted his staff, he let them know it.

Talitha and Hort caught up with Wembling on the beach. He was standing where the gentle surf lapped at his sandals, waving his arms excitedly. “That’s the answer, Tal!” he exclaimed. “The people of Langri can operate a vacation resort, and the profits will finance a medical center and anything else they want. And setting it up for them will make my reputation.”

“I don’t think the natives would want their world cluttered up with tourists,” Hort said.

Wembling grinned at him. “Hort, you’re fired.” He turned toward the sea and raised his arms, a man with a vision. “Langri —even the name sounds like a vacation paradise. There are plenty of barren worlds in this sector where life is either difficult or monotonous, and their peoples would pay a soul’s ransom for a vacation on a world like this. Look at the ocean. The forests. The natural beauties of every kind. The word ‘paradise’ is an understatement. How could I have been so blind?”

Now Hort was genuinely concerned. “I don’t think the natives—”

“Don’t talk nonsense,” Wembling told him. “Giving up a stretch of the beach to a tourist resort won’t affect the natives at all. Unless they want to work in the resort and get rich. If they don’t want to, we’ll import labor and they’ll get rich anyway.” He paced back and forth excitedly. “How could I have been so blind? This will make my reputation, Tal, and you’ll be able to play hostess in the Binoris Embassy.” He turned to Hort. “Get Fornri.”

Hort hesitated a moment, shrugged, and trotted off along the beach.

Wembling resumed his pacing. He said over his shoulder, “What do you think?”

“I think it’s a wonderful idea,” Talitha said. “Anything that gets these people the medical help they need—”

Wembling wasn’t listening. “We can leave the landing field where it is. Lay out a village on the embassy site for employees. What a resort it’ll be!” He waved his hands rapturously. “Fleets of pleasure craft at the wharves!”

“Undersea craft, too,” Talitha suggested.

“All kinds of water recreation. Fishing—those weird things in the ocean ought to provide plenty of excitement. Never know what you’ll catch when you fish on Langri. A native festival every night. Gourmet feasts of native-prepared food. I’ve been blind. You kept saying this was like a vacation world, and I never saw it that way. This is the kind of thing Binoris will understand— developing a resource a world never knew it had. It’ll make my reputation. The Binoris appointment—”

He broke off and muttered, “Now that was a fast trip.”

Hort and Fornri were approaching along the beach. Wembling and Talitha walked to meet them.

“He was on his way to see you,” Hort told Wembling. “He wants to invite us to attend Dabbi’s death rites.”

“Yes, yes, of course we’ll come. Thank you. Fornri, I have a wonderful idea. All of Langri’s problems are solved. We’ll build a World Medical Center, and the Hot Sickness will never come again. We’ll build schools for the children, and there’ll be plenty of food and everything else Langri needs.”

Fornri smiled politely. “This is welcome news. Where do the things come from?”

“We’ll get them with money. I don’t know how much you know about that—money’s the one thing without which very little can be done. Medical centers and things like that require huge amounts of money, and we’ll get it for the world of Langri by establishing a vacation resort.”

Fornri’s polite smile did not waver, but his tone of voice was firm beyond any possibility of appeal. “No, thank you. We would not care for that. We will expect you at darkness for the death rites.” He took a backward step, delivered the native salute, and strode away.

Wembling stood looking after him. “You were right,” he told Talitha. “They’re laughing at me.”

He marched back to the embassy.

Hort said to Talitha, “Now that’s a puzzle. From the way Fornri turned it down he might have been expecting it. Whenever anything strange is offered, the natives ask highly astute questions and then they retire to think it over. He didn’t take time to flick an eyelash—and how would he know what a vacation resort is?”

Hort wanted to observe the preparations for the death rites, so he followed Fornri back to the village. Talitha returned to the embassy and found her uncle and Hirus Ayns talking in the office.

Ayns said, “If the natives are that stupid, I don’t suppose there’s anything we can do.”

“Why do you have to have their permission?” Talitha asked. “You’re doing it for them, aren’t you? You’re offering something that will save lives, and what possible harm can come from that?”

“It’s their world,” Wembling said. “It’s their decision to make, and they’ve made it.”

“Maybe they don’t understand what you’re trying to do. We know ‘medical center’ means good health and lives saved, but it may be gibberish to them. When a primitive people can’t understand, then the decisions should be made by someone who does.”

“I think Fornri understood,” Wembling said.

“He couldn’t watch that child die and immediately afterward turn down something that would save children’s lives. A vacation resort means the medical center, and schools, and a proper diet for his people with no risk of famine when those whatever-they-are can’t be caught, and decent housing, and all the rest. How could he reject that if he understood what you were talking about?”

“He’s the head of the government of the independent world of Langri,” Wembling said. “Whether he understands or not, the decision is his to make.” He turned to Ayns. “Do we have a copy of that treaty?”

Ayns pulled the general referencer toward him and punched buttons. “Yes. Here it is. What about it?”

“How does one obtain concessions under it?”

Ayns took the time to read the treaty. “You’d have to obtain them from the government of Langri,” he said finally.

Wembling strode to the window. He said over his shoulder, “How many places do you suppose that treaty is on file?”

“Not many. It isn’t an important treaty.”

“How many of them could you fix?”

“Some. Maybe half. It’d be much easier to fix the references so the computers would lose it for a few years. Would a few years be enough?”

“One year would be enough. What a fool I’ve been! All these months of work trying to peddle a few piddling ideas to these stupid natives and make myself ambassador to Binoris, and the mineral wealth of a dozen worlds couldn’t buy Langri’s vacation potential. I’ve had the financial coup of my life right under my nose and I never saw it.”

“What about the medical center?” Talitha asked.

“They’ll have their medical center. Right away. We’ll have to solve Langri’s health problems to protect our work force and the tourists, and the sooner we do that the better. You can go back on the next courier ship, Hirus, and get to work on that treaty. As soon as it’s taken care of we’ll get the world reclassified and apply for a charter.”

“It’ll take time and money to lose the treaty,” Ayns said.

“You can have all you need.” Wembling returned to his desk, adjusted his chair, and faced Ayns. “While you’re working on the treaty, you can set up an office for Wembling and Company and hire a sharp law firm. Look for some competent people in construction and resort planning. We can start stockpiling supplies immediately, so we’ll be ready to move the moment the charter is issued.”

“Won’t the natives object to that?” Ayns asked.

“Probably.” Wembling grinned at him. “I’ll tell them the stuff is for their medical center. Part of it will be. We’ll use the medical center as a pilot project.”

“You’ll need an expert in medical research,” Talitha said.

“Not an expert. Just a competent technician. We’ll bring one in the moment facilities are ready. He can give the world a routine going over and have the medical problems solved before the resort opens. A couple of cases of that Hot Sickness would destroy a resort. I promise you, Tal—we’ll solve all the natives’ medical problems. We’ll have to. The medical center will be a good investment in public relations, too, just in case later on there’s a stink about the treaty.”

“If the resort is going to make that much money, you should give the natives some of the profits,” Talitha said. “It’s their world you’ll be using.”

Wembling cocked his head and looked at Ayns, who nodded slowly. “Ten per cent?” Wembling asked. Ayns nodded again. “Good idea,” Wembling said. “We’ll put ten per cent of the profits in trust for them. When the treaty tampering is discovered, it’ll be more than worth the cost. It’ll make us look like humanitarians.” He turned to Talitha. “All right, Tal. Your natives will get their medical center and a thorough study of their diseases. They’ll also get ten per cent of the resort profits, and eventually that’ll be enough to support the whole native population. In addition, there’ll be a lot of resort jobs they can handle if they want them, and we’ll pay them well for festivals and koluf feasts for the tourists. They’ll be doing very nicely for themselves. Satisfactory?”

Talitha smiled and nodded.

“There is one thing, though.” He looked at her calculatingly. “I’m going to have to get rid of Hort.”

“Am I supposed to cry?” she asked belligerently. “If you have to, then get rid of him.”

“I thought you liked the guy.”

“I don’t dislike him. Away from Langri he might be an interesting person, but one gets tired of lectures about gourds and native hunting techniques.”

“Firing him might make him suspicious,” Ayns said. “Let me find him a plush assignment somewhere else.”

“Good idea. I won’t fire him, I’ll promote him. That all right with you, Tal?”

“Whatever you think best,” she said. “How soon will our medical center be ready?”