“And therefore,” Havig asked quietly, “you took it upon yourself to attempt to destroy my reputation and standing in the academic community.”
“I merely wrote a dissenting opinion,” shot back Bernard hotly. “I couldn’t let your statements stand unanswered. And the Journal saw fit to print it. It…”
“It was a malicious, slanderous article,” Havig said, without raising his voice to the level Bernard had adopted. “Under the guise of scholarship you covered me with unwarranted ridicule and cast abuse on my private beliefs…”
“Which were relevant to the argument you were presenting!”
“Nonetheless, your entire attitude, Dr. Bernard, was an unscholarly one. Your emotional attack on me clouded the issue and made it impossible for disinterested observers to see what the point of dissent between us really was. Your article was a display of wit—a quite scintillating display, I am told—but hardly a scholastic refutation.”
Stone and Dominici had stood by somewhat puzzledly through the rapid-fire interchange of accusations. Now, evidently, Stone had decided that the bickering had gone far enough. He chuckled—the mollifying chuckle of the professional diplomat—and said wryly, “Evidently you gentlemen are old friends, even though you’ve never met. Or should I say more accurately old enemies?”
Bernard glowered at the Neopuritan. Damned pious fraud, he thought. “We’ve had our disagreements scholastically,” Bernard admitted.
“You aren’t going to carry those disagreements along for ten-thousand light-years, are you?” Dominici asked. “It’s going to make things damned uncomfortable in that ship if you two will be battling over Etruscan morphemes all the while, you know.”
Bernard let a smile cross his face. He was not particularly disposed to be friendly toward Havig, but there was nothing to be gained by continuing the quarrel. The causes, he thought, lay too deep to be resolved easily. He was convinced that Havig hated him bitterly, and could not be soothed; still, the harmony of the expedition was important. Bernard said, “I suppose we can forget the Etruscans for this trip. Eh, Havig? Our quarrel was pretty small beer, after all.”
He extended his hand. After a moment the towering Neopuritan grudgingly took it. The shake was brief; hands dropped quickly back to sides. Bernard moistened his lips. He and Havig had battled viciously over what was, indeed, a minor technical point. It was one of those quarrels that specialists often engage in when their separate specialties meet at a common point of junction. But it hardly was a good omen if he and Havig were part of the same team; the fundamental gap in their beliefs would be too great to allow of any real cooperation, Bernard thought.
“Well,” said Roy Stone nervously, “we’ll be leaving almost any minute now.”
“The Technarch said we’d have at least until tonight,” Bernard said.
“Yes. But we’re all assembled, you see. And the ship and crew are ready as well. So there’s no point in delaying any farther.”
“The Technarch wastes no time,” Havig muttered darkly.
“There isn’t much time to be wasted,” Stone replied. “The quicker we get out there and deal with those aliens, the more certain we can be of preventing war between the two cultures.”
“War’s inevitable, Stone,” said Dominici doggedly. “You don’t have to be a sociologist to see that. Two cultures are colliding. We’re just wasting time and breath by going out there to head off the inevitable.”
“If that’s the way you feel,” Bernard said, “why did you agree to go along?”
“Because the Technarch asked me to go,” Dominici said simply. “I needed no better reason. But I’m not confident of success.”
The door irised open suddenly. Technarch McKenzie entered, a bulky, powerful figure in his formal robes. Technarchs were chosen for their size and bearing as well as for their qualities of mind.
“Have you four managed to introduce yourselves to each Other?” McKenzie asked.
“Yes, Excellency,” Stone said.
McKenzie smiled. “You’ll be leaving in four hours from Central Australia. We’ll use the transmat in the next room. Commander Laurance and his crew are already out there, giving the ship its final checkdown.” The Technarch’s eyes flicked meaningfully from Bernard to Havig, and back. “I’ve picked you four for your abilities, understand. I know some of you have had differences professionally. Forget them. Is that understood?”
Bernard nodded. Havig grunted assent.
“Good,” the Technarch snapped. “I’ve appointed Dr. Bernard as nominal leader of the expedition. All that means is that final decisions will rest with him in case of absolute dead-lock. If any of you object, speak up right now.”
The Technarch looked at Havig. But no one objected.
McKenzie went on, “I don’t need to tell you to cooperate with Commander Laurance and his crew in every way possible. They’re fine men, but they’ve just had one grueling voyage, and now they’re going right out again on another one. Don’t grate on their nerves. It can cost you all your lives if one of them pushes the wrong button.”
The Technarch paused as if expecting final questions. None came. Turning, he led the way to the adjoining transmat cubicle. Stone, Havig, and Dominici followed, with Bernard bringing up the rear.
We’re an odd lot to be going starward, Bernard thought. But the Technarch must know what he’s doing. At least, I hope he does.
FOUR
One thing mankind had forgotten how to do, in the peaceful years of expansion under the Archonate: it had forgotten how to wait. The transmat provided instantaneous transport and communication; from any point within the 400-light-year radius of Terra’s sphere of dominion, any other point could be reached instantaneously. Such convenience does not breed a culture of patient men. Of all Terra’s sons, only a special few knew how to wait. They were the spacemen who piloted the lonely plasma-drive ships outward into the night, bearing with them the transmat generators that would make their destinations instantaneously accessible to their fellow men.
Someone had to make the trip by slow freight first. Spacemen knew how to wait out the empty hours, the endless circlings of the clock-hands. Not so others; they fidgeted the hours past.
The XV-ftl had left Earth at a three-g acceleration hurling a fiery jet of stripped nuclei behind it until it had built up to a velocity of three-fourths that of light. The plasma-drive was shut down, and the ship coasted onward at a speed fast enough to drive it nearly five times around the Earth in a twinkling of an eye. And its four passengers fretted in an agony of impatience.
Bernard stared without comprehending at the pages of his book. Havig paced. Dominici ground his teeth together and narrowed his forehead till his frowning brows met. Stone haunted the vision port, peering at the frosty brilliance of the stars as if searching in them for the answer to some wordless question.
The four men were quartered together, in the rear compartment of the slender ship. Fore, Laurance and his four crewmen were stationed. When acceleration had ended, Bernard went forward to watch them at work. It was like observing the priests of some arcane rite. Laurance stood in the center of the control panel like a tree in a storm, while about him the others carried on in a furious rage of energy. Nakamura, eyes hooded by the viewpiece of an astrogating device, chanted numbers to Clive; Clive integrated them and passed them to Hernandez, who fed them to a computer. Peterszoon correlated; Laurance coordinated. Each man had his job, each did it well. Bernard turned away, impressed by their fierce efficiency, feeling a layman’s awe.