Don ran his tongue over his lip. He liked this man and was in his debt. However, there was nothing he could do without risking his neck. He said, finally, “Frankly, I can’t be sure. I was all caught up in the excitement, moving as fast as I could.”
Thor slumped back in his seat. He thought about it. He said finally, “Very possibly the Kradens were sending out another peaceful feeler to us. After the lapse of fifty years, perhaps their hope was that our warlike attitude toward extraterrestrials had cooled.”
“Perhaps,” Don said, putting doubt in his voice.
“It can never be proven now,” the other said in disgust. He finished his drink. “What are you going to do now that you’re a civilian again? I would have thought you might stay in and get some chairborne assignment that would keep you out of space but still allow you to enjoy your prestige.”
“I don’t have to wear a uniform to enjoy my prestige, as you put it. In fact, I’m beginning to wish I could avoid some of the damn prestige. But at any rate, I’m going to throw myself all out into the war effort to exploit the radioactives on the satellites.”
Thor stared at him. “They’re exploiting them too damn much as it is. In ten years there won’t be any remaining. If we haven’t solved the nuclear fusion problem by then there simply won’t be any radioactives left.”
Don Mathers couldn’t think of anything to say to that. If anything, he’d welcome the day. It would free him of Demming and Rostoff. They wouldn’t have any need of him any longer.
His companion waved at Harry to bring them a refill and then went into it. He said, “We’re destroying ourselves in destroying the solar system’s raw materials like this. It’s an utterly mad socioeconomic system. Are you at all up on economic history?”
“No,” Don said. What’s more, he couldn’t care less.
“Well, the last century in particular has been chaotic. Unbelievable. Classical capitalism, of the type raged against by Marx, actually collapsed in 1929. And never recovered. After ten years of economic chaos, prosperity was restored by the Second World War. The resources, both material and labor power, of practically the whole world were thrown into the military effort. Business boomed. When the war ended, so had classical capitalism. A form of what some call State Capitalism took over. The State entered into the economy to the point of dominating it. The military-industrial complex took over, increasingly, supported by government. Supposed prosperity was maintained by spending endless billions on the military. Supposedly the West and East were confronting each other eyeball to eyeball but in actuality their basic socioeconomic systems had little real difference. The Soviet Complex called itself communist, or socialist, but in truth, it was simply a different version of State Capitalism. The major difference was that instead of having individual capitalists and corporations owning the means of production, they were owned by the State, headed by the Communist party whose heads profited by the system. But basically both Eastern and Western economies were systems of waste, destruction of natural resources, pollution, inflation, threatened collapse of the international monetary system, overproduction in the developed countries and under-production in the undeveloped. These along with the uncontrolled population explosion were leading to a complete collapse. Only the coming of the Kradens prevented it. It was a shot in the arm, somewhat similar to the Second World War. Overnight, the planet was united and became an armed camp. The space program boomed, colonies went to every planet and satellite in the system that could support human life. Unemployment ceased to exist, production boomed.”
Don said, wearying of the long harangue, “Well, isn’t that for the good? At least nobody starves anymore. Everybody has work.”
Thor looked at him pityingly. “For how long? We’re ripping off not only the resources of Earth but now of the whole solar system. Ninety percent of the efforts are going into space and so-called defense. How long before we’ve stripped ourselves naked?”
Don had never thought about it. And he still didn’t give a damn. He had his and would continue to have it for the rest of his life. If what Thor said was correct, let the powers that be figure it out when the time came. After him the deluge? Okay, let it rain.
XIV
Harry came up hesitantly, a camera in his heavy freckled hands and said “Colonel Mathers, I bought me this here Tri-Di camera on the off-chance you might come by again some day. I wanted to get a shot of you, here in my bar, so I could frame it and hang it on the wall and people’d know you usta hang out here before you got famous.”
“Sure, Harry,” Don said, standing. “Where do you want me?”
“How about up against the bar?”
Thor stood too and said, “Why not let me take it? You get behind the bar, uh, Harry. And let Don get in front of it. Then you’ll both be in the shot.”
Harry radiated at that. “You don’t mind, Colonel Mathers?”
“Of course not.”
Thor Bjornsen took three pictures in all, from different angles, and then he and Don went back to the booth.
The Scandinavian looked at him. “Do you get much of that sort of thing?”
“Yes.”
Thor said, “To get back to the radioactives thing. Who’s in it with you?”
Don wondered whether or not to answer, but, after all, it would probably soon be in the news. He said, “Lawrence Demming and Maximilian Rostoff, who already have large investments in the field and plenty of know-how, are putting up the initial capital to get going.”
The other took him in in horror. “Demming and Rostoff? They’re the two biggest crooks in the system.”
“I’m to be president of the corporation. I’ll keep them in line.”
“What do you get out of it, Don?”
“Nothing. Nothing except my expenses.”
Thor Bjornsen frowned. “And nobody else is in it at all?”
“Well, actually, Peter Fodor has been given a chunk of stock. He’s going to throw the weight of the Church behind the, uh, crusade.”
“Almighty Ultimate! If Demming and Rostoff are’ the two biggest crooks in the system, he’s the third.”
“What are you talking about? He’s the Grand Presbyter.”
“Yes, and like most big organized religions down through the centuries, his church is a racket, with him the chief racketeer. Religions might start humbly with the leaders really living up to their vows of poverty and so forth—take Christ and his apostles and early followers. They lived in a sort of primitive communism. But have you ever read an account of the church at the time of the Borgias and the Medici? When you get to the top of the heap in business, you don’t become a multi-millionaire by remaining honest. When you get to the top in politics, it isn’t by keeping your hands clean.”
“I’m not up on politics,” Don admitted.
“Well,” the other said. “My point was that big business, such as Demming’s and Rostoff’s type, big politics, and even big religion are headed by corrupt men, since power corrupts.”
Don was getting tired of it. He had made his decision and there was no way to back out of it, even if he had wanted to, and he didn’t.”
He looked at his wrist chronometer and said, “Sorry, Thor, I’m going to have to get underway.”
The other nodded unhappily. “All right, Don. But think about what I’ve said. The human race is bleeding the system white with all this so-called defense preparation. If you’d throw your prestige onto the scales, you’d be able to counter this industrial-military-political combine that’s now in control.”