"One. One finger. One generation. And they were both right. Because not only the children who were still young would grow up to have poets and playwrights and songmakers among them; but those adults presently alive who'd never written or sung would suddenly begin to produce the music that had always been in them - in response to the sudden silence about them. Because the ability to produce such things never was the special province of a few. It was something belonging to the people as a whole, in the souls of every one of them, only waiting to be called forth. And what was true at the time of that conversation, and before and since, with the Irish people, is true as well, now, for the people of Earth."
"And not for the people of the other worlds?" asked Jason.
"In time, them too. But their forebearers were sent out by the hunger and fear of the race, to be expendable, to take root in strange places. For now, they stand - all of you stand, except Tam - at arm's length from the source of the music that's in you, and the future that's in you. You'll find it - but it would come harder and more slowly to any of you than it would for any of those down there - "
He gestured at the blue and white globe he had displayed.
They sat watching him, saying nothing. Even Nonne was silent.
"I told the Exotics," Hal went on, in the new silence, "I told the Dorsai - and I would have told your people, as well, Jason, if I'd had the proper chance to speak to them all - that in the final essential, they were experiments of the race. That they were brought into being only to be used when the time came. Now, that time's come. You all know the centuries of the Splinter Cultures are over. You know that, each of you, instinctively inside you. Their day of experimentation is done. Your kind lived, grew, and flourished for the ultimate purpose of taking one side of the great survival question of which road the race as a whole is going to follow into its future among the stars. Not to you and your children, unique and different, but to the children of the race in general, the future belongs."
He stopped. They still said nothing.
"And so," he said, tiredly, "it's Earth we have to end by protecting; Earth with all its history of savagery, and cruelty, and foolishness and selfishness - and all its words and songs and mighty dreams. Here, and no place else, the battle's finally going to be lost or won."
He stopped again. He wanted them to speak - if only so that he would not feel so utterly alone. But they did not.
He looked back at the blue and white globe of Earth.
"And it's here the question of the future is going to be decided," he said, softly, "and such as you and I will have to die, if that's our job, to get the answer needed for that decision to be made."
He stopped speaking and looked again at the imaged Earth. After a second or two, he was conscious of another body close behind him, and turned, lifting his eyes, to see that it was Ajela.
She put her arms around him; and merely held him for a minute. Then she let him go and went back to her seat by Tam.
"You give us reasons," said Nonne to him, "which aren't military reasons, and may not even be pragmatic, practical reasons. My point remains that Mara's a better base for a stonewall defense than Earth is. You haven't really answered me on that."
"This isn't," said Hal, "exactly a war we're entered into for pragmatic and practical reasons - except in the long run. But the fact is, you're wrong. Mara's a rich world, as the Younger Worlds go; but even after centuries of misuse and plundering of its resources, Earth is still the richest inhabited planet the human race knows. It's entirely self-supporting, and it still maintains a population twenty times as large as that of any other inhabited world, to this day."
He broke off abruptly, holding all their eyes with his. Then he went on.
"Also, there's a psychological difference. Enclose any other world, cut it off from contact with the other inhabited worlds, and emotionally it can't escape the feeling that it may have been discarded by the community of humanity, left behind to wither and die. As time goes on, it'll become more and more conscious of its isolation from the main body of the race. But Earth still thinks of itself as the hub of the human universe. All other worlds, to it, are only buds on its branch. If all those others are cut off, whatever the cost may be otherwise, emotionally the most Earth will think of itself as having lost are appendages it lived without for millions of years and can do without again, if necessary."
"That large population's no benefit to you," said Nonne, "particularly, if - as it is - it's full of people who disagree with what you're doing. They're not the ones who're rallying to the defense of Earth. You're planning to defend that world with the Dorsai."
"In the beginning," said Hal, "certainly. If the battle goes on, I think we'll find people from Earth itself coming forward to man the barricades. In fact, they'll have to."
He turned to the old man.
"Tam?" he said. "What do you think?"
"They'll come," said Tam. The rattly, ancient voice made the two words seem to fall, flat and heavy in their midst, like stones too weighty to hold. "This is where the Dorsai came from, and the Exotics, and the Friendlies - and everyone else. When defenders are needed from the people, they'll be there."
For a moment no one said anything.
"And that," said Hal, with a deep breath, "is another reason for it to be Earth, rather than Mara. In time, even your Marans would produce people to stand on guard. But they'd have to go back into what lies below their present character to do it."
"But they could and would," said Nonne. "In this time, when everything that's been built up is falling apart, even Maran adults would do that. Even I'd fight - if I thought I could."
A little smile, a not-unkindly smile, twitched the corners of Rourke di Facino's lips.
"Dear lady," he said to her. "That's always been the only difference."
The remark drew her attention to him.
"You!" she said. "You stand there, saying nothing. Did your people bargain to defend Earth where the people have never understood or appreciated what the Younger Worlds mean - least of all, your kind? Are you simply willing to be their cannon fodder, without at least protesting what Hal Mayne wants? You're the military expert. You speak to him!"
The little smile went from Rourke's lips, to be replaced by an expression that had a strange touch of sadness to it. He came slowly around from behind the chairs of the rest where he had been standing and walked up to Hal. Hal looked at the erect, smaller man.
"I've talked to Simon about you," Rourke said. "And to Amanda. Who you are is your own business and no one discusses it - "
"I don't understand," interrupted Nonne, looking from one of them to the other. "What do you mean - who he is, is his own business?"
For a second it seemed that Rourke would turn and answer her. Then he went on speaking to Hal.
"But it's the opinion of the Grey Captains that we've got to trust your judgment," he said.
"Thank you," said Hal.
"So," said Rourke, "you think it should be Earth, then?"
"I think it always had to be," said Hal. "The only question has been, when to begin to move; and as things stand now, Bleys gets stronger every standard day we wait."
"I repeat," said Nonne. "You don't have a solid Earth at your back - you don't begin to have a solid Earth at your back. Rukh may have been gaining ground fast - as you say, Ajela - but now she's out of the picture and the job she set out to do isn't done. If you move now, you're gambling, Hal, gambling with the odds against you."
She looked back at Hal.
"You're right," said Hal. He stood for a second in silence. "But in every situation a time comes when decisions have to be made whether all the data's on hand, or not. I'm afraid I see more harm in waiting than acting. We'll begin to garrison Earth and lock it up."