Bustamonte, ignorant of Breakness psychology, was only reinforced in the conviction that Palafox was slightly mad. Reluctantly he said, "We can arrive at a satisfactory contract. For your part, you must join us in crushing the Batch, and ensuring that never again..."
Palafox smiling, shook his head. "We are not warriors. We sell the workings of our minds, no more. How can we dare otherwise? Breakness is vulnerable. A single missile could destroy the Institute. You will contract with me alone. If Eban Buzbek arrived here tomorrow he could buy counsel from another wizard, and the two of us would pit our skills."
"Hmmph," growled Bustamonte. "What guarantee have I that he will not do so?"
"None whatever. The policy of the Institute is passionless neutrality--the individual wizards, however, may work where they desire, the better to augment their dormitories."
Bustamonte fretfully drummed his fingers. "What can you do for me, if you cannot protect me from the Brumbos?"
Palafox meditated, eyelids half-closed, then said, "There are a number of methods to achieve the goal you desire. I can arrange the hire of mercenaries from Hallowmede, or Polensis, or Earth. Possibly I could stimulate a coalition of Batch clans against the Brumbos. We could so debase Paonese currency that the tribute became valueless."
Bustamonte frowned. "I prefer methods more forthright i want you to supply us tools of war. Then we may defend ourselves, and so need be at no one's mercy."
Palafox raised his crooked black eyebrows. "Strange to hear such dynamic proposals from a Paonese."
"Why not?" demanded Bustamonte. "We are not cowards."
A hint of impatience entered Palafox's voice. "Ten thousand Brumbos overcame fifteen billion Paonese. Your people had weapons. But no one considered resistance. They acquiesced like grass-birds."
Bustamonte shook his head doggedly. "We are men like other men. All we need is training."
"Training will never supply the desire to fight."
Bustamonte scowled. "Then this desire must be supplied!"
Palafox showed his teeth in a peculiar grin. He pulled him self erect in his chair. "At last we have touched the core of the matter."
Bustamonte glanced at him, puzzled by his sudden intensity.
Palafox continued. "We must persuade the amenable Paonese to become fighters. How can we do this? Evidently they must change their basic nature. They must discard passivity and easy adjustment to hardship. They must learn truculence and pride and competitiveness. Do you agree?"
Bustamonte hesitated. "You may be right."
"This is no overnight process, you understand. A change of basic psychology is a formidable process."
Bustamonte was touched by suspicion. There was strain in Palafox's manner, an effort at casualness.
"If you wish an effective fighting force," said Palafox, "here is the only means to that end. There is no shortcut."
Bustamonte looked away, out over the Wind River. "You believe that this fighting force can be created?"
"Certainly."
"And how much time might be required?"
"Twenty years, more or less."
"Twenty years!"
Bustamonte was silent several minutes. "I must think this over." He jumped to his feet, strode back and forth shaking his hands as if they were wet.
Palafox said with a trace of asperity: "How can it be otherwise? If you want a fighting force you must first create fighting spirit. This is a cultural trait and cannot be inculcated overnight."
"Yes, yes," muttered Bustamonte. "I see that you are right, but I must think."
"Think also on a second matter," Palafox suggested. "Pao is vast and populous. There is scope not merely for an effective army, but also a vast industrial complex might be established. Why buy goods from Mercantil when you can produce them yourself?"
"How can all this be done?"
Palafox laughed. "That is where you must employ my special knowledge. I am Dominie of Comparative Culture at Breakness Institute."
"Nevertheless," said Bustamonte obstinately, "I still must know how you propose to bring about these changes--never forgetting that Paonese resist change more adamantly than the advent of death."
"Exactly," replied Palafox. "We must alter the mental framework of the Paonese people--a certain proportion of them, at least--which is most easily achieved by altering the language."
Bustamonte shook his head. "This process sounds indirect and precarious. I had hoped..."
Palafox interrupted incisively. "Words are tools. Language is a pattern, and defines the way the word-tools are used."
Bustamonte was eyeing Palafox sidelong. "How can this theory be applied practically? Do you have a definite detailed plan?"
Palafox inspected Bustamonte with scornful amusement. "For an affair of such magnitude? You expect miracles even a Breakness Wizard cannot perform. Perhaps you had best continue with the tribute to Eban Buzbek of Batmarsh."
Bustamonte was silent.
"I command basic principles," said Palafox presently. "I apply these abstractions to practical situations. This is the skeleton of the operation, which finally is fleshed over with detail."
Bustamonte still remained silent.
"One point I will make," said Palafox, "that such an operation can only be effectuated by a ruler of great power, one who will not be swayed by maudlin sentiment."
"I have that power," said Bustamonte. "I am as ruthless as circumstances require."
"This is what must be done. One of the Paonese continents--or any appropriate area--will be designated. The people of this area will be persuaded to the use of a new language. That is the extent of the effort. Presently they will produce warriors in profusion."
Bustamonte frowned skeptically. "Why not undertake a program of education and training in arms? To change the language is going far afield."
You have not grasped the essential point," said Palafox. "Paonese is a passive, dispassionate language. It presents the world in two dimensions, without tension or contrast. A people speaking Paonese, theoretically, ought to be docile, passive, without strong personality development--in fact, exactly as the Paonese people are. The new language will be based on the contrast and comparison of strength, with a grammar simple and direct. To illustrate, consider the sentence, 'The farmer chops down a tree'. (Literally rendered from the Paonese in which the two men spoke, the sentence was: "Farmer in state of exertion; axe agency; tree in state of subjection to attack.") "In the new language the sentence becomes: `The farmer overcomes the inertia of the axe; the axe breaks asunder the resistance of tree.' Or perhaps: 'The farmer vanquishes the tree, using the weapon-instrument of the axe'."
"Ah," said Bustamonte appreciatively.
"The syllabary will be rich in effort-producing gutturals and hard vowels. A number of key ideas will be synonymous; such as pleasure and overcoming a resistance--relaxation and shame-out-wordless and rival. Even the clans of Batmarsh will seem mild compared to the future Paonese military."
"Yes, yes," breathed Bustamonte. "I begin to understand."
"Another area might be set aside for the inculcation of another language," said Palafox offhandedly. "In this instance, the grammar will be extravagantly complicated but altogether consistent and logical. The vocables would be discrete but joined and fitted by elaborate rules of accordance. What is the result? When a group of people, impregnated with these stimuli, are presented with supplies and facilities, industrial development is inevitable.
"And should you plan to seek ex-planetary markets, a corps of salesmen and traders might be advisable. Theirs would be a symmetrical language with emphatic number-parsing, elaborate honorifics to teach hypocrisy, a vocabulary rich in homophones to facilitate ambiguity, a syntax of reflection, reinforcement and alternation to emphasize the analogous interchange of human affairs.