Astounding Science Fiction, British Edition — page 83: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

EARTHMAN, he’s up to something that smells funny to me and Hazleton both, but we can’t pin down what it is. Come give us a hand, will you?’ “You'd better give him some time to rest, Mr. Mayor,” the monitor said disapprovingly. “Being dumped out of hypnopaedic trance is a considera- ble shock; he’ll need at least an hour.”’ Amalfi stared at the monitor in- credulously. He was about to note that neither Karst nor the city had the hour to spare, when it occurred to him that to say so would take ten words where one was plenty. *“Vanish,”” he said. The monitor did his best. Karst looked intently at the judas. The man on the screen had his back turned; he was looking into the big operations tank in the city manager’s office. The indirect light gleamed on his shaven and oiled head. Amalfi watched over Karst’s left shoulder, his teeth sunk firmly in a new hydro- ponic cigar. “Why, the man’s as bald as I am,” the mayor said. “And he can’t be much past his adolescence, judging by his skull; he’s forty-five at the most. Recognize him, Karst?” “Not yet,” Karst said. “All the Proctors shave their heads. If he would only turn around . . . ah. Yes. That’s Heldon. I have seen him myself only once, but he is easy to recognize. He is young, as the Proctors go. He is the stormy petrel of the Great Nine— some think him a friend of the serfs. At least he is less quick with the whip than the others.” | | “What would he be wanting here?” “Perhaps he will tell us.” Karst’s eyes remained fixed upon the Proctor’s image. “Your request puzzles me,”’ Hazle- ton’s voice said, issuing smoothly from the speaker above the judas. The city manager could not be seen, but COME HOME 81 his expression seemed to modulate the sound of his voice almost specifically : the tiger mind masked behind a pussy- cat purr as behind a pussy-cat smile. “We're glad to hear of new services we can render to a client, of course. But we certainly never suspected that antigravity mechanisms even existed in IMT.” | “Don’t think me stupid, Mr. Hazle- ton,’’ Heldon said. ““You and I know that IMT was once a wanderer, as your city is now. We also know that your city, like all Okie cities, would like a world of its own. Will you allow me this much intelligence, please?” “For discussion, yes,” Hazleton’s voice said. “Then let me say that it’s quite evident to me that you’re nurturing an uprising. You have been careful to stay within the letter of the contract, simply because you dare not breach it, any more than we; the Earth police protect us from each other to that extent. Your Mayor Amalfi was told that it was illegal for the serfs to speak to your people, but unfortunately it is illegal only for the serfs, not for your citizens. If we cannot keep the serfs out of your city, you are under no obligation to do it for us.” “A point you have saved me the trouble of making,” Hazleton said. “Quite so. I’ll add also that when this revolution of yours comes, I have no doubt but that you'll win it. I don’t know what weapons you can put into the hands of our serfs, but I assume that they are better than any- thing we can muster. We haven’t your technology. My fellows disagree with me, but I am a realist.” “An interesting theory,” Hazleton’s voice said. There was a brief pause. In the silence, a soft pattering sound became evident. Hazleton’s fingertips, Amalfi guessed, drumming on the desk, top, as if with amused impatience. Heldon’s face remained impassive. Comichooksnco im