XIII

 

 

There had been a fight between two of the workers in the repair shops over some contemptuous reference to the Dyasthala background of one of them; it took Rureth to Snutch’s office to get the matter straightened out, and afterwards he used the opportunity to broach the other subject concerning him.

“One of that new batch of workers,” he said thoughtfully, staring out of the big window which gave Snutch a general view of his nearer empire. He had heard the stories about what happened the day Ogric landed this batch; he was not at all surprised to see Snutch lift his head like a hunting animal snuffing a scent on the wind.

“Yes?” the manager said sharply.

Rureth settled his tubby body deep in his chair. He said, “Kazan. Know him?”

Snutch gave a wary nod. “What about him?”

“You’re wasting him on me,” Rureth said. “What I needed was dumb oxen who could be taught to turn a wrench or weld a seam—not high-calibre engineers.”

“He isn’t one,” Snutch said. “He’s a slum-bred thief.”

“But he is,” Rureth corrected gently. “Who do you think is in charge of the shops while I’m over here with you?”

Snutch stared at him for a long moment. Then he slammed his open palm down on his desk. He said, “You have no business doing that, Rureth! Putting an unqualified novice in a position of responsibility—it’s insane! Do you want an adverse entry on your service report?”

“I’m telling you,” Rureth said patiently. “It’s been a bit more than a month since I took him on. The library records show that he’s requisitioned most of the texts on engineering and physical science that are available, and I can say from my own knowledge that he’s learned them. It doesn’t make sense to keep a man with learning ability of that order in the repair shops. Also I was told he was illiterate, and he’s not. As you may have gathered.”

“So what do you want me to do?” Snutch demanded. “Anyone would think that you’d be pleased. From what you say, you could sit back till the end of your contract and leave your work to him to handle!”

“I probably could,” Rureth agreed. “But it wouldn’t suit me, and I doubt if it would suit him. The suggestion I was going to make was that you transfer him around the settlement to as many different jobs as you can, for short periods, and then let him wind up on the planning staff. Maybe I’m being optimistic, because the only signs of original thinking he’s shown so far have been in petty matters. But I prefer to back my hunch that he’d be a valuable planner, and he’d probably find ways of cutting the ten-year period to full automation.”

“You said you’d had him for—how long?” Snutch commented sarcastically.

“Long enough to know when I’m on to a good thing,” Rureth answered. “Another point: the rest of the workers from Berak regard him with almost superstitious awe. I doubt if it’s rooted in sense, but it works all right. You ought to come out and see him handle them some time. It’s hard to define, but he’s got a sort of impatience with anything that’s less than perfect, and what’s more he can make it catching. Even to me.

“He’ll gather round the four or five workers responsible for a particular job—say, replacing the magnet windings on an excavator’s power unit—and spend ten or twenty minutes going over the diagrams with them. At the end of that time he’ll have got the idea of what they’re doing through their heads. Then they throw the diagrams away and they do the job. You see what I’m getting at? For years I’ve been plagued with knob-headed wrench-pushers dim enough to follow the diagrams by rote, which is all right but calls for unceasing supervision. When Kazan gets them working, they aren’t just going through the motions—they know the reasons for the motions. And the difference is fantastic.”

“Make your mind up!” Snutch rapped. “Either you want the job done like that, or you want dumb oxen. You’ve asked for both.”

“I managed without him before he got here,” Rureth said imperturbably. “I can manage again. But if he can do this in a repair shop he can probably do it for the mines as a whole, in which case he ought to be given the chance.”

“Nonsense!” Snutch said with finality.

“You’re the manager,” Rureth shrugged. “Mark you, I guess I’m wasting my time anyway, because he’s going to make his own chances. It’ll just take him longer. In a year or two you’re going to find him involved in planning anyway. It’s his natural habitat. He’ll make for it whether he knows about it or not.”

“That’s as may be,” Snutch said. “But you keep your views to yourself.”

“No,” Rureth said. “Not without a good reason.” The change that had come over his normally rather sleepy, casual voice was astonishing in that instant. It rang now like a beaten anvil. “And it’s got to be better than the reason which people ascribe to you right now.”

“What do you mean?” Snutch said slowly.

“It’s good sense to make exceptional arrangements for an exceptional person,” Rureth said. “Kazan is exceptional. But I was talking to Lecia yesterday evening, and I understand from her that for Kazan you won’t even make ordinary arrangements.”

“What was the idiot woman talking about?”

“That isn’t fair to Lecia,” Rureth said. “But let it pass. Kazan had a woman—Clary is the name—and she applied according to regulations for shared accommodation with him. You vetoed it. Any good reason?”

“That pair were troublemakers!” Snutch barked. “Didn’t you hear what happened aboard Ogric’s ship on the way here? A near-riot to start with, and tension from then on. This Clary threatened to make the workers welsh on their contracts, and blackmailed Ogric into giving her a bonus for not doing it, and as for Kazan—well, it was over him that the riot brewed!”

“I haven’t had any trouble with Kazan,” Rureth said. “And he’s only been working directly under me. With others from Berak, yes, like that one who got involved in the fight this morning. If you want trouble from Kazan, you’re going about it the right way.”

Snutch leaped on that like a hungry animal on a scrap of meat. “You think he’s contemplating trouble?” he said.

Rureth sighed and got to his feet. “No, but you are,” he said. “You only have to wait until the rest of the workers from Berak start to feel the same way about Kazan as the ones in the repair shops already do. Like I said, they have this superstitious awe of him. But it’s turning into a kind of reflected pride. They’re thinking, “This guy is from Berak, and he’s hell with jets!’ ”

“If he tries whipping up a personality cult for himself among the workers, that can be dealt with,” Snutch said, and compressed his lips whitely together.

“Listen!” Rureth said, leaning on both palms on the front of Snutch’s desk. “You’d better hear this from me rather than someone else. Everybody knows—but everybody—you’re ashamed of yourself for hitting him the way you did. It made you look like a fool, no denying. Pretty soon everybody will know about Kazan’s talent. If you don’t want the word to go around that you’re scared of him, you’d better do something. Fast.”

“Get out before I throw you out,” Snutch said between his teeth.

Snutch had not seen Kazan since the day of his arrival. In some strange way he was surprised when an ordinary enough young man entered his office, wearing the standard reddish-brown work uniform. What had he been expecting—superman? He wondered for a moment, then checked himself and wished he had not thought of the question. An instant later he caught himself looking for traces of a bruise under Kazan’s chin.

He waved him to a seat.

“I’ve been hearing things about you,” he said, leaving the phrase deliberately vague and pausing after it. Kazan showed no sign of preconception; he merely nodded.

“I understand,” Snutch went on, “that you’ve been trying to create disaffection among the workers.”

Kazan cocked his head. He said, “How’s that, Manager?”

“You’ve been going around starting arguments between your people from Berak and the staff from Marduk and other places, about conditions of work, about living conditions—”

Kazan started to laugh. Snutch broke off, his face reddening. “What are you laughing at?” he barked.

“I’m ahead of you, Manager,” Kazan said. “I guess all I can say is that whoever told you wasn’t listening.”

Snutch hesitated. There was an uncomfortable confidence in Kazan’s voice, which reminded him of the younger man’s expression that moment before he was so incredibly foolish as to hit him. He drew a deep breath.

“All right. Give me your version,” he said.

“I’m not sure I can make it clear to you—”

“Are you hinting that I’m stupid?” Snutch cracked out, and instantly regretted it. What in the wyrds’ name made him so sensitive to this calm young man? He recovered himself. “Go on.”

“It’s a question of background,” Kazan said, ignoring the other’s outburst. “It’s like this. I come out of the Dyasthala in Berak. To me that’s like being let out into fresh air, being here. I feel I’m awake for the first time. What I used to think of as impossible luxuries are commonplace here. And I’m getting to learn things I didn’t know existed. It’s like being born all over again. But there are people here—the people from Marduk especially—who think they’re hard done by when they have to make do with what I call luxuries. They think they’re trapped and enclosed here because they have a contract to work out on Vashti, when it’s a liberation for me. I feel like”—he hesitated, hunting a comparison—“someone who’s been in a cage all his life. Now I’m out of it. I want to know about outside life. That’s all.”

Snutch studied him with narrowed eyes. It sounded convincing. It made sense, if it was true that he was a frustrated genius out of the slums. And it implied that there wasn’t much to fear from Kazan, if he was actively grateful to be on Vashti instead of in the Dyasthala.

Cautiously he said, “You like it here?”

“Better than the Dyasthala.”

“Your work?”

“Fine. I don’t have to spend too much time at it any more. Supervisor Rureth tells me I don’t need any more training than I have already. So I have a surplus of leisure.”

Without changing his expression, Snutch came to the alert. That was a problem he hadn’t foreseen. To leave this fellow, about whom Rureth made such astonishing predictions, with time on his hands—that was probably what Rureth had meant about heading for trouble. Let someone intelligent and restive get bored, and the consequences might be dangerous.

He felt calm, and pleased that he had exorcised the irrational specter haunting him from their first encounter. He debated with himself for a moment. It looked as though he’d better do two things: arrange to keep Kazan occupied by making him undergo several more training courses, as Rureth had suggested, meantime watching him closely, and secondly try and eradicate any source of a grudge Kazan might bear against him, Snutch. Provided what he had said proved to be the truth, there wouldn’t be any need to worry.

“Your girl put in for shared accommodation with you,” Snutch said after he had made his decision. “I hear she’s been miserable because I held over my approval. I wanted to make up my mind about you first. I’d heard you were talented. Supervisor Rureth’s confirmed that now. So I have some plans for your future here. You can take your girl a couple of presents.”

He had to avoid Kazan’s emotionless gaze. He fumbled up an authorization pad from a drawer in his desk.

“I’ll authorize your shared accommodation,” he said, writing rapidly. “And I’ll get you out of the repair shop. If you know all there is to know, you must be bored, hey?” He tried a friendly grin, and it failed. But Kazan smiled back, politely and mechanically.

“Shift you to the refinery,” Snutch said, after a moment’s thought: where is he likely to find the going toughest? Refinery work called for a keen understanding of chemistry; not even Kazan would hurry through his training there. “Give you something to chew on. Here you are.”

He held out the two authorizations: the accommodation and the work-transfer. Kazan took them and stood up.

“Thanks very much,” he said. “Is there anything else?”

It hadn’t worked. The devil wasn’t chained. “No,” Snutch muttered. “No, that’s all.”

And as the door closed he knew grayly that small bribes and favors were so utterly useless that even big ones probably would fail as well.

He felt trapped.