Chapter 5

COUNTER-ORGANIZATION

 

MISS CHAMPION did not wait for Maynard to tell her what to do about the Little Gem

situation. She acted. She sent out seven coded subgrams, to seven different planets.

Then, on her own electric typewriter, she wrote two short notes, also in code. She

addressed and sealed two envelopes-herself. She pushed a button. A girl came into her

office. Miss Champion said, "Here are two letters, Bessie. One is to Hatfield of InStell,

the other to Lansing of WarnOil. Each is to be delivered by special messenger. Delivery

is to be strictly-personal-signature-required. Thanks."

 

So, within a very few days after UCM's picket line had sealed the Little Gem mine as

tight as a bottle, fourteen men and one woman met in GalMet's palatial conference room

in the Metals Building, in New York City on Earth. Men representing such a tremendous

aggregate of power had never before met in any one room. Maynard called the meeting

to order, then said:

 

"Many of you know most of the others here, but most of you do not know us all. Please

stand as I introduce you. The lady first, of course. Miss Champion, my First Secretary."

 

The lady, seated at a small desk off to one side of the great table, rose to her feet,

bowed gracefully-not directly toward the camera-and resumed her position.

 

"Bryce of Metals." A slender man of fifty, with an unruly shock of graying black hair, rose,

nodded, and sat down.

 

"Wellington of Construction." A tall, loose-jointed, sandy-haired man did the same.

 

"Zeckendorff of the Stockmen ... Stelling of Grain ... Killingsworth of the Producers ...

Raymer of Transportation . . . Holbrook of Communications ... these seven men are the

presidents of the seven largest organizations of the Planetsmen-the organized production

and service men and women of ninety five planets.

 

"Will you stand up, please, Mr. Speers? . . . Superintendent Speers, of the Little Gem;

now being struck, one of the very few non-union copper mines in existence. Speers is

sitting on a situation that very well may develop into the gravest crisis our civilization has

ever known.

 

"Next, Admiral Guerdon Dann of Interstellar . . . who may or may not, depending pretty

largely upon the outcome of this meeting, become our Galaxians' Secretary of War."

 

There was a concerted gasp at this, and Maynard smiled grimly. "I speak advisedly.

Each of us knows something, but not one of us knows it all. The whole, I think, will shock

us all.

 

"DuPuy of Warner Oil . . . represents the law; Interplanetary Law in particular.

 

"Phelps of Galactic Metals . . . is our money man. "Hatfield of Interstellar . . . Lansing of

Warner Oil . . . and I, Maynard of Galactic Metals . . . represent top management.

 

"Now to business. For almost two hundred years most managements have adhered to

the Principle of Enlightened Self-Interest; so that, while both automation and

pay-per-man-hour increased, production per man-hour increased at such a

rate-especially on the planets -that there was no inflation. In fact, just slightly the

opposite; for over a hundred and fifty years the purchasing power of the dollar showed a

slight rising trend.

 

"Then, for reasons upon which there is no agreement -each faction arguing its case

according to its own bias -the economic situation began to deteriorate and inflation set in.

It has been spiraling. For instance, of the present price of copper, about two dollars and

a half a pound, only twenty five cents is . . . Phelps?"

 

Rate One, Anaconda, electrolytic, FOB smelter," the moneyman said, "is two point four

five seven dollars per pound. This breaks down into: labor, one hundred four point six

cents; taxes, ninety three point nine cents; all other costs, twenty four point nine cents;

mark-up, twenty two point three cents."

 

Almost everyone looked surprised; many of the men whistled.

 

Maynard smiled wryly and went on, "Thanks, Desmond. Copper is of course an extreme

case; the extreme case. That is because it is the only important metal, and one of the

very few items of our entire economy, that is produced exclusively on Tellus. There are

two reasons for this. First, automation cannot be economically applied to copper mining

on Tellus or anywhere else we know of; there are no known lodes or deposits big

enough. Second, the UCM is the only union that has been able to enforce the dictum that

its craft shall be confined absolutely to Tellus.

 

"So far, I have stated facts, with no attempt to allocate responsibility or blame. I will now

begin to prophesy. Information has been obtained, from sources which need not be

named . ." Most of the men chuckled; only a few of them only smiled, ". . , which leads

us to believe as follows:

 

"Burley Hoadman is in trouble in his UCM-internal trouble. There are several local

leaders, one in particular being very strong, who do not like him hogging so much of the

gravy for himself. They want to get their own snouts into the gravy trough, and are

gathering a lot of votes. The best way he can consolidate his position is by making a

spectacular play. The Little Gem affair is his opening wedge. If he can make us fight this

issue very hard, he will pull a WestHem-wide copper strike. He will refuse to settle that

strike for less than a seventy five or one hundred percent increase in scale. Since the

UCM's scale is already the highest in existence, that will make him a tin god on wheels.

 

"There hasn't been a really important strike for over fifty years; and this one will not be

important unless we ourselves make it so by putting up a real fight. Gentlemen, we have

two, and only two, alternatives; we can surrender or we can fight.

 

"If we surrender, every other union in existence will demand a similar increase and the

Labor Relations Board will grant it-and I don't need to tell you that WestHem's corrupt

judiciary and government will support the LRB. Neither do I need to dwell upon what

these events will do to the already vicious spiral of inflation.

 

"It's easy to say `fight', but how far must we be prepared to go? The LRB will rule

against us. We will appeal. While that appeal is pending, Hoadman will call all his copper

miners out. That strike will be completely effective, and as all industry slows down the

public will scream for GalMet's blood. All the mass media of WestHem will crucify me

personally. As I said, we will lose the appeal-or perhaps, even before that, the

government will seize the mines and give Hoadman everything he wants. In either case, if

we stop at that point, we will be in even worse shape than if we had surrendered without

fighting at all."

 

"But how much farther than that can we possibly go?" Zeckendorff demanded.

 

"I'm coming to that. If we fight at all, we must be prepared to go the full route. We'll drag

the legal proceedings out as long as we can. Meanwhile well be developing copper

mines on the planets. We have maps and your Metalsmen and Builders will be very good

at that. We'll ram planetary copper down WestHem's collective throat. However, that

ramming will not-he easy. The government is very strong and it will do its utmost to block

every move we make. So the most logical conclusion is that we will have to form a

government of the planets and declare our complete independence of Tellus.

 

"We are already calling ourselves the Galaxians; that would be as good a name as any

for the new government. That would probably involve a massive and effective blockade

of Tellus, which in turn might cause the Nameless One of EastHem to launch his

thermonuclear bombs. WestHem would retaliate, and it is distinctly possible that all

Tellus might become a radioactive wasteland."

 

The silence, which had been deepening steadily, was broken by an explosive "Jesus

Christ!" from peppery little Bryce of Metals.

 

"Precisely," Maynard went on. "That is why this meeting was called. This is-at least I

think it will become-the first meeting of the Board of Directors of the Galaxians, a

government which is to adhere strictly to the Principle of Enlightened Self-Interest.

 

"What we can accomplish remains to be seen. We will have to exert extreme caution; we

must keep ahead of the opposition; above all, we must be able at all times to pull up

short of ultimate catastrophe to Tellus.

 

"Whether or not we fight at all depends absolutely upon the attitude of the Planetsmen.

We must have solidarity. Hoadman expects the full support of Labor, even to the

extremity of a general strike of all the unions of WestHem. This would necessitate the

cooperation of the Planetsmen, and he expects even that. It is psychologically impossible

for any man of Hoadman's stripe to understand that on the planets there is neither

Capital nor Labor; that we Galaxians are all labor and are all capitalists. Hence it is clear

that unless we are sure of virtual unanimity of all Galaxians we cannot fight Hoadman at

all.

 

"I now ask the supremely vital question- Do the Planetsmen, the most important segment

by far of the Galaxians, want to go the route for a stable dollar and all that it means?

You seven may retire to a private room for discussion, if you like....

 

"But I see you don't need to," Maynard went on, as all seven men spoke practically at

once, Holbrook of Communications being first by an instant. "Peter Holbrook, president of

the Associated Wavesmen, has the floor."

 

Holbrook of Communications was the youngest man there. He was scarcely out of his

twenties and was so deeply tanned that his crew-cut, sun-bleached hair seemed almost

white. He looked like a -professional football player; or like the expert "pole-climber" he

had been until a year before. He stood up, cleared his throat, and said, "You're right, Mr.

Maynard, we don't need to discuss that point. We've thought about it and talked about it

a lot. We have been and are highly concerned. But I'm not the one to talk about it here. I

yield the floor to Mr. Egbert Bryce, President of the Society of Metalsmen, who has been

coordinating us all along on this very thing."

 

You, Eggie?" Maynard asked, with a grin, and the tone of the meeting became less

formal all of a sudden. I "And you never let me in on it?"

 

"Me," the wiry, intense Bryce agreed. "Naturally not. You're always beating somebody's

ears down about presenting a half-developed program and ours isn't developed yet at all.

But you've apparently made plans for a long time ahead."

 

"Plenty of them, but they're all fluid. Nothing to go into at this point. Go ahead."

 

"All right. On this basic factor there's no disagreement whatever. No doubt or question.

Tellurian labor is a bunch of plain damned fools. Idiots. Cretins. However, that's only to

be expected because everybody with any brains or any guts left Tellus years ago.

There's scarcely any good breeding stock left, even. So about the only ones with brains

left-except for the connivers, chiselers, I boodlers, gangsters, and bastardly crooked

politicians and that goes for most Tellurian capitalists, too. Right?" "Dead right, and we

don't like it one bit better than you do. That's why so much Tellurian capital is all set to

join us Galaxians when we leave Tellus."

 

"Oh? You've gone that far? That's some of the stuff you'll go into later?"

 

"Yes. Go ahead."

 

"All right. Every time I think of Tellurian labor it makes me so damn mad.. . ."

 

"Eggie's the evenest-tempered man alive," Wellington explained to the group at large.

"Mad all the time." "So what?" the bristly little man snapped. "This is a thing to really get

mad about. Slaves! Not slaves, either -slaves don't necessarily like slavery and they

sometimes rebel. They're serfs. They like it that way. Dead level advancement by

seniority only-security-security, hell! No change-change scares the pants off of 'em.

Don't want to think. Think? They cart think. One good thought would fracture their

brainless damned skulls. And as long as they get a dollar an hour more than they're

worth they don't give a cockeyed tinker's damn that their bosses are stealing everything

in sight that isn't welded down-and sometimes even some of that. So you can paste it in

your tall silk hat, Mayn, that the Planetsmen are free men, not brainless stupid serfs.

Burley Hoadman won't get any help at all from us in stealing any more megabucks than

he already has stolen. Not by seven thousand spans of Steinman truss."

 

"Serf labor versus free men," Maynard said, thoughtfully. "Very well put, Eggie. In that

connection, Speers of the Little Gem made a tape that shows the attitude of two of his

best men. Will you play it, please, Miss Champion?"

 

She played it and Maynard went on, "We have thousands of similar recordings. The serf

attitude is characteristic of non-union, as well as of union labor, and also of white-collar

people as a class. In fact, it is characteristic of Tellus as a planet. In contrast to that atti-

 

tude, Zeckendorff of the Stockmen brought along a tape, of which we will hear the last

few sentences. Scene, a meeting of Local 3856 of the Stockmen. Occasion, the voting

upon a resolution presented by a Tellurian union organizer after weeks of work. Miss

Champion?"

 

She flipped a switch and the speaker said, "The vote is nine hundred seventy eight

against; none for. That kind of crap doesn't go on the planets, Gaylord, and if you had

the brain God gave a goose you'd know it. That kind of security is what life-termers on

the Rock have and we don't want any part of it. Nobody but ourselves is ever going to

tell us what we can or can't do; so you'd better get the hell out of here and back to Tellus

before somebody parts your hair with a routing iron."

 

 "I like that," Maynard said. "I like it very much. We knew in general what the sentiment

is. However, pure Galaxianism-everybody pulling together harmoniously for the common

good-is an ideal and as such can never be realized. The question is, can we approach it

nearly enough to snake it work?"

 

"We can try-and I think we can do it," Bryce said. "Anyway, Mayn, this first hurdle was

the biggest one, and it's solid. We can guarantee that."

 

"Wonderful!" Maynard said. "Then we're in business -so let's get on with it."

 

And the meeting went on; not only for all the rest of that day, but all day and every day

for two solid weeks.

 

Shortly after the Deston Uranium Expedition got back to Newmars, the Deston family

went to Earth and to the Warner-owned, luxury-type Hotel Warner; arriving there early of

an evening.

 

Barbara was thoroughly accustomed to red-carpet treatment. She nodded and smiled;

she used first names abundantly in greeting; to a few VIP's she introduced her "husband

and business partner, Carlyle Deston." A retinue escorted them up to their penthouse

suite; the manager himself made sure that everything was on the beam. Lock, stock, and

barrel, the place was theirs.

 

Deston was not used to high life, but he made a good stab at it. Even when, at the

imposing portals of the Deep Space Room, the velvet rope was whisked aside and the

crowd of waiting standees was ignored. But when, at the end of the long and perfect

meal and of the magnificent floor show, no check was presented for signature, Deston

did reach for his wallet; to be stopped by a slight shake of Barbara's head.

 

"But no tip, even?" he protested, in a whisper.

 

"Of course not. The office takes care of everything. I never carry any money on Tellus."

 

And next morning a Warner limousine took them across town to the immense skyscraper

that was the Warner Building, where they were escorted ceremoniously up into WarnOil's

innermost private office; a huge, luxuriously business-like office worthy in every respect

of being the sanctum sanctorum of the second-largest firm in existence.

 

As has been said, Warner Oil was not a corporation. It was not even a partnership. It

had been owned in toto by Barbara's parents as community property; it was now owned

in the same way by Carlyle and Barbara Deston. Thus, it had no stock and no bonds and

published no reports of any kind. It had no officers, no board of directors. It had one

general manager and a few department heads; men who, despite the unimportance of

their titles, were high on the list of the most powerful operators of Earth.

 

The Destons' first appointment was with General Manager Lansing; a big, bear-like man

who picked Barbara up on sight and kissed her vigorously. "Mighty glad to see you

again, Barbry. Glad to meet you, Carl." He engulfed Deston's hand in a huge, hard paw.

"I apologize for thinking you were something that crawled out from under a rock. What

you've been putting out is the damndest hairiest line of stuff I've seen since the old

gut-cutting days when the old man and I were pups. But go ahead, Barbry."

 

"First, I want to assure you, Uncle Paul, that neither Carl nor I will bother you any more

than father did. Not as much, in fact, because neither of us has any delusions as to who

is running WarnOil and we both want you to keep on running it."

 

"Thanks, both of you. I was hoping, of course, but I got a little dubious when Carl here

started showing so many long, sharp, curly teeth."

 

"I understand. Second, I'm very glad that all of you-all that count, I mean-approve of

Carl's program." "Should have incorporated long ago. As for the hell raising-wow!" He

slapped himself resoundingly on the leg. "If we can push half of that stuff through it'll rock

the whole damned galaxy on its foundations." "Third, how is the probate coming along?"

 

"I'd better call DuPuy in here for that, I. . . ."

 

 "Uh-uh, listen! We don't want two solid hours of whereases and hereinbefores. You talk

our language." "We're steam-rollering 'em and it tickles me a foot up . . ." Lansing broke

off and into a bellow of laughter. "Every damn shyster the government has got is scream-

 

ing bloody murder and threatening everything he can think of, including complete

confiscation, but they haven't got a leg to stand on. They can't tax anything except what

little stuff we have here on Tellus, and the inheritance tax on that will be only a few

megabucks. Everything else belongs to Newmars, where there's no inheritance tax, no

income tax, and hardly any property tax; and the fact that DuPuy writes Newmars' laws

has nothing to do with the case. So after DuPuy and his crew get tired of quibbling and

horsing around we'll pay it out of petty cash and never miss it."

 

The Destons, during the next few days, held conference after conference, during which

hundreds of details were ironed out; and as a by-product of which the news spread

abroad that the heiress was very active indeed in the management of civilization-wide

Warner Oil.

 

One morning, then, at nine o'clock, Barbara herself punched the series of letters and

numerals that was the unlisted and close-held number of Doris Champion, the First

Secretary of Upton Maynard, the president of Galactic Metals, the largest firm that

civilization had ever known. Barbara's yellow-haired self appeared up on the FirSec's

screen; Barbara saw a tall, cool, svelte brunette seated at something less than forty

square feet of cluttered-seeming desk.

 

"Yes?" the FirSec asked, pleasantly, then stared-and lost a little of her cool poise. For

every FirSec on Earth knew that yellow-haired woman by sight ... and she was on the

com in person and there had been nothing preliminary, through channels, at all. . . .

 

"That's right," Barbara confirmed the unspoken thought." I'm Barbara Warner Deston of

WarnOil. Please arrange a half-hour face-to-face for Mr. Deston and me with Mr.

-Maynard. There's no great hurry about it; any time today will do."

 

"A half hour! Today? I'm terribly sorry, Mrs. Deston, but it's simply impossible. Why, he's

booked solid for . . ." "I know he's busy, Miss Champion, but so are we. Just tell him,

please, that he is the first metals man we have called, and that tomorrow morning we will

call Ajax."

 

"Very well. If you'll give me a ten-second brief I'll see what we can possibly do and call

you back."

 

"No briefing. You have my private number. We'll be here until twelve o'clock." Barbara's

hand moved toward the cut-off switch; but Miss Champion, being a really smart girl,

smelled a deal so big that even a top-bracket FirSec should duck-and fast. Wherefore:

 

"Hold the beam for fifty seconds, please, Mrs. Deston," she said, and snapped down the

button that made her office as tight as the vault of a bank. Then, "I'm sorry to interrupt,

Mr. Maynard, but Mrs. Deston of WarnOil is on." She cut the audio then, but kept on

speaking rapidly.

 

In thirty seconds the keen, taut face of Upton Maynard appeared upon Barbara's plate.

"Good morning, Mrs. Deston. Something about metal, I gather? A little out of your line,

isn't it?"

 

"That's right, Mr. Maynard," Barbara agreed. She added nothing and for a moment he,

too, was silent. Then:

 

"It'll have to be after closing," Maynard said.

 

"That's quite all right. We'll fit our time to yours and you may name the place."

 

"Seventeen ten. Your office. Satisfactory?"

 

"Perfectly. Thank you, Mr. Maynard," and as Barbara's hand moved to cut com

Maynard's voice went on: "Get my wife, Miss Champion. Tell her I'll be late again getting

home this evening."