could
land and claim possession before the harvesting ship came to pick up the next
crop."
He
broke off. Something in Kynance's expression had
given him a clue to what she was thinking. He said, listening to his own words
in near-bewilderment, "Legally—unoccupied . . .?"
"Not
so fast," Kynance objected, raising a hand. But
she also gave him a wink. "I assume that this boobytrap he left was what started the company on its present course?"
"I
gather from hints I've picked up that it was Shuster's idea, the thing that
advanced him in the company," Hoist said.
"That
fits," Kynance nodded. "A swine like him
wouldn't be much liked even by the fellow swine who must run the Zygra Company, so you'd expect him to
have done something exceptionally nasty to get ahead to where he is now. And
the dirty underhandedness of the traps people run into-matches his personality."
"You can say that
again," agreed Dickery Evan fervently.
"Just how underhanded?" Kynance went on,
disregarding the interruption. "Would you please tell me how each of you
was inveigled into breaking his contract?"
So they did. Horst wondered optimistically if
some of the means employed would turn out to be illegal— Kynance seemed to know a great deal about the law. But that hope was quenched as time
after time she cited reasons to justify the company's position.
To
Evan she said, "I'm afraid tampering with an officially-required record of
your work does count as sabotage and voids the contract without chance of
appeal: Levi Rico versus Free Space Haulage Company, 2153."
And
to Horst she said rather sadly, "I know they might never have used that
book-projector to give you supplementary instructions, but legally you were
not entitled to do anything that risked garbling vital information from your
employers. Computers are legally non-conscious machines, hence devoid of
intelligence, so you should have told the record that you suspected a
malfunction needing manual repairs-then you'd have been within your
rights."
And
to Coberley , who had been snared through trying to
reset the autochef when it had burned his breakfast:
"The computer was bound to consider the chance that you might alter
another of its settings and perhaps poison yourself— Fernando Duquesne versus
the Osceola Food Company, 2099, is quite clear on that."
"All right, since you're so smart," Coberley spat, "now tell us what we can do to
get off this stinking mudballl "
"I'm not sure I can do that," Kynance admitted.
"Then
what in the name of—?"
" Coberley , pipe down!" Horst rapped. "This girl
has done things you and I wouldn't have had the guts to try even if we'd
thought of them."
"That's nothing very special," Kynance said. "You see-well, it strikes me that you outworlders are too used to relying absolutely on
machines. It's only natural; you've done miracles with integrated automatic
systems which were never needed on Earth, like this one which looks after Zygra so efficiently. When your life depends on them, you
don't interfere with their operations. The moment I caught sight of you
paddling your boat along, I realized I'd fallen into the same trap—swallowed
whole what the Zygra Company told me about the planet
being impossible to colonize and even the single supervisor needing
life-support equipment costing millions of credits."
"I
thought you wouldn't have sacrificed your contract without some plan in
mind," Horst said softly.
"If
it's not a plan to get us out of here I'm not interested," Coberley snapped.
"It
may well lead to that," Kynance told him.
"Though at best it's going to involve a delay of a year—a Zygran year, I mean. There are one
hell of a lot of compensations, nonetheless. You might say there's a fat prize
attached which will more than make up for the salaries we've lost."
Dickery sat up and began to take notice, and she
unfolded to them the fantastic scheme which had come to her in a flash of
inspiration.
XIII
T he
real irony of
the whole thing, Kynance
land and claim possession before the harvesting ship came to pick up the next
crop."
He
broke off. Something in Kynance's expression had
given him a clue to what she was thinking. He said, listening to his own words
in near-bewilderment, "Legally—unoccupied . . .?"
"Not
so fast," Kynance objected, raising a hand. But
she also gave him a wink. "I assume that this boobytrap he left was what started the company on its present course?"
"I
gather from hints I've picked up that it was Shuster's idea, the thing that
advanced him in the company," Hoist said.
"That
fits," Kynance nodded. "A swine like him
wouldn't be much liked even by the fellow swine who must run the Zygra Company, so you'd expect him to
have done something exceptionally nasty to get ahead to where he is now. And
the dirty underhandedness of the traps people run into-matches his personality."
"You can say that
again," agreed Dickery Evan fervently.
"Just how underhanded?" Kynance went on,
disregarding the interruption. "Would you please tell me how each of you
was inveigled into breaking his contract?"
So they did. Horst wondered optimistically if
some of the means employed would turn out to be illegal— Kynance seemed to know a great deal about the law. But that hope was quenched as time
after time she cited reasons to justify the company's position.
To
Evan she said, "I'm afraid tampering with an officially-required record of
your work does count as sabotage and voids the contract without chance of
appeal: Levi Rico versus Free Space Haulage Company, 2153."
And
to Horst she said rather sadly, "I know they might never have used that
book-projector to give you supplementary instructions, but legally you were
not entitled to do anything that risked garbling vital information from your
employers. Computers are legally non-conscious machines, hence devoid of
intelligence, so you should have told the record that you suspected a
malfunction needing manual repairs-then you'd have been within your
rights."
And
to Coberley , who had been snared through trying to
reset the autochef when it had burned his breakfast:
"The computer was bound to consider the chance that you might alter
another of its settings and perhaps poison yourself— Fernando Duquesne versus
the Osceola Food Company, 2099, is quite clear on that."
"All right, since you're so smart," Coberley spat, "now tell us what we can do to
get off this stinking mudballl "
"I'm not sure I can do that," Kynance admitted.
"Then
what in the name of—?"
" Coberley , pipe down!" Horst rapped. "This girl
has done things you and I wouldn't have had the guts to try even if we'd
thought of them."
"That's nothing very special," Kynance said. "You see-well, it strikes me that you outworlders are too used to relying absolutely on
machines. It's only natural; you've done miracles with integrated automatic
systems which were never needed on Earth, like this one which looks after Zygra so efficiently. When your life depends on them, you
don't interfere with their operations. The moment I caught sight of you
paddling your boat along, I realized I'd fallen into the same trap—swallowed
whole what the Zygra Company told me about the planet
being impossible to colonize and even the single supervisor needing
life-support equipment costing millions of credits."
"I
thought you wouldn't have sacrificed your contract without some plan in
mind," Horst said softly.
"If
it's not a plan to get us out of here I'm not interested," Coberley snapped.
"It
may well lead to that," Kynance told him.
"Though at best it's going to involve a delay of a year—a Zygran year, I mean. There are one
hell of a lot of compensations, nonetheless. You might say there's a fat prize
attached which will more than make up for the salaries we've lost."
Dickery sat up and began to take notice, and she
unfolded to them the fantastic scheme which had come to her in a flash of
inspiration.
XIII
T he
real irony of
the whole thing, Kynance
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