Seeker Page 5

  “Well, I know they’re not capitals anymore.”

  “Except Paris. Paris is forever, they say. Chase, Earth has always had a problem: It’s loaded with more people than its resources can support. It’s always been that way. Ever since the Industrial Age. The results of too many people are that someone’s always hungry, there’s always a plague running loose somewhere. Ethnic jealousies always get worse when times are hard. Nations become unstable, so governments get nervous and impose strictures. Individual freedoms break down. One thing the place has never been short of is dictators. People there have old habits, old hatreds, old perspectives that they keep passing down from generation to generation, and never get rid of.

  “The planet’s population today is about eight billion. When the Margolians left, it was more than twice that. Can you imagine what life must have been like?”

  “So,” I said, “the Margolians were, what, downtrodden? Trying to find a place where they could feed their kids?”

  “No. They were at the other end of the scale. They were intellectuals, by and large. And they had their share of the wealth. But they didn’t like the noxious environment. Noxious meaning both physically and psychologically. They had a dictator. A theocrat by the name of Carvalla, who was relatively harmless as dictators went. But a dictator nevertheless. He controlled the media, controlled the schools, controlled the churches. You attended church or you paid the consequences. The schools were indoctrination centers.”

  “Hard to believe people would consent to live like that.”

  “They’d been trained to take authority seriously. In Carvalla’s time, if you didn’t do what you were told, you disappeared.”

  “I’m beginning to see why they wanted to clear out.”

  “They were led by Harry Williams.”

  Another name I was obviously supposed to know. “Sorry,” I said.

  “He was a communications magnate, and he was connected for years to various social and political movements, trying to get food for hungry kids, to make medical care available. He didn’t get into trouble until he started trying to do something about education.”

  “What happened?”

  “The authorities didn’t like his basic notion, which was that kids should be taught to question everything.”

  “Oh.”

  “They called him unpatriotic.”

  “I’m not surprised.”

  “An atheist.”

  “Was he?”

  “He was an agnostic. Just as bad.”

  “In that kind of society, I suppose so. You said it was a theocracy?”

  “Yes. The head of state was also effectively the head of the Church.”

  “What happened to Williams?”

  “Fifteen years in jail. Or seventeen. Depends on which sources you trust. He’d have been executed, except that he had powerful friends.”

  “So he did get out?”

  “Yes, he got out. But it was while he was in jail that he decided something had to be done. Revolution wasn’t possible. So the next best thing was to escape. ‘Joseph Margolis had it right,’ he’s reported to have said at a meeting of his associates. ‘We’ll never be able to change things.’ ”

  “I take it Joseph Margolis is the guy they’re named for?”

  “Right.”

  “Who was he?”

  “A British prime minister. A hero, and apparently something of a philosopher.”

  “What was he right about?”

  “That communication technologies lead easily to enslavement. That it is very difficult to maintain individual freedoms. He was fond of citing Benjamin Franklin’s comment to the American people: ‘We have given you a republic. Now see if you can keep it.’ ”

  He saw I didn’t recognize Franklin’s name either. He grinned and offered to explain, but I got the drift. “There were no colonies at the time, were there?”

  “Two small ones. But both were under control of the home world. There were no independents.”

  “And the government acquiesced?”

  “They encouraged him to go and offered assistance.” He stared through the window at the ocean. “Good riddance to troublemakers. But that meant they’d know the location of the colony. Williams wanted out from under their thumb. So he and whoever was with him had to go it alone.”

  “Not possible,” I said.

  “Some of the Margolians thought the same way. But he persuaded them to make the attempt. They believed they could create an Eden. A home for humanity that would embody freedom and security. An ideal place to live.”

  “That’s been tried any number of times,” I said.

  He nodded. “Sometimes it’s happened. Anyhow, they were desperate. They sent people out to look for the right world. When they found it, they kept its location secret, bought the two ships, and headed out. Five thousand of them.”

  “That’s an incredible story,” I said.

  “Harry went with the last group, more than four years after the first Margolians left. He’s reported to have told the media that, where they were going, even God wouldn’t be able to find them.”

  The server refilled our glasses. “And nobody ever did,” I said.

  “No. Not as far as I can tell.”

  Alex was not very demonstrative. If the building were burning, he’d suggest it might be prudent to make for the door. So the news that the cup was associated with both a famous ship and a celebrated mystery did not send him reeling with joy around the office. But I saw a glint of satisfaction in those brown eyes. “Jacob,” he said.

  Jacob responded with a few bars of Perrigrin’s Eighth. The kind of majestic chords with which heroic figures in the sims customarily make their entrances. Alex told him to knock it off.

  “How may I be of assistance?” Jacob asked, in the deepest baritone he could muster.

  Alex rolled his eyes. “Jacob,” he said, “we’d like to know whether any artifacts from the two ships associated with the Margolians, the Seeker and the Bremerhaven, are currently available, or have been on the market at any time.”

  “They’d be quite old,” said Jacob. “I’ll need a few moments.”

  We made small talk for about a minute, then he was back. “I see nothing of that nature. Nothing associated with either vessel. There are six verified items connected with the Margolians themselves. And numerous suspect objects.”

  “Name them, please. The ones that are verified.”

  “A communications link of some sort. A pen with Jase Tao-Ki’s name engraved on it. Tao-Ki was a prominent member of the group, and a substantial contributor. There is also a wall plaque on which is inscribed a commendation to the Margolians from a social welfare group. A lapel pin bearing their symbol and name. The symbol is a torch. A portrait of Harry Williams himself. And a copy of Glory Run, signed by its author, Kay Wallis. It’s an account of how they put the mission together. The signature is faded but can be seen in ultraviolet light. All six were left behind. There is nothing from them after their departure.”

  “Who was Kay Wallis?” asked Alex.

  “One of the founders of the organization. One of its prime defenders when people began to laugh at them. The record’s unclear, but it looks as if she died just before the final round of flights. She never left Earth.” He paused, perhaps expecting a comment. But none came. “Wallis laid out their objections to various governmental policies in Glory Run. Basically they were concerned that each generation was subjected to a series of ideologies which, once imposed, were hard to get rid of, hampered independent thought, and led to various hostilities. She spells everything out. Get the religious groups under control. Reign in the corporate types. Recognize that dissent is healthy. Provide a level playing field so no one is disadvantaged.”

  “If American society—that was America, right?—Yes, if American society was so oppressive, how’d she get it published?”

  “It was published in China,” said Jacob, “one of the last strongholds of democracy on the planet.”

>   “The Margolians,” I said, “weren’t really disadvantaged.”

  Alex’s eyes narrowed. “They had resources. But if you don’t have freedom of action, disadvantaged is the right word.” He scribbled something on a pad. “Let’s talk about the artifacts.” He requested a list of the amounts paid the last time the six Margolian objects had changed hands. Jacob reported two had been secret transactions. The other four printed out. Alex sighed. “Not bad,” he said.

  Indeed. Tao-Ki’s pen went for several years’ worth of my income. And I was well paid. The others were higher.

  Alex rubbed his hands together. “Okay. She’ll have to produce ownership documentation before any of this goes public.” He was, of course, speaking of Amy.

  “You’ll take care of that?” I said. There would also be some negotiation involved, and that line of work was his specialty.

  “Get through to her when you can. Find out if she’d be willing to meet us at the Hillside for a drink.”

  I called Amy. She decided good things had happened and pressed me for information. I explained that we were still gathering data, but that Alex wished to ask a few more questions. She wasn’t having it, of course. But that was okay. When we got to the Hillside, Alex would caution her not to pass the good news to anyone until we were sure nobody would dispute her ownership claim. We had to do that to protect ourselves since we would be facilitating the sale.

  “I’ll be there,” she said.

  Alex had placed the cup in our vault. I brought its image up and wondered about its history.

  Probably, someone had collected it as a souvenir during the Seeker’s early years, before it became associated with the Margolian migration. Or, it might have made one or two of the early flights to the colony world and come off the ship when it returned for the third mission. It was unlikely, but it could have happened that way. Were that the case, and we could show that it was, the cup would then become enormously valuable. But it was hard to see how we could take it that far.

  When I mentioned it to Alex, he told me not to get excited. “FTL travel was a big deal in the twenty-seventh century,” he said. “What probably happened is that somebody got the trademark rights and produced cups and uniforms and all sorts of Seeker souvenirs for sale to the general public.”

  The English characters looked especially exotic. Marquard had pronounced the ship’s name for me, in both Standard and in English. He’d admitted at the same time that there was some uncertainty about pronunciation. No original audio recordings remained from the period, so even though we could read the language, nobody knew for certain what it had actually sounded like.

  See-ker. Accent on the first syllable.

  Outward Bound.

  Where had they gone?

  “So far away even God won’t be able to find us.”

  Several accounts existed of various aspects of the story, the background of Harry Williams, the roots of the Margolian movement, contemporary attacks accusing the Margolians of being elitist, their probable destination, and, eventually, theories about their disappearance. They had done precisely what they said they would do, suggested some. They had gone so far out, that even now, thousands of years later, the world they’d selected remained undetected.

  The common wisdom was that something had gone wrong and the colony had perished. Some thought that Margolia, over the ages, might have sidestepped the various bumps and reversals suffered by the mainline civilization, and moved so far ahead of it that they would not be interested in communicating with us. Me, I thought the common wisdom had it right.

  Margolia had been the subject of several sims. Jacob showed me one. It was titled Invader, and had been produced less than a year earlier. In it, the hero discovers that Margolians have returned quietly to the Confederacy. They are highly advanced, they walk unrecognized among us, and they actually control the machinery of government. They consider ordinary humans to be inferior and are planning a takeover. When the protagonist tries to warn the authorities, his girlfriend disappears, people begin dying, and there are lots of chases down dark alleys and through the corridors of an abandoned space station. The plot dissolves into a major shoot-out at the end, the young lady is rescued, and the good people of the Confederacy are alerted.

  No one ever explained what conceivable reason the Margolians could have had in trying to take us over. But I’ll give the producers this: I was hanging on to my chair during the chase scenes.

  FOUR

  Drink deep the cup of life;

  Take its dark wine into your soul,

  For it passes round the table only once.

  —Marcia Tolbert

  Centauri Days, 3111 C.E.

  The Hillside was an exquisite, posh club along the Riverwalk. The kind where they don’t put any prices in the menu because you’re not supposed to care. They had a human hostess, which is standard in most of the better restaurants, and human waiters, which of course is not. They also had a piano player.

  The tables were well supplied with jasmine candles. Walls and tables were dark-stained wood. Prints in the style of the last century provided a sense of nostalgia. I noticed a couple of senators with their spouses (I assumed) across the room. One, a well-known champion of corporate benefits, recognized Alex and came over to say hello.

  Amy walked in a few minutes later, looking around as if she were lost. Then she spotted us and strode briskly over. “Good evening, Mr. Benedict,” she said, still taking in her surroundings. “This is really nice.”

  Alex rose, pulled her chair out for her, and said he was glad she was pleased. She said hello to me and sat down.

  She wore a pressed lavender suit and seemed to have had something of a makeover. Her hair was pulled back and in better order. Her eyes were more alert, and she stood a bit straighter than she had at the office. She wasn’t at ease, but that of course was the reason we were there. The Hillside was the place Alex used when he wanted to put a client on the defensive. Which is to say, when he wanted something he wasn’t sure he could get.

  She went immediately to business: “Chase said you have good news for me.”

  That was her imagination at work. Alex looked at me, read my face, and smiled. “The cup is associated with a famous, and very early, interstellar,” he said. “We think it’s reasonably valuable.”

  “How much?” she asked.

  “We’ll have to let the market decide, Amy. I’d rather not guess.” He produced a chip. “When you get time, complete this document. It will establish your ownership of the property.”

  “Why do I have to do that?” she asked. “It’s mine. It was given to me.”

  “And possession is ninety percent. But disputes have a way of appearing in these cases. It’s a formality, but it might save problems later.”

  She was annoyed, but she took it and dropped it in a side pocket. “I’ll get it back to you tomorrow.”

  “Good,” said Alex. “As soon as you’ve done that, we’ll put the cup on the market and see what happens.”

  “All right.”

  He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “Now,” he said, “while we don’t know its precise value, we should establish a minimum bid.”

  “How much?”

  He gave her a number. I’ve been through these things before, but it took my breath away. It was more than I’d been able to earn so far in a lifetime. Amy’s eyes squeezed hard shut and I saw a tear run down her cheek. I may have been getting a little damp myself.

  “Wonderful,” she said, with a breaking voice.

  Alex beamed. He was the picture of philanthropic content. It was so nice to be of assistance. Our cut, of course, would be the standard ten percent of the eventual sale price. I knew him well enough to be aware that his minimum bid was conservative.

  I thought for a minute she was going to come apart. Fluttering handkerchief, brave smile, giggle, and an apology. Sorry, it’s such a shock.

  “Now,” said Alex, “I want you to do something for me.”

&
nbsp; “Of course.”

  The waiter arrived, and we took time to order, although Amy was no longer paying much attention to the menu. When he was gone, Alex leaned across the table. “I want you to tell me where it came from.”

  She looked startled. Fox and hounds. “Why, I told you, Mr. Benedict. My ex-boyfriend gave it to me.”

  “When would that have been?”

  “I don’t know. Several weeks ago.”

  Alex’s voice dropped even lower. “Would you be kind enough to tell me his name?”

  “Why? I told you, it belongs to me.”

  “Because there might be more of these objects around. If there are, the owner may not be aware of their value.”

  She shook her head. No. “I’d rather not do that.”

  Breakup city. Alex reached across the table and took her hand. “It could mean a great deal to you,” he said. “We’d arrange things so you got a finder’s fee.”

  “No.”

  He looked at me, shrugged, and changed the subject. We talked about how nice it was to have an enormous amount of money fall out of the sky, and how the cup was a valuable artifact. The meals came, and we continued in that vein until Alex caught my eye again. I understood what he wanted, and a few minutes later he excused himself.

  Time for girl talk. “Bad ending?” I asked in a sympathetic voice.

  She nodded. “I hate him.”

  “Another woman?”

  “Yeah. He had no right.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “It’s okay. I let him get away with it a couple times. But promises don’t mean nothing to him.”

  “You’re probably better off. He sounds like a jerk.”

  “I’m over it.”

  “Good.” I tried to look casual. “If he has more of these around somewhere, it could mean a lot more money for you.”