Stranger in a Strange Land

«I wouldn't mind having money, too!»

«A little is no good. Daughters can spend ten percent more than a man can make in any usual occupation. That's a law of nature, to be known henceforth as “Harshaw's Law.” But, Captain,real wealth, on the scale that calls for a battery of finaglers to hold down taxes, would ground you as certainly as resigning would.»

«Nonsense! I'd put it into bonds and just clip coupons.»

«Not if you were the type who acquires great wealth in the first place. Big money isn't hard to come by. All it costs is a lifetime of devotion. But no ballerina ever works harder. Captain, that's not your style; you don't want to make money, you simply want to spend money.»

«Correct, sir! So I can't see why you would want to take Mike's wealth away from him.»

«Because great wealth is a curse — unless you enjoy money-making for its own sake. Even then it has serious drawbacks.»

«Oh, piffle! Jubal, you talk like a harem guard trying to sell a whole man on the advantages of being a eunuch.»

«Possibly,» agreed Jubal. «The mind's ability to rationalize its own shortcomings is unlimited; I am no exception. Since I, like yourself, sir, have no interest in money other than to spend it, it is impossible for me to get rich. Conversely, there has never been any danger that I would fail to scrounge the modest amount needed to feed my vices, since anyone with the savvy not to draw to a small pair can do that. But great wealth? You saw that farce. Could I have rewritten it so that I acquired the plunder — become its manager and defacto owner while milking off any income I coveted — and still have rigged it so that Douglas would have supported the outcome? Mike trusts me; I am his water brother. Could I have stolen his fortune?»

«Uh … damn you, Jubal, I suppose so.»

«A certainty. Because our Secretary General is no more a money-seeker than you are. His drive is power — a drum whose beat I do not hear. Had I guaranteed (oh, gracefully!) that the Smith estate would continue to bulwark his administration, then I would have been left with the boodle.»

Jubal shuddered. «I thought I was going to have to do that, to protect Mike from vultures — and I was panic-stricken. Captain, you don't know what an Old Man of the Sea great wealth is. Its owner is beset on every side, like beggars in Bombay, each demanding that he invest or give away part of his wealth. He becomes suspicious — honest friendship is rarely offered him; those who could have been friends are too fastidious to be jostled by beggars, too proud to risk being mistaken for one.

«Worse yet, his family is always in danger. Captain, have your daughters ever been threatened with kidnapping?»

«What? Good Lord, no!»

«If you possessed the wealth Mike had thrust on him, you would have those girls guarded night and day — still you would not rest, because you would never be sure of the guards. Look at the last hundred or so kidnappings and note how many involved a trusted employee … and how few victims escaped alive. Is there anything money can buy which is worth having your daughters' necks in a noose?»

Van Tromp looked thoughtful. «I'll keep my mortgaged house, Jubal.»

«Amen. I want to live my own life, sleep in my own bed — and not be bothered! Yet I thought I was going to be forced to spend my last years in an office, barricaded by buffers, working long hours as Mike's man of business.

«Then I had an inspiration. Douglas lives behind such barricades, has such a staff. Since we were surrendering the power to insure Mike's freedom, why not make Douglas pay by assuming the headaches? I was not afraid that he would steal; only second-rate politicians are money hungry — and Douglas is no pipsqueak. Quit scowling, Ben, and hope that he never dumps the load on you.

«So I dumped it on Douglas — and now I can go back to my garden. But that was simple, once I figured it out. It was the Larkin Decision that fretted me.»

Caxton said, «I think you lost your wits on that, Jubal. That silly business of letting them give Mike sovereign “honors”. You should simply have had Mike sign over all interest, if any, under that ridiculous Larkin theory.»

«Ben m'boy,» Jubal said gently, «as a reporter you are sometimes readable.»

«Gee, thanks! My fan.»

«But your concepts of strategy are Neanderthal.»

Caxton sighed. «That's better. For a moment I thought you had gone soft.»

«When I do, please shoot me. Captain, how many men did you leave on Mars?»

«Twenty-three.»

«And what is their status under the Larkin Decision?»

Van Tromp frowned. «I'm not supposed to talk.»

«Then don't,» Jubal advised. «We can deduce it.»

Dr. Nelson said, «Skipper, Stinky and I are civilians again. I shall talk as I please — »

«And I,» agreed Mahmoud.

« — and they know what they can do with my reserve commission. What business has the government, telling us we can't talk? Those chair-warmers didn't go to Mars.»

«Stow it, Sven. I intend to talk — these are our water brothers. But, Ben, I would rather not see this in print.»