[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

said, "whyinhell does my personal Fuzzy-Sitter have to have a Restricted-Areas
pass, anyway?"
Steefer sighed. "Because anyone who has free access to your private residence
has to have one. Mr. Grego, we decided on this almost a year ago-after we
found that Herckerd and Novaes had hidden a bunch of kidnapped Fuzzies on an
unfinished floor right here in Company House. To say nothing of every other
Tom, Dick, and Harry in Mallorysport coming and going through the landing
stages in the unused levels. I don't even like to talk about it. I'm still
embarrassed by how slack I'd let things get." Chief Steefer took a deep breath
and waited to see if he had sold his point to Grego. He had a hunch that he
hadn't.
Grego scratched his head and lit a cigarette. "I'm certain that she's all
right, Harry. Diamond is crazy about her. Fuzzies have an instinct for that
sort of thing, you know. They just don't take to people who aren 't on the
square." He paused, waiting for Steefer to suggest a way around the
regulation.
Steefer wasn't going to do it. "It's an Executive Ops Order-S.O.P.-you signed
it yourself, sir. If I make an exception for you, I'll have technicians in
Computer Center wanting the same thing so Aunt Minnie can bring them their
lunch, and statisticians in the Sensitive Records Section who want their girl
friends to pick them up from work, and Ghu knows where it will all end."
Grego thought for a moment. Damn it all to Nifflheim! Who's running this
company-me or the damned Operations Manual? "Here's what you do, Harry," he
said. "Issue the pass. Stamp it 'temporary,' with an expiration date that will
let you get the packet to Terra and back. Attach a memo inside the packet to
the effect that this personnel action is done on my personal authority, and
put out a supplement to that Ops Order to the effect that exceptions will be
authorized only on my personal, signed approval. When that's done, send a man
up to my office with the pass and the memo for my signature. Will that serve
everyone's best interests?"
"Yes, sir. That will be fine. No one is apt to ask for an exception if they
have to personally justify it to you."
"Excellent," Grego said. "I can't keep escorting her to the landing stage and
meeting her there every time she comes and goes, just to get her past one of
your cops. Thank you." Grego blanked the screen. That should get the job done,
while at the same time tacitly explaining to Harry Steefer an object lesson
about why people don't ordinarily resist the decisions of the
Manager-in-Chief. The Company was not a god, after all. It was a machine, and
there could only be room for one person in the driver's seat.
It had been Tuesday morning about 0830 when Ahmed and Sandra arrived at
Holloway Station, as promised with a metric ton of luggage and gear. George
Lunt had whisked Ahmed away immediately. Ruth and Lynne had dropped everything
Page 41
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
to help Sandra get situated. They had borrowed Jack's manipulator to
re-arrange some logs and boulders left around the bungalow into "something
more attractive. "Jack didn't understand that, but he had said, "Sure. Go
ahead." That left him without a vehicle, but he and Little Fuzzy walked across
the footbridge over the creek and borrowed Gerd's airboat.
Jack wanted to get up into the Cordilleras Range right away. The patrols had
reported a big mob of Fuzzies up there, so he wanted to get right up there
with an armload of shodda-bags and steel shoppo-diggos, do a little trading
with the natives, and persuade them to come on in to Hollo-way Station. Speed
was indicated because in that part of Beta the hills were alive with the sound
of prospectors-all trying to find enough sunstones to get rich quick. They
wouldn 't, of course, because they didn't know how to look for sunstones, or
how to get them out of the enclosing matrix of flint if they found a vein.
A lot of these birds were pretty unsavory characters. Some of them were bound
to be runaway veldbeest herders with stolen Company aircars. That kind of
person would be apt to vent his frustration on a Fuzzy. A little preventive
work by the Native Affairs Commissioner was indicated. The ZNPF patrol would
go up there on the regular surveillance post and check them all out and jug
the ones who had an aircar they couldn't prove they owned, explain the
boundaries of the Fuzzy Reservation to the rest, and generally get the idea
across that this was not exactly the wild frontier.
In the meantime, Jack did not want any ugly incidents involving Fuzzies. For
all he cared, these guys could shoot each other up all they wanted, but
Fuzzies were his responsibility.
Ahmed leaned down to get a better look. "I'll be damned, George. You're right.
It is the remnants of a little irrigation ditch." He pointed along the line of
the dry creek. "And it branches into three channels over there. Somebody was
cultivating these plants before the creek dried up. But, nobody's ever settled
up here. If they had we'd have found out about Fuzzies sooner than-
" He stopped short. "You mean Fuzzies had truck gardens up here?"
George nodded.
"But, Fuzzies are hunter-gatherers. They're nowhere near the agricultural
level." Ahmed frowned and stroked his nose.
"Umm-hmm." George nodded, again. "I don't know much about anthropology, but I
know hunter-gatherer societies at low Paleolithic development come a hell of a
lot earlier than fanners."
"How can you be certain it was Fuzzy-farmers?" Ahmed asked.
George pointed to the ground, turning a full circle as he did so. "Why, look
all around you at the dried-up tracks. Fuzzy footprints if I ever saw them."
Ahmed chuckled. "That doesn't prove anything. Fuzzies could have tramped
through here by the battalion when this ground was damp-hunting prawns or
something."
"Good reasoning, Captain," George said. "You're getting to be a better
detective every day. And, you're right; it doesn 't prove a thing. Now come
over here and look at this."
He led Ahmed over to the extensive weirthorn thicket that spread along the
base of the cliff. It wasn't a surprising place to find it. Wierthorn was a
kind of chaparral, with long, sharp spikes every few inches along its [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]