Chapter 7

THEY were well within detection range of Azor’s radar, if any, and yet there had been no beeping signal that the planet’s GCA had taken over and would pilot them down. Another blank? He studied the surface of the world under his highest magnification and saw no signs that it had been devastated by war. There were cities—intact, as far as he could tell, but not very attractive. The design ran to huge, gloomy piles that mounted toward central towers.

Azor was a big world which showed not much water and a great deal of black rock. It was the fifth of its system and reportedly had colonized its four adjacent neighbors and their moons.

His own search radar pinged. The signal was followed at once by a guarded voice from his ship-to-ship communicator: “What ship are you? Do you receive me? The band is 798.44.”

He hastily dialed the frequency on his transmitter and called, “I receive you. We are a vessel from outside your solar system, home planet Halsey. We want to contact a family named Cavallo of the planet Azor believed to be engaged in building machine tools. Can you help us?”

“You are a male?” the voice asked cautiously. “In command or simply the communicator?”

“I’m a male and I’m in command of this vessel.”

The voice said: “Then sheer off this system and go elsewhere, my friend.”

“What is this? Who are you?”

“My name does not matter. I happen to be on watch aboard the prison orbital station ‘Minerva.’ Get going, my friend, before the planetary GCA picks you up.”

Prison orbital station? A very sensible idea. “Thanks for the advice,” he parried. “Can you tell me anything about the Cavallo family?”

“I have heard of them. My friend, your time is running out. If you do not sheer off very soon they will land you. And I judge from the tone of your voice that it will not be long before you join the rest of us criminals aboard ‘Minerva.’ It is not pleasant here. Good-by.”

“Wait, please!” Ross had no intention at all of committing any crimes that would land him aboard a prison hulk, and he had every intention of fulfilling his mission. “Tell me about the Cavallo family—and why you expect me to get in trouble on Azor.”

“The time is running out, my friend, but—the Cavallo family of machine tool builders is located in Novj Grad. And the crime of which all of us aboard ‘Minerva’ were convicted is conspiracy to advocate equality of the sexes. Now go!”

The carrier-wave hum of the communicator died, but immediately there was another electronic noise to fill the cabin—the beep of a GCA radar taking over the sealed landing controls of the craft.

Helena had been listening with very little comprehension. “Who was your friend, Ross?” she asked. “Where are we?”

“I think,” Ross said, “he was my friend. And I think we are—in trouble.”

The ship began to jet tentative bursts of reaction mass, nosing toward the big, gloomy planet.

“That’s all right,” Helena said comfortably. “At least they won’t know I disconnected a Senior Citizen.” She thought a moment. “They won’t, will they? I mean, the Senior Citizens here won’t know about the Senior Citizens there, will they?”

He tried to break it to her gently as the ship picked up speed. “Helena, it’s possible that the old people here won’t be Senior Citizens—not in your planet’s sense. They may just be old people, with no special authority over young people. I think, in fact, that we may find you outranking older people who happen to be males.”

She took it as a joke. “You are funny, Ross. Old means Senior, doesn’t it? And Senior means better, wiser, abler, and in charge, doesn’t it?”

“We’ll see,” he said thoughtfully as the main reaction drive cut in. “We’ll see very shortly.”

The spaceport was bustling, busy, and efficient. Ross marveled at the speed and dexterity with which the anonymous ground operator whipped his ship into a braking orbit and set it down. And he stared enviously at the crawling clamshells on treads, bigger than houses, that cupped around his ship; the ship was completely and hermetically surrounded, and bathed in a mist of germicides and prophylactic rays.

A helmeted figure riding a little platform on the inside of one of the clamshells turned a series of knobs, climbed down, and rapped on the ship’s entrance port.

Ross opened it diffidently, and almost strangled in the antiseptic fumes. Helena choked and wheezed behind him as the figure threw back its helmet and said, “Where’s the captain?”

“I am he,” said Ross meticulously. “I would like to be put in touch with the Cavallo Machine-Tool Company of Novj Grad.”

The figure shook its long hair loose, which provided Ross with the necessary clue: it was a woman. Not a very attractive-looking woman, for she wore no makeup; but by the hair, by the brows and by the smoothness of her chin, a woman all the same. She said coldly, “If you’re the captain, who’s that?”

Helena said in a small voice, “I’m Helena, from Junior Unit Twenty-Three.”

“Indeed.” Suddenly the woman smiled. “Well, come ashore, dear,” she said. “You must be tired from your trip. Both of you come ashore,” she added graciously.

She led the way out of the clamshells to a waiting closed car. Azor’s sun had an unpleasant bluish cast to it, not a type-G at all; Ross thought that the lighting made the woman look uglier than she really had to be. Even Helena looked pinched and bloodless, which he knew well was not the case at all.

All around them was activity. Whatever this planet’s faults, it was not a stagnant home for graybeards. Ross, craning, saw nothing that was shoddy, nothing that would have looked out of place in the best-equipped port of Halsey’s Planet. And the reception lounge, or whatever it was, that the woman took them to was a handsome and prettily furnished construction. “Some lunch?” the woman asked, directing her attention to Helena. “A cup of tribrew, maybe? Let me have the boy bring some.” Helena looked to Ross for signals, and Ross, gritting his teeth, nodded to her to agree. Too young the last time, too male this time; was there ever going to be a planet where he mattered to anyone?

He said desperately, “Madam, forgive my interruption, but this lady and myself need urgently to get in touch with the Cavallo company. Is this Novj Grad?”

The woman’s pale brows arched. She said, with an effort, “No, it is not.”

“Then can you tell us where Novj Grad is?” Ross persisted. “If they have a spaceport, we can hop over there in our ship——”

The woman gasped something that sounded like, “Well!” She stood up and said pointedly to Helena, “If you’ll excuse me, I have something to attend to.” And swept out.

Helena stared wide-eyed at Ross. “She must’ve been a real Senior Citizen, huh?”

“Not exactly,” said Ross despairingly. “Look, Helena, things are different here. I need your help.”

“Help?”

“Yes, help!” he bellowed. “Get a grip on yourself, girl. Remember what I told you about the planet I came from? It was different from yours, remember? The old people were just like anybody else.” She giggled in embarrassment. “They were!” he yelled. “And they are here, too. Old people, young people, doesn’t matter. On my planet, the richest people were—well, never mind. On this planet, women are the bosses. Get it? Women are like elders. So you’ll have to take over, Helena.”

She was looking at him with a puzzled frown. She objected, “But if women are——”

“They are. Never mind about that part of it now; just remember that for the purposes of getting along here, you’re going to be my boss. You tell me what to do. You talk to everybody. And what you have to say to them is this: You must get to Novj Grad immediately, and talk to a high-ranking member of the Cavallo Machine-Tool Company. Clear? Once we get there, I’ll take over; everything will be under control then.” He added prayerfully, “I hope.”

Helena blinked at him. “I’m going to be your boss?” she asked.

“That’s right.”

“Like an elder bosses a junior? And it’s legal?”

Ross started to repeat, “That’s right,” impatiently again. But there was a peculiar look in Helena’s round eyes. “Helena!” he said warningly.

She was all concern. “Why, what is it, Ross?” she asked solicitously. “You look upset. Just leave everything to me, dear.”

They got started on the way to Novj Grad—not in their ship (the woman had said there was no spaceport in Novj Grad), and not alone, so that Ross could not confirm his unhappy opinion of Helena’s inner thoughts. But at least they were on their way to Novj Grad in the Azorian equivalent of a chartered aircraft, with Helena chatting happily with the female pilot, and Ross sitting uncomfortably on a narrow, upholstered strip behind.

Everything he saw in Azor confirmed his first impressions. The planet was busy and prosperous. Nobody seemed to be doing anything very productive, he thought, but somehow everything seemed to get done. Automatic machinery, he guessed; if women were to have any chance of gaining the upper hand on a planet, most of the hard physical work would have to be fairly well mechanized anyhow. And particularly on this planet. They had been flying for six hours, at a speed he guessed to be not much below that of sound, and fully half of the territory they passed over was bare, black rock.

The ship began losing altitude, and the pilot, who had been curled up in a relaxed position, totally ignoring the aircraft, glanced at her instrument panel. “Coming in for a landing,” she warned. “Don’t distract me right now, dear, I’ve got a thousand things to do.”

She didn’t seem to be doing any of them, Ross thought disapprovingly; all she did was watch varicolored lights blink on and off. But no doubt the ship landing, too, was as automatic as the piloting.

Helena turned and leaned back to Ross. “We’re coming in for a landing,” she relayed.

Ross said sourly, “I heard.”

Helena gave him a look of reprimand and forgiveness. “I’m hungry,” she mused.

The pilot turned from her controls. “You can get something at the airport,” she offered eagerly. “I’ll show you.”

Helena looked at Ross. “Would you like something?”

But the pilot frowned. “I don’t believe there’s any place for men,” she said disapprovingly. “Perhaps we can get something sent out for him if you like. Although, really, it’s probably against the rules, you know.”

Ross started to say with great dignity, “Thank you, but that won’t be necessary.” But he didn’t quite get it out. The ship came in for its landing. There was an enormous jolt and a squawk of alarm bells and flashing lights. The ship careened crazily, and stopped.

“Oh, darn,” complained the pilot mildly. “It’s always doing that. Come on, dear, let’s get something to eat. We’ll come back for him later.”

And Ross was left alone to stare apprehensively at the unceasingly flashing lights and to listen to the strident alarms for three-quarters of an hour.

His luck was in, though. The ship didn’t explode. And eventually a pallid young man in a greasy apron appeared with a tray of sandwiches and a vacuum jug.

“Up here, boy,” Ross called.

He gaped through the port. “You mean come in?”

“Sure. It’s all right.”

The young man put down the tray. Something in the way he looked at it prompted Ross to invite him: “Have some with me? More here than I can handle.”

“Thanks; I believe I will. I, uh, was supposed to take my break after I brought you this stuff.” He poured steaming brew into the cup that covered the jug, politely pushed it to Ross and swigged from the jug himself. “You’re with the starship?” he asked, around a mouthful of sandwich.

“Yes. I—the captain, that is—wants to contact an outfit called Cavallo Machine-Tool. You know where they are?”

“Sure. Biggest firm on the south side. Fifteen Street; you can’t miss them. The captain—is she the lady who was with Pilot Breuer?”

“Yes.”

The youngster’s eyes widened. “You mean you were in space—alone—with a lady?”

Ross nodded and chewed.

“And she didn’t—uh—there wasn’t—well—any problem?”

“No,” said Ross. “You have much trouble with that kind of thing?”

The boy winced. “If I’ve asked once I’ve asked a hundred times for a transfer. Oh, those jet pilots! I used to work in a roadside truck stop. I know truckers are supposed to be rough and tough; maybe they are. But you can’t tell me that deep down a trucker isn’t a lady. When you tell them no, that’s that. But a pilot—it just eggs them on. Azor City today, Novj Grad tomorrow—what do they care?”

Ross was fascinated and baffled. It seemed to him that they should care and care plenty. Back where he came from, it was the woman who paid and he couldn’t imagine any cultural setup which could alter that biological fact. He asked cautiously: “Have you ever been—in trouble?”

The boy stiffened and looked disapproving. Then he said with a sigh: “I might as well tell you. It’s all over the station anyway; they call me ‘Bernie the Pullover.’ Yes. Twice. Pilots both times. I can’t seem to say no——” He took another long pull from the jug and a savage bite from a second sandwich.

“I’m sure,” Ross said numbly, “it wasn’t your fault.”

“Try telling that to the judge,” Bernie the Pullover said bitterly. “The pilot speaks her piece, the medic puts the blood group tests in evidence, the doctor and crèche director depose that the child was born and is still living. Then the judge says, without even looking up, ‘Paternity judgment to the plaintiff, defendant ordered to pay one thousand credits annual support, let this be a warning to you, young man, next case.’ I shouldn’t have joined you and eaten your sandwiches, but the fact is I was hungry. I had to sell my meal voucher yesterday to meet my payment. Miss three payments and——” He jerked his thumb heavenward.

Ross thought and realized that the thumb must indicate the orbiting prison hulk “Minerva.” It was the man who paid here.

He demanded: “How did all this happen?”