“They elected a leader?”

“Yeah, they could all agree that they needed to. But they weren’t so unanimous about who. There were four main candidates, and they wrangled and haggled, but nobody could agree on anything—I mean, not even enough to call for a vote.”

“How long did they keep that up?”

“Long enough for it to get pretty tense, and the boys on the battlements were getting kind of edgy, eyeing each other and wondering if we were going to be ordered to start burning each other pretty soon.”

“You wouldn’t really have done it!”

“I dunno. That military conditioning runs pretty deep. You don’t know what you’ll do when you hear your lieutenant call, ‘Fire!’ ”

Sam shuddered. “What are you—animals?”

“I understand the philosophers are still debating that one. My favorite is, ‘Man is the animal who laughs.’ Fortunately, Lieutenant Mandring thought the same way.”

“Who’s Lieutenant Mandring?”

“The one with the sense of humor. He nominated General Shacklar.”

Sam whirled, the picture of fury. Then she developed a sudden faraway look. “You know …”

Dar pointed a finger at her. “That’s just about the way all the other lieutenants reacted. They started to yell—then they realized he meant it for a joke. After they’d finished rolling around on the ground and had it throttled down to a chuckle, they started eyeing each other, and it got awfully quiet.”

“But Shacklar didn’t even try to talk them into it!”

“He didn’t have to; he’d given them a taste of do-it-yourself government. So they were ready to consider a change of diet—but nobody wanted to be the first one to say it. So Lieutenant Griffin had to take it—he’s the one with the talent for saving other people’s faces. Too bad he can’t do anything about his own…”

“What happened!”

“Oh! Yes … well, all he said was, ‘Why don’t we ask him what he thinks?’ And after they got done laughing again, Lieutenant Able said, ‘It’d be good for a laugh.’ And Lieutenant Walker said, ‘Sure. I mean, we don’t have to do what he says, you know.’ Well, they could all agree on that, of course, so they put Lieutenant Walker up to it, he having spoken last, and he called the General on his wrist com, explained the situation, and asked what he’d do in their place. He said he was willing to serve, but really thought they ought to elect one of their own number.”

Sam smiled. “How nice of him! What’d they do back at Square One?”

“They asked the comedian for a suggestion. He said they ought to call out each lieutenant’s name and have everybody who had confidence in him raise a hand.”

“Who won?”

“Everybody; they all pulled, ‘No confidence.’ So Lieutenant Mandring called for a vote on General Shacklar.”

“How long was the pause?”

“Long enough for everybody to realize they were getting hungry. But after a while they started raising hands, and three hundred sixty out of four hundred went up.”

“This, for the man who had to hide in a fortress? What changed their minds?”

“The chaos, mostly—especially since he’d just done a good job directing them in battle. Soldiers value that kind of thing. So they called Shacklar and told him he was elected.”

“I take it he was glad to hear it.”

“Hard to say; he just heaved a sigh and asked them to form a parliament before they went to lunch and to start thinking about a constitution while they ate.”

“Constitution! In a prison?”

“Why not? I mean, they’d just elected him, hadn’t they?”

Sam developed a faraway look again. “I suppose…”

“So did they. That was the turning point, you see—when we started thinking of ourselves as a colony, not a prison. When we wrote the constitution, we didn’t call Shacklar ‘warden’—we named him ‘governor.’ ”

“Generous of you,” Sam smirked, “considering Terra had done it already.”

“Yeah, but we hadn’t. And once he had the consent of the populace, he could govern without guards.”

“That … makes … a weird kind of sense.”

“Doesn’t it? Only when you can make a whole planet into a prison, of course—and there’s no way out. But that’s the way it is here. So he could send the guards home, and let us fight it out for ourselves.”

“Which made you realize he was better than the natural product.”

“It did have that advantage. And, once his position was consolidated, he could start proposing reforms to the Council.”

“Council?”

“The legislative body. The Wolmen are agitating for representation, now. But that’s okay—we traders are angling for a rep at their moots. Anyway, Shacklar talked the Council into instituting pay.”

“Oh, that certainly must have taken a lot of convincing!”

“It did, as it happens; a fair number of them were Communists. But pay it was—in scrip; worthless off-planet, I’m sure, but it buys a lot here—a BTU for a neat bunk, two BTUs for a clean yard, and so forth.”

“Great! Where could they spend it?”

“Oh, the General talked Cholly into coming in and setting up shop, and a few of the con … uh, colonists, decided he had a good thing going, and …”

“Pretty soon, the place was lousy with capitalists.”

“Just the bare necessities—a general store, a fix-it shop, and three taverns.”

“That ‘general store’ looks more like a shopping complex.”

“Just a matter of scale. Anyway, that created a driving hunger for BTUs and that meant soldiers started spiffing up, and …”

“Higher morale, all over,” Sam muttered. “Because they can improve their lot.”

“Right. Then Cholly started paying top dollar for pipe-leaf traders, and …”

“A drug baron!”

“Suppose you could call him that. But it turned out there was a market for it—the drug’s very low-bulk after it’s processed, you see; and it doesn’t provide euphoria or kill pain, but it does retard the aging process. So Universal Pharmaceuticals was interested, and Interstellar Geriatrics, and …”

“I get the picture. Top money.”

“But it costs a lot, too—especially at first, when it was a little on the hazardous side. But Cholly was bringing in trade goods that made glass beads just sharp-cornered gravel, so once we managed to get trade started, it mushroomed.”

“And all of a sudden, the Wolmen weren’t quite so hostile any more.” Sam nodded.

“Aw, you peeked.” Dar scuffed at the turf with his boot-toe. “And from there, of course, it was just a little fast talking to get them to agree to the chalk-fights.”

“So trade is growing, and morale is growing, and you’re taking the first steps toward a unified society, and everybody feels as though they’ve got some opportunity, and …” Sam broke off, shaking her head, dazzled. “I can’t believe it! The central planets are mired in malaise and self-pity, and out here in the marches, you’ve managed to build a growing, maybe even hopeful, society! Back on Terra, everybody’s living in walking despair because nobody feels they can make things better.”

“What?” Dar was shocked. “But they’ve got everything! They’ve …”

“Got nothing,” Sam sneered. “On Terra, you’ll die doing the job your father did, and everybody knows it. You’ve got your rooms, your servos, and your rations. And that’s it.”

“But even beggars have whole houses—with furniture that makes anything here look like firewood! And they don’t have to do a lick of housework, with all those servos—their free time’s all free!”

“Free to do what—rot?”

“To do anything they want! I mean, even a rube like me has heard what’s included in those rations.”

Sam shrugged. “Sure, you can get drunk or stoned every night, and you can go out to a party or go to a show …”

Dar gave a whimpering sigh.

“… but actually do something? No chance! Unless you’re born into government—and even they can’t figure out anything worth doing.”

“But …” Dar flailed at the sky. “But there’s a thousand worlds out there to conquer!”