The routine was not completely without event. After our first night we emerged to discover the words Spic Go Home crudely lettered on our door. We made no complaint but simply got out cloths and detergent and went to work scrubbing the door clean. A neighbor lady, a retired Saxon, heard the activity, came out, perceived the situation, and spoke up. “That's vandalism! I'll complain to the management!”
“No need, Señora,” Spirit said, thus deliberately emphasizing our Hispanic nature. “It is a small thing.”
“So is burning crosses,” the woman snapped. “I want you to know that this is a decent neighborhood; we don't condone such behavior here. I shall see that it doesn't happen again.”
We introduced ourselves. She was Mrs. Croft, a widow, and after she had helped us clean up the door she invited us in for tea. In our presence she called the management and described without emphasis what had occurred.
“I will apologize to them immediately,” the manager said. “That man is Captain Hubris, the hero of the Belt; we are honored to have him here, and I am shocked that he should be treated this way here at Pineleaf!”
Mrs. Croft terminated the call and turned to me. “You did not tell me you were a hero,” she reproved me gently.
“I am a civilian now,” I said. “Does it make a difference?”
She laughed. “Of course not.” Then she reconsidered. “Not to me, at any rate; I am not concerned with military matters. But perhaps the manager...”
We nodded. There were different types of prejudice, negative and positive. The manager might not think much of Hispanics, but he evidently did appreciate war heroes. We had not told him about my Belt connection; he must have recognized me from the news holos. It seemed that the positive more than balanced the negative, in this case. A poor, unfamous Hispanic might have triggered a different response.
This, too, was part of the reality of civilian life.
That was about all there was to the episode, and there was no repetition. But I think it correctly signaled the situation. Prejudice, racism, and unprovoked hate do exist in our society, though normally they are masked; they do their mischief in darkness. But they are more than compensated by the elements of openness, tolerance, and fairness that manifest in light. The forces of bigotry, however directed, are an evil that must be constantly curbed, but they can never be completely eradicated. I suspect they are part of the makeup of the species of man. There must be some survival potential in them, as there evidently is in the similar percentage of individuals who are left-handed, homosexual, or who have rare blood types.
Nature does not encourage deviance capriciously; she always has reason, though we may not comprehend it, and we try to interfere at our peril. Actually it is dangerous to trust strangers too readily, and bigotry may be the logical extension of that natural caution, just as war is the extreme example of competitive spirit.
Once settled in, we proceeded to our next task: the location of Megan. One might suppose that my sister would have little interest in helping me pursue a woman, but Spirit has always been my left hand.
We could justify this quest in practical terms: Megan was perhaps the most knowledgeable person, politically, in the society of Jupiter who was not already committed to some other program. If I wished to enter politics with some chance of success, here was the advice that would be most useful. So I had been assured by an outfit in a position to know. It was indeed my intent to pursue a political career.
The fact that Megan was the one woman remaining in the Solar System whom I could love was secondary—or so I told myself. After all, I had known of Megan's existence for fifteen years and only now was following it up. But I can't honestly assess my own emotions; my talent is assessing the natures of others, not myself. This is part of the reason I need Spirit with me. She backstops me, she understands me. She is my hidden strength in ways that others need not understand. Without Spirit I am so far diminished as to be hardly worthwhile, and perhaps it is best that others not appreciate that. The symbolism in our names is to an extent valid: I have the aspirations, the hope, while she has the courage, the spirit.
I put in a call to a code I had memorized. The letter Q appeared on the screen. “This is Hope Hubris,” I said.
I should say something about the entity I called. The Q stands for QYV, pronounced “Kife,” a secret organization I encountered first through Helse. She was a courier; that is, a person who carried something for QYV. She had those letters tattooed on her body at an intimate site. I lost Helse; technically I killed her. Speculation on that is futile; I did what I did and cannot now undo it, however much I wish I could.
The point is, all I was able to retain of her was the key she carried for Kife, and finally I traded that key for a way out of a serious situation in the Navy. Part of that deal was Megan.
In a moment the screen lighted with a silent schematic of what I recognized as our own Pineleaf apartment complex, with one apartment briefly highlighted. Then it faded out, and the connection broke.
I looked at Spirit. “Here?”
“Are you surprised?”
“Yes. I thought they'd just arrange to print out the data—”
“She's a woman, Hope.”
I laughed. “She's interested in my career, not my body!”
“So am I.”
That gave me pause. Spirit was my closest relative, companion, and friend. Had she not been my sister I might have married her. There was nothing about each other that we did not know—as well as we cared to. She understood me perhaps better than I understood myself, in part because she was able to view me not only from the affinity of blood and culture and experience, but also from the vantage of the opposite sex. Even as children, when I had been the protector of our older sister Faith, Spirit had been my protector. There was little I would not do for her—and nothing she would not do for me. She never opposed me, but she was still my guardian, in more than the physical sense. If she likened the woman of QYV, Reba, to herself, she surely had reason.
It is true that I have a way with women. I believe it derives in part from my talent, for women do crave understanding, and in part from my own great need and hunger for them. There is not a woman I wouldn't take were she willing and the circumstances right. But, of course, circumstances are seldom right; the constraints of society are pervasive and powerful. Yet I had never thought of Reba in that way before. She was, after all, about fifty years old, no impulsive young thing.
“But it is to locate Megan that I need Kife,” I said.
“You haven't located her yet.”
Therefore I was not yet committed. I saw the point. I had shared intimacies with a woman a week in the Navy; it wasn't as if I had any diffidence about sex. Still, I seemed to be developing it. “I don't suppose you'd care to accompany me?”
Spirit just looked at me: answer enough. She supported me ultimately, which meant she had to absent herself from certain key occasions. Once I located Megan, I would not be dealing with any other woman on any except a professional basis. In that sense, it had to be now—for what Reba might have in mind.
I sighed inside. “Well, I have something to give her, anyway.” I searched out the manuscript I had written, which detailed my military experience. I knew that Reba would take the best possible care of it.
I walked to the indicated apartment and touched my forefinger to the recognition panel. It opened and I stepped inside.
A completely unfamiliar woman met me inside. She was about my own age, dark-skinned, heavyset in a muscular way, and with flaming red, curly hair. That would be chemically colored, of course; women had been dissatisfied with their natural coloration from the nascence of the species.
I looked again and realized it was Reba. She had changed enormously in the months since I had seen her last, but now the underlying traits were manifesting. “A disguise,” I said. “You folk travel anonymously.”
“We do,” she agreed as we sat on her couch. “I am trusting your discretion.”
“The last time I saw you, you were a portly fifty with iron-gray hair. I mistook your age completely.”
“Thank you.”
She was certainly excellent at appearances. Despite my ability to read people, I could not now judge her true age. It was more than a matter of dress and makeup; her entire bearing had changed. She was indeed a professional. “You knew I was about to contact you, and you knew where I would be when I did.”
“Your progress is my business.”
“I had supposed your interest in me would decline, once you got what you wanted.”
“We wanted an object. By the time we got it we had become interested in the bearer.”
“In what way?”
“You are immune from addiction. You have a talent for dealing with people. You are extraordinarily motivated and intelligent. We are interested in such folk.”
“You have not answered,” I said.
She smiled. “You are beautiful,” she said seriously, acknowledging my reading of her. “You are a prospect for power. You may have assumed that your talent is merely in comprehending the people you meet, but it is more than that. You also project, causing people to react to you more actively and positively than is normal. Men respect you and women love you. That is why you are potentially our next president.”
“President!” I exclaimed, startled.
“With your talent, your sister's nerve, and proper guidance, you have a real chance—if you are lucky.”
“Who provides the guidance? Kife?”
“No. We merely watch. We are not permitted to interfere with the domestic situation.”
“Then what are you doing here?”
She smiled. “As I said, I trust your discretion.”
“You have it.”
“We are active primarily off-planet, and primarily as an intelligence network. But we do have to protect our agents and our secrets, and there are risks on-planet, too.”
“That is, you have broadened your scope,” I said. “And your employer does not necessarily know to what extent.”
She shrugged, not denying it. “Administrations change and lose track of prior directives. Organizations have an instinct for self-preservation, much as living creatures do. Abrupt changes in policy can interfere with the continuity of our own efforts—such as that to abolish the drug trade.”
“I have observed how you go about that,” I said dryly.
She smiled more warmly, evidently enjoying this minor fencing. “Changes in our personnel become problematic, too. I was not the one who tried to addict you, and I never approved of that effort.”
She was telling the truth. “Still, you can be as unscrupulous as the next when you approve an effort.”
“Yes. But I believe your purposes now coincide with mine.”
“Let's see if I have this straight”. You think I might get to be president—and do you some good in that office?"
“If you feel you owe us some favors,” she agreed.
“So we are bargaining. You will help get me there if I will help you when I get there.”
“This would, of course, be an unenforceable agreement.”
But we both knew it would be honored. “Yet you can't do anything actively, on-planet.”
“Except provide key information—when requested. Exposure of our role would destroy it.”
I shook my head, the enormity of it sinking in. “I had thought to go into politics, perhaps achieving a position of power. But president ?”
“It will take time, of course,” she said. “And it is by no means certain. But that should be your objective.”
“And you personally—what is your interest?”
“I am the agent on your case. My power within our organization will be affected by yours. As president you could, for example, designate me to be head of Kife.”
“Or I could fire you.”
“Or abolish the organization,” she agreed. “We take a calculated risk.”
Still, she was reaching for the prize. She could get fired for exceeding her authority, or she could reach the top of her ladder. Through me. She had the nerve to carry it through.
“Then your interest in me is commercial rather than personal,” I said.
She spread her hands. “Naturally I cannot deceive you in this, Hope Hubris. I am affected by you in the normal manner. But your sister is not the only woman with discipline.”
Indeed not! Reba's will was steel, though she normally avoided showing it. “So you did not bring me here for any personal dalliance.”
She grimaced, looking down at herself. “Alas, no. You can do better than this.”
I was intrigued. “Can I? What woman is more intelligent or competent than you?” For, despite her matter-of-fact attitude, the power of her mind fairly radiated, and that had its own appeal. I had known beautiful women in the past; in fact, I still missed my last Navy bride, Roulette, the most stunning creature of the spaceways, but none approached Reba in intellect.
“Understand this, Hubris,” she said. “I was never an attractive female, not even in the bloom of youth. I learned to survive by using my mind and will and by extirpating illusions. I do not deceive myself that you could not have your way with me at this moment or that it would not be the high point of my emotional life—or that you have any such inclination. I admit the temptation to discover whether such inclination could be roused...” She paused and made a motion with her torso that abruptly accentuated the salient aspects of her body from breast to thigh. “But I am satisfied to know you vicariously and to share part of your power when it comes. Think of me as a business associate.”
She was correct; she had stripped herself of illusions. But that motion, slight as it had been, had stirred an immediate response in me. She could certainly rouse the male inclination when she chose. “Do I really have reason to want to be president?” I asked, returning to business.
“Yes. It is the only way you will have power to achieve your design to eliminate piracy of all types from the System.”
She was surely right. I knew that pirates did not merely swagger about aboard spaceships; they could wear business suits on Jupiter, too. “But will Jupiter accept a Hispanic in that office?”
“That will be your hurdle,” she agreed. "Historically, no naturalized citizen could assume that office, even the purest Saxon, but today it is open to any citizen—in theory. In practice no woman or obvious minority member has done it. You will encounter racist opposition from the outset, both overt and covert.