The Cosmic Computer H. Beam Piper (reader novel txt) đ
- Author: H. Beam Piper
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Conn flew to Litchfield, and found that the public works project had come to a stop at noon of the day when Force Command was entered, and that nothing had been done on it since. The cold vitrifier was still standing in the middle of the Mall, and topside Litchfield was littered in a dozen places with forsaken equipment and half-completed paving. There was no one in Kurt Fawziâs office in the Airlines Building, and the employment office was jammed with migratory workers vainly seeking jobs.
He hunted up Morgan Gatworth, the lawyer.
âCanât some of you get things started again?â he wanted to know. âThis place is worse than it was before they started cleaning up.â
âYes, I know.â Gatworth walked to an open window and looked down on the littered Mall. âBut everybody just dropped everything as soon as you opened Force Command. Kurt Fawziâs not been back here since.â
âWell, youâre here. Lester Dawes and Lorenzo Menardes are here. Why donât you just take over. Kurt Fawzi couldnât care less what you do; heâs forgotten he is mayor of Litchfield. Heâs forgotten there is a Litchfield.â
âWell, I donât like to just move into the mayorâs office and take overâ ââ âŠâ
From somewhere below, a submachine gun hammered. There were yells, pistol shots, and the submachine gun hammered again, a couple of short bursts.
âSome of the farm-tramps who canât get jobs, trying to steal something to eat, I suppose,â Conn commented. Gatworth was frowning thoughtfully. Heâd only need one more, very slight, push. âWhy donât you talk to Wade Lucas. Heâs got brains, and heâs honestâ ânobody but an honest man would have made himself as unpopular as Lucas has. If you pretend to be disillusioned with this Merlin business it might help convince him.â
âHe was blaming you and your father for whatâs been going on here in the last two weeks. Yes. Heâd help get things straightened out.â
At home, he found his mother simply dazed. She was happy to see him, and solicitous about his and his fatherâs health. It seemed at times, though, as if he were somebody she had never met before. Events had gotten so far beyond her that she wasnât even trying to catch up.
Flora, returning from school, stopped short when she saw him.
âWell! I hope you like what youâve done!â she greeted him.
âFor a start, yes.â
âFor a start! You know what youâve done?â
âYes. I donât know what you think Iâve done, though. Tell me.â
âYouâve turned everything into a madhouse; youâve sent this whole world Merlin-crazy. Look at the stock marketâ ââ âŠâ
âYou look at it. All I can see is a pack of lunatics playing Russian roulette with five chambers loaded out of six. Some of this so-called stock thatâs being peddled around isnât worth five millisols a shareâ âSeekers for Merlin, Ltd., closed today at a hundred and seventy. You notice, there isnât any L. E. & S. being traded. If you donât believe me, talk to Lester Dawes; heâll tell you what we think of this market.â
âWell, itâs your fault!â
âIn part itâs my fault that any of these quarter-wits have any money to play the market with. They wouldnât have money enough to play a five-centisol slot machine if we hadnât gotten a little business started.â
There was just a little truth to that, too. A few woolen socks were coming out from under mattresses, and a few tin cans were being exhumed in cellars, since the new flood of Federation equipment and supplies had gotten on the market. Heâd seen a freshly lettered sign on Len Yeniguchiâs tailor shop: Quarter Price in Federation Currency.
That night, however, he had one of the nightmares he used to have as a childâ âa dream of climbing up onto a huge machine and getting it started, and then clinging, helpless and terrified, unable to stop it as it went faster and faster toward destruction.
Klem Zareffâs patrols were encountering larger outlaw bands, the result of gang mergers. They were fighting with prospecting parties, and prospecting parties were fighting one another. Much of this was making the newscasts. One battle, between two regularly chartered prospecting companies, lasted three days, with an impressive casualty list.
Public demands were growing that the Planetary Government do something about the situation; the government was wondering what to do, or how. There were indignant questions in Parliament. Finally, the government dragged a couple of armed ships off Mothball Rowâ âa combat freighter like the Lester Dawes, and a big assault transportâ âand began trying to get them into commission.
And, of course, the market boom was still on. The newscasts were full of that, too. He had started worrying about if a bust came; now he was worrying about what would happen when it did. Another good reason for wanting to get to Koshchei and getting a hypership built; when the bust came, he and his father would want one, very badly.
In any case, it was time to begin getting an expedition ready for Barathrum Spaceport. Quite a few of the new companies had large contragravity craft, and the nascent Planetary Air Navy was approaching a state of being. He wanted to get out there before anybody else did.
Maybe if they got the hypership built soon enough, it would start a second, sound boom that would cushion the crash of the present speculative market when it came, as come it must.
He talked to Klem Zareff about borrowing a couple of the eighty-foot gunboats. Zareffâs attitude
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