The Colonists Part 6

"But why should they want to change a perfectly capable administrator,"

said Boggs in an injured tone, "and put in a very capable engineer and farm manager--who has no qualifications in administrative matters?"

"That too is a question to be answered on election day."

Boggs shifted in his chair, dropping the deliberately maintained smile from his face. "There have been some stories circulating about the colony recently," he said. "It is possible that you have heard them and believe them."

"Possibly," said Jorden.

"I wouldn't. I wouldn't believe them if I were you. I wouldn't even listen to them because it might lead to dangerous and erroneous conclusions, which would cause you to convict in your mind an honest man."

"That would be my error then, wouldn't it?" said Jorden.

The Governor nodded. "A grave one as far as it concerns the welfare of yourself and your family, Jorden."

Jorden's face hardened. "Threats of that kind aren't appropriate to your position, Governor."

"Perhaps you are not aware of my exact position."

"I think I am! And I intend to do everything in my power to change it.

You are a small time chiseler who saw a good chance to set yourself up for life in a cushy situation where five hundred other people would obey your slightest whim. That's an old fashioned situation, Boggs, and you can't set it up here even if you are willing to resort to sabotage and murder."

Boggs eyes narrowed and he looked at Jorden for a long time. "I am afraid, then," he said, "that there is nothing I can do except put a stop to your repeating these lying stories about me."

The Governor's eyes never moved, but Jorden shifted in sudden, wild indecision. Almost simultaneously there were two shots exploding in the narrow cabin, and then a third. Jorden and Boggs leaped out of their chairs.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

From the kitchen doorway came the steel-taut voice of Bonnie. "Don't move any further, Mr. Boggs. Put your hands in the air. Get his gun, Mark--in the pocket on this side."

For a moment Jorden hesitated, his eyes held by the sight of Boggs' two gunmen on the floor, blood spreading in tiny rivulets. He took the pistol from the Governor's pocket and held it in readiness.

"I ought to kill you now, Boggs," he said. "Fortunately, or unfortunately, we have to set a precedent in such matters if the colony is to survive. We have to go through the formality of a trial for sabotaging the power plant and murdering those killed there. Actually, it would be a good idea if you just took off over the hills and went as far as you could before the jungle got you. It would save us all a great deal of trouble."

Hope surged in Boggs' eyes as he recognized that Jorden was incapable of shooting him down. Then bitterness mingled with that hope. "You won't get away with this, Jorden. We'll see what the people have to say about your wife shooting my men down while my back is turned."

"_Their_ backs weren't turned," said Jorden. "Get them out of here now.

If you want to save explanations as to why you came here tonight you might find a convenient spot and bury them--before you take out over the hills yourself."

Watching until they could no longer see the lights of Boggs' car, they closed the door. Bonnie collapsed with a moan, cringing in Jorden's arms.

"Now they'll kill us all," she said in a lifeless voice. "We haven't got a chance. For this we followed your great dream of colonizing an outpost of the Universe!"

That night Roddy was sick. Six days later he was dead. Before they decided to go through with this section of the program there were long and heated conferences between Bonnie and Ashby and the staff working at the test pit. Bonnie insisted the program should be dropped here. They already knew that Jorden was what they were searching for. They had only to a.n.a.lyze the factors that had brought him to the test and they would have what they needed to identify as many colonists as the project required. He didn't need to be broken down any further.

Ashby knew this was not true. Jorden's basic purpose as a colonist had not yet been brought into sight. Ashby recognized that his goal was almost certainly the perpetuation of the colony--and he was the first one who had maintained such a goal this far--but they had to know the drive that existed behind the goal. If it should develop a basis wholly in flight it would still crack before completion of the program.

But Ashby continued to be hesitant on Bonnie's account. Roddy's illness and death meant a continuous tour in the test pit for the full six days.

And this was cut from the scheduled eight it normally occupied. Why it was impossible for Bonnie to reduce her own personal tension on the project, Ashby didn't know, but she had become increasingly susceptible as time went on.

Word of Jorden's persistence was spreading among the staff personnel of other sections of the lab. A subdued excitement was stirring among them.

In most cases so far examined, the colonist had by now either knuckled under to Boggs or engaged in a futile personal duel with him. If they went further, they almost invariably collapsed under the pressure of Bonnie's blame and began cursing Serrengia as well as the Earth from which they fled.

Ashby ordered resumption of the program. It was an agony for him, too, watching Bonnie during the long hours of Roddy's illness. It seemed every bit as much a test of her strength and endurance as it was of Mark Jorden's. With the televiewer Ashby brought an image of her face up close, studying her from every angle during the long nights when she and Mark Jorden exchanged vigil over Roddy. He scanned her face by the firelight of the rough cabin.

After three days, Jorden was running close to exhaustion, but in spite of the strain Bonnie seemed capable of remaining there forever. Her eyes watched Jorden's face, taking in his every movement and expression.

And after three days of watching Bonnie's face in close-up, Ashby suddenly murmured aloud to himself in disbelief and astonishment.

Dr. Miller, who was Tibbets in the program, came up to his side. "What is it, Ashby? Has something gone wrong?"

Ashby shook his head slowly in wonder and pointed to the image in the viewer. "Look at her," he said. "Can't you see what has happened to Bonnie? We should have caught it long ago. No wonder this job is tearing her apart--no wonder she doesn't want it to end the way it must--or end at all, for that matter!"

"I still don't see what you are talking about," said Miller in exasperation. "I don't see that anything has happened to her. She looks like the same old Bonnie to me."

"Does she?" said Ashby. "Watch her when she looks at Jorden. Can't you see she has fallen in love with him?"

There was probably a whole cla.s.s of people like Roddy, Jorden thought.

People incapable of surviving beyond the world on which they were born.

Since the day of his coming Roddy had fought an unceasing battle with this hated, alien world of Serrengia. He awoke each morning to renew the unequal contest before he was even out of bed--and knowing fully that he was beaten before he started.

Jorden had tried every way he knew to instill into his son some of his own love for this new world. It was a good world and the men who grew up on it in the years to come would love it with all their hearts. But Roddy could not give up his reaching back, his longing for Earth. He shrank before the problem of their doubtful food supply. He caught s.n.a.t.c.hes of adult worries and nourished them with a dark agony that made it appear to Jorden sometimes as if the boy were walking in a nightmare.

It had been cruel and brutal to bring him. But there was no use blaming himself for that. If only Bonnie would stop blaming him! He couldn't have known ahead of time that Roddy was one of those who could not be--transplanted. Fervently, he prayed for the boy's life now and vowed that when the ships came again he would be free to go home.

And always Bonnie's eyes were upon him. Sitting in the firelight of the cabin, he could feel her staring at him, accusing him, hating him for bringing them to Serrengia.

Once he looked up and caught her glance. "Don't hate me so much, Bonnie!" he said. "You're driving Roddy down. I can feel it. Reach out to him with your love and don't let him go."

But Roddy said later that same evening, "Maybe I'll go back to Earth now, Daddy. Do you think that's where little boys go when they die?"

He wanted to return so badly that he was willing to die to achieve it, Jorden thought. That's what Dr. Babbit said: "Roddy doesn't even want to live, Jorden. As incredible as it seems, he's literally dying of homesickness. I'm afraid there's not a thing I can do for him. I'm sorry, but it's up to you. You and Bonnie are the only ones who can give him a desire to remain, if anyone can."

Roddy's hate for Serrengia was greater than any desire they could induce in him to live. With ease, he conquered all the miracle drugs Dr. Babbit lavished from the colony's restricted store. He died on the sixth night after Boggs' visit.

The funeral was held in the little community church built when the colonists first laid out Maintown. Mark and Bonnie Jorden were almost oblivious to the words spoken over the body of Roddy by the Reverend Wagner, who had come as the colonists' spiritual adviser.

Bonnie's hands were folded on her lap, and she kept her eyes down throughout the service. She was aware of the agony within Mark Jorden.

It was a real agony, and its strength almost frightened her, for she had never before seen such a response in any man who had gone through the test this far. They were men concerned only with themselves, incapable of the love that Jorden could feel for a son.

He reached out and took one of her hands in his own. She could feel the emotion within him, the tightening and trembling of his big, hard-muscled arm.

Ashby was watching. Over the private communication system that linked them he murmured, "Cry, Bonnie! Make it real. Make him hate himself and everything he's done since he decided to become a colonist--if you can!