THE GREEN HILLS OF EARTH

«Well, now, Sam – I didn't do any of those things to cause you trouble. I had counted you out of my calculations. I was on my own. I'm sorry about the money.»

«Forget it. Money isn't an item with me. I'm filthy with the stuff. You know that. It comes from exercising care in the choice of parents. I was just pulling your leg and it came off in my hand.»

«Okay. Sorry.» Wingate's grin was a little forced. Nobody likes charity. «But tell me what happened. I'm still in the dark.»

«Right.» Jones had been as much surprised and distressed at being separated from Wingate on grounding as Wingate had been. But there had been nothing for him to do about it until he received assistance from Earth. He had spent long weeks as a metal worker at South Pole, waiting and wondering why his sister did not answer his call for help. He had written letters to her to supplement his first radiogram, that being the only type of communication he could afford, but the days crept past with no answer.

When a message did arrive from her the mystery was cleared up. She had not received his radio to Earth promptly, because she too, was aboard the Evening Star – in the first class cabin, traveling, as was her custom, in a stateroom listed under her maid's name. «It was the family habit of avoiding publicity that stymied us,» Jones explained. «If I hadn't sent the radio to her rather than to the family lawyers, or if she had been known by name to the purser, we would have gotten together the first day.»

The message had not been relayed to her on Venus because the bright planet had by that time crawled to superior opposition on the far side of the sun from the Earth. For a matter of sixty earth days there was no communication, Earth to Venus. The message had rested, recorded but still scrambled, in the hands of the family firm, until she could be reached.

When she received it, she started a small tornado. Jones had been released, the liens against his contract paid, and ample credit posted to his name on Venus, in less than twenty-four hours. «So that was that,» concluded Jones, «except that I've got to explain to big sister when I get home how I got into this mess. She'll burn my ears.»

Jones had chartered a rocket for North Pole and had gotten on Wingate's trail at once. «If you had held on one more day, I would have picked you up. We retrieved your ex-patron about a mile from his gates.»

«So the old villain made it. I'm glad of that.»

«And a good job, too. If he hadn't I might never have been able to square you. He was pretty well done in, and his heart was kicking up plenty. Do you know that abandonment is a capital offense on this planet – with a mandatory death sentence if the victim dies?»

Wingate nodded. «Yeah, I know. Not that I ever heard of a patron being gassed for it, if the corpse was a client. But that's beside the point. Go ahead.»

«Well, he was plenty sore. I don't blame him, though I don't blame you, either. Nobody wants to be sold South, and I gather that was what you expected. Well, I paid him for his crock, and I paid him for your contract – take a look at me, I'm your new owner! – and I paid for the contracts of your two friends as well. Still he wasn't satisfied. I finally had to throw in a first-class passage for his daughter back to Earth, and promise to find her a job. She's a big dumb ox, but I guess the family can stand another retainer. Anyhow, old son, you're a free man. The only remaining question is whether or not the Governor will let us leave here. It seems it's not done.»

«No, that's a point. Which reminds me – how did you locate the place?»

«A spot of detective work too long to go into now. That's what took me so long. Slaves don't like to talk. Anyhow, we've a date to talk to the Governor tomorrow.»

Wingate took a long time to get to sleep. After his first burst of jubilation he began to wonder. Did he want to go back? To return to the law, to citing technicalities in the interest of whichever side employed him, to meaningless social engagements, to the empty, sterile, bunkum-fed life of the fat and prosperous class he had moved among and served – did he want that, he, who had fought and worked with men? It seemed to him that his anachronistic little «invention» in radio had been of more worth than all he had ever done on Earth.

Then he recalled his book.

Perhaps he could get it published. Perhaps he could expose this disgraceful, inhuman system which sold men into legal slavery. He was really wide awake now. There was a thing to do! That was his job – to go back to Earth and plead the cause of the colonists. Maybe there was destiny that shapes men's lives after all. He was just the man to do it, the right social background, the proper training. He could make himself heard.

He fell asleep, and dreamt of cool, dry breezes, of clear blue sky. Of moonlight …