Dunin was cooler when we got back – about one degree cooler – but the temperature dropped sharply when I walked into Brian Tipton's office.  It was evident that he'd been hoping I'd disappear into the wild blue yonder, never to be heard from again.  When he saw me, you could have boxed him up and used him for a freezer unit.

I held up a hand placatingly and said, "It wasn't my idea to turn around so fast---blame Mr. Beauregard.  For my money you could have this damn place all to yourself."

"You're welcome, naturally," he said without sincerity.

"Let's not kid one another," I said, taking a can of the local beer, Voaearad, from his office refrigerator.  "I'm as welcome as acne on a teenager's first date.  What's new?"

My friendly approach annoyed him. He hadn't known when to expect me and he'd been braced for trouble when he did.  "Nothing much.  Everything has been going along smoothly."  His tone still implied that it would cease to do so forthwith.  

It was time to sweet-talk him. "Beaumont is very pleased about the way you're handling stuff here, by the way."

For a moment he looked almost alarmed.  The idea of Beauregard being pleased about anything was strange enough to scare anybody.  Praise from him was so rare as to be nonexistent, and I didn't let Tipton know that it had originated with me.  "When you left you implied that all was far from well," Tipton said. "You never said what the problem was."

"You should know. You started chasing it at the meeting in London."

"I did?"  I saw him running around in his mind for exactly what he'd said at that meeting.

"About the rumors of a new border war," I said helpfully. "Got a glass?  I like to see my beer when I'm drinking it."

"Of course." He found one for me.

"You were right on the mark there.  Of course, we know you can't run the Sutovo job and chase down things like that at the same time.  That was Crumbly's job, and he blew it for all of us.  It fell to someone else to investigate it and Beauregard picked me---and you proved right all down the line."  I didn't give him time to think too deeply about that one.  I leaned forward and said as winningly as I knew how, "I'm sorry if I was a little abrupt just before I left.  That goddamn phony victory parade left me a bit frazzled, and I'm not used to coping with this lot the way you are. If I said anything shitty, I'm sorry for it."

He was disarmed, as he was intended to be. "That's quite all right.  As a matter of fact I've been thinking about what you said---about the need for contingency plans.  I've been working on them."

"Great," I said expansively. "Like to have a look at it sometime.  Right now, I'm too busy for that.  I brought someone out with me that I'd like you to meet.  Andy Hale, the owner of Herolutions Ltd.  Can you join us for dinner?"

"You should have told me.  He'll need accommodation."

"It's fixed, Brian.  He's at the hotel."  I gently let him know that he wasn't the only guy who could pull strings.  "He's going to go up and join the rig in a day or so, but I'll be around town for a bit longer before I pay 'em a visit.  I'd like a full briefing from you. I'm willing to bet you've got a whole lot to tell me."

"Yes, I do.  Some of it's quite hot stuff, Sam."

Tipton was all buddies with me again, and bursting to tell me what I already knew, which is just what I'd been hoping for.  I didn't think I'd told him too many lies.  The truth is only one way of looking at a situation; there are many others.

For the next few days, I nursed Tipton along.  His contingency plan was good, if lacking in imagination, but it improved as we went along. That was his main trouble, a lack of imagination, the inability to ask, 'What if...?' " I am not knocking him particularly; he was good at his job but incapable of expanding the job around him, and without that knack he wasn't going to go much further.  I have a theory about men like Tipton:  They're like Silly Putty.  If you take Silly Putty and hit it with a hammer it will shatter but handle it gently and it can be molded into any shape.  The trouble is that if you then leave it, it will slump and flow back into its original shape.  That's why the manipulators (like me) get 3 times Tipton's pay.

Not that I regarded myself as the Great Svengali, because I've manipulated myself in my time by men like Beauregard, the arch manipulator, so God knows what he's worth before taxes.

Anyway, I gentled Tipton along.  I took him to the Dunin Club (he had never thought about joining) and let him loose among the old sweaty types who were primed to drop him nuggets of information.  Sure enough, he'd come back and told me something else that I already knew.  "Gee, is that right?" I'd say.  "That could put a crimp in your contingency plans, couldn't it?"

He would smile confidently.  "It's nothing I can't fix," he would say, and he'd be right.  He wasn't a bad fixer.  At the end of ten days he was all squared away, convinced that it was all his personal idea, and much clearer in his head about the politics around him.  He also had another conviction---that this chap Drake wasn't so bad, after all, for an American, that is.  I didn't disillusion him.

What slightly disconcerted me was Andy Hale.  He stayed in Dunin for a few days, doing his own homework before flying up to join the rig, and in that short time he also put two and two together, on his own, and remarkably accurately.  What's more, I swear that he saw clear through my little ploy with Tipton and to my chagrin I got the impression that he approved.  I didn't like people to be that bright.  He impressed me more all the time and I found that he got the same sense of enjoyment out of the business that I did, and that's a rare and precious treat.  He was young, smart and energetic, and I wasn't sorry that he was in another company to my own:  he'd make damned tough opposition. And I liked him too much for rivalry.

Getting news back from the Starduster was tough.  Local telephone lines were often out of action and the cab radio had a limited range.  One morning, though, Brian Tipton had managed a long call and had news for me as soon as I came into the office.

"Starduster is on schedule.  I've put it on the map.  Look here.  She's halfway in time but less than halfway in distance.  And she'll slow up more because they've got to climb to the plateau.  Oh, and Andy Hale is flying back here today.  He has to arrange to send a water bowser up there. Seems the local water is all right for the batteries, but not for drinking.  Too contaminated, I guess."

I could have told Andy that before he started and was just a little shocked that he'd only just found out.  I decided that I wanted to go and see the Starduster for myself, in case there was any other little detail he didn't know about.  I was about due to return to London soon, and rather wanted to do one more gig into Mochi-Jojeji before doing so.

I studied the map.  "This town--- Gozkar---just ahead of them. It's got an airstrip.  Any chance of renting a car there?"

He grimaced. "None at all.  It's just a small town, only five thousand people living there.  Even if you could get a car there it'd just be one of those substandard Soviet-era automobiles.  The airstrip is privately owned; it belongs to a planter's collective."

I measured distances.  "Maybe we should have a company car stationed there, and arrange for use of the airstrip.  It'd help if anyone has to get up there in a hurry.  See to it, would you, Brian? As it is I'll have to fly to Tarsaz and then drive nearly 300 miles.  I'll arrange to take one of Herolutions's spare guys up with me to help me with my driving."  I knew better than to set out on my own in that bleak territory.

I saw Hale on his return and we have a long talk.  He was reasonably happy about his company's progress and the logistics seemed to be working out well, but he was as wary as a cat about the whole political situation. As I said, he was remarkably acute in his judgements.  I asked if he was going back to England.  

"Not yet, not now," he told me. "I've got a ton of work to do here, then I'll rejoin Starduster for a spell.  I like to keep a finger on the pulse. Listen, Sam..."

"Yes?" I prompted.

"I want you to put Cliff Giles completely in the picture.  He doesn't know the score and he may not take it from me.  Why should he?  Everybody's new to the new 16 nations that were once the USSR, new to this nation, and he'll brush off my fears, but he'll accept your opinion.  He needs to know more about the political situation."

"I wouldn't call Giles exactly complacent myself," I said.

"That's the problem.  He's got so many troubles of his own that he hasn't got room for mine----unless he can be convinced that they're real.  You're going up there, I'm told. Lay it on the line for him, please."

I agreed, but not without a sense of relief.  It was high time that Giles knew the wider issues involved, and nothing I had heard lately had made me any less uneasy about the possible future of Mochi-Jojeji (AKA the unrecognized Republic of Masasan), Zarmaria, and Shamajar.  The next morning, I picked up Warren Benson, one of the spare Herolutions men, and Artem Sirenko flew us up to Tarsaz.  From there we drove inland along that fantastic road the thrust into the heart of the territory. After Yarhaienesaiel had it built it had been underused and neglected. The thick pine forest had encroached, and the huge trees had thrust their roots under it to burst the concrete.  Possibly due to the last war, it was currently undergoing a fair amount of punishment, eroding from above to meet the erosion from below.  Not that the traffic was heavy in the sense of being dense, but some damn big loads had come through here.  Our unmanned capsule was just the biggest thus far.

The traffic varied from bullock carts with nerve-wracking squeaking wheels plodding stolidly along at two miles an hour to sixty-tonners and even bigger vehicles.  Once we came across a real giant parked by the roadside while the crew ate a meal. It carried a big radio tower lying on its side, whole and entire, and must have weighed upwards of a hundred tons!

I pulled in and had a chat with the head driver.  He was Russian and very proud of his rig.  We talked in a mixture of bad English and worse Zarmarian, and he demonstrated what it would do, a function new to me but not to Warren. Apparently, it was designed to move in soft dirt and mud, and he could inflate and deflate all the tires by pushing buttons while in the cab.  When traveling over soft earth the tires would be deflated to spread out the load.  He told me that in these conditions the fully loaded rig would put less pressure on the ground per square inch than the foot of a camel.  I was properly appreciative and we parted amicably.

It was a long drive, and we were both tired and dusty when we finally came across Herolutions's people.  By now we had passed through the forest belt and were entering scrubland, the trees giving way to harsh thorny bush and the ground strewn with tree-killing Spanish moss.  Dust was everywhere, and the road edges were almost totally rotted away; we slalomed endlessly to avoid the potholes.  We found Starduster parked by the roadside.  The drivers had apparently stopped for the night, which shocked us---night driving at their speed and in Starduster was quite feasible and much cooler and normally less of a strain than daywork.

I pulled up and looked around.  One of the men I could see i knew only by name: Dara Duddy, the big Irishman who was presently manning the "mission control" cab in Starduster's rear, close to the satellite launcher.  Warren got out of the car, thanked me for the ride up and went off to join his mates.  I called Duddy over.

"Hi there.  Mr. Giles around?" I asked.

Duddy pointed up the road. "There's a bridge about a mile long.  He's taking a look at it."

"Thanks."  I drove along slowly and thought the tents surrounding Starduster made the scene look like some rough-and-tumble survivalist camp.  The commissary tent was opened up and two men were cooking.   A little further along was the camp of Captain Checnecaiel and his men, very neat and military.   Checnecaiel rose to his feet as I drove up but with the fading light, I indicated that I would visit him on my return from the bridge and went on past.

The road had been blasted through a low ridge here and beyond the ridge was a river.  I pulled off the road just short of the bridge and parked next to Giles's Land Rover.  I could see him in the distance, walking halfway across the bridge, accompanied by Spalding.  I waved and they picked up their pace.

When they came up to me, I thought that Giles looked better than he'd looked back in Dunin. The lines of his face fell in more placid folds, and he wasn't so tired.  Obviously he was happier actually doing a job than arranging for it to be done.  Nick Spalding, by his side, hadn't changed at all.  He still had his gamecock strut and his air of defensive wariness.  Some small men feel that they have a lot to be wary about.  

"Hello there," I said. "I just thought I'd drop by for a cup of coffee."

Giles grinned and shook my hand, but Spalding said, "Checking up on us, are you?  Mr. Hale's just been up here, you know."

Clearly he was saying that where Andy had gone, no man could follow.  His voice told me that he thought a lot of his boss, which pleased me.  I sometimes wondered if I was as transparent to other people as they appeared to me.

I jerked my thumb back up the road. "Sure, I'm checking.  Do you know what Starduster is worth?  Unloaded at Dunin it was declared at one million, forty-two thousand, nine-hundred and eighty-six pounds and five pence."  I grinned to take the sting out of it.  "I still haven't figured out what the five pence is for.  If it was yours, wouldn't you want to know if it was in safe hands?"

Spalding looked shocked.  Giles said, "Take it easy, Nick," which I thought was a nice reversal of roles.  "Mr. Drake is quite entitled to come up here, and he's welcome at any time.  Sorry if Nick's a bit edgy---we've got problems."

I wasn't surprised to hear it, but I dutifully asked them what they were.  Giles held out a lump of concrete.  "I kicked that out with the toe of my boot.  I didn't have to kick hard, either."

I took the lump and rubbed it with my thumb.  It was friable and bits dropped off.  "I'd say that someone used a mite too much sand in the mix." I pointed to the bridge. "Crumbly said the bridges would prove dicey.  Is this one the worst?"

Giles shook his head. "Oh no.  This isn't too bad at all.  The really tricky one is way up there, miles ahead yet. This one is run-of-the-mill.  Just a little shaky, that's all."  He and Spalding exchanged rueful smiles. "It's too chancy to move in the dark and there's only thirty minutes of daylight left.  Starduster will go across at first light.  Anyway, it'll be our first full night stop for nearly a week, good for the lads."

I said, "I came just in time to see the fun.  You mind if I stick around?  I brought Warren Benson up with me.'

"Good show.  We can use him.  We'll rig two extra bunks after we've eaten," Giles said, climbing into his car.  Spalding joined him and I followed them back to the campsite but stopped to say a few polite and appreciative things to Checnecaiel on the way.  He assured me that any labor needed for strengthening the bridge would be found very fast, and I left him, marveling at the self-assurance that a uniform lends a man.

During the ‘70s, Soviet workers had a saying that revealed a fundamental flaw in their economic system: “We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay.”  I was reminded of the phrase as I thought about the bridge.  It was going to be interesting to watch the passage of Stardust the next day on a bridge built by workers whose salaries were so small, they didn't have an incentive to work hard.  I would watch from a safe distance, naturally.  But if this bridge was run of the mill, what the hell was the tricky one going to be like?"

I laid my plate on one side. "Good chow."

There was humor in Giles's voice. "Not haute cuisine, but we thrive on it."

We sat under an awning rigged between two tall trees.  Giles was certainly more relaxed, and I wondered how best to take advantage of the fact.  We weren't alone---several of the others had joined us.  Obviously, Giles didn't believe in putting a distance between himself and the men, bug I wanted to get him alone for a talk-talk.  I leaned over and dropped my voice.  "If you can find two glasses, how about a Scotch?"

He too spoke quietly.  "No way.  I have to stick to the camp rules, sorry.  I suppose we could settle for another beer, though."  As he said this he got up and disappeared into the night, returning for a moment with a four-pack of American beer.  I rose and took his arm, steering him away from the poor-man's dining room.  "A word with you, Cliff," I said. "Where can we go?"

Presently we were settled against a quiet corner with our backs up against one of Starduster's giant tires, the blessedly cool night wind on our faces, and an ice cold can of beer apiece.

"You've got it made," I said, savoring the quietness.  "How do you keep this cold?"

He laughed.  "That's Starduster's doing, old boy.  She's equipped with extra water batteries to power such things as camping lights along with her onboard refrigeration and deep-freeze units.  She was originally designed to explore other worlds, you know.  Anyway, the cook says we're having lobster tails tomorrow night."

"I forgot the scale of that thing."

"You wouldn't if you were manning it."

I drank some of the cold and pleasantly bitter beer.  A little casual conversation was in order first.  "You married?'

"Oh, yes.  I have a wife and two kids in England: six and four, both boys.  How about you?"

"I tried, but it didn't catch on.  A man in my job doesn't spend enough time at home to hang up his hat, and women despise that as a rule."

"Indeed, they do."  His voice showed that he felt the same way.

"How long since you've been home?"

"Two months, I'd say.  I've been surveying this damn road. I reckon it'll be a good long while before I ever see home again."

I said, "Up at Sutovo the Shamjaris have just finished a big concrete airstrip, big enough for rigs like Starduster, if she needs it.  It's just about to go into operation, we've been told, though we're not sure what "just about" means."

Giles said, "No parades up there, though. Nobody's up there to see them."

"Right.  Well, when it's ready we'll be flying in the expensive bits that aren't too heavy, like the hard drives, laptops, software, and Cray mainframes.  There'll be quite a lot of coming and going and it wouldn't surprise me if there wasn't room for a guy to take a trip back to England every once in a while.  That goes for your crew as well, of course."

"That's splendid---we'd all appreciate that.  I'll have to make up a roster." He was already perking up at the thought, and I marveled all over again at what domesticity does for some men.

"How did you get into civilian heavy haulage and military contracting?" I asked him.

"It wasn't so much getting into it as being born into it.  My old man was always on the heavy side---he pushed around tank transporters in Korea---went into the munitions business after he got out----and I'm a chip off the old block."

"You ever handled anything like this before?"

"Oh yes. I've done a bit bigger than this for the Royal Rocketry Society at home.  Of course, conditions weren't quite the same, but just as tough, in their own way. There are more buildings to knock corners off in Britain, and a whole lot more bureaucracy to navigate too."

"Was that with Herolutions?"

"No, before its time."  He knew I was pumping him gently and didn't seem to mind.  "I was with one of the big outfits then."

I drank the last of my beer.  "You really are with Herolutions Ltd., aren't you?"

"Yes.  Together with Nick and Andy Hale.  We'd all been in the business before, and when we got together it seemed like a good idea.  Sometimes I'm not so sure."  I saw him wave his hand, a dim gesture in the darkness, and heard the slightly bitter touch in his voice.  I already knew that financially this was a cutting-edge operation, and I didn't want to spoil Giles's mood by raking up any economic bullshit, but I felt I could get a few more answers out of him without pressing too hard.

He carried on without my prompting him.  "We each came into a little money, one way or another---mine was an inheritance.  Nick had ideas for building new kinds of rigs and Andy and Nick had worked together before.  Andy's our real ideas man:  not just the financial end, he's into every angle.  But if we hadn't landed this contract, I don't think we'd have got off the ground."

I had had my own doubts about giving this enormously expensive and tough job to a Johnny-come-lately firm, but I didn't want to express such things to Giles.  He went on, though, filling me in with details; the costly capsule gear, which they only realized was needed after their tender had been accepted, was bought from the RRSGB.  Two of the solar panels were NASA castoffs, the others bought on the never-never and as yet not fully paid for.  The tender, already as low as possible to enable them to land the job, was now seen to be quite unrealistic and they didn't expect to make any money out of the Mochi-Jojeji job: but they had every hope that a successful completion would bring other contracts to their doorstep. It was midsummer madness, and it just might work.

I realized that it was late, and that I hadn't yet broached the subject of security or danger.  Too late in fact to go into the whole thing now, but I could at least pave the way; Giles's practical problems had rendered him oblivious to possible outside interference, and, as partially a military contractor, he wasn't truly accustomed to working in countries where political squabbles were solved by jaw-jaw rather than war-war.

"How are you getting along with Captain Checnecaiel?" I asked.

"No trouble.  In fact, he's very helpful.  I'll make him into a good trail boss yet."

"Had any problems so far? Other than the road itself, that is."

"Just the usual matter of crowd control through the villages. Checnecaiel's very good at that.  He's overefficient, really; puts out a guard every time we stop, scouts ahead, very busy playing soldiers generally." He gestured into the night.  "If you walk down there, you'll stand a chance of getting a bullet in you unless you speak up loud and clear. I've had to warn my chaps about it. Road transport in the UK was never like this."

"He's not really here as just a traffic cop," I said. "He's guarding you, or more to the point, he's guarding the Starduster.  There's always the chance that someone might try a bit of sabotage.  Just keep your eyes open too and pass that word down the line to your men, Cliff."

I knew he was staring at me.  "Who'd want to sabotage Starduster?  Nobody else wanted this job."

He was still thinking in terms of commercial rivalry and i was mildly alarmed at his political naivety.  "Look, Cliff, I'd like to put you in the picture, and I think Nick Spalding, too.  But it's late and you've got a major job to do in the morning.  It's nothing urgent, nothing to fret about.   Next time we stop for a break I'll get you both up to date, OK?"

"Right you are, if you say so."  I sensed his mind slipping away; mention of the next day's task had set him thinking about it, and I knew I should leave him al one to marshal his ideas.

"I'll say good night," I said. "I guess you'll want to think about your next obstacle course."

He stood up.  "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," he said sardonically.  "Sleep well. Your cot is rigged over there, by the way.  I use the small sleeping kiosk in the Starduster:  less risk of snakes that way."

"I know how you feel," I grinned. "But with me its scorpions. Good night."

I strolled in the night air over to the rig and stood looking up into the underbelly of the great domed saucer we were supposed to launch so two late-bloomer countries could enter the coming 21st century.  Over one million pounds were of technology, and it was being trundled precariously through Central Asia by a company on the verge of going belly-up, with a border war possibly about to erupt in its path.  What the hell was I going to do about it?  What the hell can I do about it?

Sleep on it, that's what.