“Is this what Duke Mo issues to his soldiers?”
“No, I had to leave my weapons behind when I left his service. That’s the best that I could find in Dren.”
“And why did you leave the services of Duke Mo?”
“Because my duke had gone over two dozen years without a war,” Kren said, remembering what he had read in his current history class. “Things had gotten dull, and promotions had come to an absolute stop.”
“Good. You have a proper warrior’s attitude. So tell me, now that you have a huge tract of land, what do you plan on doing with it? Not those filthy drug schemes that Kodo had in mind, I hope.”
“Drugs? No, certainly not!” Kren said, “There are plenty of honorable ways to make a decent living. But I don’t actually have the land, yet. There is a matter of signing and registering certain papers . . . ?”
“Right you are! Sala, have the papers brought up to the table here, and we’ll get on with it right now.” Turning back to Kren, he said, “But what are your plans?”
What were his plans! A strange feeling came over Kren. While it was doubtless a result of the brain segments that he had taken from Kodo, still reorganizing themselves in his head, it seemed to him to be a flash of enlightenment, as if his whole future was now laid out in front of him. It was astonishing, but it also left him somewhat confused. Fortunately, the liar he had once eaten came to his rescue, and he ad libbed until his thoughts started to crystallize about him.
“You will understand that I didn’t hear about your offer until this morning, and I will have to make a thorough survey of the property before I can be sure of anything. But I have dreamed of owning a large tract of land for many years, and I have had many thoughts. If the land I’m buying is like similar areas that I have studied, its current economic function is simply to be a place where juvenals wander into, become larger and fatter, and then wander out of, to be eaten elsewhere. No one is making a profit off of it. Currently, at the University of Dren, the average juvenal sells for almost three dozen Ke.”
“That much?”
“Yes. The method of collecting them is rather inefficient. Individual hunters, often impoverished students, go out and bring back one or two at a time. I think that if I set up an efficient system of collection, transportation, and distribution, the profits could be large.”
“That is very interesting. You seem to be a remarkably creative person, Kren.”
“Am I? It seemed only common sense to me.”
“Well, in hindsight, yes. But to have the foresight to see it, well, that is something else. But the papers are here. Shall we sign them?”
“By all means!”
As soon as all copies were signed and witnessed, Bronki and Sala collected them up.
Bronki said, “I guess that concludes our business here, Your Grace. Kren and I have to catch a train back to the university in an hour. We both have our academic duties to perform there tomorrow.”
“But I was enjoying my conversation with Kren,” the duke said. “You two go and get everything properly registered with the Bonding Authority. You can come back for him in two-thirds of an hour. They’ll hold the train if I request it.”
“Yes, Your Grace,” Sala said, taking Bronki with her.
“Now then, tell me more about your plans,” the duke said.
“Well, if the collection and distribution of juvenals goes well, and proves profitable, I plan to extend my sales organization out into other nearby cities, until I start reaching the limit of what my land can sustainably provide.”
“And then you will need more land.”
“Perhaps,” Kren said. “But that would be expensive, and there might be ways to increase the yield of what I already own. Academic studies of grass have shown that walking on it injures it. It must expend energy to repair the damage to its roots, energy that could otherwise be spent on growth. Juvenals outnumber adults by more than a gross to one. Thus, the total damage done by adults is small. Theoretical studies suggest that growth could be doubled if juvenals could be kept off of it, and this is verified by the yields of grass sequestered for the production of long grass.”
“So you are thinking of putting all of your land in long grass, and feeding it to the juvenals?”
“Not quite. Long grass is high in cellulose and low in proteins. It is not the best possible feed. But if large hovercraft could be built to mow the grass every week or so, and this could be fed to penned juvenals, I think that production would more than double. The actual cost of mowing is still unknown, of course. Just how profitable this system would be would have to be seen.”
“Yes, yes. But why do you say, more than doubled?” Dennon asked.
“Because the juvenals would have nothing to do now but eat, sleep, and grow. They wouldn’t have to expend much of their energy moving around. We could feed them only at night, perhaps, and let them lie in the sun all day. Furthermore, they might prove to be much better eating, with more tender meat and more fat.”
“This is truly a remarkable program, and I wish you well with it. I will be watching you carefully, and who knows, someday I might try something like this myself.”
“You are welcome to,” Kren said. “Once it proves profitable, I will have many competitors. I will stay out in front because I will have been there first, a step or two ahead of the rest.”
“A sensible attitude. Do you have further thoughts?”
“A few, but they will be done many years in the future, if ever. I wonder if it would be practical to grow grass under fusion-powered lights in a building. The power itself is fairly cheap, and indoors, with constant, optimal lighting two dozen hours a day, with perfect fertilization, and perfect watering, with no winters or cloudy days, well, I think that it might be possible to produce at least a dozen times as much grass per square yard as you would get outdoors. And when you consider that a building could be easily built with two dozen stories, well, perhaps I might never need any more land.”
“That would take a massive, long-term investment, but in the long run, why, it would permit our population to grow by a factor of two gross!” Duke Dennon said.
“And therein lies the profit.”
“I am fascinated! Did you have any further thoughts?”
“Only one. It is that we have been selectively breeding our own species for millions of years. Not always consciously, of course, but when we are ready for resurrection, we always pick the best body that we can get, and these are the bodies that make the next generation of eggs and sperm. We have been breeding for perfect adults, and I think that the results have been excellent. Certainly, I wouldn’t want to change that. But we have not been breeding for perfect juvenals. We have not considered that with further selective breeding, we could turn out juvenals who matured quicker, who needed less food, and who tasted better. I wonder what could be accomplished along these lines.”
Actually, Kren had several other ideas, but thought it best not to mention to Duke Dennon the breeding of superior warriors. One day, he might have to go to war with him.
“My mind boggles, Kren. I see that our assistants are returning, and that you will soon have to leave. I would like to see you again, though, perhaps for a weekend?”
“I regret that I must study through the week, and play sports on most weekends.”
“But we both know your schedule. In three weeks, the University of Dren won’t be playing for one weekend. Come visit me then.”
“With great pleasure, Your Grace.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
FROM CAPTURED HISTORY TAPES,
FILE 1846583A ca. 1832 a.d.
BUT CONCERNING EVENTS OF UP TO
2000 YEARS EARLIER
Selling Shares in Children
The duke’s guard, Lorka, met them on the stairway and presented Kren with the spear he had used earlier. Kren and Bronki talked only of ordinary things until they were in their cabin on the train. It took off immediately after they got aboard, since they really had been holding the train for them. This was something that the MagFloat Corporation did not like to do, but one does not argue with a duke.
“What happened between you and the duke while I was gone?” Bronki asked.
“Something very strange. He asked me what my plans were for the land he was selling me, and I had a most amazing burst of creativity, something which has never happened to me before. Well, I have done original things in the past, or at least things which I thought were original at the time. Originality is easy when you are ignorant of what has happened before. I deduced that by eating juvenal brain tissue, I could improve my studying, for example, and I came up with a novel way to bring six juvenals, who were each almost as big as I am, back to what is now my house. But those things were trivial compared to what happened to me today.”