Nevertheless Governor’s Island did not sink under the load
North of the city on Buchanan Island another city was burgeoning training camps for the Middle Guard and the Ground Forces. It was protested bitterly in the Estates that the presence of training grounds at the national capital was an invitation to national suicide, as one H-bomb could wipe out both the government and most of the armed forces of Venus—nevertheless nothing had been done about it. It was argued that the men had to have some place for recreation; if the training grounds were moved out into the trackless bush, the men would desert and go back to their farms and mines.
Many had deserted. In the meantime New London swarmed with soldiery. The Two Worlds Dining Room was jammed from morning until night. Old Charlie left the range only to tend the cash register; Don’s hands were raw from hot water and detergent. Between times he stoked the water boiler back of the shack, using oily Chika logs hauled in by a dragon known as “Daisy” (but male despite the chosen name). Electric water heating would have been cheaper; electric power was an almost costless by-product of the atomic pile west of the city—but the equipment to use electric power was very expensive and almost unobtainable.
New London was full of such frontier contrasts. Its muddy, unpaved streets were lighted, here and there, by atomic power. Rocket-powered sky shuttles connected it with other human settlements but inside its own boundaries transportation was limited to shank’s ponies and to the gondolas that served in lieu of taxis and tubes—some of these were powered, more moved by human muscle.
New London was ugly, uncomfortable, and unfinished, but it was stimulating. Don liked the gusty, brawling drive of the place, liked it much better than the hothouse lushness of New Chicago. It was as alive as a basketful of puppies, as vital as a punch in the jaw. There was a feeling in the air of new things about to happen, new hopes, new problems.
After a week in the restaurant Don felt almost as if he had been there all his life. Furthermore he was not unhappy at it. Oh, to be sure, the work was hard, and he still was determined to get to Mars-eventually—but in the meantime he slept well, ate well, and had his hands busy… and there were always the customers to talk and argue with—spacemen, guardsmen, smalltime politicians who could not afford the better restaurants. The place was a political debating club, city news desk, and rumor mill; the gossip swapped over Charlie’s food was often tomorrow’s headline in the New London Times.
Don kept up the precedent of a mid-afternoon break, even when he had no business to transact. If Isobel was not too busy, he would take her across the street for a coke; she was, as yet, his only friend outside the restaurant. On one such occasion she said, “No—come on inside. I want you to meet the manager.”
“Eh?”
“About your ‘gram.”
“Oh, yes—I’d been meaning to, Isobel, but there’s no point in it yet. I haven’t got the money. I’m going to wait another week and hit Old Charlie for a loan. He can’t replace me very easily; I think he’ll come across to keep me in durance vile.”
“That’s no good—you ought to get a better job as soon as you can. Come on.”
She opened the gate in the counter desk and led him into an office in the rear where she introduced him to a worried-looking middle-aged man. “This is Don Harvey, the young man I was telling you about.”
The older man shook hands. “Oh, yes—something about a message to Mars, I think my daughter said.”
Don turned to Isobel. ” ‘Daughter’? You didn’t tell me the manager was your father.”
“You didn’t ask me.”
“But—Never mind. Glad to know you, sir.”
“And you. Now about that message?”
“I don’t know why Isobel brought me in here. I can’t pay for it. All I have is Federation money.”
Mr. Costello examined his nails and looked troubled. “Mr. Harvey, under the rules I am supposed to require cash payment for interplanetary traffic. I’d like to accept your Federation notes. But I can’t; it’s against the law.” He stared at the ceiling. “Of course there is a black market in Federation money.”