“Huh?” The shift-boss was so amazed as to forget temporarily that he was talking to the
Big Boss. “They ain’t none. They ain’t gonna be none. The UCM won’t stand fer none.”
“But suppose there were some?”
“You mean a knock-down-‘n’-drag-out fight with UCM?”
“Precisely.”
McGuire pondered this shockingly revolutionary thought for a long, minute, his callused
right palm rasping against the stiff stubble on his chin. “I still couldn’t,” he decided, finally.
“Not just ’cause the union’d win, neither. I like it a hell of a lot better here on Earth. If I
was young an’ single, maybe. But I ain’t so young yet-he was all of forty two years old,
“-an’ three of tha kids’re still home vet an’ my old woman’d raise hell an’ put a chunk
under it. Besides, me an’ her both like to know where we’re at. So when they get us
organized I’ll join tha union an’ work ’til I’m sixty an’ then retire an’ live easy on my pension
an’ old-age benefits. Thataway I’ll know all tha time just where I’m at.”
“I see.” Speers’ voice was almost a sigh. “And you, Bailey?”
“Not fer me,” the powdermen said, with no hesitation at all. “George chirped it-” be
jerked his left thumb at the shift-boss, “-about wantin’ to know where yer at. I got nothin’
much against tha union. It costs, but between it an’ tha outplanets I’ll take the UCM any
day in tha week. Hoady Hoadman takes care of his men, an’ out on tha outplanets ya
never know what’s gonna happen. Yer takin’ awful big chances all tha time. Too goddam
big.”
“I see, and thanks, both of you. Call Personnel about replacements and go ahead as
usual-until you run into a picket line. That is all for now.”
As the two men left Speers’ office he flipped the switch of his squawk box. “Get me
GalMet, please. Maynard’s FirSec, Miss Champ . . .”
“Miss Champion!” The switchboard girl committed the almost incredible offense of
interrupting the Super. “Herself?”
“Herself,” Speers said, dryly. “As I was about to say, the password in this case is as
follows: ‘Gem-Little-Operation’. In that order, please.”
“Oh-excuse me, sir, please. I’ll get right at it.”
It took seven minutes, but finally Miss Champion’s face appeared upon Speers’ screen; a
face startlingly young and startlingly comely to be that of one of the top Fir Secs of all
Earth.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Speers.” Her contralto voice was as smooth and as rich as
whipping cream. “It has broken, then?”
“Yes. Four men made themselves so obnoxious that we-had to discharge them just now.
There has been no talk whatever of unionization as yet, but I expect a picket line
tomorrow.”
“Thanks for letting us know so promptly, Mr. Speers. I can’t get at him myself for fifteen
minutes or so yet, but I’ll tell him at the earliest possible moment.” “That’ll be fine, Miss
Champion. Good-bye.”
Chapter 5
COUNTER-ORGANIZATION
MISS CHAMPION did not wait for Maynard to tell her what to do about the Little Gem
situation. She acted. She sent out seven coded subgrams, to seven different planets.
Then, on her own electric typewriter, she wrote two short notes, also in code. She
addressed and sealed two envelopes-herself. She pushed a button. A girl came into her
office. Miss Champion said, “Here are two letters, Bessie. One is to Hatfield of InStell,
the other to Lansing of WarnOil. Each is to be delivered by special messenger. Delivery
is to be strictly-personal-signature-required. Thanks.”
So, within a very few days after UCM’s picket line had sealed the Little Gem mine as
tight as a bottle, fourteen men and one woman met in GalMet’s palatial conference room
in the Metals Building, in New York City on Earth. Men representing such a tremendous
aggregate of power had never before met in any one room. Maynard called the meeting
to order, then said:
“Many of you know most of the others here, but most of you do not know us all. Please
stand as I introduce you. The lady first, of course. Miss Champion, my First Secretary.”
The lady, seated at a small desk off to one side of the great table, rose to her feet,
bowed gracefully-not directly toward the camera-and resumed her position.
“Bryce of Metals.” A slender man of fifty, with an unruly shock of graying black hair, rose,
nodded, and sat down.
“Wellington of Construction.” A tall, loose-jointed, sandy-haired man did the same.
“Zeckendorff of the Stockmen … Stelling of Grain … Killingsworth of the Producers …
Raymer of Transportation . . . Holbrook of Communications … these seven men are the
presidents of the seven largest organizations of the Planetsmen-the organized production
and service men and women of ninety five planets.
“Will you stand up, please, Mr. Speers? . . . Superintendent Speers, of the Little Gem;
now being struck, one of the very few non-union copper mines in existence. Speers is
sitting on a situation that very well may develop into the gravest crisis our civilization has
ever known.
“Next, Admiral Guerdon Dann of Interstellar . . . who may or may not, depending pretty
largely upon the outcome of this meeting, become our Galaxians’ Secretary of War.”
There was a concerted gasp at this, and Maynard smiled grimly. “I speak advisedly.
Each of us knows something, but not one of us knows it all. The whole, I think, will shock
us all.
“DuPuy of Warner Oil . . . represents the law; Interplanetary Law in particular.
“Phelps of Galactic Metals . . . is our money man. “Hatfield of Interstellar . . . Lansing of
Warner Oil . . . and I, Maynard of Galactic Metals . . . represent top management.
“Now to business. For almost two hundred years most managements have adhered to
the Principle of Enlightened Self-Interest; so that, while both automation and
pay-per-man-hour increased, production per man-hour increased at such a
rate-especially on the planets -that there was no inflation. In fact, just slightly the
opposite; for over a hundred and fifty years the purchasing power of the dollar showed a
slight rising trend.
“Then, for reasons upon which there is no agreement -each faction arguing its case
according to its own bias -the economic situation began to deteriorate and inflation set in.
It has been spiraling. For instance, of the present price of copper, about two dollars and
a half a pound, only twenty five cents is . . . Phelps?”
Rate One, Anaconda, electrolytic, FOB smelter,” the moneyman said, “is two point four
five seven dollars per pound. This breaks down into: labor, one hundred four point six
cents; taxes, ninety three point nine cents; all other costs, twenty four point nine cents;
mark-up, twenty two point three cents.”
Almost everyone looked surprised; many of the men whistled.
Maynard smiled wryly and went on, “Thanks, Desmond. Copper is of course an extreme
case; the extreme case. That is because it is the only important metal, and one of the
very few items of our entire economy, that is produced exclusively on Tellus. There are
two reasons for this. First, automation cannot be economically applied to copper mining
on Tellus or anywhere else we know of; there are no known lodes or deposits big
enough. Second, the UCM is the only union that has been able to enforce the dictum that
its craft shall be confined absolutely to Tellus.
“So far, I have stated facts, with no attempt to allocate responsibility or blame. I will now
begin to prophesy. Information has been obtained, from sources which need not be
named . .” Most of the men chuckled; only a few of them only smiled, “. . , which leads
us to believe as follows:
“Burley Hoadman is in trouble in his UCM-internal trouble. There are several local
leaders, one in particular being very strong, who do not like him hogging so much of the
gravy for himself. They want to get their own snouts into the gravy trough, and are
gathering a lot of votes. The best way he can consolidate his position is by making a
spectacular play. The Little Gem affair is his opening wedge. If he can make us fight this
issue very hard, he will pull a WestHem-wide copper strike. He will refuse to settle that
strike for less than a seventy five or one hundred percent increase in scale. Since the
UCM’s scale is already the highest in existence, that will make him a tin god on wheels.
“There hasn’t been a really important strike for over fifty years; and this one will not be
important unless we ourselves make it so by putting up a real fight. Gentlemen, we have
two, and only two, alternatives; we can surrender or we can fight.
“If we surrender, every other union in existence will demand a similar increase and the
Labor Relations Board will grant it-and I don’t need to tell you that WestHem’s corrupt