The duke sat down opposite me, and the rest of the entourage took their places without further ceremony. Our ladies then started to sit, so Adam and I took the hint and joined them.
Why a pair of staunchly egalitarian Americans like us should feel so awkward around an insignificant country’s nobility was hard to explain, but there it was. It probably had something to do with the way the duke had trained long and hard in the art of being impressive, and we poor slobs had never been exposed to the tricks of his trade before.
The duke puzzled for a moment with a fork and then put it down. I opened a can of Vienna sausages, showing how the key worked, and the duke promptly opened a can of Spam in the same fashion.
“What method is used to keep the meat from spoiling?” he asked, switching back to Westronese so everyone else could understand. Seeing me use a fork, he promptly used his in the same manner.
“First sealing the food away from any further contamination, and then cooking, to kill any decay organisms present. In practice, the meat is soldered into the cans when raw, and the cans are cooked under pressure for several hours to insure sterility,” I said.
“Interesting. Still, it seems an expensive way to do things.” The duke was sampling each offering directly from the can. Naturally, nobody tried to stop him long enough to put the things on a plate.
“Not really, Your Grace. Not with mass production. If you are making millions of the same product, it becomes practical to build specialized machinery that operates quickly and almost by itself. This makes each product very inexpensive. In my country, a skilled workingman’s daily wage will purchase a ton of steel, which is what the cans are mostly made of. They have a thin coating of tin, or sometimes plastic, since iron would react with the food in the can. With mass production, the price of that can of Spam would be at most a quarter hour’s wages after taxes for a minimum-wage worker.”
“Hmm. And what would be the wage differential between your least and most skilled workers?”
Having tried everything I could offer, and passing the cans down to his subordinates, the duke settled in on a can of Spam, as I had somehow known he would. He was really chowing down.
“Oh, perhaps five dollars an hour for the least capable beginner up to perhaps fifty for a master machinist or model maker. Certain professions, medical doctors and lawyers, make much more, although they pay for their own offices, equipment and staffs.”
“I see. On the Western Isles, the range is not so large.” The man was actually opening another can of Spam.
“True, Your Grace, but here, people spend much of their income on food, whereas in the United States, a person can buy enough to survive on for ten or twenty dollars a week. Oh, they spend more than that on food, normally, but most of the difference goes to buying more-convenient, already-prepared, or better- tasting food. What I’m trying to say is, among us, most of what most people earn goes towards the purchase of things that they don’t absolutely need, but merely want.”
“So with their most basic needs easily supplied, they spend their time earning money to buy toys. Yes, I suppose that makes sense.”
“It’s also true that most of our people worry so much about their toys that they have made them into absolute necessities, psychologically, at least,” Adam said without a trace of his usual Hamtramck accent. “Because of this, from an objective standpoint, all wealth beyond a certain point is largely an illusion. Still and all, I think that we lead richer lives than your people do. We are better informed, physically more comfortable, and intellectually more stimulated, on the average, than I think the people of the Western Islands are.”
“Perhaps this is true, although you still know very little about us. Time will easily cure the problem, I’m sure. For now, well, the good warlock has discussed your proposal with me, and I must say that I find it interesting. Some of the things you propose, reducing the dead weight to increase the flotation of our islands, for example, are so obviously beneficial to my people that they need no discussion. Increasing our food supply would be equally wonderful, could I be convinced that it can be done without subjecting my people to a series of deadly plagues, or the invasion of some foreign power. The other things, the `toys’ as you have several times called them, I am not sure about. Consider, for example, that your excellent machines are currently serenading us with Mozart’s Haffner Symphony. An excellent piece of work, one of my favorites, and your equipment reproduces it better than I could have possibly imagined. But we are ignoring it as we talk together here. Not only are we spoiling our own enjoyment of it, but I think that Mozart would not be altogether pleased. Wouldn’t it be better to listen to it in a concert hall, with live performers?”
“Yes, Your Grace, it certainly would be far more moving as a live performance. And Mozart, were he still alive, would be annoyed at our treating his music so casually. In fact he was annoyed with the noblemen of his time who had hired him, when they proceeded to talk while he was performing. You see, they chose to ignore him just as we are currently choosing to ignore the servants who are waiting on us. This gets us to another advantage of an industrialized culture. In America and the Western world, there are very few servants, except for the case of a working mother who sometimes needs help with her children. Here, the wealthy enjoy a leisurely life largely at the expense of the poor. Among our people, the poorest are at least theoretically equal with the richest. I, for example, have often met with my own employees after work and enjoyed a beer or two with them.”
“Indeed. For my own part, I think that when a person tries to be what he is not, he becomes an unhappy person. He may even become a dangerous one. In all cultures, there are leaders and there are those who are led. That is the way it should be simply because nothing else works. I suppose that some of my attitude comes from my being the product of seventy-eight generations of very careful breeding, but so be it. I am exactly what I am, and I’m not the least bit ashamed of it. Rest assured that if I ever permit my people’s culture to change, it will change very slowly.”
There had been no change in the duke’s pleasant demeanor, but his words said that he was not entirely pleased with my ideas of democracy. Sometimes I think that I have a permanent case of foot-in-mouth disease.
Adam came to the rescue. “Your Grace, I wonder if I might interest you and your vassals in seeing some of the sights of your own islands that you have never seen before. Would you like to go swimming in Avalon Bay with a snorkeling rig? The coral and fishes down there are unbelievably beautiful.”
“Yes, I definitely would. It was one of the reasons that I came down here today. I also want to see your television and such, but I expect that the bay would be better seen while the sun is yet high.”
Everyone on the islands could swim, and the duke’s party had brought their swimsuits because of the rumors they’d heard.
As Adam led them off with fins and masks borrowed back from the boys, the warlock stayed behind for a moment to talk to me in English.
“Look, you ninny!” he said in a whisper. “You can hardly expect a hereditary absolute ruler to be enthralled with the glories of democracy! He is a good lord who takes the welfare of his people very seriously, but he also has an obligation to almost a hundred generations of ancestors, to hand his country intact down to his successor. He takes that duty very seriously as well. Any more nonsense out of you and you could spend the rest of your life under house arrest! Understood?”
“Yes, Your Excellency.”
“Good. Don’t forget it.”
The warlock followed the rest of the group to the beach, and I sat back down and put my head in my hands, wondering just how badly I had screwed the whole thing up this time.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Roxanna came up behind me and started rubbing my neck and shoulders. “My lord, it is not that bad. The duke is a very wise and understanding man. He knows all about the social customs of your country, and you have not seriously offended him by telling him again about them. Come. You have yet to show me the wonders of your television and your VCR. Show me something light and amusing.”