Boaz now used three magical words that seemed to describe the maximum happiness a person could achieve on Earth: Hollywood night clubs. He had never seen Hollywood, had never seen a night club. “Man,” he said, “you were in and out of Hollywood night clubs all day and all night long.
“Man,” said Boaz to uncomprehending Unk, “you had everything a man needs to really lead hisself a life on Earth, and you knowed how to do it, too.
“Man,” said Boaz to Unk, trying to conceal the pathetic formlessness of his aspirations. “We’re going to go into some fine places and order us up some fine things, and circulate and carry on, with some fine people, and just generally have us a good whoop-dee-doo.” He seized Unk’s arm, rocked him. “Buddies — that’s us, buddy. Boy — we’re going to be a famous pair — going everywhere, doing everything.
“‘Here comes lucky old Unk and his buddy Boaz!'” said Boaz, saying what he hoped Earthlings would be saying after the conquest. “‘And there they go, happy as two birds!'” He chuckled and cooed about the happy, birdlike pair.
His smile withered.
His smiles never lasted very long. Somewhere deep inside Boaz was worried sick. He was worried sick about losing his job. It had never been clear to him how he had landed the job — the great privilege. He didn’t even know who had given him the swell job.
Boaz didn’t even know who was in command of the real commanders.
He had never received an order — not from anyone who was superior to the real commanders. Boaz based his actions, as did all the real commanders, on what could be best described as conversational tidbits — tidbits circulated on the real-commander level.
Whenever the real commanders got together late at night, the tidbits were passed around with the beer and the crackers and cheese.
There would be a tidbit, for instance, about waste in the supply rooms, and another about the desirability of soldiers’ actually getting hurt and mad during jujitsu training, another about soldiers’ shabby tendency to skip loops in lacing up their puttees. Boaz himself would pass these on, without any idea as to their point of origin — and he would base his actions on them.
The execution of Stony Stevenson by Unk had also been announced in this way. Suddenly, it had been the topic of conversation.
Suddenly, the real commanders had placed Stony under arrest.
Boaz now fingered the control box in his pocket, without actually touching a control. He took his place among the men he controlled, came to attention voluntarily, pressed a button, and relaxed as his squadmates relaxed.
He wanted a drink of hard liquor very much. And be was entitled to liquor, too, whenever he wanted it. Unlimited supplies of all kinds of liquor were flown in from Earth regularly for the real commanders. And the officers could have all the liquor they wanted, too, though they couldn’t get the good stuff. What the officers drank was a lethal green liquor made locally out of fermented lichens.
But Boaz never drank. One reason he didn’t drink was that he was afraid that alcohol would impair his efficiency as a soldier. Another reason he didn’t drink was that he was afraid that he would forget himself and offer an enlisted man a drink.
The penalty for a real commander who offered an enlisted man an alcoholic beverage was death.
“Yes, Lord,” said Boaz, adding his voice to the hubbub of the relaxing men.
Ten minutes later, Sergeant Brackman declared a recreation period, during which everyone was supposed to go out and play German batball, the chief sport of the Army of Mars.
Unk stole away.
Unk stole away to barrack 12 to look for the letter under the blue rock — the letter that his red-headed victim had told him about.
The barracks in the area were empty.
The banner at the head of the mast before them was thin air.
The empty barracks had been the home of a battalion of Martian Imperial Commandos. The Commandos had disappeared quietly in the dead of night a month before. They had taken off in their space ships, their faces blackened, their dog tags taped so as not to clink — their destination secret.