Greenberg could stall the touchy problem until the boss was free; he could break in on the boss; he could go over the boss’s head to the Secretary himself (which meant picking an answer and presenting it so as to get that answer approved); or. . . he could act, using Mr. Kiku’s authority.
Mr. Kiku could not have predicted the emergency. . . but the boss had a pesky habit of pushing people off the deep end.
Greenberg’s summing up had been quick. He answered, “Sorry, Stan, you can’t talk to the boss. I am acting for him.”
“Eh? Since when?”
“Just temporarily, but I am.”
Ibañez frowned. “Look, chum, you had better find the boss. Maybe you are signing his name on routine matters. . . but this is not routine. We’ve got to bring that ship down in a hurry. Your neck would be out a yard if you took it upon yourself to authorize me to overlook a basic rule like quarantine. Use your head.”
Break quarantine? Greenberg recalled the Great Plague of ’51, back in the days when the biologist serenely believed that each planetary life group was immune to the ills of other planets. “We won’t break quarantine.”
Ibañez looked pained. “Sergei, we can jeopardize this conference. . . ‘jeopardize?’ What am I saying? We can’t toss away ten years’ work because some crewman has a slight fever. The quarantine must be broken. But I don’t expect you to do it.”
Greenberg hesitated. “He’s under hypnosis, for a tough job coming up. It may be a couple of hours before you can see him.”
Ibañez looked blank. “I’ll have to tackle the Secretary. I don’t dare wait two hours. That sacred cow from Venus is like as not to order his skipper to head home. . . we can’t risk that.”
“And we can’t risk bringing in an epidemic, either. Here’s what you do. Call him and tell him you are coming to get him in person. Use a fast scout. Get him aboard and leave the Ariel in quarantine orbit. Once you get him aboard the scout. . . and not before. . . tell him that both you and he will attend the conference in isolation suits.” The isolation suit was a sealed pressure suit; its primary use was to visit planets whose disease hazards had not yet been learned. “The scout ship and crew will have to go into quarantine, too, of course.”
“Isolation suit! Oh, he’ll love that. Sergei, it would be less damaging to call off the conference. An indignity like that would put him against us for certain. The jerk is poisonously proud.”
“Sure he’ll love it,” Greenberg explained, “once you suggest how to play it. ‘Great personal self-sacrifice’. . . ‘unwilling to risk the welfare of our beloved sister planet’. . . ‘the call of duty takes precedence over any et cetera.’ If you don’t feel sure of it, take one of the public relations boys along. And look, all through the conference he must be attended by a physician. . . in a white suit. . . and a couple of nurses. The conference must stop every now and then while he rests. . . put a cot and hospital screens in the Hall of Heroes near the conference table. The idea is that he’s come down with it himself but is carrying on as his dying act. Get it? Tell him before you land the scout ship. . . indirectly, of course.”
Ibañez looked perturbed. “Do you think that will work?”
“It’s up to you to make it work. I’m sending down your memo, ordering quarantine to continue but telling you to use your initiative to insure his presence at the conference.”
“Well. . . all right.” Ibañez suddenly grinned. “Never mind the memo. I’m on my way.” He switched off.
Greenberg turned back to the desk, feeling exhilarated by the sensation of playing God. He wondered what the boss would have done?. . . but did not care. There might be many correct solutions, but this was one; it felt right. He reached again for the pending urgent file.
He stopped. Something was gnawing at the back of his mind. The boss had not wanted to approve that death sentence; he had felt it. Shucks, the boss had told him that he was wrong; the proper action was a full investigation. But the boss, as a matter of loyalty to his subordinates, had not reversed him.