John, so it helps the terraforming with more than just money and labor, I mean think about it.”
“But do you ever wonder what’s going to come of it all?” John asked.
“What do you mean?”
“You know, this deluge of people and equipment, while things are falling apart on Earth.”
“Things are always going to be falling apart on Earth, you might as well get used to it.”
“Yeah, but who’s going to own what up here? Who’s going to call the shots?”
Frank just made a face at John’s naïveté, at the very nature of the question. One look at his grimace and John could read it all, the whole complex of disgust and impatience and amusement. A part of John was pleased at this instant recognition; he knew his old friend better than he had ever known any of his family, so that the swarthy pale-eyed face glowering at him was like that of a brother, a twin that he couldn’t ever remember not knowing. On the other hand, he was annoyed with Frank for his condescension. “People are wondering about it, Frank. It’s not just me, and it’s not just Arkady. You can’t just shrug it off and act like it’s a stupid question, like there’s nothing to be decided.”
“The U.N. decides,” Frank said brusquely. “There’s ten billion of them, and ten thousand of us. That’s a million to one. If you want to influence those kind of odds you ought to have become the UNOMA factor like I told you to when they set up the position. But you didn’t listen to me. You just shrugged it off. You could have really done something, but now what are you? Sax’s assistant in charge of publicity.”
“And development, and security, and Terran affairs, and the moholes.”
“Ostrich!” Frank pounced. “Head in a hole! Come on, let’s go eat.”
John agreed and they went off to a dinner in the Arabs’ biggest rover, a meal of basted lamb and dill-flavored yogurt, delicious and exotic. But John found himself still irritated at Frank’s scorn, which never let up. The old rivalry, sharp as ever; and no First Man routine would ever make a dent in Frank’s sneery arrogance.
Thus when Maya Toitovna showed up unexpectedly the next day, traveling west on her way to Acheron, John gave her a longer hug than he might have otherwise, and by the time that night’s dinner was over, he had made certain that she would spend the night in his rover—a matter of a particular attentiveness, a certain laugh, a certain look, the nearly accidental brushing of arms together as they stood trying sherbets, talking to the happy men of the caravan, who clearly found her fascinating…. All their old code of conciliation and seduction, established through the years. And Frank could only watch, deadpan, talking in Arabic to his Egyptian friends.
And that night, as John and Maya made love in John’s rover bed, John pulled up from her briefly and looked down at her white body, and thought, So much for political power Frank buddy! That deadpan look had told it all, the fierce desire for Maya still there, still burning. Frank, like most of the men in the caravanserai that night, would have loved to have been in John’s place at that moment; once or twice in the past he no doubt had been; but not when John was around. No, tonight Frank would be reminded what real power was made of.
Distracted by such nastiness, it took John a while to pay any real attention to Maya herself. It had been almost five years since he and she had slept together, and in the intervening time he had had several other partners, and knew she had lived for a time with an engineer in Hellas. It was strange to begin again, as they knew each other intimately and yet didn’t. Her turning face flickering under him in the dim light, sister then stranger, sister then stranger…. Something happened, then, something turned in him; all that exterior business fell away, all those games. Something in her face, in the way she was all there, the way she would give her whole self to him when they made love. He didn’t know anyone else who was quite like that.
And thus the old flame sparked again, uncertainly at first, as it had not been there at all in their first lovemaking. But then, after an hour’s quiet talk, they had started kissing and rolled together and suddenly it was ablaze and they