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definitely from New Glascow. Even his voice patterns check out. He's a real
student, and someone else is funding himùliberally. Who? How can you trace
double blind drops and fund transfers over three systems and through that
Ydrisian commnet?"
"That tells you one thing."
"Right. Whoever it is has money. Lots of it. Like several thousand
commercial magnates in the Empire, and none of them are terribly fond of
Barcelon."
The consul frowned and turned back to the screen, half listening to the
words of the speakers .
". . . of Barcelon . . . designed to keep control of agriculture from
the people . . . without food, no police state . . . no accident . . . Hein
Wadrup knew agriculture policies . . . what did he know? What did they fear
from Hein Wadrup? . . . nothing to fear, then free him . . . tell Barcelon . .
. prove us wrong . . . PROVE US WRONG! PROVE US WRONG!! . . ."
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"Just a short media incident," observed the political attachT.
"It's not the single incidents that bothers me. It's the pattern, the
continuing growth of such incidents. Always around the best universities.
Almost as if targeted at the students, and the teachers. And those students
will become teachers."
"Not on Barcelon!" protested the attachT.
"No," answered the consul, "on Barcelon, they'll either be jailed or
become revolutionaries." He sighed. "I'd rather have the teachers, thank you."
He touched the screen, which blanked.
XXVII
THE GARDENER WHISTLED a low series of notes as he finished weeding the
next-to-last row of his plot in the public garden. Already, the row of dark
green plants had shed the first set of blossoms, and the nodules were
darkening nearly to purple and beginning to take on the tubular shape of the
fruit, if an organic product that tasted like the best hand-fed steak could be
truly called a fruit.
The second set of blossoms was another week from bursting into full
flower, but the silver-haired gardener nodded as he checked each of the
fifteen plants in the first row.
The outside row was a hybrid bean common to Forsenia, with nearly the
same dark leave as the bestmeat plant. The bean plants composed the third and
fifth rows as well, while the second and fourth rows were filled with bestmeat
plants.
"How they coming, Martin?" questioned a lanky, pointed-chinned, and
white-haired woman from the next plot, cordoned off from his by a meter-high
snow fence pressed into alternative use as a plot-divider for the short summer
growing season.
"Growing. Growing fine."
"Next year, like to try whatever you got there with the beans. Looks
interesting. Lots of buds already."
"Give you some seeds if it works."
"See then," grunted the woman. "Got to finish before noon. Get my
granddaughter. Long tube ride." She straightened. "You're always here
mornings. Got creds. How'd you qual for public garden?"
"Small pension. Impie service. Work nights at Simeons. No family. Make
ends meet."
The older woman shivered. "Say lots of DomSecs at Simeons. Watch
yourself."
The man with the short-curled silver hair blinked his dark eyes, trying
to flick the gnat clear before the bug got under the tinted contact lenses.
Finally, he waved the insect away and returned to his gardening, working his
way on hands and knees down the fifth and last row.
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"See you, Martin. Off for Tricia."
"See you," he answered without looking up.
Seeing he was alone, he resumed his whistling, the doubled notes softly
following his progress.
After a time, he stood up and brushed the soil from the old flight suit
he wore, a suit stripped of all insignia, although still with an equipment
belt. Some of the original tools were obviously missing, and he had placed the
hand hoe in the empty sidearm holster.
His eyes surveyed the small plot registered in the name of Martin
deCorso, Interstellar Survey Service, technician third class, retired, and he
nodded. Within weeks, the bestmeat plants would be producing, and within days
of production he would be sharing his bounty with the other gardeners. Each of
the long pods to come would also contain a central seed pod that would allow
them to grow their own.
He hoped the Forsenian DomSecs were as indifferent to the retired and
elderly as first appearances indicated. If they weren't, then he'd have to try
something else.
Fingering the seed packet within his belt, he started back down the
plastreet pathway toward the checkout gate, where an older DomSec waited to
ensure that no one but approved gardeners entered, and where, when the plants
bore fruit, the amount produced was also entered, theoretically, he had been
told, for record-keeping purposes.
Since the bestmeats resembled giant cucumbers, Old Earth variety, he did
not anticipate any problems to begin with. Forsenia was far enough from Shaik
Corso's enterprises and Westmark that the bestmeat furor was unknown to the
Forsenian authorities, as were the house tree and a few other biological
innovations.
The man shook his head. He was not at all certain about the wisdom or
the success of his venture, but he needed time to concentrate on one project
at a time, to let things settle inside his own head. He'd told Lyr that he
would be out of touch for some time, perhaps more than a standard year. Wise?
Probably not. Necessary? No doubt of that.
He glanced around. More than half the plots were being actively tended,
even though the temperature was rapidly approaching its midday peak, close to
30¦C. The temperature would stay near the high until midafternoon, when the
thunderstorms would roll down from the highlands and drop both torrential
rains and the temperature, leaving a steamy twilight and evening that would
turn progressively drier as the night progressed.
The slender gardener took his hands from his belt and slowed his steps
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