The massed camp of the fanatic followers of Morgan appeared in the
distance like a discarded rag on either side of the road. Then as they
approached it broke into individual knots of sand-scoured, unwashed
people clustered about their tents. Morgan hadn't given much thought to
adequate facilities before leading them out here.
The truck rolled to a halt in the center of the camp. Morgan himself, a
long, lanky figure in a dusty black suit, came at the head of a group of
his people to meet them. "I hope you have the news we are waiting for,"
he said cordially.
"We have a statement," said Metcalf. "Dr. Medick here, who has made an
important discovery that will enable all of you to return to your homes,
will read it to you."
Paul could have stayed in the cab, but he preferred to climb to the
platform atop the truck to get a look at the crowd Morgan had assembled.
He hesitated a moment with the paper in his hands, then took up the mike
and read the statement Metcalf had prepared. "The United States Space
Command wishes to announce that--"
It fell utterly flat on completely non-understanding ears. Paul looked
over the mass of faces and knew it had failed. Something far more than
this was needed. A little feedback, he thought grimly. A little feedback
of the idiocy of their present situation to correct their course and
return it to normalcy.
"Five hundred years ago there might have been a crowd of people just
like you," he said suddenly in low tones. "There was a harbor, and some
small ships, and a man who believed he could sail them over the edge of
the world. On the shore were people who thought he was a fool and a
blasphemer, and a few who thought he was right--or at least hoped he
was.
"Five hundred years ago was the beginning of a new freedom from the
prison of a tiny, constricted world. Today, another freedom waits our
successful conquest of space. And whenever a freedom has been won there
have been more who jeered against it than have cheered for it. You are
today making a choice--"
He talked for ten minutes, and when he was through he knew that he'd
accomplished his goal. Even before the sound truck pulled out, the cars
of the Caravan were breaking away from the mass and disappearing in the
distance.
"Nice job," Metcalf congratulated, as if he'd been responsible for it
himself.
"Just a little feedback in the right place--" murmured Paul absently.
"Feedback? What's that--new kind of propaganda technique--?"
"Yeah, you might call it that. How could a guy have been so _blind_--?"
he said fiercely, more to himself than to his companions.
He hurried to the laboratory as soon as the truck got him back to Base.
He rounded up Barker and Nat Holt and a dozen of his other top men. "The
answer's been under our noses all the time," he said. "We've been too
busy fighting each other for the sake of our own preconceived notions to
have seen it!"
"What are you talking about?" Holt demanded.
"Feedback. Can't you guess what it is?"
"No."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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