Foundation

TRADERS-… With psychohistoric inevitability. economic control of the Foundation grew. The traders grew rich; and with riches came power…

It is sometimes forgotten that Hober Mallow began life as an ordinary trader. It is never forgotten that he ended it as the first of the Merchant Princes…

Jorane Sutt put the tips of carefully-manicured fingers together and said, "It's something of a puzzle. In fact - and this is in the strictest of confidence - it may be another one of Hari Seldon's crises."

The man opposite felt in the pocket of his short Smyrnian jacket for a cigarette. "Don't know about that, Sutt. As a general rule, politicians start shouting 'Seldon crisis' at every mayoralty campaign."

Sutt smiled very faintly, "I'm not campaigning, Mallow. We're facing nuclear weapons, and we don't know where they're coming from."

Hober Mallow of Smyrno, Master Trader, smoked quietly, almost indifferently. "Go on. If you have more to say, get it out." Mallow never made the mistake of being overpolite to a Foundation man. He might be an Outlander, but a man's a man for a’ that.

Sutt indicated the trimensional star-map on the table. He adjusted the controls and a cluster of some half-dozen stellar systems blazed red.

'That," he said quietly, "is the Korellian Republic."

The trader nodded, "I've been there. Stinking rathole! I suppose you can call it a republic but it's always someone out of the Argo family that gets elected Commdor each time. And if you ever don't like it - things happen to you." He twisted his lip and repeated, "I've been there."

"But you've come back, which hasn't always happened. Three trade ships, inviolate under the Conventions, have disappeared within the territory of the Republic in the last year. And those ships were armed with all the usual nuclear explosives and force-field defenses."

"What was the last word heard from the ships?"

"Routine reports. Nothing else."

"What did Korell say?"

Sutt's eyes gleamed sardonically, "There was no way of asking. The Foundation's greatest asset throughout the Periphery is its reputation of power. Do you think we can lose three ships and ask for them?"

"Well, then, suppose you tell me what you want with me ."

Jorane Sutt did not waste his time in the luxury of a

He said methodically, "In a moment. You see, three ships lost in the same sector in the same year can't be accident, and nuclear power can be conquered only by more nuclear power. The question automatically arises: if Korell has nuclear weapons, where is it getting them?"

"And where does it?"

"Two alternatives. Either the Korellians have constructed them themselves-"

"Far-fetched!"

"Very! But the other possibility is that we are being afflicted with a case of treason."

"You think so?" Mallow's voice was cold.

The secretary said calmly, "There's nothing miraculous about the possibility. Since the Four Kingdoms accepted the Foundation Convention, we have had to deal with considerable groups of dissident populations in each nation. Each former kingdom has its pretenders and its former noblemen, who can't very well pretend to love the Foundation. Some of them are becoming active, perhaps."

Mallow was a dull red. "I see. Is there anything you want to say to me? I'm a Smyrnian."

"I know. You're a Smyrnian - born in Smyrno, one of the former Four Kingdoms. You're a Foundation man by education only. By birth, you're an Outlander and a foreigner. No doubt your grandfather was a baron at the time of the wars with Anacreon and Loris, and no doubt your family estates were taken away when Sef Sermak redistributed the land."

"No, by Black Space, no! My grandfather was a blood-poor son-of-a-spacer who died heaving coal at starving wages before the Foundation took over. I owe nothing to the old regime. But I was born in Smyrno, and I'm not ashamed of either Smyrno or Smyrnians, by the Galaxy. Your sly little hints of treason aren't going to panic me into licking Foundation spittle. And now you can either give your orders or make your accusations. I don't care which."

"My good Master Trader, I don't care an electron whether your grandfather was King of Smyrno or the greatest pauper on the planet. I recited that rigmarole about your birth and ancestry to show you that I'm not interested in them. Evidently, you missed the point. Let's go back now. You're a Smyrnian. You know the Outlanders. Also, you're a trader and one of the best. You've been to Korell and you know the Korellians. That's where you've got to go."

Mallow breathed deeply, "As a spy?"

"Not at all. As a trader - but with your eyes open. If you can find out where the power is coming from - I might remind you, since you're a Smyrnian, that two of those lost trade ships had Smyrnian crews."

"When do I start?"

"When will your ship be ready?"

"In six days."

"Then that's when you start. You'll have all the details at the Admiralty."

"Right!" The trader rose, shook hands roughly, and strode out.

Sutt waited, spreading his fingers gingerly and rubbing out the pressure; then shrugged his shoulders and stepped into the mayor's office.

The mayor deadened the visiplate and leaned back. "What do you make of it, Sutt?"

"He could be a good actor," said Sutt, and stared thoughtfully ahead.

It was evening of the same day, and in Jorane Sutt's bachelor apartment on the twenty-first floor of the Hardin Building, Publis Manlio was sipping wine slowly.

It was Publis Manlio in whose slight, aging body were fulfilled two great offices of the Foundation. He was Foreign Secretary in the mayor's cabinet, and to all the outer suns, barring only the Foundation itself, he was, in addition, Primate of the Church, Purveyor of the Holy Food, Master of the Temples, and so forth almost indefinitely in confusing but sonorous syllables.

He was saying, "But he agreed to let you send out that trader. It is a point."

"But such a small one," said Sutt. "It gets us nothing immediately. The whole business is the crudest sort of stratagem, since we have no way of foreseeing it to the end. It is a mere paying out of rope on the chance that somewhere along the length of it will be a noose."

"True. And this Mallow is a capable man. What if he is not an easy prey to dupery?"

"That is a chance that must be run. If there is treachery, it is the capable men that are implicated. If not, we need a capable man to detect the truth. And Mallow will be guarded. Your glass is empty."

"No, thanks. I've had enough."

Sutt filled his own glass and patiently endured the other's uneasy reverie.

Of whatever the reverie consisted, it ended indecisively, for the primate said suddenly, almost explosively, "Sutt, what's on your mind?"

"I'll tell you, Manlio." His thin lips parted, "We're in the middle of a Seldon crisis."

Manlio stared, then said softly, "How do you know? Has Seldon appeared in the Time Vault again?"

"That much, my friend, is not necessary. Look, reason it out. Since the Galactic Empire abandoned the Periphery, and threw us on our own, we have never had an opponent who possessed nuclear power. Now, for the first time, we have one. That seems significant even if it stood by itself. And it doesn't. For the first time in over seventy years, we are facing a major domestic political crisis. I should think the synchronization of the two crises, i

Manlio's eyes narrowed, "If that's all, it's not enough. There have been two Seldon crises so far, and both times the Foundation was in danger of extermination. Nothing can be a third crisis till that danger returns."

Sutt never showed impatience, "That danger is coming. Any fool can tell a crisis when it arrives. The real service to the state is to detect it in embryo. Look, Manlio, we're proceeding along a pla

"Now the first crisis came fifty years after the establishment of the Foundation, and the second, thirty years later than that. Almost seventy-five years have gone since. It's time, Manlio, it's time."

Manlio rubbed his nose uncertainly, "And you've made your plans to meet this crisis?"

Sutt nodded.

"And I," continued Manlio, "am to play a part in it?"

Sutt nodded again, "Before we can meet the foreign threat of atomic power, we've got to put our own house in order. These traders-"

"Ah!" The primate stiffened, and his eyes grew sharp.

"That's right. These traders. They are useful, but they are too strong - and too uncontrolled. They are Outlanders, educated apart from religion. On the one hand, we put knowledge into their hands, and on the other, we remove our strongest hold upon them."

"If we can prove treachery?"

"If we could, direct action would be simple and sufficient. But that doesn't signify in the least. Even if treason among them did not exist, they would form an uncertain element in our society. They wouldn't be bound to us by patriotism or common descent, or even by religious awe. Under their secular leadership, the outer provinces, which, since Hardin's time, look to us as the Holy Planet, might break away."

"I see all that, but the cure-"

"The cure must come quickly, before the Seldon Crisis becomes acute. If nuclear weapons are without and disaffection within, the odds might be too great." Sutt put down the empty glass he had been fingering, "This is obviously your job."

"Mine?"