Isaac Asimov - Foundation's Edge

The First Speaker finally said, in a mild way, as though that would ease the blow, “At an emergency meeting of the Table, initiated by Speaker Delarmi—”

“Without your consent, First Speaker?”

“For what she wanted, she needed the consent of only three other Speakers, not including myself. At the emergency meeting that was then called, you were impeached, Speaker Gendibal. You have been accused as being unworthy of the post of Speaker and you must be tried. This is the first time in over three centuries that a bill of impeachment has been carried out against a Speaker—”

Gendibal said, fighting to keep down any sign of anger, “Surely you did not vote for my impeachment yourself.”

“I did not, but I was alone. The rest of the Table was unanimous and the vote was ten to one for impeachment. The requirement for impeachment, as you know, is eight votes including the First Speaker—or ten without him.”

“But I was not present.”

“You would not have been able to vote.”

“I might have spoken in my defense.”

“Not at that stage. The precedents are few, but clear. Your defense will be at the trial, which will come as soon as possible, naturally.”

Gendibal bowed his head in thought. Then he said, “This does not concern me overmuch, First Speaker. Your initial instinct, I think, was right. The matter of Trevize takes precedence. May I suggest you delay the trial on that ground?”

The First Speaker held up his hand. “I don’t blame you for not understanding the situation, Speaker. Impeachment is so rare an event that I myself have been forced to look up the legal procedures involved. Nothing takes precedence. We are forced to move directly to the trial, postponing everything else.”

Gendibal placed his fists on the desk and leaned toward the First Speaker. “You are not serious?”

“It is the law.”

“The law can’t be allowed to stand in the way of a clear and present danger.”

“To the Table, Speaker Gendibal, you are the clear and present danger. —No, listen to me! The law that is involved is based on the conviction that nothing can be more important than the possibility of corruption or the misuse of power on the part of a Speaker.”

“But I am guilty of neither, First Speaker, and you knew it. This is a matter of a personal vendetta on the part of Speaker Delarmi. If there is misuse of power, it is on her part. My crime is that I have never labored to make myself popular—I admit that much—and I have paid too little attention to fools who are old enough to be senile but young enough to have power.”

“Like myself, Speaker?”

Gendibal sighed. “You see, I’ve done it again. I don’t refer to you, First Speaker. —Very well, then, let us have an instant trial, then. Let us have it tomorrow. Better yet, tonight. Let us get it over with and then pass on to the matter of Trevize. We dare not wait.”

The First Speaker said, “Speaker Gendibal. I don’t think you understand the situation. We have had impeachments before—not many, just two. Neither of those resulted in a conviction. You, however, will be convicted! You will then no longer be a member of the Table and you will no longer have a say in public policy. You will not, in fact, even have a vote at the annual meeting of the Assembly.”

“And you will not act to prevent that?”

“I cannot. I will be voted down unanimously. I will then be forced to resign, which I think is what the Speakers would like to see.”

“And Delarmi will become First Speaker?”

“That is certainly a strong possibility.”

“But that must not be allowed to happen!”

“Exactly! Which is why I will have to vote for your conviction.”

Gendibal drew a deep breath. “I shall demand an instant trial.”

“You must have time to prepare your defense.”

“What defense? They will listen to no defense. Instant trial!”

“The Table must have time to prepare their case.”

“They have no case and will want none. They have me convicted in their minds and will require nothing more. In fact, they would rather convict me tomorrow than the day after—and tonight rather than tomorrow. Put it to them.”

The First Speaker rose to his feet. They faced each other across the desk. The First Speaker said, “Why are you in such a hurry?”

“The matter of Trevize will not wait.”

“Once you are convicted and I am rendered feeble in the face of a Table united against me, what will have been accomplished?”

Gendibal said in an intense whisper, “Have no fears! Despite everything, I will not be convicted.”

Trevize said, “Are you ready, Janov?”

Pelorat looked up from the book he was viewing and said, “You mean, for the Jump, old fellow?”

“For the hyperspatial Jump. Yes.”

Pelorat swallowed. “Now, you’re sure that it will be in no way uncomfortable. I know it is a silly thing to fear, but the thought of having myself reduced to incorporeal tachyons, which no one has ever seen or detected—”

“Come, Janov, it’s a perfected thing. Upon my honor! The Jump has been in use for twenty-two thousand years, as you explained, and I’ve never heard of a single fatality in hyperspace. We might come out of hyperspace in an uncomfortable place, but then the accident would happen in space—not while we are composed of tachyons.”

“Small consolation, it seems to me.”

“We won’t come out in error, either. To tell you the truth, I was thinking of carrying it through without telling you, so that you would never know it had happened. On the whole, though, I felt it would be better if you experienced it consciously, saw that it was no problem of any kind, and could forget it totally henceforward.”

“Well—” said Pelorat dubiously. “I suppose you’re right, but honestly I’m in no hurry.”

“I assure you—”

“No no, old fellow, I accept your assurances unequivocally. It’s just that—Did you ever read Santerestil Matt ?”

“Of course. I’m not illiterate.”

“Certainly. Certainly. I should not have asked. Do you remember it?”

“Neither am I an amnesiac.”

“I seem to have a talent for offending. All I mean is that I keep thinking of the scenes where Santerestil and his friend, Ban, have gotten away from Planet 17 and are lost in space. I think of those perfectly hypnotic scenes among the stars, lazily moving along in deep silence, in changelessness, in— Never believed it, you know. I loved it and I was moved by it, but I never really believed it. But now—after I got used to just the notion of being in space, I’m experiencing it and—it’s silly, I know—but I don’t want to give it up. It’s as though I’m Santerestil—”

“And I’m Ban,” said Trevize with just an edge of impatience.

“In a way. The small scattering of dim stars out there are motionless, except our sun, of course, which must be shrinking but which we don’t see. The Galaxy retains its dim majesty, unchanging. Space is silent and I have no distractions—”

“Except me.”

“Except you. —But then, Golan, dear chap, talking to you about Earth and trying to teach you a bit of prehistory has its pleasures, too. I don’t want that to come to an end, either.”

“It won’t. Not immediately, at any rate. You don’t suppose we’ll take the Jump and come through on the surface of a planet, do you? We’ll still be in space and the Jump will have taken no measurable time at all. It may well be a week before we make surface of any kind, so do relax.”

“By surface, you surely don’t mean Gaia. We may be nowhere near Gaia when we come out of the Jump.”