Mack Reynolds - The Best Ye Breed

Cliff shook his head and said, “It’s the damnedest thing you ever saw. Since you two left, pounding after old Ibrahim, a dozen or more delegations have come from Common Europe, India, the United States of the Americas, and, for Christ’s sake, even South Africa. Half a dozen of them are trying to lay money onto us.”

Bey and Kenny were bug-eyeing him. “Money? What in the hell for?” Bey said.

“Well, for instance, the Swedes. They’re the only ones I’ve accepted anything from, so far. They laid ten million gold Kronen on us in advance payment for bauxite. They don’t have any bauxite of their own and they’ve got a king-size aluminum industry. They want in on the ground floor.”

“ What ground floor?” Kenny demanded, unbelievingly.

“Well, it seems that Rio de Oro is ass-deep in bauxite, probably the biggest undeveloped fields in the world.”

“Where in the devil’s Rio de Oro?” Bey said.

Jimmy Peters had just entered. Originally from Trinidad, he was smaller than the American men and chunky of build. He wore old-fashioned spectacles and had an air of education and cultivation. Until he had joined El Hassan he had been with the African Department of the British Commonwealth. On his face could still be seen the lines brought on by the death of his brother, Jack, who had been as close to him as a twin. He was dressed in the new khaki uniform of the El Hassan forces.

Jimmy Peters was known for his all but photographic memory and said now, “The former Spanish Sahara was divided into two provinces, Rio de Oro, about 70,000 square miles, and Sekia el-Hamra, some 32,000 square miles. Population has been estimated everywhere from 27,000 nomads to 45,000, though I’ll be damned if I know how anybody could ever have counted them. The country’s fantastically rich in phosphates and particularly bauxite, possibly the richest deposits known. Morocco to the north, Algeria to the east, and Mauretania to the south, have all claimed the country since the Spanish pulled out. They never have made a permanent settlement, the area’s up for grabs.”

Isobel said, “What would we need with an encyclopedia, with Jimmy around?”

Had Jimmy Peters been lighter in complexion, he would have flushed, but he grinned his shy grin at her. They were all in love with Isobel Cunningham.

“But what of it?” Bey demanded. “We haven’t taken this Rio de Oro, at least as yet. So far as I know, we have no elements of our people in that area at all. Mauretania, yes, but not the former Spanish Sahara.”

Cliff said with a short laugh and a shake of the head, “Evidently, the Swedes are willing to wait. They want that bauxite so bad they can taste it.”

Homer said, “We’re being picky and choosey about whom we make deals with. We’re not out for the quick buck, we’re looking forward to the development of North Africa, for the benefit of the North Africans, not a bunch of multinational corporations.”

Rex Donaldson and Doctor Warren Harding Smythe entered. The heavy-set, gray haired doctor, whose feisty energy belied his weight, was, as usual, sputtering. “What… What!” he demanded. “Why am I torn away from my patients? I have enough work on my hands for a dozen doctors, a double score of nurses and…”

Bey said, “An Arab Union doctor should be here by tomorrow, Doctor Smythe, and two trained medicos with him.”

And Isobel said, “And we have also picked up radio signals that several of the other American Medical Relief teams are coming in, to ask questions about their continued operations in the areas where El Hassan’s followers have taken over. Surely, they’ll pitch in locally, while the emergency continues.”

Rex Donaldson, formerly of Nassau in the British Bahamas, formerly of the College of Anthropology, Oxford, formerly field man for the African Department of the British Commonwealth, was a small, bent man who usually operated in the Dogon country to the south, breaking down tribal barriers, prejudices against the new schools, and the ritual-taboos traditions of the area in general, was now on El Hassan’s immediate staff.

He looked at Bey and Kenny and said, “Hello, chaps. How did you make out with our chum, the colonel?”

“A bit bloodily,” Kenny said. “But he and the remains of his forces are coming in.”

Homer said, “Will everybody be seated about this table here? The cabinet of El Hassan is in session, or should we call it a djemaa el kebar , in the Arabic fashion?”

The others all moved up to places at the table, save the doctor, who stood glaring.

“Mr. Crawford,” he sputtered. “By no stretch of imagination can I be considered one of your cabinet. I have informed you, long since, that I am opposed to what you are trying to do. You are attempting to force these people into the 21st Century, overnight. They are not capable of assimilating such changes. I fear for their mental health under the pressures of what has been called Future Shock. I and the other teams of the American Medical Relief are here to fight disease, to build clinics and hospitals, and, above all, medical schools—not to change institutions that are not ready for change.”

Homer Crawford looked at him in exasperation and said, “Doctor, you contradict yourself. You wish to build medical schools, but who will be your students in them? Bedouins who cannot read or write? You speak of clinics. Very well, your American Medical Relief teams—and we admire their work—number a score or two in an area bigger than the United States. Your funds are far from unlimited and I understand that large elements in the American Congress, calling for financial retrenchments, wish to cut your appropriation down to a point that would make it meaningless. Then who will maintain these clinics and hospitals? Who will buy the medicines necessary to treat everything from endemic syphilis to ophthalmia, the eye disease almost universal among nomad children?”

Doctor Smythe stared at him in frustration.

Homer said, “I propose to name you Vizier of Health. Immediately, a university will be begun here in Tamanrasset. There will be a College of African Medicine. The instructors will be largely American blacks but we will also draw upon medically educated blacks from the former British and French colonies.”

“And who will finance this mad dream?”

Homer Crawford nodded in acceptance of the validity of that question and said, “We have recently received word that the Africa for Africans Association, to which Miss Cunningham and Mr. Jackson belonged, has been swung over to our support in New York, through the efforts of our Foreign Minister, Jake Armstrong. A million dollars has already been raised. Jake is placing ads in American Negro magazines and other publications, for American black doctors to come to Africa both as teachers and practitioners in the field. No matter what your feelings, Doctor, and we respect them, the cause of better health in North Africa will be better served if you take your position not as a simple general practitioner, but as the head of all medicine in the rapidly expanding domains of El Hassan.”

As he was speaking, a power reached out from the former sociologist, a psychic power, which he was unaware he wielded, but which was well known to all his immediate colleagues. His personality had suddenly dominated the room.

Such must have been the power once held by Joshua of Nazareth, by Mohammed, and, for the sake of evil, Hitler. Such must have been the power of personality of the young Alexander when he stood, surrounded by Parmenion, Ptolemy, Antepater and the others of the Companions, with the thirty thousand spearmen of the phalanx arrayed behind them, on the west bank of the Hellespont and looked over at the far shore of Asia Minor with Persia and India beyond. What must he have said in Greek? The equivalent of, “All right, boys. Forward. We’ll give them a bit of a show.”