The salesman had first tried to sell him one of the larger three- or four-place family-sized tricycles that steered with a wheel. But Hanlon finally made the man understand that he wanted only a one-man machine, and the purchase was haggled into completion—at a price so low it surprised the young secret serviceman.
"Sure is one screwy world," he shook his head as he rode back toward his apartment, after learning how to operate his new machine and its tricky engine.
Back in his room, Hanlon reviewed the situation to date on this, his second assignment for the secret service of the Inter-Stellar Corps. He had been at the head of the commission sent to Algon where he (Hanlon) had been largely instrumental in freeing from slavery the strange, vegetable-like people, the Guddus.[1] The commission had helped them make a treaty with the Federated Planets by which the natives allowed the humans to mine certain valuable metals from their planet, and to maintain the spaceship-yards that had been built by the men who had formerly enslaved them, in return for protection from exploiters, and for certain cultural assistance. Just as his work there was about finished, a message had come for Captain Hanlon to report back to the planet Simonides.
There he met his father, Regional Admiral Newton, second in command of the secret service. (This discrepancy of names was due to the fact that after young Spencer Newton's mother died, and his father "disappeared"—at the time he joined the secret service—the boy was adopted by George Hanlon, an ex-Corpsman, and his wife, and had taken his foster-father's name.)
"We're not getting anywhere on Estrella," his father had begun abruptly once they had warmly greeted each other. "I've come to the conclusion, and the Council agrees, that we need your special mental abilities there. But take it easy, Spence ... er, I never can seem to get used to calling you 'George'. Don't try to go it alone ... and you can wipe that cocky smirk off your face, mister," he commanded sternly. "This time it's an official order from the top brass. Those Estrellans are distinctly alien—not humans gone wrong."
Hanlon sobered down a bit, but secretly could not entirely shake off his attitude, feeling sure he was more than a match for any trouble he might run into. Hadn't he proved it, on Algon and right here on Simonides? Sure he had. Great Snyder, he wasn't a kid any more. He was a secret serviceman of the Inter-Stellar Corps, whom they called in when the rest of them, even his adored dad, failed.
"Just what's the problem there?" he asked, trying not to let these thoughts show in his face.
"The people of Estrella are not colonists from Terra or any of the colonized planets," the admiral explained slowly. "They are native to that world—the first such, by the way, that we have discovered who are advanced enough to be asked to join the Federation with equal status. They are quite man-like in shape, and of a high order of civilization. Their culture is much like Earth's was two hundred and fifty or three hundred years ago."
"Just beginning their real introduction to scientific and mechanical technologies on a planetary scale, eh?"
"That's it. Their system was discovered and mapped a few years ago. The Colonial Board immediately sent psychologists and linguists there to learn their language and study the natives and their form of government, their economics and general advancement. What they found, although far different from our own, was so surprisingly high that we sent them a formal offer to join the Federation. But ..." he stopped, frowning.