"Yes?" Hanlon was interested now, and paying close attention. "But what?"
"That's what we don't know. At first they seemed very pleased with the offer. They studied it carefully and, at our suggestion, sent a picked group of statesmen, scientists and merchants on a trip to our various worlds in one of our ships. These men and women seemed delighted with what they found, and enthusiastic about their world joining us. But, shortly after their return home and before the final treaties were signed, opposition began to develop."
"What kind of...?"
"All kinds. Enough to make the plans slow down and halt. The embassy sent there couldn't discover the reason—we have trouble enough understanding their way of thinking at all—and they yelled for help. We sent a couple of S S men there, and when they failed, I went there myself, to help them, and the embassy came home."
He shook his head. "I can't find a thing, either, that seems significant. Oh, the surface opposition is easily discernable. Papers, handbills, inflammatory speeches by spellbinders, whispering campaigns, all calling for keeping Estrella for the Estrellans and running out all foreigners bent on plundering the planet for their own enrichment—that sort of thing."
"Maybe some natives who want to take over, themselves," Hanlon ventured.
"Could be. We've thought of that, but have found no proof. We have no proof of anything except the opposition. Only one thing, that may or may not have something to do with this. We've discovered that almost simultaneously with this opposition an unprecedented crime wave started there—every type of criminal activity imaginable, and that is almost unheard of on that world. But we can't even get the first leads as to who is behind it all. That's why I suggested you be called in, and the staff agreed."
The admiral paused and his piercing gray eyes bored earnestly into the blue ones of his son. "Keep this in mind at all times, Spence, for it is most important. We must succeed there. This is the first non-Terran world we've found equal in cultural advancement to ours. But surely it won't be the last. And we must win them over. All civilized worlds must band together for mutual growth and well-being. So this is our most important project just now."
"Yes," seriously, "I can see that. Also, that if we do get them to join us, we can point out that fact to any other planets we may discover and try to bring into the Federation in the future."
And lying at ease on a heavily-padded bench before the control board of a space cruiser, a stranger looked deeply into a multiphased scanner that worked on scientific principles not yet discovered by humans.