"But if the British computers are wrong, why doesn't somebody do something about it?" Lindsay asked.
Anderson said, "If it were that simple, Zalen...." His smile was rueful. "Unfortunately our English friends—or their rulers at any rate—are determined that socialism is the only government suitable to their country. Actually it is nothing of the sort—they can thrive only with a mercantile capitalism under a nominal constitutional monarchy."
"In that case I still don't see—" Lindsay began.
"Contrary to what you're thinking, their leaders are not villains," Anderson told him. "They are men and women obsessed with an ideal that has hampered them for almost two centuries. And they are incapable of accepting any conclusion counter to their ideals."
"Even to impoverishing an entire planet?" Lindsay asked.
Anderson shrugged. "A penalty of their insularity," he replied. "The reason for this little meeting, Zalen, is to explain that not all of us are in favor of supporting Britain and its absurd production bungling at the expense of Mars. A few of us are becoming singularly fed up with the computer neurosis that seems to have this planet in its grip."
Maria leaned forward, her dark eyes brilliant in their intensity. She said, "Can't you see, Zalen, that is why we are so concerned with your possible assassination? We fear the whole of Earth is on the lip of a nervous breakdown. Unless the grip of the computers is broken anything might happen. And we're counting on you, with your fresh viewpoint and prestige, to help us."
"I was hoping you might be concerned about me," said Lindsay softly. "After all, I'm the one who is supposed to be killed." He watched a sudden flush of embarrassment add charming brilliance to the vividness of the Secretary General's daughter.
"Of course we're concerned," she said defensively. "We're not really monsters, Zalen."
"What Maria means," said Anderson swiftly, "is that if the worst should happen it will go a long way toward making Earth entirely computer-dependent, if du Fresne's prophecy is fulfilled a lot of people who might go on fighting will simply give up."