“No way.” I leaned forward until our faces were only six inches apart. “That’s our ship — we’ve slaved over it. If they think they can call in and take it away from me and Mac without even asking, and leave us—”

“They want you, too, Jeanie.” Limperis leaned back a bit. In my excitement I was spitting all over him. “Both of you. The orders are very clear. They want you and McAndrew and the ship.”

“And what the hell for?”

“For a mission of their own.” He looked more baffled than irritated now. “For a mission so secret they wouldn’t tell me anything about it.”

That was the first shock. The others dribbled in one by one as McAndrew and I made our way from the Penrose Institute to the headquarters of the Food and Energy Council.

The Institute had been parked out near Mars orbit. With the Hoatzin, and its hundred gee drive, or even with one of the prototypes like Merganser at fifty gee, we could have been to Earth in half a day. But Professor Limperis still insisted that the McAndrew Drive should never be employed in the Inner System, and McAndrew himself backed that decision completely. We were stuck with a slow boat and a ten day journey.

Surprise Number One came soon after we powered away from the Institute. I had assumed that we would be running a confidential mission for the Energy Department of the full Food and Energy Council. We had worked together on high-energy projects in the past, and I knew McAndrew was a real expert on the subject. But our travel documents instructed us to report to the Food Department. What did food programs need with a theoretical physicist, a spacecraft captain, and a high-acceleration ship?

Three days from Earth we were hit with another surprise. The information came in as a brief, impersonal directive that could be neither amplified nor questioned. I would not be the captain of the new mission. Despite the fact that I had more experience with the McAndrew Drive than anyone else in the System, a Food Department official would give me my orders. I became even angrier when, two days from Earth, we learned the rest of it. McAndrew and I would serve as “special advisors” reporting to a crew from the Food and Energy Council. We would have about as much decision-making authority on the mission as the robochef. I had descended from captain to cabin boy.

For me, maybe they could persuade themselves that it was a reasonable decision; some people have more deep space experience than I do (but not much more) and you could say that my talent is nothing more than tricks for staying alive and out of trouble. But McAndrew was another matter. To assign him a role as a simple information source suggested an ignorance or an arrogance beyond my belief.

All right, so I’m a McAndrew fan; I won’t deny it. When I got to Earth I would have words with the bureaucrats of the Food Department.

I needed to talk it out with somebody, but Mac was no use. He wasn’t interested in arguments on nontechnical subjects. Instead, he retreated as usual into his private world of tensors and twistors, and despite my own respectable scientific background I couldn’t follow him there. For most of the journey he sat slack-jawed on his bunk, perfectly content, gazing at the blank wall and performing the invisible mental gymnastics that had earned him his reputation.

That sort of thinking is beyond me. I spent the long hours brooding, and by the time we were led into the Council’s offices I was loaded for bear.

The Food Department enjoys a bigger staff and budget than anything else in System Government, and the opulence of its fittings was quite a contrast to the spartan furnishings of the Institute. We were conducted through four luxurious outer offices, each with its own secretaries and screening procedure. Ample working space spoke of prestige and power. The room we finally came to held a conference table big enough for forty people.

A woman was seated alone at the massive desk. I looked at her elegant dress, beautifully made-up eyes and carefully coiffured hair, and I suddenly felt scruffy and out of place. Mac and I were dressed for space work, in one-piece beige coveralls and loafers. My hair had been cropped to a few centimeters long. His thin, straggly mop as usual dipped untidily over his high forehead. Neither of us was wearing a touch of make-up.

“Professor McAndrew?” She stood up and smiled at us. I glowered back at her. “And Captain Roker, I assume. I must apologize for treating you in such cavalier fashion. You have had a long trip here, and no adequate explanation.”

Good disarming waffle, the sort you get from an experienced politician or the highest level of bureaucrat, but her smile was broad and friendly. She came forward and held out a pudgy hand. As I took it I made a closer inspection of her appearance: thirty-five years old, maybe, and a bit overweight. Perhaps this messy situation wasn’t her fault. I restrained my scowl and muttered conventional words of greeting.

She gestured us to sit down.

“I am Anna Lisa Griss,” she went on. “Head of Programs for the Food Department. Welcome to Headquarters. Other staff members will join us in a few minutes, but first I want to point out the need for secrecy. What you will learn here cannot be mentioned to anyone outside this room without my permission. I will come to the point at once. Look at this.”

She exuded an air of complete control. As she was speaking the lights dimmed and an image became visible on the screen at the far end of the room. It showed a column of calendar years, and alongside it two other columns of figures.

“Total System food reserves, present and projected,” said Griss. “Look at the trend — it’s a log scale — then look particularly at the behavior thirty years from now.”

I was still trying to assimilate the first few numbers when McAndrew grunted and put his hand up to his face.

“That’s ridiculous,” he said. “You’re showing a factor of two drop in less than three decades. What’s the basis for that projection?”

If she felt surprise at his speed of response, she didn’t show it. “We included population patterns, available acreages, plant yields, and capacity to manufacture synthetics. Would you like to see the details on any one of them?”

McAndrew shook his head. “Never mind the details. That’s disaster and starvation flashing on your screen.”

“It is. It’s the reason that you are here.” She brought the lights back up to what I regarded as a dim, conspiratorial level and dropped her voice to match. “You can imagine the effect when that projection becomes public knowledge, especially if no one can see any way out. Even though we’re talking about many years in the future, we’d see stockpiling — probably food wars.”

I was feeling a growing anger. There had been rumors of a major future food shortage flying around the System for a long time. The Administration had denied every one, dismissing all gloomy forecasts as alarmist.

“If you’re correct in your projections, you can’t keep this a secret,” I said. “People have a right to know so they can work on solutions.”

McAndrew frowned at me, while Anna Lisa Griss gave me a quick probing glance (no smile now) and raised her dark eyebrows. The man’s easy, her look said, but this one needs persuading.

“The problem is clear enough,” she agreed. “It has been known to my group for almost a decade. Fairly soon it may be obvious to everybody. But it’s the possible solution I want to talk about now. And involving the general public wouldn’t help a bit — there’s no chance that they could provide new insights.”

I didn’t like her superior manner, but in spite of my irritation I was becoming interested. “It has to be a supply-side answer,” I said. “The population growth won’t budge.”