Captain Rafael Torres, Lodgemaster, Federated Brotherhood of Spacefarers, reads the Polesotechnic League motto:
"All the traffic will bear." (p. 138)
- and reflects sourly:
"That could be taken two ways..." (ibid.)
Neither Torres nor Anderson spells out what the two ways are but readers should not need much explanation. We will ship and sell as many goods as we can? We will minimize pay and maximize hours as much as we can? A conflict of interests is built into the employer-employee relationship. Although van Rijn is the hero of this story, which became a series, my sympathies are entirely with Torres in this exchange. I would want to be represented by very tough negotiators if I were employed by van Rijn although I would also prefer SSL to some of the other companies in the League.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
And Old Nick won over Torres to supporting his plan for solving the problem posed by Borthu by volunteering to put his own neck on the line! It was much harder for Torres to refuse his help after that.
Ad astra! Sean
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