Read Online Manalone by Colin Kapp - Free Book Online

if the physical world has changed, why are they going to so much trouble to obscure the past to prevent comparison? Manalone, this is becoming insane! How do you fit teapot handles into an equation?’
    The concept of teapot handles gave him an idea. He was beginning to appreciate now both the reality and the scale of Raper’s postulated national conspiracy. A conspiracy of such magnitude must certainly involve the government – and now, on the eve of a general election, that particular government might easily be put out of office. Manalone began to haunt the television channels, listening to the currently dominant United Technocrats trying to defend their past actions, and hearing the counterclaims of the powerful New Party promising economic and sociological miracles. It was all very superficial and banal.
    This in itself was surprising. He had anticipated being able to detect a veiled apprehension in the ranks of the Technocrats, who, if their bid for continuing power failed, must surely leave the bones of the conspiracy exposed to the new administration. He had also expected to find concealed anticipation in the leaders of the New Party, who must surely have stumbled at some time against the web of Security, and would be eager for the opportunity to peer behind the curious screens to see what mysteries they contained. Manalone found no trace of anxiety or anticipation in their political manoeuvres, and, no matter how he searched, the great conspiracy could not be observed to exist.
    ‘Which isridiculous, Manalone! You’re a complete political non-runner, yet given half an hour of national television coverage you could damn the Technocrat administration permanently by simply reciting what you know. It doesn’t seem possible that the New Party is unaware of what is going on. Yet they decline to make political capital out of it.’
    Almost unbelievingly he listened to the old political tirades, the excuses, the allegations, whilst knowing with a dreadful certainty that nearby an ex-professor of history was in the centre of a situation which should have been a political bomb. The expenditure on Security forces alone could have been an issue which would have fetched down the existing government. This glossing-over of the really vital areas of government administration mainly confirmed his suspicions of the communal value of the political animal, and left him with a cold and helpless anger. If the free-election system could not protect the public from gross abuse – then what, in the name of creation, could?
    In the past Manalone had always automatically voted Technocrat, on the vague theory that the party hierarchy, declaredly all senior technologists in their own right, had the most competent understanding of the needs of a highly technical society. This time, when the Computer-poll centres were open, Manalone voted early and in favour of the New Party, in the forlorn hope that a potential change of government might throw some new factors into relief. Then he returned home and sat by the television all day watching the on-line results being declared, and gratified to see that his new allegiance was gaining heavily. When the final count had been taken and verified, the New Party had a comfortable lead. Minutes later a recorded voice on the autophone informed him that Paul Raper was already on his way.
    Raper arrivedone hour later, very hot and angry. He drew Manalone aside and came swiftly to the point.
    ‘Did you see that fiasco?’
    ‘You mean the election?’
    ‘Yes. The New Party – this morning they didn’t stand a chance.’
    ‘How do you calculate that, Paul?’
    ‘All the free opinion polls showed that the Technocrats had at least thirty percent majority.’
    ‘Not the ones that I saw.’
    ‘You could have seen only interpretations of the Information Ministry’s official survey – which was devious, to say the least. The free opinion poll’s results never got through to the press. They were censored