Cauldron of Ghosts (26 page)

But there were less benign forces in Mesan society, who were even more secretive and a lot more dangerous. Somogyi was highly placed enough to have realized years before that someone, somewhere, was pulling the strings.

Who they were . . . he didn’t know, although he suspected they were Manpower’s innermost circle.

What their goals were . . . he didn’t know.

What their plans were for
him
. . . he didn’t know that, either.

What worried him was that he thought such plans probably existed. And whatever they were, probably weren’t going to be good for him. Not because those mysterious hidden powers bore any animosity toward him but simply because he was beneath their notice.

When a behemoth makes plans to go somewhere, do those plans take into consideration the small and fragile creatures that might get underfoot along the way?

Chapter 28

“Well, we’re back.” Berry started toward Hugh but then stopped and gave him a wary look. “Any problems while we were gone?”

Hugh marked the place and set down his tablet on a side table next to the very comfortable-looking armchair he was sitting in. “Other than two insurrections—both suppressed with great bloodshed—three attempted coups d’état—you’ll find the heads of the ringleaders on pikes lining Vesey Boulevard—and one disgruntled constitutional fetishist who exiled himself rather than submit to royal tyranny, no. There were no problems. I don’t count the six plays, three street performances, eighteen vids and two old-fashioned pamphlets which denounced the brutal rule of the Usurper Arai. Speaking of which—”

A large forefinger swept across the group entering the salon behind Berry. “You’re all under arrest. It turns out I have a long-suppressed megalomaniacal personality. Who knew?”

Berry gave him a look that combined exasperation and (some) amusement, then proceeded to squelch the usurper’s scheme by the simple expedient of sitting on his lap, wrapping her arm around his neck and giving him a kiss.

Meanwhile, Jeremy took a seat facing Hugh while Princess Ruth and Web Du Havel sat on a couch at right angles to him. “Out of idle curiosity,” asked Ruth, “how much of that has any truth at all to it?”

Hugh extricated himself from the royal embrace. “There
were
a couple of vids made. One of them was a spoof, the other was . . . deranged. And there really was a guy who went into exile in protest against what he called constitutional irregularities. He posted a long list of them on a public web site. It’s still up, if you’re curious. It’s called ‘The Road to Serfdom.’ ”

“Constitutional irregularities, it is?” Du Havel shook his head. “Interesting concept—given that Torch hasn’t yet adopted a formal constitution.”

“Yup. He listed that as Irregularity Number One.”

Ruth frowned. “Now that I think about it, why
haven’t
we adopted a constitution?”

Jeremy nodded in the direction of Du Havel. “That’s the Prime Minister’s doing. He’s been stalling the matter with all his legendary skill and cunning. I’d accuse him of plotting against the nation except that I agree with him. The last thing we need to be doing right now is wasting time and energy wrangling over the provisions of a formal constitution.”

Ruth looked at Du Havel. “Can you explain your reasoning? I’m not necessarily quarreling with you, but it seems . . . I don’t know. Kind of”—she chuckled—“well. Irregular.”

“I think we’d do a lot better to let things shake down for a few years before we tried to put anything in writing.” Du Havel made a face. “Right now is not the time. We don’t have much in the way of collective experience and most of our individual citizens have even less. Slavery’s not exactly a great school for learning constitutional principles.”

Web started rolling up his sleeves, which was a habitual mannerism whenever he was expounding on something. “One of the keys to a good constitution is to keep it short and sweet. The great-great-grand-daddy of them all, the constitution of the ancient United States of America, was less than five thousand words long. That includes what they called the ‘Bill of Rights.’ Part of the reason they were able to keep their constitution that short was because they’d had years of experience trying to manage their affairs with an earlier version of it that proved to have a lot of defects. In contrast, lots of constitutionally based polities have tried to rush the process. Sometimes it works, but usually what results are hideously massive and tortuous documents that please nobody except lawyers. I’d just as soon avoid that.”

“But what—” Ruth was interrupted by a chime. That came from a large screen on the wall behind her which was currently depicting a pastoral scene but doubled as the salon’s com unit.

“Are we expecting to hear from anyone?” Berry asked.

Hugh scratched his chin. “Well . . . not exactly ‘expecting.’ But I’m pretty sure that’ll be either Yuri Radamacher or Sharon Justice. Or both, more likely.”

Berry’s eyebrows went up. “They’re here? On Torch?”

“Got here two days ago.”

“Well, accept the call, then.”

Hugh pressed the acceptance key built into the side table and the big screen came to life.

Sure enough, it was Radamacher and Justice. The high commissioner had presented his credentials to Queen Berry and Prime Minister Du Havel a couple of weeks ago. But that had been in the course of a very short visit he’d made to Torch shortly after he reached his new post. He’d spent most of his time on Erewhon.

“Hello, Your Mousety,” said Radamacher.

“I love that title,” Berry said, beaming.

Ruth rolled her eyes. “Ramses and Nebuchadnezzar are spinning in their graves.”

Radamacher smiled and continued. “We’d like to speak to you, please.”

Berry looked around. “Uh . . . which one of us? Or two or three?”

“All of you. Or at least, all of you that I can see in the screen. To enumerate, in addition to yourself, that would be Princess Ruth, Prime Minister Du Havel, Secretary of War Jeremy X and Secretary of the Posterior Arai.”

Berry burst into laughter. “Did you really use that title?”

Hugh shrugged. “It was your idea, remember? What the hell, I thought it was sort of charming—and it helped keep tempers from rising since most people understood that my so-called ‘post’ was ad hoc and jury-rigged.”

While he’d been talking, Berry had pressed the key which indicated to the security guards outside that the callers were to be allowed into the royal presence.

A short time later, the door opened and the two Havenites came in. Berry indicated the unoccupied couch to her left that faced Ruth and Web. The four pieces of furniture in the center of the room—two couches and two large armchairs—formed an oblong around a low and large table.

“Have a seat,” she said. “What’s on your mind?”

After Radamacher and Justice sat down, the high commissioner etc. etc. nodded toward his companion. “Sharon has some information she thinks we should share with you. Officially, I’m not here, by the way.”

Web got up and moved toward a side table. “Something to drink? Tea? Coffee? Khava juice?”

Yuri peered suspiciously at a beaker filled with a thick-looking liquid colored somewhere between amber and terra cotta. “What’s khava juice? And what does it taste like?”

“It’s made from khava—that’s a root, apparently, not a fruit—grown on Kapteyn 2. I have no idea what it tastes like. And I’m not about to find out, either.”

Jeremy chuckled. “That’s our Prime Minister. Set in his ways. Conservative through and through.” Which was perhaps an odd way to describe the head of government of a nation created by a slave revolt—but the former leader of the Audubon Ballroom had his own way of looking at things.

“As for what it tastes like,” Jeremy continued, “it tastes crappy. I mean,
look
at the stuff.”

“Coffee, please,” said Sharon.

“Unofficially, me too,” said Yuri.

“Why are you not official?” asked Ruth. She waved her hand. “That’s an unofficial question, of course.”

“The usual. Plausible deniability. Whoever came up with that term, incidentally? Whoever she or he is, they’ve got to be burning in hell somewhere.”

“Freezing, more like,” said Hugh. “I’m willing to bet the guilty party is spending eternity in Malebolge, Dante’s eighth level of hell. That’s the level assigned to hypocrites, grafters, counterfeiters and counselors of fraud. As for who it was, the swindle goes back so far it’s impossible to say for sure. My money’s on Octavian.”

“Who’s Octavian?” asked Berry.

“Octavian De Brassieres,” said Ruth. “Makes sense. He was the Legislaturalist who proposed the ‘unfit for office’ provision in Haven’s new constitution back in the 1850s.”

Hugh winced slightly, but said nothing. Ruth wasn’t looking his way in any event, since she was still focused on Radamacher.

For his part, Yuri was smiling, but the source of his amusement might have been the general situation. “The reason I’m not official is because the government of Haven has, as yet, taken no position on the developments which Sharon is about to explain. For that matter, the government of Haven does not, as yet, officially know anything at all about these developments.”

“And unofficially?”

“I’m sure Cachat has figured it out by now. Who he’s told, though . . .” He waggled his hand. “Anton Zilwicki and Kevin Usher, almost certainly, and if so that means President Pritchart probably knows and so does the Countess of the Tor—and if she knows, she’s very likely to have passed the information on to Empress Elizabeth.”

Ruth frowned. “Everyone who matters, in other words. So why bother with the pretense?” She shook her head. “Never mind. Silly question. So what are these developments?”

Web came back with two cups of coffee and handed them to Sharon and Yuri. “I’m now filled with curiosity myself.”

Sharon set down the cup without tasting it. “In a nutshell, Erewhon and Maya Sector have formed an alliance. Whether it’s informal or formal, I don’t know. Yet. But regardless, it’s a real alliance. The heart of it so far is that Erewhon is serving Maya as its armaments developer and manufacturer.”

She paused to pick up the coffee cup and blow on it, which gave everyone some time to think over what she’d said.

Yuri had been blowing on his coffee all along and now took a tentative sip from the cup. Still too hot, though. He moved the cup away but didn’t set it down.

“Do you know,” he mused, “that just in the last two hundred T-years and just in the Republic of Haven alone—I looked it up once when I had way too much spare time on my hands—there have been eleven separate inventions to cool coffee in a cup. Well, any kind of hot liquids, I suppose. Yet not one of them has ever been commercially successful.”

He tried the coffee again. Still too hot. He set it down. “Either we’re all a bunch of hopeless reactionaries—which is doubtful, given the giddiness with which fashion changes—or social conventions usually trump practicality. Blowing on a cup is such a nice way to pause a discussion without being awkward about it.”

“Does he always philosophize?” demanded Jeremy.

“Pretty much,” said Sharon. She finally took a sip from the cup and her eyes widened. “My, that’s good. Sumatran?”

Du Havel bestowed upon her the approving look of one connoisseur encountering another. “Allowing for some evolution, yes. The coffee beans are actually grown on Gascogne, one of the moons of a giant gas planet near Mendelschoen. But the strain originates from Terra’s Indonesia.”

Ruth was looking impatient. Her knowledge of coffee extended far enough to distinguish it from tea and no farther. “What sort of manufacturing?” she asked.

“Naval, mostly. Everything from SDs on down.”

That caused everyone to sit back a little. “They’re building
superdreadnoughts
for Maya?” asked Hugh.

“How many?” asked Ruth.

“At least a dozen. As well as a lot of lighter warships. You name it, the Erewhonese are building them. Battlecruisers—with pod capability. Multidrive missiles for the arsenal ships that Rozsak used so effectively in the Battle of Torch. Cruisers. Destroyers. No CLACs, so far I’ve been able to determine. Not yet, anyway.”

Du Havel rubbed the top of his head. “Good Lord. I knew they were developing good relations, but I had no idea it had progressed
that
far.”

“Who’s building the ships?” asked Hugh. “Specifically, I mean. And how long has this been going on?”

“The work’s mostly being done by the Carlucci Group. Maybe all of it, although they’re bound to have subcontracted a lot. As for how long . . . I’m not sure. At least two years, though.”

“And how soon will the ships start being commissioned?” That came from Jeremy.

“For the wallers, probably another two years. But they’ll have functioning pod battlecruisers within a year. As for cruisers and destroyers . . . I can’t swear to it, but I think those have already entered Mayan service. I’m almost certain that Rozsak has already been able to replace everything he lost at the Battle of Torch.” She smiled at Berry. “Giving you the
Spartacus
and the other ships they captured at that battle was generous, no question about it. But Rozsak knew he’d be making up the loss very quickly.”

“
And
with ships that didn’t pose the same problems with public relations,” said Jeremy. He grunted. “I’m still appreciative of the gesture.”

Web finished with his scalp-rubbing. “We all are—but it now goes way beyond being appreciative.” He gave Sharon and Yuri a keen look. “Why are you telling us this—when you know perfectly good and well the end result will be to pull us away from Haven?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t put it that way,” said Yuri. The coffee had cooled enough for him to slurp from it, cheerfully and noisily. “Here’s the way I look at things—me and Sharon both. Given what happened to Filareta’s fleet at Manticore, we’re bound to see a full-scale war erupting between the Solarian League and the Manties—with us now allied to them. That alliance is shaky enough—well, maybe not ‘shaky’ but certainly full of problems and pitfalls—that both Haven and the Star Empire are going to be preoccupied with their own situations for a while.” He paused to slurp from his cup again.

Sharon picked up the train of thought smoothly. “So what does that mean for Torch? Things could get pretty dicey—
unless
you solidify your relations with other protectors. Ones who are nearby, like Erewhon and Maya.”

“And ones who, like Maya, have a proven and tested track record when it comes to protecting Torch,” said Hugh. “But I’d still like to know why you initiated this.”

Sharon set down the cup, leaned back, and crossed her arms over her chest. “It seems like the right thing to do. Speed up a process that’s inevitable anyway—and one that causes Haven no harm at all. Nor the Manties, for that matter, although”—she gave Ruth a quick, semi-apologetic little tilt of the head—“that’s not my main concern.”

Hugh nodded. “Yeah, I get that. But . . .” He got an odd smile on his face. “In my experience—even with Beowulfers—envoys extraordinary with special sauce etc. etc. are not famous for their bold initiatives.”