‘Yes. I’ve got some senior Halgarths coming this weekend. I don’t know if Patricia’s secured their vote. It might be a problem if they interpret the relationship incorrectly.’
‘Rest easy, darling. You didn’t hear this from me, but EdenBurg is already lining up behind Doi. That makes six of the Big15. I don’t think Patricia and Isabella will be a factor for you.’
‘The Halgarths are backing Doi after all? Congratulations, you are better connected than me. Thanks, I really don’t need last-minute scares like this. I owe you.’
‘You certainly do. Next time I need an A-list Grandee for dinner . . .’
‘I’ll be there.’
*
Gerhard Utreth was next, a fourth-generation member of the Braunt family which had founded the Democratic Republic of New Germany. As an attorney he’d opted out of the family’s management and financial side to work in the planetary legal office. Decades ago he’d been the DRNG’s Commonwealth senator. He’d even been married to a Burnelli at one time, resulting in two invitrogestated children. Not that Justine expected that to count for much during the weekend, but it made him a good potential ally.
She had also invited Larry Frederick Halgarth, who was in the third generation of his dynasty. He arrived with Rafael Columbia, who was an inevitable addition to the weekend. But when the invitation was issued, Larry had also insisted on bringing Natasha Kersley, who shared the limo with the other two. When Justine ran her name through the Burnelli database she drew a blank. Natasha wasn’t a member of any major family. Nor had Justine ever heard of the Commonwealth Special Science Supervisory Directorate, of which Natasha was the Chief Executive. All Larry would say was, ‘It conducts theoretical studies of weapons. Exotic weapons.’
There were two more senators to complete the weekend gathering. Crispin Goldreich, whose position on the Commonwealth budgetary commission gave him a great deal of influence over the start-up arrangements of the whole starflight agency project. Justine’s briefing had him down as a mild sceptic; but as she knew there was really no such political animal. He was fishing for something.
Finally there was Ramon DB, the senator for Buta, although remarkably he didn’t belong to the Mandela family which had established that Big15 world. Instead, he was the leader of the general African caucus in the Senate, which gave him a respectable power base. He had also been Justine’s husband for twelve years. But that was eight decades ago.
‘Remember me?’ she asked coyly as he got out of his car.
He just wrapped his arms around her, hugging tightly. ‘Damn, you look hot when you’re this age,’ he rumbled softly. He held her at arm’s length, looking her up and down. A wistful expression crossed his face. ‘Can we get married again?’
It was her turn to look at him. His traditional robe had a wonderful rainbow hem of semi-organic fibre which kept swirling as if he was in a breeze. Not even that movement could entirely disguise the way it fell over his stomach. His apparent age was approaching sixty, with white hairs infiltrating his temple. Midnight-black OCtattoos ran across his cheeks, flickering in and out of visibility.
‘How much weight are you carrying under there?’ she asked.
He put his hands together in prayer, and appealed to the sky. ‘Once a wife, always a wife. I keep in shape.’
‘What shape? A beach ball? Rammy, you know you have trouble with your heart when you put on this much weight.’
‘It is the fate of senators to attend huge meals every day of the week. I expect you’ll be sitting us down for an eight-course dinner tonight.’
‘You are definitely not having eight courses; and I’m going to talk to chef about your diet for the rest of the weekend. I don’t want to have to visit you in a re-life procedure ward, Rammy.’
‘Yes, yes, woman. I am due to rejuve soon. It will all be sorted out then. Stop worrying.’
‘Have they got a specific retrosequence for your condition yet?’
He gave an impatient swish of his fly-whisk. ‘I have rare genes. It is difficult for doctors to isolate the problem and correct it.’
‘Then have them vector in a sequence for a new heart. It’s simple enough.’
‘I am what I am. You know that. I don’t want somebody else’s heart.’
She gathered a breath, ready to sigh at him. Before she had a chance his thick forefinger came up under her chin. ‘Don’t scold me, Justine. It is so good to see you again. Being a senator isn’t nearly as wonderful as everyone claims. I was hoping we could spend a little time together, you and I, this weekend.’
‘We will.’ She patted his arm. ‘I want to talk to you about Abby, anyway.’
‘What’s up with our great-grandchild now?’
‘Later.’ She read the clock in her virtual vision. ‘I have to check in with Dad and Thompson before the evening begins for real.’
‘Your father is here?’ Ramon was suddenly reluctant to get closer to the house.
‘Yes.’ She licked her lips to cover a smile. ‘Is that a problem?’
‘You know he never liked me.’
‘That’s your insecurity and imagination. He always accepted you.’
‘Like a lion accepts a wildebeest.’
Justine burst out laughing. ‘You’re a senator of the Commonwealth, and he still intimidates you?’
He took her arm, and walked into the entrance hall. ‘I will smile at him and make polite conversation for exactly three minutes. If you don’t rescue me by then, I’ll . . .’
‘Yes?’
‘Put you over my knee.’
‘Ah, hark the heavenly angels as they sing glad tidings: the good old days are back in town.’
*
Gore Burnelli had decompressed his parallel personality into Sorbonne Wood’s large array, settling himself into the house as other humans would return to a comfortable old armchair. Unlike most humans who underwent frequent rejuvenation, he didn’t dump his memories into a secure store for nostalgia’s sake. He carried them round with him in high-density inserts, loading them into local arrays wherever he went. They were essential to him; to make the deals that gave his family a smooth ride into the future he had to have the knowledge of past deals, and the reasoning behind them, if they’d worked, what the problems were. Others, like his daughter, relied on briefings and extensive database access through an e-butler; while he had the real events immediately available thanks to the homogenized access programs which his early memories were rooted to.
Business and positioning the family in the market were his constant now. Technology made it possible for him to be involved for most of the day. Some of the routines he’d developed for managing the process were almost autonomous, allowing him to parallel multitask. Even now, as he watched his son and daughter enter Sorbonne Wood’s big classical library, he was reviewing the deluge of data which fell between them like red digital rain. Figures and headlines briefly flared green as his virtual fingers flashed among them, rearranging them into new configurations, shunting money and information to form the new deals and purchases.
‘Everybody’s here,’ Justine told him.
He made no comment. That information had long since flowed past him; the house was now updating him on the location of the guests and their aides and staff and spouses and lovers: who was using the showers and baths, who was using heavy (and heavily encrypted) bandwidth to the unisphere, who was walking along the pergola paths to the main house ready for pre-dinner drinks in the Magnolia lounge. Secondary information like that was now presented to his brain in the form of scent; the multitude of OCtattoos allowing him to smell where the guests were and what they were up to.
‘I think these guests provide us with a critical mass,’ Thompson said. ‘As long as there aren’t any unforeseen problems it should go smoothly.’
‘That’s self-evident, boy,’ Gore snapped. ‘But there are always problems. I’m relying on you two to anticipate them and massage them out of those grossly bloated egos gathering out there.’
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‘The only possible glitch so far was Isabella,’ Justine said. ‘But she won’t register on the Halgarth radar. Just another trustbabe having herself some first-life fun. I don’t think Patricia had an ulterior motive for sleeping with her.’
Thompson dropped down in one of the winged leather armchairs in front of the big fireplace. ‘Not like Patricia to take any sort of risk. The girls she normally fucks are completely sanitized as far as political connections are concerned.’
‘Maybe it’s true love?’ Justine said in amusement.
‘That’d be a first,’ Thompson said. ‘Why the hell Patricia doesn’t simply get a body reassignment when she’s in rejuve I’ll never know.’
‘She can’t,’ Gore said. ‘Most of Doi’s team are female, it’s an image she’s worked hard at for twenty-five years. Nobody’s going to screw that up now by growing a dick in the tank.’
‘Speaking of which, we haven’t officially declared for her yet,’ Thompson said.
‘That can happen this weekend,’ Gore said. ‘If the timing is right. For that I’ll require confirmation of Doi’s policy on the starflight agency start-up. Assuming she’s going to back it, and she’d be a stupid bitch if she didn’t, I want us to pay particular attention to the structure which is going to emerge. This weekend will give the family a big advantage on positioning when the agency is announced. Those details will matter.’
‘The agency is temporary,’ Thompson said. ‘It’s the navy we need to concentrate on.’
‘I know. That’s where we come in.’
‘What if we don’t need a navy?’ Justine asked.
‘We will,’ Gore said firmly. ‘I happen to agree with Sheldon and Kime on this one. The Dyson aliens shoot first and ask questions later. That tells me all I need to know about them. Even if it’s just for deterrence value, the Commonwealth is going to need warships. Government will be spending money on procurement, a lot of money. We have to ensure the family gets a slice of that.’
‘Easy enough,’ Thompson said.
‘Godfuck,’ Gore closed a golden hand into a fist. ‘Don’t you ever fucking learn? All the other Grands are manoeuvring right now. Justine was right to put this weekend together for us. If we can influence the shape, our placing will be unmatched.’
‘What sort of shape do you want?’
‘The main one has got to be location. Get Sheldon to let go of that hillbilly backwood Anshun. I want the agency centred at the High Angel, where it damn well should have been all along. The family has a lot of interest in the astroengineering companies based there, a real shipbuilding programme will see their stock go through the roof.’
‘We can probably make that sound logical,’ Justine said.
‘It is logical. What we need is a way to make it serve their interests.’
‘I’ll work on it,’ she promised.
Gore turned back to Thompson. ‘The other side to the navy is going to be the planetary defences. Don’t allow that to be overlooked this weekend. People are going to want damn great force fields guarding their cities and making them feel safe. I can see that ultimately chewing up even more cash than the starships.’
‘Okay, I’ll keep that one on the agenda,’ Thompson said.
*
Dinner was the kind of formal event which Justine could sleepwalk through in her official role as hostess. They held it in the main dining room, with broad church-like arched windows looking out across gardens illuminated by thousands of twinkling white fairy stars. She made sure Campbell was at one end of the long oak table with her father, while she chatted away to Patricia at the other end. Isabella didn’t join them for dinner.
‘She finds these things a little dull, I’m afraid,’ Patricia said as the band started playing some background jazz.
‘She’s young,’ Justine said sympathetically. ‘You did well getting her to come along at all.’
‘It was the names – she’s a bit of a fame junkie,’ Patricia admitted as she bit into her starter of cannelloni of smoked salmon. ‘Right now she’s accessing Murderous Seduction, it’s the penultimate episode.’
‘Isn’t that a biogdrama of the last Myo case?’
‘Yes. A bit melodramatic for me, but the lead character is her sort of age, and it’s a good production.’
‘I wish I had time to keep up on pop culture. I’m surprised you do, especially right now.’
‘Part of the job is coaxing various celebrity endorsements, among others.’ Her smile was polite, but one hundred per cent professional.
‘Our family is very supportive of the starship agency proposal. Hence this weekend.’
‘I know, and Elaine is very appreciative of that.’
‘Will she be making it part of her platform?’ Justine looked down the length of the table, straight at her father’s expression-less gold face.
‘It’s a bit radical, but then the Dyson mission has injected a few new factors into today’s politics. The agency needs to go ahead. Elaine knows that. She’s prepared to go out on a limb if that’s what it takes.’
Gore Burnelli gave a tiny nod. ‘Our family will certainly do whatever we can to support her position this weekend,’ Justine said.
‘I’m very grateful for that help.’ Patricia couldn’t quite conceal her predatory smile as she took another mouthful of the rolled salmon.
Justine studiously avoided any more verbal fencing with Patricia for the rest of the evening. The meal wasn’t the time for the serious negotiations to start in earnest. Instead, the three Burnellis made sure they talked to everyone separately at some point, preparing them for tomorrow.
*
It began in earnest at breakfast. The staff had set up an extensive buffet in the conservatory on the side of the main house, and Justine came over early to join Patricia and Crispin Goldreich at a table. Crispin’s two wives, Lady Mary and Countess Sophia, were still in their lodge taking breakfast in bed, though one of his aides sat beside him, pouring tea and fetching food from the buffet. Patricia’s immaculate young man was doing the same thing for her.
One of the house staff brought a pot of Jamaican coffee for Justine. She sat next to Crispin as he ate his eggs benedict. It was the less confrontational position. She wanted to know the same things as Patricia, and Crispin was hugely influential. As well as his leadership of the Budget Commission, he held a lot of authority among the bloc of European affiliate planets.
‘Thompson told me you were one of the more moderate voices on the Council meeting,’ Justine said.
‘Cautious would be the more accurate word, my dear. I’ve been in this game long enough to spot an open-ended commitment. If this agency is approved by the Senate, there is no knowing how long taxpayers will be required to fund the endeavour. It won’t end with the Dyson flights, you know. If they turn out to be benign, there will be a precedent in place for government to fund exploration of other questionable unknowns.’
‘Which is surely better than having it done by a private company,’ Patricia said. ‘We’ve all heard the rumours of closed planets, worlds which have something so valuable the Sheldons have kept it for themselves.’
‘And you believe that?’ Crispin asked.
‘Not personally, no. But I do believe that the government should be more involved with the investigation of potentially hazardous scenarios, such as the Dyson Pair. For that we need the starflight agency. After all, the Dyson Pair is the very first time we’ve found anything remotely threatening. And it’s a big galaxy. So far we’ve been lucky. We have to start being more cautious.’
‘Which brings us to this dratted navy proposal,’ Crispin said.
‘You can’t deny that would be essential if the Dyson scouting mission proves them hostile.’
‘No, I don’t. But the expenditure for that will be orders of magnitude above a starflight agency.’
‘So how would you like to see this managed?’ Patricia asked.
Crispin took a moment to finish the last of his eggs benedict. ‘Wit
h a greater degree of responsibility,’ he said eventually. ‘At the moment we’re simply throwing money at the problem. The first thing I’d like to see is some proper channelling of resources.’
‘You mean some kind of oversight committee?’ Justine asked. In her virtual vision, a calendar was displaying the date two years hence when Crispin’s senatorial seat was up for re-election. He’d get it again if he wanted it, that wasn’t a problem. But of course if he was to carry on as Chair of the Budget Commission he would need to be nominated by the Executive.
‘Oversight, management, steering; call it what you like. We have to insure the resources are spent properly.’
‘Your Budget Commission has it within its purview to set up such an oversight body,’ Patricia said.
‘Technically, yes, unless the Executive starts throwing up obstacles. I’m sure the President’s Office would want to maintain a tight control over the agency, and certainly the navy.’
‘Of course. But Elaine would be in favour of legitimate financial scrutiny. She absolutely does not want taxpayers’ money wasted, and I know she has a lot of confidence in the way you run the Budget Commission.’
‘I’m delighted to hear that,’ Crispin said. He poured himself some tea. ‘In which case, providing the Budget Commission can get those financial safeguards in place, Elaine Doi would have my support for the agency. If she gets elected.’
‘If she gets elected,’ Patricia parroted, keeping a composed face.
*
‘Crispin is on board,’ Justine told her father.
‘Good work. What did it cost?’
‘Patricia gave him the Budgetary Commission leadership after Doi’s elected.’
‘There could be worse people in charge. Crispin is an old hack, but at least he understands the rules of the game. Well done. What’s next?’
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