“Why, Mr. SecGen, it’s no trouble at all.” Abruptly, he turned serious. “My condolences on the attack, sir. Is there anything I can do?”
“No, but thanks.”
“My best to Ms. Seafort.”
“Take care, Edgar.” We rang off.
Another terse conference with Branstead and Donner. “Cousin Sara implicated two more joeys, but they’d flown the coop. We’ll catch them.”
“What in God’s name,” Jerence asked, “possessed them to go on a killing spree? All those attacks ...”
Donner grimaced. “I’m not sure if they’re political fanatics, or a form of cult. Death didn’t matter, they said, because our enviro neglect already killed so many.”
Satan worked in mysterious and subtle ways. I shivered.
Jerence said, “Karen Burns and that Booker joey are still loose. Mr. SecGen”—he tapped my appointment book—“You have to stay under guard. At least until they’re caught.”
“Why, if my own guards are—”
“Karen must have meant to kidnap you, else she’d have burned you down. She may still—”
“How do you know?”
“She said she’d take you on a ride, right?”
“But where?”
He shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
“But why, damn it?” Silently, a small prayer of contrition.
“The E.A.L. was desperate to alter your policies, despite your speech. They wanted even more change.”
“Was I supposed to shut down our entire economy?”
“Apparently.”
I shrugged. Lunatics. Like all glitched enviros, they—no, I’d switched sides. I must remember that.
“Guard Arlene and Philip,” I said. “I won’t take a company of soldiers to the head to relieve myself.”
Branstead and the General exchanged glances. “Now your speaking tour is wound down, we feel—”
“We?”
“Donner and I talked it over. Sir, you travel too much. Until we catch those bastards, stay here or at the Rotunda. There’s no guarding you when you go gallivanting about.”
“I will not be their prisoner!” I slammed the table.
“Sir, it’s only for a little—”
“No! I have appointments. Dr. Ghenili has me scheduled in four days: should I cancel? My future depends on it.”
“There are committed terrorists roaming—”
I shouted, “I don’t care!”
Arlene poked her head into my office. “Bellow more softly, love.”
I waved her in. “These joeys want me to lock myself in the compound. Cancel all travel. Did you ever hear such goofjuice?”
“That reminds me, Donner,” she said. “I want a laser license for P.T.”
He frowned. “I can swing it, but public policy ...” Few were allowed to carry a laser pistol. I was licensed, of course, and Arlene.
“He shoots well; I taught him myself. And he has sense.”
“Very well, I’ll see to it. But if you stay under wraps ...” Donner looked hopeful.
“How well do you know my Nick?” Arlene’s tone was sardonic. “He won’t agree, no matter the cost.” She looked thoughtful. “On the other hand, I could disable his chair.”
“On the other hand, I could crawl.” I didn’t see the humor. Yet, my stubbornness risked whoever traveled with me. And I’d have a hard time forcing P.T. and Arlene to stay at home, if I left the compound. “Look, what if ...” I puzzled it through. “Jerence, what if I traveled in secret? Why announce that I’m going to Lunapolis to see Ghenili?”
“The media watch your jet, your official heli.”
“Smuggle me aloft in a military shuttle. Dock at the Naval wing in Earthport, transfer me to a private craft.”
“Word will get out.”
“Branstead, you’re a born plotter. Look how you smuggled goofjuice onto Victoria. I have faith in you.”
“You’re bigger than a vial of—”
“We’ll use this trip as a test. If it works, fine. Else we’ll try something else. In the meantime, catch Karen and Sergeant Booker. I’ll expect to see their holos every hour on the news. See to it.”
“The nets don’t always—”
“See to it.”
Midafternoon. I took a break from a series of dreary political calls, sat on the veranda. Thadeus Anselm leaned in the doorway, hands in pockets. “May I join you?”
“If you’d like.” I sounded ungracious, at best. I made an effort. “Sit. Get yourself a softie.”
Shyly, he relaxed into a lounge chair.
I recalled he’d told me he was lonely. Awkwardly, I sought a topic of conversation. “What’s between you and Mikhael, boy?”
“I don’t know, sir. Maybe it’s the exercise.”
“Are you hard on him?”
“I can’t be; I have no authority. I tell Bevin what to do, and Mikhael does it or not as he chooses. I’ve never complained.”
“What, then?”
For a moment he looked troubled. “I guess I’m not that likable.”
“You had friends, at Devon?”
“A few. Cadet Santini, but she ...”
“Was murdered. I’m sorry.” I cleared my throat. “When you’re not drinking, I find you likable.”
“Thanks.” He brooded. “Danil was crying last night.”
“During the ... commotion?”
“After.”
“Understandable.” I should have found the boy, comforted him. He was but fourteen. “Look after him, Tad.”
“Aye aye, sir.” It would be good practice, for when he was first middy.
The caller rang. Senator Uzuki, stubborn as ever about our enviro package. Reluctantly, I went back to work.
By evening, alone in my office, I dared hope I was making progress. Using every pressure I knew, I’d gotten seven Senators to reconsider their opposition. Not much, but it was a start. I was confident I could carry the Assembly, but if the Senate dug in, our legislation was dead in the water.
A knock. Mikhael Tamarov, his jumpsuit rumpled, his hair awry. He eyed me uncertainly.
“You’re here for your clothes?” My face was impassive.
“And to talk to you.”
“That’s not necessary.”
Unbidden, he flopped into the chair across my desk. “I’m messed up, Mr. Seafort.”
“I’m aware.” My tone was flinty.
“I think I’m glitched, sometimes. I was waiting to talk to Dad. He understands these ... understood.” His fists clenched. “Understood.”
He looked so much like Alexi, my heart ached. “And now he’s gone. You’ll never again have a talk with him. Never have his caring, the rest of your life.” Brutal, but I saw no choice. “You’re on your own.”
“Am I?” His cheeks were wet.
“You sure are, joey.” I took up my caller. “Shall I send the cadet to help you pack?”
He wept openly.
I waited him out.
“Where should I go?”
“Kiev, I suppose.” I let the silence lengthen. “Unless you ask me to take you back.”
“Would you?” It was a whisper.
“This time, only with a judge’s custody order.” With his consent and his mother’s, it could be arranged.
“Why?”
How to make him understand? “We’re a family. Arlene and I, P.T. ... we treat each other a special way.”
“I’m not part of it.”
“You are, when you live with us.”
Footsteps in the hall. Philip peered in. “Am I interrupting?”
“Yes, we’re—no, wait. You can help.” I waved him to a seat, wheeled myself from behind my desk to join them. “Remember when you were sixteen, and we had that talk?”
He flushed. “Vividly.”
“Mikhael needs to understand. Would you tell him?”
“If I must.” Philip crossed his legs, pursed his lips in thought. “I was giving Fath a hard time that year
. We fought, and he rarely let me have my way.”
I opened my mouth to protest the unfairness of it, but subsided. I’d asked him to speak.
“Partly it’s that I was certain I was right, which made courtesy unnecessary. I worked myself into a decision to leave. If you won’t bother to look at me, why should I talk to you?”
Mikhael jumped as if shot. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean ...” He crossed his arms, hugged himself. “Go on.” From time to time he threw Philip an anxious glance.
“Where was I? ...” I was ready to leave. I dared Fath to call the jerries. He said he wouldn’t. I called him ... P.T. swallowed. “I called him a liar, told him he wouldn’t really let me go.
“‘I’ll help you pack,’ Fath told me. ‘I’ll give you food for your dinner, and escort you to the gate. Then you’re on your own.’”
The room was hushed.
“He sat me down—right where you’re sitting, in fact—and told me Mom and I were his reason for living. We had a bond, a family bond, that was sacred to him. There was absolutely nothing I could do—nothing—that would make him throw me out. I could spit at him, steal his heli, scream curses at him all day long. I was still his son and I would share his home. He would endure any behavior at all because of our bond.
“But, Fath added, he would respond to that behavior. With discipline. And if I chose to break that bond by walking out, he would not take me back, ever. And, Mikhael ... he meant it.”
I said quietly, “Thank you, son.”
Mikhael licked his lips. “What happened ... after?”
“I got a strapping, for the second time in my life. And then we made up.”
“He’s not ever going to hit me.”
“All right. Anything else, Fath?”
“Did Mom talk to you about a pistol?”
“Yes, sir. It’s a good idea.” He stood, stretched. “Good night.”
When we were alone, I busied myself with papers. “Make your decision, and be quick about it.”
“Mr. Seafort?”
I put down my holovid, tried not to sound impatient. “Yes?”
“What would Dad want me to do?”
I pondered. Alexi loved Moira, of that I had no doubt. Had he known she was a weak parent? Did it matter? “I’m not sure. If I’d died and Arlene couldn’t raise P.T., I’d hope Alexi would. Or Derek.”
“Why them?”
“They knew who I was, and what I wanted for my son.”
“I won’t let you hit me.” His tone was stubborn.
“Good, the decision’s made. Get your clothes.”
Instead, he sat hunched forward on his arms, staring at a scuffed shoe. Minutes stretched into a quarter hour.
I fussed at holochips, battling not to give in.
A sigh of resignation. “What do I have to do, sir?” His voice was subdued.
“I warn you, any more of yesterday’s curses and I’ll wash out your mouth. As for your conduct, it’s been unacceptable. Bend over the desk.”
He made as if to speak, chose not to. With a grimace, he bent himself across the desk, rested head in hands.
I tugged off my belt, the same one Karen had tied me with. Carefully, I maneuvered my chair. I gripped the side rail, raised my arm high, cracked the leather across his rump.
“Straighten out, joey,” I said. “And I mean right now.”
15
AT OUR DEVON GUEST quarters, I peered into the mirror. “Smooth your hair, Anselm. It’s a matter of respect.”
“Yes, sir.”
“It’s ‘aye aye, sir.’ Have you forgotten everything? Mikhael, we’ll be back soon. Danil, are you ready?”
The cadet bounded into the room, his gray uniform neat and crisp. “Yes, sir!”
It was a memorial service for the five slain cadets. I’d put off Hazen’s suggestion of a service until the capture of the ecos; somehow it seemed obscene to memorialize our joeys while their murderers ran free.
For the solemn ceremony, he’d assembled the entire Academy at Devon, even calling down his cadets stationed at Farside Base.
We met in the dining hall, the only Academy chamber large enough to hold the whole company. Soberly, Hazen eulogized our dead, whose blood-soaked bodies I’d found in the grass, that awful July day.
If I be bereaved of my children, I am bereaved.
When Hazen was done, I wheeled to the front of the hall to speak. I spoke of the hopes unfulfilled, the lives cut short, the friendships shattered.
“I have come out of respect for your fellows who died, but also out of respect for you, and to address the wrong we did you.” I forced myself to look into their eyes.
“The Service is honor and trust, and no more. You have the right, the absolute right, to trust your fellow cadets, the midshipmen, your instructors, your officers. As they have the right and obligation to trust you.”
Throughout the hall, not a sound.
“When the joeys of Krane Barracks passed through the suiting room, they were entitled, each and every one of them, to the certainty that no person in God’s Navy would wish them ill. That no one, regardless of his politics, would betray the trust that binds our lives together. We each of us, as we sail the stars, depend on our mates for our very lives. At Devon Academy, that trust was shaken. I hope and pray that you will allow it to be rebuilt.
“On behalf of the United Nations, of the Government of Lord God, I humbly apologize to you all.”
I took a long slow breath.
“Dismissed.”
In his office, Hazen swirled the ice in his glass. “Well said. It’s what we strive to teach them.”
“Thank you.” I noticed that he, or a predecessor, had replaced much of the furniture I’d removed as Commandant. I’d found it impossible to pace without barking a shin.
“I wish everyone felt that way.” He spoke lightly, but with an undercurrent of tension.
There was something he wanted to tell me. “Who doesn’t?”
“You’ve been around longer than I, sir. Has the Navy always been so political?”
I thought of Admiral Duhaney, in my youth, and his machinations with the Senate. “From time to time.”
“These days there’s a certain ... vehemence.” Hazen hesitated. “That damned Galactic is a symbol. All my cadets want her. Three middies have put in for transfers.”
“How is that political?”
“I’ve had half a dozen calls from officers aghast at your—excuse me, our new enviro policy. They’re afraid it will scuttle Olympiad and the three unbuilt sister ships. Do I have any influence with you, et cetera.”
My eyes narrowed. “Who called?”
“You spoke, sir, of trust?”
I closed my eyes. Infuriating. If I ordered him outright, he’d likely tell me, but then he’d despise me. I should be grateful he was concerned enough to hint at all. I made another note to confer with Admiralty as soon as our bills passed the Senate. What with our vote-seeking and the savage attack on my home, that resolve had gotten lost in the shuffle.
“I think,” he said, choosing his words carefully, “the Navy needs to hear that our emphasis on ecology won’t disrupt shipbuilding, or ultimately weaken the Service.”
And that was precisely what I couldn’t promise. Our enviro measures would do so, beyond a doubt. Should I tell him so? I hesitated, unsure of his divided loyalty.
Outside the window, cadets drilled at precision march in the fading light. I suspected he’d arranged the show for my benefit. “You’ll send the Farside lot back aloft?”
“Soon. I may grant leave while they’re groundside.” At Farside Base, on the far side of the moon, our joeys were cut off from even routine contact with Earth. There were no public callers, no sat-relays except those operated by the Navy.
Parents would be grateful for the unscheduled leave. I pictured Bevin preparing eagerly for his father’s visit, and sighed. “I suppose I should collect my joeys and move on.”
“You’ve found the Bevin boy
satisfactory?”
“Quite.” Now that I’d become an enviro—a shift that still left me dizzy—I could hardly object to his politics.
“And Anselm?”
Should I tell him his middy was a souse? No, it would put a black mark on his record, one that I wasn’t yet ready to chisel in stone. “A pity about his father.”
“Eh? Oh, that. Yes.” He stood. “I’ll see you to your heli.”
Two U.N.A.F. commandos accompanied us, on a rugged military heli. My trip to Devon had been unannounced, as was our return. Bevin and Anselm chattered above the whine of the engine. Near me, where I could keep an eye on him, was Mikhael. From time to time, miserable, he wiped his mouth with a handkerchief.
I frowned, crossed my arms. The boy was impossible. When we’d returned to guest quarters for our gear, he’d accosted me, laden with petulance.
“Why couldn’t I go?”
I’d tucked my coat into my duffel. “It was a private memorial, for Naval officers.” The cadets deserved my apology, but it was unthinkable to wash the Navy’s dirty linen in public. No one outside the Service, even family, ought to be present.
Mikhael had muttered something, turned away.
Outraged, I caught his arm. “What was that?”
He shrugged.
“I heard, ‘Fucking nonsense.’”
He said nothing, but his stare was defiant.
“Into the head.” I pointed to the lavatory.
“Why?”
“Move! “I followed him, half pushing.
I grabbed the soap from the sink. “Use it.”
“You can’t make me!”
“Two days ago, you promised me a new start.” In my office, after his chastisement, a tearful reconciliation, pledges of good behavior.
“I tried.”
“I won’t have your foul language. ‘Whoso curseth his father and mother, his lamp shall be put out in obscure darkness.’” Eyes blazing, I thrust out the soap. “Do as I say!”
Now, in the heli, grimacing, he spit a foul taste into his handkerchief. Perhaps he’d learn. There was ample soap, and I’d reached the end of my tolerance. My surprise was that his defiance had crumbled, that he’d meekly washed out his own mouth. Perhaps he sought a father after all. Certainly the Alexi I knew wouldn’t have borne the boy’s behavior. Not for a moment.
Casually, as if unaware, I threw an arm across his shoulder.
Patriarch's Hope (The Seafort Saga Book 6) Page 27