Shadow of Saganami

by David Weber

  "I've been instructed by Baroness Medusa to personally thank you for your willingness to return to Spindle with us," Terekhov continued.

  "That's very kind of her, but no thanks are necessary. I'm not certain I can provide the assistance she needs, but anything I can do, I certainly will."

  "No one could possibly ask more than that. May I introduce Commander FitzGerald, my Executive Officer?"

  "Commander," Van Dort acknowledged, shaking the XO's hand.

  "And this is Commander Lewis, my Engineer."

  "Commander Lewis." Van Dort smiled as the engineering officer stepped forward. "I well recall my own days as a merchant spacer. Which means I know who really keeps any ship running."

  "I see you're as perceptive as everyone said you were, Sir," Ginger Lewis said with a smile of her own, and he chuckled.

  "And this," the captain continued, "is Midshipwoman Zilwicki."

  Van Dort turned towards Helen with a smile, then paused. It was a tiny thing, no more than a momentary hesitation, but she saw something flicker in his eyes.

  "Midshipwoman," he murmured after a moment, and offered her his hand in turn.

  "Mr. Van Dort. This is an honor, Sir."

  The Rembrandter made a tiny, graceful brushing-away gesture with his free hand, his eyes still on her face, and Terekhov smiled.

  "With your permission, Sir, I've taken the liberty of assigning Ms. Zilwicki to get you settled in aboard Hexapuma and to serve as my personal liaison with you. I believe you'll find she has considerably more experience with the sorts of responsibilities facing you than you might expect from someone of her age and lack of seniority."

  Van Dort had opened his mouth, as if to politely reject the offer, but he closed it again at Terekhov's final sentence. Instead of speaking, he simply gazed at Helen for another second or two, and she felt uncomfortably as if he'd just put her on some sort of invisible scale that weighed her abilities with meticulous precision. Or as if he knew something about her she didn't know herself. Which was ridiculous.

  "That's very considerate of you, Captain," he said finally. "I trust Ms. Zilwicki won't find my requirements too onerous."

  "Oh, I wouldn't worry too much about that, Sir," Terekhov murmured with a wicked little smile. "After all, Ms. Zilwicki's on her snotty cruise. She's supposed to find her duties onerous."

  * * *

  "So what's he like?" Leo Stottmeister demanded.

  "Van Dort?" Helen looked up from the maintenance manual on her reader. She, Leo, Aikawa, and Paulo d'Arezzo were off duty, and she'd been boning up on maintenance procedures for the broadside graser mounts. Abigail Hearns intended to conduct a verbal exam on the subject the next day, and Helen believed in being prepared.

  "No, the Andermani Emperor," Leo said, rolling his eyes in exasperation. "Of course Van Dort!"

  "He's a nice enough guy. For an old geezer." Helen shrugged.

  "Scuttlebutt says he's a real hard-ass political type. Some kind of hired gun the Provisional Governor is calling in."

  "Then scuttlebutt has its head up its ass," Helen replied tartly.

  "Hey! I'm just saying what I've heard," Leo said a touch defensively. "If I'm wrong, straighten me out, don't bite my head off!"

  Helen ran her hands through her hair with a grimace.

  "I really do have to study this maintenance manual."

  "Bull," Leo shot back. "You know that stuff forward and -backward—you've aced every proficiency exam we've had!"

  "He's got a point, Helen," Aikawa said with a grin. "If you don't want to talk about it, that's one thing. But you really need to come up with a better excuse than that."

  "All right. All right!" She grinned back, acknowledging defeat. "But you guys have to understand, I've spent probably less than two hours with him so far. It isn't like I can tell you what he's thinking or anything like that. Or, for that matter, like I would if I could."

  She accompanied the last sentence with a stern gaze, and her audience nodded in acknowledgment.

  "Having said that, I think he really is a nice guy. He's worried, I can tell you that much, although I don't know how much he knows about what the Baroness has in mind. He seems to be as smart as they come, too. And he spends most of his time buried in briefing papers and personal correspondence from what looks like people all over the Cluster. I guess the reason I kind of snapped at you, Leo, is that the one thing he isn't is a 'hired gun.' This is a very serious player—maybe even more serious, in some ways, than Cathy Montaigne—and this entire annexation idea was pretty much his brainstorm. I don't know what Baroness Medusa's thinking, but she's just latched onto the man who probably has the most political horsepower of anybody in the entire Cluster. When you combine that with the fact that she had Hexapuma divert to Rembrandt specifically to pick him up instead of just sending a dispatch boat for him, I'd say she's probably got him—and us—earmarked for something pretty damned significant, wouldn't you?"

  * * *

  "I wonder if Terekhov's picked up Van Dort yet?" Rear Admiral Khumalo murmured.

  "I beg your pardon, Sir? Were you speaking to me?"

  "What?" Khumalo shook himself and straightened in his chair. "Sorry, Loretta. I suppose I was actually just thinking out loud. I was wondering if Hexapuma's reached Rembrandt yet."

  "She probably has," Captain Shoupe said after a quick, reflexive glance at the date/time display on the briefing room bulkhead. The rear admiral's daily staff conference had just broken up, and abandoned coffee and teacups stood forlornly beside mostly empty carafes.

  "I certainly hope so," Khumalo said, and the chief of staff looked quickly back at him. His broad face looked weary, far more worried than he'd permitted it to look during the staff meeting.

  "If she hasn't already, I'm sure she will in the next day or so, Sir," she said encouragingly.

  "The sooner the better," Khumalo said. "I'm not sure I'm prepared to admit it to Mr. O'Shaughnessy, but the situation on Montana's threatening to get badly out of hand. I'm still more than a little uneasy about the entire notion of meddling in their internal political quarrels, but given this latest news . . ." He shook his head. "If Van Dort—and Terekhov, I suppose—really can do anything about it, then the sooner we get them there, the better."

  Shoupe kept her expression carefully neutral, but she was a little taken aback by Khumalo's attitude. Her superior must be even more concerned about the Montana Independence Movement than she'd thought to have changed his position that radically.

  "May I ask if the Provisional Governor's firmly decided Montana has priority over Split, Sir?" she asked respectfully.

  "You may, and I don't know," Khumalo replied with a half-smile, half-grimace. "All I can say is that with it looking more and more as if the Kornatians really did nail Nordbrandt, Montana's relative priority's risen pretty steeply. Especially after Westman's last little trick!"

  Shoupe nodded. News of the MIM's destruction of the Montana System Bank's headquarters had reached Spindle the day before.

  Why, oh why, she wondered, couldn't our problem-child star systems be closer to each other. Or to us, for that matter.

  Split lay just over 60.6 LY from Spindle. Montana was 82.5 LY from Spindle, and over a hundred and twenty from Split. Even a warship like Hexapuma would require more than eight days to make the trip from Spindle to Split. Montana was the next best thing to twelve days away, and the trip from Montana to Split would require better than seventeen days. All of which made coordination between Spindle and what looked like being the Cluster's two true flashpoints a genuine, unmitigated pain in the ass. Just getting information back and forth, even using the speedy dispatch boats which routinely traveled in the riskier Theta Bands of hyper-space, took literally weeks. No matter what Rear Admiral Khumalo or Baroness Medusa decided to do, they could absolutely count on the fact that the information on which their decision was based was out of date.

  "I suppose we should concentrate on being glad Nordbrandt and the FAK seem to be out of busine
ss, Sir," she suggested after a moment. "That doesn't make dealing with Mr. Westman any more attractive, but at least it's an improvement over having to deal with both at once!"

  "A point, Loretta," Khumalo agreed with a tired smile. "Definitely a point."

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  "The Captain's compliments, Sir, and the pinnace will depart from Boat Bay Three in thirty minutes."

  "Thank you, Helen." Bernardus Van Dort smiled and shook his head. "You didn't really have to come and deliver that message in person, you know. The com would have worked just fine."

  "First of all, I didn't mind delivering it in person, Sir. Second, when the Captain 'suggests' that a snotty personally deliver a message to an important guest aboard his ship, the snotty in question gets on her little feet, trots right down the passage, and delivers said message."

  Van Dort laughed out loud, and Helen Zilwicki grinned at him. Their relationship had come a long way in the seven days—six by Hexapuma's internal clocks—since he'd come on board. At first, Helen thought, he'd started out regretting having accepted her as his aide. He seemed, for all his accomplishments and personal wealth, a very private man. And, she thought, a lonely one. He'd certainly been politely distant from her, with a sort of cool courtesy that discouraged any familiarity. Indeed, in some ways he'd seemed even more distant from her than from anyone else in the entire ship, as if he were deliberately keeping her at arm's length. He'd gotten a bit more comfortable, but he still maintained that sense of distance, of watchfulness.

  Yet she'd come to realize there was a warm and caring person under that isolated, detached shell of his, and she wondered why a man like that lived such a solitary life. No doubt he did have large, capable staffs to serve him at home on Rembrandt. And, equally no doubt, he could call on the RTU staffers on any planet in the Cluster to provide him with secretaries and assistants at need. But he should have had a permanent, personal staff. At least one private aide to travel with him whenever travel was necessary. Someone who was as much a confidant as an administrative assistant.

  Someone to keep him company.

  There had to be a reason he didn't, and she wished she dared to ask him what it was.

  "Will you be free to accompany me to the meeting, Helen?" he asked, and she looked at him in surprise.

  "I . . . don't know, Sir. As far as I know, the possibility hasn't been discussed. I'm sure that if you'd like me to, the Captain would authorize it."

  "Well, it's occurred to me that if I'm going to be continuing aboard the Kitty," he shared another grin with her, "it would be just as well for my 'aide' to be up to speed on what we're trying to accomplish. And I've come to realize you're actually quite a bright young woman, despite occasional attempts to pretend otherwise." His expression grew more serious. "I think you could be of even greater assistance if you were fully informed on the parameters of my mission. And there are a few other reasons I think it might be a good idea to have you along."

  "Sir," she said, "I'm deeply flattered. But I'm only a middy. I'm not at all sure the Provisional Governor would approve of someone that junior being fully briefed on a mission that was important enough to haul you all the way back to Spindle from Rembrandt."

  "If I tell her I've come to rely on your assistance and that I'd like you informed—and that you'll keep your mouth shut about any sensitive information—I feel sure I could overcome any objections she might have. And you would keep your mouth shut, wouldn't you?"

  "Yes, Sir! Of course I would!"

  "I rather thought so," he said with a slight smile. "Then again, I'd hardly expect less from the daughter of Anton Zilwicki."

  Helen couldn't help herself. This time she didn't just look at him in surprise, she gawked at him, and he chuckled.

  "Helen, Helen!" He shook his head. "I've made it a priority to remain as closely informed as possible on events in the Star Kingdom ever since Harvest Joy came sailing out of the Lynx -Terminus. I know all about that affair in Erewhon. In fact, I probably know more about it than most native-born Manticorans. That feature story Yael Underwood did on your father just before the Stein funeral caught my eye, especially in light of what happened in Erewhon and, later, in Congo. I'm sure he got parts of it wrong, but he obviously got a lot right, too. It took me all of an hour and a half to put you and your surname together with his, especially after I remembered that the newsies said he had a daughter at the Manticoran Naval Academy."

  "Sir, I'm not a spook. Daddy may be some sort of superspy, although given the fact that everybody in the entire galaxy seems to know now what he does for a living, his active spying days must be pretty much over. But I never even wanted to be a spook."

  "I never assumed you did. But, as I say, you're intelligent, you've demonstrated tact and initiative in the time we've been together, and whether you want to be a 'spook' or not, your father's example when it comes to maintaining operational security has to've rubbed off on you at least a little. Besides," he looked away, "you remind me of someone."

  She started to ask who, then stopped herself.

  "Well, Sir," she said, instead, with a crooked smile, "I'm sure you could have your pick of people far better qualified than I am. But if you want me, and if the Captain doesn't have any objections, I'd be honored to help out anyway I can."

  "Excellent!" He looked back down at her with a broad smile. "I'll speak to him immediately."

  * * *

  "Bernardus!" Dame Estelle Matsuko swept across the room to greet her visitor. "Thank you for coming!"

  "Madam Governor, anything I can do to be of service is, of course, yours for the asking," he said graciously, and actually bent over her hand to bestow a kiss upon it.

  The old boy's got the chivalrous courtesy bit down cold, Helen Zilwicki thought admiringly, trailing along behind the rest of the party as befitted her astronomically junior status.

  "That's very good of you," the Provisional Governor said much more seriously. "Especially since I know how badly you wanted to get away from Spindle."

  "That was a tactical decision, Madam Governor, not a reflection of any desire to quit the fray before the annexation's completed."

  "Good," she said, "because 'the fray's' gotten progressively uglier since you left, and I need you." She waved her hand at another door, through which Helen could just make out an enormous conference table and at least half a dozen more people, including Rear Admiral Khumalo. "Please, come join us. We have a lot to talk about."

  * * *

  " . . . so unless we can get a handle on the situation in Montana, I'm afraid we'll be looking at an even greater problem than the ones we faced on Kornati," Gregor O'Shaughnessy completed his general background briefing somberly. "The steady escalation of the MIM's operations is heading Westman and his people towards an inevitable direct confrontation with the Montanan security forces. Despite all his efforts to avoid inflicting casualties, he's going to find himself in a shooting war with his own government, and the fact is, he's much more dangerous than Nordbrandt ever was. If it does come to a direct military confrontation between him and the Montanan System's police and military, he's going to do a lot more damage than Nordbrandt did because he doesn't believe in terror as a weapon. Put most simply, he's a guerilla, not a terrorist at all. He's not going to divert from his attacks on what we might call legitimate targets to waste his time taking out vulnerable civilian targets for the terror effect or just because he can rack up impressive kill numbers."

  Bernardus Van Dort nodded slowly and thoughtfully, and Dame Estelle cocked her head at him.

  "From your expression, I take it you find yourself basically in agreement with Gregor's assessment, Bernardus?"

  "Yes, I do," he admitted. Then he shook his head, his expression rueful. "This is mostly my fault, you know. Where Montana's concerned, I mean. I let Ineka Vaandrager—"

  He broke off and frowned.

  "No," he continued after a moment, "let's be honest. I used Ineka to win the most favorable possible concessions from
Montana. I never did like her tactics, but I had rather different priorities at the time, so I gave her her head. Which is one reason Westman hates my guts."

  "Have you actually met, Sir?" O'Shaughnessy asked. "Do you know one another personally?"

  "Oh, yes, Mr. O'Shaughnessy," Van Dort said softly. "We've met."

  "Would he agree to meet with you again now if you asked him to?" Dame Estelle asked, and his eyebrows rose in surprise.

  "Madam Governor—Dame Estelle, I doubt there's anyone in the entire Cluster he'd be less likely to meet with. For a lot of reasons. But especially not when his operations on Montana seem to be going so well. I'm sure that if I asked him to meet me, he'd see it as further evidence that he's in a position of strength. And, to be perfectly honest, in his boots, I'd hate my guts, too. Lord knows our 'negotiators' gave his entire planet sufficient reason to be . . . unfond of us, shall I say?"

  "What I have in mind," the Provisional Governor said, "is to send you to speak to him not in your own right, not as a representative of the Trade Union, or even of the Constitutional Convention, but as my direct representative. As, if you will, the direct representative of the Star Kingdom of Manticore. And I would prefer for the invitation to be issued very openly, very publicly, so that he knows everyone else on the planet knows I've sent you as my personal envoy."

  "Ah! You believe he's an astute enough psychologist to recognize that refusing to so much as meet with me under those circumstances would undermine the image of the gentleman guerrilla he's been at such pains to create?"

  "That's one way to put it. I prefer to think of it as his recognizing he has to appear as reasonable and as rational as any outlaw can if he doesn't want to lose the struggle for public opinion the way Nordbrandt was in the process of losing it in Split. But the way you described it also works. Especially given that he's just about reached the limit of how far he can go without major bloodshed. He's got to recognize that. So if he is inclined towards any sort of negotiated settlement, he's got to be feeling pressure, the awareness that there's a line he can't cross without pretty much ruling out any negotiated resolution. I think he'd probably be willing to talk to almost anyone, under those circumstances, before stepping across that line."