Anthony, Piers - Tyrant 3 - Politician

by Anthony, Piers

  And the antimatter, as the saying goes, hit the matter.

  I received a close-coded message from President Kenson: "What the hell are you doing, Hubris?" But the lure of progress toward genuine peace was too strong; the president had to permit the initiative. When the furor raged, he had to support it. When Congress passed a resolution of condemnation, Kenson had to assert his position by appointing a Jupiter/Gany committee to explore matters. And I received an invitation to visit the Saturn Embassy on Ganymede.

  The man I met was one Mikhail Khukov, a captain in the Saturn Navy. I knew the moment I saw him that he was a meteor. That is, a man with the background, intelligence, and drive to blaze to the top, if not assassinated on the way. Saturnine politics, I knew, were played in true hard-ball style; one small error of judgment could render a person dead, figuratively or literally. This one intended to make no mistakes, yet he was also a creature of calculated risks. His type had to be.

  He shook my hand, western-style. Technically the Solar System has no east or west, but the terms derive from antiquity: Jupiter is west, Saturn is east, and all else is indeterminate. "So glad to meet you at last, Captain," he said in English. "I have admired your conduct of the matter of the Belt."

  "I regret I am not acquainted with your own record."

  "Nor would you wish to be, Comrade Capitalist," he said heartily, dismissing the subject. "So you lit a fire under the tail of your own president."

  "Well, I was sure he would support an initiative for peace."

  "Don't we all—in our fashions. Exactly what concessions do you seek?"

  "Naturally I would not interfere with existing negotiations—"

  He laughed. "You have the power, Hubris! Do you not know it when you see it?"

  I had to smile. "I had thought to conceal my observation." For he did indeed have a talent similar to mine; the genius of judging people. He was reading me even as I was reading him. We were in a contest of skills—a contest that had no discernible object other than understanding, and no reckoning of points. We could not deceive each other. "We can do each other much good—or ill," he said. "Have we reason to do ill?"

  "I see none, when we allow for certain distinctions in our situations."

  Such as his murderous political environment. In his situation I, too, would have had to kill or be killed. His was basically a pirate government. I did not necessarily approve, but I understood.

  "Do you play pool, Captain?" he inquired.

  "Does a black hole squeeze?"

  "It has been long since I have matched against my own rank." I was no longer a captain, technically, but there was indeed a kind of interplanetary camaraderie of rank: a lieutenant competed against other lieutenants, and a commander against other commanders. Every unit had its ladder of proficiency, but at the level of captain or above, there were few to compete against. Evidently it was similar in the Saturn Navy.

  We adjourned to the embassy pool room. The table and equipment were top-line, as that of such establishments tended to be. I had not played regularly since leaving the Navy, but such skill is never truly lost; I knew I could, after wearing off the rust, give a creditable account of myself. But the point was not really to win; it was to match against one's own rank in as varied and exotic a manner as possible.

  We played. I do not remember who won; I think we split games. He was out of shape, too; Saturnine officers are not given undue leisure. It was fun; I realized again that I missed the Navy, and this was like being back in it. While we played, we continued to measure each other. I judged Khukov's talent to be less than mine, but he was a harder man; he had the kind of backbone that my sister Spirit had, so he used his powers more effectively than I did. Essentially I won over people, who then served my interests loyally; he served his interests directly.

  "Perhaps we could exchange favors," he said.

  I had known he was working up to something; he saw in me a way to magnify his power in some way. "Perhaps."

  "I speak no Spanish, yet I must deal with those who do. I distrust interpreters."

  I could appreciate why. Ganymede was an often unwilling partner to Saturn; if he used a native interpreter, his words might suffer more than was comfortable, and there could be much he missed. That could be dangerous. "You might learn the language," I suggested, realizing what he wanted of me.

  "There might come a time when you found it advantageous to comprehend Russian," he said. "You will in due course be dealing on that level."

  "I'm only a minor ambassador!" I protested, intrigued.

  "And I'm only a Navy officer, on inclement duty. But sometimes it is possible, how do you put it, to make of a sow's ear a silken purse?"

  There could indeed be advantage to knowing Russian. He read in me the same ambition I read in him: to achieve the ultimate seat of power. The odds were against either of us making it, but careful preparation and special skills could help. I nodded, interested but not committed.

  "But one reservation," he said. "I prefer that such ability not be known."

  Again I nodded. A man could learn a lot, if those about him believed he did not understand their language. Such secret understanding could on occasion make a life-and-death difference. "I have no need to advertise such a skill as the speaking of Russian, either," I said.

  We shook hands, trusting each other as no two people lacking our avenue of understanding could. This was not a matter of friendship or even of compatibility; our loyalties and philosophies were diametrically opposed. But in this we were united, as two panthers might unite to preserve a favored hunting ground.

  Thus it was that over the course of the next year I taught Khukov to speak Spanish with very little accent—he was an apt study—and he taught me to speak Russian with, I trust, similar finesse. Neither of us told any other party of this deal. Nominally we were playing pool and discussing ambassadorial matters. We never became friends—a too-complete understanding is no better for friendship than a too-complete familiarity is for romance—but we knew that neither would betray the other.

  Meanwhile, Megan had not sat idle in the Jupiter Embassy. She set about learning Spanish herself, openly, and encouraged Hopie to do the same. Indeed, Hopie entered the local school system as she came of age. We had faced the choice of private tutoring, which seemed affected and expensive; or sending her to the Navy Dependent School at Tanamo, which Megan would not hear of for several reasons, such as her aversion to military commitment and her refusal to separate our child from our family; or letting her go to a Gany school. That course seemed simple enough, and Hopie was welcomed there. The original alienation shown by the population had entirely disappeared. But after a year our course seemed less certain. The schools of Gany are not for simple education. It is the revolutionary philosophy that political education is fundamental; that a person cannot function as a responsible citizen if his political attitudes are wrong. For example, he cannot be a truly selfless team member if his philosophy is one of self-interest. He can not budget his money wisely if he is dedicated to immediate gratification at any cost. It is attitude that is critical—and so the Gany schools educate for that as thoroughly as for the literary and technical and social skills.

  Hopie was a bright child and a pleasant one. She got along well in school, as she mastered Spanish, made friends, and learned the lessons well. When she began debating the liabilities of capitalism at home, Megan grew uneasy. When Hopie challenged some of the Jupiter versions of history, such as the manner the so-called Mid-Jupe Canal was arranged, Megan became angry. And when the child began praising the dedication of Saturn to System peace, Megan had had enough. "I shall not suffer my child to become a Saturnist!" she exclaimed.

  I tried to reason with her, pointing out that the child did understand that there were different ways to view every issue and that the Gany school espoused merely one view, not the ultimate truth. But Megan replied that even a little bit of brainwashing was too much. In this we had our first significant disagreement, for I was unworri
ed by propaganda, knowing it to be a standard tool and a two-edged one, while Megan simply could not tolerate it for the child. I tried to point out that there was indeed a question about the Mid-Jupe Canal, but that only upset her further. We had come up against a Saxon/Hispanic schism that was best left buried.

  In the end Megan took Hopie back to Jupiter, while I remained on Ganymede. I had a post to fill and things to do here that were too important to leave; I simply could not yet return to Jupiter. And so we separated, and it hurt me deeply, and Megan, too, but we were helpless in the circumstance. It had never occurred to me that anything could drive us apart, least of all our child, but for this occasion it was true.

  Shelia and Ebony and Coral expressed their condolences and seemed to regret the situation as much as I did; but all three had suffered their own privations during schooling, and understood. None of them attempted to console me directly, for a reason they presumed I would not understand: All three of them were too strongly attracted to me to risk it. This effect on women is one of the liabilities of my talent. I appreciated their discretion.

  The premier expressed regret but did not interfere. "Women have their own perceptions, which men must tolerate," he said. "Raul will miss her." But Raul was now making progress independently, now that the channel had been opened; his mother was singing to him and doing well. The premier was a busy man, not given to much concern about the private problems of others.

  Khukov understood. "My wife—when I joined the Party..." He shrugged. I had not known he was married, and it seemed that was no longer the case. Only a few citizens of Saturn actually join the Party, of course—those who are seriously interested in government and power. Evidently Khukov's wife had wanted a different kind of life.

  "This is new to me," I confessed in Russian. "And painful."

  "Ah, yes," he agreed in Spanish. "There is no pain like it. But you and I, we must sacrifice all else in the pursuit of our destinies."

  "I love Megan," I said. "I will never give her up."

  "It will not be by your choice," he said with the wisdom of experience.

  I also received a note from Thorley. "Methinks I judged your wife too harshly." Naturally he approved of the direct expression of opposition to the Communist indoctrination but had evidently supposed that Megan did not. I appreciated his interest; it reminded me that though he and I still opposed each other philosophically, we retained a kind of friendship personally.

  The committee on the sugar and Tanamo issues was hopelessly deadlocked. The problems were these: the sugar market that had once been Ganymede's had been apportioned among several other Latin countries on and off Jupiter; they raised a howl of protest at the notion of losing those shares. Sugar was their major source of income; without that market some of them would quickly bankrupt. The Tanamo transfer was opposed by the Jupiter administration itself, though President Kenson remained publicly noncommittal so as not to undercut my position. The base could not be allowed to fall under Saturnine control.

  These two objections blocked the other parts of the negotiation. Neither Saturn nor Ganymede would agree to halt the export of arms and subversion to nations of the Jupiter sphere unless Tanamo were yielded, and the premier was adamant about regaining the sugar trade in return for whatever prisoners he might release. The barriers were, ironically, with the Jupiter side, rather than the Gany side. Megan's protestations to the contrary, there was some merit in the Gany political indoctrination. Not a lot, but some. A contrary political view was a serious matter here; this was something few of the folk on Jupiter could appreciate, because of their much greater freedom to adopt any political configuration they chose, or none.

  "Those bureaucrats will never lift out of the mire," Khukov said to me. "It is time for us to finish what we started." He had been instrumental in getting Saturn's acquiescence to the negotiations, and I knew that failure would reflect adversely on him where it counted: in the Party.

  "Can either of us accomplish what they can not?" I asked.

  "If we can not we do not deserve the power we reach for!" He gestured with his pool cue. "Let me make you a little challenge, señor, to test our mettle as captains against each other. I will take one issue, you the other. Let us see who is the better politician."

  "Agreed," I said. "Shall we play for the choice of issues?"

  "Indeed! Tanamo and sugar, winner's choice."

  So we played, and he won; he could beat me in pool when he chose. "Sugar," he said, smiling grimly.

  I sighed. "You took the sweet one, Comrade!" But we both knew that both issues were intractable, and that both of us were more likely to fail than to succeed. But we both had much to gain by success.

  Khukov put in a word to Saturn, and I to Jupiter. The essence of each was that he wished to arbitrate the sugar issue, and I the Tanamo issue, in nonbinding fashion. We would make recommendations for the governments of Ganymede and Jupiter to approve. Saturn, theoretically having no direct interest in either case, would stand aside. Of course, Saturn hoped to gain a naval base and lose the liability of the sugar trade if we succeeded, and to lose nothing if we failed; it was easy for Saturn to be gracious.

  "What the hell are you up to this time, Hubris?" President Kenson demanded privately after summoning me to New Wash for an emergency conference.

  "Sir, isn't the cessation of the shipment of Saturnine arms to our sphere via Ganymede worth the discontinuance of a Naval base whose maintenance on a hostile planet is costing us more than we like? Haven't we been looking for a graceful way to cut our losses—just as Saturn wants to cut its sugar losses?"

  He pondered. "Why should we assume those sugar losses—which are more than monetary—ourselves?"

  "No need," I said. "If you don't like the proposal Captain Khukov makes, turn it down."

  He stroked his chin. "Yes, of course. But I do not want to be forced to turn down your proposal. That would look bad. But we can't risk that base going to Saturn."

  "It won't, sir. It will be useless to Saturn."

  "Hubris, you were a Navy man. So was I. You've got to know better than that."

  "Sir, I was in longer than you were. As a Navy man I know what I am talking about. Let me explain."

  "Captain, you had better," he said grimly. He quirked a smile. "Show me your power."

  He had invoked the old Navy challenge. I obliged. His jaw dropped. "I didn't know that!"

  "Few civilians do, sir, and few officers without the need to know. That's why the bureaucrats on the negotiation team are stymied. As a commander in battle I had to know."

  "Let me check this out, Hubris." He reached for his phone.

  In moments he had confirmation from our own military staff. "Idiots!" he swore, referring to those on the committee who had not researched this information. Then he turned to me. "I think you're a damned genius, Hubris. You're due for promotion. I can give you an embassy that will thrill your wife."

  "Thank you, sir, but I prefer to make my own way."

  "Oh?"

  "I plan to run for governor of Sunshine again."

  He squinted at me. "Exactly where are you headed, Hubris?"

  I glanced around his office meaningfully.

  "Oho! You've already caught that virus!" He had won reelection handily the year before and could not run again; the nomination would be open. "Well, I'll not interfere. Certainly you'll have my support for governor. Go to it, Captain!" He shook my hand and dismissed me. He didn't take my ambition seriously; he was patronizing me. But his magnetism was such that I appreciated even that. And his support for my upcoming gubernatorial race would be invaluable.

  The trip to Jupiter enabled me to stop by Ybor, consult with Spirit, and spend a night with Megan. She confessed that she missed me, and that, having become accustomed to family life, she felt distinctly awkward without it, though she did have Hopie. She was most affectionate, and the night was a delight. It was also wonderful for me to see Hopie again. I hoped to return to Jupiter in a few months, and now I felt m
ore urgent than ever about it. Perhaps separation does make the heart grow fonder—or maybe it simply forces a person to realize what he is missing.

  "I have a gift for you," the premier informed me by phone. "Are you free to come here tonight?"

  The ambassador could hardly not be free to visit the premier at his behest, but I knew it was more than that. "Certainly," I agreed. "But it is not necessary to promise me any gift. In fact, my position requires that I decline all—"

  "This one you can not decline," he said smugly. "It is my thanks for what you did for Raul."

  "But I was glad to—"

  "A woman."

  This grew more awkward by the moment. "Premier, I am a married man!"

  He smiled on the screen, full of some secret. "This one you will take into your house, I am sure. She is in need of rehabilitation. I will expect you tonight." He cut off, leaving me in a quandary. What would Megan think if such a woman even came near the embassy? Yet I could not openly insult the premier by failing to make the appearance.

  I pondered. There had been something about his attitude. On the one hand, he enjoyed serving me as I had served him on the first occasion, forcing the social visit and the display of his autistic child. But there was more. The premier knew I loved Megan and knew she had returned to Jupiter because of the child, not because of any marital falling-out. He was a family man himself, and no supporter of adultery. He really believed I would be pleasantly surprised. Maybe he had found a superior cook for the embassy, though we had no problem there. Still...

  "Would you like one of us to chaperon you?" Shelia inquired mischievously.

  "Go spin your wheels by the Wall!" I retorted. We had become so acclimatized to our residence that the dread execution wall had become a thing of humor.

  "I'll go find a blindfold," she said contritely, and rolled her chair away.

  It was a minor exchange, but it served to remind me how well off I was. Shelia could never walk or dance, so probably would never marry, though she was physically capable of conceiving and bearing a baby. Her tragedy was mountainous compared to mine, yet she always appeared cheerful and was certainly competent. Here I was chafing because my wife was away for a few months, and I might have to deal with a new cook.