by Ward Wagher
“There is that,” Eckert said. “Of course, the alternative would be to buy a fusion plant for the village and the keep.”
Frank stopped digging and looked up again. “Would be nice. That would take all the money I have, and then some. On the other hand, Hydro power is cheap. I would like to find a decent turbo-generator assembly to set up next to the current one.”
“Oh. That shouldn't be too hard to set up.”
“And it doesn't have the maintenance issues a fusion plant brings.”
The conversation tailed off as both men continued working. By midmorning a respectable pile of rock and gravel was forming by the side of the right of way. Another couple of men showed up later and Harmon Eckert instructed them to start digging on the other side of the road. Father Riggs arrived in a two-wheeled un-sprung cart pulled by an ancient horse.
“Water bucket in the back, boys,” he said. “Just brought it up from the well, so it’s cold.”
Frank tossed down his mattock. “About time for a break anyway. Father, can you wait here a while until the rest of the men come out of the woods?”
“Certainly. It’s not living water, but it’s the next best thing.”
Frank looked at him with a slight squint, but did not respond.
“Reverend, this is mighty good of you,” Eckert said.
“Nonsense. Everyone else is working. This is the least I could do. Antonia would not let me study this morning anyway. She saw everyone else heading out to work and… well you can figure out the rest,” he said with a smile.
One of the men made clucking sounds and pretended to peck at his hand.
Riggs laughed. “Yeah! And who else in this group has the same problem?”
Several of the men chuckled, but said nothing. Frank grinned to himself. It doesn’t matter what planet you live on, life continues, he thought. Wendy even began speaking to me again this morning.
The aftermath of the executions three days previously had left everyone worn out, physically and emotionally. Hai Ciera seemed to be the most unaffected, but Frank assumed he had experienced things like this before. Eden, Gerry and the women had been very quiet since. Even Smith & Jones were sober.
As the men were standing around the water pail and talking, Hai Ciera rode up on a horse. He slipped off the saddle in front of Frank.
“You now have electrical power in the keep,” he said.
“That was quick.”
“Turned out to be not as big a job as I thought. The mountings and foundations were okay. We just had to unbolt the old gear-box and put the new one in.”
“Wonderful. I wish there was a way to extend it to the village.”
“Not enough oomph in the generator, I’m afraid,” Ciera said. “I suspect there is enough water power, however, to drive a second unit, although I don’t know how much larger we would be able to go.”
“You might want to have Harmon Eckert here take a look at it. I think he has an engineering background. We were discussing it earlier.” Frank pointed over at the surveyor.
“I guess I could add that to my list… of about one-hundred things.”
“I know what you mean. Every time I lift a hand to do something, it seems like three or four new things pop up that require my attention. I really shouldn’t be out here, but it seemed necessary to get everyone motivated this morning.”
“I think, Frank, once they get to know you, you will have no trouble getting them to work for you.”
Frank grinned at Ciera. “Leadership, eh?”
“Exactly. It works here just like it works everywhere else. When you picked up that ax…”
“It’s a mattock, Hai.”
“Mattock, then. Word shot around the village almost instantly. The son of one of the men helping me came running up to tell his Da that the margrave was working on the road. I could tell everyone was impressed.”
“I just hope I am as impressed when I try to get out of bed tomorrow. I had forgotten how hard it is to swing one of these things any length of time. And stop snickering, Hai.”
“Why do you think I picked the power plant job?”
“Right.”
“The reason I came over here, other than to watch you work…”
Frank made a fist with one hand and pretended to crank with the other as his middle finger slowly rose out of his fist.
Hai laughed. “As I was saying. I thought I might fly the aircar into Cambridge and get a quick paint-job on it.”
“A bit risky, wouldn’t you think?”
“I think Justin Vos would do it for me. He is not a friend of the duke. Especially not now.”
“Why not just buy one and keep this one for parts? It wouldn’t be quite so hot, then.”
“Actually, I would prefer not to have records of a purchase where our friend in Cambridge could trace the serial number, etc. This would be much more anonymous.”
Frank shrugged. “I defer to your profound experience in these matters. Just don’t get poor Vos tangled up in something that would get him or more of his employees killed.”
“I hear you, Frank. You know I am always careful.”
“That is why you have kept Daphne stashed up here?”
“That’s right. I hope she has been useful.”
“Oh, she has. Gerry Blakely is not much of a records keeper. She has gone through the comps and put things in wonderful order. Wendy started trying to talk her into resigning from the Navy and going to work for us.”
“She could do worse, Frank. I could talk to her.”
“Does she really want to give up her career in the Navy?”
“She is no longer pestering me to get back to Cambridge.”
“Let’s see how things go,” Frank said. “Meanwhile, if you are heading into the big city, I have another shopping list for you.”
Hai groaned.
Chapter Fourteen
“Where is Lazlo Tonkin?” Guilietto Roma, the Duke of Hepplewhite, asked. “He was supposed to report in days ago. He’s been gone two weeks. This is completely unacceptable.”
Glenn Foxworth glanced around the duke’s office. The room was tastefully decorated in off-white with walnut trim. The room did not contain the larger than life pictures or statues common to autocrats. The desk, while obviously expensive, had been carefully chosen to fit the décor and size of the room. The man behind the desk was neatly dressed in conservative business attire and looked every inch the consummate professional.
I do not understand how I got sucked into a job like this, the prime minister thought. Yes, I do. The duke makes an excellent first impression and it took a little time for me to realize what an idiot he is. I thought I was smarter than that. Oh and the money his brother waved under my nose to take the job and to keep an eye on dear Guilietto blinded me to the obvious. Correction: he is a vicious idiot.
“Are you going to answer me, Prime Minister?”
“I apologize, My lord. I was pondering why Tonkin may have dropped out of touch. There is no record of him leaving the planet. What did you have him doing?” I know why he has not gotten in touch. He took the first opportunity to get shet of our beloved duke.
“I sent him in to keep an eye on what Nyman was doing and report back.”
Foxworth turned his head slightly to the side and raised an eyebrow.
“Seriously. That was what I was doing. I don’t suppose Nyman could have caught him,” the duke said.
“It would help if we had a source in the village,” Foxworth said. “From everything I can find out, it seems Tonkin never showed up.”
“You know, this really frosts me. I gave Tonkin’s team a twenty-thousand Centauran bonus for this job. I should have waited to pay him until he provided proof of success. Now he is gone and Nyman is still out there. How long has it been?”
“Nyman is still out there?” Foxworth quoted back to him. “You sent Tonkin in just to do some spying?”
“No, no,” the duke said quickly. “The new margrave is a slippery characte
r. He managed to get in and out of the records section here before I had a chance to… speak with him. There is no telling what he is doing up in the mountains of Montora. That’s what I wanted Tonkin to find out.”
We both know what you were up to, My Lord. You wanted to knock off this guy too, Foxworth thought. It’s a good thing it didn’t happen. Now how can I get things on track again?
“You are correct in that it has been two weeks, My Lord. He has missed his communications schedules and basically disappeared. There has been no sign of either him or his team.”
Roma drummed his fingers on the desk top and frowned. “I wonder if Tonkin did, in fact, slip up. Nyman has those two body guards with him. And Police Chief Dodd said a couple of Navy people have gone to ground. I suppose they could be with him. Seems unlikely, though; a middle-aged man and his wife, and a couple of guards against a professional team; I mean, if they happened to spot them. I suppose they could have gotten lucky… What I am saying is that nobody was supposed to see them.”
“Perhaps nobody did,” Foxworth said.
Roma considered that for a few moments. “Yeah, you may be right Glenn. It is really unlikely. Tonkin’s group was good.” He got out of his chair and walked to the window. The duke was medium height with olive skin and well-styled silver hair. He looked out the window with his hands clasped behind his back and rocked on his heels. Foxworth watched as Roma maintained the pose for a full minute. He turned around. “Well, Prime Minister, there is nothing for it but to hire another team... for security, of course. Please see to it.”
And if I had an ounce of sense, I would be on the next shuttle off-planet myself. “Of course, My Lord. May I ask how My Lord desires to pay for another team?”
Roma’s face transformed into a snarl. “I ought to take it out of your salary for incompetence. I need the Montoran lands! It is the key to getting out from under my brother’s thumb. And the only way to get it is to make sure the Nymans are dead.”
Foxworth looked at Roma without expression. And when Nymans keep dying, the Navy will come snooping around; if they haven’t already. And that could be a Bad Thing for Evelyn Foxworth’s little boy Glenn.
Roma recovered his control and his face smoothed back into its mask of affability. “Forget I said that. It was just a figure of speech. Of course, I wouldn’t kill anybody. I need to simply run them out of here so I can claim the property. If it is abandoned I can exercise Eminent Domain.
“Of course, My Lord.”
“And now that I am thinking about it, when is the next stipend from my brother due to arrive?”
“Next week, My Lord. May I remind you we are already a month behind on the pay for the civil servants?”
The duke walked over to stand behind his chair. He maintained his pleasant expression, but his hands grasped the chair back tightly. “No, you may not remind me. I am fully aware of that need and catching up on the payroll will be the first thing we do.”
Foxworth nodded in acknowledgement. “If it please, My Lord, I will do some research and present to you a list of potential replacements for Lazlo Tonkin.” And maybe I can delay things long enough to distract his lordship with something else.
“See that you do, Prime Minister. I am not happy with your performance of late and will communicate that to my brother. I am very disappointed with you, Glenn.”
And disappointment does not begin to describe my feelings about you, your Lordship. “Of course, My Lord. By your leave?” I’ve got to get out of here before I strangle this idiot!
“By my leave.”
Frank leaned on his shovel and watched as Harmon Eckert deftly maneuvered the backhoe along the developing roadbed. The surveyor had accomplished more the first morning with the equipment than the entire team had done the previous week. The outline of the roadbed was rapidly taking shape as he drove back and forth over the first hundred meters they had been working on. Two men were using the molecular cutter to slice rock into paving stones while a group of men hammered rock into gravel. A regular stream of men pushing wheelbarrows brought more rock from the mountain side.
“Your surveyor is quite the jewel.” Wendy walked up to Frank. “Where did he come from?”
“He doesn’t say much about that. I suspect he’s fugitive on the run. I am not inclined to ask too many questions.”
“Afraid you might have to execute him?”
Frank turned his head down and raised his eyebrows to look at Wendy. “Did you come all the way out here to fight with me? If you are feeling froggy, we can have at it.”
Eckert slid the loader under the pile of gravel and picked up a scoop full. He then drove to the edge of the current paving. He then slowly backed up while letting the gravel trickle from the scoop. The noise made conversation impossible. Once the scoop was empty, he raised it and drove forward again. The crunch of the tires on the gravel covered up the slight whining sound from the motors.
Wendy put her hands on her hips. “Actually Beddings and Mrs. Marsden are bringing lunch out in the wagon for the men. I thought I would help serve.”
“That’s good. I think the men would appreciate it. If we cannot pay them yet, at least we could feed them.”
The noise picked up again as Eckert backed up, dragging the scoop over the gravel, to smooth it.
“And if Harmon Eckert is hiding something, why don’t you ask him about it?”
“You just won’t let it go, will you? So far as I know, he hasn’t broken any laws here. Not only that, he has been an enormous help. There is something to be said for letting sleeping dogs lie.”
Wendy snorted.
“Plus, he is not trying to kill us.”
The squeak of the harness and the rumble of wagon wheels on the road attracted the attention of the workers. Frank walked over to where Carlyle Beddings and Mrs. Marsden sat on the wagon. “I see the lunch wagon has arrived.”
Mrs. Marsden eased herself to the ground. “If the margrave will keep to the side, Beddings and I will see about getting set up to feed the men.”
“Yes, Mrs. Marsden,” Frank said. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Beddings grin. He turned to the workers. “We will have lunch ready for you shortly. Will someone go up to the quarry and tell the men there to knock off?”
One of the younger workers tossed his mallet aside and trotted up the road. Eckert brought the equipment to a halt and climbed off. He walked over to Frank. “For someone who claimed to know nothing about heavy equipment, Margrave, Commander Ciera sure picked us a prime piece.”
“So, we did all right for twenty-five thousand?”
“Oh, yes. It has only about five-hundred hours on the clock. The accumulators are holding up well. We could probably run almost two days on the charge.”
“The question is,” Frank said, “is whether we can recharge it over night without completely dimming out the lights in the castle.”
“I have wondered that myself,” he said, raising a finger. “The power plant is really not very large for the needs here.”
“Back to that conversation,” Frank said. “If we're patient, I'm sure something will turn up.”
Frank looked over as Wendy walked up. “You are doing a beautiful job on the road, Mr. Eckert. Where did you learn to operate equipment like that?”
Frank shot a warning look at Wendy before Eckert answered. “Oh, I’ve knocked about a bit and picked up some odd skills here and there.” Eckert looked at the ground, then at the trees, and then the sky.
Wendy turned with a slight smile and walked back to the wagon.
“You will pardon my wife,” Frank said. “She gets nosy sometimes.”
Eckert turned red. “Oh, no problem at all, Margrave. I have always liked machinery and picked up this or that as it caught my interest.”
One of the men running the molly-cutter came over. “If it please the margrave, and Mr. Eckert, we would like to take the molly-cutter up to the quarry to break up some bigger pieces of granite.”
“How is the char
ge holding up?” Eckert asked.
“Oh, fine. I think we should get through the day, no problem. This is really a fine tool.”
“Commander Ciera strikes again,” Frank said. The men chuckled. “If Mr. Eckert is happy with that, I would say to go ahead after lunch.”
The man actually knuckled his forehead and gave a slight bow. “Thank you, Margrave.”
Frank smiled. “You men are doing great. I am very pleased.”
The man bowed twice more and then walked over to the other workers.