"Am I behind on anything?"
Mandeville shook his head. "We waited for you. I have your scores for you, of course, and an idea I'd like you to take home and consider."
The graduate plucked two folded-over index cards from the clutter on his desk. He handed one to Armand and the other to Victoria, resumed his seat and steepled his fingers against his lips.
Victoria unfolded her index card and read the number on it.
421
Armand flipped his card open and glanced at it, then refolded it and tucked it into his shirt pocket, without expression. Both turned to Mandeville, who wore a slight smile.
"Would you like to discuss your scores, or can I start my sales pitch?"
Victoria leaned forward. "What does it mean?"
"Well, if I skip all the technical details --"
"Please do."
Mandeville chuckled. "-- it means you're the two most powerful psi talents ever found on Hope." He sat forward in his chair. "Did either of you have any notion that you had these abilities before the testing?"
Victoria started to speak, stopped herself and glanced over at Armand. Armand didn't twitch.
"Mr. Morelon?"
The big freshman shrugged.
"What about you, Miss Peterson?"
"Well...no, not really."
The graduate student's eyes probed hers for a moment. "Would either of you be interested in a paid position on my research team?"
The corner of Armand's mouth quirked upward. "As experimental subjects?"
"Of course."
"How many hours a week and what's the pay?"
"Fifteen hours a week, twelve hundred fifty dekas a month."
Victoria's mouth fell open.
Armand's eyes were darker than ever. "You must not have a lot of suitable subjects. A top engineer might make that much for working twice as many hours."
Mandeville rose from his chair, then leaned back against the edge of his desk. "A top engineer can't do what either of you apparently can. We want to study it, figure out how it works." He grinned. "Maybe it's teachable. Ever think of that?"
Something about the graduate student's manner rang false. Victoria could practically smell his unease, but she couldn't imagine a reason for it that would square with the offer he'd made them.
Unless he's just afraid that he might lose us.
"Where does the money come from, Mr. Mandeville?" Armand pushed himself upright and approached the graduate student. "Someone has to think this could pay off big time. How? And how long has it been going on?"
Before Mandeville could answer, words exploded from Victoria unbidden. "What's the difference, Armand? We could pay for our whole education out of one year's wages!"
The big freshman dismissed it with a gentle shrug. "We're both on scholarship, Vicki. And I still want to know why this is so important to somebody."
Anger flamed in her chest. Armand had just waved aside enough money to support her family for ten years. Thirty, if she could keep it going for the rest of her time at Gallatin.
He's never known insecurity or want. I should have had him to the house once or twice, given him a look at how the other half lives.
"The money, Mr. Morelon," Mandeville said, "comes from a consortium of businessmen interested in exploring alternatives to radio. With twenty million separate households on Hope, each with its own pet radio frequency, the spectrum is getting crowded. Practical telepathy, even if it were artificially modulated, would offer an alternative that might not have radio's congestion problems. But why should that matter to you? The availability of the funds should speak for itself. Someone cares enough to make this possible. Isn't that all you need to know?"
The room was momentarily still.
"My family wouldn't think much of me if I agreed to this without knowing what it was all about, Mr. Mandeville." Armand looked down into the graduate student's eyes challengingly. "Especially not my grandfather. Alain Morelon. Maybe you've heard of him? He's a hard man to disappoint."
Ethan Mandeville was not a small man, but Armand's bulk made him appear so. He was not without his own fund of self-confidence, but Armand's physical presence, quiet insistence, and familial status had pushed him off his base.
"Look, I'm not asking for a commitment today. I know you both have academic obligations to balance against this, plus who knows what other demands on your time." Mandeville dropped into his desk chair and leaned back to look up at the freshman. "Take the idea back to your rooms and sleep on it, both of you. If you decide you can spare the time and want the money, my team would love to have you. Come back tomorrow afternoon and tell me what you've decided."
"Why tomorrow?" Armand asked.
Mandeville drew himself up straight, for the first time displaying a hint of displeasure. "Because there's a lot of money involved, a huge research program depends on it, and I don't want to wait until the end of spring break."
Victoria was about to offer an immediate consent when Armand said "All right, till tomorrow, then."
Mandeville relaxed and nodded. "One other request. Please don't discuss it with any other students. We haven't made such an offer to anyone before, and we don't want to excite a lot of comment. Especially not among people who couldn't qualify for these positions no matter how hard they tried. Have a good evening." He waved at the door, turned away and rummaged through the mess of papers and books on his desk.
Armand caught Victoria in the crook of his arm and shepherded her out of the office. She had to fight down the urge to pull free and throw herself at Mandeville's feet.
I'd have his baby for what he's offering, but it wouldn't do to tell him that. Armand's got the right idea.
"Do you think you'll do it, Armand?"
He opened the door for her and ushered her out onto the quadrangle. "I have to think about it, Vicki. There's something about it that doesn't feel square." He grinned crookedly. "You know you can go your own way if you want. He didn't say it was both of us or nothing."
"What was your score?"
"Never mind that. I want to do a little research of my own." He settled his backpack against his shoulders. "I have a class. Look, if you want to talk this over, I'm available. Just give me a little while to let it settle, okay?"
"Are you going to tell anyone else?" Are you going to tell that little blonde bitch?
He shook his head, waved a quick farewell, and headed toward the Humanities building.
***
"You made the offer?" Magnusson asked.
Mandeville nodded and braced himself for the inevitable next question.
"Well?" Magnusson's hands tightened on the arms of his chair.
"They showed an unusual degree of self-restraint."
The biophysicist winced and rose from his desk. Dmitri Ianushkevich sat impassive, chin propped upon his fingers. Charles Petrus straightened and cleared his throat, the first sound he'd made since Mandeville entered Magnusson's office.
"We have at most six months, gentlemen," Petrus said. "How much remains in the bait fund?"
Magnusson squinted down at him. "About ninety thousand dekas."
"Offer them five thousand a month each."
"What?"
"Do you have a better idea, Einar? Or are there candidates from Bakunin or Comfort you haven't told us about yet?"
"No, but --"
Petrus's hand slashed at the air. "Then do it. First plantings are about six weeks away. How many successive crop failures can Hope withstand?"
"Charlie," Ianushkevich murmured, "what if neither of them responds to the conditioning?"
Petrus awarded the parapsychologist a gentle smile. "Then we all die. Me, you, Einar, this young man, all our families, all our friends, and everyone in every outpost of Man upon Hope. There, I've said it. There's no point in hoarding the money, Dmitri. We can't buy off the ecology. Do you have any other objections?"
Mandeville said, "I'd thought there were some problems about recruiting the Morelon boy for --"
/>
"The problems," Petrus said flatly, looking not at Mandeville but at Magnusson, "have been overcome."
"So we appeal to their cupidity," Magnusson grated. "Charlie, do you have any idea what the Morelon family holdings amount to? That boy could probably buy the whole university out of his pocket change. And you think you're going to hook him with a few thousand dekas?"
"What's the harm, Einar?" Petrus stared at the biophysicist as if waiting for him to regain his senses. "What else do we have to work with?"
Mandeville caught himself holding his breath.
"The harm, you ass, is in raising his suspicions. Nothing for nothing, Charlie. Nowhere on Hope can a man earn five thousand dekas for eighty hours of unskilled labor. I have no fears about the Peterson girl, she's as rapacious as anyone I've ever known, but the Morelon lad is neither greedy nor stupid. He'll know we have purposes we haven't disclosed. He'll take his suspicions to his beloved grandfather, and what will we do then?"
"And your alternative?" Petrus's hands balled into fists.
"We could try telling him the truth."
Petrus threw back his head and released a braying laugh. Magnusson's face mottled with blood. He stepped toward his
Inner Circle colleague. Mandeville became afraid. "Do it."
All heads swiveled toward Ianushkevich. He remained seated and calm.
"Tell him?" Petrus's eyes were wide.
Ianushkevich shook his head. "No. Offer them the money."
"And if he goes to Alain?" Magnusson eyed Petrus with hostility.
"I'll deal with it."
"What if he continues to refuse?"
Einar Magnusson's huge body blocked the flood of late winter sunshine that had poured through the window. It made his Spartan little office seem cold and dim. The three magnates of the Cabal were reduced to silhouettes in the gloom.
"I'll deal with that as well," Ianushkevich said. "Charlie's right, we're out of alternatives. Try the money." The parapsychologist rose and stood formally erect. "We hold the future of Mankind on Hope in our hands. Lifeboat ethics, my friends, in the largest lifeboat in the history of Man. We will do what we must. Mr. Mandeville," he said, turning toward the graduate student, "I trust we haven't upset you?"
Mandeville swallowed his rising panic. "No, sir."
Dmitri Ianushkevich's gentle smile was a thing of ultimate sadness. "I'm glad. You know our secrets to the last detail, now. Welcome to the
Inner Circle of the Cabal. We each do what we must." He waved at the office door. "Go and play your part." ***
Alain Morelon strode across the southernmost of the Morelon cornfields. Pale winter sun streamed through the clouds that hung over the Kropotkin. A light breeze stirred the fringe of black and silver hair that protruded from beneath his woolen cap. Dead and withered stalks, covered by a thin crust of snow, crunched softly beneath his boots. He scanned the ground carefully as he walked.
He wasn't looking for anything he could have named, except reassurance. If it was here, hidden among the leavings of the harvest just past, it was well hidden. It did not call to him.
It's not in my hands. Either it will bear, or it won't. I agreed not to interfere.
The last unexplained failures to ripen had not been four hundred years ago, but fifty. He had said nothing to anyone, had endured excruciating anxiety the whole of the following year, waiting to learn whether the failure would be repeated a million times larger, across the whole of Hope.
I shouldn't have mentioned it to Armand.
His grandson would worry. But with Dmitri Ianushkevich having asked to see him for the first time in three centuries, perhaps there was something to worry about.
He stooped over a jackpile of fallen stalks and stared down at it. The pile twitched away the light covering of snow. One by one, the stalks rose soundlessly, wisps of silk fluttering in the breeze, to hover before his face. They were like all the others he had examined: frail and stunted, as if deprived of nutrients, or light, or both.
Failure to ripen.
The weight of the secret he'd borne alone for twelve centuries tugged at him from within. He had not asked to carry it. Chance had bestowed it upon him, along with the psi powers that ran in his family's genes like a cataract of sorrow. Yet it would remain his burden until the end of his life. He would not ask an innocent boy to share it.
He would say no more to Armand.
Chapter 9
Ethan Mandeville looked up as a sharp knock was laid upon his office door.
"Come in."
The door opened to admit Victoria Peterson, Armand Morelon, and a petite blonde girl he'd seen around the Gallatin campus but whose name he didn't know. All three faces were wreathed in inscrutability. Mandeville rose as they entered.
"Good morning, Miss Peterson, Mr. Morelon. I'm glad to see you so early in the day." He turned to the blonde girl. "I don't believe I've had the pleasure. I'm Ethan Mandeville."
She smiled formally and extended her hand to take his. "Teresza Chistyakowski."
Mandeville offered her his desk chair, gestured to Victoria to take his guest chair, and leaned against the edge of his desk, hands in his pockets. "Do you have an answer for me?" He kept his expression neutral.
Victoria's eyes flicked to Armand's. The big freshman nodded and said, "We'll do it, if you can keep it from interfering with our class schedules."
Nothing in Mandeville's short life had approached the rush of relief that poured through him in that instant. He'd thought it would be hard to deal with rejection, but maintaining his aplomb in the face of acceptance taxed his self-control to its limits.
"Thank you. I'm pleased, of course. We'll be more than happy to work around your schedules and personal obligations. Shall we use first names from now on?"
"Fine with me," Victoria said. Armand shrugged.
"Tell me, please: why is Miss Chistyakowski here?"
A trace of color rose into Armand's face. "We have a class together." The Chistyakowski girl smirked and looked at the floor. Victoria revealed nothing at all.
"I see. Well, shall we discuss your duties? I imagine you'd want to know what sort of thing you'll be doing before we start you doing it."
Victoria slid forward to perch at the edge of her chair. Armand settled back against the windowsill, arms crossed over his chest.
"The two of you tested very high in all areas," Mandeville said, "but the ones where you particularly impressed us were clairvoyance and telekinesis. Armand, your perception of concealed objects is superb. Victoria, your ability to move things at a distance exceeds anything mentioned in any record we have. My team is designing additional experiments to probe just how far those abilities can be developed."
"What about the telepathy angle?" Armand asked. "I thought alternative communications was the big motivator."
Mandeville bobbed his head. "Believe me, it is. We have to show results in that area to keep our funding. That doesn't mean we can't explore these other areas too. The mind is an organic whole. No one's ever worked out how the psi powers are interrelated. If we come to understand your clairvoyance thoroughly, it might lead to a breakthrough in telepathy as well."
That came off rather well.
Neither of Mandeville's new employees showed any tension or suspicion at his explanation. The Chistyakowski girl shifted in her seat, but said nothing.
"I have to consult my other team members and spend some time with my research advisor. Could I ask you to come back after lunch, so we can lay out some schedules? We're all anxious to get this started as soon as possible."
Armand nodded. Victoria smiled brightly and said "Okay." Mandeville thanked them again, hands were shaken all around, and a minute later he was alone in his office, his pulse lashing the blood through his brain at a speed that made the walls seem to wobble and wave.
I did it. We're all going to live. And I saved all that money!
Dr. Magnusson will be so proud.
***
Teresza peered through the
bolivar bushes at Victoria's retreating back until the sophomore was halfway across the quadrangle and definitely out of earshot. "She doesn't like me, you know."
Armand squeezed her hand. "You don't like her, either. You just hide it better than she does."
She blushed. "Well, yeah."
I'd take on all the States of Earth to hold off a woman who looks at you the way she does, you big lump. You'll understand that, some day.
They were almost at the doors to the Social Sciences Center when she bade him stop and face her. Students and faculty streamed by them on either side.
"Class starts in about two minutes, Terry."
She nodded. "I know. Armand, why did you want me there?"
A cloud passed over his face. He took both her hands in his. She could see him weighing his words before he spoke.
"It's hard to say, Terry. I mean, apart from just wanting you around all the time." She had to grin at that, but he remained serious. "You have a gift of your own. Not psi, something else. Something that tunes in to, uh, quality. Or maybe to sincerity, if that's any different." He grimaced. "Ever since we started seeing one another, whenever I've liked someone and you haven't, you've been right."
She felt herself grow lightheaded.
I didn't intend for you to notice.
"It hasn't happened that often, Armand."
"No, maybe not, but often enough to register. So I figured, if there was something not quite right about this business, or about Mandeville, maybe you would sniff it out for me."
The warmth seeped out of her, not to be replaced by the late winter sun. She wanted to hunch her shoulders and shiver, but forced herself to stand straight. Armand waited. Presently she pulled him to a concrete bench near the Social Sciences Center's doors, and the two of them sat. The pedestrian traffic around them had dwindled to zero.
"I don't know, Armand." She tried to keep her manner light. "He seemed nice enough. Enthusiastic about his research. Even a little idealistic. Were you worried about something in particular?"
She felt the currents of tension mounting in him. His entire body seemed to be stiffening to meet a rising wind. His fingers flexed restlessly against her own.
Which Art In Hope (Spooner Federation Saga Book 1) Page 6