“The Committee hasn’t declared any interest. Therefore Miss Mendoza has no right in the case.”
Wu-wei was writing on his worksheet. Paula stared at Tanuojin’s back. His shirt was sticking to him. She expected him to come over to the rail, to talk it over, but he watched Parine. The little lawyer put his hands on his hips, his arms sticking out, and swaggered back toward his chair.
“Defenser, do you have an argument?” Wu-wei said.
“I don’t need an argument.” Tanuojin walked along the midline between their side of the room and Parine’s. “He needs the arguments. He hasn’t proved she still works for the Committee.”
Parine bellied up to him. “She’s never resigned. The first person she called in Crosby’s Planet was Sybil Jefferson.”
Paula muttered, under her breath. So their suite was tapped.
“Ask her if she works for the Committee.”
“The Committee is accustomed to operate sub rosa—”
Wu-wei tapped his knuckles on the table. “Parine, I’ll ask her myself.”
Sulky, Parine said, “Request permission to withdraw the bill.”
Wu-wei nodded and bent to mark his worksheet. Tanuojin sauntered across his side of the court. He slid his hands under his belt. He was warming to it. Parine turned to the Bench again.
“Your Excellency, we have another bill—”
Tanuojin went to his chair and put one foot up on it. Parine was arguing to set a time limit on the trial. With many fine gestures he laid out a dozen reasons for his bill. At the height of his discourse, Tanuojin leaned on his chair and broke it.
The people sitting in the gallery behind Paula gasped. Wu-wei threw his head back, and Parine wheeled. Tanuojin said, in the silence, “Bring me something I can sit on.”
Parine’s face flushed bright red. “Your Excellency—”
Wu-wei said, “Parine, this is my courtroom. The bailiff will supply the defenser with a suitable chair. Two suitable chairs.” He looked at Tanuojin. His soft, ageless face was expressionless. “I’ll call a recess until fourteen while we arrange the furniture.” He rapped on the table. “Akellar, come here, please.”
Saba slid off the railing. He took Paula’s hand. “Let’s go—I’m hungry.”
Tanuojin got her by the other arm. “No, leave her with me, I need her.”
Saba’s jaw clenched. Without a word he vaulted the rail and went down the aisle toward the door, brushing aside the people in his way. Sril, Bakan, and Trega followed him. Paula watched him go.
“I think the Man is jealous,” Tanuojin said, under his breath.
Paula glanced up at him. She went toward the Bench, passing Chi Parine, who was putting away notebooks in a papercase. When her back was to him, Parine said, soft, “Where do you hide the puppet strings?”
She pretended not to hear him. Wu-wei was smoothing his worksheet down with the flat of his hand. Tanuojin came over beside her, facing the judge.
“You wanted me?”
“No,” Wu-wei said. “But I have you, by the jug-luck.” He looked at Paula. “I’m an easy man, as long as I’m amused. I don’t mind slack manners but I won’t stand violence. If that happens again, I will pack and leave, and none of us will get what we came here for.” He got up and went out the side door.
Paula snorted. She turned to go. Tanuojin said, “The she-man thinks you’re the master mind.”
“They don’t seem to respect your intelligence.”
The last of the spectators were leaving out the door. Marus and Kany came up on Paula’s free side. They walked along the green corridor. She skipped a stride to keep up with them. The long hall streamed with people.
“What do you think of Parine?” Tanuojin asked.
“He’ll probably sharpen up.”
They went out the doors and across the plaza. Her heels clacked on the pavement. She was still unused to the gravity and walking was a chore. She looked around the broad plaza for Saba. A man loped along a few feet away, a camera up to his face. She jerked her head straight.
When they returned to the courtroom, there were two oversized padded armchairs on their side of the rail. Saba and Tanuojin did not stand for Wu-wei’s entrance, and the audience booed them. Parine argued an obscure point of evidence supporting his bill for a time limit to the trial. His four assistants sat in a line along the rail, two young men, two young women, their legs crossed right over left. Halfway through the lecture, the redheaded woman on the end of the line rearranged her legs left over right, and the others copied her, one after the other.
Parine said, “Because whatever euphemisms the radical fringe might employ, the friction between Mars and the Styth Empire amounts to a war. To stretch out this trial as long as the defense cares to would make this courtroom another battlefield of that war, which is surely not the court’s or our intention.” When he sat down several people scattered through the gallery clapped with vigor.
“Defenser?” Wu-wei said.
“Just a moment.” Tanuojin swung around toward Paula, who was leaning against the railing behind the two Styths. “What is he talking about?”
He spoke the Common Speech, and he did not lower his voice. Paula folded her arms over her chest. “I don’t know. I think he’s just shoveling dirt.”
Tanuojin straightened around in his chair. “I don’t care,” he said to Wu-wei. “Make it as short as you like. You’d make it even shorter if that little niggerman wouldn’t use six times the words he needs.”
Parine’s pale Martian cheeks went ruddy. The crowd erupted into boos and catcalls and stamped their feet on the floor. Saba turned to look them over, his face pensive. Paula gave a little shake of her head. Tanuojin was determined to make everybody hate him. Wu-wei nodded at the bailiff, who rang a handbell until the people in the gallery quieted and sat down.
Wu-wei raised his silky voice. “The trial will also run a good deal shorter if the gallery will not take the defenser’s baits. I accept the bill.”
Parine locked his hands behind his back. He fixed Tanuojin with an icy look. “We will now introduce a bill for a declaration of evidence.”
Paula straightened, unfolding her arms. The Martian lawyer paraded around his side of the court, his eyes on Tanuojin. “In the interests of the time limit, we are offering to submit an outline of our case, provided defenser is as forthcoming, and reduce the points of controversy.”
Tanuojin got out of his chair. He put his back to Parine and bent, his hands on the arms of Paula’s chair, to talk into her ear. “What is this?” Now he was speaking Styth.
“It’s usually done the other way,” she said. “The defenser offers to limit the case to one or two points of controversy.” She tapped her fingers on her knees. “Don’t accept it. Make them talk about it, maybe we can find something out.”
He glanced at Parine. Straightening, he flexed his long hands at his sides, unsheathing his claws. He sauntered around their side of the courtroom. Everybody was watching him, even Wu-wei, his hands folded neatly before him.
“If you want,” Tanuojin said. “There were two ships killed at Luna, that watch. I ordered the shooting from Ybix, and the rest of the charges are false. That ought to limit the points of controversy.”
Parine sat down in his chair. He plucked at the knees of his doe-gray trousers. “You’re in advance of yourself, aren’t you? The question isn’t one of issues yet, just procedure.”
“Oh.” Tanuojin circled past the Bench. “I’ll try not to confuse the case with the facts. How do I know we need your evidence declared?”
Parine turned his head away, insouciant. The young redheaded woman stood up before her chair. She spoke to the Bench. “We are not offering evidence itself, but an outline of our case. Of course, if the defenser is so willing to admit to the crimes as charged—”
“Object,” Paula said. “That isn’t what he said.”
Tanuojin shook his head at her. He walked slowly down the midline of the room, patrolling his boundary. He sway
ed to keep from hitting the white china lamp hanging from the ceiling, and the crowd murmured. Saba frowned.
“I don’t need your case,” Tanuojin said. “I know my evidence.” His bassoon voice was softer than before, as if he were uncertain.
Wu-wei said, “The defenser is obviously not familiar with the procedure. I’ll ask the adversary to restate his bill.”
The redheaded woman started toward the Bench. “Your Excellency, our evidence is exclusively documentary. If the defenser’s case is compatible, we can dispose of the adversary presentment in a matter of hours.”
Tanuojin strolled up between her and the judge’s table. Still talking, she backed away from him, and he took a step toward her. The redheaded woman braced herself. “Bench, tell this man not to chase me around.”
Paula put her hand over her mouth. Tanuojin walked away from the Martian woman, veering around the lamp. His back to the Bench, he said, “I don’t need his case. I know what happened at Luna. If he says something else happened, he’s lying. I don’t have to know the substance of a lie.”
Wu-wei knocked on the table. “Decline Parine’s bill of declaration.” He looked irritated.
Another of Parine’s staff bobbed out of his chair. His voice was high-pitched with indignation. “Bench, we object to the defenser’s behavior. Defenser is resorting to the coarsest tactics, including physical intimidation.” His voice quivered. “We’d like the Bench to state that he will use contempt procedures to control behavior in this courtroom.”
Saba leaned toward her across the arm of his chair. “I thought you said they’d have General Gordon.”
She shrugged one shoulder, her gaze on Parine, who was inspecting his own trim little hands. “That’s what I thought.”
Wu-wei was watching them. His face was smoothly expressionless again. Tanuojin went off on another tour of their half of the courtroom. Wu-wei said, “I have my doubts about the contempt citation, as I’m sure you know, but if the defenser agrees to it, I’ll consider the use.”
Tanuojin came up behind his chair and leaned on the back. “Against me only, or them too?”
“Against the offense as well,” the little judge said.
Parine bounced onto his feet. “We’re people of principle, sir, we don’t—”
Tanuojin said, “I’ve never met but one nigger with principles, and her principle is she has no principles.”
The audience roared. A voice in the back called, “Throw the black bastard out.” Marus and Kany left the wall and came up along the rail, between their chief and the crowd.
“I can assure you, Tanuojin,” Wu-wei said, “I am a man of no principles whatsoever.” The corners of his mouth tipped up in a V of a smile.
Parine had gone back to consult with the redheaded woman and another aide. He returned to the Bench. “Your Excellency, we have a bill of—”
Wu-wei leaned forward. “Parine, it’s almost seventeen hours. Before we get involved in another of these choreographs of yours, I’ll recess until nine tomorrow, so you won’t be rushed for time.” He knocked on the table. The rest of the courtroom, all but Tanuojin, heaved to its feet, and the judge went out through the back door into his office.
Paula rubbed her hands together, glad to be finished for the day. Parine’s staff was putting away papers. Tanuojin stood frowning at the floor.
A voice screamed from the back of the court: “Why don’t you go back where you came from?”
Paula went to the gate in the railing. A dozen spectators were crowded along it, yelling at Tanuojin. When she went through the gate, a fat woman turned on her. “You, too.” And raised her purse and struck her.
Marus went sideways into the fat woman, who fell hard, screeching. “He attacked me!” Three men in dark gray uniforms hustled her away. Paula turned her back. The police cleared out the courtroom.
Saba came through the railing. “You’re supposed to be watching her, too,” he said to Marus.
Paula went off down the aisle toward the doors. Saba and Tanuojin ranged up alongside her. The Styths came after her. Marus said to both of them, “I’m sorry, Akellar, I didn’t think—”
“Don’t try,” Tanuojin said. He went ahead of them all out the door.
Saba and Tanuojin started to argue on the way back to the hotel. Paula dropped behind them to stay out of their way. The other Styths trailed her. In the lobby, crossing the map in the floor, the two men kept still, but when she and Saba and Tanuojin were alone in the vertical car Saba swung around, his eyes flattened, and said, “You’re supposed to be a lawyer. You’re handling this like a hack.”
“Could you do it?”
“Better than you.” Saba crowded against her, pushing her toward the other man. “Tell him.” She stared straight ahead, uncomfortable in the heat of their tempers.
The vertical door opened and they went into the black and white sitting room of their suite. David ran to meet them. Saba snarled at Tanuojin, and the little boy veered away from him. His smile wilted.
“This snappy little stud lawyer is making fools out of us because of you.”
Paula led David by the hand into the big bedroom. His hands were grimy; he said something about a green yard where he had played in water. Sril had taken him to the park. Saba tramped in behind her.
“What are you fighting about?” she said to Saba.
“He’s botching the case.” The big Styth dropped flat across the bed. “This place makes me feel crazy. Trapped.”
She had spilled something on the front of her dress at lunch. She scraped at it with her fingernail. “It’s all the people.”
“What’s that whore’s address?”
“One-one-one something. Ask Sril.” She crooked her arm up behind her to unhook the back of the dress. “I think he’s doing well. He doesn’t know the court, he has to see how much the Bench will let him get away with.” She pulled the dress down over her hips, shivering in the cold, and turned to the closet for her robe. Saba was still lying on the bed, staring at her body. She turned her back to him. In the mirror she watched him roll up to his feet and stride out of the room.
She called Sybil Jefferson, to find out about General Gordon. Jefferson looked sleepy. Paula said, “What, did I get you up again?” and the fat woman shook her head.
“I haven’t been to bed yet.”
“Oh.” Paula wondered what her business was with the Council. “I’ll keep it short. Where is General Gordon?”
“Dead,” Jefferson said. “A heart attack. Electrically inspired.”
“Hunh. When was this?”
“Just a few months ago. The information isn’t in general release. I don’t really know much about it, dear girl, why don’t you ask Wylie?”
Paula grunted. That was Richard Bunker. “Where is he—on the Earth?”
“No—he’s here. You know he has an interest in you and the Styths.”
“How can I get in touch with him?”
“Don’t try. I’ll have him call you. Is that all?”
“That’s all.” Paula turned off the videone.
She took a shower. Without General Gordon, Parine had no case. They had misjudged the Styths. It would be instructing to see how long it took the Martians to adjust their prejudices. While she was standing in the hot mist of the shower washing her hair, David climbed into the stall with her. She washed him and dried them both off with a white towel. The child’s body was round and sweet. She hugged him, and he put his arms around her neck.
In the bedroom, Tanuojin stood at the videone, talking to someone on the screen. She put on her robe and got David into his shorts, but he refused to wear a shirt. Tanuojin shut off the videone.
“That was your friend Bunker. He’s meeting us at the Committee office at twenty-one hours. He says this place is wired.”
“Probably.” She found clean clothes. “You’ve met him, haven’t you? You know who he is.”
“Yes. The man who sent that listening device inboard Ybix at Luna and started this.” He
paced around the room, his hands under his belt. David was struggling with the latch of the door. Tanuojin said, “Your friends are as bad as you are.”
“Don’t call them my friends. When anarchists are friends it means they fuck each other.”
“You’re the only people in the Universe who could make ‘friend’ into an obscenity.”
Her arms roughened in the cold. She put on her clothes, shivering. David finally realized he had to turn the door latch; he darted out to the next room.
“Where did Saba go?” Tanuojin said.
“To the whorehouse.”
“Damn him.”
She put on a sweater and a jacket. In the mirror his image paced across the room, swerving to miss the lamps. His long hollow face was gnawed with bad temper. She reached for her comb.
“I’m not doing that bad. In the court,” he said.
“You’re doing fine.”
“Who’s listening in on us? Parine? Do you think he speaks Styth? Somebody there must.”
He never stopped moving; his restless pacing took him around the room. She felt the burden of the Planet around them, the pressure of its millions and millions of lives. She kept her eyes on her own face in the mirror and combed out her bush of brass hair.
“Damn him, he’s totally irresponsible,” Tanuojin said. “When I need him he goes off to an orgy.”
“Let him alone,” Paula said. She veered across the low-ceilinged street to read the markings on the corner building. Above the address, a plaque set into the wall read
WARNING: This building protected by Sentry Security—guard your home—hire a Sentry
They turned the corner. The street was empty of people. It was lined with people’s homes, what in Crosby’s Planet they called a dormitory area. Every few feet down the gray walls on either side was a door or a window, alternating, identical, except for the changing numbers.
“Let him alone,” Tanuojin said, sneering. “If I let him alone, do you know what he’d do? Do you know what he was like when I met him?” They went up a moving stairway. Through the gap between the step and the rail, she looked down into another stairway, on the next level below.
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