The Iron Maiden

by Piers Anthony

  “You characters would make light of Sol going nova tomorrow,” Spirit muttered.

  Thorley raised an eyebrow. “Indeed, there would be much light then.”

  Hopie tittered, and even Megan smiled. Spirit aimed a mock laser pistol at his head and pulled the trigger. They were releasing tension, knowing that they had not yet won the day. Not nearly.

  They were conducted by grim non-English-speaking troopers that made Hopie quite nervous; she stayed very close to Megan, hanging on to her hand. In due course they were in the giant bubble of Scow.

  The adults were guarded about reactions, but now Hopie was thrilled. She had never before been to a city-bubble of this size. They were ushered into a private chamber where three Saturnines sat behind a long table. One of them was Khukov, the officer Hope had met on Ganymede. He stood up and leaned over the table to shake Hope’s hand. “Welcome to Saturn, Governor Hubris,” he said in English. “Please be seated, you and your party. We have much to discuss.”

  “Indeed we do, Admiral. Are you empowered to arrange for reparations?”

  The other Saturn officers spoke to each other in Russian. By their tones, Spirit gathered that they were not pleased about this forced meeting. But Khukov smiled at Hope graciously. “The Commissar wishes to reassure himself that your party is quite comfortable. He is eager to change your status if you are not.”

  Spirit was sure that was not the nature of the Russian dialogue. But Hope returned the smile. Then, in Spanish, he said to Spirit, “These characters haven’t decided how to handle us.”

  “Now I am sure you are reasonable people,” Khukov said in English. “You know we cannot make reparations!”

  “Reparations and an apology—and the bodies,” Hope said firmly.

  “My companions are not sanguine about that,” Khukov said. “You know it was a spy ship.”

  “You know your gunners got trigger-happy and shot down a civilian ship by accident!” Playing the scene.

  “And now the fools are locked into their error,” Spirit said in Spanish.

  Khukov glanced at her, nodding.

  “He understands Spanish!” she hissed, alarmed.

  “Now how could that be?” Hope asked her blandly.

  She shook her head. “I don’t know! But—”

  “He speaks Spanish no more than I speak Russian,” he told her, and turned to face Khukov.

  Spirit eyed Hope. She was catching on now—to both parts of the deal. They had exchanged languages!

  “For abating the menace of the spy ship we should apologize?” Khukov asked Hope in English.

  “Tell the communist clown to go spy his own posterior,” Spirit told Hope in Spanish, picking up the nature of this dialogue. Hopie stifled a giggle, and Megan frowned; she had learned enough of the language to grasp the insult.

  “For mistaking a strayed civilian ship,” Hope said in English, without hint of humor.

  Thus they continued their devious bargaining, finding devices to allow the return of the bodies with token reparations.

  Khukov smiled grimly. “Your president will be pleased, no?” Spirit, Megan, and even Hopie smiled, and Thorley coughed. The Commissar chuckled. All knew that Tocsin would be privately furious at Hope’s success but would not dare to disparage it openly. That was perhaps the deciding factor for the Russians: the prospect of obliquely taunting Tocsin, who had made a career of bashing communism.

  Khukov and Hope shook hands formally, sealing the understanding. “And while we wait for the arrangements to be complete, we shall give your party a welcome that will please your president even more,” the Russian said.

  Hope then stood and shook hands with the other officers, one of whom said something in Russian, smiling broadly.

  “And you irritate my penis, you ignorant double-dealing pederastic Bolshevik,” Hope returned in Spanish with just as broad a smile.

  Khukov almost visibly bit his tongue. “It is nice to overhear the exchange of such sincere remarks between supposed adversaries,” he said in English. “I’m sure you hold each other in similar esteem.”

  “Why do I get the feeling I’m missing something?” Thorley murmured.

  “You’re not missing anything,” Spirit returned darkly.

  Then came what had all the aspects of a head-of-planet formal visit. There was a banquet with distinctly unproletarian trimmings. Megan and Hope were feted at the head table with the high-ranking dignitaries of the supposedly classless Saturn society, while Spirit, Thorley, and Hopie had a table with the ranking wives. There were translators to render the remarks of the hosts into English. After that there was even a parade in their honor. They rode under a massive red hammer-and-sickle banner while the enormous crowd cheered.

  “Tocsin will be apoplectic,” Spirit remarked, enjoying it. Hopie giggled; she had long since picked up on her family’s antipathy to Tocsin, and had caught on to Saturn’s similar sentiment. She knew that this celebration was not for the visitors so much as for interplanetary show. She loved it.

  “I fear I will never live this down,” Thorley muttered, but he didn’t seem to be as unhappy as he might have been. He would have an excellent story to write. His hand, where it didn’t show, was holding Spirit’s hand.

  Hopie happily waved to the crowd. “What’s a pederastic Bolshevic?” she asked without turning her head.

  “Later,” Spirit and Thorley said together, laughing.

  In due course they returned to their yacht with a cargo of four frozen Sunshine bodies that included the two Hispanics and the representative. The rest would follow in a Saturn freighter. They weighed anchor and put out to space with an escort of Saturnine Naval vessels.

  The usual dullness set in during the long trip home, but Spirit and Thorley made the most of it. If Hopie caught on that something was going on, she had the wit to pretend ignorance. It really wasn’t her concern if two unmarried people were finding a way to alleviate boredom.

  By the time they docked at Sunshine, Hope was notorious across the System, as the governor who had braved the Bear’s jaws and won. He really was a hero, in a culture that loved heroes. For some reason there was little other than silence from the White Bubble.

  Thorley wrote a fine series of articles on the excursion, and Hopie did a nice paper for her school class. She showed a definite flair for written expression. “Uncle Thorley told me how,” she explained. That seemed to cover it.

  CHAPTER 12

  CAMPAIGN

  But the following six months were not kind to the Hope Hubris political fortune. Hope and Spirit were dedicated to the elimination of the illicit drug trade, and Sunshine was a major conduit. Prior governors had paid lip service to the effort, but now it got serious, for this governor had special connections. He contacted Roulette Phist of the Belt, his lovely onetime wife who remained hot for him, and she used her connections to locate a crew of about fifty drug experts to loan. These were folk who could, in some cases, literally smell the drugs and who knew the sinister by-paths of illegal distribution. Hope interviewed them to verify that they intended to serve the cause faithfully. In general, Rue’s selection was excellent; they quickly formed the most savvy drug-control team extant.

  First they merely identified the routes, taking no action. The agents were instructed to accept any bribes offered and to report them privately, spending the money for themselves in ways that no ordinary enforcement agents would, so as to allay any suspicion. They enjoyed that part of it. For six months they infiltrated the delivery network of Sunshine, satisfying the professionals that business remained as usual; the new governor would not be any more effective at cutting the pipeline than any other had been.

  Then the force struck. They went after the personnel, not the drugs, and got them. The line had been cut, and ninety percent of the drug flow ceased overnight. They used the confiscated wares for a comprehensive detoxification program, providing drugs free to acknowledged addicts as long as necessary. This reduced the incentive to commit crimes to suppor
t habits, but it meant that the State of Sunshine was now in the drug business. Thorley got supposedly private information and condemned the program, but the fact was that crime was declining. Outrage faded; other states were considering similar programs. In three years both illegal drug traffic and crime were at their lowest ebb in a century.

  Then the crime cartel struck back. One of the tame addicts blew the whistle—he claimed—on the biggest secret of Hope’s administration: a massive payoff by the drug moguls. “I was a courier for the money,” he said. “I took it from the laundry in Ami and brought it to Hassee every week.”

  His figures were staggering: twenty five million dollars delivered to the Governor’s secret account every week. That was the price to keep the governor’s minions off the real drug traffic.

  “And to whom do you deliver them?” the interviewer inquired.

  “A guy called Sancho.”

  “Sancho!” Hope exclaimed. He and his staff members were of course watching the broadcast. “That can’t be!” Indeed it could not, for he knew that Spirit herself was Sancho. She had tried to keep out of sight, but must have been observed from time to time.

  “Who is Sancho?” the interviewer asked.

  “Some spic who works for the governor’s sister. That’s all I know. Always wears gloves, has a scarred face. I think he’s an illegal. Small guy, talks in a whisper.”

  “Sancho works for Spirit Hubris?”

  “Yeah. Or maybe for the governor direct. I don’t know. He’s the one who takes the money, anyway. I don’t give it to nobody but him.”

  The courier went on to describe the warehouse where he delivered the money to Sancho. The station went to look, with its cameras. It was a warehouse for campaign literature—and under it was half a billion dollars in used bills, exactly as the courier had indicated. It was of course a frame. They had planted the money there, then planted the “courier,” and suddenly Hope was in trouble. It was his warehouse, and the money was there.

  That was enough for the hostile State Legislature. A bill of impeachment was introduced and debated, and somehow it sailed through with phenomenal velocity. Objections were brushed aside or voted down by bloc—and therein was another pattern. A narrow majority was held by the members of a coalition formed of the more conservative members of Hope’s own party and those of President Tocsin’s party. It was evident that Tocsin, perceiving an opportunity, had issued a private directive, and they were obeying with partisan discipline. This was his chance to, as he had put it during the trip to Saturn, see Hope hung by the balls. It hardly mattered what the facts were; the opposition was determined to see to his undoing. He, it seemed, had been fool enough to provide them an opening.

  There seemed to be no easy way out of this. Spirit could reveal her identity, but that would merely seem to confirm her brother’s complicity. They had been caught flatfooted, and were unable to marshal refuting evidence fast enough to prevail. The Senate quickly voted, and just like that, Hope was impeached, found guilty, and removed from office.

  But neither Hope nor Spirit were easy targets. Hope called QYV. That nefarious organization had caused him trouble in space, but was now more or less on his side.

  Reba answered. She was older than she had been, and had been rising through her echelons just as Khukov had been doing through his and Hope through his, until recently.

  “It’s about time you called,” she said severely. “You made the perhaps fatal error of losing your paranoia and allowing the conspirators to catch you. Tocsin made a deal with the drug moguls to eliminate a mutual enemy. But you can still prevail if you get the truth before the public. You merely need to use the appropriate avenue. Send Sancho to Thorley.” She clicked off.

  Spirit nodded. “Why didn’t we think of that?”

  She went to Thorley, this time making quite sure she was unobserved. “I don’t like to ask this, but–”

  “I am aware of the news, and of Sancho’s innocence,” he said with a grim smile. Of course he was; they had been making love some of the times Sancho was supposed to have been accepting graft from the courier.

  “But our secret—we can’t reveal–the scandal—” She was near tears. Never before had she been put in the position of having to betray either her brother or her lover.

  “I believe this is an occasion for partial truth.”

  “I don’t see how–”

  “Leave it to me. Now may we proceed to more urgent business?”

  She flung her arms about him, gladly setting aside the crisis in favor of love. Their normal separation made them always eager for closeness.

  In due course Thorley wrote an essay titled “Let Justice Be Done.” In it he blew the whistle on Sancho:

  Sancho is in fact a disguise used for convenience by Spirit Hubris herself. It is not necessarily appropriate, even in these enlightened times, for an attractive woman of any age to travel widely alone, particularly when she is closely related to a prominent politician whose life has been threatened more than once. Therefore Spirit Hubris has assumed masculine guise, donning gloves with a stuffed left finger to conceal her deformity and removing the makeup she normally employs to mask the abrasions on her face. In this guise, as “Sancho,” she has had no difficulty and has required no cumbersome protection; her complete anonymity has been her safeguard. Naturally she preferred not to have this revealed, because a cover blown is a cover useless. This clarifies why Sancho was mysterious and had no formal identity. He was not an illicit immigrant, merely a fictive connivance.

  In this guise Spirit has on occasion provided me directly with pertinent information about her brother’s activities. It was she who informed me of the governor’s planned venture to Saturn—an expedition that for obvious reasons could not be publicly advertised in advance. When such conflicts between principle and expediency arise, Hope Hubris has compromised by informing me in this direct and private manner, trusting my discretion not to nullify a particular thrust by premature exposure. At times the line between legitimate news and counterproductive exposure becomes extremely fine. In this instance I took advantage of the knowledge to force my attendance on the Saturn sally, in this manner amplifying my eventual report.

  It happens that my records indicate that on two of the occasions in which Sancho is supposed to have accepted money at the warehouse, he—that is, she—was present at my office, delivering information to me. I can therefore vouch from direct personal experience that the charge against Sancho—and therefore against Governor Hubris—was on these occasions unfounded. I have also verified that on several other occasions Spirit, herself, was attending public or business functions in other cities, so could not have been at the Hassee warehouse when the courier claims.

  Now simple logic suggests that if part of a statement is demonstrably false, all of it becomes suspect. Certainly the courier’s rationale is questionable; it is nonsensical to suppose that he could “go public” about the covert activities of the drug moguls without being promptly and nastily dispatched, unless he was, in fact, acting on their orders. I submit for public consideration the supposition that the entire charge against Governor Hubris is false, and I invite challenge by independent parties. But for the moment let us assume that my case has been validated and that an innocent man has been impeached. Let us now consider motives.

  Thorley then proceeded to destroy the opposition case against Hope Hubris, showing with devastating logic the corrupt and political nature of the charges and the impeachment process itself. He clarified that the governor, however obscenely liberal in other matters, had suffered grievously from criminal pirates and was dedicated to extirpating the drug trade. Suddenly the campaign of the Hero of the Belt was remembered.

  I suggest that, unable to take Hubris out physically—the governor’s female security force is remarkably loyal and efficient—the pirates at last devised a scheme to do it politically. The money was not to bribe him but to frame him. This was effective; he was promptly ushered out of office. It is evide
nt that the drug business quickly reverted to normal, increasing in Sunshine to its former level. Recidivism is rampant among treated addicts, and crime in the streets is rebounding at a rate that has swamped the minions of the law. In a few brief weeks the halcyon days of Hubris’s term have been eclipsed. Certainly this was a victory for the drug moguls, who thrive on political corruption, and for crime in general. At the present rate of activity, their parcel of half a billion dollars, surreptitiously planted in the governor’s warehouse, should be redeemed within months. It was, it seems, a very sound investment. In addition I understand that much of that warehouse money has mysteriously disappeared from storage and that the proprietors are extremely reluctant to permit a recount by qualified parties. Perhaps the money was not an investment but a loan.

  He concluded: “We have witnessed a rare perversion of due process. Now let justice be done.”