"Maybe the safest course is to destroy Faraday with the rest and make everything look accidental. Or, Inn, we could throw some of the blame onto terrorists. In that case, we must find a different political route, more slow, toward our goal.
"The whole point, Sr. Quick, is that whatever we do, it must not be done timidly. We must have the balls to accept great hazards. Believe me, the danger in shilly-shallying is grossly greater.
"Yes, I must certainly stand by you in these next hours," Makarov closed.
"You're saying terrible things," Quick protested. "Why, some of those you'd kill have been freely helping us."
"I have heard another English proverb," Makarov retorted. "`You cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs.' Is an excellent saying.
"In the past I have found it necessary to sign death sentences of followers who had been valuable. I judged they were beginning to follow me too independently; or they had questionable associates; or - Well, I had a state to rebuild from chaos. How could I investigate every single case?
"For our separate reasons, Sr. Quick, we deem it vital that the human race stay home, carry out its natural tasks, and shun outsiders ... at least until it is properly organized to cope with them. Vital. Now in days before cell therapy, what woman hesitated to have a cancerous breast cut off? That harmed her beauty, but she had no choice if she would live, did she?
"Furthermore, Sr. Quick." Makarov leaned forward. "Furthermore. You are committed. Our whole little organization is. We had an ideal, we stumbled toward it, we made missteps as people always do, and today we are close to ruin. Is our ideal not correct regardless? How well can we continue to serve mankind from a prison?
"Prison it will be, if any strong hint of the facts ever comes out. Publicity will lead to investigation. Subordinates of ours will seek to save their own hides by tattling on us. Chinook is forcing us beyond the limits of any legal technicalities. We are quite clearly conspiring to violate the Covenant rights of her crew. We have already violated them, by deliberately causing a groundless warrant to be issued for their arrest. From this will spring countless further charges of malfeasance in office. We will be locked away for a long, long time - unless we strike the right blow at once, and strike it hard!"
A part of Quick recalled an essay he had read years before, on how intellectuals are chronically fascinated by violence as an instrumentality - drawn, repelled, drawn back, as they might be to the idea of sexual relations with a barely pubescent girl or with a sentient nonhuman; it is a kind of xenophilia, and when a conifict of which they approve (and they approve of most) does erupt, they take the lead in cheering on the warheads and calling for more soldiers to feed the furnace. At the time he had thought what reactionary nonsense this was. Later, cultivating his fairmindedness, he had had to admit there might be a limited amount of truth to the thesis. Yonder son of a bitch is right in the present context. You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs. Why, you can't maintain an orderly everyday society without breaking an occasional head.
And, Christ almighty, he must indeed go forward. Otherwise - arrest, indictment, trial? An actual jail sentence? A rehabilitative psychiatrist (squat, plump, blue-jowled, fleshy-nosed) probing the psyche of Ira Quick, which his grubby breed would never understand in a geological epoch? Release after he was aged, aged, to whatever drabness he could find in the wreckage of career and social life? His boys, wife, friends, mistresses, the whole world naming him kidnapper and murderer, he who had striven for nothing but human betterment?
I am well known as being fast on my feet.
Quick ran tongue over lips. "Sir, I don't necessarily agree with either of your proposals." Ah, good, how calmly he spoke despite the thick hammering inside him. "Nevertheless, when a statesman like you speaks, I listen. Would you care to explain in detail?" He felt his brave smile. "We do have to pass the time while we wait."
The voices around the cathedral image were marching to their triumphant conclusion.
XXVI
Chinook was over a million kilometers from her goal, decelerating, when the first communication struck her. Brodersen took it in his office.
The screen showed him an angular visage speaking British English: "Vincent Lawes, commanding watchship Alhazen on special duty. You are Chinook of Demeter, are you not?" It was scarcely a question. "Give me your captain."
"You have him," Brodersen answered. "What can I do for you?"
The seconds ticked away while light beams flew forth and back again. Caitlin, seated beside Brodersen, gripped his forearm, which was bare. He was acutely conscious of that warmth and pressure, of her hasty breath and faint sweet woman-odors.
"Now hear this well, Captain Brodersen," Lawes said. His tone was harsh and a tic jumped near his right eye. "You are wanted on serious charges. Your ship is armed. My orders are to see that you pass through to the Phoebean System to be taken in charge there. I am to consider you dangerous and take no chances with you. None. Do you understand?"
"What procedure shall we follow?"
Time. "You will maneuver as usual, except under direction from us, not Copernicus. In fact, you are to have no contact whatsoever with Copernicus. You will beam every message at us, and in English. Copernicus has been directed off her usual orbit. She'll keep on the far side of the T machine from you as you make transit. To contact her, you'd have to broadcast -and in Spanish, since nobody aboard her knows English. We will detect that. Any untoward action of yours can provoke our fire. I repeat, do you understand? Make sure you do, Captain Brodersen."
"My, my." The Demetran clicked his tongue. "You are tight in the sphincter, aren't you? How come? What harm in a little chat?"
Time. Caitlin chanted, a whisper - a Gaelic curse, Brodersen thought.
"I have my orders," Lawes replied, scissoring off each word. "Among other things, you stand accused of trying to disseminate technological information which would endanger public safety. Without questioning the dutifulness of the Copernicus personnel, I am to see that you send no word to them or anyone else. Needless to say, they are not to tune you in. If we become engaged with you, they will join us."
"I see. M-m, how about yourself, Captain Lawes? Our side of the story is pretty interesting. We've quite a bit we can show you, too."
Time. The sole surprise, if it was that, was the appalled vehemence of Lawes' "No! Absolutely not! At the first sign of any such attempt, I'll switch off. If you persist when I call back later, I have discretion to attack."
"Okay, okay. What else?"
Time. Brodersen muttered to Caitlin, "They've sure got to him, haven't they? Prob'ly by more than an appeal to his loyalty. He's an officer of the Union, after all, not of Europe. Bribe, blackmail-"
"Your path and vectors are incorrect for a transit," Lawes said. "Explain."
"Yeah, I was coming to that. We've developed collywobbles in the main control system. Acquired a wrong momentum and have to compensate. Instead of making straight for our first base, we're applying parameters which will bring us to zero relative velocity near Beacon Bravo. From there, we'll move to the proper location for a standard approach. I have the figures here, if you'd like me to transmit them."
Discussion went into technicalities for several minutes. At last, reluctantly, Lawes said, "Very well. We will be tracking you continuously, remember. Stand by for possible further instructions. If nothing suspicious happens, I will re-establish direct communication at nineteen-thirty hours. Is that clear?" Receiving his acknowledgment, he blanked without a goodbye.
Brodersen leaned back. "Wow," he said. "For a while there, I wondered if he would shoot. His finger's awful twitchy on the trigger. But of course, at this distance, Frieda can intercept whatever he might send - I presume."
"It's desperate our enemies are, I'm thinking," Caitlmn said.
"Right. And the more desperate people get, the more dangerous. Us included." He turned to smile at her. The darling face drew close to his. "Well, we've three to four hours before things get spiny. Better rest up, macushla, if you can."
She ran fingers down his cheek. "I've a more interesting idea, my life."
"Huh? I - Look, I've got to make the rounds, jolly the troops, check everything out-"
"If those responsible have not their departments in good shape by now, you're too late," she said firmly. "They do, though. I've sounded them out in ways the Old Man cannot. The morale of most is flying banners; the rest are at least of stout heart. Aye, we might hold an assembly, for a few rousing songs of revolution and freedom. But that's best done as late before our plunge as may be." She grinned. "Thus you've better than an hour free, Daniel Brodersen, and sure I am you've the wit to pass it in style."
"Uh, well, uh, look, frankly, I'm so full of worries, I doubt-"
