The Service of the Sword Read online

Then Kit Carson caught his eye and he really had to fight down a laugh. The Hector's XO had his most ingratiating expression on. Ever attuned to the changing of the political winds, Carson had apparently ordered the SD to stand down while Yuri had been preoccupied with forestalling another disastrous explosion. It was one of the few times in his life where Radamacher was willing to sing hosannas to the virtues of lickspittles.

  "—I guess we can all consider the military situation something of a stalemate," Genevieve continued. Frowning: "As long as everybody agrees to remain in stand down. And remain here, in La Martine orbit. Assuming the merchant ship's report that there's a truce on in the Mantie war is right also, we shouldn't need to run anti-raiding patrols for a while. And—ha!—after what we did in Laramie and New Calcutta, I doubt if any pirates are going to be stirring around here for a while either."

  Yuri picked it up and took it from there. "I agree with Genevieve. Let's face it, everybody. The crews of all the Republic's warships here in La Martine are so thoroughly mixed up by now—"

  Thanks to the fanatic. Ha! The Law of Unintended Consequences works its will again!

  "—that as long as we all stay calm—as Genevieve says, stay together in one orbit and remain standing down—then nobody can purge anybody. And besides," he added, shrugging, "does anybody really have that much of a grudge left, anyway? Not for anybody here in La Martine, I don't think. So I see no reason why we can't just keep on maintaining this sector of the Republic in a state of peace and calm. Just wait, damnation, until we find out for sure what's happening in the capital."

  The relaxation everywhere was almost palpable, on all three screens. Yuri took another deep breath. That was it, he thought. For now, at least.

  Cachat's voice interrupted his pleasant thoughts.

  "You're overlooking one final matter, Commissioner Radamacher."

  "What's that?"

  "Me, of course. More precisely, what I represent. I was sent here by personal appointment of Oscar Saint-Just, then head of state of the Republic. And leaving formalities aside, I think it's accurate to say that for some time now I have effectively ruled this sector by dictatorial methods."

  Yuri stared at him. Then, snorted. "Yes, I'd say that's accurate. Especially the dictatorial part."

  Cachat seemed oblivious to the sarcasm. His image in the display was still larger than life. The grim young fanatic face, especially, seemed to loom over everything else. On the bridge of the Hector, at least; but Yuri was quite sure the effect was the same on the Tilden—and probably even more so on the battleship where Cachat was standing in person. The man was just so forceful and intimidating that he had that effect.

  "What's your point, Cachat?"

  To his surprise, Sharon interjected herself sharply.

  "Yuri, stop being an ass. Captain Cachat has been courteous to you, so there's no excuse for you to be rude to him."

  Yuri stared at her. "He—the bastard beat you up!"

  "Oh, for pity's sake!" she snapped. "You're behaving like a schoolboy. Instead of using your brains. And aren't you the man whose favorite little saying—one of them, anyway—is 'give credit where credit is due'?"

  The image of her head swiveled, as she turned to the screen showing Cachat. "Are you really willing to do it, Captain? Nobody's asking it from you."

  "Of course, I am. It's my simple duty, under the circumstances." Cachat made that little half-irritated twitch of the shoulders which seemed to be his version of a shrug. "I realize most of you—all of you, I imagine—consider me a fanatic. I neither accept the term, nor do I reject it. I am indifferent to your opinions, frankly. I swore an oath when I joined State Security to devote my life to the service of the Republic. I meant that oath when I gave it, and I have never once wavered in that conviction. Whatever I've done, to the best of my ability at the time and my gauge of the situation, was done in the interests of the people to whom I swore that oath. The people to whom I swore that oath, may I remind you. There is no mention of Oscar Saint-Just or any other individual in the StateSec oath of loyalty."

  The square shoulders twitched again. "Oscar Saint-Just is dead, but the Republic remains. Certainly its people remain. So my oath still binds me, and under the current circumstances my duty seems clear to me."

  He now looked straight at Yuri and a thin smile came to his face. "You're very good at this, Commissioner Radamacher. I knew you would be, which is why I left you behind here. But, if you'll forgive me saying so, you are not ruthless enough. It's an attractive personal quality, but it's a handicap for a commissioner. You're still flinching from the keystone you need to cap your little edifice."

  Yuri was frowning. "What are you talking about?"

  "I should think it was obvious. Commissioner Justice certainly understands. If you're going to bury an old regime, Commissioner, you have to bury a body. It's not enough to simply declare the body absent. Who knows when an absent body might return?"

  "What—" Yuri shook his head. The fanatic was babbling gibberish.

  Cachat's normal impatience returned. "Oh, for the sake of whatever is or isn't holy! If the mice won't bell the cat, I guess the cat will have to do it himself."

  Cachat turned to face Sharon. "My preference would be to turn myself over to your custody, Commissioner Justice, but given that the situation in the Tilden is probably the most delicate at the moment, I think it would be best if I were kept incarcerated aboard the Hector under Commissioner Radamacher's custody. I think we should rule out Admiral Chin as the arresting officer. That might run the risk of stirring up Navy-StateSec animosity, which is the last thing La Martine sector needs at the moment."

  Sharon chuckled. "Yuri might have you shot, you know."

  "I doubt it. Commissioner Radamacher's not really the type. Besides, my reference to a 'body' was just poetic license. It should do well enough, I think, to have the most visible representative of the Saint-Just regime here in La Martine under lock and key." Again, that little shrug. "And if Commissioner Radamacher feels compelled to have me rigorously interrogated at some point, I won't hold it against him."

  For a moment, the dark eyes seem to glint. "I've been beaten before. Rather badly, once. As it happens, because a comrade and I were overseen by the enemy conspiring against them, and so in order to protect both our covers he feigned an angry argument and hammered me into a pulp. I spent a few days in the hospital, true enough—the man had fists like hams, even bigger than the Sergeant's over there—but it worked like a charm."

  Yuri shook his head, trying to clear it.

  "Let me get this straight . . ."

  11

  "Why," grumbled Yuri, staring at the ceiling of his stateroom, "do I feel like the poor sorry slob who got stuck with guarding Napoleon on St. Helena?"

  Sharon lowered her book and lifted her head from the pillow next to him. "Who's Napoleon? And I never heard of a planet named St. Helena."

  Yuri sighed. Whatever her other marvelous qualities—which he'd been enjoying immensely during the past month—Sharon did not share his passion for ancient history and literature.

  Cachat did, oddly enough—some aspects of ancient culture, anyway—and that was something else Yuri had jotted down in his mental Black Book. The one with the title: Reasons I Hate Victor Cachat.

  It was childish, he knew. But during the weeks since he'd arrested Cachat, Victor had found that his anger toward the man had simply deepened. The fact that the anger—Yuri was this honest with himself—stemmed more from Cachat's virtues than his vices only seemed to add fuel to the flames.

  The fundamental problem was that Cachat had no vices—except being Victor Cachat. In captivity as in command, the young fanatic had faced everything resolutely, unflinchingly, with not a trace of any of the self-doubts or terrors which had plagued Yuri himself his entire life. Cachat never raised his voice in anger; never flinched in fear; never whined, nor groused, nor pleaded.

  Yuri had fantasies, now and then, of Victor Cachat on his knees begging for mercy. But
even for Yuri the fantasies were washed-out and colorless—and faded within seconds. It was simply impossible to imagine Cachat begging for anything. As well imagine a tyrannosaur blubbering on its knees.

  It just wasn't fair, damn it all. And the fact that Cachat, during the weeks of his captivity, had turned out to be an aficionado of the obscure ancient art form known as films had somehow been a worse offense than any. Savage Mesozoic carnivores are not supposed to have any higher sentiments.

  And they're certainly not supposed to argue art with human beings! Which, needless to say, Cachat had done. And, needless to say, had taken the opportunity to chide Yuri for slackness.

  That had happened in the first week.

  "Nonsense," snapped Cachat. "Jean Renoir is the most overrated director I can think of. The Rules of the Game—supposedly a brilliant dissection of the mentality of the elite? What a laugh. When Renoir tries to depict the callousness of the upper crust, the best he can manage is a silly rabbit hunt."

  Yuri glared at him. So did Major Citizen, who was the third of the little group on the Hector who had turned out to be film buffs and had started holding informal chats on the subject in Cachat's cell.

  Well, it was technically a "cell," even if it was really a lieutenant's former cabin on the SD. Just as it was technically "locked" and there was technically always a "guard" standing outside the hatch.

  "Technically" was the word for it, too. Yuri had no doubt at all that Cachat could have picked that simple ship's lock within ten seconds. Just as he had no doubt at all that nine out of ten of the guards stationed at the door would be far more likely to ask the former Special Investigator how he or she could be of service than to demand he return to his cell.

  Sourly, Yuri remembered the arrest itself.

  "Arrest." Ha! It had been more like a ceremonial procession. Cachat emerging from the lock with a task force escort respectfully trotting behind him—and with both Major Lafitte and Major Citizen's Marines and StateSec security units lined up to receive him.

  Theoretically, they'd been there to take him into custody. But as soon as Cachat had stepped across the line on the deck which marked the official legal boundaries of the superdreadnought, the Marines had snapped to attention and presented arms. Major Citizen's StateSec troops lined up on the opposite side had followed suit within a second.

  Yuri had been startled, since he'd certainly given no order for that courtesy. But he hadn't tried to countermand it, either. Not after scanning the hard faces of the Marines and StateSec troopers themselves.

  He'd never understand how Cachat had managed it, but somehow . . .

  So, he imagined, had the Old Guard always reacted in the presence of Napoleon. Reality, logic, justice—be damned to all of it. In victory or defeat, the Emperor was still the Emperor.

  "If you want to see a genuinely superb depiction of the brutality of power," Cachat continued, "watch Mizoguchi's Sancho the Bailiff."

  Diana's glare faded. "Well . . . okay, Victor, I'll give you that. I'm a big fan of Mizoguchi myself, although I personally prefer Ugetsu. Still, I think you're being unfair to Renoir. What about—"

  "A moment, please. Since we've ventured onto the subject—in a roundabout way—let me take the occasion to ask Commissioner Radamacher how much longer he's going to slack off before completing the purge."

  "What are you talking about?" demanded Yuri. But his stomach was sinking as he said the words. In truth, he knew perfectly well what Cachat was talking about. He'd just been . . .

  Procrastinating.

  "You know!" snapped Cachat. "You're lazy, but you're not dumb. Not dumb at all. The fact that you've created a command staff throughout the fleet is fine and dandy. Fine also that, between the Marines and selected personnel from StateSec, you've put together a solid security team to enforce your authority. But this superdreadnought—and the Tilden's not much better; in some ways, worse—is still riddled with disaffected elements. Not to mention a small horde of pure hooligans. I'm warning you, Commissioner Radamacher, let this continue much longer and you'll start losing it."

  Yuri swallowed. Cachat was speaking the truth, and he knew it. Both superdreadnoughts had enormous crews, whose personnel was entirely StateSec except for a relative handful of Marines. Some of those StateSec people—Major Citizen and Sergeant Rolla being outstanding examples—were people Yuri would stake his life on. Was staking his life on, as a matter of fact.

  The rest . . . Most of them were simply people. People who'd enlisted originally to serve on a StateSec capital ship for much the same reasons that people from any society's lower classes volunteer for military service. A way out of the slums; decent and reliable pay; security; training; advancement. Nothing more sinister than that.

  They'd all been willing enough to go along with the change of guard. Especially after it became clear that Yuri had engineered what amounted to a truce so that none of them need fear any immediate repercussions as long as they kept the peace.

  But there were still plenty of SD ratings—and plenty of officers—who were not at all happy with the new setup. They'd liked being in State Security, and would be delighted to see its iron-fisted regime return—since they had every reason to expect they could resume their happy days as the fingers of that fist.

  "Damn it," he complained—hating the fact that even to himself his voice sounded whiny—"I didn't sign on to carry out a Night of the Long Knives."

  Cachat frowned. "Who said anything about knives? And they wouldn't need to be long anyway. You can cut a man's throat with a seven-centimeter blade perfectly well. In fact—have you forgotten everything?—that was the blade-length of choice in the academy's assassination courses."

  "Never mind," sighed Yuri. "It's an historical reference. There was once a tyrant named Adolf Hitler and after he came to power he turned on the most hardcore of the fanatics who'd lifted him to power. The True Believers who were now a threat to him. Had them all purged in a single night."

  Cachat grunted. "I still don't understand the point. I'm certainly not proposing that you purge Diana. Or Major Lafitte or Admiral Chin or Commodore Ogilve or any of the excellent noncoms—Marine and StateSec both—who are the people who lifted you into power. I'm simply pointing out what ought to be obvious: there are lots of sheer thugs on these capital ships and you ought to have the lot of them thrown into prison. A real prison, too—dirtside, where they can't get loose—not this silly arrangement you've got me in."

  Diana Citizen's face looked troubled. "Uh, Yuri, I hate to say it but I agree with the Special—ah, Captain Cachat. I don't even care about political reliability, frankly. We're starting to have lots of problem with simple discipline. Lots of problems."

  Yuri hesitated. Cachat's face seemed to soften, for a moment.

  "You are a splendid shield, Yuri Radamacher," he said quietly. "But the republic needs a sword also, from time to time. So why don't you—this once—let a sword advise you?"

  The young StateSec captain nodded his head toward the computer on his desk. The thing had no business still being there, of course. No one in their right mind would leave a computer in the hands of a prisoner like Cachat. Sure, sure, Yuri had slapped a codelock on it. Ha. He wondered if it had taken Cachat even two hours to break it.

  But . . .

  A computer was simply part of the dignity of a man like Cachat. To have removed it would have been like requiring Napoleon on St. Helena to sleep on the floor, or wear a sheet for clothing.

  Cachat seemed to be reading his mind. "I haven't tried to use it, Yuri," he said softly. "But if you go into it yourself, you'll find my own records easily enough. The keyword is Ginny and the password is Tongue."

  For some reason, Cachat seemed to be blushing a little. "Never mind. It was a personal reference I'd . . . ah, be able to remember. That will get you into the list of personnel I spent quite a bit of time assembling while I was operating on this warship. That list will only contain Hector Van Dragen personnel, of course. But you can find the sam
e for the Tilden—more extensive, actually, since I had more time on that ship—stored away on the computer I used while on the Tilden during our mission."

  The peculiar blush seemed to darken. "The keyword and password in that instance will be sari and, uh, shakehertail."

  Diana burst out laughing. "Ginny—tongue—sari—shakehertail, no less. Victor, you dog! Who would have guessed you were a lady's man? I'd love to meet this girlfriend of yours, whoever she is."

  The young man—for once, he didn't look like a fanatic—seemed on verge of choking. "She's not—ah, well. She's not my girlfriend. Actually, she's the wife—ah, never mind. Just a woman I knew once, whom I admired a lot." A bit defensively: "'Shake-her-tail' was a reference to her cover, and, uh, 'tongue' is because—well, never mind. There's no need to go into it."

  For once, Yuri was inclined to let Cachat off the hook instead of needling him. Cachat the fanatic, he detested. Cachat the young man . . . was impossible to even dislike.

  "Okay, Victor, we'll 'never mind,' " he said. "But what's on that list?"

  The fanatic came back instantly. "Everyone I was planning to either arrest or, at the very least, break from StateSec service. Of course, I never thought I could do it all at once. Probably wouldn't even be able to do more than get started, since I had no idea how long Saint-Just would leave me on station here. But you can do the lot at a single stroke."

  Radamacher eyed the computer. Then, sighing, got up and went over to it.

  "Well. I suppose I should at least look at it."

  The first name and entry on the list was: Alouette, Henri. GravSen Tech 1/c.

  "Damn," muttered Yuri. "I forgot all about him, things have been so hectic."

  The rest of Cachat's entry read:

  Vicious thug. Incompetent and derelict at anything else. Suspect him of conducting a reign of terror in his section, to the gross detriment of the section's performance. Arrest at the first opportunity. Most severe punishment possible, preferably execution, if sufficient evidence can be obtained. Certain it can once he is arrested and his section mates no longer fear retaliation.