Milos Vandar thought of himself as a mild-mannered and reasonable person. But he also imagined that he had something of a spine—especially when facing a jumped-up bureaucrat, rather than the secret police.
“
You make it sound like you
’
ve asked nicely a dozen times already,
”
he said.
“
What
’
s really happened is that the two thugs you sent out woke me up, dragged me out of bed, scared the hell out of me, and brought me here without telling me where I was going or why. Then you come in and bite my head off for not performing a service you haven
’
t even asked for. I don
’
t call that the best way to convince me to help you. So unless you can do better, I
’
ll be on my way.
”
He began to stand, and was already halfway out of his chair before Fribart spoke in a flat, hard voice.
“
Sit down, Vandar,
”
he said.
“
Now.
”
“
I have no intention of—
”
“
Dr. Vandar.
Please.
Sit down.
”
An odd change came over his host. Fribart shuddered, visibly, and it was as if a wall had been knocked down, a wall of official conduct and hard-edged rules and disapproval of all nonregulation behavior. Behind all that, Fribart
’
s face took on an expression, and his voice took on emotion, that had not been there before. Quite suddenly, Milos was looking at and listening to, not an annoyed clerk with too much power, but an intelligent, frightened,
alarmed
human being.
“
Please,
”
Fribart said again.
“
Please accept my sincere apologies for your treatment tonight, but I must insist you stay and hear me out. Afterward, you can do what you like.
”
Fribart gestured toward Vandar
’
s chair, and waited until Milos was seated again.
“
All right,
”
Milos said,
“
talk.
”
Fribart paused for a moment before he went on.
“
There
’
s an old saying, Dr. Vandar, that says you should never attribute to malevolence anything that could be caused by incompetence. Tonight we
’
ve gone one better. Please, I ask you—don
’
t attribute to incompetence actions that were caused by blind panic. Something
’
s come up. Something that
’
s scared the living daylights out of everyone who has seen it. That is, I
’
m sure, why they pulled you in like a common criminal. The people who gave them their orders— including me—were scared silly, and made the mistake of letting it show.
”
He put the flat-read panel on the table, but did not take his hand off it.
“
SCO Station sent down this report about five hours ago. You
’
re not alone. We
’
ve pulled in people from half a dozen disciplines to examine every angle on it. Linguistics people to match writing style. Nav and ballistics and ships
’
captains to see if this ship, the
Dom Pedro
whatever-number-it-is, could really have made the flight she
’
s supposed to have made. Artlnt people to confirm that the report has been left unaltered since it was put in encrypted storage. We
’
re checking every angle we can think of on it.
”
“
On
what?”
Milos demanded.
“
Tell me what this is about.
”
Fribart looked at Milos and sighed wearily.
“
It
’
s a complicated story, but what it boils down to is this: This report is supposed to be from over a hundred years ago. Maybe it is, maybe it isn
’
t. Other people are checking that part of it out. In any event it was opened and read by the SCO Station commander today. It predicts the last hundred or so years of the history of the terraformed Solacian environment, and its current state, with alarming accuracy. More alarming still because of what it says will happen in future. What we need you to check is the science. The report describes the methodology used to derive the predictions. It involves some highly complex math, and specialized knowledge. The report, I might add, discusses further proofs and more detailed methodology that the writer would bring with him. Those proofs and details have been lost. This report is all we have, and all we
’
re going to have. We need you to look at it and tell us if it
’
s for real. Tell us if the math and the science and theory are legitimate, or just real-sounding fakes. Because unless they
are
frauds, this planet is in trouble.
”
Fribart shoved the flat-reader across the table toward
Milos and pulled his hand away from it sharply, as if he had been eager to cease touching it and was glad to get rid of it. And with that, whatever had changed in Fribart,
changed back. The walls went back up, and the human
personality was lost to view again. Whatever it had cost him to let down his shields, he did not choose to leave them down for long.
“
So,
”
Fribart said, his voice back to
its old tone of aggrieved bureaucratic virtue,
“
does all that meet with your definition of a
damned-good reason?”
“
Yeah,
”
Milos replied.
“
Yeah, I guess it does.
”
He took up the flat-reader, reluctant to take it up, just as Fribart had been glad to get rid of it.
He started to read.
“
And that brings us to the last point,
”
said Wandella Ashdin.
“
Very good,
”
said Neshobe. She was more than glad to hear the end was in sight. Ashdin was supposed to be a superb historian and researcher, but her technique for giving a report—if such massive disorganization could be dignified with the term
technique
—was enough to drive anyone to distraction.
“
Yes,
”
Ashdin said in vague reply.
“
The last point. Admiral Koffield reported Dr. DeSiivo
’
s temporary death by heart failure. Now let me see ...
”
Neshobe Kalzant, and indeed everyone else in the room, watched with ill-disguised impatience as Wandella Ashdin searched through her excessively copious notes once again.
“
Yes. Here we are. Insofar as confirming Admiral Koffield
’
s bona fides, it is a very useful detail. It dovetails very neatly with what we know of Dr. DeSiivo
’
s movements and activities during that time, and indeed fills in one of the major lacunae in our knowledge of his life. Dr. DeSilvo was a most private person, and he kept his medical history as quiet as possible. I
’
ve learned that whenever I come across a period of his life that is completely blank, with no record of any kind of his actions, it almost always turns out that the doctor had been taken ill, and elected to withdraw himself from public view, quite often having himself placed in temporal confinement while treatment was prepared. The admiral
’
s report exactly matches one of the largest remaining lacunae in the DeSilvo
chronology. Even the mention of heart-replacement failure
matches up with what I have from third-party and secondary sources of one sort or another. I could provide you with greater detail on those if you would like to—
”
“
I
’
m sure that
’
s not necessary,
”
Neshobe said hurriedly.
“
You
’
ve been quite thorough enough already.
”
“
Why, thank you, ma
’
am,
”
Ashdin replied, plainly missing Neshobe
’
s not-very-well-hidden sarcasm.
“
Not at all,
”
Neshobe said absently. She let out a sigh
and rubbed her face with both hands. Ashdin had been the last of the experts to report, as well as the longest-winded, and it had already been a long meeting, and a
long morning, before Ashdin had started.
“
I don
’
t know
about the rest of you,
”
Neshobe said,
“
but I need a break.
Would anyone object if I ordered some refreshments brought in?
”
No one, of course, objected. It was one advantage to being Planetary Executive. You could take your breaks whenever you wanted.
“
Service system,
”
Neshobe said,
addressing the Mansion
’
s Artlnt network.
“
Meeting break
refreshments, to be brought in, now.
”
A low double-chime indicated the Mansion
’
s Artlnt service system had heard and understood.
Neshobe Kalzant stood up and stretched her arms wide,
providing as clear a cue as possible to everyone else that it was all right for them to do the same. The conference table
waited until everyone had gotten up, then extruded an arm
that cleared its surface and stowed everything in a lower
compartment. Then the table folded itself up and rolled out of the way.
Neshobe took advantage of the moment when everyone was getting out of the table
’
s way. She moved to the far end of the room, folded her arms across her chest, and turned to look out the window, using her posture and body language to make it as plain as possible that she
wanted a moment or two on her own. She did it so effec
tively that even Ashdin took the hint, after a moment
’
s
hesitation. For a second or two, Neshobe could see, out of the corner of her eye, that the woman was watching her and considering the idea of coming over for a nice
chat. Neshobe turned more directly toward the window, and that seemed to do the trick. She watched the reflection in the window as Ashdin shrugged and turned toward the refreshment cart that was rolling itself into the room.
Neshobe had discovered shortly after taking on the job of Planetary Executive that very clear body language could often do what it had just done—stop an awkward social encounter before it had even begun.
Her desire to be alone with her thoughts having been established, she turned her back on the window for a moment and considered the other people in the room, each in turn, watching as they helped themselves to tea, fruit, pastry, and whatever else the Artlnt system had served up.
First off, the two visitors from long ago, and far away— Norla Chandray and Anton Koffield. Plainly neither of them was in very good shape at the moment. Not that she could blame them, considering the shocks and stresses they had already been through.
Then, Grand Senyor Jorl Parrige, who had, the stars bless him, left his assistant behind. Fribart always got her nervous. But Parrige was a rock. She needed him.
Then there was Wandella Ashdin. She was supposed to be a brilliant historian, an expert on the early years of the founding of Solace, and on the parallel subject of the life and work of Oskar DeSilvo. Neshobe
’
s people had fished her up from the local university.
Ashdin was plainly overawed and overexcited by the situation—and, interestingly enough, it was Koffield, and not the local political heavyweights, who fascinated her.
Every time the man opened his mouth, Ashdin turned and stared at him, with every bit of the intensity her watery blue eyes could muster. At a guess, she was trying to memorize everything he said. It had pained Ashdin no end that this meeting was to be off the record. She had brought all sorts of recording and note-taking hardware, and had seemed near tears when told she was not going to be able to use it.
But Koffield
’
s presence made up for that. Koffield, after all; had actually
met
DeSilvo, talked to him, truly known
him. Ashdin had so far restricted herself to asking fairly sensible questions, but it was plainly a major effort of will
for her not to pin Koffield to the spot and ask what Oskar
DeSilvo was
really
like. Or maybe she was asking that very
question now.
Then came Dr. Milos Vandar, the biotechnician who
stood next to Ashdin at the refreshment table, trying to get
at the samovar she was blocking as she nattered on at
Koffield. Ashdin, busily monopolizing the long-suffering
Koffield, was unaware of his presence.
Vandar had not been able to say, absolutely and incon-trovertibly, that Koffield
’
s work was accurate. But neither
had he come remotely near saying Koffield had gotten any
thing seriously wrong. And Vandar was a man of enough imagination to understand the implications if Koffield
’
s
analysis was even close,to the truth. To see a man like Vandar badly worried and distracted told Neshobe just
how serious the matter could be. And Vandar seemed even
more upset and distracted than Koffield.