Victoria would like it better if he'd grovel.
But we Santa Marians are so democratic.
She sniffed at that; some things took so long to change. "How did your trusty spies lose them?"
"We expected them to go back to the Residency. We've checked their rooms. The bugs are active. We gave them plenty of space on the road. Didn't want them to notice us. They took a wrong turn. By the time we got to the corner, that damn driver had turned again. We couldn't find them. We'll reconnect when they get back to the Residency."
"If
they go back,
If
'someone hasn't offered them something better. Unless their shuttle drops out of the sky and hauls them off to heaven knows where. I want to know where they are and what they're doing every moment of their day. I want to know what they're going to do before they know."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Go. Find them, or I will find someone who can."
"Yes, ma'am."
Ray Longknife, humanity's ambassador to Santa Maria, Wardhaven's misplaced Minister for Science and Technology, retired colonel of infantry, devoted husband and future father, watched Mary dance naked with the luminous waves and the moonlight. He wished it was Rita. "Maybe she wouldn't, with the baby coming." He sighed, then shook his head. No, Rita might be beginning to show a bit, but she'd be out there jumping and prancing with Mary just the same. That was the sprite he'd married. All work when she was working. All play otherwise.
With a final splash, Mary strode from the water. She retrieved her dress, swung it over her shoulder, and backed toward the mule, eyes on the ocean. "It's so free. No boss telling it what to do," she whispered when she bumped into the rig.
"It just goes on and on." Ray nodded.
"Yes." She turned to him. Excitement was in her eyes. Probably in other places. She was his for the taking if he wanted her. And he wanted her.
He choked on the wanting and swallowed it. Nothing facing them would be made easier by losing themselves in each other tonight. He returned her gaze, trying to reflect the happiness he felt watching her ... and no more.
She slipped back into her dress. "That was fun," she said, settling it around herself. "I see you've got my sidearm back there with you."
"If some big, slimy thing had slithered out of the sea to dance with you, I wanted to make it keep a gentlemanly distance."
"Locals didn't say anything about sea monsters," Mary said.
"Lot of things the locals ain't got around to saying."
Mary settled into the driver's seat. "Sorry, sir, if my ... uh..."
"Nothing to be sorry for, Captain. You were a joy to watch, and any worrying I did came to nothing. Tomorrow, Mart's dropping a shuttle for us about ten. Make our trip back faster. No need to mention it to anyone. After our tail tonight, I'd rather keep our friends guessing."
The return to the Residency was uneventful; Ray was asleep before his head hit the pillow.
Ray lay on the operating table, looking up into the bright light. Waves of pain washed over him. The doctor stood above him in surgical scrubs, a shining laser scalpel in his hands. As the surgeon reached for Ray, the scalpel changed into a hoe, the medic into a grubbily clad gardener. Ray screamed.
He lay on the ground, the smell of recently turned earth in his nostrils. A huge field hand wielding pruning shears grabbed him and began cutting. Dead branches fell away; fresh green ones were grafted on. Ray screamed.
And came awake, shivering and desperately in need of a trip to the bathroom. Head throbbing, whole body shaking in night chills and sweats, Ray struggled to his feet and moved as quickly as his canes permitted to the facilities. His body trembled in a pain he didn't understand. Done, he worked his way back to collapse in bed. Mary had laid out pain meds; he swallowed a pill. Better to make a second trip tonight than lie awake in the grips of this agony. Ray settled back, centering his thoughts on Rita, and a girl-child as beautiful as her mother.
* * *
Three months' fieldwork had gotten Jeff Sterling used to rising with the sun. At Fairview, however, he usually slept in. With Vicky running the business, sleeping was the most exciting thing he got to do around the family estate.
This morning, Millard woke him at dawn. "Miss Sterling requires your presence at her breakfast, sir." Since Vicky had sent the downstairs butler who taught hand-to-hand combat as well as proper deportment and etiquette to the staff, Jeff tied on his robe and went. Once in the solarium, however, Jeff pointedly ignored Vicky and puttered over the breakfast bar, filling his plate slowly with eggs, brown bread, and bacon. "Do we have any strawberry jam?" he asked, knowing Vicky had sent the staff away for this private meeting and would have to answer herself.
"How should I know?" she snapped. "Buzz the kitchen. And be quick about it. We need
to talk" So Vicky was in one of her moods. This could be even more fun than usual. Jeff buzzed
the kitchen. "This place I was staying at, out on the front range," he rambled, "had this
really delicious strawberry jam. Do we have any?"
They didn't. Orange marmalade would have to do. Very expensive stuff. The Swensons had held on to their monopoly on orange trees as tightly as the Sterlings held on to their metal claims. Vicky hated the Swensons but loved orange marmalade.
"Now sit down, Jeffrey. I want a word with you."
"Yes, Victoria." To her face, not even Jeff called her Vicky.
"Why didn't you tell me about the damn spaceship?" Vicky snapped, rubbing her eyes with both fists.
They'd been over this before. "Because I didn't know about them until they landed. Besides, that village didn't have access to the net. How could I have told you?"
"Those cheap dirt farmers. They ought to be required to have net hookups. For their brats' education, at least."
"More might, if we lowered the price on fiber cable." Jeff was the family advocate for lowering profit margins and making it up in volume. Christ, fiber optic was only silicon! Vicky was for all the market would bear. With Dad dead and Mom in a convent, Vicky was in charge.
Vicky broke off a small portion of her croissant, buttered it, and munched it slowly, her gaze out the window on the distant woods. Jeff was being ignored ... again. He ate, waiting for her next announcement.
"They're hiding something." The "they" could only be the spacemen. For Vicky to conclude they were hiding something was no big news. Vicky always hid half her cards; she assumed everyone else did. It made for tough bargaining even when the other side was hiding nothing.
Jeff, however, was pretty sure the spacemen were hiding something. He would not, however, admit that to Vicky. "I don't know, they seem pretty up front," he said with his mouth full.
"Don't speak with your mouth full," Vicky shot back in irritation, making Jeff's morning. "Why won't they share their data files with us?"
"Chu Lyn is pretty dead set against them dumping all kinds of new tech on us. She's afraid of what that would do to the economy." Chu led the Green Party in the Great Circle. Normally she didn't have the votes to stop Vicky. Recent nose counts had not been "normal."
Vicky flipped her hand up disparagingly. "Lyn is afraid of her own shadow." Still, Vicky said nothing about forcing a vote. The rumors Jeff had picked up were right. Votes were changing. It was fun watching Vicky sweat.
"Why are you sitting in the circles anyway? I'm senior for the metalworkers."
Jeff had been expecting that. "I'm just sitting in on the meetings, Sis. I haven't voted." Open meetings had been a golden rule since the Landers. Anyone could attend a circle, although only representatives for recognized interest groups or locals actually voted. Nobody questioned Jeff's right to sit in, both because he was a Sterling and because he always took the seat next to the starwoman Rodrigo. He liked the questions that raised. Was he in the star group, or the Sterlings? Only Vicky had the gumption to ask.
Vicky mulled that answer as she chewed another piece of croissant. "Good idea. I like the way you're making up to that starwoman. In her pants yet?"
Jeff had half a dozen answers to that question. First in line was "None of your business." Unfortunately, Vicky saw everything with a potential value in it as her business. Jeff swallowed and fed her the line she'd want. "Mary's a tough woman. Doesn't let anyone get close to her easily."
"Smart woman. Don't let that stop you, kid. I want to know what makes her tick. AH of them. Keep working on it. You have anything else to work on?"
She knew the answer to that. As junior Sterling, Vicky made sure he had nothing to do and did nothing worth doing. "Nothing on my schedule," he answered.
"Good. Stay close to her. She'll come around. And let me know what you learn as soon as you do." She pushed away from the table, half her breakfast untouched. "And don't dawdle over breakfast. There's work to do. Get yourself over to the Residency and see what they're up to."
Since Vicky had bugged the Residency, as well as most other places where important things were talked about, if she didn't know what was happening, somebody was keeping her in the dark. Jeff really liked these star people.
Jeff continued eating with slow purpose until Vicky stalked from the solarium. Only after she left did he lean back in his chair. Damn! Vicky had given him the order he would have begged for. She would never have given it to him if he asked. Vicky's distrust of everyone inevitably sent people where they didn't want to go to do things they were poorly suited to do. Thank God the woman could be manipulated.
Jeff hustled for his room. He was curious what Ray and Mary would do today. They'd fulfilled the circles' social requirements; now they were on their own. No doubt it would be fun watching. He dressed quickly and had an electrocycle brought around to the front.
It had been a very bad night, full of shivering and sweats. Ray gulped a pain pill before starting his morning stretches. Showered and shaved, he almost felt human.
Mary met him at the stairs and went down, one step at a time. Her conversation rambled over the morning's weather and last night's drive, totally ignoring that she was there to catch him if he stumbled. He liked her nonchalant way of playing safety as much as he enjoyed her morning chatter. It reminded him of Rita before her second cup of coffee.
Their hostess, Henrietta San Paulo, Chair of the Great Circle, was already seated at the head of the table. Her daughter, a wisp of a nine-year-old, was missing.
"Where's the White Rose?" Ray asked, using the nickname Henrietta's albino daughter enjoyed.
"She had headaches in the night. I hope her noise did not disturb you. The nurse could not keep her quiet."
"Do all albinos have migraines?" Mary asked.
"Apparently." The mother concentrated on her breakfast. "Rose has visited every doctor and specialist we have. They just shake their heads."
"We met a child with migraines on our first day down," Ray said, not reaching for his oatmeal. "A County Clair Circle member also had a child like Rose. We've landed a medical team. One thing they're looking at is how to help these children."
"Could you send Rose these medicines?"
Without a thought, Ray nodded, then stopped himself. "No, I can't promise that. Some meds require a patient be under observation while taking them." He swept his hands out, then down his broken back. "I've had personal experience with our docs. I can't promise a pill Rose can take three times a day and not worry about."
San Paulo pursed her lips. "If she and her nurse went with you, would that meet your requirements?"
"I don't doubt it. I've ordered a shuttle to pick us up around ten. There will be room for her."
Henrietta nodded slowly. "I will have to discuss this with Chu. Her party can't oppose your helping a poor child. This would be a nice way to get them used to the good that will come from our involvement again with humanity."
Ray nodded while cringing inside. Would he ever become so much of a politician that helping his child took second place to policy? On second reflection, he realized that his own policy of limited technological transition had just taken a major hit. He was using his tech. But it's to help a little girl. Oh, Rita, if only you were here.
Was it an accident that Chu Lyn was announced as breakfast ended? Henrietta had the nurse bring Rose down to join her and Ray in a sitting room. Chu, a tall, dark-skinned woman with no visible evidence of her Asian namesake, and San Paulo chatted for half an hour before San Paulo invited Rose into her lap and told Lyn of Ray's offer.
Rose's bloodshot eyes grew wide; she said nothing, but the look she gave Ray was heartrending. Lyn talked in platitudes for several minutes, of her party's support for rational change and growth, but their long experience of mad, irrational action. Then she shrugged. "Of course, no one could possibly object." Rose and her nurse left to pack. Ray excused himself.
Fifteen minutes later, a small crowd collected on the steps of the Residency as everyone gathered for their good-byes. While Mary and the nurse loaded suitcases, Rose went through the tortures of a nine-year-old ... excited to ride in something new like the mule, reluctant to leave Mom and the familiar.
"Would you like to talk to your mommy whenever you want?" Ray asked. The shy child nodded. Ray took off his wrist unit, made a few adjustments so it would only be a commlink, and offered it to San Paulo.