James P Hogan. Giant’s Star. Giant Series #3

“I’ll see to it immediately,” Danchekker sighed.

chapter twenty-six

For Imares Broghuilio, Premier of the Federation of Jevlenese Worlds and head of the Thurien civilization’s Jevlenese component, the past few months had been beset with unexpected crises that had threatened to disrupt the carefully laid plans of generations.

First there had been the sudden and completely unpredictable reappearance of the Shapieron on Earth. The Thuriens had known nothing about that until the signal sent out by the Terrans at the time of the ship’s departure was somehow relayed directly to VISAR without going through JEVEX. How that had happened had been, and still was, a mystery. Broghuilio had been left with no choice but to preempt awkward questions by going to Calazar first with the Jevlenese account of what had transpired, namely that the Jevlenese had felt apprehensive at the thought of inviting Thurien intervention in a situation already made precarious by the belligerence and instability of the Terrans and therefore, rightly or wrongly, had decided to postpone announcing any news until the ship was safely clear of Earth. The explanation had by necessity been hastily contrived, but at the time Calazar had seemed to accept it. The device that had relayed the signal was not something that the Thuriens had placed near the solar system, Calazar had insisted in response to Broghullio’s accusation; the Thuriens had not broken their agreement to leave Earth surveillance to the Jevlenese. Privately, however, Broghuilio’s experts had been able to suggest no other explanation for the relay. It seemed possible, therefore, that the Thuriens were, after all, more prudent than he had given them credit for.

This suspicion had been reinforced some months later when the Thuriens secretly reopened their dialogue with Earth for the unprecedented purpose of double-checking information supplied by JEVEX. Broghuilio had been unable to challenge this development openly since doing so would have revealed the existence of information sources on Earth that the Thuriens could not be allowed to

discover, but with some fast footwork he had neutralized the attempt, at least for the time being, by securing control of the Earth end of the link. His bid to counter the surprise Soviet move of opening a second channel had not proved as successful, and he had been forced to resort to more desperate measures by having the link put out of action-something which he had avoided until that point because of the risk of the Thuriens electing to continue the dialogue by more direct means. He had calculated that they would hesitate for a long time before breaking their agreement in so open a fashion.

The Thuriens had not chosen to divulge their contact with Earth by mentioning the incident. Broghuiio’s advisors had interpreted this as confirmation that the measures taken to persuade the Thuriens that Earth was responsible for the destruction of the relay had succeeded. A further implication was that the image that had been created of a hostile and aggressive Earth had survived intact, which, it was felt, would suffice to dissuade the Thuriens from taking things further by contemplating a landing.

After some anxious moments, therefore, the gamble appeared to have paid off. The only remaining problem was the Shapieron, outward bound from the solar system and already beyond the point where an interception could be staged with only a moderate risk of disturbing planetary orbits. Broghuilio had guessed that the Thuriens, being the cautious breed that they were, would play safe and allow an ample safety margin. Accordingly he had put the relay first in order of priority, using it as a test of how easily the Thuriens would accept a suggestion of an overtly hostile act on the part of the Terrans. If they did accept it, then the odds would be acceptable they would hold Earth responsible for the destruction of the Shapieron as well. The Thuriens had passed the test, and now only a matter of minutes stood between Imares Broghufflo and the elimination of the last element of a problem that had been plaguing him for too long.

He felt a deep sense of satisfaction at a difficult challenge met as he stood at one end of the War Room, deep below a mountain range on Jevlen, surrounded by his entourage of advisors and military strategists, following the reports coming in through JEVEX from the instruments tracking the Shapieron many light-years away. As he looked slowly around at the ranks of generals in the all-black uniforms of the Jevienese military and at the arrays of

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