The Prince by Jerry Pournelle and S.M. Stirling

Grant’s smile was thin, but he managed it. “You’ll hardly expect me to agree with you,” Grant said.

“No, sir.”

Grant sighed. “But perhaps you’re right at that. I must say I wouldn’t mind retiring, so that I could live in this house instead of merely visiting it on weekends.”

What was the point? Grant wondered. He’d never convince this boy, and Sharon wanted him. Torrey would drop Bertram after the scandals broke.

And what explanations were there anyway? The Baja Project was developed to aid a syndicate of taxpayers in the six states of the old former Republic of Mexico. The Government needed them, and they didn’t care about whales and fish. Shortsighted, yes, and Grant had tried to argue them into changing the project, but they wouldn’t, and politics is the art of the possible.

Finally, painfully, the interview ended. Sharon came in, grinning sheepishly because she was engaged to one of Bertram’s people, but she understood that no better than Allan Torrey. It was only a game. Bertram would win and Grant would retire, and no one would be hurt.

How could he tell them that it didn’t work that way any longer? Unity wasn’t the cleanest party in the world, but at least it had no fanatics—and all over the world the causes were rising again. The Friends of the People were on the move, and it had all happened before, it was all told time and again in those aseptically clean books on the shelves above him.

* * *

BERTRAM AIDES ARRESTED BY INTERCONTINENTAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION!! IBI RAIDS SECRET WEAPONS CACHE IN BERTRAM HEADQUARTERS. NUCLEAR WEAPONS HINTED!!!

Chicago, May 15, (UPI)—IBI agents here have arrested five top aides to Senator Harvey Bertram in what government officials call one of the most despicable plots ever discovered. . . .

* * *

Grant read the transcript on his desk screen without satisfaction. It had all gone according to plan, and there was nothing left to do, but he hated it.

At least it was clean. The evidence was there. Bertram’s people could have their trial, challenge jurors, challenge judges. The Government would waive its rights under the Thirty-first Amendment and let the case be tried under the old adversary rules. It wouldn’t matter.

Then he read the small type below. “Arrested were Gregory Kalamintor, nineteen, press secretary to Bertram; Timothy Giordano, twenty-two, secretary; Allan Torrey, twenty-two, executive assistant—” The page blurred, and Grant dropped his face into his hands.

“My God, what have we done?”

He hadn’t moved when Miss Ackridge buzzed. “Your daughter on four, sir. She seems upset.”

“Yes.” Grant punched savagely at the button. Sharon’s face swam into view. Her makeup was ruined by long streaks of tears. She looked older, much like her mother during one of their—

“Daddy! They’ve arrested Allan! And I know it isn’t true, he wouldn’t have anything to do with nuclear weapons! A lot of Mr. Bertram’s people said there would never be an honest election in this country. They said John Grant would see to that! I told him they were wrong, but they weren’t, were they? You’ve done this to stop the election, haven’t you?”

There was nothing to say because she was right. But who might be listening? “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve only seen the Tri-V casts about Allan’s arrest, nothing more. Come home, kitten, and we’ll talk about it.”

“Oh no! You’re not getting me where Dr. Pollard can give me a nice friendly little shot and make me forget about Allan! No! I’m staying with my friends, and I won’t be home, Daddy. And when I go to the newspapers, I think they’ll listen to me. I don’t know what to tell them yet, but I’m sure Mr. Bertram’s people will think of something. How do you like that, Mr. God?”

“Anything you tell the press will be lies, Sharon. You know nothing.” One of his assistants had come in and now left the office.

“Lies? Where did I learn to lie?” The screen went blank.

And is it that thin? he wondered. All the trust and love, could it vanish that fast, was it that thin?

“Sir?” It was Hartman, his assistant.

“Yes?”

“She was calling from Champaign, Illinois. A Bertram headquarters they think we don’t know about. The phone had one of those guaranteed no-trace devices.”

“Trusting lot, aren’t they?” Grant said. “Have some good men watch that house, but leave her alone.” He stood and felt a wave of nausea so strong that he had to hold the edge of the desk. “MAKE DAMNED SURE THEY LEAVE HER ALONE. DO YOU UNDERSTAND?” he shouted.

Hartman went as pale as Grant. The chief hadn’t raised his voice to one of his own people in five years. “Yes, sir, I understand.”

“Then get out of here.” Grant spoke carefully, in low tones, and the cold mechanical voice was more terrifying than the shout.

He sat alone and stared at the telephone. What use was its power now?

What can we do? It wasn’t generally known that Sharon was engaged to the boy. He’d talked them out of a formal engagement until the banns could be announced in the National Cathedral and they could hold a big social party. It had been something to do for them at the time, but . . .

But what? He couldn’t have the boy released. Not that boy. He wouldn’t keep silent as the price of his own freedom. He’d take Sharon to a newspaper within five minutes of his release, and the resulting headlines would bring down Lipscomb, Unity, the CoDominium—and the peace. Newsmen would listen to the daughter of the top secret policeman in the country.

Grant punched a code on the communicator, then another. Grand Admiral Lermontov appeared on the screen.

“Yes, Mr. Grant?”

“Are you alone?”

“Yes.”

The conversation was painful, and the long delay while the signals reached the moon and returned didn’t make it easier.

“When is the next CD warship going outsystem? Not a colony ship, and most especially not a prison ship. A warship.”

Another long pause, longer even than the delay. “I suppose anything could be arranged,” the Admiral said. “What do you need?”

“I want . . .” Grant hesitated, but there was no time to be lost. No time at all. “I want space for two very important political prisoners. A married couple. The crew is not to know their identity, and anyone who does learn their identity must stay outsystem for at least five years. And I want them set down on a good colony world, a decent place. Sparta, perhaps. No one ever returns from Sparta. Can you arrange that?”

Grant could see the changes in Lermontov’s face as the words reached him. The Admiral frowned. “It can be done if it is important enough. It will not be easy.”

“It’s important enough. My brother Martin will explain everything you’ll need to know later. The prisoners will be delivered tonight, Sergei. Please have the ship ready. And—and it better not be Saratoga. My son’s in that one and he—he will know one of the prisoners.” Grant swallowed hard. “There should be a chaplain aboard. The kids will be getting married.”

Lermontov frowned again, as if wondering if John Grant had gone insane. Yet he needed the Grants, both of them, and certainly John Grant would not ask such a favor if it were not vital.

“It will be done,” Lermontov said.

“Thank you. I’ll also appreciate it if you will see they have a good estate on Sparta. They are not to know who arranged it. Just have it taken care of and send the bill to me.”

It was all so very simple. Direct his agents to arrest Sharon and conduct her to CD Intelligence. He wouldn’t want to see her first. The attorney general would send Torrey to the same place and announce that he had escaped.

It wasn’t as neat as having all of them convicted in open court, but it would do, and having one of them a fugitive from justice would even help. It would be an admission of guilt.

Something inside him screamed again and again that this was his little girl, the only person in the world who wasn’t afraid of him, but Grant refused to listen. He leaned back in the chair and almost calmly dictated his orders.

He took the flimsy sheet from the writer and his hand didn’t tremble at all as he signed it.

All right, Martin, he thought. All right. I’ve bought the time you asked for, you and Sergei Lermontov. Now can you do something with it?

V

2087 a.d.

The landing boat fell away from the orbiting warship. When it had drifted to a safe distance, retros fired, and after it had entered the thin reaches of the planet’s upper atmosphere, scoops opened in the bows. The thin air was drawn in and compressed until the stagnation temperature in the ramjet chamber was high enough for ignition.