Actually, the conference went along much more smoothly than Stavenger had feared. The other delegates arrived, and Humphries turned his attention to Amanda, who smiled politely at him but said very little. He seemed almost to be a different person when Fuchs’s wife was near: polite, considerate, earnestly trying to win her admiration, or at least her respect.
Stavenger called the meeting to order, and everyone took seats along the polished oblong conference table. Pancho behaved like a proper corporate executive and Humphries was affable and cooperative. Each of them made an opening statement about how they wanted nothing more than peace and harmony in the Asteroid Belt. Willi Dieterling then said a few brief words about how important the resources of the Belt were to the people of Earth.
“With so many millions homeless and hungry, with so much of our global industrial capacity wiped out, we desperately need the resources from the Belt,” he pleaded. “This fighting is disrupting the supply of raw materials that we need to recover from the climate catastrophe that has brought civilization to its knees.”
Stavenger pointed out, “The people of Selene are ready to help as much as we can. We have industrial capacity here on the Moon, and we can help you to build factories and power-generation stations in Earth orbit.”
It was Big George who ended the platitudes.
“We all want peace and brotherhood,” he began, “but the painful truth is that people are killin’ each other out in the Belt.”
Dieterling immediately replied, “The world government is prepared to offer Peacekeeping troops to you to help you maintain order in the Belt.”
“No thanks!” George snapped. “We can maintain order for ourselves—” he turned to look squarely at Humphries “—if the corporations’ll stop sending killers to us.”
“Corporations, plural?” Pancho asked. “Astro hasn’t sent any killers to the Belt.”
“You’ve sent your share of goons, Pancho,” said George.
“To protect our property!”
Humphries made a hushing motion with both hands. “I presume you’re both referring to certain actions taken by employees of Humphries Space Systems.”
“Fookin’ right,” George blurted.
With all eyes on him, Humphries said calmly, “It’s perfectly true that some of the people my corporation sent to Ceres have been . . . well, roughnecks.”
“Murderers,” George muttered.
“One man committed a murder, true enough,” Humphries conceded. “But he acted on his own. And he was punished for it swiftly enough.”
“By Lars Fuchs, I understand,” said Dieterling.
Humphries nodded. “Now we’re getting down to the crux of the problem.”
“Wait a minute,” George interjected. “Let’s not start dumpin’ on Lars. Plenty of ships have been knocked off out in the Belt, and it was HSS that started it.”
“That’s not true,” Humphries said.
“Isn’t it? I was fookin’ attacked by one of your butcher boys. Took me arm off. Remember?”
“We went through an IAA hearing over that. No one was able to prove it was one of my ships that attacked you.”
“That doesn’t mean it wasn’t one of ’em, does it now?”
Stavenger broke into the budding argument. “Unless we have concrete evidence, there’s no use throwing accusations around.”
George glowered at him, but said nothing.
“We do have concrete evidence,” Humphries resumed, with a swift glance at Amanda, “that Lars Fuchs has attacked ships, killed men, stolen supplies, and now he’s wiped out a base we were building on Vesta in a totally unwarranted and premeditated attack. He’s killed several dozen people. He’s the reason for all this violence out in the Belt and until he’s caught and put away, the violence will continue.”
Absolute silence. Not one of the men or women seated around the conference table said a word in Fuchs’s defense. Not even Amanda, Humphries noted with unalloyed delight.
CHAPTER 51
The asteroid had no name. In the catalogue files it was merely 38-4002. Barely a kilometer long and half that at its widest, it was a dark carbonaceous body, a loose aggregation of pebble-sized chondrules, more like a beanbag than a solid rock. Fuchs had left one of his transceivers there weeks earlier; now he was returning to the asteroid to retrieve it and see what information Amanda had been able to beam to him.