A cross made from two huge stones topped the crag on which Adele stood with Lieutenant Vesey; each slab must weigh more than twenty tons. The structure was artificial, but it surely predated the human colonization two hundred years earlier. Scaly vegetation grew like orange-brown-cream paint on its south face.
Adele reached for her personal data unit but then quickly snatched her hand away. The megaliths of Diamondia weren't the reason she'd had Tovera set her and Vesey down here. The aircar waited for them on a plateau half a mile away-in sight, but well out of hearing.
Vesey hadn't spoken during the flight from the emergency hospital, a high school into which Medicomps and trained personnel from the larger warships had been moved. She remained silent as she looked down on Port Delacroix and beyond. The water in the Inner Harbor was pale green. In the Outer Harbor it was dark blue, and the open sea was sullen gray.
Adele followed the lieutenant's eyes, then frowned. Rather-again-than taking out her data unit, she seated herself on a slab of basalt and said, "Where are theAlcubiere andAntigone? I didn't think they'd been destroyed in the fighting."
Vesey glanced at her and managed a faint smile. Before answering, she sat a little more than arm's length away. Though she moved very carefully, the burns to her right arm and the bone bruises to both femurs were healing. Adele'd checked Vesey's medical records-of course-but she knew from personal experience that someone whom a computer said was completely recovered might feel pain stab where the bullet'd struck six months previously.
"TheAntigone may well be a constructive loss like theExpress," Vesey said. "She's in orbit now, but it may make better economic sense to salvage her fittings and scrap her here on Diamondia."
Her voice was soft but without any music. Like Vesey's hair and her figure, it was plain. She had a fine mind, though, a mind that both Adele and Daniel could respect.
"TheAlcubiere 's going to be repaired," Vesey continued. "On Cinnabar, of course. But she's lost half her plasma thrusters so it'd have been too dangerous to land her now. She's being jury rigged in orbit, and Admiral James sent up thrusters for the crew to install during the voyage home."
A plasma bolt had blown a starboard topsail yard across the back of thePrincess Cecile, trailing a shroud which'd struck Vesey at mid-thigh and slammed her to the hull. That'd saved her life, because except for her right arm she'd been under the topsail when the next three bolts hit.
Adele thought of returning to Cinnabar a year before in the capturedScheer, renamed theMilton. Very deliberately she said, "I don't suppose Captain Bussom would appreciate Daniel giving him pointers in how to sail long distances in a jury-rigged heavy cruiser, would he?"
Vesey stared at her wide-eyed, then realized Adele was making a joke. She snorted a tiny laugh, probably as much at Adele's perfect deadpan as from thinking about Captain Bussom's reaction to getting shiphandling advice from a junior commander.
"No, mistress," she said. "I don't think I'd recommend that Six do that."
They both looked down at Port Delacroix for a moment. The buildings were largely built from blocks of porous volcanic tuff. The gray stone had been whitewashed. It'd be dazzling later in the day, but now in the early morning the half-bowl of hills into which the town and harbors nestled blocked the direct sun. The roofs were brown tile, golden when lighted but at present drab.
Besides the losses and the missing cruisers, two destroyers were in orbit on picket duty. Even so the Inner Harbor was full of ships, prizes which'd surrendered rather be destroyed along with the base on Z3 after the battle. Only one of the seventeen was of any size, a 3,000 tonne freighter which'd arrived the day before with resupply. The rest were light craft which'd been sent to the Jewel System to grind through the planetary defense array.
None of the vessels was of remarkable value by itself, but altogether they'd eventually constitute a pretty trissie in prize money. The amount would be divided among the crews of two battleships and assorted lesser craft, with the Admiral Commanding getting an eighth; nonetheless it'd take even common spacers several days to drink up their portions.
"I don't think anyone objects to Admiral James' share," Adele said, voicing her thoughts. "His plan was very effective, though it was hard on Foxhunt."
"That's how it worked out this time," Vesey agreed. She didn't turn to face Adele. "But somebody had to hold the Alliance's attention while the Admiral got his battleships into position."
She shook her head very slightly. "We're RCN, after all. We all understood that when we took the oath."
"Yes," said Adele. Using the same precision as she'd employ when aligning her sights, she said, "And do you also understand that Daniel needs you, Lieutenant?"
Vesey'd been leaning forward slightly. She jerked upright and almost slid off the slab of rock. It sloped enough that the seat of her utilities didn't grip well enough to withstand violent motion. She looked at Adele with a mixture of anger and hurt, but she didn't reply.
"Well, do you understand?" Adele said.
"Nobody needs me!" Vesey said. "Do you think that isn't obvious? I didn't expect you to bring me up here to lie to me, mistress!"
Adele nodded, pleased to have gotten a reaction. What she'd been really afraid of was that Vesey had shut down completely, because then there wouldn't have been any hope.
"You're right," she said calmly, "I misstated the matter. What I should have said was that Daniel needssomeone whom he can trust for astrogation and shiphandling. He doesn't need someone to fight the ship, of course; he'll do that himself until the day he dies, and I shouldn't wonder if he managed to stay alive regardless till he's seen off whatever enemy he's facing. Can you agree with that statement of facts, Lieutenant?"
Vesey licked her lips. She sat on the rock again, bracing herself with her hands, to give herself time to frame a response. "Yes, mistress," she said warily.
"He says you're the best astrogator he knows besides himself," Adele continued. "Further, that your shiphandling's good and getting better. Again, do you accept that I'm telling the truth? About Daniel's opinion, that is; you don't have to accept that as correct."
Vesey nodded but lowered her eyes. "I'm honored by Mister Leary's good opinion," she said. "I… my shiphandling needs a great deal of work."
"Perhaps," said Adele with a dismissive sniff. "Regardless, it's clear to me that Daniel considers you the ideal First Lieutenant for him. I grant that you might not be as well suited to a captain who'd find your skill intimidating."
"Meintimidating?" Vesey murmured, but her smile was an honest one. It faded and she said in the direction of the port, "Mistress Mundy, I really appreciate what you're doing, but it seems sopointless."
"Unlike Daniel, I don't need anyone at all," Adele said as though she were ignoring the comment. " Not Daniel, not Tovera."
She turned a hard smile toward Vesey. The lieutenant watched her sidelong.
"I certainly don't need you, Vesey," Adele said. "If all the people I've ever met suddenly vanished, I could go back to the Library of Celsus and spend the rest of my life doing research. I could make myself a little nest there, like a rat in the insulation between the hulls. The only catch is-"
She smiled again. She knew from having seen herself in mirrored surfaces in the past that you could sharpen a knife on her expression.
"-that'd I'd be dead. Dead as a human being, that is. And having spent much of my life dead in just that fashion-"
She paused, furrowing her brow with a real question. "In fact," she said, "I think that I was dead for all my life until I met Lieutenant Leary on Kostroma. Having done that, as I say, I've decided that it's better to be alive until it's time to be buried."
Vesey started to smile. Her expression hardened and she turned her head toward Adele again. "Mistress," she said harshly. "You don't care at all about Rene, do you? Master Cazelet, if you prefer."
"I most certainlydo care for Rene," Adele said. "I'm responsible for him to Mistress Boileau, to whom I owe-"
She shrugged. "Whatever you please. My life, which doesn't matter. My education, my honor, my self-respect-everything that's important to me as a Mundy and a scholar and a human being."
She allowed the humor of the situation to show in her expression. "Now," she said, "if you mean that I don't have the least romantic passion for Rene, of course I don't. I don't have the least romantic passion aboutanybody. In particular-"
Adele stopped. "Look at me, if you please, Lieutenant," she said sharply.
Vesey jerked her head up and reflexively stiffened as though coming to attention. Pain drove out a gasp, quickly silenced. "Mistress," she said obediently.
"In particular," Adele continued as though nothing had happened, "I don't feel any romantic passion for Daniel. But if the word love has any meaning in human affairs, I love him."
"I thought…," Vesey said. She turned her head away, clearly unaware of what she was doing. "Rene's smart andquick, and he knows so much already. Oh, not astrogation the way I do; but more about life, mistress, more than I ever will. And I thought…"
She put her face in her hands. "But I couldn't be you, and no one else matters to Rene!" she said through sudden tears.
Adele wondered if Daniel would've known better what to do. He must've had a great deal of experience with crying women, though Adele suspected he was the sort to bolt for the nearest door.
Whereas the late Timothy Dorst would've put his arms around Vesey and told her he loved her; which he doubtless had in a dim but very manly fashion. Well, that wasn't helpful in the present circumstances either.
Presumably Vesey would regain control of herself. Letting her cry until she did so seemed as good a plan as any. Adele turned her eyes toward the activity in the harbor.
She smiled faintly. The visor of her commo helmet would've allowed her to magnify the scene, but she hadn't considered using it. What shehad started to do was use her personal data unit to enter the command console of one of the starships below-thePrincess Cecile was the obvious choice, but she could pick the flagship-and view the harbor through the ship's external optics.
Surface craft shuttled back and forth across the Inner Harbor. One was a repair boat and there were two government barges, but most of them were bumboats which Admiral James had pressed into service to haul spars, sails, thrusters and High Drive motors from Alliance prizes to RCN vessels which needed repair.
As Adele watched, a quartet of houseboats which usually sold oranges, pork sausage, and sex to spacers on board their ships, crawled toward the destroyerExmouth. Barely awash between them was what must've been a main antenna from the captured freighter. The destroyers on picket duty changed every six hours. When they did, the relief vessels lashed stores for theAlcubiere to their outriggers.
ThePrincess Cecile was, according to Daniel, ready to lift as soon as Admiral James gave clearance. Under Pasternak's direction the crew'd put a temporary patch of structural plastic on her port outrigger instead replacing the whole unit here on Diamondia. She now wore spars and sails stripped from an Alliance minesweeper and had taken a High Drive motor as well.
Vesey fumbled in her hip pocket for a handkerchief. Sniffles had replaced her sobs.
Adele waited for her to blow her nose; then, still looking down into the harbor, she resumed, "Vesey, I've learned that there's no end of new and different ways for me to fail. I shouldn't wonder if the last thing I do in life is make another mistake. Given the kind of work you and I do-"
She turned to Vesey and smiled as broadly as she ever did. That wasn't, of course, very broadly.
"-it's not unlikely that we'll be dyingbecause we made a mistake. Still, we're both very good at our jobs. The RCN will regret losing us."
A bell somewhere in the town began ringing. Is it religious, or does it have something to do with today's festival?
Adele had gotten the data unit halfway out of its special thigh pocket this time because she'd been concentrating on this stressful business with Vesey. Sometimes her reflexes got in the way.
Still, she hadn't drawn her pistol.
Adele would much rather have been in a gunfight than holding this conversation, but it was part of the job she did for Daniel and the RCN. Nobody had told her so, but she was Mundy of Chatsworth: nobody needs to tell a Mundy her duty.
"Mistress…," Vesey said. She stopped, apparently because she didn't know how to go on. That saved Adele from having to interrupt her.
"Something that the RCN didn't have to teach me, Lieutenant," Adele said, "is that you don't quit. Quitting would dishonor your family. My present family is thePrincess Cecile and beyond it the RCN. Not long ago I came closer than I care to remember to quitting."
"You, mistress?" Vesey said in amazement. Her back straightened again.
"In a manner of speaking," Adele said with a cold smile. "I made an effort to let the Pellegrinians kill me. Fortunately, they were bad shots and I'm a very good one. I'm glad of that now, because my honor really does matter to me. Odd though that probably sounds from someone who has no faint vestige of a religious impulse or interest in philosophy."
Vesey swallowed. "I don't think it sounds odd, mistress," she said quietly. "Nobody who knows you could doubt that."
"Be that as it may," said Adele with a sniff. "The important fact is that we both have been granted opportunities to recover from our mistakes."
She looked stone-faced at Vesey and went on, "When will you be reporting aboard theSissie? I believe you were discharged from the hospital this morning, were you not?"
Vesey's face scrunched, but she didn't resume crying. She cleared her throat and said, "Mistress, will Captain Leary let me come back?"
"Yes," said Adele. She didn't amplify the statement. She was almost certain that Daniel would be glad to have Vesey return as his First Lieutenant. If necessary, however, she'd ask him to do so as a favor to her.
Adele smiled faintly. Daniel owed her a great deal. Nothing like as much as she owed him, of course, but that was the way friendship worked.
"Mistress," Vesey whispered. "If he'll have me, I'll… Iwant to come back. More than anything in life, I want to come back to thePrincess Cecile."
"Very good," Adele said. She stood and waved to Tovera. Dust immediately puffed from beneath the aircar; a few seconds later the sound of the fans running up reached her ears. "Then let's go to theSissie and get ready for the Governor's reception. I haven't looked at my dress suit since we lifted from Cinnabar."
She added with a dry smile, "I'm going as Lady Mundy, since a junior warrant officer wouldn't be allowed into the Residence."
Vesey felt alone, and because she felt that way shewas alone. It wasn't true in any objective sense, but people don't live objectively.
Not even Adele Mundy was truly objective, not in the cold dark hours before dawn.
Daniel turned a little more quickly than he should've done and felt a touch of vertigo. "Woops!" he said, touching the terrace railing with his left hand. "The punch has more of a kick than I'd imagined."
The girls giggled, which is what they'd probably have done if he'd slit his throat here on the terrace in front of them. Suzette was a sultry brunette, Tatiana a blonde as pale as a cirrus cloud, and Kitty paired red hair with green eyes. They were all young, all stunningly beautiful, and all very obviously interested in the dashing Commander Leary.
A year ago Daniel would've said he'd died and gone to heaven, and the fact that the trio's combined IQ appeared to be comparable to that of Miranda Dorst alone should've been the icing on the cake. Well, maybe he hadn't drunk enough after all.
He turned and looked out over the harbor. The raised dorsal antennas of the warships were strung with lanterns of pastel paper which illuminated only themselves. When they trembled in the mild breeze, they seemed to be floating.
To most eyes a mere corvette made a poor show compared to the huge battleships, but the rush of affection Daniel felt when his eyes fell on thePrincess Cecile staggered him anew. He remembered the first time he'd stood at her masthead and looked up at the blaze of the Matrix. In that instant he'd realized that he was captain of a starship and that the whole cosmos was his…
TheZeno 's band was playing a waltz nearby on the upper terrace; they'd trade off with their counterparts from theLao-tze in another hour, so that all the bandsmen had a chance to celebrate too. Given that theLao-tze 's personnel were having their party now, the quality of the music was likely to deteriorate after the handover. The guests generally were lapping down the punch as fast as Daniel was, however, so nobody was likely to complain.
"Oh, Commander," said Suzette, rubbing Daniel's heavily-embroidered scarlet sash with her fingertips. "Does this mean something?"
"It does, doesn't it, Danny?" Kitty said, fondling his chest from the other side. Tatiana simply giggled.
An inside-illuminated dragon floated across the harbor. Daniel wasn't sure whether it and the several similar displays-a whale, a swan, and some sort of spiky, rounded creature-were balloons being guided by small boats or if they were made from paper over frames which the boats supported on poles. They were civilian efforts, part of a local tradition.
"This means I'm a Royal Companion of Novy Sverdlovsk, my dear," Daniel said. He held his smile even though the silk and cloth-of-gold lay on top of ranks of additional medals which Suzette's forceful caresses were driving into his chest. He didn't imagine the sensation could be very erotic for her either. "I'm told it gives me the right to drink from the king's own cup at banquets if I'm ever on Novy Sverdlovsk-which heaven forbid."
The girls giggled harmoniously. He wondered if they'd taken a course in Synchronized Laughing.
Admiral James had ordered that his officers attend the Governor's fete wearing full Cinnabar and foreign decorations. In a naval gathering that would be bad taste-particularly for a junior commander-but the intention here was to overawe the civilians. Because much of Daniel's service had been on distant planets with a gaudy sense of showmanship, he made a better display than some of the RCN captains present.
Having said that, Daniel wore the Cinnabar Star at the head of his top row of medals. RCN officers would ignore the Strymonian aigrette and the sash from Novy Sverdlovsk, but they'd respect the Star.
"Commander, come and dance," Suzette wheedled, tugging on the sash as though it were a leash. "Won't you dance with me, pretty please?"
There was dancing on the upper terrace. When Daniel looked up, he saw Adele sweep by in a gigue with Captain Bussom. She was in her occasional disguise as Lady Mundy, wearing a light gray suit slashed with violet. Formal dancing was an aristocratic skill which Evadne Rolfe Mundy had therefore seen to it that her bookish daughter Adele learned.
Pastel lanterns like those on the ships lit the grounds of the Governor's Residence. They cast a comfortable dimness over the faces of people who'd drunk too much tonight or eaten too much over the previous decades.
"My dear-" Daniel began. His tongue stopped and he looked up to the higher terrace again to be sure of what he thought he'd seen in the corner of his eyes.
He really had: Vesey was dancing with Adele's young ward, Rene Cazelet. The boy wore an attentive smile, while Vesey looked flushed. That might simply be strain from dancing despite having been so badly bruised during the battle. Still, she seemed to be having a good time.
"Dancing makes me feel all funny," said Tatiana, stroking Daniel's cheek with her fingertips. "Dreamy, sort of, if you know what I mean, Danny."
She didn't look any more dreamy than a cobra tensing to strike, though Daniel was confident that her intentions weren't in the least hostile. So long as she got her way, at least.
"My dears," Daniel resumed in time to forestall Kitty's no-doubt similar suggestion, "I really don't think I'm in the mood for dancing just now. As a matter of fact, I seem to have finished my punch and-"
He broke off again, gesturing with an index finger to call the girls' attention to the fact they were about to have visitors. A big man in uniform with a tall, slim woman at his side was striding toward them.
"Good evening, Captain Stickel," Daniel said brightly, standing straight instead of letting the stone railing carry some of his weight. Michael Stickel was captain of theLao-tze. Daniel had seen him in passing when the Residence was the Diamondia Squadron Headquarters, but they hadn't met formally.
"I've been looking for you all night, Leary," Stickel said. "I should've guessed you'd be a proper RCN officer and keep close guard on the punch bowl."
From some lips that would've been an insult, but it sounded friendly this time. Daniel said, "May I introduce my charming companions, Captain?"
Bloody hell, he didn't know any of their last names. Nothing unusual in that, of course, but under the circumstances it was going to be awkward. He was pretty sure that one of them was Governor Niven's daughter, but even that wasn't a help: the Governor was as bald as a cue ball.
"No, you bloody may not," Stickel said. "Ollie my dear-" It came out as one word, olliemadur. "-why don't you go powder your charming nose."
It wasn't a question the way he said it.
"And take Leary's little friends along with you," he added, "so that he and I can have a man talk, the two of us."
Daniel didn't mind Stickel shooing away the girls, but he wondered whether the senior captain would've been so brusque with Adele. He smiled faintly. Perhaps he would have been-the first time. He wouldn't repeat the insult after he'd met Lady Mundy, however.
"I was just up there talking with Kithran," Stickel said, nodding toward the Residence, beyond the railing of the upper terrace. The windows were brightly lighted, save for those of the ground floor room which Admiral James had taken for his private office. "He's still working on the bloody report to the Senate which he says-"
Stickel glared at Daniel. His hair was iron gray and cropped short. Between that and his craggy face, he looked more like an aging bruiser than a respected senior captain in the RCN.
"-you're taking to Cinnabar tomorrow morning. It seems to me that it could wait another day or two, given that blockade runners carried the news back before we'd finished putting crews in all the prizes."
"I assure you, Captain," Daniel said calmly, "the decision on timing was his Lordship's alone. This won't be the first time I've felt what a hangover does to the process of inserting into the Matrix, but it isn't an experiment I wanted to repeat."
Stickel roared with laughter. "Well," he said, "Kithran was a pigheaded bastard when we were at day school together, so I didn't imagine a corvette commander had started leading him around by the nose. Still, I think even an admiral can take a night off for a party, don't you, Leary?"
"Yes sir, I certainly do," Daniel said. He grinned broadly. "But I didn't think it was the place of a corvette commander to tell his Lordship that."
Stickel laughed again. "Well, Idid tell him," he said, "and it made bugger all difference. There was nothing for it but that he should hash over my report again before he does his own final. You gave him your report too, eh, Leary?"
"Yes sir," Daniel said. "I believe his Lordship compiled the reports of all captains in the squadron. Or senior surviving officers in the case of theExpress andEscapade, I suppose."
Fireworks streamed skyward from both sides of the narrow passage through the mole separating the Inner and Outer Harbors. Theboomp! of mortars reached the terraces only seconds before the shells burst into stars. Those in turn burst into lesser stars, rattling like the wind through bamboo blinds.
Stickel watched for a moment. "Pretty toys for children," he said with a harshness Daniel hadn't expected. "Children and civilians. We could tell them about real fireworks, couldn't we, Leary?"
"Yes sir," Daniel said. He thought about theSissie 's bridge going dark except for the yellow-green deathlight which sizzled from all metal surfaces. He licked his lips and wished he hadn't finished his drink.
"But they wouldn't understand," he said. He seemed to be hoarse. "And sir? You and I are out there so that they don't have to learn, aren't we? So that the civilians here and the ones back on Cinnabar never learn."
"Well said, boy!" Stickel said. "Bloody well said."
His voice got rougher and he said, "Your father's Speaker Leary, I hear?"
"Yes sir," said Daniel. He was asked the question frequently. There was nothing to do but return a flat answer and hope that was an end to it. "We're not close."
"Bloody dangerous man to be close to," Stickel said. "But nobody ever said he was stupid, and I see his son isn't either."
More fireworks thumped, popped and rattled. Blue and golden streamers trailed down toward the water. Daniel would very much have liked another mug of punch. Or a mug of raw alcohol from the Power Room with just enough water to keep it from lethally drying his mouth and throat.
"Well, that's neither here nor there," Stickel said. "We're not politicians."
His face hardened and he said, "You'renot a politician, are you, Leary?"
"No sir," Daniel said, "I most certainly am not. Sir!"
He was reacting like a cadet at the Academy being grilled by a member of the cadre. He hadn't expected this tonight, though Stickel didn't seem hostile-only forceful. Very forceful.
"Kithran tells me that you launched your missiles to nudge theDirektor Heinrich into one of their own that they wouldn't notice because they were concentrating on you," Stickel said. "Is that true, Leary? That you planned it that way?"
"Captain," said Daniel, feeling an icy mixture of anger and fear, "I didn't put anything of the sort in my report."
"I know what you put in your report, boy!" Stickel said. "I've read the bloody thing, haven't I? I'm asking you if that's what youdid , because Kithran says it is."
Daniel licked his lips again. "What his Lordship says is correct," he said, "but I did not say that to his Lordship or to anyone else. Until just now, sir."
Stickel laughed explosively again. "Well, I owe Kithran a case of brandy, then," he said. "I swore nobody was that good. I thought you'd gotten lucky-or anyway, we'd gotten lucky, since you weren't claiming the hit yourself."
"Well sir…," Daniel said, feeling himself relax. He'd thought he was being accused of lying or-possibly worse-bragging. "I must say thatI didn't believe theLao-tze launched thirty-six missiles in her initial salvo. I'd have bet much more than a case of brandy against that happening. I'mvery glad that I'd have been wrong."
Captain Stickel beamed. "You noticed that, did you?" he said. "That was nice work, but I can't take much credit for it. I will say that myLao-tze 's got the best bloody crew in the RCN, bar none!"
"I won't argue with an officer of your rank and merit, Captain," Daniel said, hoping his smile was broad enough to blunt the very real edge to his words, "but if we were civilians I'd ask you aboard theSissie and we'd see what we saw."
"By theGods, Leary," Stickel said, but he was laughing again. "I heard you have ginger! I guess otherwise you wouldn't have the record you do. Say-when we're both back in Xenos, which I hope won't be any longer than it has to be, you look me up. We'll have dinner at my club and we'll talk, you and me."
"Thank you, sir," Daniel said. Bloody hell, this could've gonebadly wrong; but it hadn't. "I'll be honored to accept your invitation."
"Excuse me, Captain?" said a cool, perfectly modulated voice.
Daniel looked up. Cassandra McDonough, Admiral James' flag lieutenant, looked expectantly over the railing of the upper terrace. She looked very good in Dress Whites, but Daniel could as easily imagine making love to a porcelain figurine.
"His Lordship would appreciate a few words with Commander Leary," McDonough said when she had their attention, "before he seals the courier pouch."
Stickel snorted. "What did I tell you, Leary?" he said. "The manwill have everything just so before it goes off to Navy House. Go cross his tees for him, boy-but remember what I said about dinner."
"Yes sir!" said Daniel as he strode for the steps to the upper terrace. "I most certainly will."
McDonough waited for Daniel to get up the flight of broad stone stairs before turning to precede him around the fringes of the dancing. The band had resumed with a hornpipe which bounced over the happy murmur of voices. Couples swung into the quick rhythm or drifted off the chalk-bounded dance floor to wait for a less strenuous measure.
Daniel and his guide entered through a lounge with a coffered ceiling. Its cells were skylights; another volley of fireworks trailed sparkles in the sky above them. Half a dozen members of the Governor's staff sat smoking on the black leather chairs; a servant with a tray of drinks bent to serve them.
The civilians followed the two officers with their eyes. Daniel nodded pleasantly in acknowledgment, but Lieutenant McDonough paid them no more heed than she would've done for balls of mud on the area rugs.
There usually wasn't any love lost between the civil and military staffs of a protectorate. Here on Diamondia the naval personnel treated the civilians as cowards who'd fled rather than take the risk that an Alliance raider would sneak through the minefield and target the Residence; the civilians had considered RCN officers pushy from the moment they arrived and had found them next to unbearable since their victory. Daniel supposed both sides had the right of it.
McDonough tapped on the elegantly carved north door. "Your Lordship, Commander Leary is here," she said in a quiet, penetrating voice.
"Enter!" said James. McDonough opened the door, nodded Daniel through, and closed it firmly behind him.
The office had started out as a sitting room, but James had installed a standard RCN console in place of what'd probably been a glass-topped table. The result was serviceable though a little odd; the maroon banquette on which James was sitting in one corner made a particular contrast. Mirrors etched with hunting scenes covered two walls.
The Admiral had a courier pouch in his lap. He was in his sleeveless undershirt; the tunic of his Whites, stiff with medals and braid, hung over the back of the console. He gestured Daniel to the other arm of the banquette.
"Sit down, Leary," he said. "I want to talk with you privately before I seal this."
He tapped the pouch and continued, "And Imean private. There's no rank in this room until I tell McDonough to open the door again."
James sounded tired, but this time in a good way. The exhaustion he'd displayed when Daniel first met him on the terrace of the Residence had been as much depression as overwork.
Daniel settled onto the maroon leather in a gingerly fashion. He wasn't going to argue with an admiral, but he knew how bloody dangerous these 'all pals together' situations were for a junior party who was fool enough to take his senior at his word.
A mirror-backed wall sconce above the banquette lighted Daniel very well. James hadn't seen him in full dress before. He guffawed and said, "Well, you're a sight for sore eyes, aren't you, Leary?"
"Sir, I feel like a clown," Daniel said sincerely. "But you said 'Cinnabar and foreign medals.' "
James chuckled. "So I did, and you're certainly one up on Niven and his pretty boys in their frock coats," he said.
In a slightly softer tone he added, "A bloody impressive clown, Leary. I've read your record. Fruit salad's easier to come by than a record like yours."
Daniel cleared his throat. "Ah, thank you, sir," he muttered.
James tapped the courier pouch. Sealing it would arm a layer of thermite in the lining of the case. Opening the pouch by force would incinerate the contents, along with the person applying the force and probably the room in which it happened.
"I suppose you hope that my report recommends you for promotion because you tricked Guphill into sending away half his squadron," James said bluntly. "Don't you?"
"Sir, I'd never suggest what ought to go into my commanding officer's after-action report," Daniel said. "Never."
"I didn't ask what you'd suggest, Commander," the Admiral snapped. He'd been under strain for a very long time, and victory brought its own different stresses. "I said that's what you hoped. Isn't it?"
"No sir," said Corder Leary's son, not a politician but a man who knew politics from the inside out. "I very much hope you wouldnot put that in your report to Navy House, because it involves matters beyond the remit of the Admiral Commanding the Diamondia Squadron. At the very best, the Navy Board would regard the recommendation as an impertinence and ignore it. More probably, particularly given my history with Admiral Vocaine, the Board would assume I'd somehow nobbled you-"
James snorted.
Daniel flashed him a hard smile. "Yessir," he continued, "but they would. And they'd post me to the job of latrine inspection on West Bumfuck in response."
James chuckled. The sound was rusty as though he hadn't laughed in a while.
"I don't know that it'd be anything quite so dire, Leary," he said, "but it wouldn't have a good result, no. So I haven't done it. I do note that the intelligence of enemy movements which thePrincess Cecile brought was of inestimable value, and that Captain Leary handled his corvette with the skill and courage to be expected of an RCN officer."
"Thank you, sir," Daniel said. He was just as sincere as he'd been when he said he looked like a clown.
"If you'd managed to get yourself killed the way Powell and Meltzer-" the captains of theExpress andEscapade "-did," James continued, "I'd put you in for a Cinnabar Star. In your case, a wreath to the Star. But you don't get even that."
"That's all right, sir," said Daniel, smiling. "Perhaps I'll have better luck next time, eh?"
James laughed again. "Perhaps you will at that, Leary," he said. "Well, it's happened to plenty of others who swore the oath, hasn't it?"
His right index finger ran along the seam of the courier pouch. "I dare say it'd have happened to most of us in the Diamondia Squadron if we'd had those two battlecruisers to deal with also," he said.
Daniel didn't speak. His eyes were on the painted screen on the wall behind the Admiral. It showed a scene on the deserts of Ryndam, a voorloper stalking a casiline bird whose vestigial wings ended in defensive spikes. Did Governor Niven come from Ryndam, or had some interior decorator liked the contrast the screen made with the harbor outside?
An open plastic writing sheet lay on the small table at James' end of the banquette. He picked it up, glanced at it again, and handed it to Daniel.
"I'm sending a personal note to my cousin in the pouch, Leary," James said. "Go on, read it."
Daniel took the document but didn't let his eyes fall onto the writing yet. "Ah, your cousin, sir?" he said.
"What?" said James, a trifle sharply. "Yes, my cousin. You didn't know that Eldridge Vocaine's my wife's aunt's son?"
"Oh," Daniel said. "I didn't know that, sir."
Pursing his lips, he looked down at the letter. The richly grained plastic had a high gloss; he found he had to adjust the angle slightly so that the Admiral's firm, black writing wasn't lost in the reflection of the light sconce.
The Residence, Diamondia
7 Three 18
My dear Bucko I hope this finds you well. It leaves me a bloody sight better than I expected would be the case a week ago.
In my formal report, I recommend a number of my officers for awards and promotion. I'd appreciate it if you'd see all this business through what seems to an outsider like me to be an impenetrable bureaucracy. I'd regret being forced to make a public protest simply because some faceless, bone-idle twit in Navy House was sitting on his hands instead of processing my request.
There's a matter which I've not put in my report because it's not my place to do so. You succeeded beyond anyone's dreams with your plan to destabilize the Bagarian Cluster so that the Alliance couldn't reinforce the Jewel System. In fact, you managed to draw off half Admiral Guphill's squadron, enabling me to deal with the remainder in a thorough fashion.
If (as I expect) I'm asked to address the Senate on my return to Xenos, rest assured that I will give full credit to you, coz, for your plan; and to your agent, Captain-as I expect his rank will be by then-Leary, who so brilliantly executed it.
Hug Maisie for me, and tell Aunt Madge that I'll be bringing her a jar of Ceralian honey on my return.
Yours in haste Gams
Daniel handed back the thick sheet. "Thank you, sir," he said very quietly.
James folded the four corners in, then folded both outer quarters of the new rectangle inward. He held his signet to the seam; after thirty seconds, the gold catalyzed the plastic with a hiss, sealing the letter around a stylized K.
The Admiral flipped the letter over and on the face wroteVocaine, Navy House/Eyes Only. That done, he added the letter to the pouch which he sealed. Then he rose from the couch.
"I'll have McDonough bring it to theSissie in the morning, Leary," James said. He walked to the console and began to put his tunic back on. "No sense you having to worry about it tonight. Now, go out and have some fun. You've earned it."
"Thank you, sir!" Daniel said. "I-well, thank you, sir!"
Lieutenant McDonough opened the office door; there must've been a signal Daniel hadn't seen. He floated by her.
I've got to find Adele, he thought.
As Daniel stepped out the door onto the terrace, a volley of fireworks burst over the harbor, red and gold and splendid.