Into the Maelstrom - eARC Read online

  He turned around without waiting for an answer and held his datapad at arm’s length, leaning in close to Allenson to record his meeting with the great man.

  The man checked the picture.

  “Would you autograph it?”

  “What’s your wife’s name?” Allenson asked.

  “Alfred,” the man replied.

  Allenson scrawled a greeting to Alfred with his forefinger and scribbled an approximation of his name.

  “Hey Alf, ask him over?”

  “Would you care to join us?”

  Allenson saw to his horror that they were pulling up another chair at the double table and signaling the waiter to lay an additional place.

  “Thank you but no, I’ve only just got on-world.”

  He rose so fast that he knocked the remains of his spiced beer across the table. A rivulet waterfalled off the surface to splash his admirer’s shoes. Fortunately the man didn’t seem to notice or perhaps he just didn’t care.

  “A pleasure to meet you,” Allenson said, disengaging the man’s arm.

  He remembered why he had firmly turned down a political career. Glad-handing was not one of his skills. He made a rapid retreat, pressing a coin firmly into the floorwalker’s hand as he passed the podium. A flash of purple light as the money changed hands authenticated the coin as a genuine Brasilian crown piece. That was an overtip but the large rectangular plastic tab was the first coin he pulled from his pocket in his haste. Allenson would gladly have paid ten times as much to escape a round of gut-wrenching embarrassment from people queuing to have their picture taken with the conquering hero.

  Allenson slept surprisingly soundly. He breakfasted from the preserved food in his room’s dispenser, reluctant to brave the private dining room again. He just finished his morning cafay and was dropping the cup in the bin when his datapad chimed.

  “You requested a servant, sar,” said the receptionist, the same girl as last night going by her voice. She must work long hours.

  “Yes.”

  “I have one in reception for you to interview. I can personally recommend him as he has worked for our guests on other occasions to their satisfaction. Shall I send him up?”

  “No, I’ll come down.”

  A short, sturdy man in clean, pressed blue overalls waited for him in the lobby. He was balding but covered his head with a lemon yellow cap that had a bright blue badge advertising an agricultural product new to Allenson.

  “You must be Colonel Allenson? I’m Boswell. My card.”

  The man stepped forward and handed Allenson a small piece of stiff paper. He had forgotten the Paxton habit of exchanging business cards. On reflection, he remembered seeing a similar box of cards with the inn’s picture on the front in his room. On one side, the man’s card read Boswell’s Personal Services and on the other listed a scale of charges. He glanced down to find the costs expensive by Manzanita standards but reasonable for a more developed world like Nortania.

  There was a pause while Allenson considered what to ask. He didn’t hire the servants at home. Trina handled all the domestic business. He had expected to be dealing with an agency hiring out indentured servants not an independent contractor. Allenson always found them a difficult economic group to deal with. They were neither fish nor fowl in the Lower Stream’s social pecking order.

  Boswell had an upturned nose that conferred him with a somewhat irreverent appearance, as if a grin was always near the surface of his features. The man looked him in the eyes obviously expecting Allenson to say something.

  “The receptionist speaks most highly of you,” he eventually got out, waving his hand vaguely in the direction of her podium.

  “I should hope so, guv,” Boswell said indignantly. “She’s my niece.”

  There was that half grin again. Allenson laughed. Dammit he liked the chap’s style.

  “You’re hired. Let’s start with a week’s service and see how we get on.”

  “Money in advance?” Boswell asked, hopefully, inclining his head and adopting an innocent expression.

  “Half now, half on satisfactory completion of service,” Allenson said firmly, not wanting to give the impression that he was an easy mark.

  Boswell agreed with alacrity that suggested that he expected Allenson to have driven a harder bargain.

  “What’s first, guvnor?”

  “I’m going to take a short walk to clear my head. I want you to unpack my military dress uniform and press out any creases. No doubt your niece can give you a key to my room.”

  “Right you are, squire.”

  Boswell touched his cap brim with his forefinger.

  Allenson sat quietly in the convention hall, checking through the agenda of the meeting. He was early so delegates still filtered in. Most of them looked at him with curiosity. Boswell had done a fine job with the Honorary Colonel of Militia dress uniform. He managed to get Allenson into it without overly disturbing the knife edged creases. Gold braid around the neck and on both sleeves shone brightly against the purple and gray of Manzanita. Parades of flashes in various colors down his arms denoted the militia regiments of which he had been voted honorary colonel.

  Buller was the only other person in a military uniform but he wore a crumpled field combat dress. Perhaps the Brasilian thought the uniform would emphasize his credentials as a regular soldier or possibly he didn’t care what image he presented. Either way his demonstration was not likely to impress. The other delegates wore business or colonial official clothes. Some sported brighter garments than Allenson but none were more splendid.

  One group stood out in a display of Spartanism and simplicity by wearing one-piece garments of unrelieved charcoal gray. No lapels or cuffs, let alone jewelry or marks of allegiance, disturbed the effect, underscoring the severe style by unadornment. The Ascetics of the Heilbron colonies came from some of the wealthiest and most developed settlements this side of the Bight. Not every Heilbron delegate was an Ascetic but even the independents wore clothes that were somber by Lower Stream standards.

  The Heilbron colonies attracted voluntary immigrants in greater numbers than the other Cutter Stream worlds. They tended to be a special sort of colonist, the disgruntled dissatisfied with Home World society or their place within it. These discontents created a social and economic class quite distinct from the impoverished gentry and exiled criminals who had provided the bulk of the lower Stream populations. Ascetics were simply the most powerful group of these radicals.

  Allenson had little direct experience of them but from what he read they opposed the activities that ordinary people thought made life worth living. A dour lot, they were sure of their righteousness with an unfortunate tendency to preach. Their social values were of little import to Allenson; of more significance was that they had a strong political ideology favoring independence. They intended to build a new society without social class distinctions and the ostentation that went with an aristocracy.

  Personally Allenson thought they deluded themselves that any human society could be classless. The best you could hope for was a relatively flexible class system that allowed reasonable social mobility. Something that avoided ossifying into a caste structure. Any society that left no legitimate path to advancement for talented, aggressive, ambitious young men was doomed to violent revolution. Whereas a society where gentlemen invited potential revolutionaries into their clubs and upper class ladies invited them into their beds was likely to be as stable as anything built by human beings even if it was no utopia.

  The Ascetics’ desire for independence made them potential allies for Allenson’s political goals, provided their radicalism could be kept in check. The Lower Stream gentry were unlikely to take kindly to revolutionary social policies.

  The delegate chairs in the Assembly Hall were arranged in a horseshoe with the chairman’s podium between the open wings. An outer ring of seats for observers and officials perched on a raised balcony around the edge of the hall. The circular walls were windowless and painted
with fantastic agricultural scenes of verdant greenery. The Paxton Ruling Council met here and the artwork presumably reminded everyone where the money came from. Natural light filtered through the semi-transparent crystalline dome of the roof. Strip lighting around the base of the dome reinforced the illumination, eliminating possible shadows.

  Allenson surreptitiously checked his datapad for security. Recording and signal nullifiers blanked the hall. Anything said in the Assembly would be confidential.

  The chairman of the Assembly, a Nortanian called Evansence, called the meeting to order. His duties included an introductory address welcoming the delegates. He managed to talk for twenty minutes without actually committing himself to anything or even expressing a view. The Nortanian establishment appeared fairly happy with the status quo and just wanted to be left alone. There was a subtext of fear in Evansence’s evasions that rippled through the room like a fast flowing ebb tide. Another word for failed rebel was traitor and all-right thinking people agreed that traitors must be punished to the limit of the law.

  Allenson understood the delegates’ apprehensions and to some degree shared them. He was not afraid of being executed, after the Terran War death held little fear. Once you reached the mind-set of expecting sudden random termination at any moment you either accepted the inevitable or went mad. What did concern Allenson was the shame and ignominy that execution as a traitor would bring to him and by extension to his family. That was not to be tolerated.

  A number of “hear, hears” sounded from delegates from the smaller colonies. The Heilbron delegates frowned. One with a face like thunder slammed his hand down and opened his mouth.

  Allenson cut in quickly to stop the meeting from falling apart before it had properly commenced.

  “If I may make a point.”

  Evansence looked grateful at the interruption.

  “The chair recognizes Colonel Allenson,” he said quickly.

  Allenson looked at each delegate as he spoke.

  “Nortania has a reliable business supplying genosurgeoned crop extracts to Brasilia and it is understandable that Nortanians are alarmed at any threat to this trade.”

  “Quite,” Evansence said.

  “The products sell for a considerable markup in Brasilia but how much of that value added accrues to Nortania?”

  Falco, one of the Nortanian delegates, jumped in before the chairman could reply.

  “Off the top of my head less than five per cent,” he said.

  “But we just supply the raw material,” Evansence protested. “The complex chemistry is carried out in Brasilian factories. That’s where the market is.”

  Allenson tilted his head.

  “But suppose you manufactured the finished products here?” Allenson asked. “After all, they’re low volume, high value, cheaply transportable organics.”

  Falco looked thoughtful.

  “Then we would get nearer forty or fifty per cent of the markup,” he said. “More if we controlled the transport and wholesale distribution to the Home Worlds.”

  Evansence shook his head.

  “But what if Brasilia simply refused to purchase the finished products?”

  Allenson replied. “Then you sell to any Home World with the money to buy, but I doubt that Brasilian business would cut off its nose to spite its face by prolonging an embargo.”

  “But that would take capital that we don’t have,” Evansence said. “Lots of it.”

  Allenson laughed

  “You don’t think that financial institutions all over the different Home Worlds wouldn’t rush to invest in such a lucrative business and break the Brasilian cartel’s monopoly?”

  He sat back and let the delegates argue, confident that he had scored a point. Self-interest and avarice focused minds wonderfully. It was also understood that vested interests in Brasilia would hardly welcome the breaking of their cozy trade cartels so some degree of political rupture with the Home World was inevitable.

  Buller ranted for some time on his favorite subject, the injustice caused by preferment of inbred Brasilian aristocratic half-wits blocking the rightful rise of those who deserved advancement due to superior ability. Many of the delegates nodded and muttered “hear, hear” at Buller’s eloquence, clearly identifying themselves with the group demonstrating superior ability. Allenson wondered how they would react when their own social inferiors demanded similar opportunities.

  A great deal of hot air got expended over what form the governance of the independent state might take. The lower colonies’ gentry wished to preserve the status quo while the Heilbronites pushed for social revolution. For Allenson this was like debating the flavor of the icing before you decide how to bake the cake. He let his mind drift with just one small subroutine of consciousness monitoring the exchange.

  Allenson came to with a start when he realized that the meeting had gone quiet. Everyone looked expectantly in his direction. He ran the recorder of his memory to extract the discussion. The delegates had been agonizing about war and whether they could ever beat Brasilia. A Heilbron Ascetic with no experience of warfare had announced that one free man could beat a hundred professional soldiers because his heart was pure and his cause just.

  A cynical delegate from a Lower Stream world replied that the hypothetical pure at heart colonial would indeed have to be superhuman as there were more than a hundred Brasilians for every Streamer. Buller chipped in that a professional army could only be fought by a professional army with a unified chain of command, a blatant job application.

  The reputation Allenson earned in the Terran War, undeservedly in his opinion but there it was, made him the local authority on colonial warfare to Buller’s obvious annoyance. That was why all the delegates waited upon his opinion. Fortunately the prolonged pause before replying made him look statesmanlike and thoughtful rather than slow-witted.

  “It depends what you mean by victory,” he finally replied. “I take it no one has delusions of crossing the Bight and conquering a Home World?”

  This provoked the expected laughter.

  “To win we do not have to beat Brasilia. We merely have to survive and make a Brasilian victory too costly to be worth the effort. Military power is eroded by distance and the Bight is a sizable obstacle. Brasilia would have considerable logistical difficulties supplying large conventional forces here given the low industrialization in the colonies. I saw that for myself in the Terran War.”

  Buller nodded in support, albeit somewhat reluctantly.

  “There is also the fact that Brasilia has far more powerful rivals than us to contend with who are much closer to home—Terra for one. For all these reasons then, yes, I believe we could beat Brasilia provided we define victory carefully. I would also add that in my opinion Colonel Buller has a point. Revolutionary fervor is fine but is no substitute for discipline, training and professionalism.”

  Here he paused and looked around the chamber at each delegate in turn.

  “However, no one who has seen the brutality and wastefulness of war would ever want to provoke another one. Provided we are reasonable in our demands and don’t push Brasilia too far I believe we can achieve effective political and economic independence while leaving Brasilia a face-saving formula recognizing its nominal sovereignty. Frankly, we are not important enough for Brasilia to go to the wall over. I would add that political negotiation is recognized as completely different from armed rebellion in one important sense. They don’t hang you for it or confiscate your property if you lose.”

  The meeting ground on but eventually broke up for lunch. Allenson noted a messenger hurrying to the Heilbron delegates once the hall doors were unlocked. He idly wondered what could be so urgent. However Todd intercepted him by the door so he put the matter out of his mind.

  “No doubt you recall that you have a luncheon meeting with two Paxton bankers,” Todd broke off to check his datapad.

  Allenson inwardly groaned. The things he did for his country. A networking lunch with a couple of merc
hant bankers was about as attractive as catching his privates in a rock grinder. Todd flicked his finger over the pad, sifting through pages.

  “They are Sar Josson of Bank Agricole and Sar Huang of Emerald Office.”

  “Fine, lead me to them,” Allenson said, practicing planting a phony smile on his face. He would have to master this skill in the next few days.

  Todd guided him to where the two men sat in the anteroom. They rose and extended their hands as Allenson approached. Josson was tall and lean, almost cadaverous with sunken cheeks and a concave chest. Huang was physically his opposite, a short tubby rolly-polly sort of man who looked as if he would bounce upright if pushed over. In his head Allenson christened them Little and Large as a mnemonic aid. He couldn’t help thinking that they would cut an impressive figure if fused into a single body.

  The men presented their cards. Allenson patted his pocket prior to explaining that he had omitted to bring his own when he discovered a pack in his pocket. Boswell must have printed some on his own initiative. He sneaked a glance as he handed a card to each man. The style was more florid than Allenson would have chosen but who was to say that Boswell was wrong. The man was on home ground after all.

  Allenson glanced over Huang’s head, not a difficult task. A tall man with blond hair and pale blue eyes leaned patiently against the door frame. He stood out not just because of his appearance, which was far from the human norm of brown eyes and hair, but also by his casual wear. A line of white hair from an old wound ran across his scalp, almost hidden by his blonde coloring. Allenson blinked, half expecting the figure to disappear, to be a phantasm from his memory. It was still there after the blink, grinning at him. The man raised a hand to his brow in an ironic salute.

  “Sar Josson, Sar Huang, I must convey my abject apologies but I regret that something urgent has come up at the last moment. I have to cancel our meeting. I deeply regret the inconvenience to yourselves and assure you no slight is intended.”

  He turned to Todd.