Clan Corporate (31 page)

The idea that once people decided you were going to be a princess, or a countess, your life stopped being your own, your body stopped being private, had never occurred to her back when she was a kid. I need to talk to someone, Miriam realized. Someone other than Iris, who right now was in as much of a mess as she was. Otherwise I am going to go crazy.

It had not escaped her attention that there were no sharp-edged implements in any of the rooms she had access to.

When they let her out in the walled courtyard, Miriam looked up at the sky above the gatehouse. The air was close and humid, and the clouds had a distinct yellowish tinge: the threat of thunder hung like a blanket across the city. “You’d better go in,” said the ferret, in a rare sign of solicitude. Or maybe he just wanted to get her under cover and call a guard so that he could catch some rest.

“Right.” Miriam climbed the staircase back to her rooms tiredly, drained of both energy and optimism.

“Milady!” Miriam looked up as the doors closed behind her with a thud. “Oh!

You look sad! Are you unwell? What’s wrong?”

It was Kara, her young, naive lady-in-waiting. Miriam managed a tired smile.

“It’s a long story,” she said. Gradually she realized there was something odd about Kara. “Hey, what happened to your hair?” Kara had worn it long, down her back: now it was bundled up in an intricate coil atop her head. And she was wearing traditional dress. Kara loved to try imported American fashions.

“Do you like it? It’s for a wedding.”

“Oh? Whose?”

“Mine. I’m to be married tomorrow.” Kara began to cry-not happily, but the quiet sobbing of desperation.

“What!” The next thing Miriam knew, she was hugging Kara while the younger woman shuddered, sniffling, her face pressed against Miriam’s shoulder. “Come on, relax, you can let it all out. Tell me about it.” She gently steered Kara toward the bench seat under the window. Glancing around, she realized that the servants had made themselves scarce. “You’re going to have to tell me how you convinced them to let you in here. Hell, you’re going to have to tell me how you found me. But not right now. Calm down. What’s this about a wedding?”

That set Kara off again. Miriam gritted her teeth. Why me? Why now? The first was easy: Miriam had unwittingly designated herself as adult role model when she first met Kara. The second question, though-

“My father-after you disappeared last week-he summoned me urgently. I know the match was not his idea, for last we spoke he said I should perhaps wait another summer, but now he said his mind was made up and that a week hence I should be married into a braid alliance. He seemed quite pleased until I protested, but he said you had written that you no longer wanted me and that I should best find a new home for myself! I, I could not believe that! Tell me, milady, it isn’t true, is it?”

“It’s not true,” Miriam confirmed, stroking her hair. “Be still. I didn’t write to your father.” I’ll bet someone else did, though. “Isn’t this a bit sudden? I mean, don’t these things take time to arrange? Who’s the lucky man, anyway?” You haven’t been sneaking a boyfriend, have you? she wanted to ask, but that seemed a little blunt given Kara’s delicate state of mind.

“It’s sudden.” Kara sniffled against her shoulder for a while. “I’ve never met the man,” she wailed quietly.

“What, never?”

“Ouch! No, never!” Miriam forced herself to relax her grip as Kara continued.

“He’s called Raph ven Wu, second son of Paulus ven Wu, and he’s ten years older than me and I’ve never met him and what if I hate him? It’s all about money. Granma says not to worry and it will all work out-”

“Your grandmother talked to you?”

“Yes, Granma Elise is really kind and she says he’s a well-mannered knight who she has known since he was a babe and who is honorable and will see to my welfare-but he’s terribly old! He’s almost thirty. And I’m afraid, I’m afraid-” Her lower lip was quivering again. “Granma says it will be all right but I just don’t know. And the wedding’s to be tomorrow, in the Halle Temple of Our Lady of the Dead, and I want you to come. Will you be there?” She held on to Miriam like a drowning woman clutching at a life raft.

“You didn’t say how you found me,” Miriam prodded gently.

“Oh, I petitioned Baron Henryk! He said you were staying here and I could see you if I wanted. He even said I should invite you to witness at my wedding.

Will you come? Please?”

Oh, so that’s what it’s about. To Miriam the message couldn’t have been clearer. And she had no doubt at all that it was a message, and that she was the intended recipient. She looked out of the window, turning her head so that Kara wouldn’t see her expression. “I’ll come if they let me,” she said, surprising herself with the mildness of her tone.

“Of course they’ll let you!” Kara said fiercely. “Why wouldn’t they? Are you in trouble, milady?”

“You could say that.” Miriam thought about it for a moment. “But probably no worse than yours.”

Afterward, Erasmus Burgeson always wondered why he hadn’t seen it coming.

It was a humid evening, and he’d sat on the open top deck of the streetcar as it rattled toward the hotel downtown where he was to meet his contact. He breathed deeply, relishing the faint smoky tang of the air now that his sore old lungs had stopped troubling him: I wonder where Miriam is? he idly thought, opening and refolding his morning news sheet. She’d changed his life with that last visit and those jars of wonder pills. Probably off somewhere engaging in strange new ventures in exotic worlds far more advanced than this one, he told himself. Democracies, places ruled by the will of the people rather than the whim of a nearsighted tyrant. He sighed and focused on the foreign affairs pages.

Nader Demands Rights to Peshawar Province. The Persian situation was clearly deteriorating, with the Shah’s greedy eyes fastened on the southern provinces of French Indoostan. Of course, the idiot in New London wouldn’t be able to let something like that slip past him: Government Offers to Intercede with Court of St. Peter. As if the French would listen to British representations on behalf of a megalomaniac widely seen as one of John Frederick’s cat’s-paws

… Prussian Ambassador Wins Duel. Well, yes-diplomatic immunity meant never having to back out of a fight if you could portray it as an affair of honor.

Burgeson sniffed. Bloody-handed aristocrats. The streetcar bell dinged as it rattled across a set of points and turned a wide corner.

Erasmus folded the paper neatly and stood up. Nothing to do with the price of bread, he thought cynically as he descended the tight circular staircase at the rear of the car. The price of bread was up almost four-twelfths over its price at this time last year, and there had been food riots in Texico when the corn flour handed out by the poor boards had proven to be moldy. Fourteen dead, nearly sixty injured when the cavalry went in after the magistrates read the riot act. The streetcar stopped and Erasmus followed a couple of hopeful hedonists out onto the crowded pavement outside. The place was normally busy, but tonight it was positively fizzing. There was something unusual in the air.

He took another deep breath. Not having his chest rattle painfully was like being young again: he felt lively and full of energy. And the night was also young.

The Cardiff Hotel-named for Lord Cardiff of Virginia, not the French provincial capital of Wales-was brightly lit with electricals, broad float-glass doors open to the world. A green-and-white-striped canopy overhung the pavement, and a pianist was busy banging both keyboards on his upright instrument for all he was worth, the brass-capped hammers setting up a pounding military beat. Burgeson stepped inside and made his way to the back of the bar, searching for the right booth. A hand waved, just visible above the crowd: he nodded and joined his fellow conspirator.

“Nice evening,” Farnsworth said nervously.

“Indeed.” Erasmus eyed the other man’s mug: clearly he was in need of the Dutch courage. “Can I get you something?”

“I’m sure-ah.” A table-runner appeared. “Have you any of the hemp porter?”

Farnsworth enquired. “And a drop of laudanum.”

“I’ll have the house ale,” said Erasmus, trying not to raise an eyebrow.

Surely it’s a bit early for laudanum? Unless Farnsworth really was upset about something.

When the table-runner had left, Farnsworth raised his tankard and drained it.

“That’s better. I’m sorry, Rudolf.”

Burgeson leaned forward, tensely. “What for?”

“The news-” Farnsworth waved his hand helplessly. “I have no images, you understand.”

Burgeson tried to calm his racing heart. He felt light-headed, slightly breathless: “Is that all? There’s no reason to apologize for that, my friend.”

Farnsworth shook his head. “Bad news,” he croaked.

The table-runner returned with their drinks. Farnsworth buried his snout in his mug. Erasmus, trying to rein in his impatience, scanned the throng. It was loud, too loud for even their neighbors in the next booth to overhear them, and there were no obvious signs of informers. “What is it, then?”

“Prince James is-it’s not good.”

“Ah.” Erasmus relaxed a little. Not that he was pleased by news of the crown prince’s suffering-no matter that the eight-year-old was due to grow up to be tyrant of New Britain, he was still just a bairn and could not be held responsible for his parents’ misdeeds-but if it was just more trivial court gossip it meant the sky hadn’t fallen in yet. “So how is he?”

“The announcement will be made in about two hours’ time. I have to be back at the palace by midnight to plan his majesty’s wardrobe for the funeral.”

“The-” Erasmus stopped. “What?”

“Oh yes.” Farnsworth nodded lugubriously. “It will mean war, you mark my words.”

War? Erasmus blinked rapidly. “What are you talking about?”

“Don’t you know?” Farnsworth seemed startled.

“I’ve been on a train all afternoon,” said Erasmus. “Has something happened?”

Something more than a sick little boy dying?

“They caught one of the assassins,” Farnsworth said tensely. “An Ottoman subject.” He peered blearily at Burgeson’s uncomprehending face. “Prince James was murdered just after lunchtime today; shot in the chest from a building overlooking the Franciscan palace. It was a conspiracy! Bomb-throwing foreigners on our soil, spreading terror and fomenting fear. Naval intelligence says it’s a message for his majesty. The crisis in the Persian Gulf. Sir Roderick is recommending a bill of attainder to his majesty that will seize all Ottoman assets held by institutions here until they back down.”

Burgeson stared at him. “You. Have got to be kidding.”

Farnsworth shook his head. “All hell’s broken loose, the seventh seal has sounded, and I very much fear that we are about to be bathed in the blood of ten million lambs-conscripted into a war started as a distraction from the empty larders of the provinces, a matter which has most exercised the prime minister these past weeks.” He grabbed Burgeson’s hand. “You’ve got to do something! Make your friends listen! It’s the outside threat to distract and befuddle us, the oldest trick in the library. A brief successful war to wrap themselves in the glory of the flag and justify calls for austerity and belt-tightening, and to distract attention from the empty coffers and supply a pretext to issue war bonds. Only this time, we know the Frogs have got corpses. And so have we. So it’s going to be an unusually violent war. And of course they’ll clamp down on dissenters and Ranters. They’ll implement French rule here, if you give them the chance.” French rule-summary justice, the martial law of the Duc du Muscovy. The Stolypin necktie as an answer to all arguments, as that strange otherworld history book Miriam had given him had put it. Erasmus felt cold sweat spring out at the back of his neck.

“I’ll tell them immediately,” he said, rising.

“Your drink-”

“You finish it. You look as if you need it more than I do. I’ve got a job to do.”

“Good luck.”

Erasmus dived into the throng of agitated, wildly speculating men filling the bar and worked his way outside. A street hawker was selling the last of the evening edition: he snagged a copy and stared at the headlines. arab terror screamed the masthead in dripping red letters above an engravature of the boy prince lying on the ground, his eyes open. “Shit.” Erasmus looked around, searching for a cab. I’ll have to notify Lady Bishop, he thought, and Iron John. Find out what the Central Committees want to do about the situation.

Another thought struck him. I must talk to Miriam; she knows of other worlds more advanced than this. They’re ruled by republics, they must have corpuscular weapons-I wonder what she knows about them? A cab pulled up and he climbed in. Perhaps we could achieve a better negotiating position if the movement had some …

Mike realized something was wrong the moment he passed the checkpoint on the fourteenth floor and found Pete Garfinkle and Colonel Smith waiting for him, with a blue-suiter behind them. The guard was carrying a gun and trying to look in six different directions simultaneously. This worried Mike. Armed guards were a normal fact of life in the FTO, but nervous ones were something new.

“What’s up?” he asked.

“We have a problem,” said Smith.

“Matt went for a walk about two hours ago,” said Pete, nervously fingering his document folder.

“Went for a-”

“Down the express elevator from the twenty-third floor, or so it would appear judging from the elevator logs,” Smith added. “Although there’s no evidence he was actually in the elevator car except for the RFID tags concealed in his underwear. Which he is no longer wearing. And there’s a missing window on the twenty-third floor. Shall we talk about it?”

They went up to the newly installed Vault Type Room on the nineteenth floor and Smith signed them in. Then they authenticated each other and locked the door. The blue-suiter waited outside, which was a relief to Mike-but only a temporary one. “Do we know where he went?” he asked as soon as they were seated around the transparent conference table.

“Not a clue.” Smith inclined his head toward Pete. “Dr. James is going to shit a brick the size of the World Trade Center as soon as he finds out, which is”-he glanced at his wrist-watch-“going to happen in about thirty minutes, so it is important that we are singing from the same hymn book before he drops in. Unless we can find our runaway first.” The colonel grinned humorlessly.