Treecat Wars (22 page)

“Hey, don’t sweat it,” a voice said very quietly in her ear, and she glanced up from the corner of her eye as Karl smiled down at her. “
You’re
the one they’re all here to see and listen to, Steph,” he added, and gave her shoulder a gentle smack.

She smiled back up at him, then turned and followed Gwendolyn calmly out into the banquet room’s splendor.

* * *

“And now, ladies and gentlemen,” Gwendolyn Adair announced the better part of two hours later, “it gives me considerable pleasure to present Stephanie Harrington!”

She smiled from her place at the lectern, inviting Stephanie to join her, and the seated diners applauded enthusiastically as Stephanie rose. The introduction wasn’t strictly necessary, given the fact that she and Karl had already been introduced to a seemingly endless array of rich, aristocratic, and rich
and
aristocratic people. Still, the applause was heavier than Stephanie had expected it would be, and she felt an undeniable little stir of pleasure as it greeted her. At the same time, she felt a matching irritation that she was the only one being invited up to speak to them. Karl had been just as involved with the SFS—and with protecting the ’cats—as she had, but the Adair Foundation (just like everyone
else
in the Star Kingdom) seemed fixated on the drama of her original meeting with Lionheart.

Well, the “original meeting” they all know about, anyway
, she corrected herself, remembering a thunderstorm and a small celery thief in the rain.

The applause continued until she joined Gwendolyn on the small stage, then died away, and Gwendolyn continued.

“I know all of you are familiar with the news reports about Stephanie and Lionheart, and I’m sure all of you are as irked as I am that he couldn’t join us as well tonight. However, since you
do
know the public parts of their story, I think we can skip the usual flowery introductions and get right down to the real reason all of us are here tonight.” She looked at Stephanie. “I thought it might be a good idea to ask you to tell us a little about what treecats are really like and then, if you don’t mind, take a few questions from the floor, Stephanie.”

“Sure.” Stephanie smiled back at her just a
bit
more confidently than she actually felt, then stepped up behind the lectern and adjusted the mic more comfortably to her height as Gwendolyn returned to her own chair.

“First,” she began, “let me thank all of you for inviting Karl and me to join you this evening.” She emphasized Karl’s name ever so slightly and saw several people glance in his direction. “And, like Gwendolyn, I’m sorry Lionheart can’t be her as well. He’s actually a much better spokesman for the ’cats than I could ever be…even if he can’t talk.”

A quiet rumble of amusement answered her last remark, and she drew a deep, unobtrusive breath. Now for the tricky part, she reminded herself. It was time to enlist these people in the ’cats’ support, but she had to do it in a way that made them eager to protect Lionheart and the others without over-emphasizing their intelligence.

“When I first met Lionheart, I was doing something really stupid,” she began, “and if he hadn’t come along, I wouldn’t be here today. I guess that means I’m probably a little prejudiced in his favor, and that makes me very happy to have the chance to talk to an organization like the Adair Foundation about him and the rest of the treecats. We’re obviously only beginning to really learn about them, and it’s going to be years and years before anyone’s ready to provide any kind of definitive evaluation of them. But one thing that’s already clear is that they were on Sphinx a long time before we were, and that’s why the SFS has declared them a protected species. That’s only a provisional status, though. It’s subject to being changed or revoked, and Karl and I both think that would be a really bad idea. I hope that after this evening, you’ll agree with us, because we can use all the help we can get making sure the ’cats are protected the same way they protected me against the hexapuma.”

She heard the quiet sincerity in her own voice and, looking out at her audience, she thought she saw it reflected in attentive expressions and cocked, listening heads. She hoped so, anyway.

“That afternoon,” she went on, “when my hang-glider crashed into the crown oak, I had no idea what was going to happen. I thought—”

Chapter Eleven

“Well, I have to admit I’m glad
that’s
over with,” Stephanie admitted several hours later as Gwendolyn Adair and Oswald Morrow, who she’d introduced as one of her cousin the Earl’s financial managers, accompanied her and Karl back towards the waiting taxi. “Talking to that many people made me a lot more nervous than I expected it to!”

“Really?” Gwendolyn tilted her head, looking down at her. “I don’t think anyone would have suspected that looking at you. In fact, I thought you handled that extraordinarily well. Didn’t you, Oswald?”

“I didn’t see any signs of anxiety,” Morrow agreed. “And I thought you handled the questions quite well, too.”

“And…shrewdly,” Gwendolyn said. Stephanie looked back at her quickly, and the older woman smiled faintly. “I hope you won’t take this wrongly, Stephanie, but it was pretty apparent to me that you chose your words rather carefully a time or two. You’re very protective of the treecats, aren’t you?”

“Well, maybe I am.” Stephanie tried not to bristle. “I think I’ve got pretty good reasons to be, though!”

She felt one of Karl’s big hands settle on her shoulder and squeeze gently, and she made herself relax muscles that had tried to tighten up.

“Of course you do,” Gwendolyn agreed calmly. “That was an observation, not a criticism. I happen to think you’re entirely correct to be protective of them—that’s what the Adair Foundation’s all about, isn’t it?—and I meant it as a compliment. I don’t know where the final judgment on treecat sentience is going to fall in the end, but I thoroughly agree that this is a time to go slowly and carefully. The last thing any of us want to see on Sphinx is a repeat of what happened on Barstool.”

An icicle touched Stephanie’s heart at the reminder of the Amphors of the planet Barstool and how they’d been exterminated by the human settlers of their home world to prevent anyone from suggesting that it belonged to
them
and not the human interlopers. The hand on her shoulder tightened again, this time as much in comfort as in warning, and she made herself meet Gwendolyn’s green eyes levelly.

“No, we don’t,” she heard herself agree calmly. “And you’re right—thinking about things like Barstool does make me kind of careful about how enthusiastically I talk about the ’cats. Oh, I know it’s early to be worrying about things like that in Sphinx’s case, especially with the Forestry Service looking out for them and especially when there’s no way we can demonstrate how intelligent they really are. I do worry about it, though. I owe Lionheart too much to just stand around and watch something bad happen to him or the rest of the treecats.”

“Of course you do,” Gwendolyn acknowledged as they reemerged from the Charleston Arms into the warm, breezy night of the city of Landing, where the taxi waited on the parking apron. “It couldn’t be any other way, and I’m glad—I’m sure the entire Foundation is glad—they have such a good friend in you. And in Karl and the rest of the SFS, of course.”

Stephanie smiled brightly at her, then held out her hand.

“Thanks! And I’m glad the Foundation’s on their side, too!” she said, shaking Gwendolyn’s hand firmly. “I wish we could stay to talk about them some more, but Karl and I have a nine o’clock exam in the morning, and I just
know
a certain ’cat is going to be waiting to demand an extra stalk of celery when we get back to the dorms!”

* * *

“We are so screwed,” Oswald Morrow remarked quietly as he and Gwendolyn Adair watched the taxi lift away.

“She
is
rather more personable—and formidable—than I’d expected out of someone her age,” Gwendolyn agreed. “I knew she had to be tough and determined just to have survived the hexapuma, and it was obvious she was smart as they come, too. But she’s a lot calmer and more collected than I thought she’d be. She didn’t even turn a hair talking to the Foundation members, did she?”

“Not that anyone might notice.” Morrow grimaced. “The newsies are going to just love her the instant she starts giving interviews, you know. Smart, cute, tough, mature—she’s a PR campaign’s worst nightmare, Gwen! If she starts handing out interviews like the little talk she gave tonight, but with the treecat sitting on her shoulder and looking just as cute—and tough, with all those scars and the missing leg!—we’re going to have every gooey-hearted idiot in the Star Kingdom pulling for the little monsters. And if
that
happens, you can kiss all those land options on Sphinx goodbye. Parliament’ll grandfather in those little beasties’ claim to the planet, and their market value will drop straight into the basement.”

“You do have a dazzling grasp of the obvious, don’t you, Ozzie?” Gwendolyn observed acidly. “Of course the options’ values will tank if that happens! Unless I’m mistaken, that’s the very thing you and I are trying to prevent, now isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is,” Morrow replied tartly. “And at the moment, I’m thinking things don’t look too good in that respect.”

“Maybe not. But that was always a possibility, wasn’t it? What do you hear from Dr. Radzinsky?”

“Nothing good,” Morrow said glumly. “She says the evidence is pretty clear that they’re not just tool-users but also toolmakers, and probably even more advanced toolmakers than we were afraid they were.” He shook his head. “She’s not going to be able to convince the academic community they aren’t sentient, Gwen. Not for very long, anyway. And I think she’s a lot less optimistic than she was about convincing people their sentience is minimal, too.”

“I wish I could say I was surprised.” Gwendolyn gazed thoughtfully after the vanished lights of the taxi and pursed her lips. “So unless we can come up with some sort of pesticide that’ll kill only treecats without bothering the rest of the ecosystem, it looks like we’re stuck with them.”

Morrow glanced at her profile a bit uneasily. He
thought
she was only joking about exterminating the ’cats, but it was always a little hard to be certain about Gwendolyn. He’d realized some years ago that she was actually far more ruthless than he was once she’d fully committed to an operation…and she had more of her own portfolio invested in those Sphinx land options than he’d thought she did.

“Well,” she sighed after a moment, “if we are, we are. I know the others are going to insist on trying for the ‘only animals’ solution, but you’re right; it’s not going to fly in the end. That doesn’t mean we can’t get
most
of what we want, though. I think it’s time you and I started concentrating on Plan B. At least that way we can limit the damage.”

Morrow grunted unhappily. She was almost certainly right about that, but she had a point about “the others.” The real moneymakers behind their efforts weren’t going to be happy if
any
of the land on which they held options was snatched out from under them and handed back to the treecats. Nor were they going to be very happy with the people—like one Oswald Morrow—who’d allowed that to happen.

“Frampton and the others will scream,” he said warningly.

“Then they’ll just have to scream.” Gwendolyn shrugged. “Once we convince public opinion that the poor, aboriginal, barely sentient little savages need to be put on reservations to protect them from the corrupting influence of humans, we’re halfway home. We’ve got more than enough friends in Parliament to make sure the reservation boundaries get drawn in ways that don’t include any of the
good
land on Sphinx, Ozzie. And if we don’t—” she shrugged again “—Frampton and the others can always buy us some
additional
friends, now can’t they? Of course, it wouldn’t hurt a thing if we could also convince the big, bleeding-heart public that the little monsters are too dangerous to be allowed to run around loose where they might endanger children or other innocent bystanders, now would it?”

“No, it wouldn’t,” Morrow agreed around a fresh prickle of uneasiness. “Why? Have you got something in mind?”

“Oh, I think you might say that,” Gwendolyn replied with a small smile. “It’ll take a little time to set up, but I definitely have something in mind.”

* * *

Because he knew how nervous Stephanie was about speaking at the Adair Foundation banquet, Anders waited until he heard back from her about that to tell her about Duff DeWitt’s less than professional behavior toward the Pheriss kids.

When he did, her next message showed she took the incident as seriously as he and Jessica—and Mr. Pheriss—had. They’d messaged back and forth so often over the last several weeks—a lot more frequently than they had when
he’d
been the one on Manticore—that any early stiffness had vanished. Stephanie sprawled on her stomach on her bed, wearing shorts and a sleeveless top. Her head rested on her hands and she was kicking her bare feet up behind her. Lionheart rested nearby. The fact that the ’cat wasn’t sitting on Stephanie—as he certainly would have been if they’d been at home on Sphinx—reminded Anders that while it was autumn on this part of Sphinx, temperatures were much warmer on Manticore.

“Do you want me to see what anyone at the Adair Foundation knows about this DeWitt?” Stephanie was saying. “They didn’t select the team members, but they did vet their credentials. They may know something your dad and Dr. Nez don’t, and Gwen Adair seemed really nice. If there’s something going on that she doesn’t know about, I’m sure she’d be more than happy to help us get to the bottom of it. Let me know, okay?”

The rest of Stephanie’s message was mostly about classes. She was so busy she hadn’t even made it off campus except for the Foundation dinner.

“…Mom and Dad are coming out in about two weeks so they can have a holiday before they attend my graduation. They’re talking about extending their visit for another week or two so I can do some touring, but I don’t know…I really want to get home and see you and help with the x-a’s. We’ll see. I may not have a lot of choice in the matter.”