The Merchants’ War

by Stross, Charles

  Mike stared at her.

  Mrs. Beckstein took a deep breath. “Olga. If Mr. Fleming here doesn’t answer my questions, you have my permission to shoot him in the kneecap. At will.”

  “Which one?” asked the Russian princess.

  “Whichever you want.” Mrs. Beckstein sniffed. “Now, Mike. I want you to understand one thing, and one thing only—I’m concerned for my daughter’s well-being. I’m especially concerned when an ex-boyfriend of hers with a highly dubious employment record appears out of nowhere at a—” she coughed “—joyous occasion, and all hell breaks loose. And I am more concerned than you can possibly begin to imagine that she has vanished in the middle of the sound and the fury, because there is an official decree in force that says if she world-walks without the permission of the Clan committee, her life is forfeit. She is my daughter, and blood is thicker than water, and I am going to save her ass. Call it atonement for earlier mistakes, if you like: I’ve not always been a terribly good mother.” She leaned closer. “Now, you may be able to help me save her ass. If I think you might be useful to me, I can protect you up, to a point. Or.” She nodded at Olga. “Lady Olga is a friend of Miriam’s. She’s concerned for her welfare, too. Miriam has more friends than she realizes, you see. Thousands and thousands of them…So the question is: are we all agreed that we are friends of Miriam, and that we intend to save her ass? Or—” she fixed Mike with a vulture stare “—were you stringing her along?”

  “No!” he exclaimed. “Whoa. Ow.” The weasels had graduated from carnivore school and were working on their diplomas in coyote impersonation. “What do you want to know?”

  “Let’s start with, how you got over here.”

  “Same way Matthias got over to our—my—world.” He could almost see the lightbulbs going on over Olga’s and Mrs. Beckstein’s heads. “Family Trade captured a couple of world-walkers. Forced them to carry.” He tried to shrug himself into a more comfortable position, half-upright.

  “Forced? How?” Olga stared at him. “And what is Family Trade?”

  “Collar…bombs. They carry a cargo and come back, Family Trade resets the timer. They don’t come back, it blows their head off. When they’re not world-walking, FTO keeps them in a high-rise jail.”

  Mrs. Beckstein interrupted. “Family Trade—this is some spook agency, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. I’m—seconded—to it. Not my idea. Matt walked into the Boston downtown office while Pete—my partner—and I were on the desk. That’s all.”

  “Ah.” Mrs. Beckstein nodded to herself. “And they sent you here because they worked out that Miriam was…okay. I think I get it. Am I right?” She raised an eyebrow.

  “Yes, mostly,” he said hastily: Olga was still glaring at him from her corner. “We don’t have much intel on the ground. Colonel Smith figured she’d be able to develop a spy ring for us, in return for an exit opportunity. He wants informants. I told him it was half-assed and premature, but he ordered the insertion.”

  “He wants informants, does he?” Mrs. Beckstein grinned. “What do you make of that, Olga?”

  Olga’s expression of alarm surprised Mike in its intensity, cutting through the fog of drugs: “you can’t be serious! That would be treason!”

  “It’s not treason if it’s known to ClanSec in advance.” Mrs. Beckstein waved a hand in dismissal. “One man’s spy is another man’s diplomatic back channel to the other side; it just depends who’s playing the game and for what stakes.” Her eyes narrowed as she looked at Mike. “Your colonel wants information? Well, he shall have it, and you shall take it to him. But in return, you’re going to find my daughter.” A brief sideways nod: “you and Lady Olga, that is.”

  Running Dog

  The next day came too early for Erasmus. It was barely a quarter to eight when he checked out of the cheap traveler’s hotel he’d stayed in overnight, and walked around to the rear entrance to Hogarth Villas. Lady Bishop’s taciturn manservant Edward answered the door, then led him down a servants’ passage and a staircase that led to a gloomy basement, illuminated by the dim light that filtered down to the bottom of an air shaft.

  “Wait here,” said Edward, disappearing round a corner. A moment later, he heard a rattle of keys, and low voices. Then:

  “Erasmus!”

  He smiled stiffly, embarrassed by his own reaction. “Miriam, it’s good to see you again.”

  “I’d been hoping—” She took two steps towards him, and he found himself suddenly at arm’s length; he’d advanced without noticing. “I’m not imagining things?”

  “Everything will be alright.” His voice sounded shaky in his own ears. “Come on, I’ll explain as we go.” He forced himself to look past her face, to make eye contact with Edward (who grimaced and shrugged, as if to say you’re welcome to her): “Do you have any luggage?”

  “It’s here.” Edward hefted a leather valise. Erasmus took it. “I’ll be going now,” said the servant, “you know the way out.”

  A moment later they were alone. He found himself staring at Miriam: she looked back at him with an odd expression, as if she’d never seen him before. Is this all a terrible mistake? He wondered: is she going to be angry with me for sending her here? “You came. For me?”

  “As soon as I heard.” He found it difficult to talk.

  “Well, thank you. I was beginning to worry—” She shivered violently.

  “My dear, this isn’t the sort of establishment one drops in on unannounced.” He noticed her clothing for the first time; someone had found her a more suitable outfit than the gown she’d worn in Lady Bishop’s spy-hole picture, but it would never do—probably a castoff from one of the girls upstairs, threadbare and patched. “Hmm. When I asked them to find you something to wear I was expecting something a little less likely to attract attention.”

  Her cheeks colored slightly. “I’m getting sick of hand-me-downs. You’ve got a plan?”

  “Follow me.” It was easier than confronting his emotions—predominantly relief, at the moment, a huge and fragile sense that something precious hadn’t been shattered, the toppling vase caught at the last moment—and it was nonsense, of course, a distraction from the serious business at hand. He climbed the stairs easily, with none of the agonizing tightness in his chest and the crackling in his lungs that would have plagued him two months ago. The parlor was empty, the fireplace unlit. He placed the valise on the table. “Let’s see what we’ve got.”

  Her shadow fell across the bag as he opened it. “Ah, papers.” He opened the leather-bound passport and held the first page up to the light. “That’s a good forgery.” He felt a flash of admiration for Margaret’s facilities; if he hadn’t known better he’d have been certain it was genuine. Below it was a bundle of other documents: birth certificate, residence permit for the eastern provinces, even a—his cheeks colored. “We appear to be married,” he murmured.

  “Let me see.” She reached over and took the certificate. “Damn, I knew something had slipped my mind. Must have been all the champagne at the reception. Dated two days ago, too—what a way to spend a honeymoon.” She sighed. “What is it about this month? Everyone seems to want to see me married.”

  “Lady Bishop probably thought it would be an excellent explanation for travel,” he said, heart pounding and vision blurred. The sense of relief had gone, shattered: blown away by a sense of disquiet, the old ache like a pulled tooth that he’d lived with for far too long. The last time he’d seen Annie, alive or dead. “Or perhaps Ed wanted a little joke at our expense. If so, it’s in very bad taste.” He made to take it from her hand, but Miriam had other ideas.

  “Wait up. She’s right, if we’re traveling together it’s a good cover identity.” She looked at him curiously. “We’re supposed to travel together?”

  Erasmus pulled himself together, with an effort. “I’m supposed to take you back to Boston and look after you. Find a way to make her—you—useful, Margaret told me. Personally, I don’t know if that’s possible or appropri
ate, but it gives her a respectable excuse to get you off her plate without sticking a knife in you first. What we do afterwards—”

  “Okay, I get the idea.” Miriam picked up the passport and stared at it, frowning. “Susan Burgeson. Right.” She glanced at him. “I could be your long-lost sister or something if you’ve got trouble with the married couple idea.”

  He shrugged. Compartmentalize. “It’s a cover identity. Nothing more.”

  She looked thoughtful. “Is Erasmus Burgeson a cover identity, too?”

  God’s wounds but she’s sharp! “If it was, do you think I’d tell you?”

  “You’d tell your wife,” she said, teasingly—then immediately looked stricken. “Shit! I’m sorry, Erasmus! I’d—it completely slipped my mind. I’m sorry…”

  “Don’t be,” he said tightly. “Not your fault.”

  “No, me and my—” She took his hand impulsively. “I tend to dig, by instinct. Listen, if you catch me doing it again and it’s sensitive, just tell me to back off, all right?”

  He took a deep breath. It’s not your fault. “Certainly. I think I owe you that much.”

  “You owe—” She shook her head. “Enough of that. What else have we got?”

  “Let’s see.” The bag turned out to contain a suit of clothes, not new but more respectable than those they’d already given Miriam. “If we’re traveling together, you’d probably better change into these first. We’ll look less conspicuous together.”

  “Okay.” She paused. “Right here?”

  “I’ll wait outside.”

  He stood with his back to the parlor door for a few scant minutes that felt like hours. He spent some of those hours fantasizing about wringing Ed’s neck—a necessary proxy, for the thought of challenging Lady Bishop over the matter was insupportable, but damn them! Why did they have to do that, of all things?

  Miriam was a sharp knife, too sharp for her own good—sharp enough to cut both ways. Dealing with her as a contact and a supplier of contraband had been dicey, but not impossible. Living with her was an entirely different matter, but it wasn’t exactly feasible to stick her in a tenement apartment and leave her to her own devices. She’ll figure everything out, sooner rather than later. And then what? The precious vase was back teetering on the edge of the precipice, with no hand in place to catch it this time. And it was full of ashes.

  There was a knock at the door. A moment later it opened, as he turned round. “How do I look?” She took a step back.

  “You look—” he paused to collect himself, “fine.” The black walking suit was a little severe, but it suited her. However…“before we travel, I think we’d better find you a hairdresser.”

  “Really?” She frowned. “It’s not particularly long—”

  “Or a wig maker,” he explained. “You’re probably on the Polis watch list. But if you’ve got long blond or brown hair, a different name, and a husband, and the informants are all looking for a single woman with short black hair, that’s a start. Details are cumulative: you can’t just change one thing and expect to go unnoticed, you’ve got to change lots of different things about yourself simultaneously.”

  “Right. It’ll have to be blond. Damn it, I always get split ends.” She ran one hand through her hair. It was longer than he remembered. “There’s other stuff I need to do. When I can figure out what…”

  A moment he’d been dreading: at least, a small one. She didn’t seem to be committed to killing herself just yet. “That will be a problem.”

  “Ah.” She froze. “Yes, somehow I didn’t think it was going to be easy.”

  “The—situation—you drew our attention to is troublesome. For the time being, I think it would be a very bad idea indeed for you to try to make contact with your Clan. Or with the other, ah, local faction. I can make inquiries on your behalf, discreet inquiries, if your relatives are still trying to run your company. But until we know how they will react to your reappearance, it would be best not to reappear. Do you agree?”

  Miriam looked baffled for a moment: an achingly familiar bewilderment, the first bright moment of incomprehension that everyone felt the first time, as the doors to the logging camp swung to offer a glimpse into a colder, harsher world. “All I want is to go home.”

  He reached out and rested a hand on her shoulder, surprising himself: “Listen, home is wherever you are. You’ve got to learn to accept that, to let go, or sooner or later you’re going to kill yourself. Are you listening? Margaret told me your story. Do you want to go back to the situation you just escaped from? Or do you want the Polis to find you instead? I nearly killed myself once, trying to go back. I don’t want you to make the same mistake. I think the best way forward would be for you to come with me. It’s not forever: it’ll last as long as, as long as it needs to. Eventually, I’m sure, you’ll be able to go back. But don’t…don’t try to take on too much, Miriam. Not until you’re ready.”

  “I—” She reached up and removed his hand from her shoulder, but she didn’t let go of it. “You’re too kind!” Without warning she stepped right up to him and put her arms around him, and hugged him. Too surprised to move, he stood rooted to the spot, at a loss for words: after a while she stepped away. “I’m ready now,” she said quietly. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Everyone gets a run of bad news sooner or later, thought Eric Smith, but this is ridiculous.

  “This is not making my day any easier,” murmured Dr. James, leaning back in his chair as the door closed behind Agent Herz. He glanced sidelong at Eric. “Got any bright ideas, Colonel?”

  Eric stared at the hard copy of Herz’s report, sitting on the blotter in its low-contrast anti-photocopying print and SECRET codewords, and resisted the impulse to pound his head on his desk. It would look unprofessional—there were few stronger terms of opprobrium in Dr. Andrew James’s buttoned-down vocabulary—and more important, it wouldn’t achieve anything. But on the other hand, banging his head on the desk would probably be less painful than trying to deal with the self-compounding clusterfuck-in-progress that was, of late, what passed for the Family Trade Organization’s infant steps towards dealing with the transdimensionally mobile narcoterrorists they were hunting.

  (And their goddamn stolen nukes.)

  “Come on. What am I going to tell the vice president tonight?”

  Eric took a deep breath. “From the top?”

  “Whatever order you choose.”

  “Well, shall we get the small stuff out of the way first?”

  “Start.”

  Eric shrugged. “I don’t like to admit this, but the current operations we’ve got in train are all hosed. CLEANSWEEP has driven into a ditch and we’re lucky we got anybody back at all—going by Agent Wall’s observations, they got caught in the crossfire during some kind of red-on-red incident. We’re lucky Rich was able to exfiltrate in good order, else we wouldn’t even know that much. I think we can write off the alpha team and Agent Fleming, they’re two days overdue and they’ve overrun their provisioning.

  “On the plus side, Rich got out. We’ve continued to monitor the CLEANSWEEP team’s dead letter drops from the OLIGARCH positions, and they look clean. The fact that nobody’s visited or tried to stake them out suggests that the bad guys didn’t take any of our men alive. So CLEANSWEEP isn’t blown, and once we get more field-qualified linguists prepped we should be able to reactivate it—possibly in as little as three weeks. The real problem we’ve got is that we’re multiply bottlenecked: bottlenecked on linguists, bottlenecked on logistics, bottlenecked on general intelligence. If we could find one of their safe houses we’d be in place to run COLDPLAY against them, but the trail’s gone cold and there’s a limit to how long I can hold on to an AFSOCOM team with no mission—they’re needed in the middle east.”

  “Hmm.” James rolled his pen between the finger and thumb of his left hand. His lips whitened, forming a tight, disapproving line that made the resemblance to Hugo Weaving in The Matrix even stronger. Agent Smith, with a sm
all lapel-pin crucifix and a Ph.D. from Harvard: “I might be able to shake something loose on one of those fronts presently. But VPOTUS isn’t going to be happy about the lack of progress.”

  “Well, I’m not happy either!” Eric dug his fingers into the arms of his chair. His damaged carpal tunnels sent twinges of protest running up his arms. “If you think I enjoy losing agents and trained special forces teams…hell.” He raised a hand and ran fingertips through his thinning hair. “I’m sorry. But this failure mode wasn’t anticipated. Nobody expected them to blow up the fucking palace and start a civil war in the garden. Maybe we should have anticipated it, if we’d been better informed about their internal political situation, but they don’t exactly have newspapers over there and even if they did, we’d have trouble reading them. We’d have to have been fucking mind readers to spot a bunch of plotters running a coup!”

  “Language, Colonel, please.”

  “Shi—sorry.” Eric shook his head, angry at his own loss of control. “I’m upset. We’ve now lost two high-clearance, high-value agents and an AFSOCCOM specops team and we’ve only really been up and running for fourteen weeks.”

  “I feel your pain,” James said dryly. Eric stared at him, taken aback. “But I’m going to have to brief the vice president tonight on all the progress we haven’t been making, and believe me, chewing on ground glass would be less painful,” he added. “Now. I’ve heard from Herz. How’s CLANCY going?”

  “Badly.” CLANCY was the ongoing investigation into the nuclear device that Source GREENSLEEVES claimed was planted somewhere in the Boston/Cambridge area, before he’d so inconveniently managed to get himself killed. “We hadn’t found anything really noteworthy—a couple of meth labs, a walled-up cellar full of moonshine left over from the nineteen twenties, that sort of thing—until Judith turned up her anomaly yesterday. I was half-convinced GREENSLEEVES was lying to us, but now—well, I don’t think we can afford to take that risk.” He shivered. “Just who the he—heck stuck a B-53 bomb on blocks in a warehouse and set it to go off on a ten-year timer?”