Robert Frezza - [Colonial War 02]

by Fire in a Faraway Place (epub)

  Captain Yanagita’s intelligence staff also spoke with two men who had worked on hollowing out Vereshchagin’s caverns under the mountains. While they were able to say something about the construction, the crews had been flown out for one month at a time and had no idea where the sites were located.

  Although the initial results from his hostage policy were modest, Admiral Horii was quite pleased.

  FOLDING HIS HANDS, CAPTAIN CHIHARU YOSHIDA WATCHED MATTI

  Haijalo skim his report on the impact that Horii’s measures were having on the Afrikaners.

  “Good job, Chiharu.” Haijalo set the report aside, still mildly amused that Yoshida insisted on preparing things in writing after all these years.

  Yoshida asked a question that had been bothering him. “Sir, I heard a disturbing rumor that Admiral Horii has adopted a new formation for his ships.”

  Haijalo nodded. “Horii’s spreading his ships out. He has his freighters and transports in a loose diamond formation around Maya, and then he has the three corvettes in a triangle on top.” “Does this mean that he suspects?”

  “Yes, he knows we have a ship.”

  ‘This will make it difficult for us,” Yoshida said, outwardly calm.

  “A classic understatement. Sorry you threw in with us?” “Duty is never easy.”

  “I understand Louis Snyman was taken hostage today. I know he was a friend of yours. I’m sony.”

  “Thank you. Yes, it is a great pity, although it was perhaps inevitable that he would be selected.” Beneath Yoshida’s imperturbable demeanor lay an indefinable sadness. “A few weeks ago, he offered to baptize me. I regret that I did not agree. It would have given him great pleasure.”

  “You’d make a good Christian, Chiharu.” Haijalo tapped Yoshida’s report with a finger. “Does this mean what I think it means?”

  “Yes. The morale of the Afrikaners is crumbling steadily.”

  HORII WATCHED JULES AFANOU THROUGH SLITTED EYES. THE

  gaunt, dark-skinned sect leader and his followers lived a simple life along the middle reaches of the De Witte River, but he was clearly no simpleton. Indeed, Horii reflected, he understood the art of “belly language” as well as any Japanese.

  The cultists were Suid-Afrika’s first settlers. Over the years, the original five sects had fragmented into a dozen or more. Their military power was negligible, but from generations of occupation, they knew the back country between the Drakensberg Mountains and the north coast better than any of Suid-Afrika’s other inhabitants, and this knowledge was a form of power. One of the few cultists willing to deal with “gentiles,” Jules Afanou led one sect and had close ties to the leaders of several others, which made him eminently worth cultivating.

  . “We have many, many aircraft such as the one we sent to pick you up,” Horii said, making a show of impressing his visitor.

  Afanou waved his hand negligently. “In the eyes of the One, the Creator of all, such things are trifles. Only men and the reverence in their hearts matter.”

  “Yes. It is in matters of the spirit that Japanese have always excelled.”

  “Do Japanese truly believe in the Spirit? I had not known this,” Afanou exclaimed.

  Sensing an opening in Afanou’s guard, Horii responded resolutely, “Of a certainty.”

  “All within the Spirit are brothers. The Afrikaners are not people of the Spirit, yet there are a few men among them that are of goodwill. My heart would be troubled if a dark fate befell them,” Afanou said cautiously, exposing his interest.

  Horii probed delicately, certain that Sumi had swept into his net a few men that Afanou had reason to want released. “Obviously, we would wish to cherish such men.”

  Afanou lowered his head. “May the Spirit fill them.” “Unfortunately, we lack knowledge possessed by ones who have lived here all of their lives.”

  “May the Spirit grant you wisdom,” Afanou intoned piously. “I have heard that at times, Afrikaners have taken up arms against your people,” Horii said to prolong the game. “And of a village called New Zion.”

  During the years when USS’s authority was crumbling into anarchy, a secret faction among the Afrikaners had released plagues to devastate the crops the cultists depended upon and encouraged Afrikaner commandos to raid the sect villages. At New Zion, the Bothaville commando had herded the people into a shed and turned them into human torches.

  For a moment, Afanou’s eyes blazed. “Although all of us are brothers and sisters in the Spirit, one of my father’s sons died at New Zion, and several of my father’s daughters died in the Starvation Time. May the Spirit grant them justice!”

  His people called the trail they had taken across the roadless Stormberg Mountains “The Path of Unnumbered Tears.”

  Horii drank a little of the sake that Afanou had politely refused. “I would desire to know this land better. Its people. Its paths.” He paused. “It is rumored that you know these paths well.”

  “Once, I did. I have walked the land these many years.” “Could you find them on a map, perhaps?”

  “A map? I do not understand such things,” the sect leader said serenely. “Lines on a piece of paper mean nothing to me. In the mountains, the paths change as the Spirit wills; when the waters flow or the mud slides down the hillsides, then perhaps the paths lead nowhere at all. And the mountains have many names; my people call them by one name and the lowlanders by others. Once I knew these paths, these mountains. If you wish to find something, perhaps my feet could show you. But who can ever truly know land that belongs to other men?” Horii smiled, catlike, and leaned forward with anticipation. “Who can truly possess land? The Spirit that touches all things can decree a different owner in an instant. Yet, if this were to occur, how would we know that your feet would not deceive you, that perhaps they might deliver us into the hands of evil men?” Afanou folded his arms. “My son came with me. If my feet were to lead men of yours falsely, it would be fitting for him to die.”

  Afanou’s son was waiting outside, as patient as the native people Horii had seen in the hills of Luzon. A slender youth with bushy hair so different from Afanou’s own, he was dressed in clean but ragged clothing with a metal pencil incongruously stuck behind his ear.

  Now, it was time for the bargaining to begin in earnest. In Horii’s view, it would be entirely fitting for the Afrikaners to reap full measure of the crop they had sown, and whatever he promised Afanou would undoubtedly elicit a pleasurable amount of whimpering from Matsudaira.

  A FEW HOURS LATER, PAUL HENKE COLLAPSED AND IN THE DARK-

  ness had to be flown out of the Drakensberg Mountains in a valley-hopping Sparrow.

  Monday(317)

  VERESHCHAGIN GREETED HARJALO OVER MORNING TEA, WHICH

  was put out by custom an hour before dawn even though dawn was moderately irrelevant beneath the roots of the Stormbergs.

  Reading the set of Haijalo’s shoulders, he asked quietly, “What is wrong, Matti?”

  “This is an awkward time to bring this up, but I think Paul has lost it.”

  “Do you know why he keeled over yet?”

  “Natasha thinks it’s mostly from lack of food and lack of sleep. Paul hasn’t said.”

  “I will take care of it, Matti,” Vereshchagin said in a soft voice.

  “What else is going on?”

  “Well, I have a note here from a woman who claims that God sends her messages and wants her to relay one to us,” Vereshchagin said with a deadpan expression. “I had to explain that we could only receive instructions from higher authorities through the proper chain of command, and advised her to write to Albert.”

  Haijalo ran his fingers through his hair as he tried to keep the grin off his face.

  “How are we fixed for personnel?” Vereshchagin asked him. “I commissioned the four extra Cadillacs we had stored away and put them under a captain of Ebyl’s named Ohlrogge—you’ve met him. Ohlrogge’s boys are manning three, and I gave Mikhail Remmar the fourth.”

  Rem
mar was a former rifleman with a prosthetic knee. “Where did you find a crew for Mikhail?” Vereshchagin asked, engaging half of his mind.

  “I didn’t. He found one for himself. His wife and her cousin. Or is it her cousine? I forget whether English differentiates between genders.” Haijalo eyed Vereshchagin specula-tively, daring him to question his action. “Marie is a better driver than Mikhail will ever be, and her cousin is a natural marksman—you wouldn’t believe her reflexes. You should see her on a video game.”

  “1 will not criticize you, Matti. If they have the necessary skills, well, it is their planet, too.”

  MUSIC ECHOED IN THE VAST NATURAL AMPHITHEATER FORMED BY C

  Company’s cavern as Letsukov softly played the piano that his admirers had somehow contrived to bring along and secrete in a side passage. Hans Coldewe stopped to admire. “What are you playing?”

  “Oh, whatever the boys ask for. Remember?” Letsukov ran

  his fingers up and down the keyboard in a rapid glissando. “You said, ‘Them that pays the fiddler, gets to call the tune.’ ” “I think I was quoting something,” Coldewe admitted, momentarily taken aback.

  Letsukov smiled slyly. “It’s all right, sir.”

  “What is this? Your third war, Dmitri?”

  Letsukov fingered the keys for an instant and stopping playing. “Fourth.” He gave Coldewe a look out of the comer of his eye. “You know, sir, war is like Wagner. It’s loud and it lasts too long, and you can only smoke during intermissions.”

  For a moment, even the normal bustle of business ceased in the cavern’s still air. “Matti is right,” Coldewe said, half to himself. “We are crazy.”

  A few of the boys had already built a papier mache wall to hide Letsukov’s piano so that it could be recovered in the event that the Drakensberg caverns were compromised. When Coldewe thought about it, it cheered him to think that they were that confident.

  AS A BONA FIDE PATIENT, PAUL HENKE WAS ENTITLED TO A REAL

  bed, and Vereshchagin sat down on the edge of it, balancing a cup and saucer and a plate. “No, don’t get up, Paul. I brought you tea and a sandwich.”

  The Hangman looked up and nodded, the lines worn into the comers of his taut face showing clearly. “I was just resting. I will be out of here in a few hours.”

  “Eat something. Otherwise you are not going anywhere.” Vereshchagin said, deliberately forcing Henke to stretch. As Henke grasped the saucer, his hand trembled violently, spilling tea over the edge of the cup.

  “Excuse me, Anton,” he said awkwardly.

  Letting Henke grasp the cup, Vereshchagin took the saucer away and put the sandwich in Henke’s other hand. “Paul, we know what the problem is.”

  Henke’s voice struck a note of false cheer. “Oh, it is nothing, Anton. A little nerves. I have seen the doctor.”

  “Paul,” Vereshchagin said quietly, “in this battalion, we do not lie to each other, or even to ourselves. I have spoken to the doctor. You are not eating or sleeping, and you are drinking too much—”

  “Very little!” the Hangman said forcefully.

  “Perhaps in an abstract sense, but you are drinking more than you ever have, which is very much too much for you,

  Paul.” He rested one hand on Henke’s shoulder. “Paul, we have been through a great deal together, but there is a breaking point for each of us. You are perhaps the best officer I have ever known, and you are my friend, but you cannot command a company if you cannot command trust, both from me and from the people you lead.” Beneath his hand, he felt Henke shake violently. “I need an operations officer desperately, and there is no one better.”

  “A few days’ rest, perhaps. I admit I have missed a few meals.”

  “Paul, these are symptoms. They are not the problem,” Vereshchagin said as gently as he could.

  After a moment or two, Henke stopped trembling. “Am I really cracked, then?” He said wistfully. “Funny, I would have resented that from anyone else.”

  Vereshchagin nodded. “I know, Paul. We are all a little mad, I think, but one must have moderation in all things. Tell me, is Sergei Okladnikov ready for a company?”

  “He will do.” The Hangman ruminated. “Will I have to see a psychiatrist?”

  “You should try. Also, Dr. Solchava has been threatening to teach me how to meditate to relieve stress. We can try this together.”

  “What will the men say when they find out that you have an insane operations officer?” Henke asked with one piece of his mind.

  “It will merely confirm what they had believed for years.” A few moments later, after Henke fell asleep, Vereshchagin straightened his whitened hair and left him in Solchava’s care.

  Solchava allowed him to take on light work late that afternoon after she watched him eat a real supper. Together with Battalion Sergeant Yuri Malinov, who could work five or six hours without excessive pain, Henke began adding detail to the plan that Vereshchagin had been contemplating.

  UNDER COVER OF THE OVERNIGHT RAIN, A ROVING PLATOON OF

  armored cars from the Imperial Ninth Light Attack Battalion engaged two D Company Cadillacs, one mounting a 90mm main gun and the other a 30mm gun, as they were moving to a new hiding place. In the darkness, quick gunnery allowed the D Company vehicles to get off the first shots. The 30mm shells from the lead vehicle did no harm; the 90mm shell from

  the second struck the lead Imperial vehicle at an acute angle and scored the turret without penetrating.

  Electromagnetically enhanced projectiles from two of the Imperial armored cars smashed both D Company vehicles in a matter of seconds.

  Tuesday(317)

  HANNA BRUWER FOUND RAUL SANMARTIN IN THE SMALL KITCHEN-

  ette attached to their quarters, the only luxury she had insisted on. “Raul, have you been eating my cake?”

  “To tell the truth, I’m not sure.” He calmly licked his fingers. “It was very good.”

  “I wanted to frost it.” She reached up to brush the crumbs off his battle dress. “And now tell me the truth.”

  “If you do the politics, I’ll bake.”

  “It’s been so long—I wish there was a convection oven here.” Bruwer examined her lumpy concoction. “I hope it won’t disappoint Hendricka.”

  “No, she’ll be excited. With enough icing, she’ll never notice.”

  “Don’t be sure. She asked me yesterday whether good kittens go to heaven. One cannot lie to a child. I told her the truth. Dogs, perhaps—but cats, never.”

  Apparently unable to believe that their quarry had escaped, Sumi’s blacklegs had spent hours with sensors in Beyers’s house. Thomas’s men, creeping back in, found Hendricka’s kitten in the sock drawer with its head beaten in. Hanna’s kylix, the last of the things she had brought from Earth, was smashed beyond mending.

  Sanmartin looked at her oddly. “Why are you baking a cake? Did I forget a birthday or something?”

  “No, you did not forget a birthday,” she said, not meeting his eyes. “Tell me, did our radio messages do anything to halt this trading of information for hostages?”

  “No. It didn’t,” Sanmartin said, suddenly frightened.

  She put her arms around his neck. “I thought of something I could do that might stop it.”

  “No,” he said, understanding her. “Nobody’s asking you to. We need you here.”

  “You need me there more.” She let him hold her. “The peo-

  pie don’t understand. They think that soldiers fight wars, and that they are somehow insulated.”

  “The ones who were out on that human chain and in the cities know better.”

  “No. You are wrong.”

  “That’s not true!” Sanmartin shouted, his reserve finally cracking.

  “It is, Raul. It is,” she said very softly. “If I offer myself as a hostage, perhaps then they will understand.”

  “Damn them. Every one of them.”

  “There are things that you, or the Iceman, or the Hangman cannot do. These are my
people, and I am what Albert and Anton and my grandfather, and yes, even you, have made me. I am a soldier, even though I carry no gun. We cannot escape it.” She touched his face. “Please, Raul. I am frightened. Please do not make this hard. I am so very frightened.”

  He closed his eyes. Trained by Senior Intelligence Sergeant Shimazu, both of them knew what it was like to undergo interrogation.

  “Raul, I know that my way of fighting—without violence— would never work with people like Sumi and Matsudaira, but your way will not work either unless my people—all of them—understand. I have to show them.”

  “I hate them!”

  “No, don’t. Raul, please understand. Someone has to act.” “No—”

  “And if somehow we come through this,” she continued, “I only want one thing. I am tired—tired of being Hendrik Pienaar’s granddaughter, and Madam Speaker, and Heer President’s hatchet man, and the battalion executive officer’s wife. For a while I only want to be Hanna, and maybe Raul’s wife and Hendricka’s mother. And if that requires a superextraordinary dispensation from Anton Vereshchagin or Albert Beyers or even God Almighty, well, we will have bought and paid for it.”

  His voice softened. “I’m sorry. I guess this hasn’t been much of a marriage, has it?”

  “It has been a better one than most,” she said, pulling on his nose. “Remember the good times. That restaurant you took me to.”

  “Die Koffiehuis.”

  “They asked me afterward whether you meant it when you said you would bum the place down if the meal wasn’t perfect.”

  “I probably did. I was so nervous.”

  “You were and I was. Here we both are nervous again. Just hold me.”

  He did. He asked, “Who have you talked about this with?” “Albert and Anton.” She put her fingers over his mouth. “They both agreed it was the only way. I knew if I came to you first, I would never be able to go through with it. Anton thinks that the sooner I go, the better chance we have. I won’t see Hans and Katrina and Isaac, so you will have to tell them.” Once Bruwer got over the shock of meeting a “Bantu,” she had come to like Isaac Wanjau very much, and she was the only person alive who called Kasha Vladimirovna by her given name, Katrina.