The Revolution Trade (Merchant Princes Omnibus 3)

by Charles Stross

  Finally satisfied with his appearance, Dr. ven Hjalmar walked to the door and opened it an inch. ‘I’m ready to go,’ he said quietly.

  Of the two stout, silent types standing guard, one remained impassive. The other ducked his head, obsequious – or perhaps merely polite in this society; Griben was no judge of strange mores – and shuffled hastily towards the end of the corridor.

  The doctor retreated back to his room to wait. These were dangerous times, to be sure, and he had nearly fallen foul of muggers on his way here as it was; the distinction between prison guard and bodyguard might be drawn arbitrarily fine. In any case, the Lees had done him the courtesy of placing him in a ground-floor room with a window overlooking a walled garden; unless Clan Security was asleep at the switch and the Lees had been allowed to set up doppelgänger installations, he was free to leave should he so choose. Of course, that might simply be yet another of their tests . . .

  There was a knock; then the door opened. ‘Good afternoon, Doctor.’

  Ven Hjalmar nodded affably. ‘And the same to you, sir.’ The elders were clearly taking him seriously, to have sent James Lee to conduct him to this meeting. James was one of the principal heirs. One-quarter ethnic Han by descent, he wouldn’t have raised any eyebrows in the other Anglische world: but the politics of race and ethnicity were very different here, and the Lee family’s long sojourn on the west coast of the Clan’s world among the peasants of the Middle Empire had rendered them conspicuous in the whitebread northeast of New Britain. ‘Chinee gangsters’ was perhaps the nicest term the natives had for them, and despite their considerable wealth they perforce kept a low profile – much like Griben himself. ‘I trust it is a good afternoon?’

  ‘I’ve had worse.’ Lee held the door open. ‘The elders are waiting to hear your proposal in person, and there’s always the potential for – misunderstandings, in such circumstances. But we are all men of goodwill, yes?’

  ‘Yes.’ Ven Hjalmar nodded. ‘And we all hold valid insurance policies. After you, no, I must insist . . .’

  *

  The Lee family had fallen out of contact with the rest of the Clan most of two centuries ago – through betrayal, they had thought, although the case for cock-up over conspiracy was persuasive – and in that time they had come to do things very differently. However, some aspects of the operation were boringly familiar: an obsession with the rituals of hierarchy, pecking order, and tiresome minutiae of rank. As with the Clan, they relied on arranged marriages to keep the recessive genetic component of the world-walking trait strong. Like the Clan, they had fractured into a loose formation of families, first and second cousins intermarrying, with a halo of carriers clinging to their coat-tails. (Again, like the Clan, they practiced a carefully controlled level of exogamy, lest inbreeding for the world-walking trait reinforce other, less desirable ones.) Unlike the Clan, Mendelian genetics had made a late arrival – and actual modern reproductive genetics as practiced in the clinics of America was an unknown black art. Or so ven Hjalmar believed; in fact, he was betting his life on it.

  *

  ‘Speak to me of this breeding program,’ said the old man on the mattress.

  Ven Hjalmar stared at his beard. It straggled from the point of his chin, wispy but not too wispy, leaving his cheeks bare. Is that spirit gum? he wondered. The cheeks: There was something unnatural about their smoothness, as if powdered, perhaps to conceal the pattern of stubble. It would make sense perhaps, in an emergency, to be able to shed the formal robes, queue, and beard, to dissolve in the crowd . . . ‘It was established by the Clan’s security division a generation ago,’ he said slowly. ‘Normally the, the braid of marriages is managed by the elder womenfolk, matchmakers. But with a civil war only just dying down, the Clan’s numbers were diminished drastically.’ It was surprisingly easy to slip into the habit of speaking of them as a third party, as them not us. Another creeping sign of exile.

  ‘In America, to which they have access, medical science is very much more advanced than in the Gruinmarkt – or in New Britain. Childless couples can make discreet use of medical services to arrange for a child to be born, with one or other parent’s genes’ – he used the alien word deliberately, throwing it into conversation without explanation – ‘to the wife, or to a host mother for adoption. The duke came to an arrangement with such a clinic, to discreetly ensure that a number of such babies were born with the ability to pass on the world-walking gene to their own offspring. Records were kept. The plan was to approach the female offspring, as adults, and offer to pay them to be host mothers – paid handsomely, to bear a child for adoption. A child who would, thanks to the clinic, be a true world-walker, and be fostered by the Clan.’

  The old lady to the right of the bearded elder tugged her robe fastidiously. Despite the cultivated air of impassivity, the stench of her disapproval nearly made the doctor cough. ‘They are unmarried, these host mothers?’ she asked querulously.

  Ven Hjalmar nodded. ‘They do things very differently in the United States,’ he added.

  ‘Ah.’ She nodded; oddly, her disapproval seemed to have subsided. Must be some local custom . . . He took note of it.

  ‘As you can imagine, the Clan’s, ah, matchmakers’ – he’d nearly said old women but caught himself at the last moment – ‘did not know of this scheme. It undermined their authority, threatening their rank and privilege. Furthermore, if it went to completion it would hugely undermine the noble families, for these new world-walkers would be brought into the Clan by the duke’s security apparatus, with no hereditary ties to bind them to the braids. The scheme found favor with the radical reformers who wished to integrate the Clan more tightly into America, but to those of us who had some loyalty to the old ways’ – or who preferred to be bigger fish in a smaller pond – ‘it was most suspicious.’

  The old man – Elder Huan, James Lee had whispered in his ear as they approached the chamber – nodded. ‘Indeed.’ He fixed ven Hjalmar with a direct and unwavering gaze that was entirely at odds with the image he had maintained throughout the audience up to this point, and asked, ‘What do you want of us, Doctor?’

  Ven Hjalmar did a double take. ‘Uh, well, as a doctor, the duke commanded my attendance. I obeyed, with reservations; however, I consider myself to be released from his service by the occasion of his death. The family loyalists and the radicals are currently tearing each other apart. I come to you in the hope that you might better exercise the wisdom needed to guide and integrate a generation of new world-walkers.’ He paused. ‘I do not have the list of host mothers on my person, and indeed it would be no use to you without a physician licensed to practice in the United States – which I happen to be. There will be expenses, and it will take some time to set up, but I believe my identity over there is still secure. And I have in any case taken steps – ’

  Elder Huan glanced sideways at the sour-faced old woman. ‘Aunt Mei?’

  Aunt Mei sniffed. ‘Get to the point, boy. We don’t have all day!’ Elder Huan produced a pocket watch from one sleeve of his robe and glanced at it. ‘You are trying to sell us something. Name your price.’

  Sweat broke out on Griben’s hands. Not so Chinese, he realized. Either that, or the directness was a snub, unconscionable rudeness to someone of professional rank. ‘I can give you world-walking babies,’ he finally admitted. ‘I will have to spend some time and considerable money in the United States, and it will take at least eighteen months to start – this can’t be hurried, not just the pregnancies but the appearance of legitimate medical practice – but once the operation is up and running, I can deliver up to fifty new world-walkers in the first two years, more later.’ Lots more with harvested eggs and sperm and an IVF clinic; times had moved on since the first proposal to use AID and host mothers. ‘The money . . . I believe on the order of two million US dollars should cover start-up costs, and another hundred thousand per baby. That would be eight thousand pounds and eight hundred pounds. You’ll need to build a small shipping operat
ion along similar lines to the Clan’s to raise the money – but you have the advantage of being utterly unknown to and unsuspected by the federal agencies. If you stay out of their exact line of business you should thrive.’

  Aunt Mei’s eyes narrowed. ‘And your price?’ she asked.

  It was now or never. ‘I want somewhere to live,’ he said. ‘My patron is dead, the Clan is in turmoil, and I doubt their ability to survive what is coming. I know the Americans – I’ve worked among them for years – the Gruinmarkt will not be safe. If the loyalist faction wins, they will try to continue as before, a big mistake. If the progressives win . . . they’ll want to live here.’ He smiled, as ingratiatingly as he could. ‘We are distant cousins. Can we put past misunderstandings behind us and work together? Consider me a test case.’

  ‘You ask of us accession to our family,’ declared Aunt Mei. ‘Money and status besides, but principally refuge from your enemies.’ She turned and nudged Elder Huan. ‘Is that all?’ She sounded mildly scandalized.

  Elder Huan stared at ven Hjalmar. ‘Is that all, indeed?’ he echoed ironically. ‘You would betray your own family . . . ?’

  ‘They betrayed me!’ Ven Hjalmar was beyond containment. ‘I was placed in an intolerable position! Obey the duke and earn the undying hatred of a woman who was to be married to the heir to the throne, or disobey the duke and – well!’ He swallowed. ‘I gather there is a curse: May you come to the attention of important people. At first it looked like a simple problem to solve. The girl was an idiot, naive, and worse, was poking her nose into places it did not belong. But then the civil war started, the duke was incapacitated, and she . . . well. My household was destroyed in the war: My parents are dead, I have no brothers or sisters. What is a man at the end of his affairs to do?’

  There it was, on the table. Spun as neatly as he could manage, admittedly, no hint that his own actions had been motivated by anything but the purest obedience to his elders and betters; but soon there would be no one alive to gainsay his account. (The duke was reliably dead, and as for the dowager Hildegarde, she had followed the most insane imaginable ‘strategy of tension’ with the Americans, obviously lacking even the remotest idea of the magnitude of their inevitable response – she would follow him soon, and certainly long before she’d move to New Britain, of that he was certain.) Robard sweated some more, waiting for the elder Huan to give some indication of his thoughts. Then, after a moment, the elder inclined his head, and looked at Aunt Mei. ‘As you will.’

  Aunt Mei looked at ven Hjalmar. ‘We shall consider your proposal,’ she said. ‘Such matters are best decided on after full discussion: You may enjoy our hospitality while we search for consensus. But I shall tell you this minute that if we agree with it, there will be another price you must pay.’

  ‘Another . . . ?’ Ven Hjalmar was at a loss.

  ‘Yes.’ A crinkling around her eyes that hinted at amusement. ‘If you are to stay with us, you will have to find a wife.’ She clapped her hands. ‘Nephew.’ James Lee bowed. ‘Take the doctor back to his room.’

  *

  Erasmus Burgeson strode through the portico of the People’s Palace as if he owned it, his brown leather duster swinging around him. His usual entourage followed him – a pair of guards in the black peacoats and helmets of Freedom Riders, a stenographer and a pair of messenger boys to race his orders to the nearest telautograph, three secretaries and assistants. It was impossible to fart without his entourage recording the event and issuing a press release to reassure the masses that the commissioner of state propaganda had eaten a healthy breakfast and his bowels were in perfect working order. Such is the price of being on the winning side, he reminded himself whenever it became uncomfortable; the alternative – a short walk off the end of a long rope – was far less attractive.

  Just one month had wrought great changes. The pompous neo-classical building was crawling with Freedom Riders and guards from the newly formed Security Committee, checking passeportes and getting underfoot: but with some justification, for there had been three assassination attempts on members of the Radical government by Patriot renegades in the past week alone – one of them successful to the extent of having cost Commissioner of Industry Sutter half the fingers on one hand and the use of his left eye, not to mention a secretary and a bodyguard. Erasmus had made much of this shocking martyrdom, but it was hardly the most onerous fate the Patriot mob had in mind for any commissioner who fell into their hands, as the full gibbets in royalist-held Rio de Janeiro could attest.

  But the guards didn’t impede Burgeson’s progress through the entrance and up the stairs to the Avenue of Ministries; they stood aside and saluted with alacrity, their faces expressionless. It was only at the door to the receiving room that he encountered a delay: Commissioner of Security Reynolds’s men, of course. ‘Citizen Burgeson! You are expected, but your colleagues must identify themselves. Your papers, please!’

  Erasmus waited impatiently while the guards confirmed that his aides were indeed on the privileged list, then nodded amiably to the underofficer on door duty. ‘If you please?’ he asked. The man practically jumped to open the door, avoiding eye contact: Erasmus was of the same rank as the head of his entire organization. Erasmus nodded and, not waiting for his escort, walked through into the outer office. It was crammed with junior people’s commissioners and bureaucrats awaiting instruction, cooling their heels in the antechamber to the doctor’s surgery. Not pausing for idle chatter, Burgeson walked towards the inner door.

  A stout fellow who overtopped him by a good six inches stepped sideways into his path, blocking the doorway. ‘You can’t – ’ he began.

  Erasmus stopped and looked up at him. ‘Don’t you recognize me?’ It was genuinely curious, to be stopped by anyone – even a bruiser in the uniform of the Security Committee.

  The bodyguard stared down at Erasmus. Then, after a second, he began to wilt. ‘No sir,’ he admitted. ‘Is you expected by ’is citizenship this mornin’?’

  ‘Yes.’ Burgeson smiled, showing no teeth. ‘Why don’t you announce me?’

  The ability to intimidate secret policemen didn’t come easily or lightly to Erasmus; he still found it a thing of wonder as he watched the big bodyguard turn and push the door ajar to announce his arrival. He’d spent years in the camps, then more years on the run as a Leveler underground organizer in Boston, periodically arrested and beaten by men of this selfsame type, the attack dogs of power. It was no surprise after all these years to see these people rising in the armed wing of the revolutionary democratic cadres, and leaders like Reynolds gaining a certain reputation – especially in view of the unfolding crisis that had first provoked an abdication and then enabled the party to hold its coup – but it was a disappointment. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss: Erasmus remembered the Beckstein woman’s cynical bon mot. Then he dismissed it from his mind as the thug threw the door wide open before him and stood aside.

  ‘Hail, citizen.’ Sir Adam Burroughs smiled wearily at him as the door closed at his back. ‘Have you been keeping well?’

  ‘Well enough.’ Erasmus lowered his creaking limbs into one of the ornate chairs that faced Sir Adam’s huge, gilt-tooled leather-topped barge of a desk. And indeed, it was true: With the tuberculosis that had threatened to kill him cured by Miriam’s magic medicine, he felt like a new man, albeit a somewhat breathless one upon whose heels middle age was treading. ‘Drowning in paperwork, of course, but aren’t we all? My staff are just about keeping on top of the routine stuff, but if anything out of the ordinary comes up they need their reins held.’ Barely a square inch of Sir Adam’s desk was occupied, but that was one of the privileges of office: There was another, discreet servants’ door in the opposite wall, and behind it a pool of stenographers, typer operators, and clerks to meet his needs. ‘What can I do for you, citizen?’

  ‘It’s the French business.’ Sir Adam sounded morose. ‘I’ve asked Citizens Wolfe and Daly to join us in a few minutes.’ Wolfe was the commissio
ner for foreign affairs, and Daly was the commissioner for the navy: both cabinet posts, like Burgeson’s own, and all three of them – not to mention Sir Adam – were clinging on to the bare backs of their respective commissariats for dear life. Nobody in the provisional government knew much about what they were supposed to be doing, with the questionable exception of the Security Committee, who with gusto and zeal were going about doing unto others as they had been done by. Luckily the revolutionary cadres were mostly used to living on their wits, and Sir Adam was setting a good example by ruthlessly culling officials who showed more proficiency in filling their wallets than their brains. ‘We can’t put them off for any longer.’

  ‘What are your thoughts on the scope of the problem?’ Erasmus asked carefully.

  ‘What problem?’ Sir Adam raised one gray eyebrow. ‘It’s an imperialist war of attrition and there’s nothing to be gained from continuing it. Especially as His Former Majesty emptied the coffers and mismanaged the economy to the point that we can’t afford to continue it. The question is not whether we sue for peace, it’s how – ah, John, Mark! So glad you could join us!’

  So am I, Erasmus thought as the two other commissioners exchanged greetings and took their seats. Being seen to proceed by consensus on matters of state was vital – at this point, to take after the king’s authoritarian style would be the quickest way imaginable to demoralize the rank and file. ‘Are we quorate?’ he asked.

  ‘I believe so.’ Wolfe, a short, balding fellow with a neat spade-shaped beard, twitched slightly, a nervous tic he’d come out of the mining camps with – Erasmus had had dealings with him before, in Boston and parts south. ‘Is this about the embassy?’ he asked Sir Adam.

  ‘Yes.’ Sir Adam reached into a desk drawer and withdrew a slim envelope. ‘He insisted on delivering his preliminary list of demands to me, personally, “as acting head of state,” as he put it.’ He made a moue of distaste. Wolfe grunted irritably as Sir Adam slid the envelope across the desk towards him. ‘I don’t want to preempt your considered opinion, but I don’t consider his demands to be acceptable.’