“Yes,” Bleys said, “That’s something that won’t change. Part of the reason is that I can’t influence either the Dorsai or Exotic people the way I can those on other Worlds. Another part is the fact that if Dorsai and Exotics come to join us finally—as I hope they will, even if it’s several centuries from now—they’ll have come only because they themselves decided to. I could no more move them than I could move a True Faith-Holder, or a Fanatic, on Association or Harmony. What the Exotics live for and the Dorsai live for is beyond argument.”
“So”—Toni turned on her side in order to watch him as he lay, still staring at the starscape above—“what are you going to do next? Are you still planning to see next about gaining controlling influence on Sainte Marie?”
“I’m not sure,” Bleys said.
“It’s such a small world, largely Roman Catholic, mostly rural, with not much technology,” she said. “If time’s of the essence, as you kept saying when you were sick, wouldn’t you be better off turning next to building control on either Ceta or Freiland?”
“Partly to avoid a lot of bloodshed. In the case of Ceta, it’s still broken up into a number of small, independent countries. They’d need to be taken over one by one, and they’re quick to fight among themselves if any change is made in the balance of power among them. It would really be best to leave Ceta to be the last, so that they’d come into my family of New Worlds simply because they couldn’t afford to be left outside. As for Freiland—I was hoping to avoid it for the moment, if I could. I want to give Newton, Cassida and New Earth time to settle into the idea that they may be the only three that are closely tied together, and feel comfortable with me pulling strings on them from behind the curtain.”
“Coby,” said Toni, “could be almost more useful than Sainte Marie, even if it is smaller.”
“But it’s relatively unimportant in the larger balance of power—that among all the other New Worlds. My recruiting people there wouldn’t look so alarming to those on the Worlds I haven’t gone after yet,” he said. “Also…”
“Yes,” Toni said, when he did not go on, “also what?”
“It’s a little ridiculous.”
“You can’t be ridiculous with me.” Toni gave his fingers a slight squeeze.
“Well, then,” he said. “You know about Donal Graeme, who ended up Secretary for Defense of all our New Worlds, a century ago?”
“Of course,” she said. “As I know about Julius Caesar, Genghis Khan and Napoleon—probably more about Donal Graeme than those others, because he’s more recent in history.”
“You know he had twin uncles, Ian and Kensie Graeme?”
“Yes.”
“As I say, this will sound ridiculous, particularly from me. But, you remember that both Kensie and Ian were on Sainte Marie, and it was there that Kensie was assassinated?”
“I know the story. Yes,” Toni said.
“I read about it myself, when I was very young. So young, I was sneaking adult books because I’d outgrown the child books they’d given me. Another Dorsai, one of the Morgans who lived close to the Graemes at Foralie, wrote about it in his own casual autobiography. He was there, on Sainte Marie, in the Dorsai force hired by the Exotics to oppose some who were hired by revolutionaries on that world. An opposing force hired from our own Friendly Worlds. You remember that Ian and Kensie were twins; and how, suddenly, unexpectedly, Kensie was assassinated by the revolutionaries themselves, at a time when theoretically the opposing forces were at truce?”
“Oh, yes.”
“Well, that’s it,” Bleys said, his face still looking upward at the starscape. “As I say, I read it when I was very young; and something about Kensie’s death and what it meant to Ian touched me very deeply. Touched me for Ian, I mean. Ian, you see, was something like I’ve always been—isolated, at a distance from everyone but his twin brother. And then Kensie was killed, and Ian had to keep the mercenaries of his soldier force from going like avenging angels through the town where it happened, because everybody loved Kensie.”
Toni squeezed his hand again, but without saying anything.
“It seemed to me then—I was still with my mother, but I was old enough then to know she didn’t love me, she’d never loved me,” said Bleys. “—It seemed to me that I could feel what Ian must have felt losing Kensie. And that I could understand it only because I was like him. He was a dark man, you know. He stood apart from everyone; and he never said anything about Kensie’s death, or gave anyone a clue to his feelings. But I felt them.”
His voice hesitated, and once more Toni squeezed his hand reassuringly.
“Ridiculous, as I said,” Bleys went on. “But aside from everything else, that’s always been with me. I think—it’s just a feeling—but I feel that Ian will rest a little more quietly in his grave, once I’ve made sure that Sainte Marie will be one of the worlds where, in the long run, there’ll be no more assassinations—and no more assassins.”
Bleys was silent, and she let him be silent. But into that silence there came after a few moments, the chime of the phone on her wrist control pad. By mutual, almost telepathic understanding between the two of them, all speakers from the surrounding rooms, had been shut off. Bleys’ phone was shut off, and only Toni’s emergency channel remained alive. She had left word that Bleys was not to be disturbed under any circumstances, and she only in the greatest of emergencies. She reached to pick up the control pad from the small, table-float on her side of the bed and lifted it to her lips.
Bleys sat for a moment, looking neither at his wristpad nor at the starscape above, but just into the darkness.
“Great Teacher?” came Barbage’s voice. “Am I still connected to thee?”
“I’m here,” said Bleys. “If the Embassy has taken him in, there’s nothing I can do.”
“The Eldest could give special orders for us to go in,” said Barbage. “It is certain he is still there. We had Militia surrounding the Embassy within minutes; and the informer stayed, watching until the Militia came. He tells us no one had left but a tall, stout Exotic who is known as an accredited staff member. We need only thy word to help us go and get him.”
“No,” said Bleys in the same dead-level voice in which he had answered to begin with. “The Exotics are still a power between the stars. I can’t suggest to anyone in our government that we create an incident with them at this time. Consider Hal Mayne gone.”
“But, Great Teacher—”
“No,” said Bleys, “he is gone. Call off your Militia.”
He broke the connection, stripped off his wristpad and lay back down again. After a moment, Toni took off hers also and lay back down beside him. Bleys was lying still, staring at the starscape again, as if he were lost in it, and had forgotten not only the conversation, Barbage and Hal Mayne, but her as well.
Toni touched him very lightly with her fingertips on the skin of his upper right arm.
“Bleys?” she said very softly. “You would only have to say a word in McKae’s ear—”
“No,” said Bleys, without moving. “He’s gone off-world by now. That tall Embassy staff member would have been him. The Exotics could do that easily. There’s no use. It’s settled now. He’s not to be reached by me.”
Bleys said nothing more, and Toni waited; and when he said nothing more, she spoke again.
“Can you tell me?” she asked finally. “Why is he so valuable to you? What is there he can do for you that you can’t do without him? You’ve won New Earth, Cassida and Newton—everything you went for, without him. But you act as if you’d just lost—I don’t know. What was it you needed him for, that much?”
Bleys did not move. His gaze was wholly on the starscape, and nothing else.
“A friend,” he said.
with friends
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