Ben Bova: The Silent War

The truth was that Humphries wanted to live on the Moon, as far away as he could get from his coldly crusty father and the storm-racked world of his birth. So he built a mansion in the middle of his underground Eden, half of it taken up by research laboratories and botanical workshops, the other half an opulent home for none other than Martin Humphries.

The residential half of the mansion was big enough to take a couple of hundred guests easily. The big living room accommodated most of them, while others roamed through the formal dining room and the art galleries and outdoor patios.

Pancho headed straight for the bar built into the book-lined library, where she found Big George Ambrose with one hand wrapped around a frosty-looking beer mug, deep in intent conversation with a slinky, low-cut blonde. George was unconsciously worming a finger of his free hand in his collar, obviously uncomfortable in a tux. Wonder who did the bow tie for him, Pancho asked herself. Or maybe it’s a clip-on.

Grinning, Pancho worked her way through the chattering crowd and ordered a bourbon and ginger ale from one of the three harried-looking men working behind the bar. Dozens of conversations buzzed around her; laughter and the tinkle of ice cubes filled the big, beam-ceilinged room. Pancho leaned both her elbows against the bar and searched the crowd for Amanda. “Hey, Pancho!” Big George had disentangled himself from the blonde and pushed toward her, the crowd parting before him like sailboats scampering out of the way of a lumbering supertanker.

“How’re the bots bitin’, old gal?” George asked, in his surprisingly high, sweet tenor.

Pancho laughed. While she had worked for years to smother her West Texas accent as she climbed the slippery ladder of Astro Corporation, George’s Aussie argot seemed to get thicker every time she saw him.

“Some bash, isn’t it?” she shouted over the noise of the crowd.

George nodded enthusiastically. “ ’Nuff money in this room to finance a trip to Alpha Centauri.”

“And back.”

“How’s it goin’ with you, Panch?”

“No major complaints,” she lied, unwilling to talk about the missing freighters. “What’s new with the rock rats?”

“Closed down the last warehouse on Ceres,” George said. “Everything’s up in Chrysalis now.”

“You finally finished the habitat?”

“Naw, it’ll never be finished. We’ll keep addin’ to it, hangin’ bits and pieces here and there. But we don’t have to live down in the dust anymore. We’ve got a decent gravity for ourselves.”

Searching the crowd as she spoke, Pancho asked, “A full one g?”

“One-sixth, like here. Good enough to keep the bones producin’ calcium and all that.”

“You seen Mandy?”

George’s shaggy-bearded face compressed into a frown. “You mean Mrs. Humphries? Nope. No sign of her.”

Pancho could hear the scorn in the big redhead’s voice. Like most of the other rock rats, he loathed Martin Humphries. Is he sore at Amanda for marrying the Hump? Pancho wondered. Before she could ask George about that, Humphries appeared in the doorway that led to the living room, clutching Amanda by the wrist at his side.

She was splendidly beautiful, wearing a sleeveless white gown that hung to the floor in soft folds. Despite its slack cut, anyone could see that Amanda must be the most beautiful woman in the solar system, Pancho thought: radiant blond hair, a face that would shame Helen of Troy, the kind of figure that makes men and even other women stare in unalloyed awe. With a slight grin, Pancho noticed that Amanda’s hairdo, piled high atop her head, made her a centimeter or so taller than Humphries, even with the lifts he always wore in his shoes.

When Pancho had first met Humphries, more than a decade earlier, his face had been round and puffy, his body soft, slightly potbellied. Yet his eyes were hard, piercing gray chips of flint set into that bland face. Since he’d married Amanda, though, Humphries had become slimmer, straighter; his face thinned down, too. Pancho figured he had partaken liberally of nanotech therapies; no need for cosmetic surgery when nanomachines could tighten muscles, smooth skin, erase wrinkles. Those gray eyes of his were unchanged, though: brutal and ruthless.

“Can I have your attention, please?” Humphries called out in a strong baritone.

The room fell silent and everyone turned to face their host and hostess.

Smiling broadly, Humphries said, “If you can tear yourselves away from the bar for a minute, Amanda and I have an announcement to make, in the living room.”

The guests dutifully trooped into the living room. Pancho and George lingered at the bar, then at last followed the others. George even put his beer mug down. The living room was packed now with women in opulent gowns and dazzling jewelry, men in formal black attire. Peacocks and penguins, Pancho thought. Only, the women are the peacocks.

Despite the room’s great size it felt slightly uncomfortable with that many bodies pressed together, no matter how well they were dressed. Pancho’s nostrils twitched at the mingled scents of perfume and perspiration.

Humphries led Amanda by the hand to the grand piano in the middle of the spacious room, then climbed up on its bench. Amanda stood on the floor beside him, smiling, yet to Pancho’s eyes she looked uncomfortable, unhappy, almost frightened.

“My friends,” Humphries began.

Friends my blistered butt, Pancho said to herself. He hasn’t got any friends, just people he’s bought or bullied.

“It’s so good to see all of you here. I hope you’re enjoying yourselves.”

Some sycophant started clapping and in a flash the whole crowd was applauding. Even Pancho slapped her hands together a few times.

Humphries smiled and tried to look properly humble.

“I’m so glad,” he said. “I’m especially happy to be able to tell you our good news.” He hesitated a moment, savoring the crowd’s obvious anticipation. “Amanda and I are going to have a son. The exact delivery date hasn’t been determined yet, but it should be in late August.”

The women cooed, the men cheered, then everybody applauded and shouted congratulations. Pancho was tall enough to see past the heads bobbing in front of her. She focused on Amanda. Mandy was smiling, sure enough, but it looked forced, without a trace of happiness behind it.

The crowd formed an impromptu reception line, each guest shaking Humphries’s hand and congratulating him and the expectant mother. When Pancho’s turn came, she saw that Amanda’s china-blue eyes looked bleak, miserable.

She had known Amanda since they’d both been astronauts working for Astro Corporation. Pancho had been there when Mandy had first met Lars Fuchs, and when Fuchs proposed to her. They were old friends, confidants—until Amanda had married Humphries. For the past eight years she had seen Mandy only rarely, and never alone.

“Congratulations, Mandy,” Pancho said to her, grasping her hand in both of her own. Amanda’s hand felt cold. Pancho could feel it trembling.

“Congratulate me, too, Pancho,” said Humphries, full of smiles and good cheer. “I’m the father. She couldn’t have done it without me.”

“Sure,” Pancho said, releasing Amanda’s hand. “Congratulations. Good work.”

She wanted to ask him why it had taken eight years, but held her tongue. She wanted to say that it didn’t take skilled labor to impregnate a woman, but she held back on that, too.

“Now I’ve got everything a man needs to be happy,” Humphries said, clutching Amanda’s hand possessively, “except Astro Corporation. Why don’t you retire gracefully, Pancho, and let me take my rightful place as chairman of the Astro board?”