Эрик Флинт - The Service of the Sword

"Who's Usher?" asked Ogilve.

"One hell of a good Marine, I know that much," growled Lafitte. "I've never met him myself, but I've known two officers who served with him for a while on Terra." Lafitte chuckled. "Mind you, they said he drank like a fish and was hardly the model of a proper colonel. Even got into barroom brawls himself, now and then. But his troops swore by the man, and the officers I knew—good people, both of them—told me they'd be delighted to have him in a combat situation. Which"—the growl deepened—"is what matters."

"I do know him," Yuri said quietly. "Pretty well, once. It was a long time ago, but . . ."

His eyes rested with satisfaction on Usher's name. With even greater satisfaction, on Usher's title. Director, Federal Investigation Agency.

"What's the 'Federal Investigation Agency,' do you think?" asked Genevieve Chin.

"I'm not sure," Yuri answered, "but my guess is that Theisman—or Pritchard—decided to bust up StateSec and separate its police functions from its intelligence work. Thank God. And put Kevin Usher in charge of the cops. Ha!"

He practically did a little jig of glee. "Mind you, that's like putting a chicken in charge of the foxes. Kevin Usher—a cop, of all things! But he's a very very very tough rooster." He grinned at Major Lafitte. "Pity the poor foxes. I can't imagine who'd be crazy enough to pick a barroom brawl with him."

While he had been basking in the pleasure of seeing Kevin's name, Sharon had continued to read down the list. Suddenly, she burst into riotous laughter. Almost hysterical laughter, in fact.

"What's so funny?" asked Yuri.

Sharon, none too steady on her feet herself, took Yuri by the shoulders and more-or-less forced him into a seat on the bridge. "You need to be sitting down for the rest of it," she cackled. "Especially when you get to the names of the provisional sector governors."

Her finger jabbed at a line. "Take a look. Here's La Martine."

Yuri read the name of the new provisional governor.

"Prince in exile, indeed!" Sharon howled.

Radamacher hissed a command.

"Get Cachat. Get him up here. Now. "

When Cachat entered the bridge, Yuri strode up to him and slammed the list onto a nearby console.

"Look at this!" he commanded accusingly. "Read it yourself!"

Puzzled, Cachat's eyes went down the list. Quickly, scanning, the first time through. Then, as he read it slowly again, Yuri knew the truth. Knew it for a certainty.

The hard young fanatic was gone, by the end. There stood before the commissioner only a man of twenty-four, who looked years younger than that. A bit confused; very uncertain.

His dark eyes—brown eyes—were even wet with tears.

"You swine," Yuri hissed. "You treacherous dog. You lied to me. You lied to all of us. Best damn liar I've ever met in my life. You played us all for fools!"

He pointed the finger of accusation at the list.

"Admit it!" he shouted. "It was all a goddam act !"

"Was it?" asked Cachat softly, as if wondering himself. Then, he shook his head. "No, Yuri, I don't think so. I told you once—it's not my fault if you never want to believe me—that I swore an oath to the Republic . I've kept that oath. Kept it here in La Martine."

His voice grew firmer, less uncertain. "I was specifically entrusted by the Republic to ferret out and punish traitors. Of which the two greatest, for years, were Rob Pierre and Oscar Saint-Just. Who stabbed our revolution in the back and seized it for their own ends."

No uncertainty, now: "Damn them both to hell."

"How long?" Yuri croaked.

Cachat understood what he meant. "I've been a member of the opposition since Terra. Since almost the beginning of my career. Kevin Usher was the commander of the Marine unit stationed at our embassy there and he— Well. Let's say he took me in hand, and showed me the way out. After I'd seen enough that I couldn't stomach any more."

Suddenly, Cachat's face lit up with a smile. A real, honest-to-God smile, too, not the razor Yuri had seen a few times before. "Though not before putting me in the hospital."

He gave Sharon a half-apologetic nod of the head. "If it'll make any amends, Commissioner Justice, I can assure you that Kevin Usher gave me a worse beating than you suffered at my order."

He looked back at Yuri, and shrugged. A real shrug. "Not, I admit, as bad as the one you got. But I'm sorry, Yuri, even before I got here I had you tagged as the key to the situation, and I needed to protect you as much as possible. So I used, on a broad scale, the same simple tactic Kevin once used on me. Had you—Sharon—many of you—beaten in order to establish your innocence."

"Why didn't you tell us?" asked Major Citizen, half-whispering. "I mean—after Saint-Just died and it was all over? All these weeks . . ."

" Was it? 'Over,' I mean." Cachat's eyes were very dark. "I had no way of knowing what sort of regime was going to emerge. For all I knew, I was still going to have to continue as an oppositionist. But since I'd done everything I could to prepare La Martine for any eventuality—including the possibility of a restoration of the old regime—I needed to maintain my cover. It was my simple duty."

Every officer on the bridge was now staring at him. Precious few of the ratings seated at their stations were making any attempt to hide the fact that they were listening also.

Cachat frowned. "Why are you all looking so confused? You know how thoroughly I do my research. By the time I got to La Martine—it's a long trip—I was pretty sure I understood what was happening here. And what I needed to do. It didn't take more than a short time here to confirm it."

Of all the faces on the bridge, Major Lafitte's was the only one whose eyes weren't wide. As a matter of fact, they were narrow with suppressed anger.

"Why the hell did you order us to do your blood work?" he demanded. Glancing at Sharon. "Especially on our own commissioner. Best damn ship's commissioner any of us had ever served with."

"Don't be stupid, Major Lafitte!" snapped Cachat. The fanatic was back, it seemed. "The first thing I needed to do—"

He broke off sharply. Turned, and bestowed a hard gaze on one of the commo ratings. "Are the recorders on?"

Hastily—she didn't even think to look at the ship's captain—the rating pushed a button on her console. "Not any more, Sir."

Cachat nodded and turned back. "If you don't mind, Captain Wright, I'd prefer there to be no official record of this." He continued on, not waiting for the SD's CO to finish nodding his approval. "As I was saying, Major, don't be stupid. Jamka's insane rule—the results of it, I should say—had given me the opportunity to destroy the worst elements of Saint-Just's treason here in La Martine. Of course—"

He shrugged again; but, this time, it was the shoulder-twitch of old. "I had no way of knowing—never imagined it, in fact—that Admiral Theismann would shortly be overthrowing the traitor. But, no matter. My duty was clear. Sooner or later, Saint-Just's regime was bound to collapse. At the very least, start coming apart at the seams. No purely police state in history has ever survived for very long. So Kevin Usher told me, once, and I believe him. Saint-Just, without Rob Pierre, was bound to fall—and fairly quickly."

Usher's right, thought Yuri. Beria without Stalin didn't last for . . . weeks? I can't remember, exactly. Less than a year, that's for sure. Terror alone is never enough.

"It was therefore my clear duty to do what I could to prepare La Martine for the coming upheavals," Cachat continued. "Sanitize the sector, if you will. Jamka's murder provided me with the perfect opening, of course. But—to come back to the point, Major—doing so required me to enlist the aid of his killers immediately. Those were the only people I could count on for sure. Partly, of course, because their actions indicated their good character. But just as much because they'd see my presence as the surest way to cover their own tracks. Indeed, the quickest way to complete the mission they'd set out for themselves. I'm sure you'd planned—over time, of course—to execute everyone involved in Rating Quedilla's murder. Jamka was just the beginning."