Lois Bujold - Memory

Galeni's brows shot up; he wheeled to General Allegre, who nodded confirmation.

"As soon as those bioengineered prokaryotes were discovered," Miles went on, "Haroche lost his chance of his sabotage passing undetected, which I'm sure was his first-choice scenario. At that point, he had to have a goat. It didn't have to be a perfect goat, as long as he was able to generate enough fog to justify stopping the search for another. He disliked me, you had the right profile, he hit upon a way to take us both down at once. Sorry I made Delia keep you in the dark, but arresting the acting head of ImpSec in the middle of ImpSec HQ proved to be a bit tricky. I didn't want to make any promises till I was sure how it was going to come out."

Galeni's eyes were wide. "Forget . . . what I said."

"Does that include the part about resigning your commission?" Allegre asked anxiously.

"I … don't know. Why me? I'd never thought Haroche was particularly prejudiced against Komarrans. How much longer am I going to have to wade through this kind of crap, what more do they want from me to prove my loyalty?"

"I expect you'll be wading for the rest of your life," Illyan answered seriously. "But every Komarran who follows you will have less crap to deal with, because of you."

"You've come so far," Miles pleaded. "Don't let a cockroach like Haroche waste your sacrifices. The Imperium needs your perspectives. ImpSec particularly desperately needs your perspectives, because it's part of ImpSec's job to give much of the Imperial government its picture of the world. If we get straight truth in, maybe we've got half a chance of getting good judgment out. No damn chance otherwise, that's for sure."

Allegre seconded this with a nod.

"Besides"—Miles glanced at Delia, who was following all this in deep alarm—"Vorbarr Sultana is a very nice posting for any ambitious officer. Look at the people you meet here, for one thing. And the opportunities." Ivan nodded vigorously; Miles went on, "Um . . . not to interfere in ImpSec's internal business or anything, but I think the department of Komarran Affairs is going to need a new head man very soon." He glanced at Allegre. "The old one being about to inherit a much worse job, y'see."

Allegre looked startled, then thoughtful. "A Komarran, to head Komarran Affairs . . . ?"

"Radical," Miles purred, "but it just might work."

Both Allegre and Illyan gave him the same quelling look. Miles subsided.

"Besides," Allegre went on, "I think you're premature, Lord Vorkosigan. It's by no means assured that Gregor will confirm me as permanent chief of ImpSec."

"Who else is there?" Miles shrugged. "Olshansky isn't seasoned enough yet, and the Galactic Affairs head likes his old job very well, thank you. With this Imperial marriage coming up, at long last, your depth of experience in Komarran matters makes you nearly ideal, I'd say."

"Be that as it may." Allegre looked a little daunted; were the full implications just starting to seep in? "That's tomorrow's worry. I have enough for today. Gentlemen, will you excuse me. I think I had better start with a quick survey of Haroche's . . . Illyan's … of whatever's waiting in the in-file of that comconsole upstairs. And . . . and a meeting of department heads, to apprise them of, hm, events. Any suggestions, Simon?"

Illyan shook his head. "Carry on. You'll be fine."

"Duv," Allegre continued to Galeni, "at least go home and get dinner, and a good night's sleep, before you make any important decisions, will you promise me that?"

"All right, sir," said Galeni, in a neutral tone. Delia squeezed his hand. He had not loosened his grip upon her, Miles noticed, the whole time they'd been standing there talking. He wasn't risking letting this one get away. Once he relaxed a bit, he would perhaps realize that it would take at least four large men with hand-tractors to pry her off his arm. Foolhardy large men. Ivan, noting this byplay at last, frowned faintly.

"Do you wish to report to Gregor first, my Lord Auditor, or shall I?" Allegre added.

"I'll take care of it. You should check in with him as soon as you've triaged your situation upstairs, though."

"Yes. Thank you." They exchanged sketchy salutes, and Allegre hurried out.

"Are you calling Gregor now?" asked Galeni.

"Right from here," Miles said. "It's urgent I let him know what's happened, since I couldn't give him any hint of it earlier. The ImpSec chief's office monitors all of his communications."

"When you do . . ." Galeni glanced at Delia, and away, though his grip on her hand tightened again, "will you be sure to … will you please ask him to be sure to let Laisa know that I am no traitor?"

"First thing," Miles promised. "My word on it."

"Thank you."

Miles detailed a guard to make sure Galeni and Delia got to the outer door without any last-straw harassment, and lent Delia the use of Martin and the groundcar to convey them to Galeni's nearby flat. Miles retained Ivan, spiking Ivan's ingenuous offer to see Galeni settled and take Delia on to her home by pointing out that Ivan's groundcar was still parked at Ops HQ. Then he booted the duty officer from his comconsole station and took it over. Illyan drew up another station chair by his side to look on. Miles entered a particular code-card into the comconsole's read-slot.

"Sire," Miles said formally, when Gregor's upper body appeared over the vid plate; the emperor was wiping his mouth with a dinner napkin.

Gregor's brows twitched up at the officiality; Miles had all his attention. "Yes, my Lord Auditor. Progress? Problems?"

"I'm finished."

"Good God. Ah . . . would you care to elaborate on that?"

"You'll get all the details"—Miles glanced aside at Illyan—"in my report, but briefly, you're out one provisional chief of ImpSec. It was never Galeni. It was Haroche himself. I figured out that the prokaryote vector encapsulations had to be trapped in the air filters."

"Did he confess this?"

"Better. We caught him trying to switch the filter in his old office, which was where he'd apparently dosed Illyan."

"I … take it this event did not occur by chance."

Miles s lips drew back in a wolfish grin. "Chance," he intoned, "favors the prepared mind, as somebody or another said. No. Not by chance."

Gregor sat back, looking very disturbed. "He delivered my ImpSec daily report to me in person just this morning, and all the time, he knew. … I was almost ready to confirm him as ImpSec's permanent chief."

Miles's lips twisted. "Yeah. And he would have been a good one, almost. Look, um … I promised Duv Galeni I would have you tell Laisa he was no traitor. Will you redeem my word for me?"

"Of course. She was extremely distressed by last nights scene. Haroche's explanations threw us all into the most painful doubt."

"Lucas always was smooth," murmured Illyan.

"Why did he do it?" asked Gregor.

"I have a great many questions I still want answers to before I sit down to assemble my report," said Miles, "and most of them seem to start with why. It's the most interesting question of all."

"And the hardest to answer," Illyan warned. "Where, what, how, who; for those I could at least sometimes make physical evidence speak. Why was almost theological, and often proved beyond my scope."

"There's so much that only Haroche can tell us," said Miles. "But we can't use fast-penta on the bastard, mores the pity. I think . . . we might get something out of him, if we hit him tonight, while he's still off-balance. By tomorrow, he'll have recovered his considerable wits, and be demanding a military defender, and standing pat. No … not we. It's clear he hates my guts, though once again why . . . Simon, can you . . . are you up to running an interrogation for me?"