Pohl, Frederik - The Siege of Eternity

State Information Agency, Ukraine

"Background her later, Solly. Cut to the chase."

"Well, we haven't located the device yet, but now we have a problem, It's this Dr. Artzybachova. The irredentists have tried to kidnap her. So she's left the hospital and now she's holed up in her dacha with a few bodyguards she trusts because they're from old zek families-"

Hilda interrupted. "From what?"

"Families of old concentration-camp people. From the Gulag. People who served time with Artzybachova's grandfather; she knows the irredentists are after her, and the zek children are the only ones she trusts. Only we think one of her guards is actually a terrorist."

Hilda mulled that over for a moment. Then she turned to the deputy director. "That's tough for the old lady, but why do we care? The woman looked pretty much past it in Calgary."

"Fooled me too," Pell said sourly. "That's why I let the Canadians have her, but it looks like what was wrong with her was mostly missing her medications for a few months. Anyway, we can't let the mob have her. Do you happen to remember what her specialty was?"

"Instrumentation-oh."

"Exactly. Oh. She knows more about the freaks' instruments than anybody else who's human. Does she know enough to get some use out of that bug? I don't know, but I can't afford to find out the hard way. That's where you come in, Hilda. I'm putting you in charge."

She blinked at him. "Back in the field?"

"In the field? Hell, no, Hilda. Solly'll be the field manager, but I want you right here supervising, and-Hold it a minute."

His screen was flashing urgency. He turned it away from his guests and took a message. Then he looked up, furious. "The goddam French!" he snarled. "That was a flash from State. That mission Eurospace was planning to Starlab-they're going through with it. The French sent this note"-he glanced at the screen-"blah-blah, Freedom of the Skies treaty, blah-blah, is an abandoned satellite, blah-blah-blah. So they intend to launch within ten days."

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

With the space freaks gone-gone somewhere or other, no one seemed to be willing to say where-the safe house changed character. The uniformed guards disappeared. So did most of the interrogators, a fact which carried an attractive fringe benefit: Now there was less back-and-forth calling between the safe house and the Bureau headquarters, and so the Starlab people had a chance at the one secure line.

Dannerman lucked out. He got the first crack at the phone, and the person he was calling answered on the first ring. "Hello, honey," he said. "Looks like they're going to let us out of here pretty soon. Any chance of dinner tonight, maybe-tomorrow at the latest?"

There turned out to be a very good chance. Anita Berman was a forgiving soul, and besides she had been watching the news like everybody else. "I've really missed you, Dan," she said, sounding as loving as ever.

"And I've missed you-I can't tell you how much," he said. Meaning it literally, too; because he was reluctant to say all the things he wanted to say to her with two of the Pats waiting impatiently for their turn at the phone.

Anita was saying, "Your voice sounds funny. Is everything all right?" Well, it undoubtedly did, and so did hers, but he couldn't tell her that it was because the secure line was chaos-encoded, and then decoded at the Bureau before being redirected to the open lines to New York. "Look, I have to get off the phone, but-" He looked over his shoulder, swallowed, said it anyway: "I love you."

He gave the nearest Pat a belligerent look as he hung up. She didn't return it. She had clearly been eavesdropping and the look she gave back to him was actually, well, affectionate; but as she took the phone all she said was, "Dan-Dan was calling you. It's about this French thing; he's in the library."

So he was, irritably switching channels. He looked up as Dannerman entered. "What French thing is Pat talking about?" Dannerman asked.

The President: "The presiding officer of the United Nations Council recognizes the honorable representative of Democratic Agrarian Albania."

Mr. T. Gabo: "Mr. Presiding Officer, what is the hurry? Why are we rushing to a judgment in this matter? The so-called Starlab satellite has remained in orbit for many years now. It will remain for many years more. Why must we proceed with such reckless haste to authorize a United Nations flight to secure and exploit this wonderful technological machinery which, we are told, will revolutionize our science?

"I will answer that question. The haste is due to the desperate hunger a few large powers have to secure these secrets for their own use, a gain from which most of our great 188 independent nations will be excluded. I say, go slow! I say, wait until the vast majority of the world's nations have time to catch up, so that we may all benefit from this treasure trove. My little country of Democratic Agrarian Albania is not rich, but we have our pride! And we do not choose to be excluded from our rightful participation in this endeavor."

-Proceedings of the General Assembly, Vol. XXVII, p 1122

His duplicate jerked a thumb at the screen. "See for yourself." That was how Dannerman learned about the Eurospace intention. He peered at the news story, read the French communiqué and then shrugged. "I guess the Bureau isn't going to like that."

Dannerman-with-a-Beard looked at him. "The Bureau? Is that all you think?"

"Is there something more to think?"

"You just don't get it, do you? You haven't seen the kind of stuff they've got on Starlab. What if the French let the Scarecrows in again?"

Dannerman objected, "I thought you smashed the whatever-it-is."

"Sure I did, as much as I could. But what if the French luck out and get it going again?"

Dannerman confronted his copy amiably. "Too many ifs to worry about right now," he said. "Anyway, there's nothing you and I can do about it, is there? And I've got other things on my mind, like getting home."

The other Dannerman sighed, then shrugged. "Which brings us to another problem," he said. "Whose home are we talking about? Yours or mine?"

That was a stopper. "Oh, right. I didn't think of that. Rita's room isn't really big enough for the two of us, is it?" Then he brightened. "Anyway," he said, "I don't think we have to worry about that right now, either, because for the next couple of nights I hope to be sleeping somewhere else."

"Uh-huh," the other said, and Dannerman was pleased to see that he looked faintly jealous.

From the door a tentative voice-Pat's voice-said, "Dan-Dan?"

Dannerman turned around, but it was the other one she was talking to. She looked perturbed. "Rosaleen's left the hospital in Kiev and they won't tell us where we can call her. Can you find out?"

"I'll give it a try," he said, and left them together. It took Dannerman a moment to figure out which Pat it was. They had settled on different-colored outfits from the safe house's stores to tell them apart: blue for the "real" Pat, a red shorts suit for Pat One, a sparkly golden sweater for pregnant Pat Five. This one was wearing a gray tailored jacket-therefore Patrice-and she was lingering. She seemed to want to say something that embarrassed her.

"What?" he asked encouragingly.

She cleared her throat. "It's just-Dan, listen. If you thought I was coming on to you-Well, hell, I was coming on to you. Can I explain?"

"You don't have to. He told me."

She bristled. "Oh, really? So what did he tell you exactly? -Well, never mind, what he said was the truth. When we were all in the deep stuff up there and he was the only decent human male around-all right, I admit I got a kind of a crush on him. Well, on you, if you know what I mean, because when I came off the Lander and saw you there I figured, hey, here's my chance to have a Dan-Dan of my own. But then I heard you talking to your girl-"