The Domination, page 69
“Quiet!” Lebrun said. Marya opened the door again and looked quickly up and down the corridor.
“And I know something that you perhaps do not. Master Edward mentioned it to that slut Yasmin, while he was violating me the other night. An Alliance submarine was spotted off Nantes just the day before yesterday, and the Draka cannot find it. That is how the American and the Boche are to escape. Well, I am going too! You thought you could keep me in ignorance, I who was arrested and tortured for Resistance work as well, leave me here to be a beaten drudge and whore, I am going too.”
“Oh, Chantal,” Marya said softly. There was mourning in her voice, and Lebrun met her eyes with a like sadness. They nodded slightly at each other, one thought in their minds. She knows too much.
“Chantal, child of God, believe me, only the American and the scientist are leaving,” Marya said. “I swear it by Father, Son and Holy Ghost, on my hope of salvation.”
Chantal’s fists clenched. “You may stay and be a martyr, I have done enough.”
The nun closed her eyes in pain. “As you wish it, Chantal,” she said. “We are to send a radio message, then you will come with us to the shelter in Bourgueil, where the . . . courier from the coast will take you to a boating dock, upriver.”
Lebrun stiffened in shock, then looked at the sickened, weary face of the Pole and understood; away from the Great House, to where the armed Resistance fighters were. Amid rubble where one more hidden body would be a little matter. Marya crossed herself and spoke softly in Latin. Which he understood and Chantal did not, although he knew he was not the Person she addressed:
“And Caiaphas said, is it not expedient that one man should die for the people?”
Lebrun replied sharply, in the same language: “And if your eye offends you, pluck it out.”
“Truly,” she sighed, crossed and took Chantal’s hands with a smile. “It would be better if you had not tried to force our hand so, Chantal. So much better. But I understand, truly, and with all my heart I forgive you.”
There was absolute sincerity in her voice, on the square homely face. Lebrun looked at it and shivered, knowing it was true, knowing it would be equally true in the moment Marya pulled the trigger. God protect me from the truly righteous, he thought, then almost laughed to himself at the unintentional irony. There were times when he congratulated himself on the sheer convenience of skepticism.
“Do you understand, Sister?” Chantal said, the anger still in her tone. She disengaged her hands. “What you were afraid of happened to me, over and over, for weeks, I had to . . . to do . . . and now I’m pregnant,” she spat. “Pregnant by that swine, but I’ll never bear it, never stay here to be a sow farrowing little slaves. Never.”
For a moment Lebrun felt only a detached sympathy. Then his eyes flashed to Marya’s face, appalled, and saw her go pasty-white beneath her tan. Inwardly he was cursing himself for the quotation he had chosen, remembering the first lines of it: “Whoso shall offend one of these little ones . . . it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck and that he were drowned in the depths of the sea . . . ” Knowing that she would have thought of it herself, that no argument on earth short of a direct pronouncement by the Pope speaking ex cathedra would convince her that Chantal was not carrying a human soul beneath her heart. And that she was as incapable of harming what she considered a blameless child as she was of defiling the Host or committing necrophilia.
Well, the one-time professor of anthropology and ex-soldier thought. His eyes rested on Chantal’s triumphant form with detached appraisal. She’s stronger than I am in this state. It will have to be from behind, and quick, before the Sister can intervene. She’ll accept it once done.
Kustaa found himself surprised at how mild the banquet’s entertainment was, nothing like the propaganda; of course, this was an important occasion, and a conservative family. The food was good enough that his first concern, how to force enough into a tension-tight belly to avoid being conspicuous, turned out to be misplaced. Watch it, old son, he told himself. Not good to be stuffed before action. He looked around the hollow square of tables, snowy linen, the glitter of crystal and silverware and bone china. More formal than the afternoon; the men in dark evening suits with lace stocks or uniforms, the women out of uniform, all in draped classical-style gowns that left one shoulder bare.
Light from the globes, and from burning cressets hung between, as well; the Draka liked to see what they were eating, not grope by candlelight. Seafood, appetizers, soup, fish, a main course of roast suckling pig, salads, vegetables, while the chamber group played soft Mozart and he listened to the conversations; Andrew and Vashon rehashing their efforts to track him down, the female aeronautical engineer at his side explaining the long-term potential of hydrogen-fueled ramjets and lamenting the difficulty of modeling high-speed airflows; the Landholders and their close kin discussing weather and crops in words that might almost have been the ones he grew up among in the rural Midwest.
He raised a glass of wine and pretended to sample the bouquet; an act, it all smelled and tasted like spoiled grape juice to him. He was strictly a beer-whiskey-and-aquavit man. He noticed nobody was getting more than mildly tipsy, or stoned on the kif that was also on tap. Well, they are health fanatics to a man, he mused. It might almost have been a very tony Long Island gathering at home, except for the costumed mime-dancers who enacted the legend of Leda and the Swan. They were dark women, with the bodies of ballerinas; professionals from the older territories, considering the length of time those skills must take to learn. The swan wings and mask of the one playing Zeus transformed were really lovely—feathers and jewels and delicate gold work—but then, this was not a society that went in for mass-production of anything but weapons and the cheapest consumer goods; it could afford artisanship.
The dance ended behind a covering of downswept ten-foot wings; the whole done with delicacy rather than gross explicitness, even erotic in a sort of eerie way. He noticed that Vashon had fallen silent to watch it with a burning intensity, and stacked away the datum for the OSS files. The mimes rose, bowed low, ran off in a flutter of feathers and long hair. That was after the tables had been cleared, set with coffee and liqueurs and nuts. Kustaa recognized the singers who came forward next, but was surprised by the sudden silence that fell as they stepped out before the musicians. He did not think it was for their looks, or not mostly; it was simply that they saw no point in having fine music unless they were going to listen.
Tasteful bastards, he thought, inhaling the aroma of the Kenya coffee, this time with genuine appreciation. May they rot in hell.
“My Masters,” Solange said with a graceful curtsy. “For your pleasure, we shall present a duet from the opera Lakme, by Delibes, with modified string and woodwind accompaniment of my own adaptation.”
Kustaa had never enjoyed classical opera much: too many fat ladies in odd clothes screeching, despite the valiant attempts of his mother, who had a dogged self-improving Scandinavian regard for capital-C culture, and Aino, who had dragged him to a fair number in New York after they moved to the capital. The Frenchwoman stepped forward and opened her mouth, and the OSS agent prepared for yet another run-through of the thousand ways the extraction could go wrong. Sound wove its way through the threads of his mind, unraveling. His eyes opened in shock, to see a face transformed into something beyond beauty, a purity of self-absorption as complete as the music that poured effortlessly from that quivering throat, wove around the deeper notes of the other voice, returned . . .
He blinked himself back to awareness as Solange and Yasmin walked the circuit of the table, hand in hand, bowing and flushing at the long sharp ripple of applause. Some of the guests even rose to clap as they went by, and a standing ovation was not something Draka did casually. At last the two came to the head table before their owners; there they sank gracefully to their knees and made the full bow, palms before eyes. The clapping continued, louder, directed to the Landholders now, congratulating them on possessions beyond price. What a waste, Kustaa thought angrily as the singers and musicians withdrew. What a total, fucking waste. It was obscene, far more than the unclothed dancers.
A deep breath, and another; he would have to listen to the first of the after-dinner speakers, at least. It was the retired Field-Marshal who rose, propping a cane against his chair. There was a murmur from the tables, then silence once more. He stood for a moment scanning them thoughtfully, a steady appraising stare.
“I am the eldest von Shrakenberg present,” he said abruptly. “As we’re here to celebrate the reinforcement of the Race by two of the youngest, it’s appropriate that I speak.” A smile. “Although I can’t promise to be as melodious as what we’ve just heard.” There was laughter, and a general settling-in rustle.
“I was born,” the elderly Draka continued, “in 1882. This would be a good occasion to reflect on the changes my lifetime has seen. When I received my commission, the Domination was still officially the Dominion of the Draka, part of the British Empire. We ruled all of Africa, but no more; the British still thought of us as a subject-ally. Europe,” he added with a shark’s smile, “was just beginnin’ to worry about us. Many of the institutions you’re all familiar with were in their infancy; I can remember when the thought of women bearin’ arms would have seemed fantastical. Why, I can remember old men usin’ ‘white’ and ‘black’ as synonyms fo’ Citizen and serf. A different world.”
The scored eagle face swept around the tables. “Now everythin’ since seems . . . inevitable. I can tell you, we didn’t think so at the time! We were afraid of the Europeans, fo’ example. No, don’t look shocked, it’s fact. They were all openly set on subvertin’ our institutions, and they were stronger than us. We were afraid.” A grin. “The Yankees were just a cloud on the horizon. There were those, Draka among them, who thought our overthrow was just a matter of time. And they had a good case, on purely logical grounds.
“We all know what happened in the Great War; I was blown up over Constantinople, makin’ it happen.” He slapped the stiffened leg. “We saw our enemies’ weakness, and we struck. Then words like ‘world conquest’ and ‘Final Society’ started to look more credible. The mo’ sober worried that we’d be drunk with success, with victory disease. Europe was still the stronger, if only it would unite against us, despite the vast conquests we made. Japan, Germany, Russia threatened our new northern and eastern borders.
“And”—he held up his hands—“here we stand, in the heart of Europe, here in France. Where are the children of the men who befo’ 1914 calmly sat to debate how ‘enlightenment’ and ‘reform’ would be forced on the primitive Draka, how they could bring us ‘democracy’? In graves from here to China, workin’ in our fields and kitchens, laborin’ in mines and factories to build our power, singin’ fo’ our pleasure after this excellent dinner, and”—he crooked a sardonic eyebrow at the owners of the plantation—“servin’ pleasure in other capacities. Soon enough, fightin’ and dyin’ fo’ us. Doesn’t this seem like the unfoldin’ of Destiny, the sacred destiny of the Race?
“Horseshit!” The speaker’s fist crashed down, and Kustaa saw startlement replace bored agreement on many faces. “We won because we were tough, and prepared . . . because we were lucky enough to have enemies who’d fight each other—rather than us. This land here is already a breedin’ ground fo’ Draka; I won’t make the usual tiresome references to the reproductive habits of digger wasps. If you young people plan to extend their Domination, you’ll have to be twice as tough, twice as disciplined as we were. We can still lose it all. Never forget that, never. Every day we live, we live on the edge of oblivion. It’s up to you, the young. Rule or die, kill or be killed, crush or be crushed. Always on guard fo’ opportunity, takin’ what we can, never relinquishin’ an inch.
“Destiny is what we make it. Service to the State!”
The guests came to their feet in a sustained roar.
“Glory to the Race!” It crashed out like thunder, broke into a spontaneous chant that lasted for minutes before dying out into self-conscious laughter and a rising buzz of conversation once more.
Short and to the point, Kustaa thought behind his grin, looking up at the lights in the upper room of the tower. Let’s see how you like being on the receiving end, you evil old bastard. He had a perfect excuse, too. One hour more, and he could call. He rose, bowed to the center of the head table. Tanya von Shrakenberg’s head came up, and returned the gesture with a wave.
“A good evenin’ to you, Mr. Kenston,” she said. “Just tellin’ Uncle Karl here that he should go into politics, but some things are even mo’ urgent, eh?” Slyly: “And don’t let her convert you.”
Good-natured laughter followed him. He smiled, nodded as he walked toward the glass wall on the inner side of the terrace. For a moment he halted beneath, stared up at the glowing backlit shape of the Drakon. Fuck you, snake, he thought, and pushed through. Behind him, the lambent yellow eyes stared sightlessly out over the darkened fields.
The sounds of the waters outside her hull were the loudest things that could be heard in the control center of the Benito Juarez. Whale song, mysterious clicks and pings and creaks. Occasionally the distant throbbing of engines, once or twice the hard ringing of a sound-detection scanner.
“2100,” the horse-faced OSS controller said.
The captain nodded to a tech-5 at a console. “Up buoy, stand by to monitor,” he said softly. Theoretically a normal speaking voice was no threat, but pigboaters had a superstitious reverence for “silent running,” and the attitude of mind was one valuable enough to encourage. The man nodded, depressed a switch.
Guzman strained his ears, but only imagination could supply the sound of the float inflating, rising out through the flooded hatchcover, with its spool of wire playing out carefully behind. Breaking surface with an inaudible splash, invisibly black against black water, no more metal than the cable itself and so near-invisible to electrodetectors, nothing for their microwaves to reflect from. Not much risk. The quick throbbing of destroyer screws had not been heard since they settled to the bottom.
The radio operator clamped on his headset, twisted dials. Time passed; Guzman brought out a stick of mint-flavored chicle, offered it to the agent, grinned to himself as the man refused with a repressed shudder. Not a gringo custom, but more comfortable for a submariner than tobacco; although he had to admire the way the yanqui waited without a twitch as the minutes dragged: most of the bridge watch were fidgeting and glaring at the unfortunate able seaman like buzzards around a dying donkey. The captain himself planned to turn in as usual when his watch ended; this would be the first vigil of many.
Time passed. Guzman looked at his watch: 2115. Ten more minutes until—
“Contact,” the radioman whispered. “Contact on the assigned frequency, sir.”
The OSS man crossed to the radioman’s seat in two strides, took the headphones and listened; his face was still impassive, but the blue lights glistened across the wet skin of his forehead. His right hand went out, and the operator shoved the pad and pencil beneath it. He jotted without looking down, waited.
“They’re repeating,” he said. “Prepare to send confirmation.”
The operator looked up at Guzman, unconsciously touching his tongue to his lip. The dark officer took the wad of chicle out between thumb and forefinger, considered it for an instant. Now the danger began. The jaguar is in the jungle, he thought.
“Do it, sailor,” he said calmly, and replaced it, chewing stolidly.
The OSS man took the microphone, spoke slowly and distinctly. “The caa is in the paaak,” he said, just once. A slow smile spread over his mouth as he looked up at Guzman.
“Two men and a treasure chest coming back, Captain,” he said in his nasal Bay State twang.
Guzman surprised himself; he saluted, and took the agent’s hand. “He is a man, that one,” he said quietly; then thought of this dry stick of a spy flying low and slow up the Loire, over the Domination’s defenses, landing with nothing more than a sidearm and risking capture by a people to whom mercy was scarcely even a word. “And so are you.”
To the exec: “Number two, maintain silent running drill; all hands to action stations, prepare to take her up.” Ten minutes on the surface, to unpack and launch the bird. Two hours waiting at periscope depth for the return, and then the hideous risk of a radio beacon.
We’re all going to be, he thought. Or dead.
“Nobody here!” Solange sang, as she and Yasmin came out onto the terrace. The lights had been extinguished and the tables stripped, shadows washed across the yellow marble of the floor, and the air had begun to take on the cool spicy smell of late night in the dog days of summer. The Frenchwoman sang again, a wordless trill, and danced out into the open space, whirling the other serf by the hands until she pulled them to a halt, laughing herself in dizzy protest.
“They loved us, me, wheee!” Solange sang again, giggling. “Did you hear them applaud, did you see their faces?. Mistress says I’ll be in demand for appearances all up and down the river; maybe she’ll even send me to the city for more training, maybe even to Archona, and they’ll make recordings.” She spun, arms high. “And I’ll perform before the Archon, and people will offer Mistress millions for me and she’ll laugh at them!”
“Solange, honeybunch, you drunk an’ on more than wine ‘n’ smoke. Calm down, maybeso it happen that way an’ maybeso no—mmph!”
Solange had stopped her mouth with a kiss, and when she released her, Yasmin was laughing again herself.
“That nice,” she said. “But I’ve got anothah engagement, Solange darlin’, an’ he impatient. See you t’morrow, and doan’ dance the whole night away.”
Yasmin left, and Solange laughed more quietly; she began dancing by herself, singing wordlessly under her breath, until she saw the glow of a cigarette tip by the far end of the terrace, froze for a moment, then walked forward, swaying toward the white outline of Tanya’s gown.
