War Of Honor

"You're right." He shook his head. "And the worst of it is that I don't doubt for a moment that he pla

"That's just the problem, Tom. We still don't know what he's up to. The information he's sharing with his political allies is a means to an end, not an end in itself. Oh, I've got some pretty firm suspicions of what his ultimate goals are in a general sense, but right this minute, we don't know exactly what immediate goal he's headed for."

"Kevin doesn't have any idea at all?" Theisman sounded the next best thing to incredulous, and Pritchart's lips quirked in a wry smile.

"Kevin Usher has the instincts of a paranoid cat and the heart of a lion. He also has an incredibly soft and gooey center, which he takes great pains to hide. But one thing he doesn't have is telepathy or clairvoyance. We're lucky he's picked up this much. And," she admitted, "we're also lucky that he decided to report it directly to me."

"And who else should he have reported it to?"

"The point," Pritchart explained patiently, "is that we chose Kevin for the FIA specifically because he's seen entirely too much of the downside of using domestic security information for political advantage. Arguably, anything Arnold's done so far could be put down to a case of bad judgment and loose lips. Even though what he's done is illegal, it could be nothing more than inadvertent garrulousness on his part, and Kevin is probably better aware than anyone else in this city of just how much tension there is between Arnold and me. So I will guarantee you that he thought twice, or even three times, before he handed me information I could use to hammer Arnold if that was what I decided to do with it. The fact that he knows me as well as he does is probably the only reason he passed his findings along to me."

"Are you saying that with another president he might have suppressed the information?" Theisman frowned. "Somehow, that doesn't jibe with my impression of him. Or, I guess what I mean is that if it had ever occurred to me that he might do something like that, I'd've been very, very unhappy when you chose him for his job."

"I'm not saying he would have suppressed anything. What I'm telling you is that this information didn't come to him through any of his official pipelines, and it wasn't part of any ongoing investigation. He wouldn't have had to actually 'suppress' it, because passing what started out as little more than unsubstantiated rumors along to me was a pure judgment call on his part. He was very careful to make sure that there was substance to those rumors first—which he did without opening any official investigation—but there was absolutely no reason why he had to go out of his way to pursue those rumors on his own discretion in order to be able to tell me about something I hadn't even asked about. He made that decision entirely on his own, and he did it because he judged that I wouldn't abuse the information, the system, or his trust in me. And, I think, because he agrees with me that Arnold Giancola and the people who agree with him are the single greatest danger we face at this moment."

"Internally," Theisman agreed. "Externally?" He shook his head once more. "I still think the Manties, and particularly that jackass Janacek, are more immediate and much more dangerous threats."

"Tom, Tom." Pritchart sighed and rubbed both eyes with the palms of her hands, then grimaced at him. "I don't question your estimate of the degree of stupidity Janacek, High Ridge, or any of the rest of them are capable of. The problem is that we can't control what they do, however hard we try. The only situation we can even hope to control is our domestic one. The interstellar one is just going to have to take care of itself this time. And if Janacek and his boss do decide to do something stupid, then it's going to be up to you and the Navy to protect us from its consequences."

Theisman gazed at her for several unspeaking seconds, and she could almost feel the intensity of the thoughts flickering through the brain behind his eyes.

"You're absolutely certain this is the way you want to handle it?" he asked finally.

"It's not the way I 'want' to do anything," she half-snapped. "It's only the least bad of the half-dozen or so miserable options I see. Kevin may not know specifically what immediate objective Arnold thinks he's going to accomplish, but I'll guarantee you that I know at least two of the directions he's headed in. One is to force my hand—and yours, I suppose—where our negotiating stance with the Manties is concerned. And the second is to position himself to make his own run for President at the next election. If he waits that long."

"What do you mean, 'if he waits that long'?" Theisman sat up very straight. "Do you actually think he's contemplating something along those lines?"

"No. No, I don't." He regarded her out of narrowed eyes, and she sighed again. "All right, maybe I do," she conceded, manifestly unwillingly. "And I wish to Hell that I hadn't let the possibility slip in front of you, Tom Theisman! Because all I have for certain at this particular moment is the fact that I don't trust him, I don't like him, and I know he's ambitious, opinionated, and pigheaded. None of which is grounds for any sort of 'direct action.' "

"Appearances notwithstanding, Eloise," he said in a deceptively mild tone, "I'm not really in the habit of staging coups. Not without a lot more provocation than this, at least."

"I know," she said contritely. "I guess I just get a little crazy where Arnold is concerned. Mind you, I don't think for a moment that he'd hesitate if the opportunity for some old-style maneuvers came his way. At the moment, though, Denis and Kevin between them have pretty much taken that possibility off the board for anyone. Which is why he's coming at it from another direction. And it's also why we can't afford to let him control the information flow. He's using the existence of Bolthole as a wedge, Tom. Dribbling the facts out helps to establish his credentials as an insider, someone with access to the levers of power and the information that goes with it. And when he sits down to recruit someone who's already unhappy or concerned by the way the Manties have been stalling any meaningful negotiations, he can use the new ships to make my policy look even weaker. After all, if we've managed to make progress in equalizing our military capabilities, and we're still not prepared to press the Manties, then obviously we're too timid to ever press the issue."

"And if we'd pressed the issue when he wanted us to begin pressing it, then we'd never have had time to do any equalizing!" Theisman shot back.

"Of course not, but do you think he's going to mention that minor point?" Pritchart chuckled with very little humor. "And even if we were in a position to somehow bring it up without going public ourselves, it wouldn't do much good. Nobody's going to be interested in what the situation was three or four years ago. They're going to be looking at what the situation is now. And what the situation is now, according to Arnold, is that we have the military muscle to stand up to the Manties if we only had the strength of will to use it."

"So you're going to do what he wants you to do." Theisman's sentence could have come out as an accusation, but it didn't. It was clear that he still disagreed with her proposed policy, but it was also clear that he understood what was driving her hand. And that he realized she was right. There wasn't a "good" policy; only a choice between bad ones.

"I don't see any option but it to try to co-opt his own maneuvers," Pritchart replied. "If we a