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"More than that, he's directed us to up the stakes." He slid a sketched out deployment order across the desk to her and tipped back his chair as she sca
"Four squadrons?" Givens murmured, absently twisting a lock of brown hair around an index finger. "That's quite a diversion."
"You can say that again—and all superdreadnoughts." Caparelli smiled a bit sourly. "That's twenty-six percent of Home Fleets superdreadnoughts. If we get hit here while they're out there—" He broke off and waved both hands in a throwaway gesture, and Givens pursed her lips.
"Maybe, Sir. Then again, maybe not. It won't exactly leave us uncovered, and if the Peeps buy our fake redeployments, they'll run into over sixty superdreadnoughts they think are somewhere else."
"I know." Caparelli frowned a moment longer, then nodded. "All right, let's get this set up. And I guess we'd better send along a flag officer with the seniority for that big a reinforcement."
"Who did you have in mind, Sir?"
"Who else?" Caparelli's sour smile was back. "It'll almost have to be White Haven, won't it?"
"White Haven?" Givens couldn't quite hide her surprise. Not only did she know Caparelli and White Haven disliked one another, but White Haven was currently second in command of Home Fleet, as well.
"White Haven," Caparelli repeated. "I know it'll make a hole in Webster's command structure, but so will the squadrons we're taking away from him. And White Haven not only has the seniority and the savvy to command them, he's also our most popular officer—after Harrington—in Grayson eyes."
"True, Sir. But he's senior to Admiral D'Orville, as well. That means he'll supersede the man on the spot when he arrives. Will that cause problems?"
"I don't think so." Caparelli thought for a moment, then shook his head. "No, I'm certain it won't. He and D'Orville have been friends for years, and they both know how critical the situation is. Besides—" the First Space Lord bared his teeth in a mirthless smile "—there ought to be plenty of crap to fall on both of them, even if this works."
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Admiral Parnell entered the DuQuesne war room briskly despite the late hour. No one looking at him would have thought he'd had less than three hours sleep, but Parnell himself was naggingly aware of his fatigue. He considered—again—taking a stim tab, but if he did that he'd never get back to sleep again. Better to see what hot coffee could accomplish first.
Commodore Perot was already there, and he turned quickly, a message board tucked under his arm, at his boss's approach.
"This better be important, Russell." Parnell's tone was only half joking, and Perot nodded.
"I know, Sir. I wouldn't have bothered you if I didn't think it was." Perot's voice was calm, but he tilted his head to one side, inviting the admiral into one of the high-security briefing rooms, and surprise raised Parnell's eyebrows before he could stop them.
Perot closed the door behind them, shutting out the war room's background murmur, and punched a complicated security code into the message board before pressing his thumb to the sca
Parnell frowned at the diplomatic corps header, then glanced at the text and stiffened. He sank into a chair, ru
"My God, Sir. They've done it," Perot said softly.
"Maybe," Parnell said more warily, but his own exultation warred with his caution. He laid the message board on the desk and rubbed his temple. "How reliable is this source of Ambassador Gowan's?"
"No intelligence source can ever be absolutely guaranteed, Sir, but everything this one's ever given us has pa
"Which could mean they know all about him and they've been setting us up for the big one," Parnell interrupted dryly.
"That's always the problem with spies, Sir," Perot agreed. "In this case, however, we have some additional intelligence to support him." Parnell raised an eyebrow, and Perot shrugged. "If you scroll to the next page of the Ambassadors dispatch, you'll see that both of the Home Fleet detachments mentioned in his source's initial report departed almost exactly on the schedule he gave us, and their headings matched his version of their orders. Gowan had a day or two to work his other contacts, too, and some of the perso
"What sort of customers?" Parnell asked intently.
"Enlisted and noncom, Sir—not officers. And they were all regular patrons." Perot shook his head. "They certainly weren't ringers brought in for the occasion, so unless we want to assume Gowan's entire network's been broken and Manty intelligence knew exactly who to have gossip in front of who—" The chief of staff broke off with a shrug.
"Um." Parnell stared back down at the message board, wanting to believe and fighting his own desires. If only they'd been able to extend the Argus net to Yeltsin! But there hadn't been enough time to set it up—even assuming the seething deep-space activity in Yeltsin hadn't ruled it out. The Graysons seemed intent on smelting down every asteroid in the system for their orbital and planetary projects, and ONI had decided they were too likely to stumble over one of the sensor platforms, however heavily stealthed, and blow the entire Argus operation. Which meant he didn't have the same look into Yeltsin. Maybe that was his problem. He'd gotten used to more detailed intelligence than he had any right to expect.
"Anything from Rollins?" he asked.
"No, Sir." Perot glanced at the time and date display on the wall and made a face. "The Argus ships can't maintain a guaranteed schedule, but if they're ru
"Which means seventeen more days before we get it," Parnell grunted.
He leaned back, nibbling on his lower lip. Seventeen days was far too long to wait. Barnett was a hundred and forty-six light-years from Yeltsin, a three-week trip for superdreadnoughts, and his window was barely twenty-six days wide. He couldn't possibly delay his decision until he had Rollins' report, and, by the same token, if he went, he'd have to go in without Admiral Ruiz's three battle squadrons, still en route to Barnett. He could substitute the two squadrons his original deployment plan had assigned to reinforce Seaford, then send all of Ruiz's to Seaford to replace them... but if Ruiz was delayed, Rollins might come up painfully short against his objective.
He nibbled harder. The master plan envisioned hitting Yeltsin in overwhelming force for the express purpose of isolating and destroying any Manty units stationed there as the first step in demoralizing and grinding away the RMN. If Caparelli really had pulled four squadrons out, then the size of the prize had been cut roughly in half, assuming their original estimates of the Yeltsin deployment were accurate, and he hated to give up the extra kills. On the other hand, the morale effect might be even greater, since a smaller force might well be completely a
Available combat reports indicated it was at least as bad as he'd feared, possibly even worse, which made it tempting to stack the numerical odds as heavily in his favor as he could until he knew for certain.