Spinneret

Perez sat down, and Carmen waited for the applause to ran its course. "Further comments?" she asked. "Then we'll proceed directly to a vote. All in favor … ?"

The tally was a solid seven to three. Suppressing a grimace, Carmen turned to Meredith. "Colonel, the Council of Astra calls on you to issue an order barring all but Astran citizens from approach or examination of Mt. Olympus, the cable lying north of Wright, and all alien technology and artifacts that may be subsequently uncovered. Specifically, this order is to include both those members of Dr.

Chang's group already on Astra and the various alien representatives currently in this solar system."

"Request denied," Meredith said briskly. "Any other business you want me here for?"

A ripple of displeasure went around the table, and Carmen braced herself for the inevitable outburst. But Perez kept his poise.

"I'm afraid you don't understand, Colonel," he said calmly. "This is one resolution you're not going to simply sweep away into a corner somewhere. We've done our homework on this one: I have petitions signed by seventy-two percent of the inhabitants of Ceres that support this resolution, and other councillors have similar proofs of support from their districts. The Spi

Meredith regarded him coolly. "You have a remarkably poor memory for certain facts of life, Perez, such as those dealing with your citizenship and my authority here. I'm at perfect liberty to ignore anything you or your seventy-two percent have to say—and if you get rude about it I can toss the lot of you into detention."

Perez didn't bat an eye. "It wouldn't be nearly as neat and tidy as you make it sound. If you don't throw Chang's group out immediately, I can guarantee there will be rioting—and this time I won't be trying to hold anyone back."

Meredith didn't move or change expression, but suddenly Carmen had the uncomfortable feeling that perhaps Perez had pushed the colonel a shade too far.

"In such a case, Mr. Perez," Meredith said, his voice deadly, "neither would I."

"Of course," Perez said. "And you would win … but only temporarily. Because signs of civil strife down here could very possibly persuade one or more of the aliens out there that we needed some strong, neutral hand on us—strictly for our own good, of course—and take the appropriate action."

The room was very quiet. Meredith never flinched or broke eye contact with Perez, but Carmen sensed his frosty silence was a simple lack of any answer to that. After a few seconds Perez pulled a thick folder from the stack of papers in front of him and added to it a copy of the Council's resolution. Standing, he stepped over to Meredith and offered him the bundle. "I think you'll find, Colonel," he said, "that above all else we must present a united front if we're going to survive here."

Tight-lipped, Meredith got to his feet and accepted the papers. "We'll see," he said shortly. With a single glance at Carmen he turned and left the room.

Carmen licked her lips. "This meeting is adjourned," she said, banging her makeshift gavel with rather more force than necessary and immediately turning her full attention to loading her briefcase. The others took the hint and began packing their own paraphernalia without protest and with a minimum of quiet conversation. She waited until the last sounds of footsteps were cut off by the closing door before permitting her chosen expletive to come out.

"Agreed. And I apologize."

She looked up, startled, to find Perez sitting quietly in the chair Meredith had recently vacated. "I thought you'd slithered out with the others," she snarled.

He shrugged. "I wanted to make sure you were all right. And that you understood why I'm doing what I am."

"I'm fine," she bit out, getting to her feet. "And you don't need to explain the finer points of blackmail technique to me, thank you."

She tried to step past him, but he rose and took her arm, and before she knew it he had steered her back to the table and seated her again. "You're angry because you don't agree with my methods," he said, sitting down next to her. "But I'm afraid it's a simple fact of history that the only way a ruling class is ever persuaded to share power is through violence—either actual or threatened."

"So why don't you just go ahead and ally yourself with one of those aliens out there and do the job right?" she said bitterly.

He sighed. "I'd hoped you would grow to understand what I stand for better than that. Don't you see?—I'm not trying to exchange one inequity for another. Astra can be this century's version of the Americas, a place where people can come to escape the foolish rigidity of Earth politics. But that can't happen as long as we're simply a transplanted chunk of the U.S."

"And what are you going to feed all these tired, huddling masses when they get here?" she shot back. "We can't even grow enough to feed the ten thousand people we've got."

"We can feed them anything they want—up to and including imported caviar. Or haven't you considered what our Spi

She shook her head. "Your ideas of marketing show the same shallow thinking your politics do. If the cable turns out to be really useful it's not going to be ours much longer, not with all those warships circling overhead."

"We can handle them," he assured her. "Playing big powers off against each other is a skill the Third World is well acquainted with."

She laughed, a short, derisive bark. "Oh, terrific. You scramble to get us free of American politics and instead turn us into a transplanted Yugoslavia spending all of our energy juggling the local superpowers. What a great improvement."

She had the satisfaction of seeing him struggle to fight down his own anger. "The position the Spi

So all of it had been deliberate. She'd wondered about that, ever since his message to Meredith through her had started this whole Council mess. "You flatter yourself," she said, again getting to her feet. "It's you and your methods, not any sort of upbringing, that's soured me on your pla

"Carmen—"

She shrugged off his hand. "And as long as you've got all the answers, consider what all your huddling masses are going to do for a living once they get here. Or are you just going to distribute the Spi

She was outside the building and halfway back to the admin complex before her anger cleared enough for her to think straight again. She slowed down, looking at the dull adobe buildings around her as she walked. After living in modem military bases, Astra had always seemed almost like a throw-back to the 1800s to her …

but never until now had she noticed its complete vulnerability, both to external and internal attack. What, she thought miserably, am I going to do?

On one level the question was trivial; on another, impossible. She would certainly go and see Colonel Meredith immediately, offering whatever assistance she could to block Perez's power grab. How that end could be accomplished, though, was another matter entirely.

The quiet burp of a distant sonic boom penetrated her thoughts, and she looked westward in time to see a shuttle drop toward Martello Base. An alien delegation?