Patriots

He nodded toward the garden, about an acre and a half of varied plantings. The growth was lush. The plot must have good soil, and Mark was sure there was a sufficiency of rain everywhere on Dittersdorf.

"For no more than your present cost," he continued, "you can have enough narcissus to plant a border three feet wide. And our narcissi are of particularly white paper, I might add."

Amy winced. "Paper?" said Easton. His puzzlement turned to a frown. "Ah, you're joking. Well, have your joke, young man, but I trust that by the time you're my age, you'll have learned that plants are no fit subject for humor!"

"I beg your pardon, sir," Mark said contritely. Apparently paper-white narcissi weren't paper after all. "I assure you that our prices are no joke, though. Ah-do you have the labor on hand to carry out a beautification project of such magnificence?"

"Come on inside," Easton said brusquely. "Never mind the courtyard for now. We'll deal with that later. We've got to see Hounslow at once. He'll supply the labor!"

Easton popped through the access door like a rabbit diving for its burrow an inch ahead of snapping jaws. "You know," his voice drifted back as Mark followed Amy down the ladder, "I could do a two-level border with narcissi against the wall and a row of erythronium on the outside. Or even three-level…"

Mark and Amy had to skip from a walk to a run to keep up with Captain Easton's course along the half-lit corridors. The tu

Children's voices echoed, but there weren't any specifically martial sounds. The civilian port controller on Major hadn't any idea how big the ship that arrived last week had been. Each of the vessels Mark had seen when he first landed on Zenith had several hundred soldiers on board, and they'd also been carrying heavy equipment of the sort that was already stockpiled in enormous quantities on Dittersdorf.

The troops lounging in the corridor looked pretty much the same as those Mark had seen when he was here the first time. He couldn't swear they were the same people, but they looked equally scruffy and there weren't any more of them visible.

"Hey, sir, how you doing?" a man called to Easton 's obvious agitation. "Don't have cabbage blight, do you?"

The laughter was general but good-natured. Easton 's troops didn't hate him. That would be like hating a teddy bear.

"Now, vegetables," the captain said as he trotted along. He was too lost in dreams of expanded plantings to notice his troops or hear what they might be saying. "What sort of a selection of edible plants can you supply?"

"Anything your heart desires, Captain," Mark said soothingly. "Anything you can dream of can be in your hands in seventy-two hours."

In so big a fort, an influx of troops could be concealed far beyond the corridors co

And Captain Easton was the same man. It was hard to imagine circumstances in which the Alliance would reinforce this base but leave Easton in command of it.

Mark knew to hold his breath as they strode past the pump room converted to an open latrine. Amy didn't, and the smell shoved her against the far wall in midstride.

"Wonderful natural fertilizer!" Easton muttered. "Most of it well rotted into the best nitrate enrichment you could imagine! And then my troops flatly refuse to remove and spread it for me. Mutiny! If I weren't a forgiving man, I'd…"

"It's certainly well rotted," Amy agreed in a faint voice.

"The door's supposed to be closed, though," Easton added, pulling the panel shut. That was the first evidence Mark had seen that any aspect of the normal world could penetrate the tangle of vegetation choking Easton 's mind.

When Mark stepped close to Amy in case the brown miasma had stu

Always assuming that nobody noticed the camera and had Amy shot as a spy. He hadn't guessed she was going to take such a risk.

The door with the hand-printed COMMAND CENTER sign was ajar. It couldn't be fully closed, since the latch and jamb Yerby had smashed six months ago still hadn't been replaced. Instead of dithering outside as he had before, Captain Easton barged straight in.

Lieutenant Hounslow was arguing with a forty-year-old woman wearing sergeant's chevrons on the collar of her fresh-looking uniform. Both of them turned when the door opened. Hounslow seemed surprised, but the sergeant's expression remained one of angry frustration.

"Hounslow!" Easton snapped. "How many troops do you have?"

"Well, with the addition of Sergeant Papashvili's squad, sir, fifty-one effectives," Hounslow said. "I'm sorry to say that the sergeant here is questioning my task assignments, however."

He glared at Papashvili. Hounslow had been filling out another multicolored duty chart before the sergeant had come into the office. Now another thought struck him; he whisked the sheet of graph paper off his desk to hold behind his back. He seemed to be afraid Captain Easton had gone nuts and would start tearing up the items of greatest value to Hounslow.

Well, nuts in a different way from usual.

"I need them all," Easton said. "Immediately! We don't have much time-"

"Oh, heaven be praised, Captain!" Sergeant Papashvili cried. "I knew you both couldn't be completely bughouse!"

"-before the narcissus planting season here is over," Easton continued, ignoring the sergeant. "We'll need a border spaded around the outer circuit of the walls, three feet wide and I think six inches deep."

He pursed his lips and added, "Though we may have to settle for a shallower bed, given the time available. Well, see to it, Hounslow."

The lieutenant and sergeant both stared at Easton, transfixed. They regained control of their tongues and blurted simultaneously, "Are you crazy?"

Easton drew himself up stiffly. "Stand to attention when you address your commanding officer!" he ordered.

Hounslow and Papashvili clicked their heels as they obeyed. They looked like a couple being savaged by their pet goldfish.

"Sir, my duty rosters are made out for-" Hounslow began.

Easton brushed the protest aside incomplete. "Well, you'll have to change them, then," he said crisply. "This is a time-dependent project. It's going to be close, getting so many bulbs ino the ground before first frost anyway."

"Captain," Sergeant Papashvili said in a despairing moan. She looked like a sturdy, no-nonsense woman, but the week she'd spent on Dittersdorf had obviously shaken her. "For heaven's sake, sir, there's a permanent garrison of five hundred troops arriving next month and I've got the job of refurbishing living quarters for them. Not to mention temporary accommodations for up to four thousand more who might stage through here. One month!"

"Why, I'd forgotten that!" the captain said in sudden cheerfulness. "Five hundred troops! Wonderful! Why, I'll be able to develop the courtyard after all!"

"Change my charts," Hounslow repeated sepulchrally. He stared at the half-completed roster in his hand as if it were his death sentence. "I don't believe this."

I believe it, Mark thought. You've known Easton a lot longer than I have, so it shouldn't be a surprise to you either that he's around the bend.