Battle Hymn (19 page)

Andrew tried to listen to her. Emil had certainly cut typhoid in the army camps to a fraction of what he remembered back on Earth by posting strict orders on camp sanitation and sources of water. A cure for it would be even better, but the frustration of a senatorial hearing had simply left him drained.

"Go on," she said. "The standard formula for conversation is that I say something and you reply. Then you say something and I reply."

He saw her playful smile, and yet again he thanked God that he had found her, someone who was willing to endure the weeks and months when he was gone, the tension, the long silences, the locking away in his office, sometimes till dawn.

"Sorry, it's just they're so damn shortsighted."

Kathleen looked to the kitchen door to make sure the children had not heard him.

"Well, their dad's a solider, they might as well get used to it."

"He's also a college professor, and they shouldn't get used to it."

He shook his head and smiled. "Sorry."

"Go on, then."

"The stink over the airship. Couple of the senators are calling for a full investigation. They know they can't get Ferguson since I've officially put him on permanent sick leave, but they're after Hawthorne and Pat."

"What do they want?"

"To have them cashiered from the service for misappropriation of funds. Part of the fuel is that Vincent is the president's son-in-law, and it's a way of getting at Kal. But, by God, Kathleen, those are my two best officers. We lose them and we cripple the army. It's not like I have deep pockets, with a ready supply of well-trained personnel waiting to move up. We lost damn near half our officers corps in the war. We've got a lot youngsters who are good regimental and brigade commanders, but the type of thinking needed on the corps and army level takes years to develop."

"Vincent got it without the training."

"He's a rarity. A Sheridan type, born with it."

"So what did you say?"

"I indicated that if the issue were pressed I'd refuse."

Kathleen shook her head. "You can't do that. Remember, you're always the one saying the army has to answer to the civilian government. I fully agree with what those two fools did, but it was wrong anyway."

"I know that. I'm not saying I'd refuse directly. Rather, I'd resign."

"And?"

"Well, there was a lot of hemming and hawing. Damn near every senator is a veteran, several of them front line combat as enlisted men. They're behind me, but more than one, several of them from the old group of boyar retainers and royalty in Roum, see a chance here possibly to reassert their power. We got rid of the Hordes, and as far as they're concerned it's time to set things back right and let them take over. They had power. They lost it but still haven't accepted the fact that there's been a real revolution."

"What happens next?"

"They wanted a committee appointed immediately to call in Hawthorne and Pat and put them on the grill. Marcus, God bless him, managed to get it delayed by several weeks."

"So you're betting on the first flight to prove something."

Andrew nodded and, standing up, went over to the mantel, and looked up at the painting of Hispania.

"Funny, if we find nothing, they'll really have us. If we do find something, it'll be forgotten and the Union Party will scream that the Home First Party tied the army's hands and has now left us open."

He shook his head. "A paradox here. If we win we lose and if we lose we win. I sense we'll find something, but I pray to God we don't."

"And if we don't?"

"I resign. Maybe that will shield Pat, though I suspect Vincent might very well go because of his father. It'll be drummed around as an issue in the next election and the Union Party will go along with even bigger budget cuts to try and stay in power."

"Too bad Hans wasn't here. He'd have sniffed out this little plot of Ferguson's, found a way around it, and no one ever would have known."

Kathleen stood up, put her arm around Andrew's waist, and looked up at the painting.

"Your nose is too big."

"What?"

"In the painting. Your nose is too big and he gave you shoulders like Pat's."

Andrew laughed. He had always been self-conscious about his slender frame, and though the painting embarrassed him, he did secretly like the more heroic build the artist had given him.

"No wonder Lincoln aged so much in four years," Andrew said. "Here we were, fighting a war for survival, and there was more than one in the Senate and the Congress who didn't give a good damn about anything other than his own power and what he could wring from it while our boys died by the tens of thousands. I do wonder at times if the Republic will actually survive."

"Lincoln most likely wondered that every night," she said, holding him close.

The knock on the door caused him to look up with a start. It was followed by two more knocks, and he felt the pressure in his chest relax.

"Come."

The door opened, and Ketswana, followed by Manda, slipped into the room.

Hans looked at Alexi and Gregory and saw the tension drain out of their faces.

"You're late," Hans said.

"Karga and two of his scum were poking around the furnace. I felt I should stay. I thought my heart would stop when he paused at the charcoal pile and started poking it with a stick."

"Do you think he was onto something?" Gregory asked.

"No, but I was afraid one of my crew might give something away or, worst yet, that the diggers would hear the rapping and misinterpret it. Remember, three taps means it's all clear to bring up the dirt. Every second I expected the hatch to open."

Hans said, "We change that tonight."

Gregory nodded.

"Anything else, Ketswana?"

"I think we might have a problem. A new puddler was assigned to my furnace today. I don't trust him. I asked around, and no one seems to know him. He says he was an ironworker in one of the Chin cities before the Bantag came."

"Then why wasn't he swept up when they first got here?" Hans asked.

"My thinking as well. He knows what to do, but he just doesn't seem to quite know what to do, if you understand me. Little things, but they make me think he was quickly shown how to do his job by someone and then sent in here."

"Anything else?"

"One of my men told me that after a couple of hours he started to talk. The usual chatter, what bastards the Bantag are, questions about food and such, but then came the real one. He said he'd give anything to escape."

"That could be the talk of anyone," Hans interjected, "but go on."

"It was the way he said it. At least that's what my man told me. He said he'd gladly work on any scheme to get out, no matter how dangerous."

"Watch him," Hans replied sharply.

Talk of escape was the dream of nearly every slave, but to talk about it openly was a quick way of being sent to the pit. The man was either a fool or a spy.

"What troubles me, though, is that he is so clumsy," Manda interjected. "Perhaps he was told to be clumsy, to make himself obvious."

"Your thinking being … ?"

"So that we might not notice the real spy, believing we've already found one. There might be someone else, who will stay quiet, never say a word, just watch and listen while this fool speaks loudly."

Hans nodded in agreement. There was always a steady flow of new workers being brought in to the factory to replace the dead. To inquire about them directly might be dangerous. He thought about the layout of the factory. Number two furnace was in the southwest comer of the building and number four was on the north wall, thirty yards from number three. Gregory had chosen his spot well. No one could see directly into the charcoal pile, even from the treadmills, but they might notice the traffic, the workers occasionally going behind the furnace and not reappearing for hours, or the crew assigned to hauling the dirt, which was dumped into number three or scattered on the floor and then covered with charcoal or ore.

The problem was compounded by the fact that except for half a dozen others, the only people who knew about the tunnel were the workers assigned to Ketswana's furnace. There was only one watcher on number four and one on number two. They couldn't be there day and night.

"They know something is up," Hans said. "I sensed that from Ha'ark. Now I'm certain of it. Keep an eye on this bastard."

"We could kill him without any trouble," Kets-wana replied with a smile.

Hans thought about that for a moment and then shook his head. "There's a slight chance he might be just a fool, but I doubt that. If we do kill him, it will set off a warning that there's something we want hidden and it might be at number three. My gut instinct tells me they don't suspect a tunnel inside the foundry; otherwise they would have torn it apart.

"I want you to assign three people to this man. Befriend him, always have someone by his side. Whenever the dirt crew or a new digger is going down, make sure he's diverted."

"We need to find out just how much they suspect," Ketswana interjected. "I'll see what we can do on that."

"Just be careful."

"What about setting off a false rumor," said Alexi, "that there's a tunnel somewhere in the barracks, or that there's a plan to seize a locomotive from inside the steam engine works?"

Hans shook his head. "First off, whoever said it to someone we suspect, that man's as good as dead. They take him in and torture him to death. Second, any type of rumor will only arouse them even further to find something. We have to go as we are."

Hans looked at Ketswana, who nodded in agreement.

"What about the schedules, Alexi?"

"I met with the telegrapher early this evening. He's scared to death, and I sense he wants to back away, but I think he knows what will happen if he does. He says the schedule's usually light on the night of a Moon Feast and the track all the way to X'ian more often than not has only half a dozen trains on it during the night."

"Will he crack?"

"I hated to do it, but I told him that if he does we'll find his two children even if we can't get at him and that we'll denounce him as being in on the plan from the start if we're taken."

"What about his switchman?"

"He says he'll go along with it when the time comes."

"Fine. How's the tunnel?"

"Six days should have it done. That'll give us an extra day if we run into a problem. We're under the tracks. It's scary when a heavy train passes over and everything starts to shake. Thank Perm it's clay rather than sand."

Two knocks, followed by two more, suddenly interrupted them.

Hans waited. Ten seconds later there were two more knocks. The few papers they had out were instantly rolled up. Ketswana, grabbing the papers, reached up under Hans's desk and slipped them into a narrow slit carved in the back of the desk leg. Alexi, trying not to move too fast, went out the door into the main barracks and casually walked toward the back door while Tamira quickly uncovered the small pot of precious tea and filled five cups. Seconds later the door was flung open and Karga, bending low to clear the sill, stepped in.

"Working late?"

Hans looked up as if surprised. "We were going over the work shift to fill in for the sick."

Karga stood silent, his hand resting on the butt of his whip. "Tea?"

"Remember, I do receive a special ration by order of the Qar Qarth. I try to share it."

"Why are you working now? It is late." The voice had a cool edge to it, typical of Karga, Hans had realized, just before an explosion of temper.

"Because if I don't and we fall behind, you will kill someone as an example, that's why. There's disease in this camp, even worse in the Chin camp, but our production schedule doesn't change, so I have to figure out who will work longer hours."

Karga looked down at the scattering of papers on Hans's desk that were filled with names. He knew Karga couldn't read Rus, let alone English. Karga picked the papers up.

"I'll take these."

"If you do that, I'll have no way of rearranging the schedule of workers for tomorrow."

"Then someone will die. It is that simple," Karga replied, and slamming the door, he disappeared.

Hans felt a momentary fright, wondering if somehow a list of who was in on the conspiracy, or a plan, might have inadvertently gotten mixed in with the other paperwork. Then the other thought hit him: Only one other person in all the Bantag realm could read English.

"How does she look to you?" Vincent Hawthorne asked, stepping into the hangar and looking up with awe at the vast bulk of the new airship floating above him.

"Frightening, just plain frightening," Jack Petracci replied softly. "I never dreamed of actually flying something this big."

"We've come a long way from that first flight you and I took together back in Suzdal," Vincent said.

Jack walked slowly down the length of the hangar, gingerly stepping over the vulcanized canvas hoses that snaked out of the building and out to the gas generators on the downwind side of the hangar. They'd been loading the ship with hydrogen for more than a day, and only within the last hour had it gained positive buoyancy. The job was a dangerous one. Lead-lined vats mounted on railroad cars were backed into the edge of the field, filled with zinc shavings and sealed, then sulfuric acid was piped in. The resulting chemical reaction released hydrogen, which flowed through the hoses attached to the top of the car and into the shed. The slightest mistake and someone could be burned to death by the acid. A single spark, a wisp of hydrogen, and the entire shed and everyone in it would go up. The rail tracks were made of wood capped with rubber to avoid any sparks, and the locomotive that backed the equipment in was moved all the way back to the rail yard so that no errant sparks might drift into the work area.

Feyodor, Jack's engineer, came into the shed. "Four engines at last! Something I've always dreamed of."

"At least I don't have to worry about you bungling," Jack shot back. "You can screw up an engine in flight and we still might get back."