Executive (4 page)

“Give him here,” I said, taking the little boy back.

“He needs changing,” Shelia said. “But the diapers—”

“Aren't here yet,” I concluded. So I simply held him and he quieted down.

I returned to the matter at hand. “To deprive the people of all representation—that was never my intent.”

“You can appoint people to represent them,” Spirit said.

“I don't know. I—” I broke off, for my arm was wet. Robertico was dripping. When would those diapers arrive?

“Sir,” Shelia said. “Call from RedSpot.”

RedSpot was our neighbor-nation to the south, whose city-bubbles occupied the great Red Spot of Jupiter. They would want to know my policy toward Latin Jupiter, since for the first time a Hispanic had ultimate power in North Jupiter. I could not avoid that call, lest I precipitate a diplomatic incident before I get properly established. “Put it on,” I said wearily.

The face of the president of RedSpot appeared on the main screen. His eyes widened as he saw me standing with my shirt stained by leaking urine. “ ¡Señor Presidente! ” he exclaimed.

“We're waiting for diapers,” I muttered in Spanish.

“Diapers!” he repeated, evidently suppressing a smile. “Surely these are available locally?”

“ Si,” I agreed tightly.

The smile struggled to get out, causing his lips to twitch. “If not, perhaps we might arrange a shipment from RedSpot.”

“Unnecessary, thank you, señor ,” I demurred.

“Lend-Lease, perhaps.” Oh, he was enjoying this! “We prefer to be generous to our less fortunate neighbors.”

“What is your business, sir?” I inquired through teeth that threatened to clench.

“Just to wish you well in your endeavors,” he said, stepping on another smile as he glanced at the spreading stain on my shirt. “And to express my government's support for your new policy.”

“ What policy?” I demanded, lapsing into English. “I haven't been able to organize my own wets, uh, wits yet!”

“Well, naturally you, as a Hispanic leader, are sympathetic to our concerns. I am sure relations between North Jupiter and RedSpot will be very close.”

He was getting ready to put the touch on me! Naturally RedSpot wanted more favorable terms on things like the debt owed to our big banks. I didn't want to alienate him, for I did appreciate his expression of support, but I simply wasn't ready to talk finance.

I was saved by the arrival of the diapers. “Señor, I am sure they will,” I said quickly. “We must talk again soon! But at the moment I wouldn't want to burden you with the sight of a diaper being changed—”

He laughed. “In RedSpot we teach our women to do such things, but then, we are not as liberated as you of the North.” He faded out, shaking his head.

I looked around. “Where's a table?” I asked. “It's been about fourteen years since I changed a diaper, but I remember the principle.”

Spirit showed me to a suitable table. She did not offer to do the job for me; she had had less experience at this than I, and Coral and Shelia were no better off. We stripped Robertico of his clothes and the sodden diaper. It turned out that he had done more than one number; the result was a real mess.

Naturally we lacked equipment to deal with this problem properly. Coral fetched towels and tissues from the bathroom, and we used a damp washcloth for the cleaning. But the cloth was cold, and Robertico reacted with a howl of distress.

“Sir,” Shelia said.

“You know a better way to do it?” I snapped.

“Call from Senator Stonebridge.”

Oh. He would be concerned about the opposition walkout. What could I tell him?

I sighed. “Put him on,” I said.

Stonebridge's face appeared on the main screen. He glanced at what was going on, seeming perplexed.

“Minor crisis,” I explained as I dried Robertico's bottom and set him down for the new diaper.

“I think you need a baby-sitter, Mr. President,” he said gravely.

“I can't trust this boy to a stranger,” I said. “He doesn't speak English.”

“Few do, at that age,” he pointed out.

All three women smiled. It was true: babies of this age did not speak at all. “But he has a Spanish heritage,” I explained. “All he has heard spoken is Spanish. I would rather break him in to English gradually.”

“There are bilingual baby-sitters,” Stonebridge pointed out.

“None I know well enough to trust at the moment.”

“With all due respect, Mr. President, I suggest that that is surely untrue. You have a fully competent bilingual baby-sitter available that you can trust.”

“Evidently you know something I don't!” I gritted as I stuck my thumb on a pin. The diaper had some kind of self-stick fastener, but I had been unable, in my distracted state, to decipher it, so was using the old-fashioned pin that had been on the old diaper. Diapering an active baby, I was rediscovering, is no simple task.

“Your daughter.”

I paused, my mouth dropping open. My daughter Hopie—of course. She was fifteen years old now and eager for just such jobs as this. But she was with Megan.

I looked helplessly at Spirit. “I can't take Hopie away from Megan!”

“She would be safer here,” Spirit said. "She has to attend school, and she will now be more of a target.

Here she could be tutored and provided the same protection we are."

“But Megan—”

“I will talk to her,” my sister said firmly.

I sought to spread my hands but could not, because I had to hold Robertico. I picked him up, not bothering with the soiled pants; the diaper would have to do for now. My eye was caught by Senator Stonebridge's eye in the screen.

“If I may now bring up a somewhat less important concern,” he said with a straight face.

“The walkout,” I said.

“Exactly. The present government of North Jupiter is disintegrating. Prompt and decisive action is required if we are to retain a viable framework.”

“I am not sure the prior framework remains viable,” I said. “I have assumed power outside the normal framework, and I suspect there is no way the opposition representatives will accept that.”

“Probably correct,” he agreed. "Columnist Thorley has already dubbed your administration 'the Tyrancy.'

"

“The Tyrancy!” I exclaimed. That was the first time I had heard that appellation applied to me, familiar as it was later to become. “Well, I suppose I am, technically, a tyrant. The original term refers to one who assumes power illegally. I am legal but not by the standard of the system that has hitherto governed Jupiter. Some of the ancient Greek tyrants were enlightened rulers.”

“And some were despots,” Stonebridge pointed out.

“Still, upon reflection, I think the shoe fits. I will try to be an enlightened tyrant. So Thorley can call my administration the Tyrancy if he wants.”

Stonebridge frowned. “You are not going to have him arrested?”

“Of course not! I have always respected freedom of the press, and of speech in general. Thorley will always be free to express himself in public.”

“Then I think you are not a tyrant by my definition.”

“No, let me be called the Tyrant,” I said, liking the sound of it better as I considered it. “That solves the problem of my title.”

“Surely you jest!”

“No jest. I am the Tyrant, and my administration is the Tyrancy. I am making no pretense to honoring the old order.”

“As you prefer, Mr. Tyrant,” he said awkwardly.

“Just Tyrant,” I said. “I will make that my title of honor. It will set me apart, appropriately.”

“As you prefer,” he repeated disapprovingly. “Now as to the walkout by the opposition—”

“That becomes immaterial. I am abolishing Congress.”

“Sir?” he asked, startled.

“Let's face it, Senator,” I said briskly, while Robertico played with the buttons on my shirt. “The average member of Congress is a tool of the special interests, regardless of his party. He is beholden to the political action committees that provide the bulk of the money he needs for his election campaigns, and a fair number are corrupt apart from that. Few actually, honestly, represent their constituents. The present—prior—system of government is monstrously nonrepresentative in everything except name, and excruciatingly inefficient. The average man would be better off without it.”

“But this is treason!” he protested.

“Not anymore,” I said. “I am the new government; I merely have to find new avenues to implement my power. I'm sure I will find it much easier to balance the budget if I eliminate fraud and waste in the government—and Congress is a nest of both.”

“Sir, this—this is unfeasible,” he said, shocked. “All our institutions... there would be anarchy—”

“Not if I appoint competent and honest people to run things,” I said. “As soon as I get my priorities organized, I will be asking you to serve. In fact, I am asking you now: will you serve as my adviser on budgetary matters?”

His mouth thinned. “What is the force of that request, sir?”

“You mean, will you be arrested if you refuse? No, this is voluntary. I need good people to serve as my lieutenants, and I will heed the advice of those who do serve. I am committed to the balancing of the budget, and I feel that no individual is better qualified to advise me on that than you. Will you serve?”

Stonebridge was obviously upset and uncertain. “Let me take time to consider, sir. There are implications that—”

“Of course,” I agreed. “But bear in mind that the sooner I get competent advice, the better it will be for Jupiter.”

He faded out. I saw that Robertico was getting sleepy, so I cast about for a way to put him down.

“Hope, we have Hopie on the line,” Spirit said.

“Put her on!”

Hopie's face appeared. “Oh, isn't he cute!” she exclaimed.

“Uh, I need—” I began somewhat lamely.

“Yes, Daddy, Aunt Spirit explained. You're all upheavaled! You need a bottle, and a formula, and a crib, and some toys and a whole lot of time.”

“I don't have any of those!”

“I know. I'd better get up there and take over.”

“But your mother—”

“Daddy, she understands.”

“I'm not sure she does.”

Spirit touched my hand. “She understands.”

Evidently Spirit had talked directly to Megan. “Oh. Then—”

“I'll catch a priority flight,” Hopie said happily.

“The Navy will take you, dear,” Spirit put in. “Can you be ready in...” She glanced at Shelia.

Emerald's face flicked on the screen. “Fifteen minutes,” she said, and flicked off.

“Yes,” Hopie agreed.

“You'll be here in two hours,” Spirit told the girl.

“He'll wake before then, hungry,” Hopie said. “Give him something to chew on.”

“We'll try,” I said.

“And change your shirt,” Hopie instructed me.

I glanced down at myself. Yes, I needed a change. I started to work my way out of the shirt.

The screen blanked. “Now we'd better make the announcement about the abolition of Congress and assure the citizens that their interests will be represented,” Spirit said briskly.

“But Robertico—”

“We'll put some pillows on the floor; he'll be safe there.”

They fetched pillows from the nearest beds elsewhere in the mansion and piled them on the floor. I set the baby down, but the moment I let go of him, he woke and screamed, and I had to pick him up again.

In addition, I discovered that I had no replacement shirt. In our rush to get here and get started, that detail had been neglected. “I will order more,” Shelia said. She knew my sizes, of course; she knew everything about me that a secretary should know—and more.

So I sat in a plush easy chair, shirtless, holding Robertico, with pillows braced about me. He settled back to sleep, and Spirit and I made notes for my next announcement.

“Sir,” Shelia said.

I was coming to dread that word! “Not another crisis?”

“The Saturn Embassy,” she said.

I sighed. “Put it on.”

The face of the ambassador from Saturn came on the main screen. He took in my situation and scowled.

“Perhaps I should return when you are less domestic, Mr. President,” he said.

“Just call me Tyrant,” I said. “What is your business?”

“My government wishes to clarify the status of interplanetary relations between Jupiter and Saturn, considering your recent change in government.”

“Unchanged,” I said.

“We would prefer an improvement.”

“I'm amenable.”

He seemed disconcerted. “Specifically—”

“No specifics yet,” I cut in. “If you come to us with positive proposals for the diminution of interplanetary tension, we shall reciprocate. It's up to you.”

Still, he seemed unpleased. He was trying to measure me, and I wasn't giving him much substance.

“Surely—”

“So good to have had this dialogue,” I said, signaling to Shelia, who cut him off.

“We'll have trouble with Saturn,” Spirit said darkly. “They always work over a new administration.”

“Precisely,” I agreed. “I mean to be ready for the vultures as they descend.”

We returned to work on the announcement, punctuated by calls from every type of party. I dealt with them as well as I could, making no commitments. We formulated a list of prospects for service in the new administration; Spirit had largely prepared that beforehand and needed only my concurrence. It was complicated because there were so many necessary offices and so many people; matching the two together was a headache. We knew we had to get at least a patchwork government organized promptly, so that anarchy would not erupt.

Suddenly Hopie was there, lifting the sleeping baby from my shoulder; I had hardly been aware of the passage of that time. My daughter did know her business; she set up shop in a corner of the room (because Robertico felt comfortable with me but not apart from me) and saw to a feeding and another change of diaper. Coral brought in another shirt for me; evidently Shelia's order had arrived.

We continued, calling the people on our list, asking their participation, accepting their excuses, stressing that there was no coercion here: we wanted only those who would be committed to the welfare of Jupiter without reservation. Some were belligerent and some were afraid, but when they learned that it truly was voluntary, a number of these softened and did accept the positions. Some who turned down the offer later called back with a change of heart, and we accepted them. Slowly but satisfyingly the new framework was being erected.