Striking the Balance (73 page)

Sylvia looked down under her feet. “Fetch me a dustpan,” she said to Naomi. “It’s getting pretty deep in here.” She turned back to Jones. “You’re even cheekier than I recall.” He grinned, not a bit abashed. Looking him, Embry, and Bagnall over with a critical eye, Sylvia went on, “You must be the lot who were in here last week looking for me. I was in bed with the influenza.”

“I never thought to be jealous of a germ,” Jones said. Sylvia planted an elbow in his ribs, hard enough to lift him off his feet She went on behind the bar, emptying the tray of the pints it had carried, and started filling fresh ones.

“Where’s Daphne?” Ken Embry asked.

“She had twin girls last month, I hear,” Goldfarb answered, which effectively ended that line of inquiry.

“I do believe I’d kill for a bit of beefsteak,” Bagnall said, in a tone of voice implying that wasn’t meant altogether as a joke. “One thing I’ve found since we got here is that we’re on even shorter commons than they are on the Continent. Black bread, parsnips, cabbage, spuds—it’s like what the Germans were eating the last winter of the Great War.”

“You want beefsteak, sir, you may have to kill,” Goldfarb said. “A man who has a cow stands watch over it with a rifle these days, and it seems rifles are easy to come by for bandits, too. Everybody got a rifle when the Lizards came, and not all of them were turned back in, not by a long chalk. You’ll hear about gunfights over food in the papers or on the wireless.”

Sylvia nodded emphatic agreement to that. “Might as well be the Wild West, all the shooting that goes on these days. Chicken, now, we might come up with, and there’s fish about, seeing as we’re by the ocean. But beef? No.”

“Even chicken costs,” Basil Roundbush said. Goldfarb had been thinking the same thing, but hadn’t said it, though with his tiny pay he had more justification than the officer. But, when you were a Jew, you thought three times before you let others perceive you as cheap.

Jerome Jones slapped himself in the hip pocket. “Money’s not the biggest worry in the world right now, not with eighteen months’ pay dropped on me all at once. More money than I thought I’d get, too. How many times have they raised our salaries while we were gone?”

“Three or four,” Goldfarb answered. “But it’s not as much money as you think. Prices have gone up a lot faster than pay. I was just thinking that a few minutes ago.” He glanced down the bar toward Naomi, who had just set a pint pot in front of a slicker-clad fisherman. His shoulders heaved up and down in a silent sigh. It would be so good to get her out of here and live on his pay—except he could barely do that himself, and two surely couldn’t.

He caught his fiancée’s eye. She came back over with a smile. “A round for all my friends here,” he said, digging into his pocket to see what banknotes lay crumpled there.

By immemorial custom, everyone would buy a round after that. He’d want a radar mounted on the front of his bicycle by the time he had to go back to barracks, but he expected he’d manage. He’d have a thick head come morning, but he’d manage that, too. Beefsteak might be thin on the ground, but they’d never yet run short on aspirin tablets.

The Tosevite negotiators rose respectfully when Atvar entered the chamber where they waited. He flicked one eye turret toward Uotat. “Give them the appropriate greetings,” he said to Uotat.

“It shall be done, Exalted Fleetlord,” the translator answered, and switched from the beautiful, precise language of the Race to the mushy ambiguities of the Big Ugly tongue called English.

One after another, the Tosevites replied, Molotov of the SSSR through his own interpreter. “They say the usual things in the usual way, Exalted Fleetlord,” Uotat reported.

“Good,” Atvar said. “I am in favor of their doing any usual thing in any usual way. On this planet, that is in and of itself unusual. And speaking of the unusual, we now return to the matter of Poland. Tell the speaker from Deutschland I am most displeased over his recent threat of renewed combat, and that the Race will take unspecified severe measures should such threats reoccur in the future.”

Again, Uotat spoke English. Von Ribbentrop replied in the same language. “Exalted Fleetlord, he blames errors in decoding the instructions from his not-emperor for that unseemly lapse of a few days ago.”

“Does he?” Atvar said. “After the fact, a male may blame a great many things, some of which may even have some connection to the truth. Tell him it was as well he was mistaken. Tell him his not-empire would have suffered dreadful damage had he proved correct.”

This time, von Ribbentrop replied at some length, and apparently with some heat. “He denies that Deutschland needs to fear the Empire and the Race. He says that, as the Race has been dilatory in these negotiations, his not-empire is within its rights to resume conflict at a time and in a manner of its choosing. He does regret having misinformed you at that time and in that manner, however.”

“Generous of him,” the fleetlord remarked. “Tell him we have not been dilatory. Point out to him that we have the essentials of agreement with the SSSR and with the U.S.A. Tell him it is the intransigent attitude of his own not-emperor over Poland that has led to this impasse.”

Again Uotat translated. Von Ribbentrop let out several yips of Tosevite laughter before answering. “He says that any agreement with the SSSR is of less worth than the sheet of paper on which its terms are stated.”

Even before von Ribbentrop had finished, Molotov began speaking in his own language, which to Atvar sounded different from English but no more beautiful. Molotov’s interpreter spoke to Uotat, who spoke to Atvar: “He accuses the Deutsche of violating agreements they have made, and cites examples. Do you want the full listing, Exalted Fleetlord?”

“Never mind,” Atvar told him. “I have heard it before, and can retrieve the data whenever necessary.”

Von Ribbentrop spoke again. “He points out, Exalted Fleetlord, that the SSSR has a long frontier with China, where conflict against the local Big Uglies continues. He also points out that one Chinese faction is ideologically akin to the faction ruling the SSSR. He asks how we can imagine the males of the SSSR will not continue to supply their fellow factionalists with munitions even after reaching agreement with the Race.”

“That is an interesting question,” Atvar said. “Ask Molotov to answer.”

Molotov did, and took a while doing it. Though Atvar could not understand his language any more than he could English, he noted a difference in style between the representatives of Deutschland and the SSSR. Von Ribbentrop was histrionic, dramatic, fond of making little points into big ones. Molotov took the opposite approach: the fleetlord did not know what he was saying, but it sounded soporific. His face was almost as still as that of a male of the Race, which, for a Big Ugly, was most unusual.

Uotat reported, “The male Molotov states that a large number of Soviet weapons and munitions are already in China; they were sent there to aid the Chinese, or one faction of them, in their struggle against Nippon prior to our arrival here. He further states that, because of this, the SSSR cannot be held liable if such weapons and munitions are discovered in China.”

“Wait,” Atvar said. “The SSSR and Nippon were not at war with each other when we came to this miserable mudball. Yet Molotov admits to aiding a Chinese faction against the Nipponese?”

“He does, Exalted Fleetlord,” the translator replied.

“Then ask him why we should not expect the SSSR to supply the Chinese with arms against us, with whom his not-empire also would not be at war.”

Uotat spoke. Molotov answered. His interpreter relayed his words to Uotat, and Uotat to Atvar. “He says that, unlike the Nipponese, the Race would have both the power and the interest to punish any such violations.”

Such breathtaking cynicism made the fleetlord let out a sharp hiss. Nevertheless, the approach was realistic enough to make dealing possible. “Tell him violations
will
be punished,” he said, and added an emphatic cough.

“He acknowledges your concern,” Uotat said after Atvar had spoken.

“How good of him to do so,” Atvar said. “And now, back to the matter of Poland, which appears to be the principal concern remaining before us here.” As he spoke, he wondered if that would be true in the long run. China had a much larger area and many more Big Uglies living in it than Poland did. It also had a long frontier with the SSSR that even the Race’s technology would have a hard time sealing. Sooner or later, the males of the SSSR would try to cheat and then deny they’d done it. He could feel that coming.

The male from Britain spoke up: “A moment, please.” He was polite; he waited for Uotat to gesture for him to continue before going on, “I must reiterate that His Majesty’s government, while acknowledging the Race’s conquest of large portions of our empire, cannot consider any sort of formal recognition of these conquests without in return obtaining a cease-fire identical in formality and dignity to the ones to which you have agreed with the United States, the Soviet Union, and Germany.”

“So long as the conquest is real, whether you recognize it does not matter,” Atvar replied.

“A great deal of history contradicts you,” Eden said.

As far as Atvar was concerned,Tosev3 did not have a great deal of history. He did not say that; it only nettled the Big Uglies. What he did say was, “You must know why Britain is not in the same class as the not-empires you named.”

“We have no atomic weapons,” the British male answered. “And you must know that is not necessarily a permanent condition.”

For a moment, Atvar was tempted to grant the British the formal cease-fire they craved on the spot. If for no other reason than to inhibit their nuclear research program. But he held silent with three Tosevite not-empires already in possession of atomic weapons, what did one more matter, even if the British could make good on the warning? “Poland,” he said.

“Is and must be ours,” von Ribbentrop declared.

“Nyet.”
Atvar understood that word without any help from the interpreters; Molotov used it so much, it had become unmistakable.

“The Race shall, for the time being, retain possession of those parts of Poland it now holds,” the fleetlord said. “We shall continue discussion with Deutschland, with the SSSR, and even with the Poles and Jews, in an effort to find a solution satisfactory to all parties.”

“General Secretary Stalin has instructed me to acquiesce in this,” Molotov said.

“The
Führer
does not, will not, and cannot agree,” von Ribbentrop said.

“I warn you and the
Führer
once more: if you resume your war against the Race, and especially if you resume it with nuclear weapons, your not-empire will suffer the most severe consequences imaginable,” Atvar said.

Von Ribbentrop did not answer, not to bellow defiance, not even to acknowledge he’d heard. The only thing that worried Atvar worse than a blustering, defiant Big Ugly was a silent one.

Ludmila Gorbunova pressed the self-starter of the Fieseler
Storch.
The Argus engine came to life at once. She was not surprised. German machinery worked well.

Ignacy waved to her. She nodded back as she built up revolutions. She would have had to push the
Storch
hard to get it airborne before it rammed the trees ahead. Her old U-2 could never have taken off in so short a space.

She nodded again. More partisans bent to remove the blocks of wood in front of the light plane’s wheels. At the same time, Ludmila released the brake. The
Storch
bounded forward. When she pulled back on the stick, its nose came up and it sprang into the air. She could see the trees through the cockpit glasshouse: dark shapes down there, almost close enough to reach out and touch. The Poles whose candles had marked the edge of the forest for her now blew them out

She buzzed along steadily, not wanting to gain much altitude.

As long as she was on the Lizard side of the line, she might be shot down as an enemy. Ironic that she’d have to make it to German-held territory to feel safe.

Safe wasn’t all she hoped she’d feel. By the coordinates, she was returning to the same landing strip she’d used before. With luck, Heinrich Jäger would be there waiting for her.

Off to the right, muzzle flashes blazed in the darkness. Something hit the side of the fuselage, once, with a sound like a stone clattering off a tin roof. Ludmila gave the
Storch
more throttle, getting out of there as fast as she could.

That complicated her navigation. If she was going faster, she needed to fly for less time. How much less? She worked the answer out in her head, decided she didn’t like it, and worked it out again. By the time she discovered where she’d gone wrong the first time, a glance at her watch warned her it was time to start looking around for the landing strip.

She hoped she wouldn’t have to do a search spiral. The Germans were liable to start shooting at her if she buzzed around for too long, and the spiral might take her back over Lizard-held territory if it got too big.

There! As usual, the lanterns marking the landing strip were small and dim, but she spotted them. Lowering the enormous flaps on the
Storch
killed airspeed almost as if she were stepping on the brakes on the highway. The light plane jounced to a stop well within the area the lanterns marked off.

Ludmila flipped up the cockpit door. She climbed out onto the wing, then jumped down to the ground. Men came trotting up toward the
Storch.
In the darkness, she couldn’t be sure if any of them was Jäger.

They recognized her before she could make out who they were. “There—you see, Gunther?” one of them said. “It
is
the lady pilot.” He gave the word the feminine ending, as Jäger sometimes did, as she had so often heard Georg Schultz do (she wondered what might have happened to Schultz and Tatiana, but only for a moment: as far as she was concerned, they deserved each other).

“Ja,
you were right, Johannes,” another German answered. “Only goes to show nobody can be wrong
all
the time.” A couple of snorts floated out of the night