Vicky Peterwald: Survivor (Vicky Peterwald Series Book 2) (18 page)

T
HE
Attacker
limped into High St. Petersburg station late and slow.

The last freighter, the
Proud Hussy
out of Port Royal, had stayed with her for the rest of the voyage, standing by in case the captain ordered the
Attacker
abandoned. That assumed that anything that went wrong in engineering did so slowly enough for the skipper to order his ship abandoned.

No one aboard really took a deep breath until the
Attacker
was along the pier and the reactors doused. Likely for good.

“She’s a good ship, but where will they find a pfennig to repair her these days?” Captain Bolesław almost moaned to Vicky as they shared wine during her last supper aboard. If it was possible for a hardheaded ship driver to be brokenhearted, he sure sounded the part.

Vicky loaded her computer with a copy of the brief battle and everything the sensors had picked up on the attacker during the fight. Her temper flaring, she marched for Admiral von Mittleburg’s station office.

“Would you care for a glass of wine?” the admiral said as she charged, unannounced, into his office.

Unannounced, but maybe not unexpected.

“No, thank you. I’d much more prefer to know who the hell let that ship get into our space and where it came from.”

“Sit down, Commander,” the admiral told Vicky’s trailing escort. “Take a load off your feet, if not your soul. Would you care for wine?”

The commander accepted the offered wine with a “Thank you, sir. I am told that your father keeps the best vineyard on Bayern.”

“As did his father and his father before him. Vines are delicate things. They grow better with age. Like Grand Duchesses, don’t you think?”

“I think this one is aging well, Admiral,” Vicky’s watchdog reported.

“I’m glad that I’m still aging, considering that the Navy can’t keep a pirate out of the commercial space ways,” Vicky spat. She hated to be ignored, and ignored she most definitely felt at the moment. Instead of taking the offered seat, she paced back and forth. She was a tiger looking for something to devour, and the admiral was at the top of her dinner list.

“We are patrolling the commercial lanes as best we can with the resources we have,” the admiral said, not at all defensively. “We just never expected a pirate to take on a cruiser.”

“Well, one just did. Can’t you protect my convoys any better than that?”

“We planned to protect you a whole lot better than that,” the admiral said, swirling his wine gently.

“I didn’t feel very protected.”

“We gave you two cruisers,” the admiral said, evenly. “Our plan was for the
Biter
to enter every jump ahead of the
Attacker
. Then you changed our plans.”

Vicky was working herself up into a really fun rage. The air went out of it in a breath. “Oh,” was all she got out.

She settled into the offered chair.

“I understand the urgency of your mission, Your Grace,” the admiral said, “and none of us expected the mess we found on Presov. By the way, the people you referred to us for trial?”

“Yes,” Vicky answered, expecting to lose more of her air.

“We’ve found out quite a lot about them as the prosecutors on St. Petersburg dug into their transactions and bank accounts. Quite a lot. Their mail will be sent a long time in care of some
jail dirtside. And there are stockholder suits coming in just about every week. One has to wonder where all the money went.”

“Are they talking?”

“Not yet. It seems they are expecting some pardon from the Imperial Palace.”

“That will tell us a lot if it comes,” Vicky said.

“Yes, but now, let us talk about how we keep one Grand Duchess alive. I apologize for sending you out with only two cruisers. We only had the two available. Admiral Waller sends his respects and informs me that the battleship
Retribution
has been ordered to St. Petersburg. It will always be available in the future for your use.”

Vicky found herself rather empty of rage and rapidly filling with amazement.

The Chief of the Naval Staff had sent
his
respects to
her
. Admirals sent a lieutenant commander compliments if they noticed them at all. Commanders sent their respects when admirals deigned to grant them any attention.

Kris Longknife used to laugh that no one knew what to make of her princess thing, so she was making all she could of it. Apparently, Vicky wasn’t doing too bad a job of making this Grand Duchess thing into something to be respected.

There was a lot she wanted to say. What she did say was, “A battleship?”

“For your exclusive use,” the admiral pointed out.

“
Retribution
, that’s quite a name,” Vicky said, puzzled.

“Yes, it’s one of the last produced before these troubled times. I’m told by Admiral Waller that your father, our Emperor, personally selected the name.”

“
Retribution
?” Vicky repeated.

“I think your father intended to use it to settle some old score.”

“Like the one he racked up with Wardhaven when he tried to level the place, and Kris Longknife blew away all six of his battleships.”

“That was never proven,” the admiral was quick to put in.

“I’ve talked with Kris and her staff. I know what they think. Oh, and I overheard Dad getting yelled at by Admiral Waller. Yelled at more than my father ever put up with from any man and let him live. I know where those battleships came from.”

“What battleship?” her commander asked.

“It’s way above your pay grade, Commander. You’ll have to drink poison after this meeting is over.”

“That’s fine, sir. Might I have another glass of this delicious wine before the poison?”

“I’ll take that as your last wish,” the admiral said ruefully as he refilled the glass.

“I was kind of hoping my last wish would be for a lovely maiden to beg tearfully for my life,” he said, casting gimlet eyes toward Vicky.

“I didn’t know there was a lovely maiden on this station,” the admiral said, but a smile was threatening to ruin any effect his words might have.

“Well, how about the supplications of a tired old lady?” Vicky offered.

“We don’t have any of them aboard either,” the admiral said, refilling his glass. “Sure you won’t have some?”

Robbed of her anger and seriously curious about the wine, this time Vicky took the offered glass.

“This
is
delicious. As good if not better than any served in the palace.”

“Don’t tell your father. He’ll confiscate it.”

“Or my stepmom. She’ll poison it,” Vicky said, enjoying another sip.

“So, now that we’ve let wine soften our hearts, if not our heads,” the admiral said, “what is your business on St. Petersburg?”

“I have a pile of orders from Poznan for everything from tractor carburetors to several types of specialty steels. I had no idea there were so many types of steel. It’s as bad as ice cream.”

“And likely as important to people of a certain age,” the admiral agreed.

“Anyway, along with the pile of orders, I have a pile of loan requests from just as many sources. The businessmen I talked to don’t want handouts, they just want a hand up. They all had good lines of credit with banks on Greenfeld before the banks suddenly quit lending. They’re grateful for what we’ve sent them for free. Now they want to pay for the next round, but they need loans to get them started. Do you think the local banks on St. Petersburg can step up and fill the hole left by the Imperial banks?”

“That will depend a lot on what your friend Mannie can do, and you, Your Grace.”

“How much can I push this Grand Duchess role?” Vicky asked, not expecting any answer.

“That is the question we’re all waiting to see, Your Grace. You talked a whole lot of people into loading a Fleet of Desperation full of lousy food to keep a planet alive. By the way, how bad was it?”

“Bad,” Vicky said, taking a sip of the wine. “A whole lot worse than we thought. I’ll admit to you, I came back as quickly as I did because I’m a coward. I couldn’t bear to be there when they started discovering all the children who didn’t make it. All the grandparents who were lost in the great runaway. I dealt with businessmen who were looking for their workforce.”

Again Vicky sipped the wine. “There were enough grown men missing. When they tally up all the wives and children who just disappeared . . .” She couldn’t finish that thought.

Vicky might have drained the glass right then and there. Instead, she set it down gently on the table beside her.

“I understand that your doctor didn’t come back with you,” the admiral said.

“No. Maggie is a gentle soul who is in her element. You wouldn’t believe what she’s finding, though. I thought she’d have her hands full with cuts, bruises, and infections. Broken bones that weren’t set right or not set at all. What acted as the local police were quite brutal. But she’s loaded down with beriberi, rickets, scurvy, and other diseases I didn’t even think existed anymore.”

“Famines will show you the things we thought the human race was done with,” the admiral replied thoughtfully. “I’m advised that the Navy’s colonies have had very good crops this year. We’ll be donating wheat, rice, beans, and other basic commodities by the shipload.”

“Will we need to escort them?”

“Likely not, unless you want to go with them.”

“Hmm, that is a thought,” Vicky admitted.

Again, the admiral twirled the stem of his wineglass. “Has this changed anything for you?”

“Has any of this changed anything for the Navy?” Vicky asked right back.

The admiral remained silent.

Vicky listened to the old-fashioned chronometer tick off the seconds for a restful while, then ventured into mined waters.

“I am told there is a flag somewhere, hidden under the bed or up in the attic. I’m told that no one can decide if it should be taken out and waved.”

The admiral pursed his lips but said nothing.

“I’m told there is a young woman somewhere that some people might want to wave that flag. Assuming they had it, of course.”

Again silence.

“I find that a certain young woman is getting less and less reluctant to wave that nonexistent rag if it should ever be taken out of the closet and handed to her.”

“But not eager yet,” the admiral said.

“Let’s say less reluctant,” Vicky said.

“I’ll keep that in mind and pass it along to anyone who might have that nonexistent heirloom in their closet.”

Vicky stood. “Admiral, do you think you could loan me a barge and bosun to fly it? I’m reluctant to fly with this lush at the controls, but I feel a strong need to go dirtside immediately.”

“I am
not
a lush,” the commander said, standing on an even keel. “I was just anesthetizing myself for the poison to follow.”

“Bad news, Commander,” the admiral said. “That nonexistent fair maiden has put in a good word for you. The poison is postponed.”

“Damn. I figured poison was the only way out of my present assignment.”

“No rest for the wicked,” Vicky said to her commander.

“But I haven’t been wicked. Not even evil, sir. Truly. Just ask this fair maiden.”

“It’s got to be the wine speaking,” Vicky said.

“Take him dirtside to sober up,” the admiral ordered. “I don’t want this lush befouling my station.”

“Thank you, Admiral,” Vicky said.

“I think the Navy needs to thank you, Your Grace.”

“We shall see,” Vicky allowed.

T
HE
ride down was smooth. This trip, no one threatened to shoot Vicky out of the sky. She took it as a good omen and concentrated on organizing her thoughts.

The time she spent figuring out how to arrange a meeting with Mannie was a waste. He was waiting for her with a limo before the shuttle made it up the ramp from the bay to the spaceport’s apron.

“There’s a meeting scheduled for ten minutes from now,” the mayor of Sevastopol announced as he held the door open for her.

“Ten minutes?” Vicky said. “Isn’t this a bit tight since I didn’t radio ahead to tell anyone I was coming?”

“The business representatives from Poznan radioed in as soon as they entered the system. We know everything on their wish list and have copies of their loan applications.”

“No secrets here,” Vicky said.

“None needed. If you want to buy something, it’s kind of silly not to ask the seller if he has it in stock, don’t you think?”

“One might fear that they’d jack up the price if you let them know you want it.”

“One might on Greenfeld, but this is St. Petersburg. We
have rather good records of what this item or that cost people yesterday and last week. We
want
to sell things today and next month. We don’t have time for silliness.”

Vicky mulled that over. The drive was short, and she was still thinking about it when they pulled up to the circle in front of a magnificent tower of steel, glass, and stone.

“Not your City Hall, today?” Vicky asked.

“This is business. We will beard the lions in their corporate den. The men and women you’re about to meet are the most powerful industrialists and bankers on this planet. People from all over the Midland Sea have flown in for this meeting. It’s not just Sevastopol you’re dealing with this morning.”

Vicky glanced down at her Navy undress blues with the few lonely stripes of a lowly lieutenant commander.

It may take a bit of work to make the Grand Duchess shine through.

The elevator took them to the top floor. The conference room Mannie led Vicky into was spectacular even by Greenfeld standards.

Glass gave a breathtaking panorama from the room’s outer three walls. The ceiling was arched glass, inviting the sky to come down and sup with the powerful.
The panorama from here must be awe-inspiring at night
.

Don’t gawk, girl. You may be underdressed, but you’re still the Grand Duchess.

All conversation ceased as everyone stood upon Vicky’s entrance. The chair at the head of the table was empty; with gentle pressure on her elbow, Mannie aimed Vicky toward it.

Vicky was halfway there when the silence broke into applause that continued until she took her place at the head of the table. She’d never been greeted with such a wave of approval. Vicky gave them her best Grand Duchess smile and sat.

The applause ended, and they all sat.

No one said anything. They just looked at her and she at them.

Mannie cleared his throat but didn’t say anything.

Vicky took a deep breath.

“We want to thank all of you for coming here to meet with us on such short notice,” Vicky said, laying the Imperial “We” on with a butter knife.

“We recognize some of you from our previous meetings and strongly suspect that all of you had a large hand in our effort to bring relief to Poznan and Presov. We can tell you that in both cases, your assistance arrived in time. Indeed, it arrived at a critical time before irreparable loss would have occurred. We wish to congratulate all of you.”

Some of the men and women around the table smiled with satisfaction. Some, but not all. Vicky noted the number in attendance who let the praise wash off their backs like money vanishing into a corrupt politician’s pocket.

This was not going to be an easy crowd to work.

“From your generosity, you gave enough to pull these planets back from catastrophe. We thank you, and they thank you. Now, they have sent representatives to reopen the normal course of business and trade between planets. They need to buy what you want to sell. However, in order for them to restart this process, they need to borrow money.”

Vicky paused for a moment. Around the table, some eagerly leaned forward. Others sat back. Were they reluctant to get involved or just waiting to drive the hardest bargain they could?

“Only a few years ago, all of these businesses now applying for loans from banks in St. Petersburg were considered creditworthy by Imperial banks on Greenfeld. At least they were before those banks quit loaning money. Now they are willing to focus their trade on St. Petersburg if your banks are willing to help them get that trade going.”

Another pause.

“We, the Imperial Grand Duchess Victoria of Greenfeld, heartily endorse their requests to you.”

There, Vicky had said all she could. Now she sat back in her chair and prepared to listen.

Dear Lord, but they had a lot to say.

With due respect, the two sides took turns presenting and reiterating their positions.

“This is just the chance we’ve been looking for to grow our industries,” an industrialist would say. “We still are not up to full employment. We’ve got plant capacity that we aren’t using. This is what we need to get us out of the doldrums.”

That optimism, however, would be quickly countered.

“We don’t have the money for this. After the last tax collector
came through, we’re just about out of Imperial gold marks. The St. Petersburg marks we’re printing are no better than fiat script at best. If we expand the money supply too much, too fast, we’ll have inflation. Maybe not runaway inflation at first, but it’s a risk that’s just waiting for us if we get this wrong.”

Before that speaker even stopped talking, the next would be getting his oar in the water . . . or maybe slamming it over the last speaker’s head.

“We’re a long way from inflation. Where is the demand for things that can’t be met with the goods available? You’ve got to have people waving money at you to get their hands on scarce resources or the too few goods before the market will let any seller start raising prices. Inflation is just you bankers’ bogeyman, and, frankly, I’m not afraid of the dark.”

“You will be if our economy overheats, and you get that excessive demand.”

“Show me some demand.”

“Gentlemen,” Mannie finally said, “I’d like to introduce something else for our consideration.”

“What?” came from several red-faced men at the table.

“Captain Spee, of the good ship
Doctor Zoot
, has been swinging around the planets in our jump group, selling the crystal he picked up on Presov.”

“And stealing our market,” someone down the table muttered low, but so all could hear.

“Can I bring him in? I think you’ll find what he has discovered on his journey to be very interesting.”

The captain was allowed in. He came to stand beside Vicky’s chair. With a formal bow and a good heel click to her, he turned to the table.

“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for allowing me to address you. I’ve just completed a voyage to several of your neighboring planets. Good Luck, Finster, Ormuzd, and Kazan have all, like you to a lesser degree, suffered from the breakdown in trade. I was the first ship any of them have seen in a year. They took my crystal, but all they had to offer were luxury goods and raw materials. What all of them needed were spare parts. None of them have any heavy industry. They need what heavy industry provides. They need to buy that, and, if they can, they want to buy some fab mills of their own.”

He turned to Vicky with a nod. “You’ll excuse me, Your Grace, but the colonial policies of Greenfeld stink. They stank before, and now what with credit dried up and trade going the way of the proverbial dodo bird, they stink to high heaven.”

“Are those planets in danger of going the way of Poznan?” Vicky asked.

“Not this week. Maybe not this month, but, Your Grace, I am not at all willing to say what they will be like next year.”

“More markets,” an industrialist said.

“More demand. If it gets out of control, there will be hell to pay,” put in a banker.

“Can we look at ourselves in the mirror next year,” came slowly from an old man, maybe the oldest person at the table, “if we do nothing about this now?”

That brought the table to a long, meditative silence.

“Captain Spee, would you mention to those gathered here what Ormuzd gave you in trade for your crystal?” Mannie said.

“I got a consignment of rare earths. A nice balanced ton of all of them.”

“What’s your asking price?” came from down the table.

“What are you offering?” shot back the captain. “Ormuzd don’t want marks, gold or any of that stuff. They have a long list of machinery and spare parts they need. If you want the dirt, you get me those parts.”

“It’s a deal.”

“Rare earths?” Vicky said.

“They are critical ingredients to just about everything electronic,” Mannie said. “Before the crash, Greenfeld bought all the rare earths Bayan Obo could produce and manufactured just about everything that used them. With a monopoly on the market, they priced them accordingly. We have a very small source of the stuff in the desert south of Moskva. We used it to develop our own little electronics industry. Not enough to be noticed by the powers that be on Greenfeld but enough to let us make a few things cheap and local.”

Mannie looked down the table. Several men grinned proudly and nodded along with him.

“If we really want to build an electronics industry, and there is no doubt that we can, we’ll need a lot of rare earths. Right now, the best source on St. Petersburg is way off in the
eastern desert. To get there, we’d need to build a whole lot of infrastructure and somehow figure a way to bring water to the place.”

The mayor paused.

“Or we could just start importing the stuff from Ormuzd and get the industry going now. No doubt, as our population grows, some of it will spread out into the eastern desert. Once that rare-earths mine isn’t so way off and gone in the outback, we’ll just naturally be able to exploit the stuff.”

“Here, here,” came from many at the table.

“It was fine for us to smuggle some cheap electronics into our economy,” a banker pointed out, “but when things get back to normal, and we get Imperial inspector generals from Greenfeld looking over our shoulders, it won’t be possible to hide a major, unapproved industry.”

“And when are things going to get back to normal?” came from somewhere around the table.

“Never,” came forcefully from several.

“Your Grace, this meeting must be very tiring, and I know you just completed a long and harrowing voyage,” Mannie said. “Would you care to leave these fine people to their discussion of our planet’s future?”

“Why thank you, Mr. Mayor,” Vicky said, grateful for the hint. She wasn’t so much tired as bored. She was starting to wonder if her dad didn’t have something with his idea of just telling the market what to do and see that it did it . . . and she really didn’t like the taste of that thought.

It was all too clear to Vicky that her dad’s way of running things wasn’t working out all that well, what with him busy in the bedroom and the Bowlingame mob doing what they pleased.

Vicky rose but did not turn to go.

“We are appreciative of all your great concerns, both for your proud St. Petersburg and those other planets that have been thrown on such hard times. You ask when matters may return to normal. We must tell you that we do not see that day coming anytime soon. We don’t see it coming without even more disruption and pain. We hope that you will take it upon yourselves to alleviate as much of that pain and suffering as you can.”

Now Vicky turned and let Mannie lead her to the door.

To her surprise, he led her through it and over to the elevator.

“You don’t have to come with me,” she said.

“You think I want to stay in there? They’ll talk and talk for the rest of the day. Then, maybe about midnight, as they’re yawning, they’ll settle on something. I’ll be there to make sure they settle on something the way I want it.”

“And you’re leaving now?” Vicky asked.

“To take a nap, so I won’t be yawning later. Oh, and maybe talk a bit with you.”

The elevator came, and they entered.

“Me?”

“How bad is it out there?”

“Worse than you want to imagine,” Vicky said, and filled him in on some of what she’d seen. She finished her tale as they were crossing the foyer. “It was worse than I could take. I left before Poznan could start counting its dead.”

Mannie shivered.

“It could have been us,” he muttered, as the limo drove off.

“But you held together.”

“We wouldn’t have. Not without the city charter and the Navy work.”

“I’m glad I let Kris Longknife talk me into signing that charter.”

Mannie smiled. “I was flying by the seat of my pants that day.”

“You flew very well.”

Mannie seemed to like the taste of that, but he took the moment to hand Vicky into his limo, then joined her. When he spoke again, it was on a different subject. “I understand you were attacked on your return voyage.”

“A pirate schooner or sloop or corvette came at us. We blew it to atoms, so we’re not all that sure what it was or where it came from. Anyway, we got it, but it got us good. We weren’t sure the entire way back that the
Attacker
would make it.”

“About the
Attacker
. Will the Navy repair it?”

“Not likely,” Vicky said. “They don’t have the facilities on High St. Petersburg to do all that heavy repair work.”

Mannie made a face. “Maybe they don’t. Maybe
we
do.”

“Maybe
you
do?” Vicky echoed.

“We have two repair slips on High Petersburg. They were
built to repair merchant hulls, but they’re large enough to take in a heavy cruiser like the
Attacker
.”

Vicky shook her head. “It’s one thing to work on the light scantlings and engines of a merchant hull, another thing to tackle the heavy machinery of a warship or its 8-inch lasers, even less its heavy hull members needed to support the ice armor . . . and everything else.”