"In a lot of ways," he admitted, "I'd almost prefer surrender. I've been fighting the Manticorans for a long time now, Eloise. Hell, I started fighting them in Yeltsin, before the first war ever began! My emotions where they're concerned are probably as tangled up and knotted as those of anyone else in the Republic, but I'm tired of seeing men and women under my command, men and women who follow my orders because they trust me, killed. Especially when they're being killed because of a stupid fucking misunderstanding.
"But I'm an admiral; you're the politician. Is a surrender to them possible?"
"I don't know." She inhaled deeply, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. "I just don't know. I could carry the Cabinet with me, but I don't see how I could possibly carry the Senate, even if I told them everything we suspect about Arnold at this point. And I don't have the power, as President, to declare war or conclude peace-or surrender-without the advice and consent of the Senate. God only knows what would happen if I tried. Our legal system and chains of authority are still so new, they might shatter outright if I ordered a surrender and Congress repudiated my orders. Everything we've worked for could collapse. Even your navy could come apart. A lot of it would probably obey the order if you endorsed it, but other parts might ignore it and try to keep prosecuting the war. We might even wind up with another round of civil war!"
"Can we send a private message to Elizabeth, then?" Theisman was almost pleading. "Can we tell her we want another cease-fire. A stand down in place of all units while we send a diplomatic mission direct to Manticore?"
"Do you really think they'd listen after all that's happened?" Pritchart said sadly. "That's exactly what I proposed before, Tom! And they're convinced it was only a ploy. That I set it up for some Machiavellian reason of my own, and then tried to murder two teenaged girls to sabotage my own summit. If I try it again now, they're going to see it as an exact replay of the way Saint-Just derailed their Buttercup offensive. It would only 'prove' to them that their new weapons have us panicked."
A single tear tracked down her cheek, and she shook her head.
"I want this war ended even more than you do, Tom. I'm the one Arnold got to with his goddamned forged correspondence. I'm the one who started this entire fucking mess. And now look at it. Hundreds of thousands of men and women dead, star systems wrecked from one end to another, and even Javier."
"Eloise, it wasn't just you." Theisman leaned forward, reaching across the desk, and captured her hand and gripped it fiercely. "Yes, he fooled you. Well, he fooled me, the rest of the Cabinet, and the entire goddamned Congress, as well! You just said it yourself-you didn't have the power to declare war without advice and consent, and you got both of them."
"But I asked for them. It was my policy," she said softly. "My administration."
"Maybe it was. But the way we got here doesn't change where we are, or the options we've got. So, if we can't negotiate, and we can't surrender, what can we do except launch Beatrice? It's an 'all-costs' situation, Eloise, and Bravo was specifically designed to take out Eighth Fleet, as well. If we manage that, we knock out the only force we know is equipped with the new missiles, but even that's pretty much beside the point if the main op succeeds. That's really what it comes down to, now. If we wait, we lose; if we attack and I'm wrong about their deployment status, we lose; but if we attack and I'm right, we'll almost certainly win. It's that simple."
He looked into her eyes once again, still holding her hand.
"So which way do we go, Madam President?"
Chapter Fifty-Nine
"Duchess Harrington!"
"Over here, Duchess Harrington!"
"Duchess Harrington, would you care to comment on-?"
"Duchess Harrington, did you know-?"
"Alvin Chorek, Duchess Harrington, Landing Herald United Faxes! Are you going-?"
"Duchess Harrington! Duchess Harrington!"
Honor ignored the newsies' shouts as she moved quickly across the shuttle pad's concourse. It wasn't easy. A last-minute conference aboard Imperator that ran well over its originally allotted time had her running over six hours behind her original schedule, but that had only given the mob more time to gather. Worse, someone had obviously leaked her adjusted arrival time, and the concourse was a madhouse. Capital Field security personnel, joined by hastily mobilized drafts of Landing City Police, formed a cordon, holding the reporters-and what looked, to her jaundiced eye, like at least ten million private citizens-at bay.
Mostly.
A trio of particularly enterprising newsies bolted suddenly out of a service doorway which had somehow been left unguarded. They charged towards her, shoulder-mounted cameras running, shouting questions, then skidded to a sudden halt as they found themselves face to face with a suddenly congealing, solid line of green-clad armsmen.
Armed armsmen.
Unsmiling armed armsmen.
Andrew LaFollet had guessed what might happen, and he'd sent an additional twelve-man team from the Bay House to the concourse. They'd reinforced Spencer Hawke, Clifford McGraw, and Joshua Atkins at the arrivals gate, and LaFollet himself could not have bettered the stony brown stare Captain Hawke turned upon the lead newsy.
"Ah, um, I mean-"
The reporter's brashness appeared to have deserted him. Hawke made absolutely no threatening gesture, but none was needed, and as Honor watched gravely, her own unsmiling expression hid an inner chuckle as she wondered if "Newsy Intimidation 101" was a course listing on an armsman's training syllabus somewhere.
"Excuse me, Sir," Hawke said with exquisite courtesy, "but you're blocking the Steadholder's way."
"We just wanted-" The newsy began, then stopped. He looked over his shoulder at his two fellows, as if for support. If that was what he'd been searching for, he didn't find it. They were busy looking in different directions.
Then, as if by the result of some telepathic communication, the three of them drifted aside as one.
"Thank you," Hawke said courteously, and looked at Honor. "My Lady?"
"Thank you, Spencer," she said with admirable gravity, and the entire cavalcade resumed its interrupted passage to the waiting air limos and escorting sting ships.
Spencer Hawke looked studiously out the limo window as Hamish Alexander-Harrington wrapped one arm about his wife in a crushing hug.
"God, I'm glad to see you!" he said quietly as Honor sat beside him in the limousine seat, her head on his shoulder. She pressed the top of her head against his cheek, and the treecats on their shoulders reached out to rub their cheeks together, as well.
"And you," she murmured into his ear. She let herself relax totally for a moment, then straightened and sat more upright, still in the circle of his arm, but far enough back to see his face.
"Emily?" she asked. "Katherine?"
"Fine, both of them fine," he reassured her quickly. "Emily wanted to come, but Sandra wouldn't hear of it. For that matter, Jefferson was ready to put his foot down if she'd tried." He shook his head and glanced at Hawke with a wry grin. "How the hell have you managed to retain any tattered illusion that you run your own life after having had Grayson armsmen looking after you for so long?"
"Jefferson's only doing his job, love," Honor told him primly, also watching Hawke from the corner of her eye. Her personal armsman seemed to have become remarkably hard of hearing, however.
"And Sandra was probably just exercising simple sanity, given the madhouse out there!" Honor continued.
She jabbed her head at the spaceport buildings, dwindling rapidly behind them, and he snorted.
"Better get used to it," he advised her. "The news broke yesterday. Coupled with what Terekhov did at Monica, Lovat has public morale and enthusiasm soaring to new heights. It's actually rebounded harder because of the contrast to what happened at Zanzibar before the cease-fire. Not to mention the fact that Her Majesty's subjects are in the most murderous mood I've seen since your 'execution' over what happened to Jim and almost happened to Berry and Ruth. And since Terekhov won't be back from Talbott for another month or so, all of it's going to be focusing on you, Madam Salamander."