The scene-carved door opened, held by an aide. In walked Matthias Esterhazy, formerly a major in the Airborne Assault Engineers of the Army of the Federal Republic of Sachsen on the continent of Taurus, later an investment banker with SachsenBank, most recently comptroller and chief of investments of both the Legion del Cid, SA and Carrera's own family's corporation of Chatham, Hennessey and Schmied. He had other duties, as well; most significantly, Esterhazy was the direct representative of the Legion to the War Department of the Federated States of Columbia.
About Carrera's height, five-ten or so, Esterhazy's appearance, like his name, indicated a heavy admixture of Magyar along with his predominantly Sachsen heritage. He was, by nature, darker than Carrera. The natural dark could not easily be seen, however, except in the eyes. Contrasted to Carrera's icy blue, Esterhazy's were hazel.
The Sachsen's skin was only slightly olive in tone. While Carrera's had tanned to a dark finish to match his office door, as one would expect with someone who spent nine months in ten under the pitiless sun of the Sumeri desert, Esterhazy had paled under the weak sun and indoor lighting of the metropolis of First Landing, the largest city in the Federated States.
Carrera shook hands over the desk and indicated a seat with the other hand. He pushed aside a map. Had anyone looked, the map would have shown a one to two hundred-thousand scale topological view of Pashtia, a half mountainous-half desertified half-failed state south of Kashmir and north of the Islamic glacis states along the border of the Volgan Republic. There was a war going on in Pashtia, a sister campaign to the one being waged in Sumer.
"Good news and bad news, Patricio," Esterhazy began, after seating himself. Carrera noted that Esterhazy's Sachsen accent had almost disappeared under the influence of seven years of living in the city of First Landing in the Federated States.
"Bad news first."
Esterhazy had anticipated that. "In a few days the Progressive Party is going to win the next election in the Federated States. Yes, it will be close but they're still going to win. Their most likely candidate for SecWar is James Malcolm. I have spoken with Malcolm, at a fund raiser. The Legion's contract for Sumer will not be renewed. No possible campaign contribution, or even outright bribe, that we could offer will change that. I have also spoken with your family senator, Harriet Rodman. She says that getting it renewed is beyond her power and that it doesn't matter what you pay her; it would still be beyond her power."
Carrera shrugged. "I expected that. The campaign in Sumer is pretty much over, anyway. That Harriet can't help is . . . disappointing. But she's always been up front with me and if she says she can't then she probably really can't. Pity. And the good news . . . ?"
Esterhazy, uninvited but welcome, took a cigarette from a pack on Carrera's desk. Lighting and puffing it to life, he continued, "Financially, you can continue to support the force you have, and even expand it to the full fifty thousand you want to. But that is all; you don't and won't—not with anything low risk that I can do, investment-wise—have the means to continue the war at the current level. At least you won't be able to continue it indefinitely."
"Details?" Carrera asked, likewise reaching for a cigarette and leaning back to put his feet up on the desk.
"I've been conservative, as you wished me to be," Esterhazy cautioned. "Right now, legionary assets are on the order of fifty-two billion FSD. The income from this, after adjusting for inflation and the limited tax we pay, is about two billion FSD per year. This pays for the force but for almost nothing else. It absolutely will not pay for maintaining a full legion of over thirteen thousand men deployed and at war without invading the corpus. In the long run, that is death."
Carrera thought, In the long run, we're all dead anyway.
"There is," Esterhazy continued, "a way to substantially increase the amount I have to work with, if you are willing."
Carrera's eyes narrowed. Whenever Esterhazy used the phrase "substantially increase" it always meant "risk." Carrera was not particularly risk averse, in most respects. Risking money, however? That went against his family's grain. Besides, he understood the kind of risks he took willingly. Those were military risks. He didn't, quite despite upbringing, really understand finances.
"Go on," he said, warily.
"Well . . . you need to start making your own money," Esterhazy announced. He hastily added, "Not money for street commerce. I mean—and I've thought on this a lot, Patricio—that you can increase your assets by converting some of it to precious metals and then offering precious metal certificates, PMCs, for X quantity of gold, silver, platinum, palladium and rhodium to people—rich people—who feel the need to have escape money or even just a hedge against inflation or economic collapse. There are a lot of people like that in the world, you know. There are, for example, something on the order of half a trillion FSD"—Federated States Drachma—"out of circulation around the globe, many—perhaps most—of them held for just those reasons. All the inflation on that money represents profit, risk-free profit, for the Federated States."
"So where would our profit come in?" Carrera asked.
"In two ways," Esterhazy answered. "As it is very unlikely that everyone in the world is likely to ask for their precious metals all at the same time, we can sell a lot more of the certificates than we actually have precious metals on hand. Equally important, I can play the market, buying up certificates and metal when the value of, say, gold is down and selling them when it's high. This is all really just playing the market, but with the added features of leveraging a smaller amount of metal and ourselves becoming something like inside traders. I am good at what I do, Patricio. I will make you money."
"And how much of our fifty-two billion would you like to put into this?"
"Ideally all . . . " Esterhazy was stopped by Carrera's vigorously shaken head. " . . . but I know you won't go for that. How about twenty percent then?"
"How about five percent and we'll see how it works?" Carrera countered.
Esterhazy sighed. "With a mere two and a half billion, Patricio, I can't exercise the kind of leverage that would really generate a profit. How about that amount over and above what I need to generate sufficient operating expenses for the full force . . . say . . . . five billion?"
Carrera considered quietly for a few moments. "I could accept that amount . . . maybe. But see, Matthias; I am not really worried about our being unemployed for very long."
"But I just told you . . . "
"Never mind that," Carrera interrupted, reaching for the map he had earlier pushed aside. "The FSC's War Department may not want to renew our contract for Sumer. I can hardly blame them. But there's still a piracy problem at the edges of the Islamic and Salafi world and the old Venganza"—a Great Global War era aircraft carrier the Legion had purchased for a song—"is about to be recommissioned . . . though we still haven't got a name for the ship. I think they, or somebody, may hire us for that. Moreover, they're going to need a good infantry division for Pashtia here," his finger indicated the map, "before too very long. More specifically, the FSC is going to need a good infantry division capable of operating with very constrained logistics. We're the only ones who fit that bill, the only ones on the planet."