"It's getting to be lunchtime, don't you think?" I said to the nude girl snuggled next to me.
"Yes, sir. "
"Well, why don't you get me a couple of salami sandwiches, a side of onion rings, and a cold Budweiser. And get anything you want for yourself."
"Yes, sir. "
An untalkative girl, but she was pretty and obedient, and I guess you can't have everything. Nice outfit, too. She was back almost immediately. She spread my lunch out on the control desk and stood waiting.
"Aren't you hungry? Why don't you eat?" I said.
"Yes, sir." She brought in a bowl of something that looked like custard and spooned it quickly down.
"Is that all you're eating?"
"Yes, sir."
"Don't you want anything else?"
"No, sir."
I shrugged. Well, she was pretty young, and kids that age can survive on nearly anything. I put it down to some sort of fad diet.
I sat back, put my arm around her, and hit the START button.
Chapter Fourteen
Captainette Lubinska's trial went on for five days. I managed to scrupulously avoid it, except when I was called in to testify as to exactly what orders she had been given. Baron Vladimir spoke at length in her behalf, but when the sorry affair was over, a jury of her peers, twelve captains and captainettes, found her guilty. According to the code of military justice that I myself had written, the punishment was death by hanging, and that's exactly what Baron Pulaski sentenced her to, to be carried out first thing in the morning.
My own rules required a speedy sentence, provided that the case could be reviewed in time, since to keep a condemned prisoner waiting for months or years, as is often the modem practice, seemed to be unnecessarily cruel to the criminal. Enough time for the condemned to say a good confession, go to mass, and spend a night in prayer was all that could be morally justified. Also, much of the reason for punishing someone is as an example to others, and if the thing drags out for years, people forget what the crime was all about. The hanging, when it finally happens, becomes a simple, needless murder by the state.
Baron Vladimir came to see me that evening. He repeated all the arguments he had made before, and also said that much of the fault for the incident was mine, for I had put a weak and stupid peasant woman into a position that was too far above her.
"My lord, if you loaded ten tons of iron onto the back of a mule and it collapsed, would you blame the animal? Would you kill it for having failed in its duty?"
"We're not talking about a dumb animal here, Vladimir. We're talking about a human being!"
"True, my lord, and I would not be arguing so strongly if it were only a dumb animal you were abusing, though I would still call your failings to your attention. You are my liege lord, and I am obligated to give you my best counsel, even and especially when you don't like it! Furthermore, the difference between a dumb animal and a dumb peasant is less than you may think. We are knights, you and 1. Our function is to protect the peasants, not to hang them for being peasants!"
So that was the crux of the problem. Baron Vladimir was a traditional member of the old nobility, while I was a man born in the twentieth century. Vladimir was a good friend and a valuable subordinate, but his world outlook was very different from mine. And he hadn't stopped explaining things to me yet.
"We were put here by God to protect women, my lord, not to kill them for having feminine weaknesses! I say again that the fault is yours for putting her in the position that you did, for elevating her far above her station, and for trusting a woman to do a man's job. You had men who were sound of mind but could not join us in the field. Baron Novacek, for one. He may not have hands, but he could have commanded East Gate and done a good job at it. Why you insisted on having all your women's companies led by women is beyond me."
Why indeed? It had seemed good for morale, and it ensured that a man wouldn't take advantage of a female subordinate, but the main reason was my twentieth-century belief in equality. If women were doing the defending, they should lead the defense as well. Now it seemed that I was equalizing the captainette right out of her life.
I let Vladimir continue until he started repeating himself, then I said, "Baron, I don't know what I'll do about this mess yet, but whatever I do, it won't be done lightly. Tell me, that courier who missed you in the dark near Sandomierz. What did you do to him?"
"Him, my lord? Well, he was incompetent as a scout or messenger, so I could hardly leave him with a Big Person, but he had done his best within his limitations. I let him sleep while we recrossed the Vistula and then put him back down in the ranks as a pikeman. It doesn't take much brains to do that job, simply courage, strength, and obedience, things that a peasant is often good at."
"But you didn't punish him?"
"Would I punish a fish because it couldn't fly? Peasants are stupid! You can't expect one to do a nobleman's job."
"I see. To change the subject, what about you, Baron Vladimir? You've done a wonderful job these last six years with the army. Have you done any thinking about what your reward should be? About what you want to do now?"
"Hmmm. I've had some thoughts, my lord, or perhaps I should call them dreams. I have saved much of my salary over the years, and I'll get my share of the booty. I wonder, well, there is the castle you got from Count Lambert, the one Baron Stefan used to hold. You've never used it for much of anything. Would you consider selling it to me?"
"No, but I'd give it to you if you wanted it. You've certainly earned it, and as you say, it's just going to waste. Or better still, how about the new castle I built for Count Lambert at Okoitz? It's a dozen times larger and comes stocked with a renewable supply of attractive young ladies. "
"A portion of me is tempted by Okoitz, my lord, but my better parts say that I'd be happier with my wife and family without the count's fabulous harem. You see, what I want is to live in the old traditional way, with the wife and children that I haven't seen enough of these past years. My oldest boy is eight years old now, and he has seen very little of his own father. I don't want to live as Count Lambert did, and I certainly don't want to live like you! Further, I think that there are a lot of the peasants on the lands that you've gotten that prefer the old ways as well. With your permission, I would gather together those peasants that would swear to me and take them from these mines and factories of yours."
"Permission granted, old friend. From my standpoint, you'll be relieving me of some of my malcontents. The castle is yours, along with as much land as you can find men to farm it."
"And a bit more, some forest for a hunting preserve, my lord?"
"Fine, so long as you don't go and reintroduce wild boars and wolves on it. And the people you talk into joining you, well, don't get too traditional on me. I'm going to insist that they have schools, stores, and modem fanning methods. "
"Of course, my lord. I never intended to throw out any of your improvements! It's this business of changing jobs all the time, and promotions, and not knowing the grandsons of your grandfather's friends that troubles me. I don't know quite how to put it, but it's as if things have gotten like a river that is running too wide and too shallow! I want to go along in a deep, old channel, where the human things go on as they always have and always will. Glass in the windows and flush toilets and good steel plows are fine things, and a man would be a fool to not use them, but it's the human factors that I worry most about."
One of the failings of the communists was that they had a vision of the future that they thought was good, and they tried to make everybody conform to their ideas of goodness. To my own mind, well, it's a big world and it takes all kinds of people to fill it. If some peasants prefer a life-style that I would find oppressive, well, as long as nobody is forcing anyone, I say let them do as they wish. I don't need everybody on my bandwagon.