The official whose job was to arrange protocol hadn't spoken since Yerby pulled his cap down. "Can we go somewhere private?" Ms. Macey said doubtfully. She looked as if she would have dived back into the car if she'd thought there was a chance of escaping from the compound.
"Madame, sirs," Mark said. "You're in no danger, I assure you. You're just an interesting exhibit, is all."
"Yerby," said Amy decisively, "why don't we take our guests into the house? They'd probably like something other than whiskey to drink after their journey."
"Hmpf!" Yerby snorted. "Nothing wrong with my whiskey. But sure, you folks come in the parlor with us."
He turned to the crowd in general and bellowed, "Boys, make sure the rest of our guests see what Greenwood hospitality's like. I don't want nobody sober enough to stand come dawn."
The locally hand-crafted furnishings in most rooms of the Bannock house were solid, tasteful, and to Mark's mind extremely attractive. He suspected he could export similar pieces to Quelhagen and sell them at a profit despite the transportation cost.
The parlor alone was furnished entirely with off-planet material. No two pieces were of the same style. Most of the furniture was badly copied from Terran antiques. On three of the four walls hung holoprints of fantasy castles. Yerby was so proud of the parlor's imported splendor that there was no possibility that he would bring his foreign guests anywhere else.
Yerby probably didn't notice the way the visitors blinked as they walked into the parlor, but Mark did. He cringed in embarrassment for an instant before he realized that neither he nor anybody else in the room had a right to sneer at Yerby Bannock. Yerby's taste was his own business.
Yerby opened an extruded-plastic reproduction of a Queen Anne sideboard and displayed a double row of imported liquors. "Name your poison!" he said expansively to the Quelhagens.
"Actually, we had refreshments on the flight from Wanker's Doodle," Elector Daniels said. "If you're Mr. Yerby Bannock, we have a business proposition to discuss privately."
"I'm him," Yerby said. He took a glass for himself, picked a bottle of Chartreuse-apparently for the color-and poured. "That's my sister Amy-she's part owner here, so don't just take her for a girl-"
Amy and Ms. Macey both stiffened as though they'd been goosed by broomsticks.
Yerby didn't notice. He seemed surprised at how thick the liqueur was. "And the lad's Mark Maxwell, my legal advisor. He's a Quelhagen like you are."
Dr. Jesilind opened the door from the hallway and peered at the gathering. He'd just decided the room was safe to enter when Amy deliberately slammed and locked the panel. Yerby raised an eyebrow, but he didn't comment on his sister's action.
"Would that be Mark Lucius-son Maxwell?" Mr. Holperin asked. "Pardon me for a personal question."
Mark bowed. "That's correct, sir," he said. "Perhaps you're acquainted with my father?"
"He was representing the other party in a contract dispute," Holperin said with a wintry smile. "A most excellent attorney, your father. He cost me a great deal of money."
He bowed to Mark in turn.
"Money's what we're here about," Daniels said, taking charge of the discussion, "We represent the investment group that owns Greenwood. The undeveloped portion of Greenwood, that is."
"You're the owners of the base grants issued by Protector Greenwood?" Mark clarified. He wasn't any sort of legal advisor, but he could translate Daniels's language into terms Yerby understood.
"Yes, we bought the undivided tracts over a number of years," Daniels agreed. "The value of the investment should have risen sharply now that Greenwood is ripe for large-scale immigration. Recent Zenith agitation clouds our title, however."
The investors have gotten the grants dirt cheap because of those Zenith claims. To make the profits they intended, they'd have to convince would-be settlers that Hestia grants were valid.
"I don't see what that's got to do with me," Yerby said. "You need to take it up with Zenith, right?"
"We will indeed be exercising all our legal remedies, Mr. Bannock," Holperin said. "But that won't do us a great deal of good if the situation on the ground has changed in the meanwhile."
"If there's a city of fifty thousand in the middle of a tract," Ms. Macey said bluntly, "all we can sell is a lawsuit. And that's what the matter has to do with you. As you saw today, the Zenith syndicate is regranting all the Hestia tracts, settled as well as open. The city could as easily be on your property as ours."
"Oh," said Yerby. His smile made Mark tighten up before his conscious mind recalled that the big frontiersman was his friend. "I don't think they'll be settling my property any time soon. Nor that of any of my neighbors."
"Exactly our point," Daniels said. "We're your neighbors too, Mr. Bannock, and like good neighbors we intend to help you. Our attorneys will defend your rights as if they were our own."
"All we're asking in return," Holperin said, bending forward slightly on a wooden captain's chair which Mark knew from experience was just less uncomfortable than a torture rack, "is that you act as our agent here. Continue what you did today, that's all. If one large-scale immigrant community is built on Greenwood, let alone a dozen of them, you and your friends will be swamped and helpless. The time to act is now."
"We think a slightly more formal basis would be useful," Macey said. "Form a planetary militia. It's important that you act in accordance with legal forms. Now-"
"Legally, Greenwood is administered by the Protector of Zenith," Mark interrupted. "Are you asking Mr. Bannock to start an armed insurrection against the Paris authorities?"
"Not at all!" Elector Daniels said. By his title, he was one of the officials elected by the citizens of Quelhagen instead of being appointed from Earth. Given the state of relations between the Council of Electors and the Protector, the Atlantic Alliance authorities would dearly love a chance to arrest Daniels for fomenting rebellion.
"Zenith's claim is not certain," Holperin said. "We don't mean anyone should take arms against the Alliance, Mr. Maxwell. Zenith representatives attempting to grab land by force, however, can properly be resisted by a militia organized among the citizens of the threatened community."
"They're asking you to hold an election and have your friends proclaim you militia commander," Mark translated. He turned to Daniels and continued, "If Mr. Bannock were willing to take on that dangerous burden, there would still be the question of compensation."
"Pay?" said Yerby. "Say, don't worry about that, lad. I wonder if I'd need a uniform, do you think?"
"I had more in mind a proposal that would benefit the planet as well as you, Mr. Bannock," Mark said. He noticed how formal he sounded, but that was the part of his mind that he needed to carry on a negotiation like this.
"I don't need to be paid to do my duty, boy!" Yerby said in a near growl.
"Yerby!" Amy snapped. She stepped to her brother and shook her finger under his nose. "Be quiet and speak when Mark tells you to speak! Do you understand?"
Yerby backed a step and cleared his throat. "Sorry, Amy," he muttered toward a corner of the room.
Mark cleared his throat also. "A reasonable recompense for Mr. Bannock's best efforts on your mutual behalf," he said, "would be a plant to process stockyard waste at the Spiker. Blaney's Tavern, that is. Assuming an arrangement can be worked out with Mr. Blaney."
He cocked an eyebrow at Yerby in question.
"To do what?" Yerby asked.
"Allow us to place a ten-by-thirty-foot unit with solar collectors in the stockyard," Mark explained. "It'll take the manure as well as the slaughteryard waste and convert it into bricks of fertilizer and animal food."