“A seventeen-year-old girl and a nine-month-old artificial intelligence,” Richard reminds. I snort into my coffee.
Frye doesn't have any kids, does she?
“Nary a one. And she's an only child.”
Lucky dogs, the both of you. That wouldn't work for half a second if she did. You don't actually think she's going to break and tell you anything?
“I'm just hoping Alan and Patricia can make her sweat hard enough on the stand that she looks like she's lying.”
The chances are slim.
“The choices look grim,” he answers, with a funny hiccuping rhythm, like he's quoting a song. If he were real and standing in front of me, I'd fix him with my bug-eyed look. “Never mind. Someday my cultural referents will catch up to yours.”
And by then I'll be in my grave, and you'll be confounding Genie's children.
“I'll need new personalities to confound Genie's children. The Feynman persona would leave them a bit too baffled.”
It's a little creepy, hearing the AI talk about what I think of as himself as if it were an accessory, a shirt that could go out of fashion. Just another brutal reminder of how inhuman he really is. I'd miss you, Dick.
“Dick's not going anywhere.”
Except to the stars, I answer, and we share a pleased interior laugh at that.
There's something of a kerfuffle when we get to the UN; more security personnel than I expected, and a few discreet questions between Riel and our charming guide, the same Mr. Jung (in green and red hanbok, this time), turn up the not-too-surprising information that the Chinese delegation has arrived, and the premier is with them today.
The PanChinese group catches sight of us in the General Assembly lobby, in the shadow of the enormous pendulum. Three of them break away as soon as we enter, attention obviously caught by the three rifle-green uniforms, the darker, richer green of Min-xue's kit, and Patty and Riel in civvies, flanked by the stiff spines of a couple of Mounties in plainclothes. Two Mounties. Not nearly enough to keep this crew out of trouble, but all they let us bring inside.
The good news is, the PanChinese also get only two.
From the way the dark-suited individuals who look to be the security team are hustling to keep up, the slender-shouldered man in the lead has to be Premier Xiong. I'm more sure of it because he looks familiar, if bigger than he does on the feed, and I've gone from somebody who wouldn't recognize Minister Shijie if he fell at my feet to being able to pick his sad-bulldog face out of a crowd at two hundred paces. A thousand, if you gave me a sniper scope.
That shark in the mahogany suit is still right alongside him, and there's another attaché of some sort bringing up the rear of the pack.
I step back, getting myself between Min-xue and Patty and the Chinese, and let Riel and Frye deal with the guests. Min-xue's indrawn breath is audible from where I'm standing.
Oh, this is going to be fun.
Except Premier Xiong stops in front of Riel as if there were a microphone stand marking the spot, nods his head — a quick birdlike dip of the chin that acknowledges the petite woman in front of him and brings him momentarily down to her level without making a production of it — and thrusts out his right hand with the aplomb of the father of the groom sorting out the groom's guests from the bride's. A hush falls like snow.
“Prime Minister,” he says, a very white, slightly predatory smile illuminating his homely face, “it is a pleasure to finally meet you in person.”
The swing of the Foucault pendulum might be the arrested pulse of a giant heart. The whole room feels like an in-held breath, and I can feel the pressure of all those eyes.
And then Connie Riel takes two broad steps forward, and reaches out, and grabs Xiong's hand in both her own just as if she always meant to, and the collective heart of everybody in the room thumps once, hard, and begins to beat again. “Premier Xiong.” Her flat Albertan accent rings harsh against his musical tones. “I look forward to a new era of cooperation between our governments. Once we have set these differences behind us.”
I don't think either she or Premier Xiong notice the way General Shijie's brow smooths, and a slight smile turns up the corners of his mouth, but I'm suddenly certain why I had that premonition that I ought to make sure I showed up today.
Xiong steps back and offers Riel a short crisp bow, which she returns without the heel-click. He turns toward me when he pivots away, and I catch the devilish glitter in the coffee-dark eyes under his thinning brows and almost swear out loud.
They set that up. Son of a bitch. And from the stricken look on Frye's face, I'd have to say it was worth it. Even though I really don't like the way the minister of war is smiling.
“Right,” Riel says, as Xiong strides away, and glances up at me with a sly, sidelong smile. Some days, I really don't mind having taken three bullets for her. “Let's go in there and make the world safe for parliamentary democracy with pronounced socialist leanings, shall we?”
I'm not surprised when Fred is the only one who laughs.
Patty Valens's knowing smirks might almost have been enough to shake Janet's resolve, if she hadn't already made up her mind. The kid didn't know anything; the kid couldn't know anything. She held that thought cleanly in her mind, hard and fast, as she mounted the steps to the podium. Because if Patty knew something, then Fred would know it, and if Fred knew it, Janet Frye had no illusions that she would have lived long enough to take that stage and look up to meet the expectant eyes of the world.
Frederick Valens was not one of the good guys, and he never had been. And he would have very quietly, very thoughtfully seen that she was out of the way if he'd known what Toby gave her.
If he had known what she had agreed to do.
The funny thing was, she hadn't decided until this morning. She didn't think she'd slept in four days, and she'd had far more to drink than anybody in her position ought to. And it hadn't been Patty Valens's transparent manipulations that had made her mind up, once Patty had realized there was a hook in Janet's lip that could be worked. It hadn't been the simple dignity of Casey's testimony, or the way Captain Wu had broken down on the stand. No. That wasn't what made her hand shake when she shook the secretary general's hand.
It was the memory of Constance Riel looking her dead in the eye and snapping, And then if you want to hand PanChina the keys to the castle, you can do it on your own watch.
Damn you to hell, Connie, she thought, as she stated her name. Her oath was ashes in her mouth. She raised her right hand anyway and thought of Canada and the good of the commonwealth.
She took one deep breath and found Connie's chair at Canada's table, and made damn sure that Constance Riel was looking into her eyes when she opened her mouth and said, “Before I make any other statements regarding my knowledge of circumstances leading up to the tragic events of last Christmas, I need to reveal a few very important facts that have not yet entered the record.”
She needed another breath. Two, maybe. She needed a drink of water, so she took one, and let the ice click against her teeth. Look pretty for the cameras, Connie, she thought. They're going to be closing in for the reaction shot.