Wheels Within Wheels Read online

  Old Pete grunted. “That’s what bothers me: deBloise throwing away a fortune. I’ve never met that man, Josephine, but I know him. I know him as well as his mother, his father, and his wife know him. I probably know some things about him that even he doesn’t know. And one thing’s certain: he’s not a fool. He’s crafty, he covers all exits, and his involvement in this fiasco-to-be is totally out of character.”

  “Which leaves us with only one possible conclusion,” Jo said, glancing at a man leaning against a wall outside the lounge area. It almost seemed as if he were watching them.

  “I know,” Old Pete replied in a breathy voice. “DeBloise knows something we don’t. And that bothers me.”

  Jo dismissed the watcher as just another bored traveler; this conspiracy talk must be getting to her. “What bothers me more is the thought that the warp gate could be lost to us. I mean, what if Haas’s company folds and he really does decide to withhold the gate from sale or lease or whatever. That could be tragic.”

  Old Pete shrugged. “Tragic, yes. But he’d be perfectly within his rights. According to Andy, the patents are good for at least another couple of decades. The human race would just have to wait it out.”

  The signal for their shuttle flight flashed and they rode the belt out onto the field. The man who had been standing across from the lounge area went up to the observation deck and watched them enter the shuttle. Only after the craft was airborne did he go below.

  He headed directly for the row of subspace transmission booths that are a feature at every spaceport. Entering the first booth, he sealed himself in, opaqued the glass, and began to transmit an urgent message to Fed Central.

  deBloise

  THE BARROOM WAS DONE entirely in wood, something you didn’t see much any more on Fed Central. But this section of the club had originally been a tavern in the Imperium days and had been preserved in the original state. The bar itself was the same one patrons had leaned on nearly three centuries ago when the place had been called the White Hart, its solid keerni wood preserved under a clear, thick, high-gloss coating through which an idle drinker could still make out doodles and initials scratched into the original finish.

  It belonged now to the Sentinel Club, the oldest, most respected, most exclusive club in the outworlds. Membership was strictly male, and restricted to those who had managed to achieve status in the financial, political, and artistic spheres. Elson deBloise reveled in such a rarefied atmosphere, felt a real sense of place and purpose here. He belonged here. There was no comparable establishment on his homeworld where a man of his breeding and wealthy heritage could be among his peers.

  He was not among his peers at the moment, however. The hour was a shade early and he was alone at the bar, hunched over a delicate glassful of Derbian orchid wine. The green-tinged fluid was a little too sweet for his taste but was all the rage on Fed Central these days, so he ordered it whenever he was out. Had to keep up with the times, be as modern as the next man, if not more so. Talk about tomorrow, never about the old days.

  Because nobody around here thought of the old days as good. LaNague had seen to that: his revolution had changed more than the power structure; it had reached into the hearts and minds of his contemporaries and caused a fundamental alteration in the way they viewed their society. Today, generations later, outworld thinking was still influenced by the lesson of that revolution. So a conservative image had to be avoided at all costs.

  “Restructurist” was much preferred as a label. It was neutral in emotional tone and had a certain progressive ring to it. After all, that’s what they intended to do – restructure the Federation. DeBloise smiled to himself. Restructure? They were going to turn it upside down and twist it around.

  He continued to smile. It was fitting in a way that he should be sitting here in this converted tavern plotting the scrapping of the LaNague Charter. It was said that Peter LaNague and Den Broohnin had spent many an evening in this very room when it was called the White Hart as they conspired to bring down the Metep Imperium nearly three centuries ago.

  And what a conspiracy that had been! Despite the fact that deBloise publicly minimized LaNague’s contribution to the revolution, despite the fact that the Restructurist movement had for years been engaged in a clandestine campaign to discredit the bizarre society that had spawned LaNague, thereby discrediting the man himself. Despite the fact that the man’s ingenious wording of the charter had frustrated Restructurists for generations, he had to grant LaNague grudging admiration. His conspiracy had reached into every level of Imperial society, had stretched from the deepest galactic probe to Earth itself. Utterly masterful!

  DeBloise felt he could be generous in his praise. After all, he was the engineer of a conspiracy of his own. True, it didn’t have the breadth and depth of LaNague’s, and its flashpoint would be nowhere near as brilliant and dramatic, but its outcome would eventually prove to be as crucial to the course of human history. The Haas warp gate provided the key. And when that key was turned, there would be furious protests in some quarters, but nothing that could not be soothed by promises that the invocation of the emergency clause in the charter was merely temporary. All would soon return to normal just as soon as we get this one little matter settled, they would say.

  But things would never be the same. A single instance of forceful intervention in the interstellar economy by the Federation was all that was necessary; thereafter, the power of the charter to restrain the Restructurists would be effectively broken. In a few standard years, the charter would be a revered but vestigial document and the Federation would be under Restructurist control.

  He could almost picture himself on the high presidential dais after the next Assembly elections. He deserved that seat. He’d worked for it. It had taken many years of searching and planning to find the right issue – volatile enough to energize the Assembly, and yet still manageable as to timing and discretion concerning his involvement. Only he had seen the political potential of Haas’s invention; only he had possessed the influence over his fellow Restructurists to convince them to go along with his plan.

  Yes, he deserved the presidential seat. And he’d make good use of it once it was his. All economic activity – and thereby all human activity – within the Federation would come under his supervision. Bringing the larger corporations and trade services to heel would be no easy matter but it could be done. First he’d start singling out oddball planets like Flint and Tolive and bring them into line through trade sanctions – they’d never willingly accept a Restructurist-dominated Federation. The corporations would naturally protest since they didn’t like anyone to close a market to them. When they did, he’d bring the full weight of a bolstered Federation Defense Force against them. And when they tried to bribe him – as he knew they eventually must – he would righteously expose them as the moneygrubbing leeches they were.

  And soon… soon humanity would shape itself into a cohesive unit, soon there would be true harmony and equality among the planets, each sharing in the bounties of the others, soon there would begin a new Golden Age for humanity, a Golden Age designed and administered by Elson deBloise.

  LaNague had had an opportunity to take a similar course three centuries ago; he’d held the outworlds in the palm of his hand but had refused to grasp them. Instead, he presented them with his charter and hurled them free. Such an act remained far beyond deBloise’s comprehension. The human race needed someone to guide it and oversee its course. The great mass of humanity had no thought of destiny. Too many individuals expended their energies in chase of puny, shortsighted goals. They all needed direction – and deBloise was convinced he could provide it.

  There would, of course, be those who’d insist on choosing their own course and the rest of humanity be damned. There would always be self-styled individuals who’d selfishly insist on pursuing their own personal values. These would have to be discouraged or weeded out from the vast body of the human race.

  He’d also have to contend with tha
t other breed of nay-sayer: the ones who would point to history and say that economies and societies controlled from the top have never succeeded; that the impetus for a society must come from within, not from above.

  But he knew that no society in history had ever had a man such as Elson deBloise at its helm. Where others had failed, he could succeed.

  A few years ago such thoughts would have been idle fantasies, but now the actual means to achieve them was in his grasp. It was all so exhilarating, almost intoxicating, that even the prospect of today’s departure for his homeworld couldn’t take the edge off his mood. He checked the chronometer on the wall: he had another hour to kill before his orbital shuttle left the spaceport.

  He flagged the bored bartender and indicated his need for a refill. The man dutifully complied and then returned to the far end of the bar. He had tried in the past to strike up a friendly conversation with deBloise – the Sentinel Club paid him well to add the human touch to bar service – but had been ignored each time. So now he kept his distance from Mr. deBloise. And deBloise in turn studied his fingernails as the glass was filled; if he’d been interested in socializing with the likes of the bartender, he would have had his drinks out at the spaceport bar.

  He didn’t need the extra drink – he’d already had two before leaving Anni’s – but decided to have it anyway. The next few days would be spent aboard a Federation liner. The passenger list would contain the names of many elite and no doubt interesting people, some of whom would surely be from his homeworld. And thus he’d be duty bound to play his role of Elson deBloise, sector representative and leader of the Restructurist movement, to the hilt.

  The role became trying after a while. That’s when he would miss Anni. She was an excellent mistress, socially and sexually skilled, he could let down his guard with her. Yes, he’d miss her the most. Not sexually, however. With the final stages of the Haas plan fast approaching, he’d found himself unable to perform without the use of drugs. The plan dominated his thoughts every hour of the day, sapping his strength and sorely trying his patience.

  He smiled again, wondering what the reaction would be if it became generally known that he kept a mistress on Fed Central. A respected sector representative… and a family man, too! It was a common practice in the Assembly and no one paid it too much mind in the cosmopolitan atmosphere here. But it would be difficult for those provincial clods at home to swallow; they were all firm believers in faithful monogamy, or at least pretended to be.

  If it came out, someone would no doubt try to score some political points with it on the local level, and his home life would be disrupted for a while; he’d deny it all, of course, and before too long it would all be forgotten. Voters have always had short memories.

  No, there wasn’t much he could do short of a violent crime or a public obscenity that would significantly erode his support among the yokels back home. He had led the sector into the Restructurist fold with promises of economic rebirth; they expected him to deliver on those promises… someday. Until then, he was the local boy who’d made good and they would follow him anywhere.

  But there were always dues to pay. His wife and children remained at home; he wanted it that way. There was, after all, the children’s education to think of – it wouldn’t do to have them hopping back and forth between worlds – and besides, his wife would help to keep his presence felt on the homeworld when he was off on Federation business. Still, he had to return on a regular basis. The yokels expected it. He had to be seen among them, had to appear at certain local functions, had to play ombudsman for the sector.

  And it was all such a bore, really, listening to their petty complaints and trivial problems when there were so very many much more important things that required his attention… like the Haas plan. But, noblesse oblige.

  There was another reason he disliked going home: a little man named Cando Proska. By the Core, how that monster of a human being frightened him! And as sure as Fed Central circled its primary, he’d be calling at the deBloise office with a new demand. But enough of that! Such thoughts were disturbing.

  Another glance at the chronometer showed that it was time to go. He pulled a rectangular disk from his pocket, tapped in a code, and his secretary’s face appeared. After telling her to send a flitter to the Sentinel Club to take him to the spaceport, he was about to blank the screen when he noticed that she seemed to be disturbed.

  “Something wrong, Jenna?” he asked.

  She shrugged. “One of the girls on the second floor came down with the horrors at lunch.”

  DeBloise muttered his condolences and faded her out. The horrors – he’d almost forgotten about that. The plague of random insanity that had started before he was born and continued to this day was something that everyone in Occupied Space had learned to live with, but it was something that was rarely forgotten. New cases popped up daily on every planet. Yet the Haas plan had pushed it almost entirely from his mind.

  He rose to his feet and quickly downed the rest of the wine. The juxtaposition of Haas and the horrors in his thoughts was unsettling. What if Haas got hit by the horrors? The whole plan would have to be scuttled. Worse yet: what if he himself were struck down?

  He didn’t dare think about that too much, especially since The Healer, the only man thus far able to do anything about the horrors, had seemingly vanished a few years ago. And as each succeeding year passed, deBloise became more firmly convinced that he had been responsible for precipitating The Healer’s disappearance.

  It had happened on Tolive. DeBloise had traveled all the way to IMC headquarters to talk to the man, to convince him gently to see things in a light more favorable to Restructurism, and had wound up threatening him. The Healer had only smiled – an icy smile that deBloise remembered vividly to this day – and departed. No one had seen or heard from him since. He was probably dead, but there was still this nagging suspicion.

  A light flashed above the bar, indicating that someone had a flitter waiting, and deBloise hurried to the roof as if to escape thoughts of the horrors and enigmatic men who could not be bullied or cajoled into line. Thank the Core there weren’t too many of those around.

  As he took his seat, the flitter driver handed him a coded message disk. He tapped in a combination that only he and a few of his closest associates knew, and five lines of print began to glow on the black surface. The words would remain lit for fifteen seconds, then would be automatically and permanently erased. There could be no recall.

  The lines read:

  Haas had two visitors today.

  Young female named Josephine Finch.

  Older man unidentified as yet.

  Both from IBA. Any instructions?

  There had obviously been a leak, but that was not what occupied deBloise’s mind at that moment. It was the name Finch. It seemed to mean something to him… and then it came, rushing out of the past.

  Of course. Finch. How could he have forgotten?

  An uneasy feeling settled over him and he couldn’t shake it off.

  Finch.

  There couldn’t be any connection, could there?

  Of course not. Just a coincidence. Just an awful coincidence.

  Easly

  EASLY RAN THE FINGERS of his right hand up and down the middle of Jo’s bare back and wondered idly how she continued to have such a disconcerting effect on him.

  Not when they were out in public, of course. Then everything was always cool and professional. They both had their roles and played them well – lived them well. She was mistress of a respected business advisory firm; he was master of an information-gathering service. They’d meet now and then for a game or two of pokochess and, if time permitted, perhaps a light meal afterward. They were two self-sufficient and self-reliant individuals who enjoyed each other’s company on occasion, but otherwise led separate personal lives. That was in public. And he could handle that easily enough.

  But when they were alone, especially like this – in bed, skin to skin, tangled li
mbs and breathless afterglow, communicating in the tiniest whispers, barely moving their lips and eyes – at times like these he found himself bewildered at the emotional bond that had grown between them. He’d never known a woman like Jo.

  And he’d never expected to become emotionally involved with a client. But, then, virtually all of his clients had been male until Jo.

  Until Jo. So many things these days seemed to start and end with that phrase.

  It seemed like only just the other day that he’d received her message requesting a meeting about a possible assignment. He had hesitated then at the thought of taking her on as a client. He had never dealt with a woman on those terms, and if her last name had been anything other than Finch, he might well have turned her down.

  He was glad he hadn’t, for he’d found her delightful. Expecting a staid, middle-aged matron, he discovered instead a bright, vivacious creature who could sparkle with the best of them and yet had a laser-quick mind, strong opinions, and unquestionable integrity. Before long he found himself looking forward to their meetings, not just for the intriguing assignments that often developed, but for the stimulus he derived from her company. He would search for ways to increase the frequency of their meetings, and to prolong them once they were together.

  Eventually, they met for other than business reasons and quickly graduated to the sexual intimacy of lovers. Here, again, Jo surprised him. For one so cool and seemingly detached across a pokochess board or a dinner table, she exhibited a passion and a lack of inhibition between the sheets that to this day continued to leave him gasping.

  An enigma, this woman. Easly couldn’t decide whether she was a core of steel with a woman’s exterior, or a vulnerable little girl hiding behind a metallic patina. Sometimes she seemed one, sometimes the other. He was forever off balance, but delightfully so.