“Airport maintenance. Giraud told me. A middleman in a contact between Councillor Corain and Jordan.”

“A two‑way conduit of information. We detained him, of course we did. But we don’t know if he’s the only one. A leak to and from Novgorod? Absolutely there was. There may have been others. It’s possible Thieu didn’t need his mental faculties about him to know Patil was going to Eversnow…if Corain’s contact man wasn’t the only font of information in Planys. The fact that the news hasn’t broken in wider Paxer circles yet indicates if there is a flow of information we haven’t already stopped, it’s tightly controlled and it’s being careful. We’re watching that possibility carefully…feeding a little disinformation to see where it turns up. It was one reason I wanted to break that news to Jordan and watch his reaction. I was running truthers. The surprise seemed real…so he didn’t get the information from Corain’s man. But what goes on in Corain’s office…who knows where they have contacts? You don’t blow a good spy for some minor piece of news. You let him sit and wait until there’s something worth his being there. And so far nobody’s breached security in Corain’s office–until–possibly–now. Somebody took out our plans for Eversnow, in one day.”

Finally. Finally she had the notion Yanni was leveling with her.

“So,” she said, “Thieu wanted to get to Patil–who’s the logical recipient of those notes you took from him, one of the only people, maybe, who’ll really understand them.”

“Understand, there was absolutely nothing illegal in what we did: it’s classified material, the man was going downhill medically, we had to protect it. The military sits right there next to Planys, with the capability to ‘protect and defend’ military interests. They could be across that gap in fifteen minutes flat.”

“Eversnow is still their project. Thieu was working for them, but physically inside PlanysLabs. And they didn’t have those notes.”

“He’d been working with them, still corresponding with them quite extensively–we don’thave the content of many of those letters. They dropped into the great black hole of Defense Communications. We assumethey don’t have his last notes. If they have their own copy, we don’t know. Can’t know.”

“Didn’t his notes go to them, if he was working for them?”

“His work is proprietary to Reseune. They wanted something done, they got the result, not the research. We have hisside of the exchange with them, not their answers.”

“Will Jacques talk?” she asked.

“I may make headway with Spurlin on that front–assuming the election goes his way. Meanwhile, before the election results, I want the project staffed. I have to replace Patil.”

“If Khalid shouldget into office…”

“Exactly. I’m going to be raiding other nanistics people out of Beta–where Defense is going to be mildly unhappy with me. I’m going to hire people away from theirprograms.”

“So you’re going full speed ahead. But we’re running out of nanistics Specials.”

“We’re outof Specials. I do have five candidates for the Eversnow directorship, backup in case Patil had said no, top of her list of her own choices to go to Fargone. I’m going ahead with the project, all out. Be advised of that.”

“I think we pretty well have to, don’t we?” she said, because that really was where her thoughts were tending now. “We need to find out what’s going on. Not to let our enemies win this. I wasn’t for it. But somebody who doesn’t like us is againstit.”

“I’m glad you take that position,” Yanni said, looking tired. He’d resisted the wine, beyond a sip or two. He picked it up, looked at it. Looked at her. “If I drink this and get indiscreet, are you going to be a priss about it?”

“I’m not,” she said. “Never will be. But answer me first, Uncle Yanni. I really, really love you and I so want you to tell me the absolutely honest truth in this. Maybe Jordan’s lying to everybody. Maybe he brought that card with him from Thieu for his own reasons. Do you have any inkling that’s the case?”

“I just think he knows more than he’s saying.”

That was a disappointment. She wanted more out of Yanni. She pressed her lips together. And waited.

Yanni said, “You really shouldn’t try to run Reseune yet, you know.”

Shift of direction. She saw it. She still tracked. “What makes you think about that?”

“Because you’re getting very sharp, very fast, and you’ve gathered a small army.”

“Yanni, somebody bugged my new staff, and I’m pretty sure who, and probably you are. I didn’t like that.”

“It wasn’t me,” he said.

“Hicks, then,” she said. “Independently. I may eventually forgive him for it, but he did it, and he pretty certainly knew he did it. I’m onto it, and I’ve fixed the problem. Don’t mention it to him, though. I’m trusting you to know about it and keep quiet. For your own protection. My people are dangerous to people who’d try to do things like that.”

“You remind me of your predecessor.”

“Did you like her?”

“Odd question.”

“Did you likeher, Yanni?”

“I did, actually. She was what she was, and she did good in her life, on the average. And let me say right now that if you want me to step down tonight, I will, but I hope you’ll reconsider a move like that.”

“Why?”

“Because, for one thing, we can get quite a bit of yardage for Reseune’s programs if we don’t let Corain know you’re coming into power sooner than most people think–and I think you are. They’ll deal, right now, because they’re scared to death of you. Corain is shocked by what happened to Patil–but he’s still on board with the Eversnow deal. So are the others. Secondly, we haven’t seen the outcome in the Defense election, and maintaining a bit of our flexibility in the face of that outcome is a good thing. Polls have been wrong before.”

“And meanwhile there’s somebody running around Reseune leaving cards from somebody who’s supposed to be under strictest security weeks before she was murdered? And it had Planys markers, Yanni. What’s the theory on that, officially?”

“Authenticity,” Yanni said with a shrug. “Whoever did it wanted it to smell like Planys, as authentic as possible, and whoever did it went to a small bit of trouble to do that–probably to rattle the walls and see if they could provoke some action. Or maybe it’s real and Jordan lied. Maybe an old man with a failing memory and a few weeks to live really wanted some personal acknowledgment from somebody about to take over his life’s work. It’s Planys paper. It may have been printed almost anywhere buton Reseune office machinery–there’s that security feature: micro‑ID in the typeface, if your security hasn’t told you. Which still leaves, as a source, the town, various neighboring towns, and passing rivercraft, not to mention the airport. The card has all kinds of issues attached, nofinger‑traces of any kind except the people that we well know handled it–super‑clean.”

“So it was real. Or it was somebody knew about the markers and knew to be careful about the microprint. Did you search Jordan’s apartment?”

“While he was at supper with you, yes. We did. Found nothing, of course.”

“Did you tell him you searched it?”

“No. Nor left any traces he could find, if Hicks was entirely up to his job.”

“Yanni, I want you to back off Jordan. Don’t make him mad. Give him work to do. Real work.”

“There’s a small problem with that.”

A pose, a quizzical tilt of the head. “You mean you don’t trust him?”

“I trust he’ll do something. He’ll sabotage something just to make us find it. And we’re busy.”

“Send the results to me. It’s good exercise. I’ll check them.”

“You have enough to do, yourself. Just keep going with your lessons.”

“Do it, Yanni.”

“He’ll burst a blood vessel.”

“Probably, but I’ll check what he does. Who’s Clavery?”