"In some ways, I suppose," Theisman acknowledged. "But I've kept the Naval Affairs Committee informed. That keeps Congress officially in the loop the way the Constitution requires."

"Be honest, Tom," Pritchart chided. "You haven't told them everything about your new toys, now have you?"

"Maybe not everything," he admitted. "But I've kept them fully informed on the purpose of Bolthole, and they know at least a part of what Foraker is doing. If they didn't, the Senator couldn't have 'spilled the beans' to his brother."

"Agreed. And that's precisely the domestic problem that most concerns me. Most of our senators and the members of the Cabinet are still a bit more diffident than I'd really like them to be in a lot of ways. For one thing, if more of them would grow spines and build up other power bases I could use to balance Giancola, it would help a lot when it comes to reining him in. They won't do it any time soon, though, and in the meantime there's still entirely too much of the reflex acceptance of restrictions on information simply because the government says it's 'necessary.' That's the only way we got the budget to keep Bolthole running through without debate in the first place. But if Giancola keeps on pushing more and more strongly for us to take a harder line in the negotiations with the Manties, then sooner or later he's going to start bolstering his arguments by dropping some of the details his brother has obviously fed him. Which is going to bring the Department of State into direct conflict with the Department of War."

"We'll just have to deal with that as it arises," Theisman said. "I realize it can create an awkward situation, and I'll try not to let my paranoia pressure me into maintaining secrecy longer than is actually warranted. But I truly don't think I can overemphasize the importance of building up to a level capable of deterring any Manty temptation towards preemptive action before we go public about the new ships."

"As I said, I'm not prepared—or even tempted—to overrule you in this particular area. I just wish the Manties would stop providing Arnold with fresh grist for his mill. And truth to tell, I think they're up to something, myself. There has to be a reason they keep refusing even to seriously discuss the return of the occupied star systems, and if they're not planning to hang onto them permanently, then what the hell are they doing?"

Ms. Midshipwoman Zilwicki saw the familiar green-on-green uniform before she caught sight of Duchess Harrington. Everyone on Saganami Island knew that uniform, because it was the only non-Navy or Marine uniform allowed on the RMN academy's campus. Helen Zilwicki wasn't supposed to know about the resentment and outrage certain august personages tended to very privately vent behind the scenes over its presence here, but she wasn't her father's daughter for nothing. Anton Zilwicki might have started his naval career as a "techno weenie," but before that career had come to a screeching halt four T-years before, he had more than completed his transition to a full-time intelligence type, and a good one. He wasn't the sort who talked down to anyone, far less to his motherless daughter, and he'd always emphasized how important it was to actually listen to anything she heard.

Of course, his . . . relationship with Lady Catherine Montaigne, Countess of the Tor, also offered Helen a certain insight denied to her fellow midshipmen. Helen never actually tried to eavesdrop on the conversations between her father and Lady Cathy, but the countess was as effervescent and compulsively energetic as Anton Zilwicki was methodical and disciplined. Her exclamation point-punctuated conversations usually seemed as if they were going off in all directions at once, with a sort of high-energy trajectory that left the unwary feeling somewhat as if they'd been run over by a ground lorry . . . or possibly a small fleet of them. In fact, there was always an underlying structure and cohesiveness for anyone who had the wit to stay in shouting distance of Lady Cathy's scalpel-sharp intelligence. And one thing the Countess of the Tor had never possessed was anything like Anton Zilwicki's instinctive respect for authority and tradition. "Irreverent" was far too mild a term to describe her, and her comments on the current Government started at scathing and went rapidly downhill from there.

Which had made it inevitable that Helen would hear Lady Cathy's opinion of the ill-considered attempt Sir Edward Janacek had made to revoke Duchess Harrington's special permission to bring armed personal retainers into the sacred precincts of the Naval Academy.

His efforts had failed ignominiously, exactly (in Helen's opinion) as they deserved to. Fortunately for him, he, or at least his political advisers, had possessed enough sense not to conduct his campaign in a public forum, which had left him room to retreat when he ran into the Queen's unyielding resistance. Since the dispensation which allowed for the presence of the Harrington Steading armsmen on the island in the first place had been granted by the Queen's Bench at the direct request of the Foreign Secretary in light of the fact that Steadholder Harrington and Duchess Harrington were two totally separate legal entities who simply happened to live in the same body as Admiral Harrington, the decision to revoke it had not been the purely internal Navy affair Janacek had attempted to make it. The Foreign Secretary who had requested it had also happened to be the Queen's uncle, and the Queen's Bench answered directly to her, not to Edward Janacek or even Prime Minister High Ridge. Given both of those things, only an idiot would have tried to overturn the arrangement out of what was clearly a sense of petty spite.

That, at least, had been the countess' opinion, and nothing Helen had seen or heard elsewhere suggested Lady Cathy had been in error. Not that Helen intended to discuss that observation with any of her classmates. Her father had often admonished her to remember the example of the 'cat, who saw and heard everything but said nothing. Of course, that example had developed a small flaw since the treecats had learned to sign. On the other hand, it was beginning to look as if the 'cats had been doing a lot more hearing and seeing—and thinking—than even her father had ever suspected, so perhaps the analogy was actually even better than she'd thought. Either way, a first-form midshipwoman had no business at all explaining to her fellow students that the civilian head of their service was a small-minded, small-souled, vindictive cretin. Especially not when that was true.

Helen's lips twitched in an almost-smile at the thought, but she banished the expression and stepped out of the way as Colonel LaFollet came through the pistol range door. The armsman's gray eyes swept his surroundings with an attention to detail which had long since become instinctive. He noticed the tall, sturdy young midshipwoman, and his expression suggested that some orderly file in his mind had brought up her image as one of Duchess Harrington's hundreds of students. But recognition or no, those eyes considered her with a cool, analytical detachment which made her suddenly grateful that he was unlikely to consider her a threat to his charge.

She was dressed out for gym at the moment, in the shorts and unitard which were standard issue for midshipwomen. That uniform included no headgear, which excused her from the normal requirement to salute a superior officer, but she braced quickly to attention until he nodded in acknowledgment of the courtesy. Then he stepped past her, and she came to attention once more as Duchess Harrington walked into the range behind him.

"Ms. Zilwicki," the Duchess observed.

"Your Grace," Helen responded respectfully.