Tactics of Mistake (12 page)

Cletus relaxed, pushing back the tension in his body that threatened to possess it in impatience at being anchored here on the bed when so many things were yet to be done. What would be, would be…

The sound of the door opening brought his eyes open as well. He raised his head and looked to his right and saw Bat Traynor entering the hospital room. There had been no warning from Arvid, still in the bathroom. Fleetingly, Cletus permitted himself the hope that the young lieutenant would have the sense to stay out of sight now that his chance discreetly to leave the hospital room was barred.

Bat strode up to the edge of the bed and stared down at Cletus, his expressive eyebrows drawing together in a faint scowl.

“Well, Colonel,” he said, as he pulled a nearby chair close to the bed and sat down so that he stared into Cletus's face. He smiled, in hard, genial fashion. “Still got you tied up, I see.”

“I'm supposed to be turned loose today,” Cletus answered. “Thank you for dropping by, sir.”

“I usually drop by to see one of my officers who's in the hospital,” said Bat. “Nothing special in your case—though you did do a good job with those six men up on the Blue River, Colonel.”

“The guerrillas weren't very eager to make a fight of it, sir,” said Cletus. “And then I was lucky enough to have them do just what I'd guessed they'd do. The General knows how unusual it is when everything works out in the field just the way it's planned.”

“I do. Believe me, I do,” answered Bat. Under the heavy brows, his eyes were hard but wary upon Cletus. “But that doesn't alter the fact you were right in your guess about where they'd come through and what they'd do once they were through.”

“Yes, I'm happy about that,” said Cletus. He smiled. “As I told the General, I pretty much bet my reputation on it to my friends back on Earth just before I left.”

He glanced, as if unthinkingly, at the loose pile of face-down spaceship covers. Bat's eyes, following the direction of Cletus's gaze, narrowed slightly at sight of the yellow envelopes.

“You've been getting congratulations, have you?” Bat asked.

“There've been a few pats on the back,” Cletus said. He did not add that these had been only from such local people as Eachan, Mondar and newly made Sergeant Ed Jarnki. “Of course, the operation wasn't a total success. I heard the rest of the guerrillas managed to get back through the pass before Lieutenant Athyer could contain them.”

Bat's eyebrows jerked together into a solid angry line of black. “Don't push me, Colonel,” he rumbled. “Athyer's report said he got word from you too late to take his men up into position to bar the pass.”

“Was that it, sir?” said Cletus. “I'd guess it was my fault, then. After all, Athyer's an experienced field officer and I'm just a desk-jockey theoretician. I'm sure everybody realizes it was just luck that the contact my squad had with the enemy was successful and the contact the lieutenant and the rest of his company had wasn't.”

For a moment their eyes locked.

“Of course,” said Bat, grimly. “And if they don't understand it, I do. And that's what's important—isn't it, Colonel?”

“Yes, sir,” said Cletus.

Bat sat back in his chair, and his brows relaxed. “Anyway,” he said, “I didn't come here just to congratulate you. A suggestion by you came through to my office that you set up a staff to make regular weekly forecasts of enemy activity. There was also your request for personnel and office space to facilitate your making such forecasts… Understand, Colonel, as far as I'm concerned, I still need you like I need a fifty-man string ensemble. But your success with the guerrillas has got us some good publicity back at Alliance HQ, and I don't see how you can do any harm to the rest of the war effort here on Kultis by setting up this forecast staff. So, I'm going to approve it.” He paused, then shot the words at Cletus. “That make you happy?”

“Yes, sir,” said Cletus. “Thank you, General.”

“Don't bother,” said Bat, grimly. “As for Athyer—he had his chance, and he fell on his face. He'll be coming up for a Board of Inquiry into his fitness as an Alliance officer. Now—anything else you want?”

“No,” said Cletus.

Bat stood up abruptly. “Good,” he said. “I don't like having my arm twisted. I prefer handing out favors before they're asked. Also, I still need those tanks, and you're still going back to Earth at the first opportunity, Colonel. Tuck that fact into your prognostications and don't forget it!”

He turned on his heel and went toward the door. “General,” said Cletus. “There is a favor you could do me…"

Bat checked and swung about. His face darkened. “After all?” His voice was hard. “What is it, Colonel?”

“The Exotics have quite a library here in Bakhalla,” said Cletus. “With a good deal of military text and information in it.”

“What about it?”

“If the General will pardon me,” said Cletus, slowly, “Lieutenant Athyer's main problems are too much imagination coupled with not enough confidence in himself. If he could get away and season himself for a while—say, as Information Officer for the Expeditionary Forces, to that Exotic library—he might turn out highly useful, after all.”

Bat stared at Cletus. “Now why,” said Bat softly, “would you want something like that for Athyer instead of a Board of Inquiry?”

“I don't like to see a valuable man wasted,” said Cletus.

Bat grunted. He turned on his heel and went out without a further word. Looking a little sheepish, Arvid emerged from the bathroom.

“I'm sorry, sir,” he said to Cletus. “The General must've come by air and landed on the roof.”

“Think nothing of it, Arv,” said Cletus, happily. “Just get out in that corridor and find me that doctor. I've got to get out of here.”

Twenty minutes later, Arvid having finally located and produced the medical officer, Cletus was finally out of his cast and on his way to the office space Arvid had located for him. It was one of a set of three office suites, each consisting of three rooms and a bath, that had originally been erected by the Exotics for housing VIP guests. The other two suites were empty, so that, in essence, they had the building to themselves—a point Cletus had stipulated earlier when he had sent Arvid out to search. When they reached the office, Cletus found it furnished only with some camp chairs and a temporary field desk. A lean major in his early forties, with a white scar across his chin, was examining these in disparaging fashion.

“Major Wilson?” asked Cletus, as the officer turned to face them. “I'm Colonel Grahame.”

They shook hands.

“Security sent me over,” Wilson said. “You said you were expecting some special problem here, Colonel?”

“I'm hoping for one,” replied Cletus. “We're going to be handling a good deal of material here, from the classified category on up. I'm going to be making weekly forecasts of enemy activity for General Traynor. Sooner or later the Neulanders are bound to hear of this and take an interest in this office. I'd like to set it up as a trap for anyone they send to investigate.”

“Trap, sir?” echoed Wilson, puzzled.

“That's right,” said Cletus, cheerfully. “I want to make it possible for them to get in, but, once in, impossible for them to get back out.”

He turned to indicate the walls around them.

“For example,” he said, pointing, “heavy steel mesh on the inside of the windows, but anchored so that it can't be pried loose or cut through with ordinary tools. An obvious lock on the outer door that can be easily picked—but a hidden lock that fastens the door securely once the open lock has been picked and the door opened and shut once. Metal framing and center panel for the door frame and door itself, so that they can't break out once the hidden lock has closed the door… Possibly a wiring system to electrify the doors, windows and ventilator system just to discourage any attempt to break loose.”

Wilson nodded slowly, but doubtfully. “That's going to add up to a good bit in the way of work-tune and materials,” he said. “I suppose you have authorization for this, Colonel…?”

“It'll be forthcoming,” said Cletus. “But the thing is for your division to get to work on this right away. The general was just talking to me less than an hour ago in the hospital about getting this office set up.”

“The general—oh!” said Wilson, becoming brisk. “Of course, sir.”

“Good, then,” said Cletus. “That's settled.”

After discussion of a few details, and after Wilson had taken a few measurements, the security officer left. Cletus set Arvid to getting Eachan Khan on the field telephone, which, with the table and chairs, was the office's only equipment. The Dorsai colonel was finally located out in the training area set aside for his mercenary troops.

“Mind if I come out?” asked Cletus.

“Not at all.” In the small vision screen of the field phone, Eachan's face looked faintly curious. “You're welcome anytime, Colonel. Come along.”

“Right,” said Cletus. “I'll be there in half an hour.”

He broke the connection. Leaving Arvid to see about getting the office supplied with furniture and staff, Cletus went out and took the staff car in which Arvid had driven him here to the training area of the Dorsai troops.

He found Eachan Khan standing at the edge of a field with a ten-meter metal tower in its center, from which what looked like a company of the tanned Dorsai professionals were practicing jump-belt landings. The line of those waiting their turn stretched out behind the tower, from the top of which mercenaries were going off, one by one, the shoulder jets of the jump belts roaring briefly and kicking up a cloud of whitish-brown dust as each one fell earthward. For men not trained exclusively as jump troops, Cletus noted with satisfaction as he limped up to the watching Eachan Khan, there were a great many more soft, upright landings than might have been expected.

“There you are,” said Eachan, without turning his head, as Cletus came up behind him. The Dorsai colonel was standing with his legs slightly spread, his hands clasped behind him as he watched. “What do you think of our level of jump training, now you see it?”

“I'm impressed,” answered Cletus. “What do you know about guerrilla traffic on the Bakhalla River?”

“Fair amount. Bound to be, of course, with the river running right through the city into the harbor here.” Eachan Khan stared at him curiously. “Not so much infiltrators as sabotage materials, I understand, though. Why?”

“There's a new moon tonight,” explained Cletus.

“Eh?” Eachan stared at him.

“And according to the local tide tables,” said Cletus, “we're having an unusually high tide—all the tributaries and canals will be running deeper than usual as much as twenty miles inland. A good time for the Neulanders to smuggle in either large amounts of supplies or unusually heavy equipment.”

“Hm…" Eachan fondled the right tip of his mustache. “Still… if you don't mind a word of advice?”

“Go right ahead,” said Cletus.

“I don't think there'd be anything you could do about it,” said Eachan. “River security is maintained by a half-dozen Army amphibs with half a dozen soldiers and light weapons on each one. That's not enough to do any good at all, and everybody knows it. But your General Traynor opts for dryfoot war equipment. About six months back he got five armored personnel carriers by swearing to your Alliance HQ that his river defenses were perfectly adequate and that, instead of sending him a couple of patrol boats, they could give him the personnel carriers instead. So if you go pointing out probable trouble on the river, you're not going to be making Traynor very happy. My advice would be to let any Neulander activity there go by on your blind side.”

“Maybe you're right,” said Cletus. “How about lunch?”

They left the training ground and drove in to the Officers' Club for lunch, where Melissa joined them in response to a telephone call from her father at Cletus's suggestion. She was somewhat reserved, and did not often meet Cletus's eye. She had come with her father for one brief visit to Cletus in the hospital, during which she stood back and let Eachan do most of the talking. She seemed inclined to let him do most of the talking now, although she glanced at Cletus from time to time when his attention was on her father. Cletus, however, ignored her reactions and kept up a steady, cheerful flow of conversation.

“Wefer Linet's been after me,” Cletus said to her when they were having coffee and dessert, “to take one of his underwater tours in one of the Mark V submarine dozers. How about joining us this evening, and we can come back into Bakhalla afterward for a late supper?”

Melissa hesitated, but Eachan broke in, almost hastily. Good idea, girl,” he said, almost gruffly. “Why don't you do that? Do you good to get out for a change.”

The tone of Eachan's voice made his words sound like a command. But the naked voice of appeal could be heard beneath the brusqueness of the words. Melissa surrendered.

“Thank you,” she said, raising her eyes to meet those of Cletus, “that sounds like fun.”

Stars were beginning to fill the Bakhallan sky as Cletus and Melissa reached the gates to the Navy Yard and were met by an ensign attached to Wefer Linet's staff. The ensign conducted them inside to the ramp where the massive, black, two-story-tall shape of a Mark V squatted on its treads just above the golden-tinged waters of the Bakhallan harbor. Cletus had phoned Wefer immediately on parting from Eachan and Melissa to set up the evening's excursion.

Wefer had been enthusiastic. Navy regulations, he gleefully informed Cletus, absolutely forbade his allowing a civilian such as Melissa aboard a duty Navy vehicle like the Mark V. But, personally, he did not give a damn. For the record, he had caught only the words “Dorsai” and “Khan” when Cletus had phoned him earlier—and to whom, of course, could those words apply but to a mercenary colonel of his acquaintance, who was certainly no civilian? So he would be waiting for Colonel Grahame and Colonel Khan aboard the Mark V at 7 P.M.