"I never said I did want to." Westman's voice was harsh, not with anger, but with resolution. "But I will. If I have to."
"Never doubted it," Palacios said simply. "But you've been moving heaven and earth to avoid it. And, truth to tell, I don't much like what I reckon it's going to do to you if it comes down to it. Don't expect I'll much care for how the other folks on this planet'll think about all of us, for that matter. Not that I'm about to pack it in on you at this point. I just want you to be thinking about the fact that we've probably come pretty close to playing this string all the way out. Reckon we'll get away with it today without hurting anybody. It won't be that way much longer, though. And sooner or later, we're gonna come up against some of Trevor's boys and girls, and we're all gonna have guns in our hands. The boys and me, we'll back you all the way. You know that. And I don't reckon most of us are gonna have anywhere near the problem you are when it comes to squeezing those triggers, 'cause we're all perfectly willing to let you do the thinking. But you're the one's gonna have to live with those decisions."
He paused again, looking very levelly into Westman's eyes.
"I've known you a lot of years, Boss. Grown pretty fond of you, too. But it's not gonna be so very much longer before you have to make those decisions, and I don't want you making one that's gonna eat you up alive from the inside. So you'd best be thinking real hard about how much blood-and whose-you're really ready to shed."
Stephen Westman looked back into his foreman's eyes for several seconds, then nodded.
"I'll think about it," he promised. "But I've already done a lot of that. I don't think I'm going to change my mind, Luis."
"If you don't, you don't," Palacios said philosophically. "Either way, the boys and I'll back your play."
"I know you will," Westman said softly. "I know you will."
"He said they're going to what ?"
Warren Suttles sat back behind his desk in the spacious, sun-drenched office of the System President and looked at Chief Marshal Bannister in shock. Bannister was a man of only medium height-a bit on the short side, actually, for Montana-with a head of thick, grizzled red hair and dark eyes. He was deeply tanned and, despite a job which kept him behind a desk far too much of the time, he was fighting a mainly successful battle against the thickening of his middle. He was also a taciturn, soft-spoken man with a reputation for never using two words when he could do the job with one-or with a grunt.
Which was the main reason he didn't reply to what he recognized as a rhetorical question. It wasn't the only reason. As a matter of simple fact, Trevor Bannister found Warren Suttles the silliest excuse for a chief executive of any of the three system presidents he'd served as Chief Marshal. Suttles wasn't a bad man; he just wasn't a very strong one, and the spin-masters and political handlers who'd gotten him elected weren't any better. For all practical purposes, the so-called "Suttles Administration" was little better than a committee whose nominal head would've had trouble deciding what color to paint his bedroom without first commissioning multiple popular opinion polls. It was unfortunate, in many ways, that Warren Suttles was President instead of Stephen Westman. Although, when it came right down to it, little though Bannister respected Suttles, the President's -policies-especially where the annexation issue was concerned-were far better for Montana's future than Westman's were. He didn't like admitting that. If there was anyone on Montana who liked Bernardus Van Dort less than Stephen Westman did, it was almost certainly Trevor Bannister, and the thought of supporting anything Van Dort thought was a good idea stuck in his craw sideways. But he'd managed to choke it down, because however much he loathed Van Dort, Suttles was right about the future, and his administration's policy of embracing the annexation was the only one that made sense.
And even if it didn't, this son of a bitch's the duly elected President of my star system, his policies represent the freely expressed will of damned near three quarters of the electorate, and I'm bound-both by law and my personal oath-to enforce the law and to protect and preserve the Constitution of Montana against all enemies, foreign or domestic. Including enemies who happen to be close personal friends.
"Can he really do that?" Suttles asked, finally moving on from useless questions to some which might actually be worth -answering.
"Mr. President," Bannister pointed out, "the man's done every other single thing he said he would."
Warren Suttles clenched his jaw and managed-somehow-to keep himself from glowering at the man seated across his desk from him. If he'd thought for a minute that he could politically survive firing Bannister, he would've done it in a heartbeat. Or he liked to think he would have. The fact was, that he wasn't sure he would've had the nerve to do it even if it had been politically feasible. Which, of course, it wasn't. Trevor Bannister was an institution, the most successful, most hard driving, most dedicated, most decorated, most everything-in-the-damned-world Chief Marshal in the history of Montana. And he wasn't even impolite. It was just that he managed to make Warren Suttles feel like an idiot-or feel pretty confident Bannister thought he was an idiot-with apparent effortlessness.
"I'm aware of that, Chief Marshal," the System President said after a moment. "Just as I'm aware that, so far, we don't seem to've come a single centimeter closer to apprehending him than we were after that first escapade of his."
That was about as close to a direct criticism of Bannister's campaign against the Montana Independence Movement as Suttles was prepared to come, and the verbal shot bounced off Bannister's armor without so much as a scuff mark. He simply sat there, gazing attentively and respectfully at the System President, and waited.
"What I meant, Chief Marshal," Suttles continued a bit stiffly, "was that it seems incredible to me that even Mr. Westman and his henchmen could pull this one off. I'm not saying they can't; I'm just saying I don't understand how they can , and I'd appreciate any insight into their capabilities you could offer me."
"Well, Mr. President, I can't say positively, of course. What it looks like is that he got to the old service tunnels under the bank. They're supposed to be sealed off, and the ceramacrete plugs the Treasury put in sixty, seventy T-years ago are ten meters thick. They're also supposed to be alarmed, and the alarms are supposed to be monitored twenty-seven hours a day. On the face of it, it shouldn't be possible for him to get through them, but it seems pretty clear that he did. Say what you will about the man, he's got a way of doing what he sets his mind to."
"You don't think this time he might be bluffing?"
"Mr. President, I've played a lot of poker with Steve Westman. One thing about him; he don't bluff worth a damn, and he never has. He's not bluffing this time."
"So you think he's actually planted explosives under the System Bank of Montana?"
"Yes, Sir. I do."
"And he'll actually set them off?"
"Don't see any other reason to've put them there."
"My God, Chief Marshal! If he sets those things off, blows up the national bank, it'll be a devastating blow to the entire economy! He could trigger a full-scale recession!"
"I expect he's thought of that, Mr. President."
"But he's gone to such pains to avoid angering the public. What makes you think he's ready to change that pattern here?"
"Mr. President, he's told us all along he's prepared to go to the mat over this. That he's prepared to risk being killed himself, and to kill other people, if that's what it takes. And everything he's done so far's been a direct, logical escalation from the last thing he did. Sure, he's going to piss off a lot of people if he blows the economy into a recession. However, pissing people off is what he's been after all along. And however pissed they're going to be at him, he's figuring they're going to be just as pissed at you, me, and the rest of the Administration, for letting him do it. The man's willing to get himself killed over this-you really think he's going to lose sleep over people thinking unkind thoughts about him?"
Suttles felt his teeth trying to grind together, but this time, he knew, at least two-thirds of his frustration was directed at the absent Westman, not at Bannister. Well, maybe a bit less than two-thirds.
"All right, Chief Marshal. If you're convinced he's serious about it, and if you're also convinced he's somehow planted explosive charges in the bank service tunnels, why don't we send someone down to disarm them?"