The ambassador from the Holy Alliance started to take the seat next to Bushell’s. “I did not invite you to sit, Comte Bonaparte,” Sir Martin Luther King said, ice in his voice. He hadn’t risen to shake hands with the diplomat, either.
“So you did not, Your Excellency,” Bonaparte said, straightening. “I assumed, however, you did not summon me here for the purpose of insult only.” His eyes glittered. “Perhaps I was wrong.”
“Perhaps you were,” Sir Martin said. “I summoned you here to inform you that, as you have become persona non grata to the North American Union and the British Empire, I request and require you to leave our territory within forty-eight hours of this moment.”
“On what grounds?” Bonaparte cried.
Sir Martin nodded to Bushell, who continued his flat recitation: “On the grounds that you conspired with Sir Horace Bragg and other Sons of Liberty to raise a rebellion against the lawful government of the North American Union, and that this conspiracy involved the theft of The Two Georges and the attempted assassination of the King-Emperor, Charles III.”
“Of this last I knew nothing,” Philippe Bonaparte replied. “It was the inspiration of Bragg and his fellow what is the word they use? - patriots; yes, that is it. As for the other -“ He shrugged a Gallic shrug. “It is my duty to enlarge my country’s prospects, just as it is the duty of the British ambassador in Paris to do likewise for your Empire.”
“And if the British ambassador is caught meddling as your sovereign deems he should not, he is expelled,” Sir Martin said. “You have been caught at something rather worse than meddling, sir. Count yourself lucky we content ourselves with your expulsion and do not go to war.”
“You would not,” Bonaparte said. “It would send the whole world up in flames.”
“That did not concern you when you gave aid and comfort to the Sons of Liberty,” Sir Martin Luther King replied. “My opinion is that the prospect of losing concerns you more than the prospect of war.”
“You are of course entitled to your opinion.” Bonaparte gave the governor-general another half-bow; even expelled, he lost none of his urbanity. After a moment, he added, “And speaking of opinions, mine was never that this effort had - or deserved - a large probability of success.” He turned to Bushell. “I gave you a warning, you will recall, during the reception at Duke Orlov’s.”
“If that was a warning, you’d been ambassador to Delphi before you came to the NAU,” Bushell said. Bonaparte nodded to show he appreciated the classical allusion. Bushell went on, “If you didn’t think your plot deserved to succeed, why the devil did you cover up what you were trying to say? Why didn’t you just come right out and tell me - tell somebody - what you meant?”
“But I could not do that, Monsieur!” Now Bonaparte sounded genuinely shocked. “I had my duty to my own sovereign and to his requirements of me to consider first. Within those limits, I told you everything I possibly could. Does not your Empire, your duty, come before your own personal feelings?”
The shaft hit close to the mark. Had Bushell paid less attention to his duty and more to his personal feelings, he might well have remained married to Irene - and how would that have affected his chances of dealing with the theft of The Two Georges! The very way he framed the question showed how deep a hold duty had on him.
“All right, Monsieur le Comte,” he said. “There is some truth in what you say.”
“Some, perhaps, but not enough,” Sir Martin Luther King said. “Our Lord said, ‘Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s.’ Doing one’s duty renders unto Caesar, but doing what is right renders unto God.”
“It is not to be doubted, Your Excellency, that you must have been formidable as a man of the cloth, even if you suffered the misfortune of Protestantism,” Bonaparte said. “There must of necessity, however, be a difference between the views of a man of the cloth and those of a man of the world. Is this not so, Colonel Bushell?”
“It’s so,” Bushell said, not caring to agree with the Franco-Spanish ambassador - the ex-Franco-Spanish ambassador - but not about to lie, either. “I wish it weren’t.”
“I also wish it were not so,” Sir Martin Luther King said. “As a man of the world, Comte Bonaparte, I repeat to you that you now have something less than forty-eight hours to remove yourself and your personal effects from the territory of the North American Union. I do not say au revoir, sir. I say good-bye.”
“I obey under protest,” Bonaparte said, and turned to go.
“So long as you obey,” Sir Martin said to his retreating back.
The taxi pulled to a halt halfway down the block of attached homes. The driver pointed. “There you are, sir - number 41,” he said, then glanced at his meter. “That’ll be four pounds, three and sixpence.”
Bushell gave him a fiver and walked toward the door through evening twilight without waiting for change. Like all the other homes on the block, number 41 was neat and well kept - a far cry from the grim dwellings of the miners in Charleroi, even if built to the same basic principle. Before Bushell could ring the bell, Kathleen Flannery opened the door. She looked cool and comfortable in a flower-printed shift of thin cotton. “Come in,” she said, smiling.
“Thanks.” Bushell hung his hat on the tree just inside the door - a lone fedora among cloches, pillboxes, berets, a couple of broad-brimmed picture hats, and others of styles whose names he’d never bothered to learn. Then he kissed her. She prolonged the kiss. His arms tightened hungrily around her. When they separated, she waved him down the short front hall. “Go on, sit down - make yourself at home.”
“Don’t mind if I do.” Bushell paused in front of the sofa to look around before he sat. Books, prints, a phonogram and wireless receiver in a cabinet of blond wood, furniture upholstered in a green, lustrous fabric, rusty-brown carpet a few shades darker than Kathleen’s hair. He nodded once, decisively. “I like this place. It looks like you.”
That made Kathleen peer around the room, as if seeing it in a new light. “It does, doesn’t it?” The breeze from an electric fan on a bookcase tugged at her hair. Probably without noticing what she was doing, she smoothed it down as she said, “Do sit down. I’ll be right back.” She went into the kitchen. Her heels tapped on the tiles there. Bottles clinked together. Ice cubes clattered musically into glasses. She came back with two drinks, handing Bushell the amber one and keeping the clear one with a slice of lime for herself. “Thanks,” he said again, and sipped.
“Is it all right?”
“Jameson,” he said. “Ice. Hard to go far wrong.” A stack of cork-bottomed coasters with medieval-looking paintings of knights on them stood at a corner of the polished oak coffee table. He picked one up, examined it, set it down, and put his glass on it. After a moment, he passed her one, too.
“The clerk from Adler Cubicles came by today - with Marge,” she said. “I shot them to the front of the queue, the way I said I would.” She paused to drink from her gin and tonic. “Marge was very impressed.”
“At seeing The Two Georges or at the VIP treatment?”
“Both,” Kathleen said. “I got the idea she didn’t believe he could deliver. When he did, it left her speechless.”
“That must have made the clerk even happier than he was already.”
Kathleen’s scowl would have been more effective had it been less severe. Bushell smiled back at her, bland as butter. The scowl faded. “You are an impossible man,” she told him. “I believe I’ve mentioned that once or twice already.”