"We may differ on just what would be affected if I spoke to the newsies," White Haven said coldly. "However, other than that, I find myself unusually in agreement with you, My Lord."
"What, specifically, do you want to know?" Janacek grated.
"Her Majesty," White Haven stressed, "would like to know the Admiralty's official reaction to Duchess Harrington's report of Havenite Naval activity in Silesia?"
"At the moment, the Admiralty's official reaction is that the Sidemore Station commander's report contains far too little detail for any definitive conclusions to be drawn."
"Excuse me?" White Haven's eyebrows rose.
"All that weor Admiral Harringtonknow," Janacek retorted, "is that a single Republican destroyer engagedor was engaged byan armed merchant auxiliary of the Silesian Navy commanded by a half-pay Manticoran officer who was dismissed his ship for cause forty T-years ago. That virtually the entire crew of the destroyer was massacred in the ensuing action. And that the captain of the armed auxiliary in question handed over fragmentary records which he claimed to have obtained from the wrecked destroyer's computers."
White Haven stared at him, as if momentarily bereft of words. Then he shook himself almost visibly.
"Are you suggesting that Admiral Bachfisch fabricated this entire affair for some unknown Machiavellian reason of his own?" he demanded.
"I'm suggesting that at this moment we know absolutely nothing for certain," Janacek shot back. "I can't think of any reason why Bachfisch might have fabricated anything, but that doesn't mean I'm prepared to dismiss the possibility out of hand. The man's been out of Manticoran uniform for forty years, and he didn't exactly leave it voluntarily, did he? He fucked up by the numbers when he wore the Queen's uniformunder remarkably similar circumstances, I might addand I see no reason to assume he didn't do the same thing here. And even if he didn't, he's undoubtedly still bitter over what happened to his career. That might make him an ideal conduit if someone wanted to deliberately plant disinformation on us."
"That's preposterous," White Haven snorted. "And even if he was inclined to do anything of the sorteven to the extent of voluntarily allowing both of his own legs to be shot off to lend authenticity to his effortsDuchess Harrington and her staff evaluated the records and interviewed the surviving crew members independently."
"Yes, and sent a task group off to examine the star where this hypothetical 'Second Fleet' was supposedly stationed," Janacek retorted. "But she didn't find anything there, did she?"
"Which proves absolutely nothing," White Haven pointed out. "There are any number of reasons why a fleet ordered to remain covert might have shifted its base."
"Of course there are. And that's precisely what Theisman wants us to think."
"Theisman? Are you suggesting now that the Republic's Secretary of War deliberately sacrificed a destroyer and its entire crew just to convince us he was prepared to contemplate an act of war against us?"
"Of course not!" Janacek snapped. "He never intended for the destroyer to be damaged. But he did expect it to be spotted and followedwhy else would he have openly sent two fleet destroyers to ostentatiously orbit the one planet in the entire sector where there was a Havenite diplomatic mission? In a star system where our patrol units call regularly?" The First Lord sneered. "If they were so damned determined to remain 'covert,' don't you think they could have found something just a bit less obtrusive than that?"
"And the purpose of allowing themselves to be spotted and followed?" White Haven asked, fascinated despite himself and despite his scalding anger.
"To convince us of exactly what Admiral Harrington was convinced of," Janacek said with the patience of someone speaking to a very small child. "Our relations with the Republic are deteriorating steadily. You know that as well as I do. And despite all of his public statements of confidence in his navy's abilities, Theisman isn't at all certain of his ability to stand up to us. So he sent his two destroyers off to Silesia with orders to draw our attention there in order to convince us he was sending forces to threaten Sidemore. Obviously what he wants is for us to divert still more of our strength to Silesia, thus weakening ourselves at the decisive point if the cease-fire should fail."
"I see." White Haven considered the First Lord in silence for several seconds, then shook his head. "Exactly how were his destroyers supposed to suggest all of this to us?"
"By being followed to an appropriate star somewhereexactly as this Hecate was. Undoubtedly, they hoped to be picked up by one of our warships. If one of them had been, she would have 'suddenly' realized she was being trailed and broken away from the star she'd been to such trouble to bring to our attention. Our ship would have followed her until she either lost us or else returned to the Horus System 'for new orders.' In either case, when the incident was reported to Sidemore, Admiral Harrington and her staff could be relied upon to draw the proper conclusions.
"As it turned out, they were spotted and shadowed by what they thought was a typical Silesian merchant ship, and they thought they saw an even better way to get their disinformation into our hands. Obviously, they intended to board Bachfisch's ship, drop a few hints, and then turn her loose with stern orders not to go anywhere near the Marsh System. Of course any Silly merchant crew would immediately see the possibility of selling such information to us, which would have sent them straight off to Admiral Harrington!"
"And the data Admiral Bachfisch recovered from her computers?" White Haven asked.
"Strictly a fallback position," Janacek said confidently. "Hecate was never intended to be captured or destroyed, but it must have been apparent to their planners that their ship might be unfortunate enough to attract the attention of a cruiser or even a battlecruiser. With our compensator efficiency advantages, Hecate's ability to pull away would have been far from assured, so they briefed her crew with a cover story and planted a few ambiguous references to this 'Second Fleet' of theirs in her computers. They probably had it set up to look as if the crew had attempted to purge their database and failed to get everything dumped." He shrugged. "When they screwed up and misidentified Bachfisch's ship as a regular merchie, someone had time to go back to the fallback plan before he was killed."
"Do you seriously believe any of that?" White Haven asked almost conversationally, and Janacek swelled with fury.
"Of course I do!" He shook his head angrily. "Oh, I'm sure we have some of the details wrong, but there's no wayno way in the universeTheisman would even contemplate genuinely sending a force as powerful as the one Harrington is postulating that far away from the decisive theater at a time like this! I don't doubt that their ops plan came apart on them. Certainly I don't believe they deliberately sacrificed an entire destroyer crew just to convince us their information was genuine! But the only thing that makes any sense is that this was intended as some elaborate diversionary effort."
"And you don't intend to be diverted by it, do you?"
"No, My Lord, I do not," Janacek said flatly, staring unyieldingly into White Haven's eyes.
"My Lord," White Haven said quietly, "haven't you even considered the other implications of this supposed diversionary effort of yours?"
"What 'other implications'?" Janacek demanded.
"If Duchess Harrington's belief that sizable Havenite forces have been sent to Silesia is, in fact, correct, then they can only be there for one purpose: to attack Sidemore Station and destroy her task force. If they did such a thing, it would be a clear act of war, and we would respond to it as sucheverywhere, not just in Silesia. The implication is clearly that they're actively contemplating resuming hostilities, and if they're willing to do so in an area as far from our strategic center as Silesia, then they're certainly willing to do it somewhere closer to home, as well.