The Lotus Eaters

his task was . . .

And, then too, with the corps commanders, Carrera, his personal staff, and Parilla gone, why shouldn't I become the new commander? I will be first among equals. I'll have the gratitude of the old families. And if I can do that, why not president myself, someday? Why shouldn't I watch out for my own interest?

Chapter Twenty-one

Responsibility and authority will equal out in the long run. The society that robs the future will have no future. The descendents of the man who places family over society will find no society to shelter them.

The trick, then, is to limit power to those who can, in the aggregate, be expected to use it responsibly. As we have seen, kings and tyrants are, at best, fifty-fifty; elites, oligarchs, and aristocrats are not a whit better; and even popular democracies have no great track record of responsible voting and actions, over the long term.

Geniuses may vote irresponsibly while morons vote wisely, wisdom being more a matter of instinct and experience than raw, native intelligence. Education not only doesn't guarantee responsible exercise of political power, if anything it tends toward the opposite, for the educated—who are too often also the arrogant—fool themselves into thinking they are voting the issues, after sober reflection, when in fact they just vote their emotions and gut instincts. Whatever the airs they may put on, they are, like the rest of mankind, not rational so much as rationalizing.

Just as, in the words of Voltaire, 'A rational army would run away,' so the act of responsible voting requires at some level an irrational mindset—to vote for the good of the whole over the good of the self—or one that, if really rational, thinks in the long term and understands long term costs and benefits.

—Jorge y Marqueli Mendoza,

Historia y Filosofia Moral,

Legionary Press, Balboa,

Terra Nova, Copyright AC 468

Anno Condita 472 Officers' Mess, Fort Cameron, Balboa, Terra Nova

An untouched plate of chorley bread, yellow and smelling buttery, sat on the table in front of Chapayev. Besides the bread was some greenish dip with a dead fly next to the shallow bowl.

Chapayev was in mufti, and unshaven for the past several days. Worse, he had the appearance of a man who had been drinking pretty heavily for all those days. Perhaps worse still, he looked like he didn't care.

Samsonov took one look and thought, I was afraid of this. On the other hand, I was also afraid he'd bring the little tramp back here and she'd be fucking my officers—just like she did back in Volga—and upsetting my mess.

The legate took a deep breath, exhaled, and walked to sit at the table where Chapayev sat alone, a half empty glass and a clear bottle directly in front of him, between the table's edge and the bread.

'Victor, what are you doing back so soon?' Samsonov asked.

'It didn't work out, sir,' answered Chapayev in a voice totally devoid of emotion.

Samsonov didn't want to ask for details. He could guess at these well enough, anyway. Instead, he just said, 'Well, these things happen. I'm sorry, Victor, for what it's worth.'

'Yes, sir. So am I. Nothing to be done about it.' A corpse would have shown more feeling than the Volgan tribune did. 'So . . . I had nothing else to do. After finishing up the interviews and the shopping, I came back here.'

'Well, I can't put you back on duty now. You're still convalescing.' And now you have two things to heal from, don't you, son? Too much of a burden to let you bear while still doing your job? Too dangerous to leave you alone to mope? Can't make a decision like this sober, and it's too early to for me to join you in a drink.

Samsonov continued, 'Tell you what, Victor. You look like the very devil. Go to your quarters and sleep a while. Consider that an order. I'll pick you up at eighteen hundred for dinner. There's a restaurant down town I've been meaning to try. Then we'll get stone blind, paralytic, ossified drunk. Tomorrow I'll decide whether you should resume your duties or finish your leave . . . or maybe something else. We'll see.'

* * *

Chapayev said barely a word as he ground his way mechanically through his food. Only his glass of vodka held any real interest for him, a glass Samsonov kept constantly refilled from a bottle left at the table by the waiter.

On his fourth large glass, and plainly feeling it, Victor blurted out 'She was pregnant when I got there. Several months.'

Samsonov, who knew Chapayev's schedule for the last two years as well as Chapayev did himself, simply said, 'Oh. I see.'

'No, sir, it was much worse than that.' Then Chapayev told his commander all the vile things Veronica had said to him in the Saint Nicholasburg apartment the week before. Tears welled in the tribune's eyes.

'Victor . . . there is nothing I can say to you that will make it any better . . . except, maybe, that these things pass . . . the pain, I mean. You are not the first; you will not be the last. And for whatever it is worth to you . . . she's lost more than you have.' The fucking bitch, Samsonov added silently. I should offer a bounty for the cunt's life to the next group I send home on leave.

Pride was stung, too. 'What can I tell my company? All this time I've been telling them of my 'peerless' Veronica; the light of my life. How can I face them now? They'll think I'm a fool.'