The Lotus Eaters

develop a very large fuel-air-explosive mine that can be pre-emplaced, but not filled until needed. And it has to be able to be remotely detonated'—again Carrera's eyes shot upwards—'and not by radio means.' The sketch for that said, 'Volcano.'

'The last thing I want is prepackaged light artillery. Kuralski has rounded up some seven hundred 85mm guns, surplus from the Great Global War and in pretty good—actually depot rebuild—shape. Apparently they've been . . . umm . . . 'lost' from the Volgans' books. I want half of them, a decent load of ammunition for each, plus fire control equipment, packaged for long term storage in shipping containers and put on ships. The rest will be shipped here openly.'

Again, Carrera showed Siegel a diagram. 'I don't have a name for this project,' he said. 'The Volgan 180mm started as a naval gun and was turned into a heavy field piece. I've put our friends in Volga to work designing and building a railroad carriage. In some ways it's the simplest thing. We're going to take receipt of thirty-two of them, openly, that we'll mount in the old bunkers the Federated States left behind. I need you to receive sixty-four of these, secretly, break them down into shipping containers, and send them to the Isla Real. Don't sweat ammunition; that's coming separately.'

'Sig, these are your babies. Go to Cochin. You don't speak the language, I know, but you do speak French and all the educated Cochinese do, as well. Make whatever contacts you need, pay whatever bribes you must, buy whatever talent and materials are required. Get me those five things. I'll send ships to pick them up when you have a worthwhile load.

'While you're at it, nose around for any redundant military supplies and equipment we might be able to get cheap. In particular I am interested in aircraft.'

Siegel looked confused and torn. 'Can I bring my wife?'

Sadly, Carrera picked up the manila folder and passed it over. 'These are transcripts of some phone calls. Also some events in your wife's recent history. She's been passing on information, too, Sig. To the Tauros. And, yes, Fernandez confirms you didn't know.'

Carrera sounded like he meant it when he said, 'I'm sorry.'

* * *

'Sig looked terribly upset when he left, Patricio,' Lourdes said.

Carrera didn't answer except to bite his lower lip and nod.

'You're not going to tell me about it?'

Still biting, he shook his head, 'No.'

Lourdes sighed, sadly, and began to turn away.

'It's personal to Sig,' Carrera explained, hurriedly. 'I've no right to tell anyone, not even you. If it were . . . Lourdes, please sit down.'

Carrera hesitated. This was going to be hard . . . hard.

'Lourdes, how much have you guessed about why I collapsed?' he asked.

'You mean besides the obvious, like burning both ends of the candle for ten years?'

'Yes, besides that.'

She smiled slightly. 'Well, let's see. What am I supposed to make of it when you ask, in your sleep, 'Would you prefer, Mustafa, that I obliterate Makkah al Jedidah and the New Kaaba?' Or when you say, 'Cheer up, old man. You still have one son left: Me'? Patricio, I know you nuked Hajar.'

'Oh.'

'Oh.'

'And your feelings on that?'

'I sometimes think of men like Adnan Sada and women like his wife, Rukhaya, and think, 'They could have been my friends, too, those people Patricio killed.' But then I think, 'could have been is not the same thing as were.' And I think, 'how many people that are my friends have been saved because you terrified the Yithrabis into ceasing their support of the Salafi Ikhwan?' '

'It wasn't just adults like Adnan and Rukhaya I murdered,' Carrera said. 'There were children in that city, maybe half a million of them.' He looked down at the hands he loathed. Holding them out, he said, 'There's the blood of half a million kids on these hands, Lourdes.'

'And my children and the children of my friends, to include Adnan's and Rukhaya's, are safer because of it.'

Lourdes stood up and walked the step and a half to the stone railing around the balcony. 'Patricio, if you're asking me for absolution, I can't give it. I'm not only not a priest, I'm not even Catholic. But if you're asking me if I understand that you did what you had to do, that the world is a safer and perhaps better place because of it, then, yes, I do understand that.'

'That's not exactly what I'm asking,' he said. 'I'm asking if . . .'

She turned around, placing her shapely posterior against the stone and folding her arms across her chest. 'Of course, I still love you, you idiot.'

Carrera's head sank onto his chest. 'Thank you for that, my love,' he said, softly.

Lourdes walked to the side of his chair and took his head in her hands, pressing it to her abdomen below her breasts. She said nothing but contented herself with stroking his hair and his cheek. After a time Carrera consulted his watch.

'It's a bit over an hour before the select committees get here,' he said. He stood up and took her hand. 'Let's go to bed.'

* * *