Field Of Dishonor

Neufsteiler had represented Honor's financial interests for almost five T-years, and she was profoundly grateful she'd fallen into his hands. He had a few quirks that could be irritating, like his childlike delight in delaying the disclosure of good news to tease her, but he was scrupulously honest, and he had an uncanny investment sense. Honor's prize money from Basilisk Station had made her a millionaire; Neufsteiler's management had made her a multi-millionaire several times over. Which meant the least she could do was buy him an occasional supper, even at Cosmos prices, and put up with his version of a sense of humor.

She raised her wineglass at the thought, using it to hide her smile. But she wasn't here simply to hear Willard's report, and her eyes circled the table, lighting with a deeper warmth as they brushed over Paul Tankersley before settling on the newest pair of replacements to report aboard Nike.

The battlecruiser's attached Marine battalion had suffered heavier losses in Hancock, proportionate to its numbers, than any other department. Both Lieutenant Colonel Klein and Major Flanders, his exec, had been killed in action, and Klein's senior company commander was on indefinite medical leave for his wounds. Captain Tyler, the ranking survivor, had done well, considering her relative inexperience, but everyone knew she was only acting CO. Yet the Admiralty had been in no hurry to relieve her or even to replace the other casualties. Intellectually, Honor found it hard to blame Their Lordships. Her Marines weren't likely to be dropped into combat while Nike was under repair, after all, and the Navy had other things on its mind. But it had been hard not to resent the effect on her people's morale and training schedules.

That much, at least, was about to change, she thought with intense satisfaction, because the Admiralty had shown unusually good sense when it finally picked Klein's successor.

Colonel Tomas Santiago Ramirez had been a major the last time Honor saw him. He'd commanded HMS Fearless's Marines at Yeltsin's Star, and she suspected that the job he'd done then had something to do with his rapid promotion since. Whether it did or not, he certainly deserved his new rank, and Honor was delighted to see him again.

The colonel was an emigre from San Martin, which explained his almost fearsomely imposing presence. He, his sisters, and his mother had fled San Martin via the Trevor's Star terminal of the Manticore Worm Hole Junction even as the Havenite occupation fleet moved in, crushing the out-classed San Martin Navy and killing his father in the process. Ramirez had been only twelve at the time, but people reached physical maturity early on San Martin, and the colonel reflected the gravity to which he'd been born.

The first adjective to occur to anyone on first sight of him was 'big,' but 'enormous' was a better choice. His height wasn't much above average, but he was huge-boned and squat with lumpy muscle, a man whose beer- barrel neck tapered sharply to merge with his head. Paul Tankersley sat beside him at the table, and the difference between them was instructive. Paul was a chunky, powerful man, despite his relative shortness, but Ramirez's shoulders were twice as broad as his, and the colonel's upper arms were thicker than most men's thighs. At a hundred and eighty-three centimeters, he massed over a hundred and fifty kilos, and if there were three excess grams of fat anywhere about his person, twenty T-years of Marine phys-ed had been unable to find them.

His new exec was another matter. Major Susan Hibson, another veteran of the Blackbird Raid and the Second Battle of Yeltsin, was as dark skinned and haired as Ramirez, but she was almost petite, with startling, sea-green eyes in a face which was much tougher than the colonel's. It was a good face, with finely chiseled features, but there was no softness in it. It wasn't harsh; it simply warned all comers that the woman who wore it had never had the slightest interest in figuring out how to back up for anyone.

It was the first time Ramirez and Hibson had served together since Yeltsin's Star, and Honor was delighted to see them both. Between them, this pair would blow any rust off of Nike's Marines in record time.

She lowered her glass, and their waiter reappeared like an alert genie to refill it. He circled the table, checking all the others, as well, then disappeared again without a word. Good as he was, he could have taken a few lessons in total unobtrusiveness from her own steward, but perhaps he was supposed to be seen to make certain the customers were aware of the service for which they were paying.

She smiled at the thought and toyed with the notion of calling him back to order a cup of cocoa, but even her sweet tooth had been momentarily sated by the baklava they'd just finished. Besides, offering Paul such an opening to twit her over her beverage of choice might not be the smartest thing she could do.

She decided against it, not without regret, and offered Nimitz another stick of celery. The maitre d' hadn't turned a hair when she arrived with the 'cat. He couldn't see many of them here on Manticore, but he'd simply snapped his fingers to summon a waiter with a highchair that worked equally well for infant humans or adult treecats and had it placed at Honor's elbow. Nimitz had settled himself into it with the dignity of a monarch assuming his throne, and his table manners, always excellent on formal occasions, had been even better than usual. As a rule, Honor tried to keep his celery intake to a minimum. Much as he loved it, he had the wrong enzymes to digest Terran cellulose, but this time he'd earned it, and she rubbed his ears as he crunched blissfully away.

'I still can't believe how much he likes that stuff.' Neufsteiler shook his head. 'You'd think he'd get tired of it eventually, Dame Honor.'

'The average life expectancy of a Sphinx treecat is about two hundred and fifty years,' Honor told him, 'and there's no record of any 'cat ever getting tired of celery.'

'Really?' Amusement glinted in Neufsteiler's voice, and Honor shook her head.

'Really. I scold him about it, but it never fazes him. And, in a way, I suppose I'm actually grateful for it.'

'Grateful?' Paul Tankersley chuckled. 'I have to say I'd never have suspected it from the way you go on at me for slipping him his fix!'

'That's because you spoil him,' she said severely. 'And I didn't actually mean to say I was grateful for his addiction. I was speaking of treecats in general.'

'Why?' Neufsteiler asked.

'Because it was celery that first brought humans and 'cats together.'

'This I've got to hear!' Tankersley laughed and sat back in his chair. 'Assuming, of course, that you're not pulling my leg,' he added. Nimitz paused in his chewing to give him a haughty look, and Honor smiled.

'No, I'm serious. Humans didn't go out of their way to study 'cats when they first arrived on Sphinx. The first colonists had other things on their minds; they hardly even realized treecats existed, and none of the survey teams ever guessed how intelligent they really are. Personally, I think that's because of their size. No one's ever encountered another intelligent species with such a low body mass, and no one expected to... which is probably why the survey crews never looked closely enough to realize they're tool-users.'

'I'd never heard that, Ma'am,' Colonel Ramirez sounded surprised. His voice was as deep as one might have expected from that enormous chest, but his San Martin accent softened its rumble with almost musical overtones. 'I don't doubt you, of course, but I've always been fascinated by treecats. I've read everything I could find on them, and I've never seen a hint of that.'

'I don't doubt it, Tomas.' Honor glanced around the table, then shrugged and looked back at Ramirez. 'In fact, I'd be surprised if you've found much about their social organization, either. Am I right?'

'Well, yes, Ma'am, now that you mention it.' Ramirez rubbed his chin. 'I have found a fair amount on their physiology, and the literature on their adoption bonds with humans is fairly extensive. Not that it explains very much. Every 'expert' seems to have a different explanation for just how it works.'

'And the best any of them can offer is a 'hypothesis,' right?' Honor asked, and Ramirez nodded. 'Well, the truth is that most people who know much about 'cats aren't talking. I wouldn't go so far as to call it a conspiracy of silence but the xenologists who drop by to study them either get adopted themselves or else don't seem to learn very much before they get bored and leave. Those who do get adopted usually wind up working for the Sphinx Forestry Commission, and treecats are a protected species, which means the planetary authorities—including Forestry's xenologists—discourage people from bugging them. In fact, almost all Sphinxians tend to be extremely protective where the 'cats are concerned. We just don't talk about them very much except with people we trust. Which, in turn, tends to keep the available off-planet literature on them in the schoolgirl primer category, but they're definitely tool-makers. Oh, we're talking very simple implements, about on the order of Neolithic man's, but you should see the flint hand-axes and other artifacts some of the Sphinx 'cat communities turn out. Of course, they're not very interested in ornaments or personal possessions without some specific utility And those who adopt humans—like Mister Greedy Guts over there—don't really need tools. They've got people to do the heavy work for them.'