Shadow of the giant

out. In the open. Clear at last. Of course
she was really irritated at all the things she complained about. But underneath
it all was resentment about how Peter had let Bean do his killing for him.
    "Petra," said Peter. "I'm not a
soldier."
    "Neither is Bean!"
    "Bean is the finest military mind alive," said
Peter.
    "So why isn't he Hegemon?"
    "Because he doesn't want to be."
    "And you do. And that's why I hate you, since you
asked."
    "You know why I wanted this office and what I'm trying
to do with it. You've read my Locke essays."
    "I also read your Demosthenes essays."
    "Those also needed to be written. But I intend to
govern as Locke."
    "You govern nothing. The only reason you even have your
little army is because Bean and Suriyawong created it and decided to let you
have the use of it. You only have your precious compound and all your staff
because Bean killed Achilles and gave it back to you. And now you're back to putting
on your little show of importance, but you know what? Nobody's fooled. You're
not even as powerful as the Pope. He's got the Vatican and a billion Catholics.
You've got nothing but what my husband gave you."
    Peter didn't think this was quite accurate—he had labored
for years to build up his network of contacts, and he had kept the office of
Hegemon from being abolished. Over the years he had made it mean something. He
had saved Haiti from chaos. Several small nations owed their independence or
freedom to his diplomatic and, yes, military intervention.
    But certainly he was on the verge of losing it all to
Achilles— because of his own stupid mistake. A mistake that Bean and Petra had
warned him about before he made it. A mistake that Bean had rectified only at a
grave risk.
    "Petra," said Peter, "you're right. I owe
everything to you and Bean. But that doesn't change the fact that whatever you
think of me and whatever you think of the office of Hegemon, I hold that
office, and I'm trying to use it to avoid another bloody war."
    "You're trying to use your office to make your office
into 'dictator of the world.' Unless you can figure out a way to extend your
reach out to the colonies and become 'dictator of the known universe.' "
    "We don't actually have any colonies yet," said
Peter. "The ships are all still in transit and will be until we're all
dead. But by the time they arrive, I'd like them to send their ansible messages
back home to an Earth that is united under a single democratic government."
    "It's the democratic part I missed," said Petra.
"Who elected you?"
    "Since I don't have any actual authority over anybody,
Petra, how can it possibly matter if I'm not legitimately authorized?"
    "You argue like a debater," she said. "You
don't actually have to have an idea, you just have to have a seemingly clever
refutation."
    "And you argue like a nine-year-old," said Peter.
"Sticking your fingers in your ears and going 'La la la' and 'same to
you.' "
    Petra looked like she wanted to slap him. Instead she put
her fingers in her ears and said, "Same to you" and "La la
la."
    He did not laugh. Instead he reached out a hand, intending
to pull her arm away from her ear. But she whirled around and kicked his hand
so hard that he thought she might have broken his wrist. As it was, he
staggered and stumbled over the corner of the bed in his hotel room and ended
up on his butt on the floor.
    "There's the Hegemon of Earth," said Petra.
    "Where's your camera? Don't you want this to be
public?"
    "If I wanted to destroy you, you'd be destroyed."
    "Petra, I didn't send Bean into that compound. Bean
sent himself."
    "You let him go."
    "Yes I did, and in any event I was proven right."
    "But you didn't know he'd live. I was carrying his baby
and you sent him in to die."
    "Nobody sends Bean anywhere," said Peter,
"and you know it."
    She whirled away from him and stalked out of the room. She
would have slammed the door, but the pneumatics prevented it.
    He had seen, though. The tears in her eyes.
    She didn't hate Peter. She wanted to hate him. But what she
really was furious about was that her husband was dying and she had agreed to
this mission because she knew it would be important. If it worked, it would be
important. But it wasn't working. It probably wouldn't work.
    Peter knew that. But he also knew that he had to talk to
Caliph Alai, and he had to do it now if the conversation was to have any good
effect. If possible, he'd like to have the conversation without risking the
prestige of the office of