Shadow of the Hegemon, the - Book 2 (Ender)

every country," said Bean.
    "Achilles is enough to tip the balance wherever he goes."
    Bean nodded. "Rationally, I have to agree with you. Irrationally expect to see her again someday."
    "If I didn't know you so well, I might interpret that as a sign of your faith in the resurrection." Bean picked up his suitcase. "Am I bigger, or is this smaller?" "The case is the same size," said Carlotta. "I think I'm growing." "Of course you're growing. Look at your pants." "I'm still wearing them," said Bean. "More to the point, look at your ankles."
    "Oh." There was more ankle showing than when he bought them.
    Bean had never seen a child grow up, but it bothered him that in the weeks they had been in Araraquara, he had grown at least five centimeters. If this was puberty, where were the other changes that were supposed to go along with it?
    "We'll buy you new clothes in Greensboro," said Sister Carlotta.
    Greensboro. "The place where Ender grew up."
    "And where he killed for the first time," said Sister Carlotta.
    "You just won't let go of that, will you?" said Bean.
    "When you had Achilles in your power, you didn't kill him."
    Bean didn't like hearing himself compared to Ender that way. Not when it showed Ender at a disadvantage. "Sister Carlotta, we'd have a whole lot less difficulty right now if I had killed him."
    "You showed mercy. You turned the other cheek. You gave him a chance to make something worthwhile out of his life."
    "I made sure he'd get committed to a mental institution."
    "Are you so determined to believe in your own lack of virtue?"
    "Yes," said Bean. "I prefer truth to lies."
    "There," said Carlotta. "Yet another virtue to add to my list."
    Bean laughed in spite of himself. "I'm glad you like me," he said.
    "Are you afraid to meet him?"
    "Who?"
    "Ender's brother."
    "Not afraid," said Bean.
    "How do you feel, then?"
    "Skeptical," said Bean.
    "He showed humility in that email," said Sister Carlotta. "He wasn't sure that he'd figured things out exactly right."
    "Oh, there's a thought. The humble Hegemon."
    "He's not Hegemon yet," said Carlotta.
    "He got seven of Ender's jeesh released, just by publishing a column. He has influence. He has ambition. And now to learn he has humility-well, it's just too much for me."
    "Laugh all you want. Let's go out and find a cab."
    There was no last-minute business to take care of. They had paid cash for everything, owed nothing. They could walk away.
    They lived on money drawn from accounts Graff had set up for them. There was nothing about the account Bean was using now to tag it as belonging to Julian Delphiki- It held his military salary, including his combat and retirement bonuses. The I.F. had given all of Ender's jeesh very large trust funds that they couldn't touch till they came of age. The saved-up pay and bonuses were just to tide them over during their childhood. Graff had assured him that he would not run out of money while he was in hiding.
    Sister Carlotta's money came from the Vatican. One person there knew what she was doing. She, too, would have money enough for her needs. Neither of them had the temperament to exploit the situation. They spent little, Sister Carlotta because she wanted nothing more, Bean because he knew that any kind of flamboyance or excess would mark him in people's memories. He always had to seem to be a child running errands for his grandmother, not an undersized war hero cashing in on his back pay.
    Their passports caused them no problems, either. Again, Graff had been able to pull strings for them. Given the way they lookedboth of Mediterranean ancestry-they carried passports from Catalonia. Carlotta knew Barcelona well, and Catalan was her childhood language. She barely spoke it now, but no matter-hardly anyone did. And no one would be surprised that her grandson couldn't speak the language at all. Besides, how many Catalans would they meet in their travels? Who would try to test their story? If someone got too nosy, they'd simply move on to some other city, some other country.
    They landed in Miami, then Atlanta, then Greensboro. They were exhausted and slept the night at an airport hotel. The next day, they logged in and printed out guides to the county bus system. It was a fairly modem system, enclosed and electric, but the map made no sense to Bean.
    "Why don't any of the buses go through here?" he asked.
    "That's where the rich people live," said Sister Carlotta.
    "They make them all live together in one place?"
    "They feel