He shook his head. "According to Bart's last report, the farm's books balance to the last cent."

"This discrepancy is a lot more than a cent." She slid the folio back to Douglas. "There are only four people who have access to the investment accounts. It shouldn't be a lot of trouble to work out where the excess came from."

"Patrice," he said, "one of the things we've never discussed is exactly whose money this is. All I know for certain is that it's not mine. Is it yours?"

She laughed heartily. "I could only wish. It's Morelon Investments Corporation property."

"We're not paid out of this account, are we?"

"No, we're not."

"Then whose accounts payable lists us as creditors?"

Her brow furrowed. She looked away, clearly troubled.

"I never thought to ask," she said. "The stipend is so large, I figured it had to come from the farm corporation. What other entity has that kind of cash flow?"

Douglas rose from his seat and went to look out the window. The cornfields stretched well beyond his eyes' ability to follow them. Stippled over the expanse he could see, dozens of workers tended to the crops, maintaining the rows, clearing away detritus, and guiding the great machines that fertilized, irrigated, and kept the weeds at bay.

It's not a classically beautiful vista, but it speaks volumes about Morelon productivity and wealth...and power. The sort of power that can be used to bend others without ever claiming power of the overt sort.

"As far as I know," he said, "there's never been a disbursement from the investment account that wasn't for a stock purchase. So you, I, Chuck, and Charisse have sole control over an account that's about to touch a hundred million dekas in cash and equities. I haven't made any deposits into that account. You haven't made any deposits into that account. Who does that leave?"

There was a protracted silence.

"Douglas," Patrice finally said, "has it ever occurred to you to wonder why, of the five people involved in Morelon clan accounting and financial management, three of us are Kramniks or former Kramniks?"

He nodded. "And the other two are the clan matriarch and her husband."

"This doesn't seem like the sort of thing we should keep to ourselves."

"Indeed."

"Then it's time for a meeting."

"Agreed."

"Just the investment council, or the whole clan?"

He considered it briefly. "For now, let's make it just the three of us, plus Bart if we can make it happen."

"Do you have any idea what's going on, Doug?"

"Not yet," he said. "Not a clear one, anyway."

"We're going to have to do more digging," she said.

He nodded.

"It could piss off a lot of people."

"I'd say no more than two."

Her eyes widened. "You do have a notion about this."

"I do," he said, "but I don't think I should broach it just yet." He grinned wanly. "I want to live."

Chapter 15: Quartember 2, 1307 A.H.

"Grandaunt," Althea said, fighting to keep her tone soft, "it's going to happen. The plane is ready, we're ready, and the Relic is just hanging there waiting." She forced a smile. "We were hoping to make an event out of the first flight, the sort of showy public affair that might get other clans interested in joining the effort. It would help that along if you and Granduncle Chuck were there to witness it."

Martin gave her hand a quick, gentle squeeze. She glanced over at him. His expression was as bland as skimmed milk. He nodded minutely toward their clan matriarch.

The thundercloud on Charisse Morelon's face was anything but neutral.

We shouldn't have agreed to do this in her office.

"Why," Charisse said, "should I agree to witness an event that I disapprove and would stop if I could?"

Althea started to reply, but Martin squeezed her hand a second time, with considerably more force, and she held her tongue.

"Sooner or later, Charisse," he said, "Mankind will return to space. If a pair of your kindred are to be the first to do so, don't you want to be present to see it?"

"I'd rather that my kindred leave such foolishness to other clans," Charisse said. "All my kindred."

It came near to catapulting Althea out of her seat. Martin bore down on her hand, and she restrained herself.

"You...don't approve of spaceflight?" he said.

"I don't see the need, and I do see the costs and the risks," Charisse said. She rose from her seat and bade them survey her office with a wave of her hand.

"Tell me, young ones," she said. "Do you think I need anything you might find on the Relic? Do you think Clan Morelon does? Just what do you expect to find up there, anyway? A little more uranium? A few obsolete devices irrelevant to Hope life? Or maybe some Spoonerite's journal of the Hegira, to bore us with tales of life in a dimly lit, pressurized tunnel bored into a lifeless planetoid? And that's assuming you survive to get there and back. Exactly what on that barren, evacuated rock is worth risking both your lives? What do you expect to find that would repay you adequately for the price you've paid, in dekas, dedication, and discomfort?"

She slashed the air. "I want nothing to do with this madness. If I'd had any inkling of how much it would cost or how fixated you are on it, I'd have found a way to stop it four years ago. As it stands, all I can do is deny you my approval, in the hope that you might yet regain your senses, so that's what I'm going to do."

"And Chuck?" Martin said. "Will you forbid him to see us off?"

The fury in the clan matriarch's face seemed to redouble.

"Etienne will remain here with me. Don't you dare approach him out of my presence."

Etienne?

"I see," Martin said. He turned to Althea. "Let's be on our way, love."

As they rose and made to leave, Charisse said, "Althea."

She turned. "Yes, Grandaunt?"

"If you...persist in this," Charisse said, "I will have you removed as Morelon scion."

An unprecedented coldness descended upon Althea. She released her husband's hand and awarded her clan matriarch a precisely formal bow.

"As you wish, Grandaunt."

They exited Charisse's office in silence.

Martin ushered Althea into their bedroom and closed the door carefully behind him.

"I've never seen her like that before," he said.

Althea seated herself on their bed and folded her hands in her lap. "It's almost as if we've offended her personally. I can't imagine how, but I'm beginning to think we might have done exactly that."

He sat next to her and took her hand. "Maybe we did."

"Hm? How?"

"By not inviting her involvement and approval at the very start of the effort," he said.

"Four years ago?" she said.

Martin nodded. "If not before that. We could have coaxed her into it by degrees, if we'd started early enough. We could have given her a reason to invest in it-to invest herself in it. At this point it has nothing to do with her or the rest of the clan. It's strictly Al and Martin's folly. And it's the biggest thing anyone on Hope-never mind Clan Morelon-has ever attempted."

He snorted. "Now that I've looked at it that way, I see it clearly. We offended her by omitting her. She never got her fingerprints onto it, much less a turn in the driver's seat. It would have been more of a surprise if she'd agreed to endorse it."

Althea looked up into her husband's face and studied the currents flowing through it.

"Did you suspect anything like this," she said, "back at the beginning?"

He grinned wanly. "I wasn't present at the beginning, love."

"Hm? But-"

"The beginning," he said, "was when you took your grandparents' bequest into your hands and started forging it into the largest individually held fortune on Alta."

"Oh."

I suppose it doesn't help much that even with all we've spent, I still control lots more capital than she does.

-You betcha, Al.

Oh, hi, Grandpere. Listening in again?

-Indeed, dear. I didn't lose my interest in this subject when I died, you know.

It still rattles me when you say that. But which subject? Spaceflight or infuriated Morelon matriarchs?

-(humor) Either one, I suppose. But it's become clear that you'll have to accelerate your plans and protect your efforts very carefully. Charisse isn't the sort to accept the dismissal of her authority with a shrug and a smile.

Yeah, I'm beginning to see that.

-Focus on it, Al. Don't shrug it aside and look away. There's more to it than pique at your enterprise alone.

I'd appreciate it if you could be a bit more specific, Grandpere.

-Been there, done that, got the fancy urn. Keep your eye on Charisse. You'll learn what you need to know as you need to know it.

I don't like the sound of that.

-Neither do I. Just stay alert. Tell Martin the same.

I think he's ahead of me already.

-Do it anyway.

"Martin," she said softly, "I think we should launch as soon as possible."

He looked at her with new intensity. "Why, love?"

She took a moment to organize her thoughts.

"General principles, really," she said. "The plane is ready, the suits are ready, and we're ready. Why should we wait to get off the tarmac and into space? Besides, when there are forces opposed to what you want to do, it's not smart to give them lots of time to find a way through your defenses."

"Hm." He nodded. "Good point. Are you thinking only of Charisse, or do you have other forces in mind?"

"I...don't know," she said. "I'm not even sure I'm thinking of Charisse. I just want us to go."

He chuckled and wrapped an arm around her. "Are you afraid you might lose your nerve?"

She nodded.

I'm even more afraid I'll lose my nerve about letting you come along.

"Al," he said, "I don't think you could lose your nerve. I think this is lodged too deep inside you to be pulled out. I think you'd face down all the States of Earth if they dared to get in your way...and I think you'd beat them."

She laughed. "You think too much of me."

He shook his head. "Not at all. Shall we go over the CPMs one last time?"