said, “Is there any particular reason why you should be staring at me, Mr. …”
“Captain Mauser,” Joe said hurriedly. “I’m afraid I’ve been rude, Miss—well, I thought I recognized you.” He hoped that she wouldn’t think he was running a tired old line on her.
She took in his civilian dress, typed it automatically, and came to an erroneous conclusion. She said, “Captain? You mean that with everyone else I know drawing down ranks from lieutenant colonel to brigadier general, you can’t make anything better than captain?”
Joe winced. “I came up from the ranks. Captain is quite an achievement, believe me. Few make it beyond sergeant,” he said humbly.
“Up from the ranks!” She took in his clothes again. “You mean you’re a Middle? You neither talk nor look like a Middle, Captain.” She used the caste rating as though it was not quite a derogatory term.
Not that she meant to be deliberately insulting, Joe told himself wearily. It was simply born in her. As once a well-educated aristocracy had, not necessarily unkindly, named their status inferiors niggers—or other aristocrats, in another area of the country, had named theirs greasers—so did this aristocracy use derogatory labels in an unknowing manner.
“Mid-Middle now, Miss,” he said slowly. “However, I was born in the Lower castes.”
An eyebrow went up, half cynical, half mocking, as though amused at a social climber. “Zen! You must have put in many an hour studying. You talk like an Upper, Captain.” With a shrug, she dropped all interest in him and turned to resume her journey.
“Just a moment,” Mauser said. “You can’t go in there, Miss—”
Her eyebrow went up again. “The name is Haer,” she said. “And just why can’t I go into my father’s offices, Captain?”
Now it came to him why he had thought he recognized her. She had basic features similar to those of that overbred ass, Balt Haer. With her, however, they came off superlatively.
“Sorry,” he said. “I guess you can, under the circumstances. I was about to tell you that they’re recruiting, with men running around half clothed. Medical inspections, that sort of thing.”
She made a noise of derision and said over her shoulder, even as she sailed on, “Besides being a Haer, I’m an M.D., Captain. At the ludicrous sight of a man shuffling about in his skin, I seldom blush.” She was gone.
Mauser watched her go. Her figure was superlative from the rear, as Grecian classic as her face. “I’ll bet you don’t,” he muttered.
Had she waited a few moments, he could have explained his Upper accent and his unlikely education. When you’d copped one and spent days or weeks languishing in a hospital bed, you had plenty of time to read, to study. And Mauser had decided early on in life that any bit of knowledge he might gain was precious, potentially useful. His career had verified that belief on numerous occasions, and his natural curiosity and intelligence made it easy for him to follow his program of self-education. Had he been born an Upper, he might have been an Academician, but as it was…
Yes, time in the hospital had given him time to study, and more. Time to contemplate—and fester away in his own schemes of rebellion against fate. And Mauser had copped many in his time.
CHAPTER THREE
By the time Mauser called it a day and retired to his quarters, he was exhausted to the point where his occasional dissatisfaction with the trade he followed was heavily upon him. Such was the case increasingly often these days. He was no longer a kid. There was no longer romance in the calling—if there ever had been for Joe Mauser.
He had met his immediate senior officers, largely dilettante Uppers with precious little field experience, and been unimpressed. And he’d met his own junior officers and been shocked. By the looks of things at this stage, Captain Mauser’s squadron would be going into this fracas both undermanned and with junior officers composed largely of temporarily promoted noncoms. If this was typical of Baron Haer’s total force, then Balt Haer was right; unconditional surrender was to be considered, no matter how disastrous to the Haer family fortunes.
Mauser had no difficulty securing his uniforms. Kingston, as a city on the outskirts of the Catskill Reservation, was well populated by tailors who could turn out uniforms on a twenty-four-hour delivery basis. He had even been able to take immediate delivery of one kilted uniform. Now, inside his quarters, he began stripping out of his jacket. Somewhat to his surprise, Mainz, the small man he had selected earlier to be his batman, entered from an inner room, resplendent in the Haer uniform.
He helped his superior out of the jacket with an ease that held no subservience but at the same time was correctly respectful. You’d have thought him a batman specially trained.
Mauser grunted, “Max, isn’t it? I’d forgotten all about you. Glad you found our billet all right.”
Max said, “Yes, sir. Would the captain like a drink? I picked up a bottle of applejack. Applejack’s the drink around here, sir. Makes a topnotch highball with ginger ale and a twist of lemon.”
Mauser looked at him. Evidently his tapping this man for orderly was sheer fortune. Well, Joe Mauser could use some good luck on this job. He hoped it didn’t end with selecting a batman.
He said, “Sounds good, Max. Got ice?”
“Of course, sir.” Max left the small room.
Vacuum Tube’s officers were billeted in what had once been a group of resort cottages on the old road between Kingston and Woodstock. Each cottage featured full amenities, including a tiny kitchenette. That was one advantage to a fracas held in a civilized area where there were plenty of facilities. Such military reservations as the Little Big Horn in Montana and some of those in the Southwest and Mexico were another thing.
Mauser lowered himself into the room’s easy chair and bent down to untie his laces, then kicked his shoes off. He could use that drink. He began wondering all over again if his scheme for winning this fracas would come off. The more he saw of Baron Haer’s inadequate forces, the more he wondered. He simply hadn’t expected Vacuum Tube to be in this bad a shape. Baron Haer had been riding high for so long that one would have thought his reputation for victory would have lured at least a few freelance veterans to his colors. Evidently they hadn’t bitten. The word was out, all right.
Max Mainz returned with the drink.
Mauser said, “You had one yourself?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, go get yourself one and come on back and sit down. Let’s get acquainted.”
“Yes, sir.” Max disappeared back into the kitchenette to return almost immediately. The little man slid into a chair, drink awkwardly in hand.
His superior sized him up all over again. Not much more than a kid, really. Surprisingly forward for a Lower who must have been raised from childhood in a trank-bemused, telly-entertained household. The fact that he’d broken away from that environment at all was to his credit. It was considerably easier to conform—but then it is always easier to conform, to run with the herd, as Mauser well knew. His own break hadn’t been an easy one.
He sipped at his drink. “Relax,” he said.
Max
