Doyle Phoebe Heejanus
Phoebe hurried into the Knight of Elizabeth a full hundred seconds before schedule. The
proprietor, a fussy old gentleman with gray, wavy hair and a matching goatee, waved her over to a
corner table. Whisking a "Reserved" placard away, he asked after her health and her pleasure, then
scurried off to prepare her pot of Irish-Breakfast Tea himself. Attentive, fussy where it counted,
but he really made too much of her patronage, to her face and to other people.
Scooting one of the chairs, with its thick, rounded pad and narrow, curlicue back and legs, farther
into the corner, Phoebe lounged back on it and swept the place with her gaze. Strange that Okra
likes this place, too. Round, lace-covered tables stood everywhere, each complemented by two or
three of the barely comfortable chairs. It's superficial. Chintz curtains, flowery wallpaper, and
shelf after shelf of knickknacks crowded the place with fussiness at once dainty and reassuring.
Feminine. Scattered about, servers, low and oval, offered the sweetcakes that were the shoppe's
real draw. Secular ... hedonistic even.
A place I can relax, nurture myself, let go of acting like an anshin chief amid homey smells and
pretty things. Is that what Okra gets out of it?
Phoebe found it hard to match that appreciation with the man who had faced her in the impromptu
will-see three days before. He had been brusque, direct, impatient, totally entrenched in his role
as tactical advocate for The Tangent where every member was known to be devout, which meant him
too. Maybe he took a break occasionally, like her.
Or maybe he thought such a setting would distract me from my objectives. Phoebe clenched a fist to
resist that temptation.
Customers — a good crowd for early afternoon — buzzed about the servers like finicky bumblebees.
Phoebe could almost smell the icings, crusts, berries, and butter, but today, she planned to
confine her nibbling to the English biscuits that came on the saucer with her cup. She hadn't
admitted how well she knew the shoppe to Okra, and she wasn't going to indulge in its comforts in
front of him. Especially if that's what he is tempting me to do.
A smattering of Gastarbeiter, obvious from their clothing, sat with locals. As guests or maybe
spending their gong-shi-tang ration here. Food in the public dining halls has turned awful lately,
according to rumor.
Their presence brought Phoebe back to her impending meeting with Okra. She didn't like the man:
too focused on his job, too focused on his combine's needs, too resistant to change, even when the
need swarmed about him. Gastarbeiter were the harbingers of change, change that was inevitable,
change that Ganj Dareh, even all of Popovich, craved, needed, would die without. Okra refused to
see that. He hunkered over his neighborhood like a brooding hen.
His refusal exposed Ganj Dareh to unnecessary danger. The Tangent didn't have the resources to
handle High-Multiplier Incidents. Her anshin combine could handle up to 20.6 such Incidents at the
same time, if she committed all reserves. Add an unexpected drain of constables and medical
Techniker into Skeinswift — how could she refuse their call for help? In that event, she could
end up with gaps in her service to the rest of the direvnya. Gaps that could kill people, in her
combine and in her customer-base.
I can't risk losing precious individuals. Fates, I can't risk the Collective punishing me over
'Failure to Protect Life-Expectancy,' not with contract renewal coming up. I've got to bring
Skeinswift in line with our overall prevention and warning programs.
In the will-see, Okra had shown her a weakness. He had folded under to rude pressure, especially
where the handicapped Bears were concerned. Today, she would take up that angle, show some
sensitivity to the plight of those disadvantaged people and the financial burden to the
neighborhood caring for them. Use the new hiring authority Dain had passed along to her in an
official message two days ago.
Offer to employ the Bears, good wages for not-so-good work, in exchange for merging his police,
fire, and medical teams into the larger Ganj Dareh force. I won't ask for his counselors, though,
not with their cult focus.
She wouldn't mention the threat against the Bears she'd made the other day, but he'd know she still
meant it.
Now she was ready for Okra to arrive. Where is he? She glanced around again, feeling confident
and relaxed. A nearby server caught her eye. She craned a bit to peer at it. Any gooseberries?
