The tactics of mistake

11

"Well, Colonel," said Bat, grimly, "what am I supposed to do with you?"

"The General could put me to use," said Cletus.

"Put you to use!" They were standing facing each other in Bat's private office. Bat turned in exasperation, took two quick steps away, wheeled and stepped back to glare up at Cletus once more. "First you make a grandstand play up by Etter's Pass, and it pays off so that you collect about five times as many prisoners as you had men to collect them with. Now you go out for a midnight picnic with the Navy and come back loaded with guerrillas and supplies bound for Bakhalla. Not only that, but you take a civilian along with you on this Navy spree!"

"Civilian, sir?" said Cletus.

"Oh yes, I know the official story!" Bat interrupted him, harshly. "And as long as it's a Navy matter, I'm letting it ride. But I know who you had with you out there, Colonel! Just as I know that wooden-headed young character, Linet, couldn't have dreamed up the idea of capturing those motor launches full of guerrillas. It was your show, Colonel, just like it was your show up at Etter's Pass!... And I repeat, what am I going to do with you?"

"In all seriousness, General," said Cletus, in a tone of voice that matched his words, "I mean what I say. I think you ought to put me to use."

"How?" Bat shot at him.

"As what I'm equipped to be - a tactician," said Cletus. He met the glare from under the general's expressive brows without yielding, and his voice remained calm and reasonable. "The present moment's one in which I could be particularly useful, considering the circumstances."

"What circumstances?" Bat demanded.

"Why, the circumstances that've more or less combined to trap the Military Secretary of the Coalition here on Kultis," Cletus replied. "I imagine there's little doubt, in the ordinary way of things, that Dow deCastries would be planning on leaving this planet in the next day or two."

"Oh, he would, would he?" said Bat "And what makes you so sure that you know what a Coalition high executive like deCastries would be doing - under any circumstances?"

"The situation's easily open to deduction," answered Cletus. "The Neulander guerrillas aren't in any different situation than our Alliance forces here when it comes to the matter of getting supplies out from Earth. Both they and we could use a great many things that the supply depots back on Earth are slow to send us. You want tanks, sir. It's a safe bet the Neulander guerrillas have wants of their own, which the Coalition isn't eager to satisfy."

"And how do you make that out?" Bat snapped.

"I read it as a conclusion from the obvious fact that the Coalition's fighting a cheaper war here on Kultis than we are," said Cletus, reasonably. "It's typical of Alliance-Coalition confrontations for the past century. We tend to supply our allies actual fighting forces and the equipment to support them. The Coalition tends merely to arm and advise the opposition forces. This fits well with their ultimate aim, which isn't so much to win all these minor conflicts they oppose us in but to bleed dry the Alliance nations back on Earth, so that eventually the Coalition can take over, back there where they believe all the important real estate is."

Cletus stopped speaking. Bat stared at him. After a second, the general shook his head like a man coming out of a daze.

"I ought to have my head examined," Bat said. "Why do I stand here and listen to this?"

"Because you're a good general officer, sir," said Cletus, "and because you can't help noticing I'm making sense."

"Part of the time you're making sense... " muttered Bat, his eyes abstracted. Then his gaze sharpened and he fastened it once more on Cletus' face. "All right, the Neulanders want equipment from the Coalition that the Coalition doesn't want to give them. You say that's why deCastries came out here?"

"Of course," said Cletus. "You know yourself the Coalition does this often. They refuse material help to one of their puppet allies, but then, to take the sting out of the refusal, they send a highly placed dignitary out to visit the puppets. The visit creates a great deal of stir, both in the puppet country and elsewhere. It gives the puppets the impression that their welfare is very close to the Coalition's heart - and it costs nearly nothing. Only, in this one instance, the situation's backfired somewhat."

"Backfired?" said Bat.

"The two new guerrilla thrusts that were supposed to celebrate deCastries' visit - that business up at Etter's Pass, and now last night's unsuccessful attempt to infiltrate a good number of men and supplies into the city of Bakhalla - have blown up in the Neulanders' faces," Cletus said. "Of course, officially, Dow's got nothing to do with either of those two missions. Naturally we know that he undoubtedly did know about them, and maybe even had a hand in planning them. But as I say, officially, there's no connection between him and them, and theoretically he could leave the planet as scheduled without looking backward once. Only I don't think he's likely to do that now."

"Why not?"

"Because, General," said Cletus, "his purpose in coming here was to give the Neulanders a morale boost - a shot in the arm. Instead, his visits have coincided with a couple of bad, if small, defeats for them. If he leaves now, his trip is going to be wasted. A man like deCastries is bound to put off leaving until he can leave on a note of success. That gives us a situation we can turn to our own advantage."

"Oh? Turn to our advantage, is it?" said Bat. "More of your fun and games, Colonel?"

"Sir," answered Cletus, "I might remind the General that I was right about the infiltration attempt through Etter's Pass, and I was right in my guess last night that the guerrillas would try to move men and supplies down the river and into the city - "

"All right! Never mind that!" snapped Bat. "If I wasn't taking those things into consideration I wouldn't be listening to you now. Go ahead. Tell me what you were going to tell me."

"I'd prefer to show you," answered Cletus. "If you wouldn't mind flying up to Etter's Pass - "

"Etter's Pass? Again?" said Bat. "Why? Tell me what map you want, and show me here."

"It's a short trip by air, sir," said Cletus, calmly. "The explanation's going to make a lot more sense if we have the actual terrain below us."

Bat grunted. He turned about, stalked to his desk and punched open his phone circuit.

"Send over Recon One to the roof here," he said. "We'll be right up."

Five minutes later, Cletus and Bat were en route by air toward the Etter's Pass area. The general's recon craft was a small but fast passenger vehicle, with antigrav vanes below its midsection and a plasma-thrust engine in the rear. Arvid, who had been waiting for Cletus in the general's outer office, was seated up front in the copilot's seat, with the pilot and the vessel's one crewman. Twenty feet behind them, in the open cabin space, Bat and Cletus conversed in the privacy provided by their distance and lowered voices. The recon craft approached the Etter's Pass area and, at Cletus' request, dropped down from its cruising altitude of eighty thousand feet to a mere six hundred. It began slowly to circle the area encompassing Etter's Pass, the village of Two Rivers and the two river valleys that came together just below the town.

Bat stared sourly at the pass and the town below it, nestled in the bottom of the V that was the conjunction of the two river valleys.

"All right, Colonel," he said. "I've taken an hour out of my day to make this trip. What you've got to tell me had better be worth it."

"I think it is," answered Cletus. He pointed at Etter's Pass and swung his fingertip from it down to the town below. "If you'll look closely there, sir, you'll see Two Rivers is an ideal jump-off spot for launching an attack through the pass by our forces, as the first step in an invasion of Neuland."

Bat's head jerked around. He stared at Cletus. "Invade Neuland... " He lowered his voice hastily, for the heads of all three men up front had turned abruptly at the sound of his first words. "Have you gone completely out of your skull, Grahame? Or do you think I have, that I'd even consider such a thing? Invading Neuland's a decision that's not even for the General Staff back on Earth to make. It'd be the political boys in Geneva who'd have to decide that!"

"Of course," said Cletus, unruffled. "But the fact is, an invasion launched from Two Rivers could very easily be successful. If the General will just let me explain - "

"No!" snarled Bat, keeping his voice low. "I told you I don't even want to hear about it. If you got me all the way up here just to suggest that - "

"Not to suggest it as an actuality, sir," said Cletus. "Only to point out the benefits of the appearance of it. It's not necessary actually to invade Neuland. It's only necessary to cause the Neulanders, and deCastries, to realize such an invasion could be successful, if launched. Once they realize the possibility, they'll be under extreme pressure to take some counteraction to prevent it. Then, if after they've taken such action, we move to show that invasion was never our intention, Dow deCastries will have been involved in a local blunder from which it'll be impossible for him to detach his responsibility. The Coalition's only way of saving face for him and itself will be to cast all blame on the Neulanders and penalize them as evidence that the blame-casting isn't just rhetoric. The only form that penalizing can take is a lessening of Coalition help to Neuland... Naturally, any reduction in Coalition aid to the Neulanders puts the Alliance contribution to the Exotics in that much stronger position."

Cletus stopped talking. Bat sat for a long second, gazing at him with an unusual expression - something almost like awe - below the heavy, expressive eyebrows.

"By God!" Bat said, at last, "you don't think in simple terms, do you, Grahame?"

"The complexity's more apparent than real," answered Cletus. "Everyone's more or less the prisoner of his current situation. Manipulate the situation and the individual often hasn't much choice but to let himself be manipulated as well."

Bat shook his head, slowly. "All right," he said, drawing a deep breath, "just how do you plan to signal this fake invasion attempt?"

"In the orthodox manner," answered Cletus. "By maneuvering of a couple of battalions of troops in this area below the pass - "

"Hold on. Whoa - " broke in Bat. "I told you once before I didn't have spare battalions of troops lying around waiting to be played with. Besides, if I order troops up here on anything like maneuvers, how am I going to claim later that there never was any intention to provoke Neuland in this area?"

"I realize you haven't any regular troops to spare, General," said Cletus. "The answer, of course, is not to use regular troops. Nor should you order them up here. However, the Dorsai regiment under Colonel Khan is engaged in jump-belt training right now. You could agree to a suggestion which Colonel Khan might make to the Exotics - and which the Exotics will certainly check out with you - that he bring his Dorsais up here for a week of live training jumps in this ideal terrain, which combines river valleys, jungle and hill country."

Bat opened his mouth as if to retort - then closed it sharply. His brows drew together in a thoughtful frown.

"Hmm," he said. "The Dorsais... "

"The Dorsais," Cletus reminded him, "don't operate out of your budget. They're financed separately by the Exotics."

Bat nodded, slowly.

"A full two battalions of men in this area," went on Cletus, "are too many for deCastries and the Neulanders to ignore. The fact that they're Dorsais rather than your own troops makes it seem all the more likely you're trying to pretend innocence, when in fact you've got some thrust into Neulander territory in mind. Add one more small factor, and you'll make suspicion of such a thrust a certainty, to deCastries at least. He knows I've been concerned with the two recent incidents when the Neulanders were frustrated. Appoint me your deputy general commander of this Dorsai unit, with authority to move them wherever I want, and nobody on the other side of the mountains will have any doubt left that the jump training's only a cover for an attack on Neuland territory."

Bat jerked his head up and stared at Cletus suspiciously. Cletus returned his gaze with the calm innocence of a man whose conscience has nothing to hide.

"But you won't be moving those Dorsais anywhere, except between Bakhalla and this area, will you, Colonel?" he demanded softly.

"I give you my word, sir," said Cletus. "They'll go nowhere else."

For a long moment Bat continued to stare, hard, at Cletus. But then, once again, slowly he nodded.

They returned to Bat's office in Bakhalla. As Cletus was leaving, headed for his staff car in the parking lot, a flyer settled into one of the marked spaces and Mondar got out, followed by the small, waspish shape of Pater Ten.

"There he is," said Pater Ten in a brittle voice, as he spotted Cletus. "Why don't you go ahead into the Headquarters building, Outbond? I'll stop a minute with Colonel Grahame. Dow wanted me to extend his congratulations on Grahame's success last week - and last night."

Mondar hesitated briefly, then smiled. "As you like," he said, turned and went on toward the Headquarters building.

Pater Ten walked over to face Cletus.

"Congratulate me?" asked Cletus.

"The Military Secretary," said Pater Ten, almost viciously, "is a very fair-minded man - "

In mid-sentence he broke off. For a second some inner change seemed to wipe his face clean of expression, and then it shaped itself again into a different kind of expression - an expression like that of an excellent stage mimic who has decided to impersonate the character and mannerisms of Dow deCastries. Except that Pater Ten's eyes were fixed and remote, like a man under hypnosis. When he spoke, it was in an eerie echo of Dow's ordinary speech:

"Evidently," said those silkily urbane tones, "you're still trying to raise the ante, Grahame. Take my advice. Be warned. It's an occupation that's fraught with danger."

As abruptly as it had come, the unnatural resemblance to Dow smoothed itself from the little man's features and his gaze became normal again. He looked sharply up at Cletus.

"Very fair-minded," Pater said. "You underestimate him. I promise you, you've underestimated him - " The little man broke off, abruptly. "What're you looking at me like that for?" he snapped, acidly. "You don't believe me, is that it?"

Cletus shook his head, sadly. "I believe you," he said. "It's just that I see I did underestimate him. It seems he's not just a dealer in other people's minds. He buys souls as well."

He turned and walked off to his car, leaving Pater Ten staring after him uncomprehendingly but with the automatic rage on his face with which the violent little man viewed nearly all things in the universe.