Chapter 5

A Flight of Stairs

Collins disliked exceptions.

The Silmerian Offensive caught everyone by surprise. The difference between expectation and reality is such that although someone might very well have predicted the event, many things nevertheless come off as unthinkable. The Silmerian campaign westward was one such thing. The sanctity of treaties had declared all the petty nations west of the Parnasses immune to the war--a token compensation for their weakness--and their neutrality was to be respected. When the first of several hundred thousand Silmerians began to pour through the borders, the first reaction was disbelief. How could they? And yet it was so. It did not come off to them as any small irony that so many leaves and bottles of ink could stop both blade and bayonet, no less when borders are made of grass and agreements only so much wind. It was in this sense that what the Silmerians did surprised everyone and it is in the nature of such surprises that, when the veil is breached, the cold wind of a forbidding night would carry the first of many invaders trundling past these borders to take what is otherwise sacred. A treaty, after all, is only so much wind and the eager patriot, chomping at the bit, is no exception when cast in the defense of the things he loves. Collins was worried about such exceptions.

As he travelled amidst the smooth cobblestone roads of Leonide accompanied by his wife, Elandra, Frederick Collins pondered the shapeless caprices of foreign policy. Passing by an ornate streetlamp in the wealthy district of the La Volenta he was struck and taken aback by the hapless circumstance that troubled the Rosalian nations. The scraping of a mountebank's fiddle sung an elegy as the cheerless player, harangued and surrounded by a pair of shabby streetears, prattled his tune. How strange that what we should otherwise suspect as so very orderly a state of affairs would take special coloring behind the distant lens of introspection. Treaties being what they were one suspected some form of solidity, or, at the very least, civilisation from one's partners.

"You're doing it again, dear" his wife said.

"I am doing what again?" Collins replied.

"That face"

"I am making no face!"

"You are quite clearly frowning, dear."

"I am pondering important facts of state! It is a mere unfortunate circumstance I could not refrain from being ugly in the process."

His wife pouted and pinched his cheek. "You promised you wouldn't take violent thoughts on our way to Mrs. Mayhew, remember. Today's our day out dear, I want you to enjoy yourself."

They were dressed well for Lunch, Collins in a strapping black uniform and his wife in a fine silk dress and beaver hat. They made quite a pair, on that fashionable street. More than once the knowledgeable citizens would doff their hats and Collins would nod grandly. But the gold lace and brass buttons nor the high collar could hide the bulging circles that rimmed his eyes and the paunch that would otherwise be a token of age would hang just a little more loosely.

He was not a man given to drink, much less to overeating but if overwork was to him was a sin then a soul blackened by fatigue would be his benighted dark. Elandra worried about him and so arranged to eat out that weekend and having arranged a meeting with Eleanor sought to show her husband a little sun.

"Frederick!" she said one day, throwing open the velvet curtains of his study. He had slept again among the documents, trying to meet his deadline. No one entered the room while the Marshal was working and dust had caked the linings of the curtain after over a week of continuous work. Elandra thought to have it cleaned. Motes of dust would hang in the air for a few moments while Collins stirred. The deadline of the ultimatum was a week away and the mobilization in full swing. He was struggling to get missives in order to have the rail departments to arrange the deployment on time. The dust landed gingerly on the stack of papers occupying his desk.

"What time is it, dear?" he said, groggily.

"Its ten in the morning."

"Three hours of sleep. I'm off schedule."

"That's enough dear, you'll work yourself to death."

"If I don't work, I'll send my troops to death!"

"And if you die on me, who will look after the troops?"

"Why, Mayhew, of course! But I need a succession plan in place, I'll get to that right away."

"Dear, you've barely a wink. Why not take the day off?"

"If I do, Browning might forget to organize the levies!"

"Forget Browning, dear. Browning can take care of himself."

"But Browning can't take care of the troops! And the exchequer still doesn't want to approve the new allocations. If I don't send a missive to the Prime Minister, we'll never have those agreements in time."

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Collins had a bad habit of taking on too much. He had been advised repeatedly to delgate. "Delegate, delegate, delegate" he was told by his predecessor, a trim man named Verne, the previous Marshal, when he first arrived at the Arletine--"it is by delegation we are saved!" But he never learned to delegate. Instead, he had an unhealthy suspicion of the incompetence of his peers and his subordinates. They could never get his wishes quite right and there would be a frightful row over documents, his lifeblood. In the end, instead of replacing his lackeys--new hires would often find it too difficult to work with him and quit after a few months--he took on more and more by himself. This was made worse by the fact that he did not like working with people he did not know and had a temperament that was often cool to the touch.

But his briefs were impeccable, well-written and insightful bits of policy written by a true expert in the field. This is why he had survived not just two but three Prime Ministers as Field Marshal of the General Staff and now Minister of Defense. But his habit of working his staff a bit too hard to get his way got him into a fix and his health would suffer as a result. Only his sheer will and ability to plot a steady course would keep him alive in spite of the burden.

It was a bit different with his wife and his son, lately of the civil service, and the Marechal du Fer had a soft spot for his family. There was warmth there, the kind not often found out-of-doors and, save for his study, his hearth was tidy and well-kept.

Elandra made a face and Frederick backed down a bit. "You may be right. I do need some rest maybe a little sunshine, perhaps I can have a coffee in the cafe. I'll take the papers with me right away. I'll--"

"Dear, you're panicking."

Collins gave way. "Oh, you know how I am. If it's to be war and we're not ready, who knows what might happen?"

"And if you fall asleep when reviewing the troops, what will happen?"

"I'll--" Collins fell to thought, " Why, you're right. Whatever shall they think of me?"

"No less, I'm sure," Elandra replied, "but spare your old wife, Frederick, you'll worry her to death."

"Oh, you know I won't do that to you."

The Boulevard the couple was walking on was known as the Volenta or 'the Flight' as it resembled a casement of stairs winding first upward and then Downward the great Hill that sat in the center of the city of Leonide. Leonide was a city of castles, after all, with tall spires, high walls and soaring towers. It was built on a nest of five hills and was built around a fortress that hugged the Marlene, the river that cut across the Parnasses and threw watercourses throughout the hillside before dispersing upon the coast.

Leonide was old, far older than the grandest sire who would sit rocking upon the banks of the Marlene and was for good cause the great capital of the North. The high walls that started from the Colline Sacre and wended its way down into Fort Marbeouf and from there criss-crossed the city were built and rebuilt over the centuries so that here and there there were red brick walls crashing into blue painted stone and the ancient white mortar would send powdery gusts were the wall was weak and every so often there would be government brickmen touching up the walls with cement. The city itself was no fort and would survive no bombardment, not against modern weaponry, but the Marbeouf was well-kept and its walls were low and made of new brick and cement. Galvanic Catapults would rest on their tops and the sheen of the yellow afternoon light would catch the glint on brass and copper wiring and light up the city. It was a city built on its cannons.

But it was morning still, not quite noon, and the cool morning sun shone mildly. Collins looked up from beneath an awning where he and Elandra had paused to catch their breath. It was not often that they would go out and the aged couple would fan themselves and buy a refreshment. Elandra turned to Collins and straightened his uniform

"I want you to be on your best behavior."

The irony made Collins smile, "you know I always am."

"No exceptions, I want you to steer away from talking about policy and enjoy the afternoon."

"You know that's impossible. You know what I'm like--and what's the harm, really?"

"Your blood pressure, that's what."

Knowing Mayhew, she knew it was impossible but that her stately disposition would have a calming effect on her husband. It was impossible, she told herself, having invited Mayhew on the express intention of having someone for her husband to talk to. If anything calmed him down, it was work or talk of work, and the irony was not lost on her. She could not call on the getlemen of High Street for they were away or indisposed and her polite adventures among her calling cards led her to the Generalissimo's second in command, who was, fortunately, away.

She didn't like Mayhew. Too combative she said, too much of a fighter. Having grown old in a comfortable minister's family, Elandra thought that what Mayhew had in military sense, he lacked in manners. Worse, he was said to be something of an eccentric, spending the majority of his days away from the battlefield smoking rough cigars and taking solitary rides into the forest. It was fortunate that he had the able administration of his wife to balance his books. But it was strange how the man and her husband got along. Mayhew would barge in while Collins was working and her husband would greet him like an old brother. They would talk for hours while they smoked cigars in the parlor, Mayhew in his stiff uniform, and Collins in his smoking jacket.

"Like a Minister tending to a foreign dignitary", she told herself once and then never complained.

Of all her friends, it was Mrs. Mayhew she trusted most and her being the eldest daughter from an intellectual's family, she had the good sense to know her way around matters of state more so for her keen mind and her educated pretensions. She was a bit cold, she admitted, but a good woman.

"I want you to take the day off, you understand? I want no talk of business, much less of the war. You'll be plenty busy in the coming weeks and with the war only a week away, I want you to enjoy yourself."

"Dear--"

"No buts, I'm still talking." Elandra said, straightening Collins' collar and generally fussing about him. "Frederick, listen, with the war about to start, we don't know if Silmeria will come quietly or with guns blazing and I don't want them in Leonide. You will be fighting them from your office so there's no threat to your person, but I'm saying that if you go in there you might not be home for days and a cold meal in the evening is all I will have to remember you by. Now, when the war starts and I'm not saying I want it to start--"

Collins held her by the hand. "Dear, it will be fine. The mobilisation is underway and hopefully SIlmeria will accept the results of the referendum. It could just be a--a--leaf in the wind. We simply need to present the Silmerians a show of Solidarity for the political effect it would have on them."

"And if they don't? If they don't accept the terms of the referendum?"

"Then you'll eat with Mrs. Mayhew daily to stay warm."

"Oh, you know she's no good as company!"

"Don't worry, we'll be home before the first snow falls."

It was the Queen of all exceptions.

***