Her soprano voice had been completely level. The fingers caressing Nimitz’s ears had never strayed from their gentle rhythm. But her eyes had been very, very cold, and Prince had seemed to recoil ever so slightly.

“That may be the case, Your Grace,” she’d said after a moment, “but the strength of the controversy seems to be growing, not ebbing. Why do you think that is?”

“I suspect that it’s partly human nature,” Honor had replied. What she’d wanted to say was: Because the High Ridge Government—with your precious New Kiev’s connivance—is deliberately orchestrating it as a smear campaign, you idiot! But, of course, she couldn’t. Charges of deliberately falsified smear campaigns had been the first refuge of the guilty for so long that resorting to them now would only have convinced a huge chunk of the public that the accusations must, in fact, be true. After all, if they weren’t, the accused would simply have produced the proof instead of resorting to that tired old tactic, wouldn’t they?

“There’s an inevitable, and probably healthy, tendency to continuously test the character of those in positions of political power or influence,” Honor had said instead. “A tendency to assume the worst because it’s so important that we not allow ourselves to be taken in by manipulators and cretins who deceive us into believing they’re better than they are.”

“That, unfortunately, can have its downside when reckless, unsubstantiated charges are flung about, because no one can prove a negative. I’ve made my own position as clear as I possibly can. I have no intention of belaboring the point, nor do I feel that endless protestations of innocence on my part—or Earl White Haven’s, for that matter—would be appropriate or serve any useful purpose. We can both insist endlessly that there’s no shred of truth to the allegations that we’ve ever been physically intimate, but we can’t prove it. At the same time, however, I would point out that my statement also invited anyone who has evidence to prove anything to the contrary to bring that evidence forward. No one has.”

“But according to Mr. Hayes,” DuCain had pointed out in return, “that’s because Earl White Haven’s security and—especially—your own is too efficient at… suppressing unpleasant evidence.”

“My armsmen are extremely efficient at protecting me from physical threats, as they demonstrated right here in Landing, at Regiano’s, several years ago,” Honor had replied. “And they do serve my security functions as Steadholder Harrington, both on Grayson and here on Manticore, as well. I suppose that if I really wanted them to, they could be quite effective in suppressing or concealing evidence. But Mr. Hayes claims to have spoken to people who say they have firsthand knowledge of the alleged improprieties. Unless he’s prepared to accuse me of resorting to threats of physical violence to silence those witnesses, I fail to see how my armsmen could prevent him from bringing them forward. And if I were prepared to resort to threats or violence, why in the world wouldn’t I have started with him instead of these supposed witnesses of his?”