“I’ve never advocated pushing things to the brink of an actual resumption of hostilities,” he told her. “But star nations can stumble into wars neither of them want if they misread one another’s strength and determination. And at the moment, the Manties seem to be busy underestimating both of those qualities where we’re concerned.”

“I don’t believe our last note to them could have been much clearer in that regard,” Pritchart observed, that edge of chill still frosting her voice.

“Not if they’re actually bothering to listen to anything we say in the first place,” Giancola replied.

And there, Pritchart was forced to admit, he might well have a point. She didn’t like how hard it was for her to make that admission, because she knew why it was. Her personal antipathy towards Giancola was making it increasingly difficult for her to listen to anything he said without automatically rejecting it. It was one thing to maintain a healthy sense of suspicion where someone who obviously had his own agenda was concerned. It was quite another to allow that suspicion to begin dictating an auto-response rejection of anything he ever said. Unfortunately, it was much easier for her to recognize that danger than it was to find a way around it.

In this instance, it was just a bit easier for her to concede that he might be correct, however. Previous experience with the Star Kingdom’s diplomacy—as practiced by the current Government, at least—provided a more than sufficient counterirritant.

Her most recent set of proposals had been more than reasonable. She still hadn’t actually offered formal recognition of the Star Kingdom’s annexation of Trevor’s Star. The Republic’s permanent renunciation of all claims to San Martin was simply too valuable a bargaining chip to give up until she got at least something in return. And although she’d dropped her previous offer of a plebiscite in that system, her suggestion that she might accept the same sort of arrangement the Star Kingdom already enjoyed with the Andermani Empire in Gregor for the Trevor’s Star Junction terminus had constituted a significant hint that she was at least open to the possibility of an eventual, formal recognition of the system’s annexation. Moreover, she’d also conceded that legitimate Manticoran security concerns might well require at least some additional territorial adjustments, particularly in the area immediately around Trevor’s Star. And she’d offered to cede the former Havenite naval bases in the systems of Samson, Owens, and Barnett outright, as permanent RMN bases to deepen the Manticoran Alliance’s defensive frontier.

Of course, she admitted, the Star Kingdom was already in possession of all of those systems… not to mention all of the other systems currently in dispute, including the Tequila System, less than fifty-five light-years from the capital system itself. And Tequila was one of the systems she was not prepared to leave under Manticoran control.

The Manticoran Alliance actually controlled a total of twenty-seven star systems which were technically claimed by the Republic of Haven. Six of those twenty-seven were effectively uninhabited; most of them had boasted naval bases, which explained the Alliance’s original interest in them, but possessed no habitable planets to attract civilian development. Another three had been sufficiently recent acquisitions of the People’s Republic to leave the local inhabitants with an extreme dislike, even hatred, for anything coming out of the Haven System, regardless of any reforms which might have occurred there. Those three had already expressed their firm intention to seek annexation on the pattern of Trevor’s Star, and Pritchart was prepared to let them go. The readopted Constitution gave them the right to do that, and even if they hadn’t, she would have been perfectly willing to use them as bargaining chips. Assuming the Star Kingdom had shown any desire to bargain.