The Caryatids by Bruce Sterling Page A

you'll have a top-notch technical-support team! You'll have your own office of PR girls from the environmental design group at San Jose State . . . They're young people, young, like you and me. They're very forward-thinking."
    "So it's me here, and it's not Herbert."
    "Exactly. We need a much calmer, gentler hand with this place. You have a much more sensitive, more feeling approach to Mljet than your robot commissar there."
    "Suppose that I say yes to you."
    Montalban leaned down, plucked up his film, and crumpled it briskly. He pocketed it, and smiled at her.
    "Then it's simple. Our next step would be Vienna: a conference of the stakeholders. That's a sum-mit of typical Acquis higher-circle drones, and some ranking Dispensa-tion activists. Your boss will be there, too, of course. Your brother Djordje will be hosting that event in Vienna. I'll be there to present you to the money people. They're some very seasoned investors. They were the trust behind the reconstruction of Catalina Island, after the big fires. They can handle this sort of thing."
    "Why are you doing all this, John?"
    "Because I'm a white-knight investor, and I'm saving the world. And, through no coincidence, I'm also saving you." He gazed at her for a long moment. 'You don't believe me. Well, you don't believe me yet. I've done it before, Vera. I've already done it twice. I can prove to you that I know what I'm doing, though it will take me a while. A merger-and-acquisition like this can keep a banker happy for years."
    "You're asking me to betray my comrades here. They're the cadres who did all the work here."
    "Well, the cult will face a strategic choice," said Montalban. "They can choose him, or they can choose you. The attention camps here will be shutting down — they're too controversial. If the cadres are zealots for their great man and his brain intrusions, then they can join him in Antarctica. If they stay here with you—and you're welcome to them-—then they can enlist in our repatriation program for the natives of Mljet. We'll be restoring the people who properly belong here. We'll be recon-secrating Catholic churches, restoring the picturesque rural villages . . . The national and religious elements in the Balkans, they're stakeholders here too, you know."
    "So this is quite a big, fancy plan you've brought here from your big, fancy city."
    "It's the way of the big, fancy world."
    Vera narrowed her eyes. "Suppose that I just say no to your way of the world." Montalban nodded slowly. "You can say no to the world. People often say that here in the Balkans. But it never makes any sense to do that. Why? Why would you say no to peace, and wealth, and power, and se-curity? This arrangement gives you everything that you wanted! It means that you win, it's your personal victory! You took a failed, crimi-nal place that was an open sore, and you saved it, you healed it! You made your home island much better than it was in your whole lifetime, and you gave it back to the world! Things are finally as they should be. It's justice."
    It took Vera three heartbeats to realize, with a pang of truth, that she wanted the island all to herself. She wanted Mljet to remain a quiet place outside the world. Its own place. An authentic place that was no-body's tool or pawn or property. A wild and natural place, blooming under the sun, beholden to nobody. It had never occurred to her that her homeland might be saved for other people.
    "You don't believe in nature," she told him. "You don't believe what I believe. I even believe in reality."
    "Well, I believe in ecotourism and the heritage industry. Because those are two major, wealth-creating industries."
    Vera allowed him a nod.
    "It won't be easy work, Vera. It's hard work. It'll take labor and invest-ment to bring a heritage mediation online here. But I know that we can do that, together. I'm sure we can. I can promise you that. In ten years, right here where we're sitting, the troops of Augustus Caesar will be