I wanted to make clear to you the extremity of our situation, so that you would accept the only alternative. It will be very distasteful to you."
"I have no doubt of that," said Bishop Peregrino.
"An hour ago, as I was wrestling with this problem, trying to see if there was any class of files that might be immune to this treatment, I discovered that in fact there was one person whose files were being completely overlooked. At first I thought it was because he was a framling, but the reason is much more subtle than that. The Speaker for the Dead has no files in Lusitanian memory."
"None? Impossible," said Dona Crist .
"All his files are maintained by ansible. Offworld. All his records, all his finances, everything. Every message sent to him. Do you understand?"
"And yet he still has access to them - " said Dom Crist o.
"He is invisible to Starways Congress. If they place an embargo on all data transfers to and from Lusitania, his files will still be accessible because the computers do not see his file accesses as data transfers. They are original storage - yet they are not in Lusitanian memory.
"Are you suggesting," said Bishop Peregrino, "that we transfer our most confidential and important files as messages to that - that unspeakable infidel?"
"I am telling you that I have already done exactly that. The transfer of the most vital and sensitive government files is almost complete. It was a high priority transfer, at local speeds, so it runs much faster than the Congressional copying. I am offering you a chance to make a similar transfer, using my highest priority so that it takes precedence over all other local computer usage. If you don't want to do it, fine - I'll use my priority to transfer the second tier of government files."
"But he could look in our files," said the Bishop.
"Yes, he could."
Dom Cristao shook his head. "He won't if we ask him not to."
"You are naive as a child," said Bishop Peregrino. "There would be nothing to compel him even to give the data back to us."
Bosquinha nodded. "That's true. He'll have everything that's vital to us, and he can keep it or return it as he wishes. But I believe, as Dom Crist o does, that he's a good man who'll help us in our time of need."
Dona Crist stood. "Excuse me," she said. "I'd like to begin crucial transfers immediately."
Bosquinha turned to the Bishop's terminal and logged into her own high priority mode. "Just enter the classes of files that you want to send into Speaker Andrew's message queue. I assume you already have them prioritized, since you were printing them out."
"How long do we have?" asked Dom Crist o. Dona Crist was already typing furiously.
"The time is here, at the top." Bosquinha put her hand into the holographic display and touched the countdown numbers with her finger.
"Don't bother transferring anything that we've already printed," said Dom Crist o. "We can always type that back in. There's precious little of it, anyway."
Bosquinha turned to the Bishop. "I knew this would be difficult."
The Bishop gave one derisive laugh. "Difficult."
"I hope you'll consider carefully before rejecting this - "
"Rejecting it!" said the Bishop. "Do you think I'm a fool? I may detest the pseudo-religion of these blasphemous Speakers for the Dead, but if this is the only way God has opened for us to preserve the vital records of the Church, then I'd be a poor servant of the Lord if I let pride stop me from using it. Our files aren't prioritized yet, and it will take a few minutes, but I trust that the Children of the Mind will leave us enough time for our data transfers."
"How much time will you need, do you think?" asked Dom Crist o.
"Not much. Ten minutes at the most, I'd think."
Bosquinha was surprised, and pleasantly so. She had been afraid the Bishop would insist on copying all his files before allowing the Children of the Mind to go ahead - just one more attempt to assert the precedence of the bishopric over the monastery.
"Thank you," Dom Crist o said, kissing the hand that Peregrino extended to him.
The Bishop looked at Bosquinha coldly. "You don't need to look surprised, Mayor Bosquinha. The Children of the Mind work with the knowledge of the world, so they depend far more on the world's machines. Mother Church works with things of the Spirit, so our use of public