Now Porter shrugged. "If that is the way you see it, I can, of course, only tender my regrets."
"Well, you won't have to. I'm not resigning."
The sharp declaration made Porter blink. "It's rather unusual that a man, after a vote of no confidence—"
"To hell with that. If a tape got out of my office, it's my fault. I'll grant that. But there's more to this. I'm willing to bet the man who told you was the same one who engineered the steal."
"That's ridiculous! Are you accusing Senator Crane of—?"
"I'm accusing an opportunist-demagogue of playing fast and loose with national safety to further his own ends and salve his ego. I'm accusing the men above me of being too weak-kneed to back their own against outside interference."
"I'll stand for no insults from you, Taber!"
"You'll take it and like it," Brent Taber said savagely. "You'll take it because you can't knock me out of my office overnight. It will take time. You've got to go up through the command and you'll have to go pretty high before you'll find anyone who'll do it with the stroke of a pen. Nobody wants to stick their neck out."
"Of course," Porter replied icily, "if you care to keep functioning as a discredited person—"
"I can. And I will. I'd be a coward if I didn't."