Starfire (32 page)

"Not for a pension. You tryin' to give me the creeps? I'll find a reason to give her."

"Very well. Consider this situation. Both of you work for the Argos Group, and from what you say she is highly placed within it. Suppose that she goes to her superior and asks who else is involved in what you are doing."

"She'll strike out. Gordy Rolfe don't work like that. Nobody in the Argos Group knows I came to you, an' no one will. The only person who knows I'm on this job is the man who assigned it to me, an' Gordy'll let you have fifteen feet of his small intestine before he'll give up information."

If Seth was typical of the Argos Group, I readily accepted what he said regarding the paucity of information transfer. But I was not yet satisfied. "This woman, Maddy Wheatstone, will surely not assist you for no reason. There must be a
quid pro quo.
Suppose that she insists on knowing more of what you are doing, as a condition for her cooperation."

"I told her I was looking for the murderer, an' that was enough. She wants me to help her keep an eye on a guy called John Hyslop, a big-shot engineer on Sky City. And no, she didn't tell me why she's watching him. She's as tight as Gordy Rolfe." Seth lay back on his bed, so the RV jacket no longer provided me with a view of his face. "Anyway." His voice was weary. "If you had let me finish before you blew off, you'd have seen why none of this matters worth a damn. I met John Hyslop, an' I'm spendin' a helluva lot of time diggin' into the data bases, lookin' for clues an' findin' diddly-squat. An' Maddy Wheatstone an' me are traipsin' round Sky City like a couple of mad tourists. But the places where the kids were killed have been picked over fine. I'm tellin' you, chances of us comin' across anythin' like a lead to the murderer are flat-out zero."

My moment had come. "That," I said softly, "is no longer necessary."

"Say what?" He raised his head.

"You no longer need to seek evidence on Sky City. I know the name, occupation, motive, and present location of the murderer."

I exaggerated a little. My knowledge of the killer's present location was in truth a little imprecise.

Seth was on his feet again. "I don't believe it. Tell me everything."

I did, slowly, carefully, and completely. It took many minutes, but there was no danger that Seth's attention might wander. At the end I said, "Well? Are you persuaded?"

"Yeah. You got it." He was silent for a while, then repeated, "You got it. You don't even need to send the data you pulled in today. I believe you. But you know the problem?"

"Of course. A court of law is a curiously irrational place. It disdains a mosaic of collateral evidence that any rational person regards as conclusive, and asks for proof. The knife in the murderer's hand, the foot still on the victim's windpipe. Proof."

"Which we need and don't have."

"Precisely."

"And until we got it we got nothin'."

That was hardly fair. I forbore to point out to him that if we now had nothing, an hour ago he had had considerably less than nothing.

"So we still have problems," he went on. "You feel sure there'll be no more killings?"

"What would be the point? There is no need for them. And our murderer is supremely logical."

"Logical, and a monster. What do we do?"

"We think. Or, more precisely, I think. For the moment, I suggest that you remain on Sky City."

"Great. I stay up here while this crapheap flies off to nowhere or comes apart tryin'."

"Remain there for the time being. Continue to cultivate Maddy Wheatstone and, if you can, the engineer, John Hyslop."

He stared at me shrewdly. "You're holdin' out on me. You got somethin' more."

"No." I shook my head, even though there was no way that he could see me. "I have nothing close to an answer. If and when I do, you will hear from me instantly. I have no more desire than you to prolong this enterprise."

"Mmm. An' I thought you were gettin' fond of me." Seth paused for a moment, then added, "Good one, Doc. You did some fancy thinkin' after all, just when I was ready to write you off. Do it one more time, and let's nail the bastard."

He broke the connection, rather before I was ready to do so. It had been my intention to warn him to take care. The murderer would certainly be willing to kill again for one reason: to prevent discovery.

Then my rational processes gave me reassurance. Even if Seth's wanderings through Sky City had been noticed, there was no reason to believe that our search would be more fruitful than anyone else's. The evidence was old or vanished. Furthermore, Seth had in the past given ample proof that he was able to look after himself. He would not be an easy man to kill.

I reflected that Seth's final words showed, in his own bizarre way, sincere appreciation for my efforts. I
had
done "some fancy thinking," just as he said. As for "Do it one more time," I wondered if that would be possible.

I am not ready to say otherwise, although I have in truth no idea how to catch our killer. What I do have is a conviction that waiting for another murder, or seeking additional evidence of past murders, will be pointless. We are dealing with an individual who employs precise calculation before taking action. Twelve murders were enough, so there will be no more. And such material evidence as has already been found has been picked clean, over and over, by numerous investigating teams. It is old and unlikely to yield a single further shred of useful data. The killer must be feeling very comfortable.

How, then, to catch such a person?

Again I defer to you, the invisible reader of my words. You were ahead of me, perhaps, in divining the identity of the murderer. Do you also know how to ensure apprehension? Remember, the evidence must be strong, direct, and incontestable.

I do not know. Not yet. But I do know this: No passive procedure will work. Any successful approach must take the initiative.

* * *

The conversation with Seth took only half an hour, but by the time I went to my bedroom the clock on the dresser showed almost four. After a busy day—and night—I had earned, one might think, a little sleep. However, at fifty-five degrees north the late-July sunrise already lightened the sky. Long experience has taught me that I cannot sleep during daylight hours.

I went back to the kitchen, made strong coffee, and sat down at the long butcher-block table to record the events of the past twenty-four hours. I was very tired, and my mind interspersed memories of the pleasant birthday party with thoughts of the Sky City murders. Regrettably, I achieved no insights comparable with those of the great Henri Poincaré after partaking of black coffee. However, one useful conclusion did emerge.

During the next few weeks, unprecedented events would be taking place on Sky City as it flew far out from Earth to take its position close to Cusp Station. It was possible that those same events would provide an unprecedented opportunity to catch our killer.

I had been patient in restoring my darlings, waiting many years before I began their cloning. Seth and I could not wait so long, but we, too, must be patient— and always ready to act.

20

It took Nick Lopez three tries before Celine was persuaded.

"You don't have to
like
the son of a bitch," he said. "Hell, I don't like him myself. But he's the brains behind the rolfe designs, and all the related patents are his."

"I don't deny that." Celine felt besieged. She had tried to begin a normal day of work, but urgent messages from Lopez had popped up everywhere until finally she had agreed to meet with him in the Oval Office. It was almost ten o'clock, she had yet to make her first planned meeting, and her schedule was in tatters. "I know how valuable the rolfes are for space work, but we already have a slew of them in Sky City and on the shield. If Rolfe says he's pulling them out of there, we'll simply invoke emergency powers and say no."

"That's not the problem." Lopez pulled a sheaf of papers from his case and brandished them at Celine. "These are orders from Sky City for
additional
rolfes with special new capabilities. We know that Gordy Rolfe can provide the machines—he has advertised them, even boasted about them. We'd like to see them shipped up as soon as possible, but without Rolfe's cooperation it won't happen. He laughs and says the changes are trivial; but no one on my staff or on Sky City knows how to make them."

"Have you asked him to cooperate?"

"Of course. I told him about Wilmer Oldfield and Star Vjansander's work, and I stressed the urgency of the new schedule. He says it's all nonsense. He's heard all the panic talk from me before, and he doesn't believe there's going to be a different form of particle storm. Even if there is, he says, he'll be safe."

"Probably true. He'll hide underground. But I don't see how I'll be any better at talking Rolfe into helping us than you've been."

"He likes you." Lopez was pouring on the charm. Celine could feel the force of his personality washing over her like a relaxing tide.

"Nick, that's rubbish. I don't think Gordy Rolfe likes anyone."

"He says he's willing to meet with you. That's better than I could do."

"You tried?"

"I called him again yesterday. He told me to go away and stick my head up my ass."

"That's not very nice. On the other hand, Gordy Rolfe told one of my staff, less than a month ago, that I was a raddled old trollop who'd be more at home in the whorehouse than the White House. Likes me? Nick, you'll have to do better than that."

"Well, he did agree to meet with you."

"Why?"

"Because he admires you. You're probably the one woman in the world—"

"Nick! Gordy Rolfe doesn't admire
any
woman. He tolerates a few, but I'm not one of them."

He sagged back in his suit and ran a hand through his bushy gray hair. His frown of defeat was more friendly and disarming than the average smile. "All right. So he doesn't admire you. I have no idea what that twisted little runt thinks of you. My best guess, he says he'll meet with you because he thinks there's a chance he'll be able to humiliate you. Me, he's already humiliated."

"Thank you, Nick. At last. That, I can accept. Now tell me how I'm supposed to talk Gordy Rolfe into coughing up the rolfes that we need on Sky City."

"He needs your help. You've got something he wants."

"Remind me."

"Well, according to what I've heard—only rumor, of course . . ." Lopez was gazing down and sideways, as though fascinated by the old wicker wastepaper basket beside Celine's desk. "According to rumor, you promised you'd help the Argos Group with a license for a new launch facility on U.S. territory, off the coast of Florida."

"How the hell did you learn
that
? What I said was unofficial, and it wasn't to go outside this office."

"Oh, you know how it is." A shrug of massive shoulders. "Word about these things gets out . . ."

"If you see Auden Travis before I do, tell him to expect to be sent up in flames. Do you know who I said that to about the license?"

"A Miss Maddy Wheatstone. Or so I have been told. But Gordy's having doubts about her. He's having doubts about everybody these days. I think he's really losing it. But that's to our advantage. You go to see him, you tell him that you promised nothing to anybody, and you negotiate."

"A bit hard on Maddy."

"Could be. These days, times are hard all over. She's a big girl, she'll get by. I'll try to do her a favor, if that's what it takes to get you to Gordy."

"We'll put that on hold." Celine was examining her calendar. "Today, I suppose?"

"You know how urgent this is."

"Nick,
everything
is urgent. Everything has been urgent for twenty-seven years. You reach the point where crisis is so much the normal operating condition that you can't respond to it."

"If Oldfield and Vjansander are right, we have less than thirty days."

"Don't lecture me, Nick. I'm quite capable of doing that to myself." Celine was examining a list and crossing items off it. "I have to see Milton Glover."

She noticed Nick's tiny grimace at the name. "I can't stand the man, either," she went on, "but I've slipped his appointment every day for two weeks and he's outside waiting. Jahangir Hekmat, too—he's the head of the Socinists. They believe that God is a still-evolving entity. I owe them a meeting as a payback for a political favor."

"I could try my hand with Hekmat if you like. I have some sympathy with the idea of an evolving deity—certainly the gods we've had in the past haven't done too well by us. Why are they called Socinists?"

"They claim to be followers of a sixteenth-century theologian, Sozzini, who said that God wasn't omnipotent and omniscient. God is still learning and growing. But let me warn you, today's Socinists believe that the Alpha Centauri supernova is part of the evolving consciousness of the universe, and they say we ought not to defend ourselves against it."

"Hekmat should be talking to Wilmer Oldfield. If I understand correctly, he and Astarte Vjansander believe something along the same lines. The gamma pulse and the particle flux didn't come our way by accident. It all happened by
intention
."

"Don't believe everything Wilmer and Star tell you. When they get going they can be as crazy as Hekmat. Anyway, he can't talk to them. They're out on Sky City. Their work is too important for me to bring them back here." Celine stabbed her pencil at the page and viciously crossed out another line. "I sometimes wish I were out there, too. It's where the real action is."

" 'They also serve who only stand and wait.' "

"Right. Stand, and wait, and meet with power-mad crazies like Gordy Rolfe, or self-centered bags of wind like Milton Glover. Don't you ever long for the old times, when if you did just one thing well, at the end of the day you could feel satisfied with your efforts?"

"You mean your days on the Mars expedition?"

"That's what I was thinking of."

"You were young then. Look at it realistically. You spent a few years locked up in a metal can, you flew back home, and then half of your crew died."