One thing was certain: this woman was a friend. She was a companion; she complemented him, rounded him off, made him feel somehow more complete when he was with her than when he was not. Especially at a time like this when they had each other totally to themselves.
She was a friend, and he wasn’t used to having friends who were women. Until Jo.
He had told Jo that once, and she’d haughtily called him a typical product of the outworlds. On the surface, he resented being called typically anything, but inwardly he was forced to admit she was right. His view of women had been typically and rigidly stereotyped: they were frail, lovable creatures, good for homekeeping and bedwarming, requiring affection, protection, and occasionally a good swift kick; their capacity for original thought and practical behavior in the outside world was strictly limited.
He’d never verbalized these concepts, of course; he owed himself credit for that. But he also had to admit to being surprised whenever a woman exhibited prowess in any field of endeavor outside the home, thus eminently qualifying him for the title, “Typical Product of the Outworlds.”
Until Jo.
In the past his relationships with women had been fleeting and superficial. Intentionally so. Women were for huddling with, for satisfying mutually urgent physical needs, but not for spending serious time with. There were more important, more intriguing, more demanding things calling him.
Until Jo.
Easly knew he would never be the center of her life; nor she the center of his, for that matter. They each had “the business” as the major recipient of his or her attentions. It was a subject that had never come up in discussion and probably never would. It was understood. Neither of them was the type of person who lived for other people.
Yet they were close – as close as each could be to another person. But despite that emotional proximity, Easly was aware that there was an important part of Jo closed off to him. Somewhere within her psyche he sensed a hot, high-pressure core of… what? Something raging and ravenous there, locked away from the world and, perhaps, even from Jo herself. There were times in the too few nights they could spend together when he’d awaken and find her rigid beside him. She’d be asleep, her eyes closed, but her teeth would be clenched, her hands would be squeezing his arm, and every muscle in her body would be straining as if against some invisible force. Then she would suddenly relax and a thin film of cool perspiration would sheen her skin.
“What’s your secret?” he whispered to her.
“Mmmh?” Jo lifted her head and opened her eyes.
He shook her playfully. “What dark mystery is enshrouded within you? C’mon… tell me!”
She rolled onto her back and threw her right forearm across her eyes. She was naked, quite unselfconsciously so.
“Sacre bleu! Tu es fou!” she moaned, lapsing into Old French, the second language of Ragna. After a moment or two of silence, she uncovered her eyes and rose up on one elbow. “You’re really serious, aren’t you?”
Easly nodded, holding her eyes with his.
“Some nerve!” she snapped. “You’ve never even told me what planet you were born on, and don’t tell me Ragna ’cause I know you weren’t born here.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“You don’t speak French.”
“Maybe I just pretend I don’t.”
“Maybe you pretend a lot of things, Larry. Maybe that isn’t really your name. But before you try your deductive powers on me, better do a little talking about yourself!”
Sitting up, Easly leaned his shoulders against the headboard and reached for a cigar. He favored the dry-cured type, toasted crisp in the ancient Dutch method. He picked a torpedo shape out of a recess in the wall behind him, squeezed the tip to ignite it, and was soon puffing away. Regarding the white ash, he said, “Nice aroma. Reminds me of a story. Want to hear it?”
“I’m ready to settle for anything by now,” Jo replied sharply. “Stop fooling with that foul-smelling roll of dried leaves and start talking.”
“Soon as I get comfortable.” He drew his legs into the lotus position and leaned back, puffing leisurely. “Can’t do this in that float bed of yours,” he remarked. Easly used to have a deluxe, anti-gravity float bed with laminar air flow and all the other accessories. But he’d found himself waking every morning with a stiff back.
“Okay. Where shall I begin? How about the name of the planet on which the story takes place?”
“Good start!” came the sarcastic reply.
“The planet is Knorr and the story concerns a love triangle of sorts. The woman’s name was Marcy Blake and the man’s was Edwin – Eddy – Jackson – typical names for Knorr since most of the original colonists there were of English extraction. Marcy was young, beautiful, and had inherited a personal fortune of a couple of million Knorran pounds. She was unattached, too; which might seem strange, considering her appearance and wealth. But anyone who knew her personally did not think it strange at all: besides being of borderline intelligence, Marcy’s personality was totally obnoxious. She was an incredibly boring woman whose voice and manner always managed to set people’s teeth on edge.
“Eddy Jackson was as handsome as Marcy was beautiful, as crafty as she was stupid, and as poor as she was rich.”
Jo interrupted: “And so he decided to marry her, have her killed, and inherit her fortune. What else is new?”
“Just have a little patience, my dear. You’re jumping way ahead of me.
Eddy toyed with the idea of marrying her but never quite had the courage to take the plunge – which will give you an idea of what Marcy’s personality was like. He did keep company with her now and then, however, just to keep his options open. And he noticed that she made a few visits to the neurosurgical center in Knorr’s capital city. A little bribe here, a little bribe there, and he learned that Marcy had a unique, idiopathic degenerative disease of the central nervous system. The prognosis was death in two years or so.
“Then he decided to marry her, especially since Knorr’s common law provided certain advantages in the area of survivor’s rights. Eddy figured he could put up with anything for two years, after which he would be a bereaved but wealthy widower.
“So he figured. But marriage seemed to have a beneficial effect on Marcy’s condition. Two years passed. Then three. By the time their fifth anniversary rolled around, Eddy was near the breaking point. Marcy had controlled the purse strings for those five years, keeping Eddy on a strict allowance, and talking, talking, talking. He finally confronted her physicians, who informed him that the disease seemed to have undergone a spontaneous remission. If her progress continued at its current rate, she would probably have a normal lifespan.”
“That’s when he decided to kill her,” Jo stated confidently, but Easly shook his head.
“No. That’s when he decided to leave her, money or not. He took what money he had saved out of his allowance and traveled to the city to see what kind of luck he’d have in the casinos. He was sure he could parley his winnings into a good-sized stake, and then he’d say good-by to Marcy.
“Naturally, he lost every cent and had to return home in disgrace. And then, a miracle – or what seemed like one. Eddy entered the house and noted the faintest aroma of cigar smoke; it was particularly strong in the bedroom. Cigar smoke! Neither he nor Marcy smoked at all, and few of their friends did since tobacco wasn’t plentiful on Knorr. He asked Marcy if anyone had stopped by over the weekend and she very innocently said no… too innocently, he thought.
“Eddy was flabbergasted. Incredible as it seemed, Marcy was cheating on him! Infidelity, as I’m sure you know, is the rule rather than the exception on the Sol system planets. But on outworlds like Knorr, it remains scandalous. Not that he cared – it was just a question of whom. The why of it was conceivable: she was undeniably attractive and, he supposed, bearable in small doses.
“He decided to learn the identity of her lover and even went so far as to tip a rookie flitter-patrol cop to watch th
e house and see who came and went when Eddy wasn’t there. He planned to threaten Marcy with exposure and disgrace once he had his proof, and allow her to buy his silence with a nice chunk of her fortune.
“But the patrolman reported nothing: no visitors to the Jackson home. Eddy’s allowance wouldn’t cover the expense of a detective, so he resigned himself to the unhappy conclusion that Marcy’s affair must have been a one-time thing – after a single intimate meeting, Marcy’s lover had probably come to know her well enough to know that he didn’t want to know her any more.”
Easly paused to blow some smoke rings, then he turned to Jo. “That’s when he decided to kill her.”
She yawned. “’Sabout time.”
“His plan was very tight, very simple, and very workable. He borrowed a gambling buddy’s flitter, made a copy of the by-pass key. Knorran flitters use a thumbprint for ignition, but everyone keeps a by-pass key in case someone else has to drive it. He arranged to have this buddy meet him in the city for a night at the tables. At one point during the evening, he intended to excuse himself from the room, run for the casino roof, and roar off in his friend’s flitter. With his running lights out, he’d land in the dark backyard of his home, go inside, kill Marcy, grab some valuables, then race back to the casino. He’d have an alibi: he was at the casino all night; the roof attendant would truthfully say that the Jackson flitter never left its dock; and the crime was obviously a, robbery-homicide.
“Not a perfect plan, but as I said: tight, simple, workable.”
“But it obviously didn’t work,” Jo said. “Otherwise you wouldn’t be telling me all about it.”
“Right. But it almost worked. He came in the house and grabbed a vibe-knife from the kitchen and called for Marcy. She was on the upper level and asked him why he was home so early. As he rode the float-chute up, he said he got bored with the games and decided to come home. She was wearing only a filmy robe and her back was to him as he walked into the bedroom. Without hesitation, he spun her around and plunged the vibe-knife into the middle of her chest. Its oscillating edges sliced through cloth, skin, bone, cartilage and heart muscle without the slightest difficulty; and Marcy Jackson, nee Blake, died with a strangled, gurgling sound.
“It was probably just then that Eddy noted an odor in the room; and his olfactory sense was probably just about to label it for him when he heard a voice behind him.
“‘You killed her!’ it said in a shocked whisper.
“Eddy spun around to see the rookie cop – the one he had tipped to keep an eye on the place – emerging from behind a drape. He was half-dressed; there was a half-smoked cigar in his left hand, and a blaster pistol in his right. The last thing Eddy saw before he died was a searing white light at the tip of the blaster barrel.”
“Cute,” Jo said in an unenthusiastic tone. “But hardly original. Especially that part about hiding behind the drape.”
“Where would you have hidden in his place?”
Jo shrugged. “Whatever happened to this rookie?”
“He got in a lot of trouble. At first he tried to tell his superiors that he’d heard Marcy scream and went in to investigate, but soon the history of his detours into the Jackson home whenever Eddy was out and things on the beat got slow came to light, and he finally told the whole story.”
Jo suddenly became interested in the rookie. She sat up and faced Easly. “What’d they do to this cigar-smoking character?”
“Oh, not much. A trial would have been an embarrassment to the force; and, they rationalized, even though he shouldn’t have been in the Jackson home at all, he was on duty at the time he blasted the murderer. The conundrum was finally resolved when it was decided that the best thing the rookie could do was resign from the force and set up future residence on a planet other than Knorr. Which is just what he did.”
“Tell me something,” Jo said. “Why is it you named only two of the characters in the triangle? Why does the rookie remain nameless?”
“His name isn’t important, just the fact that he was a young, inexperienced rookie who foolishly allowed himself to get involved in a compromising situation.”
“How come you know so much about him?”
Easly puffed on his cigar: “Professional interest.”
“And where is this rookie now?”
“Speaking of professional interest,” Easly said with a quick cough, simultaneously shifting his body position and the subject of conversation, “how’re you getting along with Old Pete?”
“Why do you ask?”
“You don’t trust him – I can tell.”
“You’re right. And as days go by, I trust him less and less. Remember that autopsy report on my father I told you about – the one with the blank area?”
Easly nodded. “Sure.”
“Well, I contacted the Jebinose Bureau of Records and their copy is incomplete, too.”
“Maybe it’s just a clerical error. Things like that do happen, you know. There wasn’t anything of consequence missing, right?”
“No. Just the analysis of the urogenital system. But I checked the company records and found vouchers for Old Pete’s trip to Jebinose after the murder. He was there about the time the report was filed. And when he tells me he can’t explain that blank area, I don’t believe him. I have this feeling he’s hiding something.”
Easly chewed on the end of his cigar for a moment, then: “Tell you what, since you got nowhere with Haas, why don’t I send someone to Jebinose to investigate deBloise’s background. And while he’s there he can check into this autopsy report.”
Jo bolted upright in the bed. “Jebinose? What has deBloise got to do with Jebinose?”
“It’s his homeworld.”
“Jebinose?” She pressed her palms against her temples. “I knew he represented that sector, but I never realized that was his homeworld!”
“I thought everybody knew that.”
“I’ve never had much interest in where politicos come from, who they are, or what games they play.” She lowered her hands and turned narrowed eyes upon Easly. “Until now. Larry, I want you to go to Jebinose yourself. Dig into deBloise’s past for whatever you can find. And while you’re there, dig up whatever you can on the death of one Joseph Finch, Jr.”
Josephine Finch had just become personally involved in Old Pete’s conspiracy theory.
Jo
JO SAT BEHIND HER DESK and thought about rats. Or tried to. She had just completed a short meeting with Sam Orzechowski, the man with the trained space rats, and had informed him that she’d only found partial backing for him. He’d seemed disappointed but was willing to keep on waiting. He had no choice, really: IBA was the first company to take him seriously since he had come up with his rat control method years ago. But Jo felt she should have been able to do more for him by now… if only this warp gate affair would get out of her mind and let her get back to work.
She expected Old Pete momentarily. He’d said he wanted to see her – something about planning the next step. He was so persistent on deBloise. She had tried to drop the subject and let it go as a foolish gamble on the politician’s part, but Old Pete wouldn’t let her. And even if he had, the problem would have stayed with her.
It was that damn recording from the Restructurists’ conference room. It raised too many questions that wouldn’t let the problem go away. Besides… deBloise was from Jebinose.
Old Pete strolled in. “What’s new?” he asked, sliding into a chair. He always said that, even if he’d seen you only a few hours before. It was his way of saying hello.
“Nothing,” she said. That incomplete autopsy report still bothered her.
“I was afraid you’d say that. Looks like we don’t know much more now than we did at the start.”
“Not true,” Jo replied. “We now know who Haas is and we know that he’s developed something that will eventually revolutionize interstellar travel. We also know that Elson deBloise and the Restructurist inner circle have placed a huge sum behind Haa
s and the warp gate.”
Old Pete’s smile was grim. “And we can be certain that the motives behind their actions are purely political. In my years of study of deBloise’s life, I’ve yet to find any action on his part that was not designed to further his career and increase his political power. His mind is homed in on one goal and he allows nothing to sway him from pursuit of it. Nothing!”
“That leaves us with the obvious conclusion that there’s a political plot connected with the Haas warp gate.”
“Which is right back where we started,” he grunted.
“But the way they’re going about it, they must know that the gate will be driven off the market before Haas can perfect the improvements that will make it economically viable.”
“And if Haas means what he says – and I believe he’s absolutely sincere about withdrawing the gate permanently from the market if it fails commercially – we’ll have lost the greatest boon to interstellar travel since the original warp field was developed back on old Earth.”
Jo leaned forward and rested her chin on folded hands. “You know, I have this horrible suspicion that they want the gate to be a commercial failure, that they know Haas will withdraw it from the market then, and it will be lost to us until the patents run out or somebody else figures out a different way to get the same result.”
“I can’t see the sense in that at all.”
“Why else would they be encouraging Haas to rush the gate to market?”
“Don’t know. Maybe there is something to that remark about military contracts. Maybe deBloise has cooked up something with one or two of the higher-ups in the Fed Defense Force.”
“A military coup?”
“No.” Old Pete sighed. “That’s patently ridiculous, I know. But the military could be involved just the same.”
Jo shook her head slowly, confidently. “The military’s not involved.”
“I suppose you’re right,” he admitted. “The gate could be of tremendous value in a war, but there is no war. I mean, who’re we going to fight? The Tarks?”