"You must find a way to prevent Matsukawa's interrogation— but without harming him. This is absolutory imperative."
"Are you out of your tiny mind? How am I supposed to do that? There's no way I can get at the psychotronic equipment to sabotage it. Frost and Gregoire have locked it in the wardroom where they plan to do the probing."
"You'll have to think of something," the Galapharma security chief says with harsh urgency. "We can't allow Matsukawa to be questioned."
"But what difference does it make? You'll get both prisoners back when I—"
"This is an order!"
"What about Ollie Schneider? Do I have to muzzle him, too?"
"It's not necessary. But Matsukawa must not be probed!"
"Well... I suppose I could try to take him out with food poisoning. You can pick up a lethal bug culture on Cravat just by wiping a Kleenex on the starport tarmac. If I can smuggle it through the decon gate—"
"I don't want the man dead, you bloody fool! Only unable to respond to the psychotronic machines. He must not be harmed in any way!"
"This wasn't part of our original deal."
"If you fail, not only is the deal null and void, but so are you."
"That's a terrific incentive."
"Don't take that tone with me. You made the choice to betray your comrades. And don't think you can skip out with what we've already paid you. We'll track your ass to Andromeda and points west." Abruptly, Baldwin's voice moderates, becomes persuasive. "I know it'll be a tough job. They'll guard the prisoners like the Crown Jewels. But find a way and Galapharma will triple the sum originally agreed upon."
"Triple! ... Wait a minute. I just remembered something. A trick human pirates sometimes used to botch up our interrogations. It could work. Matsukawa will be puking like a pig and feel pretty bad, but he'll survive."
"Explain."
The bizarre expedient is described. "Trust me. It'll work. But you listen to me, Baldwin: I want the extra pay right now, while I'm on the com and able to verify. This is non-negotiable. And the same precautions apply as in your man's original arrangement with me."
"Agreed."
"You'd better tell me how you want to arrange the handover of the prisoners."
"That hasn't yet been decided. We'll be tracking you closely on your way to Earth. Perhaps you might seize control of the ship at one of the more remote fueling stops."
"Just like that!"
"When you've done the job, a broadband summons will bring us to you in short order."
"What's wrong with you setting up an ambush? Gala-pharma running short of heavy cruisers?"
"The Y700 could easily outmaneuver them ... if it were flown by a competent pilot. And we can't risk the lives of the prisoners in a firefight. Find another way. Earn your excessively generous pay."
"All right. But Gala better be playing straight with me. I'm warning you, Baldwin. I know how to take care of myself."
"Take good care of Jim Matsukawa, my friend, and you'll find out just how generous Galapharma can be."
I slept among the roses and palm trees for fifty whole minutes before my phone buzzed.
"Yes."
"It's Matt. I have Karl Nazarian on the subspace com. I think you should talk to him."
The anxious sound of her voice was like an ice cube down my collar. I sat bolt upright.
"Is it bad news?" I demanded.
"Plomazo was attacked about half an hour ago. Karl and the others are all right. They're heading for Torngat Starport for minor repairs."
"Shit! ... Torngat's about five thousand lights from here, isn't it?"
"Five thousand four hundred twenty-two," she said.
"Where are you?"
"The Port Authority building, on the Ring Promenade right next to the starport terminal."
"I'm on my way."
The spa's concierge knew all about me and my VIP associates. When I asked her for speedy transport, she volunteered to take me herself. But Cravat Dome was so small that the only personal ground vehicles were modified go-carts with a top speed of 15 kph. We rolled sedately to the opposite side of town while I ground my teeth in frustration. The Ring Promenade was a cantilevered floating mezzanine thirty meters above ground level that harbored small shops and office strips, interspersed with living greenery that cascaded over the parapet edge like the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. Matt was waiting for me at the Port Authority entrance as we rolled up the ramp. I thanked the concierge and hopped out.
"This way." She hurried off with me struggling to keep up with her. My freshly repaired leg ached like a sonuvabitch.
The last time I'd seen Matt Gregoire had been a fleeting, unfocused glimpse in Cravat's hospital, just before the medics hauled me away for repairs. She'd been euphoric then, sharing the Dagasatt triumph. Now the onyx-black eyes were somber and her cinnamon skin seemed pale. We didn't speak again until we reached the communication rooms.
She eyeballed the scanner on a locked room labeled dedicated com—restricted access. The door rolled open to admit us. Inside was a bank of open-beam subspace transceivers connecting Cravat to Rampart Central on Seriphos, Fleet Security HQ on Tyrins, the Starcorp offices in Toronto, and each of the four Zone Patrol posts serving the Perseus Spur. No employees were on duty. They'd probably been cleared out on orders from Madame Vice President.
Matt sat at the com unit hooked to Seriphos, which was relaying the signal from Karl. I pulled up a chair as Nazarian's weathered face came onto the display.
He said, "Helly. Congrats on the Dagasatt caper. Matt told me about it. I'm sorry to rain on your parade."
"What happened?"
"The time-frame is important. Today at 0720 Zebra Plo-mazo was attacked by three light-cruiser-class starships." He gave the ship's coordinates at the time of engagement. "The aggressor vessels were of human manufacture, highly modified DAS-4 types a couple of rungs below our Y660 in assault capability. They made no attempt to communicate, just popped out of a dust cloud and started zapping. I, um, blew the crap out of them, but it was a close call. There were no aggressor survivors."
"Matt said you sustained damage."
"A minor hull breach. Hector says we're in no immediate danger. We're limping to Torngat, twenty lights distant, for a fix."
"That's not a Sheltok world, is it?" The big energy Concern owned most of the major starship fueling and maintenance stations in the Orion Arm. Since Sheltok was an ally of Galapharma, I wasn't anxious to do business with it. I'd already instructed Mimo to plot Chispa's course using freesoil pit stops, even though the routing was less direct and a lot more expensive than following conventional shipping lanes.
"Torngat belongs to Macrodur. It's a winter resort world serving Sector Six. I think we'll be reasonably secure there... for a little while."
I caught his drift. "Right. We'll have to pick you guys up. We can be on Torngat in a little over three days. Our Y700 is big enough to carry everybody."
The old security man pulled a wry face. "Depends on who you include in the 'everybody' bag! Matt told me about your Operation Q crew. I think it's possible that one of them tipped off Galapharma to Plomazo's course. And pretty damn recently at that, or we'd have been hit earlier along the route. There aren't that many private Y660s riding the void. It would have been easy to track us if the bad guys had a sizable observer net—like Gala—and knew what to look for."
"Christ! You could be right. But... I don't see how it could have happened. You surely can't suspect Mimo or Ivor of selling us out. And the new crew members signed on after you guys left. Maybe your bandits were real bandits after all."
"Plomazo's too fast and well-armed to attract conventional pirates, even in triplicate. And there was no summons from the hostiles demanding surrender. They came at us with lethal intent."
Matt said, "The leak couldn't possibly have come from my Rampart Central office or the Seriphos starport crew. I made certain that the only people who knew that Plomazo carried Garth Wing Lee were personnel who had
been vetted in duress for loyalty."
"I'll vouch for Lotte, Hector, and Cassius with my life," Karl stated. "My people are loyal."
"That leaves me and my folks, doesn't it?" I said dispiritedly.
"Seems so," said Karl. "Unless we had stone bad luck on one of our earlier fueling stops, and some informant told Gala security that Plomazo was passing through. We altered her ID, not that it helps much with such a distinctive boat. Drummond's spooks know Mimo's your good buddy. They might have put out an early APB on a Y660 starship, thinking you might be aboard, along with Lee."
"It could have happened that way," Matt said.
"I'm supposed to be dead," I reminded them.
"You've been resurrected before," Matt observed. "But I'm more inclined to believe the stool pigeon scenario. A fairly recent tipoff."
I shook my head. "It doesn't seem possible, after all my crew and I went through together."
"But you can't discount the possibility," Matt said. "Who else besides Mimo knew you were shipping Lee to Earth?"
I tried to remember. "Meem and I discussed the matter casually on the flight to Nogawa. We were wondering what Lotte Dietrich was going to find in the data-dump she'd taken from Garth Lee's ship—"
"She found a lot," Karl broke in. "But it'll keep. Go on, Helly."
"Um. We were in the dining saloon, drinking coffee after a meal. Ivor was clearing the table. The new crew members had already finished eating and were gone."
"So Ivor could have overheard you," Matt said.
I blew up. "It's ridiculous to think he'd betray us!"
"Calm down," Karl said from the SS com. "The boy might not have realized that the information was sensitive. He could have passed it along innocently to one of the others."
"I'll check with him." Matt pulled out her pocket phone, tapped up a code and spoke. "This is Matt Gregoire. Where are you? ... Good. Do you recall any conversations with Helly or Mimo during Operation Q where Plomazo's mission to Earth was mentioned? In connection with Karl transporting a man named Garth Wing Lee? ... Did you ever discuss the matter with members of the new crew? This is really important, Ivor... Okay. Thanks."
She cut off and said to me, "He remembers the messroom discussion. He swears he never passed on the information to anyone."
"I believe him," I said. "The leak—if there was one—must have come through me, but I'm damned if I can think how. Rats! I feel like a total schlump."
"The attack on Plomazo could have been a fluke. A piece of incredibly bad luck, just as Karl said."
"We'll go ahead on that assumption. For now, at any rate."
"You're the boss." Matt turned back to the SS com and spoke briskly to Karl. "Keep a close guard on Lee. There's an especially important question we failed to ask him during his psychoprobe session back on Seriphos. Helly and I will get back to you in a day or two, after we sort things out."
He nodded and ended the transmission.
"Important question?" I inquired dopily.
"Whether Lee himself is a Haluk demiclone."
"Oh, right. My brain has turned to cowflop."
She nodded in humiliating agreement. "The most obvious suspects are Ildiko Szabo and Joe Betancourt, but I'm at a loss to know how either of them could be long-term Gala agents. I picked them out of a hat when you asked me to find recruits for the operation. If either one defected to Gala, it
must have been a spur of the moment decision, done for money."
"What are we going to do, Matt?" In the state I was in, I hardly had a clue.
"There's always psychoprobing."
"Aw, geez. Scramble my friends' brains on a fishing expedition? I can't do it, babe."
"Then we simply leave the two of them behind."
"Ildy saved my goddamn life on Dagasatt. She wants to see her folks back on Earth and I promised to bring her along. And Joe took out the Haluk ship that could have sunk our whole operation. He really needs money to start his charter operation, and we need another pilot to spell Mimo and me on the trip."
She thought about it. "If we secure the ship's SS com from everyone except you and me and Mimo, lock up the portable weapons, and do a buddy system arrangement with the crew to forestall crude forms of sabotage, we might be okay. If there is a Gala agent on board, he or she will have to be circumspect to avoid giving the show away—to say nothing of self-endangerment. Our traitor wants to live to spend the loot."
"Let's be up-front with everyone about the possibility of a spy being among us. If nothing else, it'll put the fink on notice." I looked at my wrist chronograph. "It's time for our little melodrama with Terence Hoy. And then we're out of here."
Ollie and Jim, looking crestfallen and accompanied by Fleet Security guards, were waiting in the anteroom when we all trooped past them into Hoy's office. The Port Traffic Manager, who was the de facto governor of Cravat, seemed nearly as uncomfortable as the prisoners. Matt had already warned him what was going to happen, explaining that it was a legal necessity so Rampart could plausibly deny having invaded Dagasatt.
It was plain to see that Terence Hoy fervently wished that the legal necessity was happening on someone else's planet.
Matt instructed the guards to wait outside for a while with the prisoners, then closed the door and checked to make sure that the props were there: a tall folding floorscreen, a vocal distortion device, and a bulky armored combat glove. She herself had brought along a zipped carrier bag that clinked.
Mimo, Ivor, Ildiko, and Joe stood behind the desk with Terence, witnesses to the upcoming proceedings. Matt stood in front. I hid behind the screen, which was set up at the left, arranged so the person in back of it couldn't be caught on the room's holovid recorder or seen by others in the room. I selected an artificial voice from the device menu, put the glove on, and said, "Testing, one-two!"
I sounded like Donald Duck, but nobody laughed.
"Very well," Matt said. "Terence, please activate the recorder."
He touched a pad on the desk console and we were rolling.
Matt faced the holocam, identified herself, announced the time, date, and place, and named those present. The last individual mentioned was one Geronimo, disenfranchised person and bounty hunter.
I stuck my gloved hand out from behind the screen and waggled my fingers in greeting.
"Mr. Geronimo," Matt said, "your desire to remain anonymous is understood and respected. Why have you met with us today?"
"I'm here," said the duck, "to formally offer to Rampart Star-corp the persons of two suspected felons—Oliver Schneider and James Matsukawa—apprehended by me pursuant to CHW Criminal Statute 22, Clause 743 A."
"What is your fee?" Matt asked.
"One dollar and other good and valuable considerations."
I stuck out my gloved hand, and she put the coin into it. Then she opened the outer door and summoned Ollie and Jim and their guards.
"Are these men the ones you apprehended?"
"They are," I quacked from my hiding place. Schneider did a double take. Matsukawa stayed deadpan.
"Thank you for services rendered, Mr. Geronimo. I accept delivery of Schneider and Matsukawa in the name of Rampart Starcorp. Guards, you may take the detainees back outside and wait with them there. And you, Mr. Geronimo, may also withdraw."
She told Terence to shut off the holocam. When its red eye winked off and the door closed, I came out from behind the screen, ditched the glove and the voice disguiser, and stood meekly before the Vice President for Confidential Services. The camera was reactivated.
"Are you the man sometimes known as Helmut Icicle," Matt asked me formally, "who knowingly misused a Rampart Red Card on the planet Nogawa-Krupp after your employment had been terminated by Rampart Interstellar Corporation?"
I admitted it. She ordered me to surrender the card and levied a fine of one dollar. I returned her lucky buck and she pronounced my trespass forgiven. Then she gave me a new Red Card made out to Asahel Frost and announced that I was herewith rehired as Vi
ce President for Special Projects, enfranchised and fully empowered to exercise all duties and offices of the alpha-level corporate position, including that of praefectus conlegius of the Commonwealth Judiciary.
She then remanded to the custody of Asahel Frost the persons of Oliver Schneider and James Matsukawa, detainees suspected of committing multiple crimes against Rampart Interstellar Corporation and the Commonwealth of Human Worlds. I accepted responsibility for them, declaring that I would, as empowered by law, interrogate them sub duritia en route to Earth, and turn over psychotronic evidence deposed by them to prosecutors of the Commonwealth Judiciary Tribunal upon my arrival in Toronto. (I'd also transmit the depositions via SS com to Eve as soon as they were complete; but their final validation would be delayed until Matt and I were able to affirm them in person.)
Matt thanked Terence Hoy and the other witnesses and declared the proceedings at an end. The camera was shut off. She made three copies of the holovid, gave one dime to Terence, one to me, and kept the third herself.
Then she lifted the carrier bag onto the desk, unzipped it, and pulled out two bottles of Veuve Cliquot NV and a package of disposable glasses. Corks popped and we drank to Rampart's success and the confusion of her enemies. Mimo Bermudez offered expensive Cohiba Robusto cigars in plastic cylinders to those assembled. Mellowed by the champagne, Terence Hoy took two of the Cuban stogies, Ildiko Szabo took one, Joe Betancourt took three, and the rest of us passed.
The necessary business being concluded, we said goodbye to the friendly folks of Cravat, collected the prisoners, climbed into Chispa, and set off for Earth at top ross pseudovelocity.
Chapter 12
I'd promised the doctor to rest in bed for at least two days before attempting any strenuous activity; psychoprobing prisoners fit the "strenuous" category in spades. But before 1 embarked for dreamland I contacted Eve on the subspace communicator to give her the news.