B002D48NTG EBOK

by Mike Resnick

  Taniguchi disconnected Cole from the machine and deactivated it. "All right, Mr. Cowin-so you didn't kill any miners or steal any diamonds. There are doubtless trillions of men who can make that same statement."

  Cole pulled another cube out of his pocket. "But they don't have your four hundred diamonds, and I do. Put that in your computer, and have any expert in this complex examine it."

  Taniguchi called in another man, handed him the cube, and said, "Find out where these are from."

  The man left with the cube, and Taniguchi sat down again, facing Cole.

  "How did you come by them?" he asked.

  "I'm a treasure hunter," said Cole. "My profession is retrieving lost articles."

  "These weren't lost," replied Taniguchi. "They were stolen, and a number of men were murdered in the process."

  "That's not my concern," answered Cole. "You know I didn't steal them or kill your miners." You at least know I didn't steal them on Blantyre; let's hope you don't notice the subtle difference.

  "Where are they now?"

  "In a safe place."

  The door irised and the man with the cube stepped through.

  "Well?" asked Taniguchi.

  "Definitely from Blantyre IV," said the man.

  "Is there any possibility that you could be mistaken?"

  The man shook his head. "The computer says no other diamond has that exact color at the center of it."

  "Thank you," said Taniguchi, dismissing him. "Well, Mr. Cowin," he said when he and Cole were alone, "what is your proposition?"

  "My information is that everything on Blantyre IV, or everything shipped from Blantyre IV, is insured for ninety percent of market value. Now, I think market value on these diamonds-there are six missing; all the rest are there-should be about thirteen million credits, but I'm willing to be shown that I'm wrong." Suddenly he smiled. "I may even have undervalued them."

  "That's more than double what they're worth," said Taniguchi.

  "If you're going to lie that blatantly, I'll just put my own value on them and stick with it," said Cole.

  "If you think I'm going to pay you thirteen million credits ..." began Taniguchi heatedly.

  "Of course not. I'm a businessman, not a thief. I just want a finder's fee."

  "All right. Name a price."

  "I'm going to ask you one more time before I do," said Cole. "How much are these things worth on the open market?"

  "We would have to examine each stone separately to determine its value."

  "Since you've yet to see a stone, how do you know the amount you have to pay on the insurance claim?"

  "I'm not at liberty to discuss our methods with you, sir," said Taniguchi.

  "Fine," said Cole. "Then I will arbitrarily declare their value to be twelve million credits. They're insured for ninety percent. Even if you hedge and finagle and talk them down to ten million market value, you're still going to be out nine million credits. Do you agree?"

  Taniguchi merely glared at him.

  "Well, you don't disagree, so clearly we're making progress. Mr. Taniguchi, I am prepared to save the Pilargo Company six million credits. If you will pay me three million in cash, I will turn over the diamonds to you before I leave the planet, which I will do this afternoon with or without reaching an agreement with you."

  "Three million?" snapped Taniguchi. "That's outrageous!"

  "No, sir," said Cole. "That's business."

  "We won't pay it."

  "That's your privilege," said Cole, getting up and walking slowly toward the door.

  "Wait!" said Taniguchi.

  Cole turned and stared at him.

  "Two million," said Taniguchi.

  Cole resisted an urge to smile. You blinked. Now it's all over but the shouting.

  "This isn't a negotiation," answered Cole. "I asked you to give me a value before, and you refused. Now my price is three million. You can pay it and save your company six million credits, or you can refuse to pay it, in which case I will walk out of your office right now, and you will never see me again. You will have to pay nine million credits, and probably more, to settle the claim, and your head office will be informed that you were given the opportunity to pay a finder's fee for the diamonds and refused."

  Taniguchi was silent for a long moment, then spoke: "Three million, you say?"

  "That's right. In cash."

  "It will take half an hour to get it."

  "That's fine. In the meantime, I'll want a written and holographed pledge from the Pilargo Company not to harass or prosecute me for any reason whatsoever."

  "You never mentioned that."

  "I'm mentioning it now," said Cole. "Look, you know I didn't rob the mine or kill the miners. If the police hook me up to another Neverlie Machine, it'll say the same thing. Do you really want to look like a fool for the home office?"

  Taniguchi considered what Cole said, and finally nodded his assent. "I agree to your conditions. Now where are the diamonds?"

  "I'll give them to you when I get my hands on the money."

  "Why should I believe you?"

  "Why should I lie? I assume that you'll have weapons trained on me from the second I get the money until the second you get your diamonds. I'm mercenary and avaracious, not suicidal."

  "Wait in the reception area," said Taniguchi. "I'll let you know when the money arrives."

  "Fine," said Cole, walking the rest of the way to the door, which sensed his approach and let him pass through.

  Taniguchi delivered the money some twenty-four minutes later, and Cole led a procession of executives and armed security guards to the spaceport. He allowed Taniguchi and one security man aboard the ship after making sure their weapons had been removed, had Morales turn over the diamonds, and took off before anyone from Pilargo could contact the spaceport authorities and detain them.

  "By God, this is going to be easy!" said Cole as they hit light speeds.

  "I was worried, sir," said Morales. "I know it sounded good when you talked about it, but you were still walking in cold and demanding millions of credits."

  "They didn't have any choice."

  "You sure don't run the pirate business the way Captain Windsail did, sir," said Morales. "I'm glad I joined the Teddy R. "

  "Your Captain Windsail never understood that the reward has to be commensurate with the effort," said Cole. "He'd risk his crew's lives, he'd risk his ship, and then his profit margin barely paid for his fuel and his ammunition. Dumb way to run any business-especially the pirate business."

  "I know," said Morales. "But when I was alone in the ship waiting for you, I kept worrying that something had gone wrong."

  "If you plan it properly, not much can go wrong," answered Cole confidently.

  He was right in principle, but he was about to find out just how wrong he could be in practice.

  "Three million!" exclaimed Sharon Blacksmith as she, Cole, and Forrice stood together in the science lab. "I've never seen as much as ten thousand in a single lump before!" She ran her hands over the neat stacks of thousand-credit notes. "Isn't it beautiful!"

  "And you had no trouble at all?" put in Forrice.

  "No more than expected," said Cole. "He screamed, he threatened, he held his breath until he turned blue-and then he gave in and saved his company six million credits. Probably more. I like my original estimate of thirteen million better than ten."

  "Why didn't you stick to it, then?" asked Forrice.

  "Get me an ID that can stand up to close scrutiny and I will," said Cole. "My guess is that by now the Navy knows I was on New Madrid."

  "What we really need is a mole who can get into the Master Computer on Deluros VIII," said Sharon. "Someone who can put someone else's prints and retinagram together with your name, and yours with some other identity."

  "Why don't you wish for a million credits while you're at it?" said Cole.

  "Why bother?" she replied with a smile. "You've already given me three million."

  "Believe it or n
ot, that's not all for you," said Cole. "We've got a ship to run and a crew to pay."

  "No one's bitching," said Sharon. "Yet."

  "We don't have anything to spend it on anyway," added Forrice. "We're going to need shore leave pretty soon."

  "Talk to Morales and find out what shores are hospitable to us," replied Cole. "We're going to need to refresh the nuclear pile one of these days. We might as well do it on a friendly world."

  "I'll go talk to him now," said the Molarian.

  "Talk to him whenever you want, but we're dumping the jewelry first," said Cole.

  "Three million credits isn't enough?" demanded Forrice. "We have to have more before we can drink stimulants and hunt up lady Molarians in season?"

  "With the money we get for the jewelry I want to buy a small ship," replied Cole. "The closest we came to real trouble was renting the one I used. They're going to scrutinize us a lot more closely when we're renting a ship that's worth hundreds of thousands than when I show up on a planet with nothing in my hands."

  "You know, I just hate it when you make sense," muttered the Molarian.

  "While I'm thinking about it," continued Cole, "has Christine found out who insured the jewelry yet?"

  "I haven't asked her," said Sharon.

  "Nor have I," said Forrice. "It didn't seem vital when you were hundreds of light-years away dumping the diamonds."

  "Well, find out for me while I go grab some lunch," said Cole. "Have we got any further business here?"

  "None," said Forrice, heading for the airlift.

  "That's a beautiful pile of money," said Sharon admiringly. "I hate to leave it."

  "As the Chief of Security, you're in charge of it," noted Cole. "I expect it to remain intact."

  "You're not even going to pay me for sexual services rendered?"

  "What the hell-fair is fair," said Cole. "Take ten credits and don't bother me again."

  "Wait'll the next time you're taking a shower and Security informs your room that it's now being occupied by a methane breather."

  "Okay, fifteen."

  She laughed and began locking the money away. Then Christine Mboya's image appeared in front of him.

  "I've found the insurer, sir," she reported. "It's a division of the Amalgamated Trust Company."

  "Where is it located?"

  "Phalaris II, sir."

  "Never heard of it."

  "It's headquartered in the Albion Cluster, sir."

  "Hell, that's a third of the galaxy from here," he complained. "If they're an arm of Amalgamated, they should be all the hell over the Republic, maybe even on the Inner Frontier. See if you can hunt up something closer."

  "Working ..." said Christine, obviously studying her computer. "There's a very small office on Binder X, but as far as I can tell they just sell, they don't handle claims. I think your best bet is the branch on McAllister IV, sir."

  "A Republic world?"

  She nodded. "Yes, sir."

  "Figures," he said. "How far away is it?"

  "From our current position?" said Christine. "About three hundred and ten light-years."

  "All right," said Cole. "That's where we'll sell them back their jewelry. Find me a populated Frontier world where we can rent a ship."

  "Will you be sending Mr. Morales again, sir?"

  "No. Even if he had a new ID, they've got his prints and holograph on record. If he walks in, it'll set off every alarm on the planet. Let me think about that while you're hunting up an appropriate world."

  He broke the connection.

  "You know," said Sharon, who had finished securing the cash, "as long as the money for the jewelry is earmarked for a ship, why not buy it now out of these funds and pay yourself back when you unload the jewelry? It might cause a lot less problems than renting another ship."

  "That's not a bad idea," Cole admitted. "I knew there was some reason I let you stick around after you put your clothes on."

  "Then let me give you another one," she said. "If you can bear to part with about a hundred thousand credits, I can probably pick up whatever we need to give everyone passports and identities that'll pass muster even in the Republic."

  "Since when does printing and coding equipment cost that much?"

  "It doesn't. I can get the equipment for well under fifty thousand credits."

  "What's the rest for?"

  "The forger."

  "Can't you do it yourself?"

  "I'm good, but I'm not that good. If we want to beat the Republic's security, we need a real pro."

  "Are you on good terms with many expert forgers, Colonel?" he asked sardonically.

  "No," answered Sharon. "But when word gets out that I'm willing to spend that kind of money on one, I'll have to fight them off with a stick."

  "How long do you think it'll take?"

  "To find someone who can forge ID disks and passports?" she replied. "They're on every populated world on the Frontier. The trick is to find a good one."

  "I mean, how long will it take him to do the job?"

  "There are forgers who can give you an ID that'll pass every test my Security department can devise, and they can produce it in three hours or less. We're carrying a complement of about thirty. We'll have to get one for Morales, now that he's blown the one he used to rent that ship, but on the other hand Wxakgini might spend the next ten years in his little plastic cocoon, tied in to the navigational computer, so he certainly doesn't need one." She paused, as if counting up the hours. "I'd say a dozen Standard days should do it."

  "I'm not going to hang around some planet for twelve days while we get new IDs made for the whole crew," said Cole. "We'll give him half the money up front, I'll wait long enough to get an ID for myself and maybe a couple of others, and then we'll come back with the rest of the money after he's had time to do the job."

  "I don't imagine that any forger will object to that," said Sharon. "After all, he'll have the retinagrams, voiceprints, fingerprints, and holos of everyone he's making them for."

  "But if he's on the Inner Frontier, who's he going to turn them in to?" said Cole with a smile.

  "Bounty hunters," she replied seriously. "They're just about the only law the Frontier's got. Some of them are really good at their jobs."

  "How do you know all this stuff?"

  "When I'm dressed, I'm the Chief of Security, remember?"

  "Okay," he said. "I'll leave it to you and Christine to choose a planet. Once I get my new ID, I'll buy a ship and go transact our business on McAllister while the rest of the IDs are being made."

  "Sounds reasonable," said Sharon.

  "Fine. Then I'm finally off to grab some lunch," he said, walking to the door of the lab. "I'll catch up with you later."

  "Now that you're worth three million credits, bring money."

  Cole bought a ship on Hermes II, and stuck around long enough to get a better ID. The Teddy R remained in orbit while Sharon arranged for IDs for the rest of the crew, and Cole took off in the new ship, alone this time, for McAllister IV.

  Once there he landed at the planet's only spaceport, cleared Customs, and went to an information kiosk, where he was given instructions for getting to the Amalgamated Trust Company.

  It was a large building for a thinly populated planet. Then he remembered that insurance was just a small piece of the action that Amalgamated Trust had carved out for itself, and that McAllister was probably the banking center for a dozen nearby agricultural planets and twice that many mining worlds.

  He entered the building and looked around. Clearly the main floor was strictly a bank. Most of the tellers were human, but there were a few Lodinites, Atrians, and even a Mollute. As one neared the Inner Frontier and got farther from Deluros VIII and the other major worlds of the Republic, the credit was in much less demand. There was a very busy exchange booth that flashed an ever-changing rate, to four decimal places, for the credit, the Maria Theresa dollar, the Far London pound, the New Stalin ruble, and half a dozen other currencies that were
likely to show up at this end of the Republic.

  Finally Cole walked up to a human guard.

  "Excuse me," he said. "I'm looking for the insurance company."

  "There are three of them in this building," answered the guard. "Do you know which one you want?"

  "Amalgamated."

  The guard nodded. "Yeah, that's the biggest of them. They've got the whole fifth floor. Take the airlift that's off to your left, not the one across the lobby."

  "Thanks," said Cole.

  "When you get there," continued the guard, "if you don't know the name of the person you want to see, at least tell the receptionist whether you're here to buy some insurance or make a claim."

  Cole thanked him again, and headed off before the guard could offer any more self-evident advice. He ascended to the fifth floor, stepped out onto a glistening resilient floor, and walked directly to the well-marked reception area.

  "Good morning and welcome to the Amalgamated Trust Insurance Company," said a furry Lodinite, speaking into a T-pack and waiting for the translation to come out in a dull monotone. "How may I help you?"

  "Who's in charge of your claims division?" asked Cole.

  "If you have a claim to file, I can give you the proper form to fill out," said the receptionist. "What type of property was insured?"

  "I don't want a form," said Cole. "I just want to know who the head man is."

  "Head man?" repeated the Lodinite, offering its equivalent of a frown. "All men have heads. All men within my experience, anyway."

  "Who is in charge of the claims division?" Cole asked again with growing irritation.

  "I must not have made myself clear," said the Lodinite. "First you must fill out a claim form. Then I will send you to see the next available agent."

  "If you don't direct me to the man in charge, I will go to one of the other insurance companies in the building," said Cole. "But first I'll need your employee number and the exact spelling of your name for the letter of complaint I intend to write, so Amalgamated will know who to blame for losing all of my corporation's business."

  The Lodinite stared at him silently. If it was nervous or frightened or angry, Cole was unable to tell from its expression. Finally it spoke: "I will tell Mr. Austen that you are here to see him."