Trista died because she had seen the murder, and she planned to do something about it. Lysa had never planned for Trista’s body to be discovered. She’d probably thought the fire would be discovered sooner. By the time someone had found it, the entire ship went into a panic. Which, if Richard thought about it, meant that her calculations had been off. Professor Grove the mathematician had been right about her after all. Her math skills hadn’t been up to the task.
Then Agatha Kantswinkle and Susan Carmichael had seen Lysa in the area, and if there were an investigation, they might’ve mentioned her. She didn’t want to risk it. So she planned the last two murders, and might’ve gotten away with all of it if Hunsaker hadn’t moved Carmichael out of her room.
What Richard couldn’t figure out was why she killed Remy Demaupin.
“I didn’t,” Lysa snarled. They had tied her up and moved her to the bar, along with all the other passengers. No one wanted to be alone any longer. They all worried that Richard and Hunsaker and Carmichael had caught the wrong person, even though Lysa made it pretty clear from the moment she’d been incapacitated that they hadn’t.
“What do you mean you didn’t kill Remy?” Carmichael said. “We know you did.”
Lysa shook her head. “He killed himself,” she said. “In fact, he inspired me. I figured everyone would look for a connection between him and Professor Grove. Then we would have the emergency and everyone would forget and . . .”
She lowered her head. Richard watched her, realized he’d met her type before. The type that imagined what they’d do, then did it, and wondered why nothing quite worked the way they’d planned.
“You should’ve just shoved him out of an airlock,” Richard said.
Everyone looked at him. He realized he’d said too much.
He shrugged, pretending a nonchalance he didn’t entirely feel.
“What I mean is that had you done something simple, no one would’ve thought twice about it. All this elaborate stuff was your downfall.”
That still sounded bad. He sounded like one killer giving advice to another. Which, in fact, he was.
Hunsaker crossed his arms, watching Richard, a slight frown on his face. Anne Marie stood in the back of the room, listening. The captain was still at his table, drowning himself in drink. Carmichael kept checking the time, hoping that her father’s ship would get here soon.
Everyone else sat very far away from Lysa, as if her particular brand of insanity was catching.
Richard didn’t stay that far away, though. For all her insanity, her elaborate kills, and her mistakes, she was what a murderer should be. Someone who had a reason to do what she did—not a bloodless reason. A personal reason. An important reason. Something that was, to her, life and death. So she acted, in a life-or-death manner. And he found that both inspirational and appropriate.
He didn’t ask her any more. Carmichael’s father could take them all in his various ships. Somewhere Lysa would get prosecuted for what she had done. Not that this was a happy ending for anyone. The captain would probably lose his job. Carmichael was going back to a situation that she clearly didn’t want to be in. And Richard would have no way to get to Ansary.
Not to mention all the people who had died. Their families would never be the same.
He walked back to Anne Marie Devlin. Pretty woman. Or she would’ve been if she weren’t a depressive and a drunk. She was sober right now, but he could see the tendencies. She was the kind who didn’t want to change because she saw no point in it. Besides, change was hard. That was becoming clearer to him, each and every day.
* * *
The ships arrived in fifteen hours, not eighteen, and offered everyone a ride. Once Hunsaker realized who Carmichael’s father was—he truly was a mucky-muck of high muck who had a lot of mucking money—he made noises about the damage to his resort and how embarrassing it would be if it ever came out that his daughter had been a target. When that didn’t move her father, Hunsaker added that it would also be embarrassing for people to know that his daughter had been fleeing from him when all of this occurred.
Hunsaker got a tidy payout, enough to renovate the entire resort if he felt like it. And he felt like it. He wanted this place as tamperproof as possible. He didn’t ever want to be in this situation again.
Ilykova hadn’t left with the rest. He wasn’t going to testify, either, no matter how much anyone pleaded with him. He sat in the bar these days and watched Anne Marie drink, which was a sight to behold. He didn’t seem miserable, but he didn’t seem happy either. He was waiting for the next ship, for a way out. Although he clearly didn’t know where he was going.
And Hunsaker had been thinking about it. The station was a world unto itself. Technically, anything that happened here was prosecuted in the Commons System, but no prosecution had ever happened.
Hunsaker wasn’t sure what he would’ve done if Ilykova hadn’t been here. Ilykova wasn’t big or burly and he didn’t seem tough. But he had experience.
And he had no qualms about doing what it took to keep the peace.
You should’ve just shoved him out of an airlock.
Hunsaker couldn’t’ve done that to anyone. Ever. But he could pay someone to do it while he looked the other way. That ability wouldn’t’ve worked in this circumstance, of course. But it might come in handy in the future.
And if Hunsaker had learned anything from this experience, he had learned it was better to be prepared.
If he had been prepared, none of this would’ve happened.
The doors would’ve locked properly, the environmental controls would’ve been up to date, and all the rooms would’ve been cleaned.
Woulda coulda shoulda.
He wasn’t going to have any regrets. He was going to move forward.
He squared his shoulders and walked to the bar. He paused for a brief jealous moment when he saw how close Ilykova was sitting to Anne Marie. Then he saw the look of disgust on Ilykova’s face and realized that the man would never be interested in her.
So Hunsaker sat down at their table and offered Ilykova a job.
No one was surprised when Ilykova said yes.
Copyright © 2010 Kristine Kathryn
Asimov's Science Fiction 01/01/11 Page 21
