by Timothy Zahn
We headed back, making as little noise as possible. Third-class seats weren’t equipped with sonic neutralizers like those in first and second, leaving it up to the individual passenger to spring for his or her own earplugs or portable neutralizers or else to hope for quiet neighbors.
Bofiv was lying quietly when we reached his row. One of the passengers three rows up from him had his reading light on, which had the effect of throwing the Shorshian into even deeper shadow than he would have been in without it.
Still, I could see him well enough to tell that his inner eyelids were closed. “I woke up di-Master Strinni,” I whispered to Kennrick. “It’s your turn.”
“But you’re so good at it,” Kennrick said, gesturing. “Please; go ahead.”
“You’re too kind,” I said, frowning. On Bofiv’s left, against the car’s side wall, was an empty seat, presumably that of his compatriot Master Tririn.
But on Bofiv’s right, where I would have expected to find the empty seat of the late Master Colix, was the smooth half-cylinder of a closed privacy shield. “Who’s that?” I asked, pointing at it.
“A Nemut,” Kennrick said. “He’s not part of our group.”
“Why isn’t that Colix’s seat?” I asked. “Didn’t he want to sit with his buddies?”
“I don’t know,” Kennrick said, frowning. “Huh. I hadn’t really thought about that. You think maybe the others didn’t like him?”
“Or vice versa,” I said, making a mental note to ask Bofiv and Tririn which of the party had come up with the seating arrangements. “So where was Colix sitting?”
“There,” Kennrick said, pointing to an empty middle seat across the aisle and two rows forward of the sleeping Bofiv.
I backtracked for a closer look. The late Master Colix’s seat was flanked by a pair of privacy shields. Irreverently, I wondered if one of the shields concealed an attractive female Shorshian. Maybe that was why he’d chosen to ditch his colleagues.
And then, as if on cue, the aisle shield retracted to reveal a young Human female.
A really young female, in fact. She couldn’t be more than seventeen, and even that was pushing it. Her face was thin and drawn, with the look of someone who’d just gone two rounds with food that didn’t agree with her.
Make that three rounds. Even before the privacy shield had retracted completely into the armrest and leg-rest storage lip she was on the move, heading toward the front of the car at the quick-walk of the digestively desperate.
I eyed the remaining privacy shield in that particular three-seat block. Maybe that was the knockout Shorshic female.
“Well?” Kennrick prompted.
“Well, what?” I countered, turning around to watch the girl. She reached the front of the car and disappeared into one of the restrooms.
“Are we going to ask Master Bofiv about Master Colix’s habits and appetites?” Kennrick elaborated.
“In a minute,” I said, a sudden unpleasant tingling on the back of my neck as I stared at the closed restroom door. Colix had gotten sick and died … and now one of his seatmates had suddenly made a mad dash for the facilities?
Kennrick caught the sudden change in my tone. “What is it?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe nothing.”
“Or?”
“Or maybe something,” I said, glancing at my watch. Five minutes, I decided. If the girl wasn’t back in five minutes I would grab a Spider and send him in to find her.
It was something of an anticlimax when, three minutes later, the door opened and the girl reappeared. She started a little unsteadily back down the aisle toward her seat, looking even more drawn than she had before.
“Or nothing, I take it?” Kennrick murmured.
“So it would seem,” I agreed. The girl’s eyes were fixed on me as she came toward us, a wary and rather baleful expression on her pale face. I waited until she was about five steps from us and then tried my best concerned smile on her. “You all right, miss?” I asked softly.
“I’m fine,” she said, clipping out each word like she was trimming a thorn hedge. If my concerned smile was having any effect, I sure couldn’t detect it. “You mind?”
I wasn’t even close to blocking her way, but I gave her a little more room anyway. “I just wondered if you were unwell.”
“I’m fine,” she said again, brushing past me and flopping down into her seat. She adjusted herself a bit and reached for the privacy shield control.
“Because your seatmate had a bad attack of something,” I went on, kneeling down beside her. No point including any more eavesdroppers in this conversation than absolutely necessary. “You might have noticed when his friends took him to the dispensary?”
She slid the control forward, and the shield started to rotate into its closed position. “The dispensary, where he died?” I finished.
The shield closed. I counted off three seconds; and then, the shield opened again. “What did you just say?” the girl asked, her face suddenly tight.
“I said Master Colix is dead,” I repeated.
For a long moment she just stared at me. Her eyes flicked up to Kennrick, then back to me. “How?” she whispered.
“He was poisoned,” I said. “What’s your name?”
She hesitated. “Terese,” she said. “Terese German.”
“Frank Compton,” I introduced myself in return. “How well did you know Master Colix?”
“Hardly at all,” Terese said, looking at Kennrick again.
“You didn’t talk to him?” Kennrick asked.
Terese hunched her shoulders. “Mostly I read or listened to music.”
“But you must have at least occasionally talked to him,” Kennrick persisted. “You’ve been sitting together for the past two weeks, after all.”
“He’s the one who did all the talking,” Terese growled. “Mostly about his job. Oh, and he showed me a few holos of his family, too.”
“He was married?” I asked.
A shadow of something crossed her face. “No, they were pictures of his parents and brothers,” she said.
“Are you married?” Kennrick asked.
“Is that any of your business?” she countered stiffly, giving him an icy look.
“I was just wondering if you were traveling alone,” he said in a tone of slightly wounded innocence.
“Then ask that,” the girl bit out.
“Our apologies,” I said hastily. “Are you traveling alone?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Do you remember Master Colix mentioning feeling ill prior to tonight?” I asked.
“Not to me,” she said. She let her glare linger on Kennrick another couple of seconds, apparently making sure he got the message, then looked back at me. “As far as I could tell, he felt fine. At least, up to a couple of hours ago.”
“What did he say?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said. “But he was shifting in his seat a lot and making these funny noises.”
“What kind of noises? What did they sound like?”
“Mostly uncomfortable-sounding grunts,” she said. “Like his stomach was bothering him.”
I gestured toward her abdomen. “Like the way your stomach was bothering you a minute ago?”
“It’s not the same thing,” she said tartly.
“How do you know?” I countered.
“I’ve got some stomach trouble, that’s all,” she insisted. “Nothing I’m going to die from.”
“Okay,” I said, wondering if Colix had been thinking the same thing up to the point where the doctors started poking hypos into him. “What happened then?”
“I was just wondering if I should give up and go to the bar for a while to get away from the noise when he got out of his seat and headed back to his friends,” she said.
“How long ago was this?” Kennrick asked.
“Like I said, a couple of hours,” she told him.
“Any chance you can pin it down a little more closely?” he
asked.
“No, I can’t,” she said. “I was trying to sleep. I wasn’t exactly looking at my watch.”
“That’s all right,” I assured her. “Did anything in particular happen just prior to that time? Had he just returned from the dining car, or had a snack?”
“Or had he been talking to anyone other than you and his other seatmate?” Kennrick asked.
“He hadn’t been anywhere or done anything that I saw.” Terese nodded at Kennrick. “And the only visitor I saw was you.”
I frowned at Kennrick. “You were back here this evening?”
“Early afternoon,” he corrected. “I was working on the plans for a traditional Shorshic halfway-celebration meal for next week and wanted Master Colix’s advice on menu and procedure.”
“How long was this before the uncomfortable grunts started?” I asked Terese.
“Oh, hours,” she said. “He had dinner afterwards. And if he had any snacks, I didn’t see them.”
Dead end. “Did Master Colix go anywhere else this evening? Maybe back to talk with his colleagues a couple of rows back?”
“No.” Terese hesitated. “Actually, I had the feeling he didn’t get along too well with them.”
“How so?”
“For one thing, he didn’t want to sit with them,” she said. “The Nemut in the aisle seat offered to trade with him right after we left Homshil, but he turned him down.”
I looked at Kennrick. “And you didn’t notice any of this undercurrent during your meetings on Earth?”
“No, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything,” he said. “Shorshians are very good at social compartmentalization. They can all behave in a perfectly friendly way in a business setting even if they personally can’t stand each other.”
“Not even now that they’re on their way home?” I asked. “Wouldn’t one of them have at least mentioned it?”
“They wouldn’t have mentioned it to me,” Kennrick said. “I work for Pellorian Medical, so wherever I am is by definition a business setting. Ditto whenever the Shorshians are with any of the four Filiaelians in our group.”
“Are any of the Filiaelians in this car?” I asked, glancing around.
“No, they’re all up in first,” he said. “And I doubt any of them has made the trek back here since the trip started.” He cocked an eyebrow. “But the fact the Shorshians won’t talk about their problems to me doesn’t mean they won’t open up to you.”
I made a face. “In other words, it’s time for me to nudge, shake, or otherwise drag Master Bofiv back to the land of the living?”
“Just be persistent,” Kennrick advised. “As you saw, they do wake up eventually.”
He headed back toward Bofiv’s seat. “Nice guy,” Terese muttered.
“He’s all that,” I agreed, getting back to my feet. “Thanks for your time.”
I joined Kennrick at Bofiv’s row. The Shorshian was still lying on his back, his inner eyelids closed. As far as I could tell, he hadn’t moved at all since our arrival. “Master Bofiv?” I called softly, giving his arm a cautious shake.
There was no response. “Master Bofiv?” I called again, wiggling the arm a little harder.
Still nothing. I glanced toward the front of the car, wondering if there might be a Spider nearby who I could commandeer for this duty. There wasn’t, but I did note that Terese was leaning around her seat watching us.
I turned back to Bofiv. “Master Bofiv, I need to talk to you,” I said. I shook his arm again, still without effect, then reached up to try patting the side of his neck.
It was cold. Not cold in the way a sleeping person’s skin might get if he forgot to tuck his blanket all the way up to his chin. Bofiv’s skin was much colder.
I pulled out my flashlight and flicked it on. The deep shadows had hidden his skin earlier, but I could see now that it had the same mottling that Colix’s skin had shown there at the end.
I gazed down at his empty face, a hard knot forming in my stomach. No one was going to be nudging, shaking, or otherwise dragging Bofiv back to the land of the living. Not anymore.
I looked back at Terese. She was still peering around the side of her seat, her curiosity starting to drift over into uncertainty. “What’s the matter?” she stage-whispered.
“Do me a favor,” I told her. “Go find a conductor and tell him that I need him and another Spider back here right away. And have them get Dr. Witherspoon out of the second/third dispensary and bring him along.”
Terese got out of her seat, her eyes on Bofiv’s still form. “Is he sick?” she asked.
“No,” I told her. “He’s dead.”
“Without tests I can’t be certain,” Dr. Witherspoon said as he straightened up. “But in my opinion, he died from the same poison that killed Master Colix.”
I looked down at the dispensary’s treatment table, where the late Master Bofiv now lay side by side with the late Master Colix. It was a cozy fit. “Great,” I said. “We’ve got a pattern going.”
“God help us all,” Kennrick muttered. “What are we talking about, Doc, some kind of plague?” He looked pointedly over at the server Spider again standing unobtrusive vigil on the other side of the dispensary. “Something new the Spiders’ fancy sensor net let slip through?”
“If it is, it would have to be something both new and very slippery,” Witherspoon said. “I’ve seen lists of what those sensors catch. Nothing harmful gets through, I assure you.”
“Then it has to be something they ate,” Kennrick concluded. “If it’s not airborne, that’s all that’s left.”
I looked at Tririn, who was standing against the wall beside the Filly doctor. His skin wasn’t mottled like the late Master Bofiv’s, but it definitely looked paler than it had earlier.
Small wonder. Two of his companions had now bitten the dust, companions who had probably been eating the same food and had definitely been breathing the same air he had over the past two weeks. In his place, I’d have been pretty nervous, too.
“There was nothing dangerous in the food,” the server said in his flat Spider voice.
Every head in the room turned at that one. Servers were usually quiet, unassuming little Spiders, with a normal conversational range that was limited to asking a dining car patron what he wanted for lunch or telling a barfly that, sadly, the train was completely out of Jack Daniel’s. To have one of them volunteer information, especially information like this, was unheard of.
Kennrick recovered his voice first. “So you say,” he countered. “I’d want some actual proof of that.”
“What about something one of the group brought aboard?” I asked. “Some foodstuff that maybe wasn’t packaged properly and went bad?”
“I suppose that’s possible,” Witherspoon said. “Bacteria-generated toxins can certainly be nasty enough. But it’s hard to imagine Master Colix or Master Bofiv eating something that was obviously tainted.”
“Which makes it all the more urgent that we get an analysis of the victims’ blood and tissue,” I said. “Until we know which poison was responsible, there’s no way to backtrack it and figure out where it came from.”
“And how do you intend to do that?” Kennrick demanded. “Di-Master Strinni has already said no autopsies.”
“No, di-Master Strinni said no autopsy on Master Colix,” I corrected. “He hasn’t said anything about Master Bofiv.”
“And why would he—?” Kennrick broke off. “You’re right,” he said, sudden interest in his voice. “Master Bofiv wasn’t on the same Path di-Master Strinni is.”
“Which means he might be willing to let us work on Master Bofiv,” I said.
“It’s worth a try,” Kennrick agreed. “Go ahead. We’ll wait here.”
“You’re the one who knows him,” I reminded him.
“You’re the one who knows how to wake him up,” he countered.
“I’ve already had to do this twice,” I said.
“Once,” Kennrick corrected. “You didn’t actually
wake up Master Bofiv.”
“What is the matter with you two?” Witherspoon snapped “There are people lying dead here.”
“And I don’t want to be the one to break that news to a business associate,” Kennrick said coolly. “It was Compton’s idea. He can do it.”
Witherspoon rumbled something under his breath. “Oh, for—never mind. I’ll do it.”
He stripped off his examination gloves, tossing them onto the dispensary counter. With a final glare at me, he strode toward the doorway.
He’d made it halfway there when the obvious problem belatedly caught up with him. “Only I can’t, can I?” he growled with frustration and embarrassment. “Di-Master Strinni is in first class.”
“I think that in this case the conductors will be willing to pass you through,” I said.
“You will be permitted,” the server confirmed. “A conductor will meet you in the rearmost first-class car and accompany you to di-Master Strinni’s seat.”
“Thank you,” Witherspoon said. He got two more steps, then once again hesitated. “Perhaps, Master Tririn, you would accompany me?” he asked, turning to the remaining Shorshian.
Tririn looked at Kennrick, then back at Witherspoon. [Very well,] he said. He murmured something to Aronobal that I couldn’t catch; then he and Witherspoon left the room and headed forward.
That left Kennrick, Aronobal, Bayta, and me. Plus the Spider, of course. “Well, that went well,” I commented.
“He’ll learn,” Kennrick said cynically, his gaze lingering on the empty doorway. “Dr. Witherspoon, I mean. Everyone thinks dealing with Shorshians is a walk down the escalator. But he’ll learn.”
He looked at Aronobal. “But I don’t have to tell you that, do I?” he went on. “The Filiaelian Assembly has been dealing with them for at least six hundred years now.”
“I have never had trouble with the Shorshic people,” Aronobal said diplomatically.
“Then you’re the exception,” Kennrick said. “Half my job seems to consist of smoothing those waters.” He turned back to me. “So what now? We wait until they get back?”
“Unless you want to risk Strinni’s wrath by starting before the opening bell,” I said.
