by Timothy Zahn
"He's interviewing Ms. Auslander," Bayta said. "She's very upset."
"Sudden death does that to people," I said. "So she did know the kid?"
Bayta nodded. "Pyotr Gerashchenko, one of the group going to Ian-apof for that ski trip. He stayed behind with Ms. Auslander when her ticket was canceled."
Which the Spiders had done under my orders. Which meant that ultimately I was the one responsible for getting the kid killed.
I shook away the thought. It was the Modhri who'd killed him, not me. "So why did he run?"
"I don't know." Bayta paused, cocking her head as if listening to something faint. "She's telling Mr. Morse …Mr. Gerashchenko was accustomed to using certain illegal drugs. She thinks he must have thought he was going to be arrested."
"I wonder how he came to that conclusion," I said sourly, thinking back to the Shorshian who'd been talking earnestly to Gerashchenko just before he spotted me and took off.
"She doesn't know," Bayta said.
"I do," I said. "The Modhri engineered the whole thing, from spooking the kid into running, to helping us herd him someplace nice and private, to sending someone in to kill him."
"The fifth walker?"
"Or someone else who slipped over there ahead of us and waited for Gerashchenko to show up," I said. "Interesting that the lack of a fifth walker body implies the Modhri didn't want to waste that particular one."
"But why kill Mr. Gerashchenko at all?"
"That is the question, isn't it?" I agreed, looking at my watch. Morse had had five minutes alone with Penny. That was plenty. "Let's go find out."
We left the room, walking past the two server Spiders Morse had apparently shanghaied into guarding me. Bayta led the way down a corridor to one of the private conference rooms adjoining the stationmaster's office. Again we brushed past a couple of Spiders and went inside.
Penny was seated in one of the chairs, her head bowed, her eyes on the floor in front of her. Morse was half sitting, half leaning against the table beside her, a standard posture for giving the interrogator intimidating height over the subject. Both of them looked up as Bayta and I entered. Penny with a look of defiance-flavored trepidation, Morse with completely unadulterated annoyance. "What the bloody hell are you doing here?" he demanded. "I told you to stay—"
"Ms. Auslander, my name is Frank Compton," I introduced myself, ignoring Morse. "One question: what was it your friend Pyotr wanted you to do?"
The sheer unexpectedness of the question brought Morse's budding tirade to a halt. "What?" he asked.
"Ms. Auslander?" I prompted. "You and Pyotr were discussing something before we arrived. What was it?"
She was staring at me like something that had just crawled out of a fishbowl and quoted Nietzsche. "He wanted me to go home with him," she said. "I mean, not with him—just go back to Earth and forget the ski trip and whatever the problem was with my ticket."
Morse heaved himself off the desk and took a step toward me. "Compton. if you're not out of here in five seconds—"
"And you discussed this in the waiting room?" I asked Penny. "In full earshot of anyone who happened to pass by?"
Penny's expression was starting to slide into sudden horror. "My God." she breathed. "Are you saying—? Oh, no. God. no."
I looked at Morse, silently inviting him to renew his rant. But he just stood there, a grim look on his face. "I'm afraid so," I confirmed, looking back at Penny. "Someone wants to find your friend Mr. Stafford, and he's counting on you to help him do that. The last thing he wants is for you to turn around and go back home."
"And he killed Pyotr for that?"
"Your boyfriend is very important to him," I said.
The girl took a deep, shuddering breath. "Not boyfriend," she corrected quietly. "Fiancé."
I looked at Morse, noting his complete lack of reaction. Apparently, that was one of the tidbits on his private data chip. "All the more reason we need to get to him first," I told Penny. "Will you help us?"
She dropped her gaze to the floor again. Clearly, the fact that her fiancé's pursuer was willing to play rough had all sorts of potentially unpleasant ramifications for her safety as well as Stafford's. If their engagement had been made in some boardroom instead of heaven she would probably be seriously rethinking the whole thing right now. "What do you want me to do?" she asked at last.
"You can start by telling us exactly what you've heard from Mr. Stafford in the past two weeks," Morse said.
Penny shrugged, a nervous hunching of her shoulders. The haughty young woman in the waiting room who'd demanded to know what had taken us so long had vanished, replaced by someone a little vulnerable, a little scared, and way more human. I definitely liked this version better. "He sent me a message about a week and a half ago telling me he'd found a great new resort on the north side of Carvlis Fang and that I should get a group together to come join him."
"Don't you all have classes?" I asked. "I thought you were students."
Penny shook her head. "We all graduated last semester."
"Except for Mr. Stafford, of course," Morse murmured.
"He's not what you all think," Penny snapped, some of her earlier fire flaring out again. Her lips quirked, her eyes dropping away from Morse's. "Anyway, he's doing an independent study on alien sociology this semester. He can travel as much as he wants."
Or at least, as much as he wanted up to the limit of his parents' bank account and patience. "So you collected the gang and headed out," I said. "I presume you were supposed to call him once you got to Ian-apof?"
Penny nodded. "Only this griggle with my ticket came up and I couldn't transfer trains." She gave me an accusing look. "Only I gather it wasn't just a griggle, was it?"
"Meanwhile, Mr. Gerashchenko volunteered to stay behind and keep you company," I said, ignoring the question. "And then tried to get you to go back to Earth."
"Could he have been hoping to steal you away from Mr. Stafford?" Morse suggested.
"No," Penny said, the fire gone again with the fresh reminder of Gerashchenko's violent death. "I don't know. Maybe. If he was, it wouldn't have worked." She blinked a couple of fresh tears from her eyes. "It takes more than a few hours alone with someone, you know."
I felt my breath catch in my throat. A few hours …"I suppose that depends on the person." I said, keeping my voice casual. "Excuse me a minute."
I touched Bayta's arm and backed out of the room. She followed, a puzzled look on her face. "Is that all you needed?" she asked.
"No, but the rest can wait," I said. "Right now, we need a train. A fast one."
"The next express to Ian-apof—"
"Faster than an express," I cut her off. "I need something that can gain five or six hours over the distance between here and Jurskala. We need to catch Penny's original Quadrail, the express Morse was heading for back on Terra Station when he got clobbered."
"What for?"
I looked at the door we'd just come through. Morse might already be on his way to find out the reason for my sudden retreat. "Because the Hawk the Modhri stole from Bellis is on that train."
Bayta's eyes had just enough time to widen in shock; and then, right on cue, the door opened and Morse strode through, a suspicious glint in his eyes. "Our company suddenly not good enough for you?" he demanded.
"Bayta and I need to get moving," I told him. "Good luck with your investigation. I trust you can take care of Ms. Auslander?"
"I thought you wanted in on this," Morse said.
"I thought you didn't want me."
"I don't," he said. "But as far as I'm concerned, you're still under suspicion of murder. Of six murders, now, actually. I don't intend to let you out of my sight for the foreseeable future."
It was basically the response I'd expected. It was also the one I'd wanted. If the Modhri wanted Penny in on the hunt for Stafford, I didn't want her out of my sight, either. "I don't have time to argue the point," I said, trying for the right combination of chagrin and resignation. "Ba
yta thinks she can get us a train that'll get us to Jurskala ahead of Penny's friends."
"That's impossible," he said, frowning. "They're on an express."
"Bayta thinks she can get something faster."
He gave Bayta a long, speculative look. "All right, I'll play," he said. "Just make sure it has enough seats for the four of us. You think Ms. Auslander's friends can help us find Stafford?"
"Multiple heads are usually better than one."
"Maybe." He grunted. "I'm not looking forward to telling them about Gerashchenko's death."
"I'm sure your natural tact will carry the day," I assured him. "Why don't you get Ms. Auslander's luggage together and we'll meet you outside."
"Just make sure you're still there when we arrive," he warned, and disappeared back into the room.
I started to head the opposite direction, but was brought up short by Bayta's grip on my arm. "Frank, the Hawk can't be on that Quadrail," she insisted. "The Spiders checked the records, and those Bellidos are still on their original train."
"The Bellidos are; the Hawk isn't," I said. "They transferred it to another walker team at Terra."
"But that doesn't make sense," she protested. "I thought the Modhri trapped us on Helvanti Station so that that group could get ahead of us."
"Right, but they can't outrun a message cylinder," I said. "If the walkers hadn't switched at Terra, we could have easily gotten word to someone ahead of them before the next major station and arranged an ambush. What sidelining us incommunicado at Helvanti did was make it impossible for us to keep track of where the Hawk was."
"But why would he put it on Ms. Auslander's train?"
"I doubt he even knew Ms. Auslander was aboard," I said. "I think he just wanted an express that would get the Hawk to Nemuti space in a timely manner, but not on an obvious straight-line path. The Jurskala-to-Ian-apof line fits that description perfectly."
"So do six to ten others."
"But none of them was the train Morse was heading for when he was clobbered."
That one stopped her. "What?" she asked, frowning.
"Think about it," I said. "If all the Modhri wanted was to get hold of Morse's data chips—or, rather, to get hold of my data chip—a simple trip plus maybe a light blow to the head would have done the trick. But instead, he hauled off and really walloped the guy. Why take that kind of risk unless he was desperate to keep Morse—and us—off that particular train?"
"Maybe his goal was to keep us from connecting with Ms. Auslander."
I shook my head. "He had three hours to figure out a countermove while she was sitting here complaining to Gerashchenko in the waiting room," I reminded her. "He certainly would have figured out we were the ones who'd snafued her schedule, and that we were on our way. But he didn't do anything, except make sure Gerashchenko couldn't talk her into going home. In fact, my guess is that he's pleased we're joining forces."
"He'll be watching us, of course."
"As long as that's all he does, I don't mind."
She gave me a slightly strained look. "I'll see what the Spiders can do."
"And tell them to hurry," I said. "The Modhri mind segment here will be sending a message ahead. It would be nice to be in position before the segment on the Quadrail gets the message and dumps the Hawk somewhere else."
I had envisioned some kind of sleek, private train out of a dit rec western or EuroUnion drama, perhaps not as luxurious as a Halkan Peerage car but at least to the level of the standard Quadrail compartment car.
The outside, at least, was a serious disappointment.
"You are joking," Morse said as a pair of conductor Spiders escorted us across the last of the passenger tracks toward the short train that had been readied for us. "Looks like a cattle car."
"It's called a tender," Bayta told him, a little stiffly. "It's the only thing the Spiders could put together on short notice."
"Looks like a pushmi-pullyu," Penny commented, sounding as doubtful as Morse did. "What's that?" Bayta asked.
"A legendary animal from an old dit rec musical," Penny explained. "It had a head at both ends."
I gave the girl points—that was indeed exactly what our new transport looked like. It consisted of three windowless Quadrail cars with a small engine at each end facing opposite directions. "What are these things used for?" I asked Bayta.
"They carry drones, drudges, and repair equipment," she said. "There's an engine on either end so they can go wherever they need to without first having to go to a station or siding to turn around."
"I hope you reminded the Spiders that we need air to breathe," Morse said. "Not to mention food and water and rest facilities. Even a regular Quadrail takes over three days to get to Jurskala—this one's not likely to be any faster."
"It's probably faster than it looks," I offered. In fact, I knew it was. The loop gantries on the two end cars extended at least two meters higher than the standard Quadrail. Since a train's speed was determined by how close the closest bit of matter was to the Coreline's quantum thread, this thing could probably do close to double the usual light-year-per-minute if it wanted to.
Assuming that the wheels and structural integrity could handle such speeds, of course. Still, even a modest percentage gain should give us what we needed.
The Spiders ushered us to the center of the three cars, where my original trust in our hosts was fully vindicated. Inside, the car was set up like a double first-class passenger compartment, though without the extendable dividing wall between the sections or the mirror-imaged curve couches that were normally built into that wall.
There were a few other alterations, as well. Instead of the usual overbed luggage racks there was another permanently fixed bunk, giving us upper and lower berths on both ends of the car. There was also only a single half-bath cubicle instead of the usual pair that a double compartment would have, with the space that had been thus freed up given over to a food prep/storage area.
"Interesting," Morse said, setting down his carrybags and making a quick circuit of the car. "Looks like some kind of prototype."
"It's not decorated as nicely as the standard compartment," Penny seconded. "No privacy, either."
"Obviously, you've never ridden third class," I said.
"We'll give you all the privacy we can, Ms. Auslander," Morse said. "It's only for a couple of days."
"I was thinking about Bayta," Penny said, lifting her eyebrows at Bayta. "She seems more uptight about things than I am."
Bayta's face darkened a little. "I can handle it, thank you," she said coolly.
For another few seconds the two women eyed each other. Then Penny shrugged and headed toward the rear of the car. "Fine," she said. "Dibs on the lower bed."
TEN :
The trip to Jurskala took just under two and a half days, and was every bit as awkward as it had looked going in.
The lack of privacy turned out to be not as big a problem as I'd feared. The problem of showers, more specifically the dis- and re-robing before and afterward, was solved by dousing the lights during the process. The food was decent enough, too, though for the life of me I couldn't figure out where it was from. My eventual best guess was that it was cuisine from the other end of the galaxy, Shorshian or Filiaelian delicacies that I'd never run across before.
The problem wasn't with the accommodations. The problem was Morse and Penny.
Somewhere midway through the first day Penny apparently got over the initial shock of Gerashchenko's death and started wondering what exactly had happened to him. Unfortunately, Morse got to her with his version of the story before I could get to her with mine.
It created an instant bias that no amount of subsequent explanation or damage control was able to alleviate. The sleeping arrangements, which had started out with Penny and Bayta at one end and Morse and me at the other, changed abruptly after the first night as Penny silently but firmly moved to Morse's end of the car.
After that, the whole thing took on a distinct Us Versus
Them flavor. Morse and Penny would sit together on the lower bunk on their side of the car, facing each other from opposite ends and having quiet, earnest conversations. Every time I tried to penetrate the invisible wall they'd built around them all talk abruptly ceased and two pairs of studiously neutral eyes followed my every move until I retreated back to my half of the car.
They didn't think any better of Bayta, either because of her association with me or her mysterious influence with the Spiders.
Bayta spent most of the trip sleeping. I whiled away the hours lounging on my bunk and gazing at the earnest conversations going on at the far end, wondering what useful secrets they might be trading back and forth.
Still, I had some hard thinking to do. A little peace and quiet was just fine.
Besides, it wasn't as if Bayta and I didn't have a few secrets of our own.
I'd told Bayta I wanted to reach Jurskala at least half an hour before the train carrying the Hawk. She and the Spider driving the tender did me one better, getting us into the station nearly an hour ahead of Penny's friends.
"We have seats in the first of the first-class cars," Bayta informed me as we worked our way through the mostly Jurian crowd toward our platform. Now that the tension of Penny's presence was gone, she was back to her usual cool, competent self. "That's all I could get."
"Any chance of switching later to a compartment?" I asked.
"Two of the members of Ms. Auslander's group have compartments which they'll be leaving at Ian-apof," Bayta said. "They're not connected, though. The stationmaster's still pulling the records for the other compartments. He'll let me know if he spots a double becoming available."
"You okay with open seats?"
"I'll manage," she said. "Ian-apof is only two days' journey away."
It was a little more than that, actually, but I wasn't about to quibble. "Fine," I said. "What about Morse and Penny?"
"Mr. Morse didn't want me making their arrangements," Bayta said, a slight flush coming into her cheeks. "I told the stationmaster to reserve seats in our car for them in case it fills up before they reach the ticket counter."
