“She left this morning, yeah.” Dan walked up close to the agency chief. “You know my dad was planning to go with her. It would take something damn serious to—”
“Sit down, Dan.”
Dan sat on the edge of a chair facing the desk. “Is he dead?”
“I have no idea what shape he and Gomez are in,” Bascom answered. “We know they took off for Brasilia three days ago.” He spread his hands wide. “That’s the last anybody’s heard.”
“But what are you doing about—”
“I already told you that I’ve sent ops to Rio to find out what happened.”
“But they haven’t, have they, learned a damn thing?”
“Not thus far,” admitted Bascom.
“That girl—Jean Marie Sparey. Doesn’t she know anything?”
Sitting back, Bascom steepled his stubby fingers. “I’m inclined to think she does,” he said. “The only trouble is—we can’t find the little lady.”
“But she’s in that damn hospital—dying.”
“So we thought. In fact, I shed several sincere tears over the sad vidtape she sent along.”
“Where is she?”
“Not in the São Jose Private Hospital in Rio de Janeiro,” answered the agency head. “Jean Marie isn’t there anymore—nor are the three medics, one human and two andies, who were allegedly looking after her. The hospital officials claim they have no notion of where they all went. Miss Sparey and crew were last seen on the morning of the day your dad and Gomez left Rio.”
“Then she must’ve been faking. She set my father and Gomez up.”
“It could mean that, it could mean that she was kidnapped to keep her from talking to us,” he said. “My ops have also found out, which does little to cheer me, that most of the other people whom Jake and Gomez talked to down there are also among the missing.”
“Damn it.” Dan got to his feet. “This whole case was just some kind of dodge. A plan to kill them.”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe? Good Christ, you know damn well that—”
“Easy, Dan. All I know for sure is that neither your dad nor Gomez has reported in for three days,” Bascom said. “We don’t have enough facts yet to speculate much.”
“There’s got to be something more we can do. Do right now.”
“Jake is a good man, so is Gomez. I’m still inclined to bet that if they’re in a mess, they can get themselves out,” the agency chief said. “You better head for home now. I’ll contact you soon as any news comes in.”
Dan stood, hesitant, for a moment. “Okay,” he said finally, turning away and leaving the office.
15
JAKE WAS WAITING FOR Beth in Berlin.
It was on the morning after she arrived in the city that they met. A cold grey morning filled with heavy rain.
Beth, accompanied by Agents Neal and Griggs, had just stepped free of an IDCA land-car near the side entrance to the World Drug Court on Potsdamerplatz.
There were ten armed guards, human and robot, lining each side of the long passway from the curb to the narrow entry gate. All around them, huddling under dark umbrellas, a small crowd of curious onlookers had gathered.
Beth was only a few steps from the car when she saw Jake.
He was pushing his way through the bystanders, waving, trying to attract her attention. “Beth!” he called, grinning his familiar grin. “Thought for awhile I wasn’t going to make it.”
“Jake!” Her smile turned into a pleased laugh. She pulled free of the grip of Agent Griggs, ran the fifteen feet to where he stood. “My god, what happened to you?”
“Long story.”
A uniformed Berlin policeman was standing between Jake and the young woman, warning him back with his drawn stungun.
“It’s all right, officer,” she said. “He’s okay. I know him. Please, stand aside.”
“I’m sorry, Miss Kittridge.” He held out his free hand and gently pushed her back.
“Jake, I was so damned worried,” she said around the cop. “Where were you?”
“Gomez and I ran into some extra trouble. Tell you about it later. You okay?”
“I’m fine—now.” Using her elbow, she started to nudge the officer out of the way.
“Beth, wait a minute.” Agent Neal had come trotting over. He reached out to grab her.
“Oh, really, Emmett.” She eluded him, pushed around the policeman. She put her arms around Jake. “I’m so glad—”
There was an enormous explosion.
16
IT WAS A SMALL town on the edge of the vast forest. Just a scatter of low buildings and a couple of streets sitting, there in the bright morning sunlight.
Jake spotted the cafe first. “They ought to have a vidphone there,” he said, leaving the jungle trail and starting for it.
Gomez, limping some, followed Jake onto the dusty street. “I’m hoping they can also provide food and beverages,” he said. “After living off the land for several days, I’m ready for—”
“Beth must be in Berlin by now,” said Jake, hurrying, his footfalls stirring up dust. “I’ll have to contact the IDCA office there to find out where she’s staying.”
“If we call Cosmos first, Bascom will know what—”
“Rather do it my way, Sid.”
The cafe had a rickety verandah running along its front. The name of the place, judging by the single word scrawled on the window in milky paint, was LIMAO’S.
Jake went running up the shaky wooden steps, pushed through the lopsided swing doors.
There were only three people in the dining room, plus a sleeping dog and a very old parrot.
The two customers were at separate tables and the waiter, a gaunt man in white trousers and a tattered polka dot shirt, was leaning against a crooked wooden pillar. They were all watching a dirt-smeared vidwall screen.
Jake was about to ask where the phone was, when Beth appeared on the screen.
It was footage taken a few months earlier at a conference in San Francisco. She was smiling, making her way into a meeting hall, politely refusing to answer any questions about the Kittridge anti-Tek system.
A newsman, speaking Portuguese, started to explain.
Jake couldn’t make out every word, but he got most of them.
“ ... Beth Kittridge was twenty seven when she ... death ... this morning ... in Berlin ... ”
Everything around him seemed to fade away, to vanish from the room. There was only Jake, feeling suddenly very cold, and the images on the wall.
As he watched, the wall showed him Beth getting out of a landcar in Berlin that morning. Agent Neal was with her and Agent Griggs.
Jake seemed to be there, too. At the edge of the small surrounding crowd, working his way closer to Beth.
He sensed what was going to happen. “No—it’s a kamikaze!” he warned.
But Beth didn’t pay any attention to him. She shook free of Griggs. She dodged Neal. She pushed by the German cop.
“No!” shouted Jake.
She put her arms around the other Jake, started to kiss him.
Then came the explosion and she ...
Jake turned away. He couldn’t watch that.
“That’s a damn shame,” observed the gaunt waiter.
“And what a waste,” chuckled a fat man who was having sausage for breakfast. “A nice piece like that.”
Jake went charging over to him. He grabbed the fat man’s shirt front, jerked him out of his chair.
He didn’t say anything, simply started punching the man in the face as hard as he could.
Gomez got hold of him in a bear hug from behind. “Jake, c’mon! Leave the guy alone.”
“Bastard.” Jake tried to keep hitting at the fat bloody face.
Tugging harder, his partner dragged him clear. “Not his fault.”
Jake tore free of Gomez, staggered, stumbled. He sat down in a wooden chair. “They killed her,” he said slowly. “Bastards killed Beth.”
“Yeah.�
��
Jake leaned far forward, put his hands out flat on his knees. Very quietly he started to sob. “That’s what this was all about,” he said in a voice that was not quite his.
17
THE RIO HOTEL ROOM started talking to Gomez at a few minutes before 8 A.M. the next morning.
“Bom dia, senhor,” said the wallspeaker near the head of his floating bed. “There is a visitor in the lobby who desires to come up to your suite.”
Blinking a few times, yawning once, Gomez elbowed himself into a sitting position. “Oh, so?” he managed to say.
“Sim. His name is Dan Cardigan.”
“Oh, then you don’t want me. Contact Jake Cardigan in the other bedroom.” He started to stretch out again.
“We’ve already tried Senhor Cardigan’s room. There was no answer. Do you wish us to detain the young man down here until—”
“That’s okay, send the lad on up.” Sitting on the edge of the bed, Gomez rubbed his eyes, tried a few yawns and then, reluctantly, left the wide oval bed.
He and Jake had been out until near 3 A.M., asking questions all over Rio, trying to get a lead on the present whereabouts of Jean Marie Sparey. They’d had no luck whatsoever, even with the other Cosmos operatives Bascom had sent down helping them.
He located his clothes where he’d discarded them a few hours earlier. When the door announced a visitor, Gomez was dressed and nearly wide awake.
“Good morning, amigo,” he said, letting Dan in.
“Don’t lecture me about coming here,” requested the young man. “I got a special leave from the academy, so I’m not in trouble. When I talked to my dad on the phone yesterday afternoon—Well, I thought he might need me down here.”
“Good idea.” Gomez led him into the living room.
Glancing around, Dan asked, “Where is he?”
Gomez crossed to the door of Jake’s room and knocked. He waited a half a minute before opening the door. “The answer to your inquiry, Daniel, is somewhere other than here.”
Hurrying over, Dan looked into the empty room. “He didn’t even sleep in the bed.”
“He must’ve sneaked away after I turned in.”
“Where to?”
Shrugging, Gomez turned away. “Probably wanted to follow up on something.”
Dan caught his arm. “That’s not what you really think, is it, Sid?”
Facing him, Gomez attempted to look guileless. “Eh?”
“You figure he’s probably off at some damn Tek house. The shock of Beth’s death has—”
“I don’t figure anything, lad.” He nodded toward a sofa. “Sit yourself down.”
“Don’t feel like sitting. He blames himself for her death, doesn’t he?”
Gomez nodded. “That he does, sí.”
“But he couldn’t have known that—”
“He thinks he should’ve tumbled earlier that this was just a flimflam to get him out of the way.”
“But why would they go through all this trouble? What I mean is, if they didn’t want him to be around to protect Beth—why not just try to kill him?”
Shaking his head, Gomez said, “We’re not talking about efficiency and logic here, my boy. These guys, whoever worked this one out, wanted to kill Beth, sure. But they also wanted to hurt Jake. See, revenge is sometimes much more fun if your victim is around to suffer.”
“You’re saying they didn’t want to kill him?”
“Exactly, Daniel. Because they know blaming himself for her death is going to hurt him one hell of a lot.”
“They really must hate him.”
“That they do. They wanted Beth out of the way, but this was also an act of vengeance against Jake.”
Dan walked over to the blanked windows. “He didn’t tell me much on the phone,” he said. “What exactly happened to you guys after Brasilia?”
“When we got way out in the wilds, to a place known as Fazenda Cinca, we encountered a powerful disabling generator. They’d set it up in one of the old buildings. Soon as we flew within range, the damn thing killed our skycar. Knocked out the engine, the communication system, even the nearcaf machine. It cooked our pocketphones, too. Jake managed to crash land safely, but we were completely stranded and cut off in the middle of the woods.”
“So you did what?”
“Hiked back to civilization—or to a near approximation thereof,” answered the detective. “We lived off the supplies we salvaged from our skycar. When those ran out, we dined on woodland produce and game. That was a challenge, too, since even our stunguns had been rendered defunct.”
“Well, all right,” said Dan, nodding. “Now we have to go out and find my father.”
“No, we have to order breakfast first.”
“I’m not up to—”
“I am, however,” Gomez assured him. “After that, you’ll remain here watching the vidwall or playing with the viewindow. I’ll go out and—”
“But something could happen to him while you’re dawdling.”
“They’re not going to kill him, Dan. Not for awhile. They’re still enjoying watching him suffer.”
He walked over to the vidphone and buzzed room service.
Beth wasn’t dead.
When Jake reached the cottage high in the Berkeley hills, she was there.
None of the IDCA agents was around, though. The security robot wasn’t at his post either.
That bothered Jake and before taking Beth in his arms he asked, “How come no guards? That’s not smart.”
She laughed, slipping her arms around him and kissing him on the cheek. “The Teklords think I’m dead.”
“Sure, but even so—”
“Relax, darling. You really worry too much.”
“After what happened in Berlin, I—”
“But that wasn’t me, Jake. It was just an android dupe,” Beth explained, hugging him.
“What about Agent Neal? He was killed, too.”
“Another andy.”
“You should’ve told me what you were planning.”
“I tried, but couldn’t reach you.”
“My fault there, yeah. I let them sucker me out into the middle of nowhere.”
“But it’s all right, Jake. There was no real harm done.”
Jake held her tightly, aware of the warmth of her. “When I saw you die, it was like—”
“I didn’t die, darling. I’m right here.” She kissed him.
After a moment he said, “You know, Beth, there are a lot of things I never got around to telling you. About how much I love you, how much you’ve changed my life.”
“I’m aware of all that,” she assured him, laughing gently. “There are better ways than words for expressing feelings like those.”
“Sometimes, though, it’s important to say things right out,” he said. “From here on I’m going to try.”
“I’m quite content with you the way you are.”
“Well, maybe I’m not. So humor me, huh?”
She smiled. “Okay.” She stepped back from him, then reached out to take hold of his right hand in both of hers. “I’ll be forthright with you right now—let’s go into the bedroom.”
“That’s a good idea.”
But there was someone in the bed.
She sat up, giggling, when Jake crossed the threshold. “Hi, Uncle Jake.”
Jake, angry, pulled away from Beth to go walking over to Jean Marie Sparey. “What are you doing here?”
“Beth and I are old friends. Didn’t she tell you?”
He turned to Beth. “This girl set me up.”
“No, I didn’t, Uncle Jake. Get in bed now and we’ll explain everything. Won’t we, Beth?”
Jake shook his head. “This isn’t what I ordered. Jean Marie isn’t supposed to be here at all.”
Beth came over, smiling, and mussed his hair. “Don’t pout, Jake. It makes you look so old.”
“Everything is wrong. I’m supposed to be in control.”
“Shit,” said Jean Mari
e, “you don’t control a damn thing anymore, Uncle Jake.”
“That’s right,” seconded Beth. “Not. even your Tek dreams, dear.”
“No!” shouted Jake at the two women. “You’re not—”
“Welcome back, amigo.”
Jake blinked, took a gasping breath. He was back in the dimlit private cubicle of the Tek joint. Sitting in the ancient fat armchair again, hooked up to a Brainbox.
“You’re a pretty good detective,” he told his partner.
“You weren’t that hard to find.” Gomez was leaning against a dirty pink wall.
“Sermon coming?”
“Nope. Soon as you’re through feeling sorry for yourself, though, we can head back for the hotel,” he said. “Dan’s there.”
“How the hell did he—”
“He was concerned about you,” Gomez told him. “Kid got the notion you might crack under the stress and do something dumb. Dan arranged a special leave and hopped down here.”
“I’m not back on Tek, Sid.”
“Sure, sí. And this isn’t even a Tek parlor and that’s not a Brainbox you’ve got your cabeza hooked up to.”
Jake yanked the electrodes off his head. “I mean this was just a one-shot thing.”
His partner said, “That makes, I think, the third time you’ve told me that lately.”
“God damn it! She’s dead!” Jake got up, swaying, clenching his fists.
“That’s absolutely true, amigo. And Beth is just as dead now as she was before you started frying your fucking brains with that stuff.”
“You don’t know what I was going through,” Jake told him. “Nobody does.”
“That’s right, sure, because you’re the only hombre on Earth who ever lost someone before he was ready for it,” said Gomez. “C’mon, amigo, and wake up. That’s what being alive is about, learning how to lose things you think you can’t live without.”
“Didn’t you promise no sermons?”
“This ain’t a sermon. It’s a lecture—and I’m getting as tired of it as you must be.”
Jake sighed out a breath. “Okay, okay,” he said. “I tend to fall back on Tek when things get too rough. Does Dan know where I am?”
“He’s got a pretty fair idea.”
“I’ll tell him what I did,” decided Jake. “No use lying.”
Tek Vengeance Page 6
