“But then she must have found out something negative about Bennett?”
“Yes. Though I am of course merely guessing.”
“Why did she go away?”
“She did say that she wanted very much to get away by herself for a while, away from under the eyes of the McCays. Nancy felt she needed time to work things out. I had the impression she wasn’t certain what to do about whatever it was that she’d learned.”
Dan rested both elbows on the tabletop. “Okay, but when I talked to you before, Jill, you told me you had no idea where she might’ve gone,” he said. “But now you do?”
“I’ve been turning things over in my mind, trying to come up with some memory that might help.” She leaned forward. “Just today I recalled that Nancy told me—oh, quite soon after we’d met at school—that a friend of hers, an American girl whom she’d known at home, had been living in England. This friend had decided to run away and was hiding out in one of the wilder sections of London.”
“Did Nancy tell you who this girl was and where she was living?”
“Yes, since the friend had apparently communicated with her once or twice. It’s a section of London that’s ruled by street gangs.”
“Can you tell me where to find the girl?”
Nodding, Jillian took a slip of paper from her tunic pocket. “I’ve written down all that I remembered, Daniel,” she said slowly. “I find, I’m afraid, that I’m simply not brave enough to go to the authorities directly with this. Since you’re a close friend of Nancy’s with a father who’s a detective, perhaps you can see that this information gets to the proper people. It may not be worth anything, but I felt I must confide in someone.”
“I’ll handle it.” Dan reached across to take the slip of paper from her.
“Nancy has very romantic and naive notions about what life is like in that part of London,” Jillian said. “If she thinks of it as a refuge for confused young women, she’s in for a rude awakening. The kid gangs that—” She paused, looking into his face, and frowning. “Surely, Daniel, you’re not thinking of going in there after her yourself?”
He rose up. “Thanks for passing this information along, Jill,” he said. “I’ll be in touch.”
“It’s really too dangerous. You simply can’t go there.”
“Yes, I can,” he said and left.
15
THE SCOTLAND YARD ROBOTS were extremely polite to Jake.
There were two of them, big gunmetal bots wearing plaid overcoats and bowler hats. When Jake hit the platform at the London subtrain station, they were waiting close to the spot where his compartment had come to a stop.
Tipping their hats in unison, they both stepped into his path. “Mr. Cardigan, isn’t it?” inquired the one on the left.
“Yeah, it is.”
They both pointed to their metallic foreheads. Small plates in each skull slid silently aside to reveal tiny viewscreens. On each appeared authenticated copies of their police credentials. After allowing sufficient time for Jake to read the material, the panels snapped shut.
“We trust, sir, that you enjoyed a pleasant journey from the continent?” inquired the one on the right.
“Trip wasn’t bad,” admitted Jake. “And I appreciate Scotland Yard’s sending you down to inquire. Now I’ll bid you farewell.”
“If you wouldn’t mind, Mr. Cardigan,” requested the one on the left in deferential tones, “we’d be most gratified were you to accompany us.”
“Haven’t got the time, fellas.”
The one on the right said, “Perhaps if we were to explain the current statutes applying to formal requests for an interview, sir?”
“Yes, that might be a jolly good idea,” seconded the one on the left.
“I know,” cut in Jake. “You have the right to use a stungun on me if I don’t come along willingly. That’s a dimwit law, by the way.”
“Ah, but then, sir, we merely carry out the laws as they are written.” The robot on the right adjusted his bowler hat on his round metal head. “You are not, please understand, being arrested, nor are we implying in any manner or form that you might perhaps be a wrongdoer.”
“Not at all. We are simply inviting you to step around to the Yard, Mr. Cardigan.”
“To see who?”
“Our Inspector Beckford.”
“Beckford,” said Jake with a definite lack of respect.
“You’re acquainted with the inspector, I believe.”
“I know Becky,” admitted Jake. “He is, to use a technical term, a first-class jerk. Really, fellas, there’s absolutely no good reason why—”
“Since you’re familiar not only with Inspector Beckford, but with British law in all its richness and complexity, Mr. Cardigan,” said the robot on the right, “you must be aware that if you dawdle and stall much longer, we’ll be compelled to stun you and transport you to the Yard in a medivan.”
“Right, sure,” said Jake. “Okay, I may as well go there conscious.”
“Come along this way, sir.” The one on the left got a firm grip on Jake’s arm.
“We appreciate your spirit of cooperation, sir.” The one on the right took hold of Jake’s other arm. “Off we go to Scotland Yard.”
Gomez was lying again.
He was doing it while guiding his rented landcar through the crowded lower-level streets of Paris, glancing now and then at the vidscreen implanted in the dash.
An angry Natalie Dent was glaring at him on the screen. “But you weren’t at your darn hotel or anywhere in the vicinity,” she said accusingly. “It seems to me that when you make a date to meet someone for lunch, Gomez, you either ought to show up at the preordained spot or make other arrangements.”
“Chiquita, I left a message for you at the desk.”
“There wasn’t anybody at the desk except some nitwit robot chef who claimed he was filling in because the clerks were off taking a strike vote.”
“Nat, had not a sudden important situation come up, we’d be lunching right this minute in some ritz bistro and exchanging important info.”
“Where are you?” the red-haired reporter asked pointedly.
“En route to the American Embassy,” he assured her. “It’s a routine check of my travel papers.”
“That doesn’t, if you’ll pardon my mentioning it, sound like anything very serious to me, Gomez.”
“Not to you, not to me, sí, but to the embassy it is.”
“It seems to me that a man with your gall could simply have told them you had a lunch date.”
“It isn’t Cosmos policy to ignore official requests like this.” Gomez turned his car onto a quirky lane. “Ah, but I see the embassy looming up ahead, so I must bid you a reluctant adiós.”
“What I’m seeing—and granted I’m only getting a somewhat cockeyed view of what the phonecam is seeing over your droopy shoulder and out the dingy back window of that clunky vehicle you’re joyriding around in, but what I’m seeing looks an awful lot like the neighborhood down along the Seine. Where your present client happens to live. The embassy, on the other hand, is way over on—”
“Es verdad,” admitted the detective as he drove into a parking area. “But actually I’m meeting the ambassador himself down here. Don’t know why I said embassy, I meant I saw the ambassador looming up. It’s his custom, pobrecita, to take a stroll along the river after lunch.”
“How can you handle paperwork while strolling along the river?”
“I asked him the very same question, Nat, and he replied, ‘You simply have to trust your government, Mr. Gomez.’ I must rush off now.”
“I’m not the sort of person who likes to issue dire warnings,” said Natalie on the phonescreen. “But, Gomez, you darn well better get together with me before the sun sets on another day and be prepared to share some facts about the Bouchon killing with me. Otherwise my seldom-seen vindictive side will work out some very unpleasant consequences.”
“We’ll meet later in the day,” he promise
d, unbuckling his safety gear.
“Where? When?”
“Ah, those are excellent reporter questions, Nat. I’ll phone and set up a meeting,” he said. “Adiós.” He clicked off the phone, dived out of the car.
Their client had contacted him a half hour earlier and told him it was important that she see him at once. That was—well, it was one of the reasons anyway—why Gomez had ditched Natalie Dent.
He went hurrying out of the parking area, slowing only to grab the chit that came out of the slot in the chest of the mechanical attendant.
When he got to the gangway leading up to Madeleine Bouchon’s houseboat, there was no sign of the chrome-plated guard-bot. Not even his wrought-iron chair was there. Poking his tongue into his cheek, Gomez scanned the area along the river. A few plump pigeons were strutting on the imitation cobblestones. An android was sitting under a tree playing the accordion.
Uneasy, but unable to pinpoint anything else out of the ordinary beyond the absence of the guard, Gomez started slowly up the gangway. Less than halfway to the deck he noticed a beret floating down in the water. It looked a lot like the one the robot had tipped to them on their last visit.
He took a few more steps toward the boat, then noticed the wrought-iron chair underwater down in the river, its legs sticking up.
From the conservatory on the houseboat came the sudden cry of a woman in pain.
16
THERE WAS NOTHING IN Inspector Beckford’s large off-white office except the inspector, two off-white chairs, and Jake.
After dusting off the seat of his chair with a plyochief, the trim blond Beckford seated himself. “My associates tell me you alluded to me as a first-class jerk,” he said.
“I didn’t want to use stronger language in front of them,” said Jake. “I never like to see a robot blush. What exactly do you want?”
“They also stated that you referred to me as Becky.”
“Not a term of endearment.” Jake spun the chair around, sat straddling it.
“I prefer not to be called Becky, Cardigan.”
“Fine. Why am I here?”
“That’s precisely what I’m most anxious to learn,” Inspector Beckford told him. “What does bring you to London?”
“Personal business.”
“You may recall that I didn’t care for you when you were a California police officer and came poking around in London some years ago,” said the inspector. “I find I care for you even less now that you’re nothing more than a private investigator.”
Jake reflected. “I guess I dislike you about the same as I did back seven years ago. No more, no less.”
Beckford rested his hands on his knees, watching Jake. “This Unknown Soldier case is one I don’t want anyone interfering with,” he warned.
“Whoa now. You don’t have any jurisdiction in France.”
“Don’t try playing schoolboy games with me. You’re much too along in years to bring it off, Cardigan.”
Grinning, Jake asked, “There’s been a new killing, huh? Right here in England.”
“I assumed you already knew that. Isn’t that why you came over to England in such a rush?”
“No, it isn’t. Who’s the victim?”
“Senator Ainsworth. He was murdered outside the apartment of his current mistress,” answered the inspector. “His skycar pilot was only stunned. Ainsworth, of course, was killed by having his body quartered.”
“Do all the details match the other killings?”
Leaving his chair, Beckford slowly walked to the room’s solitary window. He stared out at the gray day. “The description of the killer matches, his method was the same.”
“But something’s bothering you?”
“I know you’ve been hired to look into the murder of Joseph Bouchon. Are there really any indications that he wasn’t a victim of the Unknown Soldier?”
“Some, yeah.”
The inspector returned to his chair. He dusted it again before reseating himself. “The note he left last night contained a variation.”
“Which was?”
“In addition to his usual message, he added a postscript. It consisted of one word—‘True.’ ”
“Which could mean,” said Jake, “that this was a true Unknown Soldier kill and not an imitation.”
“You’re thoroughly convinced, are you, that there are two separate killers?”
“There seem to be,” said Jake. “There’s the Unknown Soldier and there’s the copycat who did in Bouchon.”
Inspector Beckford said, “You give me your word that you aren’t in England to interfere in my investigation?”
“Until you told me, I didn’t even know there’d been a new killing.”
“Where are you staying?”
“The Crystal Palace Hotel.”
The inspector stood. “You may consider our interview at an end.”
Gomez recognized both of the goons who were standing in the conservatory, glaring down at the sprawled Madeleine Bouchon. They were the exact same lads who’d burst into Eddie Anguille’s room at the Hotel Algiers yesterday. In fact, the needlegun thrust in the belt of the larger of the two louts was probably the same one that had been used to shred the informer to tatters.
“What I really need right now,” the lurking detective said to himself, “is a diversion.”
He was crouched in the galley next to the conservatory, having snuck about the houseboat and slipped in there. He was watching the two husky men threaten Madeleine, his eye to the slit of the barely open door between the two rooms.
“You understand?” The one with the needlegun squatted next to the woman. “You better forget all about your husband’s murder, lady.”
His companion squatted, too, grabbing hold of her blonde hair. He yanked hard, jerking her head up clear of the carpeting. “All you got to remember is that the Unknown Soldier killed the bastard.”
Gomez overcame an impulse to go charging in there. He looked around and noticed Maurice, the serving robot, standing stiff in a shadowy corner of the galley. Quickly, quietly, he slid over to the robot and activated it.
“Oui? How may I be of—”
“Quiet, please,” urged the detective in a whisper. “What I want you to do, Maurice, is walk right into the conservatory and pretend those two lunks in there ordered drinks. Beer, I think, will be the best.”
“Monsieur, I fear I don’t exactly comprehend—”
“Just listen. You miss the glass and, making it look like an accident, you spritz beer into one of the guys’ faces. Then, acting flustered, you drop the glass on his foot. Do you think you can play a scene like that, Maurice old chum, without—”
“One hates to perform one’s duties in such a slovenly fashion.”
“Mrs. Bouchon is in danger. But you and I working as a team can save her.”
“Ah ... but in that case I am yours to command.” The robot rolled to the door, pushed it open, and went into the next room.
“Hey—who the hell are you?”
“Here is your beer, monsieur.”
“Aw, this ain’t the time for booze or ... Yikes!”
“Watch out, you stupid tincan, you shot it in his kisser and ... Ow! Don’t roll over my damn foot.”
Gomez entered then, stungun in hand.
He fired at the one with the needlegun.
The other lout was wiping beer off his face with a plyochief.
The other one had reached for the needlegun, but the stungun beam had hit him square in the chest before his fingers closed on the butt. He stiffened, executed a jerky shuffle off to his left, stumbled, went crashing into the glasswall of the big room.
The remaining goon noticed Gomez, through beer-blurred eyes, and grabbed for his lazgun.
“Nope.” Gomez shot him.
When the sizzling beam hit this one, he went swooping backwards. He flapped his arms for a moment, as though he had suddenly decided he knew how to fly. But he never got airborne. Instead he fell over with an impres
sive thud, bounced once, and lay still.
Tucking away his stungun, Gomez ran to Madeleine’s side, saying to the robot in passing, “You did a dandy job of distracting them, Maurice.”
“It was rather effective, oui.”
Kneeling, Gomez slid an arm around the blonde woman’s slim shoulders. “You all right, ma’am?”
“I’m not too bad. They’ve only been here a few moments.”
He helped her to stand. “From what I overheard, they’d like you to stop looking into your husband’s death.”
“We’ll keep on,” she said. “In fact, we have something important to take care of as soon as we can.”
17
SHOWERED AND CHANGED, JAKE stepped back into the living room of his hotel suite.
There was a lean, pale man sitting relaxedly up on his bed, smoking a potcig and casually rummaging through the contents of his suitcase. “These aren’t from the best shops, old man,” he observed, tossing two of Jake’s tunics back into the case. “But then, one supposes, even the best shops in Greater Los Angeles aren’t exactly what one would dub haute mode.”
“Lucky for you my stungun is sitting way over there on that table. Who are you?”
“It’s a wonder, you know, that you can still even fit yourself into some of these togs,” continued the lean, pale man. “You’re getting a trifle thick in the middle. I can’t, for the life of me, understand how Beth could describe you as—”
“Are you, possibly, Denis Gilford?”
“Certainly.” Gilford took a long, relaxed drag of his potcig. “One assumed you’d recognize one. My portrait, after all, does appear daily over my highly respected column in the FaxTimes.”
“Who let you in here?”
“Ah, I happen to be something of an amateur cracksman.” Flipping Jake’s suitcase shut, the reporter shoved it farther across the bed. “Having a gift for breaking and entering can aid one in one’s journalistic career.”
“Tell you what,” said Jake. “This meeting got going a little too informally for me. Suppose you get out of here now. If I decide I need your help, I’ll contact you.”
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