The Centauri Conspiracy

by G Russell Peterman

Chapter Eight

  Woll the Clone

  Two days later the elevator doors on the 28th floor opens and Bakman steps forward for a talk with Harry. Before him a surprised Duffy Bakman sees an old lady with long white hair wearing an ankle-length rose-colored dress decorated tastefully with small light-yellow flowers.

  The old lady is dressed as a proper housewife and smiles at him.

  Bakman smiles back. From her regular stead eye blinks Bakman is sure she is a mechanical, but he has never seen one with an old face before. Stepping forward and trying not to look obvious Bakman studies again the steady fifteen-second, four a minute, eye blink rate that gives away mechanicals. The only time their blink rate varies is on guard duty. There a mechanical only blinks once a half minute, a long five second one eye closing at a time blink to keep both of their eyes moist, a two eye blink twice a minute, and that is why usually two are teamed together to be watchful while the other is blinking. One eye use reduces some of their depth perception.

  Smiling warmly the old mechanical woman steps forward, offers her hand, and speaks in a soft pleasant voice. "Mister Duffy Bakman, I'm Mary."

  "Glad to meet you, Mary,” Bakman tells her shaking the offered small warm soft-feeling womanly hand.

  “I have an appointment with your husband."

  "Harry's expecting you, Mister Bakman."

  Mary smiles and turns to escort him back though the large apartment. As the old white-headed mechanical walks in front of him, her age-lined face turns often to look over her shoulder to see if Harry’s expected visitor is still following.

  On one of these face and shoulder turns Mary tells him, "Harry has been terribly grumpy all morning. I hope your visit will cheer him up."

  "I hope so too, Mary," answers Duffy Bakman as Mary turns into a room.

  Behind her Bakman enters and sees Harry OpDyke lying in a cranked up hospital type full-sized bed looking deathly pale. A feeble hand lifts in recognition as Mary smiles at Harry and turns to leave closing the door behind her.

  "My wife, Mary, died eleven years ago. I missed her, was lonely, so had a companion made to look and speak just like her."

  "I wasn't sure without a pink tunic."

  “A pink tunic on an old wrinkled face with white hair would be to lots of people some kind of vulgar joke. I wouldn't do that to my Mary's memory, besides this Mary is also my bodyguard. You know, Duffy, about mechanical bodyguard companions."

  A smiling Bakman nods.

  "On the stand beside my bed is our Old West Club contract. Read section 18, Duffy," Harry tells him.

  Stepping forward Duffy Bakman picks up the inch thick contract, flips pages, finds the asked for section, and reads section 18. Surprise spreads over Bakman’s face for the clause is Harry’s will leaving all his money and property to Duncan Gulihur “Duffy” Bakman.

  "My will filed with the city says the same thing. Wray and others know about it. When I die, you assume ownership of all my worldly-goods. I have no legal heirs. I've asked you here to make sure you know that Duffy . . . and to ask for a couple favors."

  "I never expected . . . Harry, what are the favors?"

  "All I ask is that you complete the project and look after Mary when I'm gone."

  "No problem on either one."

  "Good. I hope it's all right for me to have added to Mary’s program that Dee is her daughter and you are her son-in-law."

  "No problem. I'll tell Dee. She'll be pleased to gain a mother and a bodyguard."

  "How's our meeting going downstairs?"

  "Yesterday, several of them got mad at someone. One of them shouted, ‘If you do I'll cut off your fingers.’ After a few minutes of angry shouting back and forth they stopped short of shoving and went back to work. As things got moving and they each got deeper into their own areas of expertise, most of that seem to disappear. I think two or three more days will do it. The first real break came later that same afternoon when one of them asked Wray how he could get some information that he did not have. Information about the kind and thickness of radiation shielding on the spaceship the U.N. is building. Your section quickly supplied it and more. After that, everyone wanted something. Since then all ten have been keeping our information section very busy."

  "Good. First, we had to get our people organized."

  "When I arrived they had already collected information on a list of people. I was pleased, and it was easy to select what we needed. I went over assignments with Emmert Barbbre, my team leader. Tytan Rey Prizo has public relations. Point man Sullivan Traud will make contact with people we need. A knowledgeable science and medical writer Tonda Rog is on cloning. Morgana Burnap is planning the Old West Clubs. She will manage them too. Noble Maag is organizing our computer, mechanical, and programming needs. German Woodin and Millisen Algrin retired military are working on space travel and space ships. Ethan Dinnel with a photographic memory is my liaison with your team and will be available for missions to collect information we cannot gather by other means. And of course, you've met my chief of security and damage control Breen Seckeland."

  “Put that list in my Computer.”

  “Will do.”

  "Duffy, I was impressed by your team. You have a talent for finding the people you need; it's a talent a great number of people in administration don't have. Without it, an administrator has to be like a mother hen looking after a batch of baby chicks out in the middle of a busy Monday morning First Level Causeway. When you have to worry like that you don't get time to think or plan, and that's what you and I do. We think and plan."

  "Thanks Harry."

  "Duffy, I'm going to suggest a name . . . don't want to hurt your feelings."

  "Suggest away."

  "We are going to need someone that is outside the law. Someone that can and will get things done for us that we cannot do. A person that will not leave a trail of evidence behind that point’s straight back to us . . . Right!"

  "You’re right, Harry. I can think of at least a couple items we cannot buy. There will be more, I’m sure. Who did you have in mind?"

  "Woll the Clone."

  At the mention of New Dallas’ most wanted criminal Duffy Bakman smiles. "Harry, the police would like to get their hands on him . . . from what I hear the man is good at what he does. Most average men could retire comfortably on the city’s offered reward of four and a half million."

  "Tell Traud to go to the DeBartolo Building’s Maroon Room in the old lower southeast part of town at ten in the morning. It's under the Sixth Causeway in the bridgeworks. No one knows Woll owns it; he comes in mornings and leaves before twelve. The Maroon Room opens at ten for the soup and sandwich lunch trade and serves nothing stronger than juice, tea, or coffee until two-forty-five when the band and mechanical girl-dancers arrive. Woll's usually gone by eleven-thirty. The password to the bartender when ordering a cup of coffee is, "Pour me a hot curtain raiser."

  “Any special information we should know about."

  "Don't lowball him . . . pay him and he and his people will work for us. He will laugh at you if you tell him you will pay after the job or half before and half after. Do that and Traud might not get out of the Maroon Room alive. Just say we have work for him and hand him a book. Tell him about the million dollars. Explain that it’s his retainer fee and that you will talk to him after he verifies its real money and in his account. Make sure Woll knows we pay in advance and pay well. Have him meet you on the Sixth Level basement of this building tomorrow night. Take him down to a secret Seventh Level where my clone lab is located. Seckeland or Dee will show it to you before then. Let Woll look at the place so he can use it as a safe and secure drop-off location. Have him organize several Fertility Laboratory robbery teams and teams to move goods and people. The first book is for his planning and organizing costs nothing more. Also, tell him we pay a book a job, a million a job, and each robbery and each move is a separate job. He'll be glad to work for us and will do a good job."

  "Harry, I'd been wondering about that
end. I'm impressed with everything else, and I want to thank you for my companions . . . and for my pretty wife." Duffy Bakman grins.

  Harry tries to laugh but starts coughing when he tries to speak.

  Quietly Bakman waits until it passes so Harry can speak.

  "I guess human DNA is really what we are planning to send to another planet, in fact three more planets. DNA backward is And. The message to start this into final action has to be on the bottom of the page of the U.N.’s daily pre-flight brief. U.N. reports spell out the document number at the top and page number at the bottom. At that stage after it happens, an angry beehive of government people will investigate everyone and everything. Afterward, one of them will see the words ‘and three’ on the daily briefs and try to find out how it got there. Make it italics with a line under the last and first letter of the two words. Look on the back of your contract."

  Bakman looks and sees "and three."

  "Instead of ‘page three’ it must read ‘and three’ at the bottom of the page and most people will not notice the change until later. Only those we want will know what it means and they will look for it. Anyone else will think it is a clerical error. I don't know when the spaceship will be ready. Government projects always run over. I gave them their 200 billion, but I'll have to give them some more. Then, I can make conditions about getting our cargo aboard. It will have to be something I donate to the colonists. The ship should be, is supposed to be, having space trials in 3230. My guess is it won't. Something will delay the completion date.”

  Another brief pause to catch his breath before Harry can continue. “Duffy, I'm guessing 3233 that's why I used three. It means we go on the third year, third month, third day, third hour, third minute, and third second to three planets. The U.N. also likes to do things, schedule things, toward the first of the month and that’s also why I used three. Their daily report will be long with all that will be happening. I expect the first launch of colonist up to the new spaceship will be scheduled for the first week or second week in a month. Today, I would guess March. With our And-code we can time different elements in different places to start on time. Use the same release code with two or four if I’m wrong about 3233."

  "You've thought about this a long time Harry."

  "Since Meryl Runk's Report . . . I guess I'm selfish. I'd rather try this with my money than start another Trust or Foundation, but I have to make it look like that is what I'm up too. I’ll have to start a small trust telling anyone that asks that I’m trying to get the bugs out of it before dumping all my money into it. However, I think I'd rather let the government take it for a spaceship than do that."

  "Harry, I'm glad I got to know you."

  The old white face starts to smile, gets pasty pale, and tries to nod. His old brown spotted hand motions for Bakman to stop. His finger presses a button and Mary returns motioning at Bakman that it was time to leave.

  A smiling Mary walks him back to the elevator. As the doors opened she speaks in her soft pleasant voice again. "Thank you for coming, Mister Bakman."

  “Thank you for having me, Mary. It was nice to meet you,” he replies as the elevator doors close. Bakman feels the floor moving downward.