Eternity's End (15 page)

"Then who were they?" Dr. Goldman shook his head in dismay. "If this was an abduction, we'd better call the police at once." He turned to the robot guard. "Check the door security. See if there's a record of the vehicle that Ms. O'Hare left in."

Harriet spoke quickly. "We'll need that, and we'll need all of the purported documentation." She pulled at her earring and spoke subvocally for a moment.

"May I ask who you are?" Dr. Goldman said.

"Harriet Mahoney, attorney at law," she said brusquely. "Doctor, there will certainly be a legal investigation into this matter, and it is paramount that all of the documents be preserved. We'll need to examine them for evidence of forgery."

The doctor's alarm deepened visibly. "Yes, of course. But hadn't we better concentrate on getting the police on this?"

"Absolutely. Please do that. We'll be in touch. But right now, we must see if we can put a pursuit on that vehicle."

"They told me they were headed for the Northern Province," Dr. Goldman said.

"Then they probably aren't. Legroeder, let's move quickly. Thank you, Doctor." Without waiting for anyone to reply, Harriet seized Legroeder above the elbow and propelled him down the hall toward the lift and the exit. "If there's any more to learn here, Peter and his people will learn it. I don't think we want to be here when the police arrive."

"Are we going after the car that took Maris?"

"Peter's getting someone on it right now. But Legroeder—understand there's very little chance of catching them. If they could produce papers to fool the hospital, then they aren't going to be waiting around for us to catch them."

"But we've got to do everything we can—"

"We will, Legroeder. We will." Harriet steered him out a side exit onto the street. In front of the hospital, a police flyer's lights were flashing. As they strode away quickly, she added, "But we'll let the people do it who can do it.
You
, my friend, have other business. And no time to delay, before the police start to suspect you." She shook her head worriedly. "And what am I doing? Helping you to become a fugitive? God. There's the car..."

Legroeder slumped in a chair in Harriet's office, picking with a pair of chopsticks at a nearly empty carton of Fabri takeout food. An hour ago, he had been starving; now he had no appetite.

Morgan glanced at him sympathetically. She was still busy copying and scanning the hundreds of pages of material they had brought from McGinnis's house. The data on the cube had already been encoded and distributed for safekeeping on the net.

Legroeder started as Harriet snapped off her phone; he must have dozed off. "You were right, Legroeder. There
is
no Symmes Hospital in the town of Arlmont. The town itself is nothing more than a trading post for lumbering interests in the northern forest."

Legroeder grunted, unsurprised. Maris really was gone, then. Either dead... or in the hands of the same people who had tried to kill him.

"Peter will give a report to the police, of course. But I doubt they'll be able to do much." Harriet consulted her notes, then continued grimly, "We need to think very carefully about what your next move should be."

"Meaning—"

"Meaning, whoever these people are, they seem to have connections in more places than I'd guessed. We may not be safe here for long." Harriet ran her fingers through her hair in agitation. "But who the hell
are
they? Someone in Spacing Authority? Some outside group? There's a note here from Peter. It seems that spaceship hangar where Jakus Bark worked is owned indirectly by Centrist Strength. I wonder if they're involved."

"Centrist Strength again! Where do these people
come
from?" Legroeder asked in annoyance.

Harriet looked as if she had a bad taste in her mouth. "Mainly Faber Eridani, though there've been rumors of offworld connections outside their own organization. It began years ago as a particularly strident, and racist, lobbying group—then they started getting into paramilitary activities. Their members all have military-type ranks and titles. And they've got wilderness training camps—which is where they're causing that trouble with the Faber aborigines I told you about. Lately, they seem to have been trying to improve their public image, but I haven't heard of any change in their human-supremacist outlook."

"I wonder how Jakus got mixed up with them."

"Good question. And I wonder how, or if, they're connected with your problem."

Legroeder grimaced. "May I make a suggestion?"

"By all means."

"We're not going to solve this by wondering. Let's contact that Narseil historian that McGinnis told us about. El'ken. Maybe he knows some things. And we've got to read the rest of this material. What are we doing for security?" Legroeder looked around, as if terrorists might leap out of the closet.

"Peter is proofing my house right now," Harriet said. "I think we'll be safe there for the time being. He's the best in the business. Morgan, you're staying with us."

Morgan nodded, sorting pages.

"Then let's study while we can. And let Peter do his work."

Peter met them at the office to escort them to Harriet's house. Among humans, Peter was the only name he used. He was a Clendornan—a silver-blue-skinned humanoid with a wedge-shaped head, wide and flat on top. His nose was all angles, and his eyes looked like clear orbs with luminous steel wool at the backs of the eyeballs. He smiled only once, briefly—a zigzag smile beneath an angular brow, and then was all sober concentration. He had two bodyguards with him—a long-armed, almost tentacled Gos'n named Georgio; and a Swert named Pew, a brawny individual with a head like a horse's and an astringent smell. "We take no chances from now on," Peter said, after introductions. "We've scanned your house, I'll leave Georgio and Pew to look after you for the night, and I'll stay in touch with them, but I have many investigations to undertake tonight. Are you ready to go?" The words spilled out of his mouth like marbles out of a bag.

"We need to get these spare copies stored safely," said Harriet, showing him the datacubes.

"The bank vaults won't be open at this hour. But if we each keep a cube, that will give us a measure of security. You've dispersed a copy on the worldnet, right? Good—and the originals?"

"Right here. Peter, we might need to make a trip to the asteroid belt. Can you arrange that?"

Peter blinked; the effect was like a lighted sign going off and on. "I can arrange it if necessary." He peered at Legroeder. "Is it your intention to become a fugitive?"

"Could I be more of a fugitive than I am now?"

Harriet cleared her throat. "I believe Peter's reminding us of your bail conditions—namely, that you won't leave the planet. And of my responsibility, as your attorney, not to encourage you to violate the law. Is that correct, Peter?"

The PI turned up his long-fingered hands. "I'm not trying to tell you what to do. But I wanted to remind you, not just of Mr. Legroeder's bail, but of the fact that he is a potential suspect in both the disappearance of Jakus Bark and the possible death of Robert McGinnis. It would not appear to help his case for him to vanish from the planet. That is the sort of thing that fugitives do, no?"

"You're absolutely right, Peter," said Harriet. "But frankly, we're in some pretty deep manure here. Whatever is going on, I'm convinced that someone in the Spacing Authority is involved. And maybe Centrist Strength—who knows? We certainly can't trust the RiggerGuild, and the police are less and less likely to believe us, as all this circumstantial evidence piles up. I hate to say it—you can't
imagine
how much I hate to say it—but I'm afraid if we follow all the rules, we're going to wind up squashed. The same way I believe Mr. McGinnis has been squashed. Have you learned anything more about him?"

Peter's eyes flared with light. "Nothing, really. We can't get near the house, and all the regional authorities will tell me is that the fire's still burning inside the forcefield, and they can't do a thing until the forcefield generator fails." He shrugged and tilted his large head. "With all the smoke, they can't even tell me if the rental flyer is still intact."

"The rental flyer is the least of our worries," said Legroeder.

"The rental company won't think so," Peter chided. "Anyway, the burn mark from the missile may be about the only evidence on your side in this entire business."

Legroeder grunted.

"So one or more of us should go to visit this El'ken," Harriet said.

"And you would be taking Rigger Legroeder with you?" Peter asked.

"Damn right she is," said Legroeder.

"The reason being—?"

Legroeder answered irritably, "I'm only going to beat this by finding out what the hell's going on. And what it all has to do with
Impris
." He paused a moment. "Someone wants it kept quiet pretty badly. Badly enough to frame me. Badly enough to kill and kidnap people. I can't help Maris directly, it seems. So where would I rather be—out in the asteroid belt looking for information, where at least it'll take them a while to catch up with me—or here, waiting to be arrested?" He looked at Harriet. "If anyone should stay here, it's you."

"Why do you say that?" she asked quietly.

"You'll become an accessory if you come with me. Aren't you a little old to become a criminal on the run?"

"I could go with him," said Morgan.

Harriet turned and squinted at her daughter.

"That way, you could keep working here. And if he needs legal advice while he's there—"

"Are you a lawyer, too?" Legroeder asked.

"Most of a lawyer. I never took the planetary bar." Morgan stared at her mother.

"You're both missing the point," said Harriet, "which is that we have an urgent need to gather this information, and I need to hear it for myself. And I'm probably better at digging for it than either of you. Now, the fact that I may well lose my legal license is neither of your concerns."

Legroeder and Morgan exchanged glances. "Then I'm coming along to keep an eye on you, Mother," said Morgan. "You might be smart, but you think you're invincible, and you need someone to guard your back. And you'll probably need some legal advice of your own, before you're done." With that, Morgan turned away and busied herself with the last of her work.

Harriet stood silent, frowning into space.

"If that's settled, are you ready to gather up and head home?" Peter asked mildly.

By the time they reached Harriet's house, they all realized that they were dead tired, and probably the best thing to do was get some rest. Legroeder tossed and turned on his bed in the little guest house for what seemed hours. The last thing he remembered thinking was that, having snatched Maris, his enemies were not likely to wait long before trying to snatch him, as well.

It was the middle of the night when he awoke from a dead sleep to a thumping on the door. He sat up with a start. "Who is it?" he demanded hoarsely.

"Peter. We need to see you in the house. Hurry, please."

Legroeder let out the breath he'd been holding and pulled on his clothes. He stumbled across the lawn to the dining room door, rubbing his eyes. Everyone was gathered around the table, including the Fabri housekeeper, Vegas, who apparently had been roused to make coffee and was clucking unhappily as she offered some to Legroeder. "What's going on?" he murmured, accepting a steaming cup.

Harriet gestured to him to sit. "I think Peter had better tell you."

The Clendornan's eyes were flickering like a thunderstorm. "I've just heard from a friend in the police department. They're drawing up a warrant to bring you in on suspicion of murder. And since that business at the hospital, they're moving even faster. They could be here within the hour."

Legroeder's head was spinning. "Just which murder do they think I've committed?"

"Two counts," Peter said. "One—Robert McGinnis. The house has burned to the ground. The forcefield is still holding, but scanners have identified a human body in the rubble."

Legroeder said nothing, but felt a sudden, fresh weight of sadness and regret.

"I'm sorry," said Peter. "By the way, they're considering arresting Harriet on that one, too."

Legroeder looked up. "Why Harriet?" he asked Peter.

"Because she was with you, obviously. And it was she who put in the call about the fire. And she who stored McGinnis's flyer. It didn't take them long to find it."

"But she didn't identify herself when she called in the fire."

"Which is a strike against her. The com had a transponder ID, and they've confirmed the voice recording. I might add that my friend indicated that the department is under some pressure from the outside to act against you."

"The outside? Who on the outside?"

"He wouldn't say."

Legroeder sighed. "What else, then?"

"Your old friend Jakus Bark."

Jesus
. "They found him? How was he killed?"

Peter tipped his top-heavy Clendornan head. "They have
not
found him. But they did find a series of holo recordings, starting with the two of you arguing, then you skulking around in the back hallway of that hangar, and finally Jakus lying unconscious and bloody on the floor of the basement. Oh, and they found Jakus's bloody cap, which indeed has oil traces from your hands on it."

Legroeder stared at the PI. "But they don't have a body?"

"No."

"Then it's all circumstantial, right?"

Peter gestured to Harriet, who was lost in thought. "Harriet?"

She looked up with a start. "What? Yes—but unfortunately, they probably have enough to bring you in. Under Fabri law, they don't need a body, or even proof of a murder, to arrest you under suspicion. They have the circumstantial evidence, plus one piece of material evidence. It wouldn't be enough for them to convict you—but they could hold you indefinitely."

"Indefinitely?"

Harriet nodded.

Morgan, who had been sitting quietly at the end of the table, said, "Faber Eridani is not a signatory to the Danii Convention. So the laws are a little different here. It goes back to the days after the Thousand-Sun War."