The Game-Players of Titan (10 page)

“I fully concur in the action of banning Pretty Blue Fox,” Hawthorne said. “Despite what your inborn prejudices may tell you.”

Pete said, “You’re wasting your time baiting him for his association with the vugs.” It was obvious that Hawthorne was used to it by now. He probably encountered it everywhere the two detectives went.

Coming over beside Pete, Joe Schilling said softly, “I’m just not satisfied with the attitude of that Bert Barth. He’s giving in too easily; a good aggressive lawyer would stand up for us more.”

“Perhaps so,” Pete said. It had seemed that way to him, too.

“I have my own attorney back in New Mexico; his name is Laird Sharp. I’ve known him professionally and socially a long time; I’m familiar with his way of operating and it’s in great contrast to Barth’s. And since they’re evidently going to book you I’d like to see you get him instead of this attorney of Calumine’s. I know he could get you right out.”

“The problem,” Pete said, “is that military law still prevails
in many situations.” The Concordat between Terrans and Titanians had been a military one. He felt pessimistic. “If the police want to take us in they probably can,” he said to Schilling. Something was terribly wrong. Something with enormous power was in operation; it had acted against six members of the group already, and who knew what its limits were? If it could deplete them of their recent memories—

The vug E.B. Black said, “I agree with you, Mr. Garden. It is unique and disconcerting. Up to now we have not run into anything exactly like it. Individuals, to avoid being scanned, have procured electroshock and managed to obliterate memory-cells. But that does not seem to be the case here.”

“How can you be sure of that?” Stuart Marks said. “Maybe these six people acted together to get electroshock equipment; they could have done it through almost any psychiatrist and psychiatric hospital. The machinery is readily available.” He glowered at Pete hostilely. “Look what you’ve done. Because of you our group has been banned!”

“Because of me?” Pete said.

“Because of the six of you.” Marks looked suddenly around at all of them. “Obviously, one or more of you killed Luckman. You should have looked into the legal situation before you did it.”

Mrs. Angst said, “We did not kill Luckman.”

“You don’t know that,” Stuart Marks said. “You don’t remember. Right? So don’t try to have it both ways, remembering that you didn’t do it and not remembering that you did.”

Bill Calumine spoke up; his voice was icy. “Marks, damn it, you have no moral right for acting this way. What do you mean by accusing your fellow group-members? I’m going to insist that we continue to act together and not let ourselves be split apart this way. If we start to fight among ourselves and begin accusing each other, the police will be able to—” He broke off.

“Be able to what?” Hawthorne said mildly. “Be able to locate the slayer? That’s all we intend to do and you know it.”

Calumine said to the group, “I still insist we should stick together, those with intact memories and those without; we’re still a group, and it’s up to the police to voice the accusations, not us.” To Stuart Marks he said, “If you do that again I’ll ask for a vote to have you dropped from the group.”

“That’s not legal,” Marks said. “And you know it. I still say what I said; one or more of these six people killed Luckman and I don’t see why we should protect them. It means the obliteration of our group. It’s to our best interests to have the slayer discovered. Then we can resume playing.”

Walt Remington said, “Whoever killed Luckman didn’t do it for himself; he did it for all of us. It may have been the act of an individual, an individual decision, but we all benefited; that person saved our hides, and as far as I’m concerned it’s ethically loathsome for a member of the group to assist the police in apprehending him.” Shaking with anger, he faced Stuart Marks.

“We didn’t like Luckman,” Jean Blau said, “and we were terribly afraid of him but that didn’t create a mandate for someone to go out and kill him, supposedly in the name of the group. I agree with Stuart. We should cooperate with the police in determining who did it.”

“A vote,” Silvanus Angst said.

“Yes,” Carol agreed. “We should decide on policy. Are we to hang together or are we, as individuals, to betray one another? I’ll tell you my vote right now; it’s thoroughly wrong for any of us to—”

The policeman Wade Hawthorne interrupted her. “You have no choice, Mrs. Garden; you
must
cooperate with us. It’s the law. You can be compelled to.”

“I doubt that,” Bill Calumine said.

Joe Schilling said, “I’m going to contact my own attorney
in New Mexico.” He crossed the room to the vidphone, clicked it on and began to dial.

“Is there any way,” Freya was saying to Hawthorne, “that the lapsed memories can be restored?”

“Not if the braincells in question have been destroyed,” Hawthorne answered. “And I assume that’s the case. It’s hardly likely that these six members of Pretty Blue Fox have simultaneously suffered hysterical loss of memory.” He smiled briefly.

Pete said to him, “My day was fairly well reconstructed by the Rushmore Effect of my car, and it didn’t put me at any time near a psychiatric hospital where I could have obtained electroshock.”

“You stopped at San Francisco State College,” Hawthorne said. “And their psych department possesses ETS equipment; you could have gotten it there.”

“What about the other five?” Pete said.

“Their days have not been reconstructed by Rushmore circuitry as has yours,” Hawthorne said. “And there are major omissions in yours; a good deal of your activity today is far from clear.”

Joe Schilling said, “I have Sharp on the vid. You want to talk to him, Pete? I’ve sketched the situation briefly.”

The vug E.B. Black said suddenly, “Just a moment, Mr. Garden.” It conferred telepathically for a time with its colleague, and then it said to Pete, “Mr. Hawthorne and I have decided not to book any of you; there’s no
direct
evidence involving any one of you in the crime. But if we let you go, you must agree to carry tattletales with you at all times. Inquire of your attorney Mr. Sharp if that will be acceptable.”

“What the hell is a ‘tattletale’?” Joe Schilling asked.

“A tracing device,” Hawthorne said. “It will inform us where each of you are at all times.”

“Does it have a telepathic content?” Pete asked.

“No,” Hawthorne said. “Although I wish it had.”

On the vidscreen, Laird Sharp, youthful and active-looking, said, “I heard the proposal and without going into it any further I’d be inclined to label it as a clear violation of these people’s rights.”

“Suit yourself,” Hawthorne said. “Then we’ll have to book them.”

“I’ll have them out at once,” Sharp said. To Pete he said, “Don’t allow them to hook any sort of monitoring devices to you, and if you discover they have, rip them off. I’ll fly right out there. It’s obvious to me that your rights are being resoundingly violated.”

Joe Schilling said to Pete, “Do you want him?”

“Yes,” Pete said.

Bill Calumine said, “I—have to agree. He seems to have more on the ball then Barth.” Turning to the group Calumine said, “I offer the motion that we retain this man Sharp collectively.”

Hands went up. The motion carried.

“I’ll see you shortly, then,” Sharp said, and broke the connection.

“A good man,” Schilling said, and reseated himself.

Pete felt a little better now; it was a good feeling, he thought, to have someone battling hard on your side.

The group as a whole seemed less stunned, now. They were coming out of their stupor.

“I’m going to make a motion,” Freya said to the group. “I move that we order Bill Calumine to step down and that we elect someone else, someone more vigorous, as group spinner.”

Astonished, Bill Calumine said, “W-why?”

“Because you sicked that do-nothing attorney on us,” Freya said. “That Bert Barth who just let the police walk all over us.”

Jean Blau said, “True, but it’s still better to let him remain as spinner than to stir up trouble.”

“But trouble,” Pete said, “is something we can’t avoid. We’re in it already.” After an interval he said, “I second Freya’s motion.”

Taken by surprise, the group began to murmur.

“Vote,” Silvanus Angst said. Snickering, he added, “I agree with Pete; I vote for Calumine’s removal.”

Bill Calumine stared at Pete and said hoarsely, “How could you second a motion like that?
Do you want someone more vigorous?
I would think you wouldn’t.”

“Why not?” Pete said.

“Because,” Calumine said, his face red with anger, his voice trembling, “you personally have so much to lose.”

“What causes you to say that?” the detective Hawthorne asked him.

Calumine said, “Pete killed Jerome Luckman.”

“How do you know that?” Hawthorne said, frowning.

“He called me and told me he was going to do it,” Calumine said. “Early this morning. If you had scanned me more thoroughly you would have found that; it wasn’t very far down in my mind.”

For a moment Hawthorne was silent, evidently scanning Calumine. Then he turned to the group. Thoughtfully, he said, “What he says is true. The memory is there in his mind. But—
it wasn’t there earlier when I scanned him a little while ago.”
He glanced at his partner, E.B. Black.

“It was not there,” the vug replied in agreement. “I scanned him, too. Yet it’s clearly there now.”

They both turned toward Pete.

Joe Schilling said, “I don’t think you killed Luckman, Pete. I also don’t think you called Bill Calumine and told him you were going to. I think someone or something is manipulating our minds. That thought was not in Calumine’s head originally; both cops scanned him.” He was silent then.

The two of them were at the Hall of Justice in San Francisco, awaiting the arraignment. It was an hour later.

“When do you think Sharp will be here?” Pete said.

“Any time.” Schilling paced about. “Calumine obviously is sincere; he actually believes you said that to him.”

There was a commotion down the corridor and Laird Sharp appeared, wearing a heavy blue overcoat and carrying a briefcase; he strode toward them. “I’ve already talked to the district attorney. I got them to lower the charge from homicide to simply knowledge of a homicide and deliberate concealment of the knowledge from the police. I pointed out that you’re a Bindman, you own property in California. You can be trusted out on bail. We’ll have a bond broker in here and get you right out.”

Pete said, “Thanks.”

“It’s my job,” Sharp said. “After all, you’re paying me. I
understand you’ve had a change of authority in your group; who’s your spinner, now that Calumine is out?”

“My quondam wife, Freya Garden Gaines,” Pete said.

“Your quondam or your goddam wife?” Sharp asked, cupping his ear. “Anyhow, the real question is can you swing the group so that they’ll help pay my fee? Or are you alone in this?”

Joe Schilling said, “It doesn’t matter; in any case I’ll guarantee your fee.”

“I ask,” Sharp said, “because my fee would differ according to whether it’s an individual or a group.” He examined his watch. “Well, let’s get the arraignment over and the bond broker in here, and then let’s go somewhere and have a cup of coffee and talk the situation over.”

“Fine,” Schilling said, nodding. “We’ve got a good man, here,” he said to Pete. “Without Laird you’d be in here on an unbailable offense.”

“I know,” Pete said, tensely.

“Let me ask you point blank,” Laird Sharp said, across the table to Pete. “Did you kill Jerome Lucky Luckman?”

Pete said, “I don’t know.” He explained why.

Scowling, Laird Sharp said, “Six persons, you say. Name of god; what’s going on, here? So you could have killed him. You or any one of you or several or even all.” He fingered a sugar cube. “I’ll tell you a piece of bad news. The Widow Luckman, Dotty, is putting great pressure on the police to break this case. That means they’re going to try for a conviction as soon as possible, and it’ll be before a military court … it’s that damn Concordat; we’ve never gotten out from under it.”

“I realize that,” Pete said. He felt tired.

“The police have given me a written transcript of the investigating officers’ report,” Sharp said, reaching into his briefcase. “I had to pull a few strings, but here it is.” He brought a voluminous document from his briefcase and
pushed his coffee cup aside to lay it out on the table. “I’ve already glanced at it. This E.B. Black found in your memory an encounter with a woman named Patricia McClain who told you that you were about to perform an act of violence having to do with Luckman’s death.”

“No,” Pete said. “Having to do with Luckman
and
death. It’s not quite the same thing.”

The lawyer eyed him keenly. “Very true, Garden.” He returned to the document.

“Counselor,” Schilling said, “they have no real case against Pete. Outside of that phony memory that Calumine has—”

“They’ve got nothing.” Sharp nodded. “Except the amnesia, and you share that with five other group-members. But the problem is that they’ll be digging around trying to get more dope on you, beginning from the assumption that you are guilty. And by starting with that as a premise, god knows what they may be able to find. You say your auto-auto said you dropped by Berkeley sometime today … where Luckman was staying. You don’t know why or even if you managed to reach him. God, you may have done it all right, Garden. But we’ll presume you didn’t, for the purposes of our case. Is there anyone that you personally suspect, and if so, why?”

“No one,” Pete said.

“Incidentally,” Sharp said, “I happen to know something about Mr. Calumine’s attorney, Bert Barth. He’s an excellent man. If you deposed Calumine on Barth’s account you were in error; Barth is inclined to be cautious, but once he gets started you can’t pull him loose.”

Pete and Joe Schilling glanced at each other.

“Anyhow,” Sharp said, “the die is cast. I think your best bet, Garden, is to look up your Psionic woman friend Pat McClain and find out what you and she did today and what she read in your mind while you were with her.”