Angel of Destruction (11 page)

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Hilton Shires set his mark to another line of audit code on the receiving report with a sense of accomplishment too thoroughly mixed with a sense of the ridiculous to be completely enjoyable.

He was learning to do receiving reconciliation and inventory management. The acquisition of new skills was an intrinsic good. There was no telling when it might turn up suddenly useful to be able to audit a cargo in record time and present a fair report on wastage and dilapidation.

But he was also Hilton Shires, a once-lieutenant in the Langsarik fleet that had exercised its own particular if not inimitable brand of wastage and dilapidations against cargoes permanently diverted from warehouses much like this one and absorbed directly against the bottom line of somebody else’s books.

The contrast made for meditation that was not free from bitterness. It wasn’t because he was ungrateful. The warehouse crew didn’t go out of their way to be friendly, no, but he’d known Dolgorukij kept to themselves when he’d accepted the job. He’d been glad to accept the job. He’d wanted the money, and moldering in settlement without anything constructive to do could only lead to trouble.

He was glad to see the foreman coming toward him from the direction of the administrative offices; he could take a break from congratulating himself on learning how to count cargo crates. A little self-admiration went a long way. He had little enough he could admire in himself these days. Who was that with the foreman?

He watched them come.

Middling-sized man, square-shouldered and light on his feet, where had he seen that uniform before? Bench standard trousers, over-blouse, cap, footgear; but the color was a peculiar gray, and there was no rank that Hilton could see.

Bench intelligence specialist.

The woman, too, a little on the short side but as sturdy as a chisel. Once Hilton identified the uniform in his mind he remembered where he’d seen those people before, or at least the man. Garol Vogel. The man who had made it all possible, the settlement, the amnesty, Hilton’s job, everything. He had a lot to thank Vogel for, but in his heart he knew that genuine thanks were owing.

So he would be polite.

His foreman waved to him, having obviously realized that Hilton had noticed them; so Hilton signed off on the counter — never leave a counter unsecured and open, he’d been told; otherwise, it was vulnerable to unauthorized emendation that would invalidate the count — to join the foreman and the people he had with him. He hadn’t heard there were Bench intelligence specialists in Port Charid. Bench intelligence specialists were devious that way.

“Hilton Shires,” the foreman said to Vogel, as Hilton approached. “This is the man you want? The Bench specialists are asking after you, Shires. Don’t be too long, though, there’s a lot to be done before we can load-out that shipment for storage, and our freighter’s due to dock in less than two days.”

Right.

The foreman walked on. Hilton stopped short and waited for Vogel to open the discussion.

“Garol Vogel,” Vogel said, politely, in case Hilton hadn’t recognized him, Hilton supposed. “I’ve just been out to see your aunt. There’s a problem with raiding in the Shawl, I expect you’ve heard all about it.”

As indeed he had. “Not since the hit on the Tyrell Yards.” If there had been anything since then, it was news to Hilton. “Disgusting waste of time and energy. Not to mention the vandalism.”

Vogel shook his head. “Nope, that’s the last one. Till the next one. The Bench is worried, Shires; people are talking about Langsariks.”

As if he didn’t know, Hilton told himself, indignantly. The crew here in the warehouse were good about it — they seemed genuinely to admire the Langsarik fleet’s history of successful, if ultimately futile, resistance to assimilation within the embrace of the Jurisdiction. The Combine itself hadn’t been all that eager to make treaty, if he remembered his history correctly.

“Target of opportunity, Specialist Vogel. Specialist Ivers? Good to see you again. You were at the talks, weren’t you?”

She wasn’t giving him much of a reaction one way or the other, listening politely but without response. It didn’t matter. He was just making his point. “You’ll remember the terms, I expect. The Langsarik fleet to yield all transport and articles of war or aggression, including such weapons that might otherwise be granted for defensive purposes. The Bench to decline to exercise judgment on condition that behavioral guarantees are met. Yes, people talk, Specialist Vogel. But not even my aunt could manage to attack a warehouse in the Shawl from a shack on Rikavie. And if she had, she wouldn’t have made such a sloppy botch of it.”

People had been murdered. The authorities were keeping the details close in order to avoid compromising evidence; a person didn’t need much imagination to guess at the general outlines of the crime. Langsariks had been commerce raiders. The Bench had called it piracy, but there was a world of difference between assisting the creative redistribution of material resources and killing people while one was at it.

“Even so.” Vogel’s voice was reasonable, even sympathetic. He had an open manner that invited confidence; it seemed to indicate an honest heart — as far as that went. “The Bench isn’t always as careful as we’d like about politically volatile situations. Primary value is the rule of Law and the maintenance of the Judicial order, which means that the appearance of an issue can be an issue. The Flag Captain says she doesn’t know of anything going on in-house. Suggested that we see if you had heard anything.”

Hilton felt himself redden in the face with vexation. Aunt Walton had said that? Sent Vogel here to get his assurances? Maybe she’d been thinking about speed machines. It was true he’d succumbed to temptation and borrowed one without having had the opportunity to ask permission. He’d paid for the repairs, hadn’t he? That machine had been better than new once the work had been finished, too. He had even been invited to wreck another of old Phiser’s speed machines anytime.

“What Walton Agenis doesn’t know about what’s going on in settlement isn’t worth knowing. If she says there’s nothing, then there’s nothing, Bench specialist. But since she told you to ask me. No. I haven’t heard any hints of raids or thievery from any Langsariks I know. People are depressed, not stupid.”

Vogel nodded. “Good enough for me, Shires. Your aunt is a woman of her word. In fact, the Bench granted amnesty on the strength of that word, pretty significant sign of respect there.”

So don’t embarrass her, Vogel was saying. What made Vogel think he was involved in anything? Vogel was an intelligence specialist. He surely knew exactly how much weight it was appropriate to give the gossip of idle minds.

“And well placed, Bench specialist.” His response sounded a little stiff and offended to himself, but Vogel didn’t seem to take offense. He just reached into the front of his uniform blouse for a packet of some kind.

“I agree. Well, we’ll be going, Shires; if you hear anything that might help us discover who’s responsible for the Tyrell murders, I hope you’ll let us know. Here. The Flag Captain asked me to give this to you.”

It was a scarf, and a hideous one, an incredibly garish length of cloth patterned in great gouts of completely incompatible colors. Even the color tones themselves were mismatched.

“I don’t understand.” It was beyond belief that his aunt would send something so horrible as a gift. “Is there an explanation that goes with this thing?”

Vogel folded his hands together in front of him, his fingers loosely interlaced. “Not much explanation, I’m afraid. Modice gave it to me to give to you, to be returned to someone named Kazmer Daigule, the next time you saw him. Does that mean anything to you?”

Ivers had been staring at the scarf in Hilton’s grasp with horrified fascination. When Vogel said Kazmer’s name she glanced up quickly at Vogel, though, as if she’d been taken by surprise.

Was this a setup, to see if they could get a guilty reaction out of him by surprising him with the name of a possible accomplice? It could be. But it wasn’t.

If Vogel and Ivers had set a trap, Ivers would have watched his face, not looked at Vogel. So there was something going on that they hadn’t worked out between themselves, yet.

“Kazmer Daigule is a friend of mine. He courts Modice to annoy me.” What Kazmer had been doing in Port Charid the morning of Hilton’s interview with Factor Madlev Hilton could only guess. He would rather Kazmer had not come into any conversation with Bench intelligence specialists, on principle; Kazmer had ferried the odd illegal cargo.

But Kazmer would never be party to murder.

Now that it was clear that the Bench specialists knew of Kazmer’s visit, the best thing to do was make full disclosure and trust in truth. Hilton didn’t like it, though.

“He was in port not long ago to move a cargo. I saw him, but we both had places to go. I guess he went out to the settlement. Aunt Walton doesn’t approve of his suit for Modice’s affections.” Hilton refolded the scarf as he spoke, putting it away in the side pocket of his warehouseman’s coveralls. “And with taste in scarves like this, I guess you can see why. Anything else?”

He was unhappy about the turn this talk had taken, and it showed — he could hear it in his own voice. Vogel shook his head.

“No, that about covers everything for now. Thank you for your time, Shires. Factor Madlev will know where to find us if you need to reach us about anything.”

Good.

He could go back to receiving reconciliation, with the single worst pattern in known Space radiating great waves of sheer unadulterated tastelessness from his pocket. He probably glowed in the dark with it. He hoped it wouldn’t alter his genetic structure; he would probably be lucky if it merely scarred him for life.

He wished more than ever that he hadn’t seen Kazmer in the street that day, but now it was more for Kazmer’s sake than that of his self-pride.

He knew Kazmer wasn’t a killer.

But he didn’t trust the Bench to display equivalent perceptiveness; and not even Aunt Walton could wish the Bench on Kazmer Daigule, whether or not she thought he had any business courting Hilton’s cousin Modice.

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Walking in companionable silence out of the warehouse, Garol waited for Jils to make the first move. She had something on her mind; so much had been obvious by virtue of her presence at his interview with Factor Madlev. And he was interested in whatever it had been that caught her attention in his talk with Shires.

He found the speed machine where he had left it, parked outside of the warehouse’s administrative offices. Jils stopped short of the machine while Garol straddled it with a certain degree of self-conscious bravado. He only had one safety helmet; but Jils liked to live dangerously.

At least any woman who voluntarily surrendered her body to the ministrations of bone-benders — dubious professionals at best, outright charlatans at worst — had nothing to say to anybody about merely riding a speed machine without a helmet. That would be his line, anyway.

“Hey, pretty lady, wanna ride? For you, no charge.”

But she knew him too well to rise to the bait. She pulled a tab on one of the panniers behind the pillion seat, and there was a safety helmet. Damn. Perfectly good tease, shot to hell.

Fastening the helmet strap beneath her chin, Jils mounted the pillion seat behind him, passing him a piece of documentation as she settled herself. “Drive, you smooth-talking seducer of innocent young women,” Jils suggested — in part because of the line he’d started to run, yes, but it would serve just as well to cover them from casual observation. “We have much to do, and time flies like youth itself.”

What, had she been reading the Poetic Classics again?

The documentation was a receiving report from the Port Authority at Anglace, where the bulk cargo from the Tyrell raid had apparently turned up. Part of it, at least. There’d been an anonymous tip. Those were always interesting — anonymous tips almost never had anything to do with concern for law and order, and everything to do with personal malice of one sort or another.

But that wasn’t the really interesting part.

The pilot of the impounded freighter was a Combine national named Kazmer Daigule.

Garol passed the documentation back to Jils and started his motor. “Say,” he suggested, calling back to her over the sound of the speed machine’s engine. “There isn’t really a whole lot to do in Port Charid. Let’s go find some action, shall we?”

Port Anglace.

Public opinion blamed the Langsariks for recent predation at Okidan, Tyrell, and several earlier targets.

Hilton Shires had been a lieutenant in the Langsarik fleet, and it couldn’t be very easy for him — or any of his fellows — to adjust to their reduced expectations and meekly take direction from people who had been prey.

Kazmer Daigule had been in Port Charid recently, and was personally acquainted with both Hilton Shires and the lovely young Modice Agenis.

Walton Agenis said there was no Langsarik involvement that she knew of, but Modice had let Garol know that there was a connection between Daigule and Shires, so either the women were genuinely unaware of any deeper implications of Daigule’s visitor — or they were giving Garol the keys he’d need — or they just didn’t know, but felt that Shires and Garol should be equally warned.

It was enough to make a person think very hard about starting a melon patch and abandoning the whole Bench intelligence specialist thing for a quiet life of preserves, jams, jellies. Compost. Maybe a pond, with salamanders.

“Talked me into it,” Jils responded, only Jils used the communications link built in to the safety helmet, rather than trying to make herself heard over the noise of the engine. The sound of her voice reminded Garol that he was the one who was supposed to be driving, instead of just sitting there brooding.

Garol nodded.

Slipping the neutral on the speed machine, Garol pulled away from the parking apron, heading back to the docks, where their courier was waiting.

This news from Anglace gave him the perfect excuse to depart Port Charid immediately and leave Hilton Shires alone with his thoughts.