The Gordon Mamon Casebook (14 page)

Gordon wasn’t convinced that the killer
was
competent. There were just too many things about the way it’d played which didn’t feel right, didn’t feel professional.

Did this, therefore, mean that the perp wasn’t perhaps capable of planting a red herring, or indeed a herring of any arbitrary colour? Perhaps the stealth cloak’s presence on the cargo deck was completely accidental. An oversight by a sloppy killer? There was no way to know. But he had to assume that Havmurthy’s assassin might well be one of the four guests currently aboard 270.

If so, then who? Ligotmi was obviously connected in some way to Havmurthy. Miharties was in turn connected to Ligotmi. But he hadn’t been able to probe either of them in sufficient detail to establish credible motives, nor the absence of such: to do so would have risked overplaying his hand. He wasn’t, officially, investigating, he was just acting on a hunch, and seeing what he could do to flesh said hunch out. Idovist, alone of the guests, had a criminal record—in fact, probably had enough tracks to constitute a criminal ‘Greatest Hits’ collection—but claimed all that kind of thing was behind him now. Still, the ex-con must have had considerable connections among the underworld, and might not necessarily have severed all of those ties. And Idovist had recently returned from the outer solar system. Admittedly, the other
side
of the solar system from Saturn’s current position, but still. Underwire … well, frankly, he doubted Underwire’s ability to dress herself. But perhaps she didn’t normally need to?

He hadn’t yet grilled Underwire on the cheese angle. That was an oversight he’d need to correct.

And if the field was wide open in terms of motive, there was also the frustration that the surveillance footage of the attack left no indication of the attacker’s physique. Stealth cloaks were one-size-fits-all items, designed to disguise such particulars as the wearer’s height and build. Any one of 270’s guests might equally have been that blur on the footage …

It occurred to him, just then, that Miharties’ ostensibly-redundant prosthetic hook, which had looked to be genuine solid metal, would have made a very convenient close-quarters weapon capable of inflicting on Havmurthy the kind of damage he’d worn on his chest. (But hadn’t Havmurthy been set to bail out Miharties’ pirate radio operation, through advertising revenue? In which case—)

Gordon’s reverie was interrupted by the call signal on his handheld, which he fished from his pocket. (In so doing, he discovered that he’d spent the past five minutes pacing steadily down the motorised ‘up’ rampway.) “Gordon here.”

“Hi Gordon, Belle. Sue just called to say she’s down on the cargo deck, and she’s saying she’s got a result. Whatever that means.”

“Thanks, Belle. Be right there.”

Or at least, he would be once he’d switched rampways.

* * *

”This suitcase,” Sue said, leaning against the monolithic beep-detecting device and pointing to a nondescript grey hard-shell stacked between Ligotmi’s double-necked-sitar case and several plasticrates of Idovist’s pop-psych books.

Gordon rummaged in his pocket, pulled on a fresh pair of doorknob-polishing gloves, and wheeled the suitcase out. “No label. And my handheld’s not registering any fingerprints either. Any trace of cheese?”

“What
is
it with you and cheese at the moment?” asked Sue, her exasperation plain.

“Forget it. Don’t suppose you have any idea whose case this is?” he asked.

“Sorry, no,” said Sue. “It was Belle on security duty when the luggage was loaded.”

“Guess we’ll find out soon enough,” said Gordon, laying the case flat atop a book-crate. He fiddled with the latches, which sprung helpfully open … although the suitcase itself didn’t. “No good. The zipper’s padlocked.”

“These do?” Sue asked, pulling a pair of bolt-cutters out of her chef’s smock.

“Why’re you carrying bolt cutters?” Gordon asked.

“Food prep,” Sue replied. “Don’t worry, they’re clean.” It took Sue several minutes to break through the padlock, during which time the ‘beep’ sounded once more. Gordon opened the case. The stealth cloak was lying under several items of clothing and a couple of large blocks of Havmurthy cheese. Gordon lifted the cloak out, marvelling at how it masked his hands and forearms. It didn’t quite convey the illusion of full transparency, but beyond a dull shimmer …

“I think I know,” said Sue, rummaging to the suitcase’s depths, “whose case this is.”

“I think you’re right,” Gordon replied, carefully folding the cloak up. Or trying to; folding an effectively-invisible object wasn’t, it turned out, the simplest of tasks. He gave up the attempt, and smooshed it back over the suitcase’s top stratum of undergarments.

“OK,” said the figure in the doorway. “This has gone far enough.”

* * *

There was a moment of deathly stillness. Even the ever-present hum and rumble of the lift-module’s mechanical workings, usually loudest here in the underbasement, seemed to have quieted.

“Last time I fired this thing,” said the assailant, brandishing a Kill-O-Farad 357-calibre Incapacitator in her right hand, “it was set to stun, and it killed a man. This time it’s set to kill.”

Gordon swallowed. His recent identification of the suitcase’s owner had, it seemed, been correct, but that was slight comfort.

It wasn’t Ligotmi, or Miharties, or Idovist holding the stunner. No, the one with the gun was the visual stunner herself. The amazing Grace.

“Do you at least want us to raise our hands?” Gordon asked.

“No, what do I care?” Underwire asked, in a voice as far from the foghorn-like intensity of her earlier exchange with him as Gordon could have imagined. Steady, calm, and in control. Exactly how he wasn’t feeling right now. “Although,” Underwire continued, with a pert nod towards Sue, “you could at least drop the snippy things, love.”

Sue let the bolt cutters slip from her hand. They fell with a quiet thud to the cushioned floor of the cargo deck.

“And before you get any ideas,” Underwire explained, with a flick of her head that did something to the bounce of her hair which would have been delightful and coquettish if she hadn’t happened to be levelling at them a death-dealing piece of weaponry, “please don’t bother trying to signal for help. It’ll only annoy me. And this little jammer here—” she pulled from her pocket a small grey device, looking like a cross between an old-fashioned remote control and a powder compact “—would render the attempt futile. Nothing gets out of this room without my say-so. And that certainly includes the two of you.” She trained the gun on Gordon, then on Sue, then back again.

Underwire had stepped a short distance into the cargo deck, so as to be clear of the line-of-sight from the rampway leading down to this level, but was standing perhaps ten paces from Gordon and Sue. Too far for him to try anything heroic. The armoured bulk of Sue’s detector, which looked admirably capable of stopping anything short of a low-yield nuclear charge, was unfortunately at their backs rather than between them and Underwire. And Gordon judged that any attempt to yell for help would probably be muffled into inaudibility by the three levels of plant and storage between them and the lobby level. Grace held all the aces.

“So you found the stealth cloak?” said Underwire. “Thought I’d left it behind. Must’ve left it switched on when I was packing the suitcase back on Skytop, and never noticed it.”

“Guess that’s an occupational hazard with invisible clothing,” offered Gordon.
If only he’d still been holding the cloak when Underwire had entered the room
 …

“Hazard?” asked Underwire. “For you, as it turns out. Serves you right for meddling, Matron.” She checked a setting on the barrel of the weapon, never taking her gaze entirely off Gordon and Sue.

“
Mamon
. Supposing you do kill us,” said Gordon, seeking to shuffle himself in front of Sue. Wondering if he could keep Underwire talking long enough to at least allow Sue to sidle behind the supersized, shielded slab of electronics at her back. “What then? How would you escape? You’d need to dispose of the bodies somehow. And security groundside would pick you up the moment Bel—the moment the automated systems registered our absence.”

“Are you always this helpful to your opponents, Minim?” she asked.

“
Mamon
,” Gordon replied. “I’m just trying to say, you can’t seriously hope to get away with it.”

“I’d say differently. Pity you’re not going to be around to see how. But it involves a fire, and a smokescreen, and me the sole survivor of this lift-module. Soon as I’m done in here, I’ll go set the charges. Then once they release me from medical, nobody will suspect a thing.”

“Just one favour,” said Gordon, inching towards the unobstructed side of the bulky detector, and hoping that Sue would follow suit. Unfortunately, so far as he could tell, she was transfixed by the novelty of the whole at-gunpoint thing. “I’ve solved murders, and things that looked like murders but weren’t, but this one had me stumped. So can you put me out of—uh, can you please let me know what this is about? It’s not as if it’s going to matter to you, after all.”

“Monologuing? Seriously, is that the best card you’ve got to play? I expected a bit more innovation from you. Gordon Madam, the famous vertical detective.”

“
Mamon
. Sorry to disappoint you. And I can’t, obviously, compel you to answer. But I’m guessing you must really hate cheese.”

“Cheese?” asked Sue. “What d’you mean, cheese?”

“This whole thing smells of cheese,” Gordon explained, turning his head to answer. “For reasons I don’t presently understand. Cheese, and the Saturn Propulsions miracle engine.”

“Who told you about the Sat Prop angle?” Underwire asked, voice suddenly sharp-edged. “I had you pegged as just a bystander.”

“I
am
a bystander,” Gordon complained. “Or was, at least. But the cheese, and the engine business, they keep getting connected somehow.”

“Yeah, well, you got that right. It was never just about the cheese,” said Underwire. “It’s what the cheese
signifies
.”

“High-yield explosive? Holding the world to ransom?” Gordon offered.

“
What
are you on?” Underwire asked.

“You’ve no idea?” Gordon asked, reading the answer in her face, and trying to run his mind across two problems at once. The gun; the distance; the fixtures and assorted clutter of the cargo deck.
Was there some way in which he could get to one of the cargo nets? Throw it, or one of the items of luggage, at Underwire? But there was nothing close enough, and the gun-toter surely wouldn’t hesitate to discharge her weapon before he could complete his action. Blast.
“Then what do you mean, ‘what the cheese signifies’?” he asked.

“Cholesterol?” asked Sue. “Lactic substances?”

“Don’t bother,” said Underwire, sighting along the weapon. “You won’t get it. Except, of course, that in another sense, you’re about to. Get it, that is.”

“What do you mean, ‘signifies’?” Gordon repeated, risking another very small step sideways. “Is the cheese some kind of … message?”

“Some kind of code?” asked Sue.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Gordon, turning partly around. “How could a block of cheese be a … oh.
Oh
. Wait. It
could
, actually. Couldn’t it?”

“Couldn’t what?” asked Sue.

“Protein,” said Gordon. “The code of life.”

“That’s DNA, actually,” said Underwire, ranging the stun-gun from Gordon, to Sue, then back to Gordon. “Code of life, I mean. But very good. It’s almost a pity to have to kill you.”

“You know, you could save yourself the mental anguish there,” suggested Gordon, inching sideways again. (
Why wasn’t Sue taking the hint? Sidling behind him, shuffling towards the clearance required to duck behind the decommissioned fridge unit?
) “So, DNA, then? Why?”

“No, you were right with protein.”

“I don’t … oh. Oh. Getting a signal out through Skytop. Or rather, in through Skytop. And the hotel elevator’s one of the main freight hubs, for Earth-to-interplanetary trade. I’m betting most of the cheese exported from Earth passes through Skytop. Bloody hell.”

“Gordon,
what
?” asked Sue.

“The cops were going gangbusters to make sure all the comm channels were being intercepted. And probably checking every piece of written material to pass through the hotel’s transit lounges, all to ensure that they blocked a message being sent. And all the time, they might well have been eating the message, in their sandwiches, and on their crackers—”

“Hello? Woman with gun here?” Underwire reminded him.

“I’m right though, aren’t I?” Gordon asked, with the kind of fanatical solver’s zeal that sometimes fell on him when, two-thirds of the way through a crossword puzzle, he’d mastered the crucial clue, the lynchpin on which all the other answers depended. “This is the connection with the Saturn hyperdrive thing, isn’t it?”

“Very good. You’ll go to the top of the class. Posthumously.” Underwire’s finger twitched on the Incapacitator’s trigger.

“Wait,” said Gordon in sudden desperation. “Why?”

“Why posthumously?” Underwire sneered. “I thought
that’d
be evident.”

“No, I mean,” said Gordon, his tone betraying a degree of exasperation that might, in the circumstances, be just a bit injudicious, “why the Saturn hyperdrive? Why Havmurthy? Why the cheese / anticheese eplosion?”

“What cheese / anticheese explosion?” Underwire beat Sue to the question by a fraction of a second. She sounded annoyed.

“You really don’t know?” Gordon felt suddenly unsure of himself. That is, additionally unsure of his ability to comprehend the situation, let alone to cope with a homicidal woman armed with a dangerous, unpredictable weapon, in the cargo hold of a badly-constructed vehicle currently plunging at considerable velocity toward the atmosphere of the largest ball of rock in the solar system. “In that case, why you? And why me?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” asked Underwire. “Money. Pure and simple. The Saturn Propulsions hyperdrive stands to make megazillions for whoever can knock them out fastest. It’ll revolutionise interplanetary freight, in particular—it’s always been an irony of existing hyperspace technology that it takes longer to travel from here to Jupiter, say, than it does to flit between some star systems, because hyperdrives don’t work up close to a gravity well. They’ve been saying, this last month or so, that the Saturn hyperdrive has that problem licked. Seems Havmurthy wanted himself a slice of that—and I couldn’t let that happen, now.”