Coming Home

Twenty-eight

The expected arrival of the Capella was more than five weeks away when we got back to Rimway. Alex dropped me off at my place, told me to take a few days’ vacation, and headed for the country house. I was relieved to get to my cottage without having to think about how much work had piled up at the office.

It wasn’t the first time we’d failed on a serious outing. Alex usually accepted defeat without remorse. Hunting for artifacts, or sometimes just lost information, never came with a guarantee of success, so he never had a problem shrugging things off. It was part of the business. But this time was different. I wasn’t sure whether it was that the stakes were so high. Or that he felt he’d let Marissa Earl down. Or that he was convinced he’d missed something. Whatever was weighing on him, he’d grown increasingly quiet during the flight home.

In the morning, I went down to the gym and restarted my workout routine. Afterward, several of us met for lunch. Then I went back to my apartment, read for a bit, watched some HV, and was drifting off to sleep when a call came in from Brockton Moore, the host of Morning Roundtable. “I hope I’m not disturbing you, Chase,” he said.

It was unusual for any of the media people to call me at home. “Not at all, Brockton,” I said. “What can I do for you?”

“Well, we know that you and Alex just came back from Earth. And that it had something to do with Garnett Baylee. I was wondering if you’d care to share with me what it was about?”

Moore, I decided, thought I would be more likely to talk with him than Alex would. “We were just on vacation. Who’s Garnett Baylee?”

“Well, his granddaughter’s one of your clients.”

“Oh. That Garnett Baylee.”

“Very funny, Chase. Seriously, though, what’s going on? Can I persuade you to come on the show to talk about it?”

“I’m not sure why you’re calling me. Alex is the person you should talk to.”

“Alex isn’t taking calls, Chase. Anyhow, you look a lot better than he does. We’ll get more viewers.”

“That’s very kind of you, Brockton. If you like, I’ll tell him he has an invitation from you.”

“Is that really the best you can do?”

“I’m sorry. A client’s business is confidential.”

“Then it is connected with Marissa Earl?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Sure you did. Listen, Chase, we’d love to have you on the show.”

“All right. You want the truth?”

“Sure.”

“We were looking into something. Nothing came of it, so there’s no story. There’s just nothing there that would interest your viewers.”

“Why don’t you come in and tell them that yourself? Tell them what the story was that didn’t pan out?”

“Because it would be boring. I hate being boring.”

In the morning, I decided I’d had enough sitting around and headed for the country house. I walked in the front door and Jacob said hello and told me that Shara had just tried to reach me. I was still in the act of sitting down when my link sounded. It was Shara. “Glad you’re back, Chase,” she said. “How was the trip?”

“We did a lot of sightseeing. What’s happening with the Capella?”

“We might have a breakthrough. Orion is making the Grainger available for testing.”

“How’d that happen?” I asked.

“What we’re hearing is that President Davis leaned on them. They’re claiming he had nothing to do with the decision, that it’s being done purely in the public interest. If that’s the case, it took them a long time.”

“So you’re going to use it in a test?”

“Yes. We’re going out again. You and Alex want to come along?”

“This one’s not secret?”

“No way Orion would overlook publicizing its commitment to the public welfare.”

“When are you going?”

“End of the week.”

“Hold on.” Music was coming from the conference room. I stuck my head in and saw Alex seated in front of one of the displays. “Got a minute?” I said.

“Hi, Chase. What are you doing here?”

“Just thought I’d drop by. Listen, SRF has the Grainger. They’ll be making another effort in a couple of days. You want to go?”

“I’d like to, but I have all kinds of commitments, and I don’t see how I could do anything except get in the way. You want to handle it?”

“All right.”

“Good. By the way, Southwick will be here in an hour or so.”

“Okay. Why?”

“Don’t know. He called and asked if he could come by.”

He arrived in an aircab, directed it to wait, and strode up the walkway to the front door as if he owned the place. Jacob opened up for him, and I escorted him in. “Good to see you, Chase,” he said with an amenable smile. “I have an appointment with Alex.”

“He’s in back.” I showed him. “Straight ahead on your right.”

Southwick entered the conference room. I turned away and started back to my office, but Alex called for me to join them. “You’ve been part of this from the start, Chase. If Mr. Southwick doesn’t mind, I’d like to have you sit in.”

Southwick nodded. “Lawrence, please. And absolutely. Glad to have Chase stay. I hope I didn’t mislead you guys. I don’t really have any information to add. I was just hoping you’d met with some success. That you’d picked up some sense of where Garnie got that transmitter.”

“I wish, Lawrence,” said Alex. “But no, we didn’t really find anything. At one point I thought we were in business. But we got nothing.” He shrugged. “Can I get you a drink?”

“No, thanks. I’m fine.” He looked disappointed. “So do you think it’s worth pursuing any farther?”

Alex shifted around in his chair. Looked down at the table. “We just don’t know.”

“You said that you thought you’d come across something?”

“Does Larissa mean anything to you?”

“You mean Marissa Earl?”

“No. Larissa with an ‘L.’ This would be a place. I think.”

He stiffened. “I have no idea. Never heard of it.”

“It looks as if Baylee got interested in some historical notes that claimed the Apollo artifacts had been taken from the Prairie House to a place called Larissa. It was a Greek city close to where Dmitri Zorbas was born. You know who Zorbas was?”

“Yes. More or less. He was the director at the Prairie House.”

“Right. We went to Europe and looked, but there’s no indication that Baylee ever showed up in the area. So I think we can write that off.”

“That’s a pity. I’m sorry it didn’t lead anywhere.” He looked out at the trees. Something was chirping. “You have a beautiful view, Alex.”

“Thank you.”

“Okay. I won’t take any more of your time. I know you went to a lot of trouble to try to chase this down. I just wanted to say thanks. I appreciate it. And I know Garnett’s family does, too.” He got up. “Time to let it go, I guess. If there’s anything I can do, anything at all, let me know.”

I walked back to the front door with him. “You know, Chase,” he said, “I wish I’d known about that communication device, the transmitter, when he was alive. There’s probably a simple explanation that would have settled all this pretty easily.”

A few minutes after he’d left, Alex came into my office. “Do you have any details about the Grainger test? What are they planning on doing?”

“I can check with Shara.”

“No, that’s okay. We don’t want to be giving them stuff to do. By the way, something I meant to tell you earlier and forgot. I was doing some research. We might have had a closer call than we realized.”

“What do you mean? Did we get dumped in the ocean during shark season?”

“I’m not talking about the attack on the boat.”

“What then?”

“The research base on Larissa. You remember one of the buildings still had power?”

“Yes.”

“Some of the power sources they used in ancient times could become seriously dangerous if they didn’t get shut down. They were effectively self-sustaining, and they could continue to function pretty much indefinitely.”

“That’s hard to believe, Alex. They’d continue to function over thousands of years? I’m more inclined to think somebody’s been doing some maintenance.”

“We have energy sources now that have the same capability. But there’s a difference. Modern ones have, or are supposed to have, a safety feature. After a while, they disconnect on their own. The older ones were supposed to have that, too. But according to what I’ve read, it didn’t always work. And when it didn’t, they tended to become unstable. They were especially dangerous if, after a long period of just sitting there, somebody activated them.”

“You mean like by opening an airlock?”

“Yes. Then there was a fair chance they’d blow the place apart. A few people have been killed.”

“Maybe it would be a good idea to disable them.”

“Most are disabled. But stations get put all over the Belt. Our client Linda Talbott and her husband live on an asteroid. Who knows where all these places are? Anyway, if we do something like that again, we should be careful. Not do anything that might turn on the power.”

“Alex, that wasn’t the first time we’ve done that.”

“I know. That’s why I’m mentioning it.”