The wind passeth over it, and it is gone…
- Psalms, CIII
The Polaris convention provided just what I needed: a rationale to get away from my usual routine and an evening so full of whimsy and nonsense that it became pure pleasure. When the scheduled presentations ended, the attendees threw a round of parties that extended well into the night. I got home close to dawn, slept three hours, got up, showered, and staggered over to the office. It was my half day, and I knew I could make it through to lunch. But I hoped nothing would come up that would require me to think clearly.
More calls were coming in, mostly from people outside our regular circle of customers, asking what Polaris artifacts we possessed, querying prices or, in some cases, making offers. The word had gotten around.
The bids were, I thought, on the high side. Even accounting for the loss of the rest of the exhibition. But Alex nodded sagely when I reported the numbers to him.
“They’ll be through the roof before it’s over,” he said. “By the way”-he looked innocently at the ceiling but couldn’t restrain a smile-“how’d it go last night?”
“It went fine.”
“Really? What did they decide about the Polaris? That the ghosts got them?”
“Pretty much.”
“Well, I’m glad you enjoyed yourself.” He saw that I wanted to ask something.
“What?” he said.
“You’re sure you want to hang on to these?” I was talking about the jacket and the glass. “We could get a lot for them. Guarantees your bottom line for the quarter.”
“We’ll keep them.”
“Alex, this is a period of peak interest. I agree that they’ll go still higher, but that’s probably a long time away. In the short term, there could be a falloff. You know how these things are.”
“Keep them.” He walked over and looked at the glass, which was front and center in the bookcase.
Next morning, CBY announced that the Mazha had been assassinated. Apparently by his son. With a knife, while the guards watched.
“Just as well,” Alex commented. “Nobody’s going to miss him.”
I hadn’t said anything about the call. It was embarrassing to have been a social contact of sorts with a monster. But when the news came, I told Alex everything that had happened.
“You must have made an impression,” he said.
Despite myself, I was sorry for him.
Alex was a good boss. I was responsible for day-to-day operations, and he left me to take care of things without trying to give a lot of directions. He spent most of his time entertaining clients and sources, but he always made it a point during the middle of the week to pull me out of the office and take me to dinner.
A couple of days after the convention, we went to dinner at Molly’s Top of the World, which is located at the summit of Mt. Oskar, the highest peak in the area. He was excited because he’d located an early-German coal stove. The thing was worth a fortune, and the owner needed the money and wanted to make a quick sale. Usually, we simply put buyers and sellers together, but the price was so good, Alex was thinking of buying the unit himself.
We spent the hour talking about stoves and European antiques. He solicited my opinion, and I told him sure, buy it, what can we lose? The decision made, we fell into small talk. It was late when we finished, and normally he’d have taken me home, but I had work to do, so we rode back to the office.
The house had originally been a country inn, a solitary structure built atop a low rise. It had catered to hunters and travelers until Alex’s uncle Gabe bought it and had it refurbished. Alex spent much of his boyhood in it. In those early days it had been surrounded mostly by forest. There’s an ancient graveyard just off the northwestern perimeter. The markers and the statuary are worn smooth from the centuries. Older boys had told Alex the occupants went wandering at night. “There were evenings,” he said, “if I was alone in the house, I hid behind a sofa.” That didn’t sound at all like the Alex I knew.
Gabe had fought a long, and ultimately losing, battle against development. He’d been something of a fanatic on the subject, and he would not have approved of the surfeit of neighbors the house had acquired over the years, or the loss of large sections of forest.
It was a glorious house, four stories and lots of windows overlooking the Melony. Furnished in the reserved traditions of the previous century. Rooms everywhere, several with VR, another with workout gear, another with a squabble table, another for sitting and watching the river go by. Some rooms were held aside for visitors, and others were pressed into service to store the occasional pieces of other civilizations that Gabe had brought back from his travels.
It was completely out of sync with the other houses in the neighborhood, which were modern, sleek, utilitarian, no space wasted. Practical. Land was at a premium outside Andiquar, and you didn’t find many houses that weren’t part of a designed community. You’ll understand then that the country house stood out. You could see it from a couple klicks away when approaching from the city. Except, of course, at night.
We passed over the Melony, adjusted course, slowed, and drifted down through the treetops.
It was about an hour after sunset. The moon was down, but the stars were out in force. The house, and the landing pad, normally lit up as we approached, but on that evening they remained uncharacteristically dark.
Alex jiggled his comm link. “Jacob,” he said, “lights, please.”
No response.
“Jacob?”
We eased gently to the ground.
“I don’t think he’s there,” I said, as the engine stopped, and the skimmer’s exit lights winked on and threw shadows along the front and side of the house. The cabin doors opened, and a cool breeze blew through the aircraft.
“Stay put,” said Alex. He climbed out.
The area was crowded with other houses. They pushed up to the edge of the low stone wall that marked the northern and eastern perimeters of Alex’s property. They were all illuminated, so whatever was going on, it wasn’t a general power failure.
The landing pad is in a slight depression. Once you’re down you can only see the upper stories. He started up the incline toward the front door. I got out and fell in behind him. I’d never seen the place completely dark before. Burglars are virtually nonexistent nowadays, but you never really know. “Careful,” I said.
The walkway was chipped stone. It crunched underfoot, and we could hear a mournful wind moving through the trees. Alex kept his ID remote in his ring. He strode up the front steps and pointed it at the door. It opened. But slowly. The power was low.
He pushed through. I hurried up beside him and grabbed his wrist. “Not a good idea.”
“It’s okay.” He waved me back and walked into the living room. The lights tried to come on but faded almost immediately. “Jacob,” he said, “hello.”
Nothing.
Starlight came through the windows. He had an original piece of art, a Sujannais, hanging over the sofa. I was relieved to see it was still there. I stuck my head in the office. Maddy’s jacket remained folded inside its display case. And the Polaris glass was in its accustomed place among the books. Had there been a burglar, they should have been the first things taken.
Alex came to the same conclusion. “I think Jacob just went down,” he said.
“There’s no sign of a break-in.”
“Did Jacob ever do a blackout before?”
“No. But AIs go down all the time.”
Actually, they almost never do.
He looked past me into the kitchen. “Maybe you should wait outside, Chase. Just in case.” He opened a cabinet door, fumbled around, and produced a lamp.
Jacob’s internals were located inside a wine cabinet in the dining room. A red warning light was blinking.
The power came by way of a laser link through a dish on the roof. I went outside, far enough away from the house that I could see past the overhang. The receiver was missing. I found it on the ground in back. The base was scorched where someone had cut it down.
I told Alex and suggested he get out of the house. “Just a minute,” he said. He can be frustrating at times. I went in and dragged him out. Then I called the police.
A woman’s voice responded. “Please give your name,” she said, “and state the nature of the emergency.”
I complied and told her that we’d probably had a burglar.
“Where are you now?”
“In the garden.”
“Stay there. Do not go inside. We’re on the way.”
We watched the front door from a safe distance, back within running range of the skimmer, so we could jump aboard and skedaddle if we had to. But the house stayed quiet, and after a few minutes lights appeared overhead. A police cruiser. My link chimed. “You the lady who called?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, ma’am. Please stay well away from the house. Just in case.”
The cruiser assumed station directly overhead.
Alex and I had talked before about security at the office. But burglaries were so rare as to be almost unheard-of, and Alex couldn’t be bothered upgrading his alarm system. “But I guess I’ve learned,” he said. There’d been two break-ins in the area over twelve years, and he’d been the victim of both. “We’ll do something about it this time.”
“Mr. Benedict,” said the voice from the cruiser, “we’ve scanned the house. It’s clear. But we’d prefer you don’t go inside just yet.”
The police drifted down and landed beside the skimmer. There were two officers, male and female, both tall, neatly pressed, courteous. The male, who had dark skin and enormous shoulders and a vaguely northern accent, took charge. He questioned us about what we knew, then they went inside while we waited. After about ten minutes we were invited in, but told not to touch anything. “They used a laser on your dish,” the male said. “Took you right off-line. You’re on backup power.” He was middle-aged, had been on the job a while, and obviously thought citizens should take better care of their property. Maybe invest in decent security systems. I could see it in his eyes. He had thick arms and a heavy black mustache.
“We found a set of footprints that we followed out to the road. But after that-” He shrugged. “Whoever did it must have worn a suit. He left nothing we can trace.”
“I’m sorry to hear it.”
“Have you noticed any strangers in the area? Anyone behaving oddly?”
Not that either of us could recall.
“Okay, why don’t you folks look around? Let’s find out what’s missing.”
The thieves had taken Alex’s collection of Meridian coins-about two thousand years old but not particularly valuable-and a few first editions. Nothing else seemed to be gone.
The officers linked Jacob to a portable power source, and the lights came back on. Alex activated him and asked what he remembered.
“Have I really been off-line?” he said. “It appears I’ve lost two hours, forty-six minutes.”
“Not that long after we left,” said Alex.
We watched while the AI produced pictures of the missing books and coins. The officers asked about estimated value, and they seemed to have an idea how the thieves would get rid of the property. “Anyone who’s shown an unusual interest in any of this stuff?” the female asked. She looked puzzled.
We couldn’t think of anyone other than Alex who had even seen the coins during the last year, although they’d been in plain sight in one of the upstairs rooms. As to the books, everybody knew about them, but they, too, weren’t all that valuable.
“Mr. Benedict,” said her partner, “am I safe in assuming that you have some jewelry on the premises?”
“Yes, I do. But it’s still there. I checked it.”
“Anything else you’d describe as a likely target for thieves?”
He thought it over. “Just the collectibles. Fortunately, it doesn’t look as if they knew what they were doing.”
“You mean they missed the good stuff.”
“That’s exactly what I mean. There are other things, a lot easier to carry than books, that they might have taken.” There was, for example, a Kulot bowl and a recorder from ancient Canada, both in the living room, and in the study a necklace worn at the beginning of the century by Anya Martain. Not to mention the Polaris glass and Maddy’s jacket. All in plain sight.
“Odd,” he said.
Alex shrugged. “If they were smart, they wouldn’t be thieves.”
The intruder had cut through the back door, which would have to be replaced.
The male took a deep breath, suggesting a world-weariness. “You have the nicest house in the neighborhood, Mr. Benedict. If a thief is going anywhere, he’s coming here.”
“I guess.”
He slapped the cover shut on his notebook. “I think that’s about all we can do for now. If you find anything else we should know, get in touch.” He handed Alex a crystal. “Here’s a copy of the record, with your case number.”
Alex managed a smile. He was not happy. “Thanks.”
“No trouble, Mr. Benedict. We’ll keep you informed. You can keep the generator until you get up and running again.” They wished us good evening and got back into the cruiser. “I don’t think you need to worry,” he said. “They never come back. But keep your doors locked anyhow.”
I went out onto the roof, hauled the dish back up, reset it in its housing, taped it down, and was gratified to see that it worked. “It should be all right for tonight,” I said.
“We’ll want to get somebody over in the morning to take a look at it.”
We sat down and began running pictures of the house, room by room, on a split screen, as it had been at the beginning of the day, and as it was now, to see whether we’d missed anything. But everything looked unchanged. Cushions were arranged as they had been, kitchen chairs were in the same positions, a cabinet door left half-open in the dining room remained half-open. “It doesn’t look as if they were very serious,” he said.
“Maybe they’d just started when we arrived and scared them off.”
“That can’t be. Jacob says he was down well over two hours.”
“Then they must have known exactly what they wanted.”
He frowned. “The coin collection and The Complete Fritz Hoyer? ”
“Yeah. I don’t understand it either.”
The kitchen before and after flashed on the wall screen. The dining area. The living room.
The living room had four chairs, a sofa, a bookcase, and side and coffee tables.
A book lay open on one of the chairs. The drapes were drawn. Vina, the pagan goddess of the Altieri, stood fetchingly atop a globe representing the world, her long arms outstretched. The book was My Life in Antiquity, and it was open to the same page in both displays. Pictures were distributed around the walls. These were of Alex’s father (whom he had never known) and Gabe, of Alex and some of his customers, and a couple of Alex and me.
Finally, he sighed, told Jacob to shut it down, and we took to wandering through the house, studying drapes and windows and tables and bookshelves. “They went to a lot of trouble,” he said. “There must have been a reason.”
So much of the stuff should have begged to be taken, onyx religious figurines from Carpalla; a ninth-century drum from the obscure rhythm group, Rapture; a set of eight-sided dice from Dellaconda. “Don’t know,” he said. “Makes no sense.” We gave up finally, went back to the office, and sat down.
We sat there for a couple of minutes in puzzled silence. It was late, and I was ready to go home. He was looking at Maddy’s jacket.
“Gotta go, boss,” I said, getting to my feet and pulling on my coat. “Tomorrow comes early.”
He rose also, nodding, but paying no attention. Instead he walked over to the case holding the jacket, stared at it for a minute, and tried the lid. It was still locked.
“You look surprised,” I said.
The lock was electronic, designed to keep children or idle adults from handling the contents. It wasn’t the sort of thing that would have deterred a burglar. He opened it and pursed his lips. “They’ve been into it,” he said.
You already know the angle of the imager didn’t give us a picture of the jacket as it had appeared earlier. But it was still folded. It looked okay to me. “Alex,” I said patiently, “if they’d done that, they wouldn’t have gone to the trouble to put it back.
And relock the case.”
“You got me there, love.” He grimaced. “This is different from what it was, though. Look at Maddy’s name.”
It had been clearly visible before. It still was, actually, but it was partially around the fold. “This isn’t the way it was,” I said.
“No. They took it out, refolded it, and put it back.”
“That can’t be right. Why would a thief do that?”
“Why would a thief leave the jewelry? Or the Sujannais?” He walked over to the bookcase, turned its light on, and looked at the long-stemmed glass. The lock was an old-fashioned one requiring a metal key. It could have been opened, but, unlike the display case, not without breaking it. “It hasn’t been touched,” he said.
Advanced Electronics showed up next day, shook their heads a lot, and wondered that we’d left so much to chance. “Well, no more,” they told us. “From now on, anybody tries to knock out your dish, you’ve got a serious backup. Anybody manages to break in, Jacob will call the police, and the intruder will be lying on the floor when they get here.” They collected the police generator and announced they’d return it.
That was the day we started the paperwork to implement the idea about doing some radioarcheology. But Alex was distracted by the break-in. “We better assume,” he said, “that they got into the records.”
“Did you ask Jacob whether he can make a determination as to whether that happened?”
“He says he has no way of knowing. So we have to assume the worst.”
“Okay.”
“Chase, we need to inform everyone with whom Rainbow has done business recently, say, the last two years, that the details of all transactions have been compromised and may be in the hands of thieves.”
While I was taking care of it, he went to lunch with someone, and I got a call from Fenn Redfield. Fenn was a police inspector, and also a friend. He’d handled the original burglary years before. “When you get a chance, Chase,” he said, “you and Alex might want to drop by the station.”
“Alex isn’t here,” I said. “He’s off working with a client.”
“Then yourself will do fine.”
Fenn has an unusual history. In another life, literally another life, he’d been a small-time thief, apparently not very competent. In the incident that ended that career, the owner of a house he was burglarizing walked in on him. There was a struggle, the owner got pushed through a second-floor window and died of his injuries. Fenn, who had a different name in those days, was caught leaving the premises. The jury found him guilty, a fourth conviction. The judge pronounced him incorrigible and a danger to society, so they’d done a mind wipe and a personality adjustment. Nobody in Fenn’s new life is supposed to know that. He didn’t even know it. He received a new identity, a new address halfway across the country from where the crimes occurred, a new set of memories, and a new psyche. Now he had a wife and kids and a responsible job. He worked hard, seemed to be competent, and showed every sign of enjoying his life.
I knew all this because the victim’s sister was a Rainbow client. She’d wanted the killer dead, and she’d shown me pictures from the trial, and there was Fenn.
Incredible. I pointed out to her that the killer was dead, as surely as if he’d been dropped in the ocean.
But I’ve never said anything to anyone, not even Alex. And I doubt this memoir will ever be published. In any case, I won’t allow it until I’m sure it can do no harm.
I thought his summons meant they’d caught the intruder. Probably trying to break into someone else’s place.
The police office is located on the lip of a ridge about a kilometer away from the country house. The day was unseasonably warm, so I decided to walk over.
It’s an old run-down stone building, a former courthouse, with a lot of space in back and upstairs that they’d sealed off because they had no use for it and wanted to avoid the expense of climate control.
The front looks like a neglected thirteenth-century portico. Lots of fluted columns, curving steps, and a fountain that doesn’t work anymore. A bit pretentious for a police station. I climbed the steps and went in. The officer on duty showed me directly into Fenn’s office.
Fenn was short and heavy, with a voice down in the basement somewhere. Off duty, he enjoyed a good party, a good joke, good VR. But when he put the badge in his pocket, his personality changed. Not that he became unduly formal, but anything not related to the business at hand was clearly perceived as inconsequential.
He had large jaws, riveting green eyes, and a talent for making people feel that everything was going to be all right. A plastene bag stood on the floor at his feet.
“Don’t know what we’re coming to, Chase,” he said, looking up from a document and waving me to a seat. “Getting so people’s homes aren’t even safe anymore.”
He lifted himself out of his chair, came around in front of the desk, and used it to prop himself up. The office was small, with a single window looking out on the house next door. The walls were covered with awards, commendations, pictures of Fenn standing by a police cruiser, Fenn shaking hands with important-looking officials, Fenn smiling broadly as someone pinned a set of bars on his shoulders. A blackened Fenn carried a child out of a disaster site.
“Did you catch them?” I asked.
He shook his head. “No. Afraid not, Chase. Wish we had. But I do have good news for you.” He reached down beside the couch, picked up the bag, and held it out to me.
It was the coins.
“That was quick,” I said. “Where’d you find them?”
“They were in the river.”
“In the river?”
“Yes. About two klicks downstream.”
The satin-lined container that had housed the collection was ruined. But the coins were okay.
“A couple of kids were making out on a landing. Skimmer comes by, swings low over the river, and drops that and the books. Everything was in a weighted sack.” He produced one of the books. It was a soggy mess. I couldn’t even read the title.
“I don’t get it,” I said. “Why steal stuff, then throw it in the river? Were they worried about getting caught?”
“I have no idea. It happened the same night they were taken. Next day, the boy came back to the spot with a sensor.” He examined one of the books under a lamp, holding it carefully as if it were something unclean. “He thought it was strange, and he called us. This one”-he consulted his notes-“is God and the Republic. ”
“Yep. That’s one of ours.”
“Leather cover.” His jaw muscles worked. “I don’t think it’s of much use now.”
We sat staring at one another.
“Sounds as if somebody has a grudge,” I said.
“If they did, Chase, Alex wouldn’t have had a house to come home to.” He ran his fingers through his hair and made a series of pained faces. “It doesn’t make a lot of sense. Are you sure nothing else is missing?”
“How do you mean?”
“Sometimes thieves really want an ID, but they take other stuff so the owner doesn’t notice right away. That way they can go on a spree.”
I looked down at the bracelet that carried my data disk and thought about it.
“No,” I said. “We checked that possibility last night. Did the kids get a look at the skimmer?”
“It was gray.”
“That all?”
“That’s it. They didn’t get the number.” He squinted at one of the coins.
“Where’s it from?”
“Meridian Age. Two thousand years ago.”
“On Rimway?”
“Blavis.”
“Oh.” He put it back. “The inspecting officer told me there were other valuables that the thieves missed.”
“That’s correct.”
“And that some of them were out in the open.”
“That’s true, too. You’ve been over there, Fenn. You know what it’s like.”
The green eyes narrowed. “You and your employer need to get serious about security.”
“We already have.”
“Good. It’s about time.”
I thought we were ready to change the subject. “By the way,” I said, “have you made any progress toward catching the people who planted the bomb at Proctor Union?”
He grunted. “It’s not my case. But we’ll get them. We’re checking out every Kondi in the area.” Kondi was a disparaging term for anyone from Korrim Mas. His lined face acquired a bulldog look. “We’ll get them.”
“Good.”
“The bomb was homemade. From chemicals available over the counter. And insecticide.”
“Insecticide? Can you really make a bomb out of that?”
“Yes, indeed. And it packs a wallop.”
I sent the boy who’d found the package in the river a couple of rare coins, and judging from his reply, he was smart enough to understand their value. A few days later Fenn confessed they were having no luck tracking down the thieves, and he said that we’d have to be patient, that eventually they’d make a mistake, and he would catch them. What he seemed to be saying was that the police were waiting for them to burgle somebody else.
At about the same time I got a call from Paul Calder. He materialized in the office, wearing a gray military-style jacket over a blue shirt. He was outside on his veranda. “Chase,” he said, “I wanted you to know how much I appreciated your getting Maddy’s vest for me.” He’d already thanked us. That, and the fact that he looked embarrassed, told me something had happened. “I’m sending you another four hundred.”
“Was there something else you wanted to buy?”
“No. Call it a bonus.”
We’d already been paid. “That’s generous of you, Paul. But why?”
He was about average height, a bit overweight. He wore an unruly black beard in an effort to appear intellectual, but he just looked unkempt. Calder was afflicted with runaway piety. Lots of references to the Almighty. “I really liked that vest.”
I noted the past tense. “What happened to it?”
Another grin. “I got an offer I couldn’t refuse.”
I believe, had he been physically in the room, I’d have throttled him without a second thought. “Paul,” I said, “tell me you didn’t sell it.”
“Chase, they doubled my money.”
“ We would have doubled your money. Damn it, Paul, I told you that thing was worth a lot more than you’d paid for it. Do you still have it in your possession?”
“He picked it up this morning.” I sat there shaking my head. He cleared his throat and pulled at his collar. “I know what you said, about what it was worth, but I thought you were exaggerating.”
Paul’s money was inherited. He’d never known what it took to create wealth, so he’d never taken it seriously. Money was just something he spent when a whim took him. More or less, I thought, the way he took his religion. There was a superficiality to it. Lots of Bless you’s and God willing’s but I never got the sense he thought in serious terms about what a Creator might be like. Or what the implications were.
Nevertheless, he was a difficult man to stay angry with. He literally cringed while waiting for me to react. So I calmed down. “Any chance you can cancel the deal?”
“No,” he said. “I wrote a receipt, took the money, and gave it to him.”
“No escape clause?”
“What’s an escape clause?”
I found myself thinking about the thief poking around in the Rainbow data banks. “Paul,” I asked, “how’d he find out you had it?”
“Oh, that’s no big deal. Everybody knew. I didn’t make a secret of it. And anyway I took it with me the other day to the monthly meeting of the Chacun Historical Association.”
“How’d they react to it?”
“They loved it. Friend of mine even brought a sim of Garth Urquhart.”
“Paul, the person who bought it, did you know him? Prior to the purchase?”
“No. But he was at the meeting.” He tried grinning again. “Little guy. Name’s Davis.”
“Okay. Thanks for letting me know.”
“I’m sorry if I upset you. Selling it seemed like the right thing to do.”
“Maybe it was. I’m not upset, Paul. You doubled your money so I guess you came out of it all right.” I thought about returning the bonus he was sending us, but there was really no point in that. I’d just earned it.
I stared at the empty space Paul’s image had occupied. How could he be so dumb?
But there was nothing to be done about it.
Even though we were no longer involved with Polaris artifacts, I was still curious about the incident itself. I began to think I’d never rest easy until I could at least construct a rational sequence of events that could have resulted in the disappearance of Maddy and her passengers. “Jacob?” I asked. “Is there a visual record of the Polaris departure?”
“Checking.”
While he looked, I went to the kitchen and got a cup of tea.
“Yes, there is. Do you want me to set it up?”
“Please.”
The office morphed into a Skydeck terminal. And they were all there. Maddy and Urquhart, Boland, Klassner (looking barely alive), White, Mendoza, and Dunninger. Along with a crowd of about fifty people. And a small band. The band played a medley of unfamiliar tunes, and people took turns shaking hands with the voyagers.
Martin Klassner was propped against the back of his seat, talking to a rumpled man, whom I recognized immediately as Jess Taliaferro, the Survey director who’d organized the mission and had himself eventually disappeared. It was an odd scene, Klassner and Taliaferro, two men who’d walked into the night on different occasions, and never been seen again. Klassner’s lips barely moved when he talked, and his hands trembled. I wondered that they’d send a man so obviously ill on such a journey.
There was a physician on one of the accompanying ships, but that hardly seemed sufficient.
Nancy White stood near a souvenir shop. She was trim, attractive, dressed as if she were headed out of town for a holiday. She was talking quietly to a small group, one of whom was a tall, dark-complexioned, good-looking guy, who looked worried.
“Her husband, Michael,” said Jacob. “He was a real estate developer.”
Urquhart was surrounded by journalists. He was smiling, holding up his hands, no more questions, folks, I really need to get on board, okay just one more.
Chek Boland was flanked by two women. “He’s been described as the man who solved the mind-body problem.”
“What’s the mind-body problem, Jacob?”
“I’m not clear on it myself, Chase. Apparently it’s an ancient conundrum. The issue seems to revolve around the nature of consciousness.”
I thought about asking him to explain, but it sounded complicated so I let it go.
Tom Dunninger and Warren Mendoza were holding forth for another group near the ramp. “The one next to Dunninger,” said Jacob, “is Borio Chapatka. Ann Kelly’s there, too. And Min Kao-Wing - ”
“Who are they?” I asked.
“At the time, they were the major biomedical researchers.”
There was a fair amount of gesturing and raised voices. Whatever they were talking about, it was loud and open to debate. Ann Kelly appeared to be making notes.
Madeleine English, crisp and blonde and very efficient, came out of a side passageway with a tall man. He was a looker. Big, red hair, dark eyes, and a faintly lascivious smile. Probably a few years younger than she was. “That’s Kile Anderson,” said Jacob. “He’s a journalist. Assigned to Skydeck. It’s how he met her.”
“This was her boyfriend?”
“One of them.”
Boland looked up, straight across the terminal at me, almost as if he knew I was there. He had classic features, with dark bedroom eyes. One of the women with him looked familiar. “Jessica Birk,” said Jacob. She’d later become a senator.
Birk eventually detached herself and wandered through the boarding area, taking a couple of minutes with each of the passengers, giving the journalists a clear shot whenever possible, shaking hands with all. Good luck. Enjoy the flight. Wish I were going with you.
Maddy disappeared with her male friend up the tunnel leading to the ship.
Moments later he came back down alone, looking forlorn. He surveyed the people around him, shrugged, and walked off.
Klassner, assisted by Taliaferro, got to his feet and started for the ramp. Several of the onlookers crowded around to shake his hand. I could read their lips. Good luck, Professor.
Klassner smiled politely, and said something.
Nancy White joined them and gave him her arm to lean on. Taliaferro answered a call on his link. He nodded, said something, nodded again. Looked at White. Sure, she told him, go ahead.
He looked apologetic. I could make out Something came up. Have to go. Sorry.
He made a quick round of the other voyagers, wished them luck, then was pushing through the crowd. Within moments he’d disappeared down the concourse.
There was an announcement that the Polaris would be departing in ten minutes, please board, and everyone began moving toward the ramp, saying their good-byes, waving for the cameras. A journalist cornered Boland, asked a couple of quick questions, What do you expect to see out there?, and As a psychiatrist, will you be more interested in the reactions of the other passengers than you are in the collision itself? Boland answered as best he could. I’m on a holiday. You don’t get to see something like this very often.
One last round of farewells, and they drifted into the tunnel, all smiles.