Order happen again. That was why she had joined the constabulary, and that was why, when the offer of this promotion had come, she had taken it. Remembering all this, Mhevet took heart, and reached for her private comm, entering a number known to only a handful of people throughout the quadrant. A voice familiar throughout the Union came through.
“Arati? Is that you?”
“Yes,” she said. “It’s me.”
“Any word on Antok?”
“No, not yet. Sir, I hate to ask you this, but do you by any chance have any idea where I can find Natima Lang?”
There was a brief pause.
“Now why do you think that I would know that?”
“I don’t know, sir. I don’t know what’s going on. I’m working on the assumption that we’re all still on the same side—”
“Well, so am I, Arati, although I’m rather surprised to find that you feel the need to say it out loud.”
“In that case, sir, I think it might be helpful for you to know right now that Lang’s aide has been murdered.”
She heard him groan. “Murdered.”
“Body dumped in the garden where the campus memorial stands.”
He hissed in a breath. “I see.”
“I think we should talk, sir.”
“Yes,” he said. “I think you’re right.”
* * *
With great trepidation, Lang climbed into the skimmer. The door sealed behind her. She looked around. It was as if she was enclosed in a box with dark tinted windows on all sides. She could just see the driver through the screen ahead, and the road outside, but to her left a jet-black screen divided her from the other passenger seat. Slowly, this divide began to lower, and she came face-to-face with Elim Garak.
He was not smiling. “Professor Lang,” he said. “I gather you’re going on vacation to Arawath. It’s lovely there. I own a small house there myself. But perhaps before you leave you could do me the courtesy of speaking to me first?”
Lang briefly closed her eyes. All the fear that had accumulated over the past day was starting to turn into a deep and bitter fury. She knew she had done nothing wrong, nothing other than want a job that this man did not want her to have. She was being played with, toyed with, and she had done nothing to deserve this kind of treatment. But she was not easily cowed. She had run rings around the Obsidian Order for many years. She was happy to go around one more time.
“Are you in the custom,” she said coldly, “of chasing prominent intellectuals across the city in your skimmer, Castellan? I shall have to write to my assemblyperson and tell her that they’re not keeping you busy enough.”
“I’m not in that habit, no,” replied Garak. “But then you are quite exceptional.” He looked past her, through the dark window. “Well done, by the way. You led us a fine dance. Whatever you’re paying that driver, you should double it.”
The driver, she thought. She fumbled for her personal comm in order to pay him, and perhaps she could send a message through him for Servek, to contact her nestor. This situation was clearly even more serious than she had realized.
“That won’t work in here,” said Garak.
“I beg your pardon.”
“Your comm. It will be blocked. I like my privacy.”
“Are you allowed to do that?”
He gave her a very cold stare. Then he tapped a few buttons on the armrest beside him. “Don’t worry about the driver,” he said. “I’ve picked up the tab.”
“I was also going to contact my nestor.”
“Oh yes? Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”
Garak leaned forward and rapped on the window. The big skimmer pulled out onto the road, leaving Lang’s skimmer on the roadside. They sat in silence for a while, and then Garak said conversationally, “Have you heard from Quark recently?”
So he was going to play games with her first. “Not for a few months.”
“Perhaps you should invite him to visit.” His lips twitched. “Yes,” he said. “That might be very amusing for us all.”
“Castellan,” she said. “I do not understand what is happening and I am very afraid. Must we play these games?”
“All right, no games. It might not console you entirely to hear that I too do not understand exactly what is happening. I am, however, not easily scared.”
She opened her eyes to look at him. Had he ever been tasked to investigate her, she wondered. Had he read her files or tried to infiltrate her network? If so, she had defeated him. He had been exiled from Cardassia before she too was forced to leave. I will not be afraid of you, she thought.
“Tell me about Project Enigma,” he said.
“I have no idea what it is!” she said. “I had heard nothing about it before this week!”
His blue eyes narrowed. “Are you quite sure?”
“What do you mean?”
“Ultimately, what I mean is—can you prove it?”
“Of course I can’t prove it! I can only give my word that I know nothing about it.”
“Be as accurate in your statements to me as you would be in your own work,” he said softly. “Think back to when you first served on university committees, and be scrupulous in what you assert to be the truth.”
She thought carefully before offering a reply. She was starting to feel that this was less an interrogation, and more the start of the process of constructing her defense. “I served on a large number of committees before I fled Prime,” she said after a while. She shook her head. “The truth is—I can’t remember.”
“Ah.”
“I know that sometimes I agreed to decisions that sat badly. I supported—or did not obstruct—the removal of numerous texts. I did not prevent financial support being removed from one or two troublesome students. I’m not proud of any of that,” she said.
“We all had compromises to make.”
“But a project like this? Experiments on children?” She shook her head. “I’d remember that! But I don’t. I don’t remember. Therefore, I have to assume that I never saw anything about it. Could I have forgotten? I don’t think so. Not something like that. But that’s not the same as proof, is it?”
“No,” Garak said. “Not the ideal answer, but it’s a start at least.” He took a deep breath, and she had the distinct impression that he was greatly relieved. But then he pursed his lips and gave her a vexed look. “Might I suggest that running for the hills at the first sign of trouble was not the best way to communicate your innocence?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“Nor do I!”
“It was my aide’s suggestion.”
“Ah, yes, your aide,” said Garak. “Do you know where she is?”
Lang looked at him in puzzlement. “I left her at my office. She packed my suitcase for me.”
“Did you also know that somebody has been systematically deleting files from your archive?”
“I have been doing some housekeeping.”
“Someone other than you.”
Lang shook her head. “No, no, I didn’t. Servek had access to them . . .”
“Did she? Well, when we find her, we’ll ask her about that.” He studied her. “Really,” he said, “you’ve made the most frightful mess of all this.”
“I know,” Lang said, and put her hand to her brow. “It’s been terrible. All of it—terrible. I thought I was going to be chief academician. I suppose I can forget that now.”
“Well, it’s certainly going to make it harder.”
“What I don’t understand,” said Lang bitterly, “is your hostility toward me.”
“My hostility toward you?”
“What have I done to you, Garak?” she burst out.
Garak looked at her in frank amazement. “Natima, what are you saying? I have no hostility toward yo
u! I admire you greatly!”
“Then why are you so opposed to my taking on the role of chief academician?”
Garak didn’t answer right away. He leaned back in his seat and studied her carefully. “Do you want the post so much?”
“Of course I do!” said Lang. “The university is my home! The place that has mattered most to me my entire life!”
“Perhaps,” said Garak.
Lang stared at him. “What do you mean by that?”
“I mean . . . that places change. People change. You were away from Cardassia Prime for quite some time. Exiled. So was I. I cannot speak for anyone else, but I know that when I returned, I found that all that had once meant a great deal to me had been transformed. Remade.” He looked at her curiously. “Did exile not have the same effect on you?”
“I . . . had not thought of it in that way,” she said. “Of course, so much was gone . . .” She shook her head. “I don’t believe I have an answer to that question.” Lang gave a small laugh. “That hasn’t happened in a while.”
“I’m certainly flattered to think that I could challenge your thinking in that way.” He smiled, leaned over, and patted her arm. “I think we should take you home.”
“Home?”
“Yes, home—by which I mean your house here in the capital. Not some country retreat or hideaway on a distant system. Go home, walk past any journalists with your head held high, and then come out and make a statement. My people can help you write it—I strongly suggest you take me up on this. But, really, this has gone on long enough. You say you have nothing to hide, and I am prepared to believe you.” He looked at her with pity. “I am not your enemy,” he said. “Far from it. And I believe that these accusations are most likely to turn out to be baseless.”
She gave a wry smile. “That is not quite a full statement of support.”
“Well, I prefer to cover all the bases. Take me up on my offer,” he said. “Go home and make your statement. Speak to your nestor. And then think carefully about what it is you really want.”
The skimmer turned off the main circular and began to wind its way through Paldar, the residential district where Lang had her home. “A nice area,” Garak said. “Recovering well.”
“But not what it once was.”
“None of us are what we once were,” he said. “For which I am, daily, very grateful.” They pulled up outside her house. “What a lovely home you have!” he exclaimed. “What a sensitive reconstruction!”
She looked out fearfully. “There’s nobody here,” she said. “Where have they all gone?”
He gave a sly smile. “I instructed my people to let out the information that you were heading for the spaceport. I imagine they’ve all gone over there. It’s easy to put people off the scent, when you know how.”
Lang laughed at that, at the thought of them all scurrying toward the spaceport while she was sailing back in the opposite direction. Smiling, he offered her his palm, and she pressed her own against it and felt oddly cheered that this man was so plainly on her side.
“I’m glad we’re not enemies,” she said.
“So am I,” said Garak. “More than you know.”
She heard a sudden chime from the comm on his armrest. “Forgive me,” he said. “That noise means urgent. I should answer that. One never knows if one will find one’s nation suddenly on the brink of war.”
“I can hardly imagine.”
He gave her a strange, bright look. “No? I’m sure you could, if you tried.”
He raised the divider again to take the call in private. When he lowered it again, his face was completely changed. He was no longer friendly, but had schooled his expression to complete blandness.
“Castellan, is everything well?” she said, and then thought that perhaps that was an indiscreet question.
“I’m afraid not, Professor,” he said. “There has been a rather unfortunate turn of events. We’ve found your aide.”
“But surely that’s good news?” said Lang. “We can get to the bottom of these wretched files and what’s been happening with them.”
“Alas no,” said Garak. “She’s dead. Murdered.”
Lang raised her hand to cover her mouth.
“You understand,” said Garak softly, “that this is very bad for you?”
“I understand,” said Lang.
“It’s imperative,” said Garak. “That you do everything I ask, without delay.”
And Natima Lang, nodding, found herself in the remarkable position of relying on a man who had, once upon a time, represented everything she most loathed and feared.
Garak leaned forward to speak to his driver. “To the residence, please. Not the official residence. My private residence. My home.”
* * *
Mhevet had often visited the official residence, but she had never been to Garak’s home in Coranum before. She knew—because he had told her—that it was built upon the ruins of what had been his father’s mansion. His father, Enabran Tain, the former head of the Obsidian Order, once the most feared man in the Union, had attempted to wipe out the Founders, leading directly to their genocidal assault upon the Cardassian species. She wondered, as she drove her skimmer slowly through the haze up along the winding avenues of Coranum, why Garak would elect to build his home upon the ruins of that man’s house. Was it to remind himself of his past? Tell himself that he had transcended it? Not for the first time, Mhevet thought that perhaps Garak’s mind tended to the morbid.
Mhevet sighed. In her old life, before the war and the Fire, she had no call to visit this part of the city, which had been home to the wealthiest and most powerful people in the Union. It wasn’t that crimes weren’t committed here—far from it—but it wasn’t as easy to make anything stick. The kind of people who had lived in old Coranum had, on the whole, lived lives of complete impunity. The Jem’Hadar had put a stop to that. They had not discriminated. To be Cardassian was sufficient to merit extinction. And after that, in the new Cardassia, everything had changed. No crime would go unpunished; no criminal would think they were above the law. Not on her watch. No matter how eminent they were, and no matter what their past had been.
The security was lighter than at the official residence, but effective nonetheless, and Mhevet’s skimmer was stopped several blocks away, and her clearances checked, before she was waved on. At the door of the house, a team of two bodyguards checked her credentials once again, and then one of these led her inside. It was a small place, almost humble, and it still had a rather makeshift air about it. Most people had rebuilt by now. But then, Garak had been away for some years on Earth before moving into the castellan’s official residence. Still, she had expected something grander. He had never struck her as the kind of man to skimp upon his surroundings. Perhaps he found it soothing.
Garak was waiting for her in a small sitting room. This space was much more as she had expected, comfortable and tasteful. The lower walls were lined with bookcases, the upper sections with paintings. Garak was standing in front of a big window that looked out into a garden full of stone statues. Beyond was a view of the city at night.
“Arati,” he said. He studied her carefully, and a small smile played across his lips. “It’s nice to welcome you to my home at last.”
“Sir,” she said. “This isn’t a visit. You know why I’m here. I’m looking for Natima Lang.”
“Oh yes? And why do you think I would be able to help?”
Mhevet took up a formal stance, feet slightly apart, hands clasped behind her back. “Sir,” she said, “a woman is dead. Natima Lang is the most immediate suspect. There is a clear motive—”
“Which is?” said Garak.
“Lang had given Servek access to her files. We know Servek had been tampering with them—perhaps on Lang’s instruction. Lang murdered her to keep this secret—”
“Why?” said
Garak. “Why do that?”
“I don’t know,” said Mhevet.
“No,” said Garak. “You don’t.”
“I don’t know because I haven’t had the opportunity to interview Lang yet!” Mhevet said, not bothering to keep the irritation from her voice. “Perhaps Servek tried to blackmail her.”
“Ah, I see we are already well into the realms of conjecture now.”
“Which is where we will remain,” Mhevet shot back, “until my people get to carry out their interview.”
Garak didn’t reply. He walked slowly toward her, away from the window, and sat down in a comfortable chair. He gestured to her to sit down in the chair opposite, but she remained standing. “As a matter of personal interest,” Garak said, “do you believe that Natima Lang agreed to allow experiments to be conducted on children?”
“I have no idea. But I have reasonable grounds to suspect her.”
“I see.”
“Do you, sir?”
He shrugged.
“Do I have to spell this out for you, sir?”
Garak’s expression was still, almost stony. Mhevet felt herself tremble and struggled to conceal it.
“By all means spell it out for me, Arati.”
“Very well. You’re obstructing a police investigation.”
“And?”
“Sir,” said Mhevet, “do you really want me to arrest you?”
Garak rose from his chair and slowly walked over until he was standing directly before her. They were about the same height. Garak looked directly into her eyes. “Say that again,” he murmured. “I’m not sure I caught it.”
“Yes, you did. But just in case I wasn’t clear—I said, do you want me to arrest you?”
Something flickered behind Garak’s eyes. “Would you really do that?”
“You bet your boots I would!”
They stood, face-to-face, staring at each other. After a moment, Mhevet thought she saw the faintest ghost of a smile upon the castellan’s lips. She thought she caught something like pride.
Garak said, “And you’ll be glad to hear that I find you completely convincing.”
Enigma Tales Page 18