Cosmopath - [Bengal Station 03]

by Eric Brown

  He saw this and laughed, pulled her to him and kissed her.

  “I’ll get on to Lin in the morning, sort something out.”

  “But the assassin...?”

  “Once all this has blown over, I’ll up the shifts.”

  She nodded. “Oh, Jeff... Everything was going so well, wasn’t it? I was so happy. We had everything. Two lovely girls. I had you...”

  “Hey, we’ve still got those things. Everything’ll work out fine, believe me. And seventy per cent are good odds, Su.”

  She looked at him. He was smiling down at her, radiating strength and confidence. She felt something melt within her, despair and at the same time relief that she had this man at the centre of her life.

  Later, around midnight, with the best part of six bottles of beer consumed between them, Sukara stopped off at the door to the girls’ bedroom and leaned against the woodwork, staring in at the quietly sleeping figures. They were almost identical, embryonic shapes in their beds, jet hair dark against the pillows, breaths synchronised as they slept.

  Wondering what the future might hold, she pushed herself away from the door and joined Jeff in bed. They came together in silence and held on to each other like the survivors of a shipwreck.

  * * * *

  FOUR

  AN IRRESISTIBLE OFFER

  That morning, Vaughan had a lucid dream. It was a replay of the chase the day before, and its aftermath. He was sitting in the bar, thinking he’d shaken the Korth, when Sukara called him with the news about Li. Then the jade-green alien was standing on the threshold and this time, with the arbitrary revisionism of dreams, Vaughan watched as the Korth killed the security woman with a single burst of its pistol and turned to face him...

  He cried out and sat up in bed, overwhelmed by the fact that had Sukara not called him last night then the Korth would undoubtedly have killed him.

  He stared around the luxury hotel room, momentarily confused. The floor-to-ceiling window looked out over stepped gardens, and beyond them the vast expanse of the Bay of Bengal shimmered in the early morning sun.

  Sukara stirred beside him. She rubbed her eyes and smiled, and Vaughan reached out and cupped her head. Even first thing in the morning, even with the scar that bisected her face, she was beautiful. They kissed.

  “Jeff,” she murmured. “Thanks for last night. I feel a lot better.”

  “We’ll be fine,” he said. “Li’ll be fine.”

  “Jeff, after what happened yesterday...”

  He nodded. The assassin, on top of the news about Li’s condition, was a burden he could have done without. He was torn; part of him wanted to work on the case, find out what the hell was going on. Another part wanted nothing more than to hole up with Su and the kids and concentrate on getting Li cured. But how to pay for that without actively working, and so putting himself in danger?

  Pham traipsed barefoot and sleep-fuddled into the bedroom. She climbed between them and snuggled in. “Li’s still sleepy.” She looked up at Vaughan with massive eyes wide below her pudding-bowl fringe. “She’ll be okay, won’t she, Daddy?”

  He tweaked her nose. “She’ll be fine in no time,” he said.

  A soft double-note chime announced they had a caller.

  “Who the hell can that be?” Vaughan said, swivelling out of bed and dressing quickly.

  “Maybe room service with a big breakfast,” Pham said. She thought of little but her stomach these days.

  He moved from the bedroom and crossed the plush suite.

  A screen beside the door allowed the room’s occupant to view the caller. Vaughan activated it and stared with disbelief at the revealed face.

  “Mr Vaughan? It is your old friend and servant come to offer his services in this, your time of need.”

  “How the hell did you find out where we were?” Vaughan asked.

  The old man smiled, looking more than ever like a leathery old turtle. “I have my contacts, Mr Vaughan; there is little that does not come, in time, to my attention.”

  “Well, you’d better come in.”

  Vaughan opened the door and stepped aside as Dr Rao, diminutive in his impeccable Nehru suit, made a namaste gesture and slipped into the room.

  “It’s been a long time, Rao. Three years?”

  The old man beamed. “Closer to four, during which, need I say, you have often been in my thoughts.”

  Vaughan smiled, wondering what the old rogue wanted this time. He gestured to the sofa before the plate-glass window, and Rao crossed the room and eased himself into its embrace.

  “Su!” Vaughan called. “We have a visitor.”

  Seconds later Sukara entered the room, knotting her kimono and peering at their guest.

  “Dr Rao?” she said.

  Vaughan watched conflicting emotions pass across his wife’s face. Six years ago, it was Rao who had informed Sukara of her sister’s death; four years ago, the Brahmin Fagin had helped Vaughan locate Pham and save her life.

  “Well, this is a big surprise, Dr Rao,” she said.

  “And before breakfast, too,” Vaughan said. “We’re just about to eat? Care to join us?”

  “As ever,” Rao said primly, “your generosity cannot be spurned. A salted lassi and idli, perhaps.”

  Vaughan dialled up coffee, idli, and toast from room service, and a minute later the wall unit chimed. He carried the tray across to the coffee table and set it down before Rao.

  He considered enabling his tele-ability and reading Rao’s motives for coming here. The memory of the last time he’d dipped into the doctor’s mind, however, stilled his hand. He had no real desire to meld with Rao’s cunning, sanctimonious psyche. And anyway, by scanning Rao he’d pick up the girls’ thoughts too, and he’d promised himself that he’d never do that.

  Pham joined them, snuggling in between Vaughan and Sukara on the sofa, while Dr Rao sipped his lassi and consumed the idli in three bites. He attended to his lips with a napkin, then sat back and laced his fingers across his stomach.

  “Now,” Vaughan said, sipping his coffee. “First off, how did you know we’re here?”

  “Simplicity itself, Mr Vaughan. I needed to contact you last night, and sent one of my children to your apartment. However, you were leaving, surrounded by guards, and so my child exercised her wit, hailed a taxi-flier and followed you here. By the time she returned, I deemed it too late to intrude upon your privacy.”

  “How can I help you?”

  The doctor smiled. “Happily, it is I who am admirably positioned on this occasion to extend the hand of succour to you.”

  Vaughan suppressed the urge to smile at the man’s arch formality. “And how might you do that?”

  Rao removed his antique wire-rimmed spectacles and made an exhibition of polishing the lenses, all the while smiling with self-satisfaction. He replaced the glasses, blinked at Vaughan and said, “It has come to my attention that you are, if I might make so bold, in the position where, ah... extra finances might facilitate your desires?”

  Vaughan turned to Sukara. “I think he means we need some extra cash,” he said.

  “Your economy with the language is succinct, if lacking in a certain elegance, if I might make the observation.”

  Sukara said, “How do you know?”

  “My dear, I am an esteemed member of the medical profession. I have friends in elevated positions. I also know that to successfully discharge financial obligations in the matter of effecting a cure for your daughter’s condition will demand a considerable sum. Now, it so happens that I am in the position to effectuate a situation whereby such sums are within your attainment.”

  “In plain English, if you don’t mind, Rao.”

  “In unadorned parlance, as per your request, Mr Vaughan; I have a contact who is desirous of making your acquaintance so that he might put to you a certain business proposition-”

  “I’m doing nothing illegal, Rao.”

  Rao pantomimed a gesture of shock. “Mr Vaughan! I assure you that my contact
would be sorely discommoded at such an imputation.”

  “Who is it and what do they want?”

  “My contact is none other than the feted businessman and voidship tycoon, Mr Rabindranath Chandrasakar.” Rao sat back primly and smiled.

  Vaughan shook his head. “So what does the multi-billionaire starship magnate with half the Expansion in his pocket want with me, Rao?”

  “That, Mr Vaughan, he did not disclose to me, his humble servant. Suffice to say, Mr Chandrasakar is confident that you will grant him an audience, as not only might doing so ease your financial situation, but also take you away from the Station at this time of... ah, shall we say... personal peril.”

  “What do you know about that, Rao?” Vaughan snapped.

  Dr Rao raised both palms in a gesture of impugned innocence. “Merely what Mr Chandrasakar vouchsafed; to wit, that yesterday an attempt was made upon your life.”

  Vaughan looked at Sukara. He didn’t like the sound of leaving the Station, and he had no doubt that the self-serving Dr Rao was revealing less than he knew, but at the same time he was intrigued by the offer of financial aid.

  Sukara murmured, “You could always meet the guy, Jeff, see what he wants you to do.”

  Dr Rao beamed. “I can see that the passing years have done nothing to blunt your wife’s perspicacity, Mr Vaughan.”

  “Okay, Rao. I’ll see him. But I’m promising nothing.”

  Rao spread his hands wide and beamed. “In that case I will contact Mr Chandrasakar immediately and effect a meeting.”

  He stood, creakily, and moved towards the door, where he spoke in hushed tones into an ancient communicator.

  Beside Vaughan, Pham whispered, “What did the man say, Daddy?”

  Sukara squeezed her. “He said that he might have work for Daddy, to pay for Li’s medicine.”

  Pham looked at Vaughan, and he nodded.

  Rao returned. “Mr Chandrasakar is more than delighted at the prospect of making your acquaintance, Mr Vaughan. He suggests that we make immediate tracks for the spaceport, where he is currently supervising the refitting of one of his liners.”

  Vaughan nodded. “Give me thirty minutes to get a shower, and I’ll be with you.”

  Dr Rao smiled. “I shall await you in the coffee house in the plaza, Mr Vaughan.” He made a gallant bow to Sukara. “It was, as ever, a delight to make your acquaintance.”

  Sukara smiled uncertainly and nodded as Rao hurried from the room.

  Vaughan showered, changed, and then slipped into Li’s bedroom. She lay on her tummy, mouth open. She looked, in sleep, the picture of vulnerability, and Vaughan wanted nothing more than to hug her.

  He returned to the lounge, kissed Pham and embraced Sukara.

  “Be careful, Jeff,” she whispered.

  “Always am,” he said. “I’ll tell you all about it when I get back.”

  He kissed her and hurried from the room.

  * * * *

  He sat in the passenger seat and stared out.

  The flier banked and came in low over the packed streets bordering the spaceport. The streets terminated seconds later and they were flying over the relatively barren expanse of the spaceport, the deck pocked with docking rings and populated by star-ships at rest. Vaughan had worked here six years ago, and starship technology had moved on in that time; many of the ships he’d worked on had long gone to the scrapyard, to be replaced by a new series of faster, more efficient voidships. He stared down at the sleek, insectile vessels decked out in the colours of the many starship lines.

  The flier slowed abruptly, hovered, then lowered itself gently to the deck alongside the flank of a voidliner; Vaughan was put in mind of a minnow beside a vast basking whale as he climbed out and stared up at the curving mountainside of the Chandrasakar Line ship.

  Dr Rao peered out at him from the back seat. “I will leave you here, Mr Vaughan, and wish you every success in your employment with Mr Chandrasakar.“

  “You presume much, Rao.”

  The doctor smiled and jogged his head from side to side. “I think you will find Mr Chandrasakar a persuasive gentleman, Mr Vaughan.” He raised his cane in farewell. “Until next time.”

  The flier blasted its turbos, turned on its axis, and sped off.

  A tall Indian woman in a trim crimson uniform appeared at his side. “Mr Vaughan? If you would care to accompany me to Mr Chandrasakar’s quarters...”

  Discreetly, Vaughan enabled his tele-ability and probed. The woman was shielded, as were most of the workers beyond the skin of the ship.

  She led the way to a ramp, which climbed into a brightly lit interior; they passed through a concourse like a busy shopping mall. Wherever he looked, uniformed workers scurried back and forth, engineers attended open inspection panels and drones - spindly AIs like spiders - scuttled up the walls and across the great arched dome of the ceiling, pausing occasionally to insert needle probes into access ports.

  The woman gestured towards a sliding door and Vaughan stepped onto an elevator plate. They rode the plate as it shot up a diaphanous column, and down below the frantic workers were quickly reduced to the aspect of ants.

  The plate halted and the woman indicated a long corridor, which Vaughan guessed ran towards the nose cone of the liner.

  Five minutes later they arrived at a pair of sliding doors. The woman said, “Apologies for the trek, Mr Vaughan.” She indicated the opening doors with an elegant hand. “Mr Chandrasakar will see you now.”

  He sent forth a probe, and came up against a patch of static in the room before him. Not that he had expected Chandrasakar to have gone without a mind-shield.

  Now was one of the times he wished he was equipped with the latest anti-shield viruses. He’d approached Lin just last month, requesting she at least think about investing in the programs. She’d reminded him that they were illegal, and that she wasn’t prepared to stump up the hefty fines if her agency was discovered to be using the viruses. Vaughan had decided not to argue.

  He stepped over the threshold and behind him the door hissed shut, leaving him alone with the billionaire voidship tycoon.

  On the way to the port he’d accessed all the information on the tycoon available to the agency’s com program, which was precious little. Chandrasakar was a notoriously private person who kept a low profile. He was also one of the richest men in the Expansion and something of a philanthropist, subsidising hospitals and children’s homes on Earth and on the many colony worlds under his financial aegis.

  Vaughan had never seen an image of the tycoon, and he was surprised by what he saw now. Perhaps he’d been expecting someone who in the flesh might be a match for all his mercantile achievement, more of a film star than a captain of industry: someone tall and thrusting, endowed with the armour of arrogance that had earned him his current eminent position.

  The opposite was true. Chandrasakar was short, rubicund, and seemingly perpetually cheerful. He had a full head of oiled hair and wore an old-fashioned black suit, opened to accommodate the thrust of his ample belly.

  He moved nimbly around a desk, hand extended to take Vaughan’s.

  “It’s good to meet you at last. Dr Rao has told me much about you.”

  “I...” Vaughan hesitated, wondering whether what he was about to say would be considered undiplomatic. “I must say that I’m surprised you know the good doctor.”

  Chandrasakar laughed as he made his way over to a well-stocked bar. “The truth to tell, Rao and I were schoolboys together over sixty years ago. Blue Mountain, isn’t it?”

  Vaughan smiled his acceptance, wondering what else the tycoon might know about him.

  “We’ve kept in contact ever since. Rao, for all his scheming, has a veritable heart of gold. There have been times when Rao has proved, shall we say, a useful contact.”

  “Such as now?” Vaughan suggested.

  Chandrasakar gestured towards a semicircle of sofas positioned before the delta viewscreen overlooking the sloping nose of the starship. Vaug
han sat, nursing his beer.

  Chandrasakar sat down opposite, legs apart, so that the globe of his belly was ensconced upon his lap. “Dr Rao mentioned that you were the best telepath working on the Station.”

  “Dr Rao flatters me.”

  “He also mentioned your current... situation.”

  Vaughan smiled without humour. “Rao gets his nose into everything.”

  “I calculate that the cost of your daughter’s treatment and aftercare should total in the region of a quarter of a million dollars. I hope you don’t mind my observing that your current insurance might not cover such an expense, and that even a telepath of your renown might be working for a long time in order to meet the shortfall.”