Robert Charrette - Arthur 01 - A Prince Among Men

by Robert N. Charrette

"Ranger says no bears this time of year," Manny said.

  "Wasn't a bear."

  "Forensics say so?"

  "No."

  "Then how do you know?"

  Poor Manny. Nothing was real till some authority confirmed it for him. "Ranger's right about the time of year. Besides, that's not a bear kill."

  "Come on, Charley. The poor bastard's been knocked to shit, slit up, and bloody half eaten."

  True as far as it went. "Bears don't ride motorcycles away from crime scenes."

  Manny was unimpressed. "Any tramp could have done that. He comes along, sees the thing. A free bike. Nobody around here to complain. Or see him. Especially the corpse. Tramp just takes it and rides."

  "Body was still oozing when the bike left."

  "How you know that? You been talking to Forensics without telling me?"

  Charley took a sip of the cooling, coffee-colored swill. "I looked."

  Manny grumbled into his cup. As usual when he wanted to vent, in Spanish. As usual, Charley pretended he didn't understand the language. Charley waited until Manny ran down.

  "Glad you came up."

  "Hey, we're partners. Couldn't leave you to the mercy of the locals. These country boys ain't got no respect for real cops."

  "They're doing okay." Once Lieutenant Cullen, the local in charge of the investigation, had gone through the "you're off duty and we're not and it's not your jurisdiction anyway" speech, they'd been pretty decent. He even believed Cullen when the guy had said that making Charley wait around wasn't his idea, even though the lieutenant wouldn't spill on who Charley was supposed to be waiting around for. Charley understood that kind of jam; he'd had to do the same thing to a witness in the Gossamer case last year. "Lucky this wasn't on corp turf."

  Manny nodded knowingly. Dealing with private cops and all their bullshit about company confidentiality made any investigation a pain. Murders like Gossamer's were the worst. The local boys were lucky they weren't going to have to deal with that kind of shit.

  Sipping his coffee, Manny helped Charley watch the forensics team. Slowly his face screwed up into the grimace that meant he was thinking hard about something. Charley waited. Manny would talk when he was ready.

  "So what's so important about this Churdy guy?"

  "Don't know."

  "You ain't figured an angle on it yet?"

  "No."

  "Maybe it was a bear, then."

  Manny was persistent; you had to give him that. Captain Milton called it boneheaded, but then Captain Milton didn't think much of Manny. Charley didn't think much of Captain Milton. "Like I said, no bear."

  "Maybe it's a hit by the Barrington creepo? That bastard tears 'em up pretty good."

  "That slasher's got a pattern. Timing's not right."

  Manny grunted. He didn't like that answer either. "Copycat?"

  "Out here? Get real."

  "Yeah." He looked disappointed. "Still. It's gotta be something, if they want you to hang out here and talk to whoever it is they want you to talk to."

  "So they won't tell you either?"

  "Lieutenant Cullen says I gotta wait if I wanna see. 'Jurisdiction,' he says. Jurisdiction, my ass. Bugger likes being one up."

  Charley nodded. He had assumed the lack of info was just due to his being a witness. "Never tell the civs anything" was usually the safest rule, and in this case Charley counted as a civ. But if the locals weren't telling Manny either, they might be under some kind of gag order. Or maybe that lieutenant just didn't like outsiders breathing down his neck.

  Aircraft noise made the lieutenant look up. Charley gave a glance, but only a glance; Manny gawked. Even the lab boys looked up from their work. One of them cursed and scrambled to unfold a tarp to cover the body.

  "This them?" Manny asked.

  "Good guess."

  A Boeing Swingjet™ appeared from behind the mountain and banked toward them. The engines perched on the ends of the stubby wings looked ominous, almost like rocket pods on a ground-attack helo. Charley knew better, but he couldn't help flashing on the image. He felt better when the Swing-jet's nose turned away from him, lining up with the highway for a landing. The plane had no markings, but its sleekness said money or connections, or both. Maybe this killing did have corporate connections, after all. Charley's stomach felt tight. The engines kicked up clouds of debris and gusted hot, oily air over him as the Swingjet settled.

  Before the engines cut out, the door swung down into a ramp. As the stairs popped up, a quartet of tough-looking guys in suits pounded down them. Fancy boys in tailored suits. They didn't show any weapons, but Charley had no doubt they were carrying. The first one made a beeline for Cullen, while the rest spread out around the Swingjet.

  A couple of tech types—in goddamn white coats, for Christ sakes—struggled down the ramp. Their satchels made the narrow passageway difficult for them to negotiate. The last guy out of the Swingjet had a little trouble squeezing through the narrow hatchway even though he didn't have to bend over to keep his head from bumping the coaming as the others had. The guy wasn't very tall, but he sure was wide, nearly as wide as he was tall, making Charley think of a drill sergeant he'd once had; this guy looked a lot like old Jonesy if you took a couple feet out of Jonesy's middle and lightened his skin tone a dozen shades.

  The shrimp was clearly in charge. Charley heard one of the techs call him Mr. Sorli. Very deferentially. Sorli pointed at the tarp-covered body and the techs scurried off. The locals pulled off the tarp, then stayed out of the whitecoats' way. The new boys opened up their bags and started to do the same things the crime scene crew had been doing.

  Redundancy, sweet redundancy. These guys had to be feds.

  "Lotta muscle for hunting bear," Manny commented.

  Manny just wasn't going to give up on the bear theory.

  "They're feds. Haven't met the fed yet who's going to worry about a bear."

  "Feds?" Manny's face darkened, then lightened a bit. "So much for no pattern. This must be some kind of psycho killing. Interstate stuff. Bet the perp's been cutting people up in half a dozen states. More of that luck of yours, Charley. Bet this is the closest they've come yet. You're gonna get yourself famous like Billy Kent down in Philly, Charley-boy."

  Charley felt a sudden nostalgia for the bear theory.

  The whitecoats went diligently about their task while the first suit talked to Lieutenant Cullen. Sorli stood by the Swingjet, arms folded, surveying his team at work. Two of his pet suits towered behind him like a pro linebacker's Masai bodyguards.

  Finally Cullen pointed toward Manny and Charley, and the suit headed in their direction. When he arrived, he addressed Manny.

  "Officer Gordon?"

  "That's me," Charley said. The twitch of annoyance in the suit's face as he turned gladdened Charley's heart.

  "Come with me, please," the suit said stiffly.

  Why the hell not? A few questions and he could be headed someplace warm. Charley went along. The suit led him toward the shrimp. When they arrived in the shadow of the

  Swingjet's wing, the suit stepped aside, leaving Charley face to face with—well, facing anyway—the shrimp.

  Sorli's hands were in his pockets, and he didn't pull one out to offer a handshake. "Gordon?"

  "That's me."

  "You are the one who found the body?" asked the suit on the left.

  "Yup."

  The guy held out a reader. "Would you please read your statement?" Charley did so. "Is there anything you would like to add?" Charley shook his head as he handed the reader back. "Anything you would like to alter?"

  "Nope."

  "This is a serious investigation, Officer Gordon. Your superiors have promised complete cooperation. I do not believe that you understand the gravity of the situation."

  "Damn straight."

  "Your levity is not appreciated, Officer Gordon."

  Too bad. You don't own the country. You don't own me. "I don't much appreciate being told to hang around here in the cold."


  "We would appreciate your cooperation."

  "I've been cooperating by hanging around out here, and you're acting like I'm the one putting you out."

  "This is a serious investigation, Officer. We have no interest in wasting our time, or any citizen's time for that matter. I am sure that we all will be quite happy to get on to other things."

  The sooner the better. "Look. If you got specific questions, ask them."

  The suit looked as though he'd bitten into a lemon. A real one, good and sour. When he asked it, his question sounded more like a statement. "You saw no one near the body, nothing out of the ordinary."

  "A bloody corpse on a mountain road is not ordinary. Leastwise when it's not a deer."

  "Quite. I meant to ask if you saw anything unusual that might be related to the killing." "Nop e."

  "The report you gave was very clear, but totally lacking in supposition. You are a police officer and surely you have some observations concerning the crime. Some thoughts."

  More all the time. "I found the body, but I'm off duty."

  "You are a police officer, are you not?"

  "I'm on leave, and even if I wasn't, this isn't my jurisdiction. I reported the find like a good citizen, and like a good citizen, I'm content to leave the investigation to the local law officers. I have plenty to do back home."

  "Ah, yes. You are involved in the Barrington slasher-killer investigation, are you not?"

  "Peripherally."

  "You found one of the bodies in that case as well."

  "Yup."

  "Do you see any connection between the two?"

  Other than dead bodies? "Different killer."

  "You are sure of this?"

  He'd thought so. Now? Maybe not. "Got no evidence. You're the boys been collecting that."

  "Quite. Do you have any supposition concerning—"

  Sorli interrupted him. "Are you related to the victim?"

  Just before Charley turned his eyes to the shrimp, he caught a flash of annoyance on the suit's face. Discord in the ranks? Sorli either didn't notice or didn't care; he stared at Charley with a hard expression. His dark eyes glinted coldly above his bearded cheeks.

  The question didn't make any sense to Charley, but he answered anyway.

  "Never saw him before."

  "You are sure?" the suit prompted.

  "Yup."

  Sorli's flinty eyes stayed on Charley for a moment. Then he seemed to sink into himself, thinking. After a while he mumbled something. It sounded like, "These things are often tied together."

  Tied together, huh? "What things?"

  Sorli stared up at him, clearly irritated. The shrimp probably thought he hadn't spoken aloud. Interesting. The annoyance in Sorli's voice made his words sound like concrete blocks grinding together.

  "You are a conscientious man, Officer Gordon. It is a quality that I appreciate. I am also told that you are lucky and inquisitive. Stay lucky. Don't be inquisitive."

  "Why not?"

  "If you are lucky, you won't find out."

  The shrimp turned his back on Charley and headed for the Swingjet. Several of the suits filed after him. The one doing the interrogation said, "That will be all, Officer Gordon," before following the others.

  For once, John was glad that Coach wasn't present for the Tuesday night practice. Lack of corporate interest in fencing meant a lack of funding as well, and the team had to practice when none of the other teams wanted school facilities, which wasn't very often. They had to make do where they could, which meant shifting sites and times. The odd scheduling meant that Coach Montoya, obliged by other, more mainline commitments, couldn't always make practices. Especially when the team was slipped into a gap in off-campus facilities like Rezcom 7's gym, as they were today.

  The coach's no-show was still a mystery, but John knew all too well why he was late. His appointment with Dr. Block—praise the powers that be, it had been short—and the problems getting to the rezcom; the trolley had been half an hour late. Across the room, Yael, Will Brenner, and Philip Skyler were already going through their warm-up exercises.

  John dug into the bottom of his duffel, groping for the box with the sensor tips. He finally found it, tucked inside his mask. He pulled both out and set the mask down. Opening the hard plastic case, he took one of the tips from the foam-lined compartment and fitted it to his foil.

  The sensor tips were the latest in high-tech fencing equipment, and had consumed most of the team's budget for the year. The tips combined the protective cover for the metal point of the blade with a chip-driven monitor. A sensor registered the pressure of a thrust, while another monitored blade angle and motion. The feedback allowed the chip to score hits for quality. A trigger on the grip allowed a fencer to register intent to attack, and a continuous communication loop between two opposing tips allowed the right of way only to the first fencer to register his intent. The freedom from monitor cords had changed the face of the sport, taking it away from the single line of the mats and returning it to the freer styles of ancient sword fights. John pulled on his glove and ran the chip's self-check, receiving the reassuring "right of way" buzz in his palm.

  Yael and Phil were sparring by the time he got his mask on. Will, the usual laggard, was having trouble getting the straps on his mask adjusted. John stepped over to give him a hand. Will was a senior and had been a member of the team longer than any of the rest of them, but he was still something of a klutz. Only conference rules and a lack of interested athletes kept him on the team.

  Once Will was ready, they set frequencies, squared off, and set to. The physical action felt good after the frustrations of psychological sparring with Dr. Block. John trounced Will in three passes running before easing off. Calmed, he stretched himself by letting his point drop and offering Will openings. Will took the offerings, but John was still too quick for him. On the next pass, John opened his guard further.

  He felt good, elated not so much for his easy defense against the clumsy Will, but by his control, form, and mastery of the weapon. Fencing was much better than basketball. Not that he didn't like B-ball. He had enjoyed playing in high school, but his first semester on the 'Tech frosh team had taught him how different things were between high school and college. Even on the freshman team, the pressure of collegiate play had been omnipresent. And if the pressure to make the cut wasn't enough of a distraction, there was always the intrusive attention of the corporate sportsmongers. College B-ball had a media following, and that meant that every team, even 'Tech's bargain-basement squad, had a following. Of media hacks, at least. John had found the artificiality of the whole thing nauseating.

  The heavy corporate promotion of the sport had soured him on playing. The sponsorship required everything to be so rigid, made it seem so controlled. That wasn't what sports were supposed to be about. So he had quit the team halfway through the season and tried looking for something else, but none of the other sponsored teams had wanted him after that. He had spent his second semester without any organized physical activity at all and discovered that he liked that even less. During the summer he tried the rezcom athletic programs, but they were full of screaming kids and geezers, and so instead of doing something, he spent a lot of his time trying to figure out what sort of sport he could live with when the fall semester rolled around. He made it through the summer mostly because his docent work at the Armory Museum had kept him busy. It wasn't active, but it did fill the time. While he was at the museum, anyway. Then Will, a member of a medieval reconstruction group, had visited the museum. They got talking about swords and Will happened to mention the fencing program at 'Tech and John was immediately fascinated. The idea of swinging a sword brought images that fit snugly with John's dreams of knights, fairies, castles, and damsels. Better still, the corporate media mostly ignored fencing. Best of all, some of his teammates had the same fascinations with the romance of swordplay that he did.

  Over the years, John had found few friends who shared his interests, bu
t he still shied away from organized groups, even those that seemed to focus on those very interests. He'd heard of re-creation groups like the Society for Creative Anachronism but had always been too embarrassed to participate. They seemed a little too out of sync with the real world. John had been accused of asynchronous behavior too often as it was.

  John laid his point against the heart target on Will's jacket for—what?—the tenth time? The grip of John's sword signaled cutoff; Will was conceding the match.

  "You're too good for me tonight, John. I need a break." Will pulled his mask from his sweaty head. "Gotta save some energy for later. Hey, wanna come to the Society meeting tonight?"

  "Not that Sea crap again, Will." Phil stood nearby, mask tucked under one arm, sword under the other. He had his usual disapproving frown on his face.

  "Who asked you, Phil-uptight?"

  "Certainly not you, my history-besotted freund." Phil stepped between Will and John and swept his blade up into a salute at John. "This is a fencing practice, not a costume-party club. You ready, Reddy?"

  John took two steps back to open space and returned the salute. Will walked away, shaking his head, as Phil slipped on his mask. Yael joined Will and the two started to talk, but John had no time to pay attention because Phil started to attack.

  John's height gave him almost as much of an advantage in fencing as it had in B-ball, for his reach allowed him to strike at much greater distances than most of his opponents. This was an especial advantage against the short and compact Phil, but the pugnacious Phil always insisted that he didn't mind, that he liked the challenge. Dogged determination and skill were what Phil relied upon, and he was constantly working on ways to make the initial slip past John's point Tonight, Phil immediately started pushing, pressing John to fall back or allow him within reach. John retreated and maintained distance, content to allow Phil's attacks to play out. On the switchovers, John regained all the ground he had surrendered. Will shouted encouragement and John responded, "It's always easy when you fight people who can't reach you."

  Within his mask, Phil snorted in reply to the taunt and took up his attack with renewed vigor. Will's catcalls and John's quips seemed to fire him. His attacks stepped up and began to get a little wilder, but John covered, parrying and retreating. John's counters reached through Phil's defense to score, and each score brought a whoop from Will, but seemed only to add to Phil's determination. John's blade rang as Phil's strikes came harder and faster.