by Mary Carmen
“May I help you, sir?” he asked.
“Hello. You are new here, aren’t you? I’m Captain Iwan of the police force, come to see Madame Olatana. She knows me,” the former lieutenant said.
“Madame is with a client now, sir, but I am certain I can get you in, if you can wait fifteen minutes,” the tall, skinny Lonl told Captain Iwan.
“Yes, I will wait. I always expect to wait when I drop in here,” Captain Iwan answered.
Within twenty-five minutes Captain Iwan was seated in the best clients’ chair in the consultation room.
“There’s more trouble, Madame,” he said. “And I think you may be involved. Not criminally involved, but I think you were used to facilitate a crime.”
“Heavens and mercy!” cried Madame Olatana. “It’s not Lotgh Wilnaugh again, I hope. My lawyer has managed to get over three thousand in Universal Gold out of me for extras involved with that business.”
“No,” Captain Iwan said, shaking his head. “It’s about a money laundering incident.”
“Money laundering is not a crime on this planet, Captain,” Madame Olatana insisted.
“I am aware of that, Madame. We are one of only seven planets that will legally launder money,” Captain Iwan agreed.
“And I pay taxes on every dollar I charge for laundering. That money goes into my bottom line, just like every other dollar that comes into this office,” Madame Olatana went on.
Captain Iwan waived away any thought of tax evasion and said, “Let’s look at your records. I am looking for a fairly small amount, and one that came from King Edsella of Lillitzen.”
The two comrades studied Madame Olatana’s income file and finally found the entry Pache had made.
“She’s gone, of course, off to a posh job with the clerk of the Warbut Supreme Court,” Madame Olatana said. “But it looks like she took in ten grand from King Edsella and paid out eighty-two hundred to the Allegheny Paint and Varnish and Spackle Corporation on Earth.”
“Just as I thought,” Captain Iwan said. “We have two other payments to that same company from other Warbut businesses. The police on Earth can’t figure out where the money went since the trail is very convoluted. I wish you were not involved with this matter, but you have done everything right and according to our procedures.”
“Whatever has happened?” Madame Olatana asked, now alarmed.
“Two young boys died on Farnoll when a large house there was bombed. The house belonged to the father of the boys, a citizen of Octula who is the Chief Justice of the Universal Supreme Court,” Captain Iwan explained.
“And you think King Edsella had a hand in it?”
“I do. The bombs were located under the guest toilets, as was the case with several other bombings that King Edsella ordered. Can you read from its chart? The exact date of the bombing was April 24, 2250, on the Earthlings’ calendar.”
Madame Olatana quickly brought up the insane former monarch’s birth chart and watched as her computer moved through the rapid transiting planets and the slow progressions.
“It is indeed exact, the date I told King Edsella it would have a wish fulfilled,” Madame Olatana sighed as she stopped the motions of the computers.
“The wish must have been for yet another enemy’s destruction. The old man was out of the house, but the children were there, and their deaths probably meant more pain for the Chief Justice than his own death would have,” Captain Iwan said.
“What more can be done to King Edsella? The Universal Bill of Rights will not allow it to be murdered, even for a heinous crime like this,” Madame Olatana said.
IX
“What can you be thinking of? We can’t take away Its Majesty’s access to the Universal Message System,” Dr. Sepr Shu, the chief psychiatrist at the Alto Reste Hospital, said to the administrator.
“Listen, Dr. Sepr Shu, this is not my idea,” Dr. Harda Mri insisted, waiving a sheaf of papers. “Just look at this opinion from the Universal Supreme Court. Eddie used the Universal Message System to convert some money it had stashed away into a payment to a hired assassin. The hired assassin murdered two children in an attempt to kill their father. The Universal Supreme Court has ordered us to remove all communication devices from Eddie’s room!”
“Its Majesty will lose all of its wits!” Dr. Sepr Shu replied.
“And how will we notice that? The dumbwaiter brings its food and medicines, and three robots clean the room and change the linens,” Dr. Harda Mri said. “We used to be able to watch Eddie’s movements until it broke both of our cameras in that room.”
“So our costs will go down? Is that what you are thinking?” Dr. Sepr Shu asked.
“Down? Last week I had to order a special robot, one that was reinforced with a diamond and platinum cover, to replace one Eddie had smashed. The Crown was paying for Eddie’s interplanetary access to the Universal Message Service, and I was tacking on a big surcharge, so that income is gone. We are worse off than before,” Dr. Harda Mri told the psychiatrist.
“And Its Majesty’s vital signs are much improved, as Nurse Ocli has noted,” Dr. Sepr Shu said. “Eddie may outlive all three of us.”
Table of Contents
Prologue 1
1. Prucilla Weathers, Ph.D. 3
2. Shasian Shepcover 59
3 Evela Trodais 105
4 Chef Glocy 142
5 Isabella Witchen 159
6 Piev Fallgan 188
7 Frak Fallgan 206
8 Lucilla Seaten 234
9 Wizzent Gerbyal 239
10 Carls Wunwak 270
11 Lotgh Wilnaugh 293
12 King Edsella 316