Final Inquiries (18 page)

"Things are that tense?" Wolfson asked, interrupting the flow of the questioning.

"We've made great progress in the Pentam negotiations, but, yes. All that we have built up is still quite fragile. It all relies on trust--and there is precious little trust between the two species. You might say the trust we've built up here isn't between humans and Kendari, or even the human and Kendari governments--it is between the two staffs, the two embassy compounds--and it runs--or at least ran--through the joint operations center." The ambassador frowned. That answer was too high-flown, too much like a speech meant to rally the troops. Not at all the right tone for this situation.

"So that an attack on someone in the joint ops center was more or less literally an attack on the relationship between the two sides," Wolfson suggested.

"That's right," he agreed, resisting the temptation to elaborate.

"Let me edge over into speculation for a moment," she went on. "Might that just possibly be the motive for the crime? Not dislike of the victim, or any personal motive--but a deliberate attempt to derail the Pentam negotiations? Perhaps to force us to withdraw?"

"The short answer is yes," said the ambassador. It was exactly the point he had been stewing over since the first moment of this nightmare, and he had no desire to discuss it further--particularly with a pair of intrusive police officers.

"I see," said Mendez. "All right then. Getting back to our chronology, you and Flexdal speak on the phone. What sort of record is there of that call? Once again, a time and date stamp, or a call duration, would come in very handy."

"I can do better than that," said the ambassador. "I recorded the call at my end. I'll get you the full recording whenever you like."

"Excellent," said Mendez. "For the moment, however, can you give us a quick summing-up of that conversation?"

"Well, yes," said the ambassador, and hesitated for a moment. "But I believe it would be best if I gave you some background to the situation. First off, you must understand that we might be very close to settling the Pentam issue."

"Who's going to get the Pentam System, then?" asked Wolfson.

The ambassador smiled wearily. "I haven't the faintest idea. We haven't even gotten close to
that
issue yet. What I should have said is that we're close to settling on the procedure for
negotiating
the Pentam issue. You might say we're having talks about the talks. To put it very crudely, we, the Kendari, and the Vixa, and the other interested parties have just about agreed on the rules for how the humans and Kendari will state their cases. What we can and cannot do and say to convince the Elder Races in general--and the Vixa in particular--that we are the species that should take over the Pentam System. To use an old diplomatic expression, we've finally agreed as to what size and shape of table we're going to use. We're just about ready to get it built and sit down at it."

"Do you have to convince them that we're more deserving, or that we'll do a better job, or what?"

"We don't know for sure. Part of the procedure--or, if you will, part of the game--is that neither side is to be told what, exactly, the decision criteria will be."

Mendez smiled at that himself. "Great. So long as they don't make it too hard on you."

"Precisely. But the point is that neither Flexdal nor I wants to wreck the progress we've made. If, God forbid, we had to start over from scratch, it might be years or decades, even centuries, before we got back to this point. This death--this murder--is a terrible thing, but it must not be allowed to interfere with the negotiations--especially given that, as Agent Wolfson suggested, upending the negotiations might well have been the motive for the crime. I called Flexdal, told him what had happened, and the steps I had taken. Flexdal got off the line and called me back a few minutes later. I expect--but I can't say for certain--that he was having his people check on the situation. He immediately suggested that, rather than risk wrecking the negotiations, we initiate a rush investigation and call in outside investigators if at all possible. He suggested that we request the use of one of the Vixa's hyperfast ships.

"We placed a conference call to the Preeminent Director's household to advise him of the situation and request assistance. The Vixa haven't exactly fallen over themselves to be helpful in the past, so we weren't expecting it would be easy to convince them. I'd bet that Flexdal was as surprised as I was when the Director immediately offered the use of the
Eminent Concordance
for the purpose of collecting an investigator who wasn't a suspect in the case."

"Why us?" Mendez asked.

The ambassador smiled slightly. "Why human BSI agents, and not Kendari Inquirists, or why you two in particular?"

"Both, I suppose. My impression was that Brox requested the two of us specifically."

"He did indeed, shortly after the Preeminent Director finished speaking with us. As for why the BSI, it was of course the obvious choice after the decision was made to request a human rather than a Kendari investigator."

"But why
not
a Kendari investigator? Why didn't they insist on that? After all, it was a Kendari that had been killed."

Ambassador Stabmacher frowned, sat up straight in his chair, and needlessly tidied up a few papers on his desk. "You'll have to ask them that, to get a definitive answer--and good luck to you. However, I can offer some guesses.

"First off, we know nothing of the actual relationship between Inquirist Brox 231 and the deceased. For all we know, they could have been seen fighting loudly an hour before. There might be some other evidence of which we are unaware that would cast suspicion on Brox, or on someone else on that side of the wall. Perhaps they were hoping that human investigators would have more difficulty proving a case against a Kendari.

"Or there might be some political issue back on Kendal that would make it impossible to dispatch any Inquirists. Perhaps the whole affair is so scandalous--a lover's quarrel, a murder in front of outsiders--that Flexdal didn't even want to try to get support from back home. Perhaps some other reason that isn't remotely close to my guesses. All I knew for certain was that I wanted BSI, and not the Kendari Inquiries Service--and when the other side agreed, I wasn't going to ask why. I was the one who suggested dispatching Brox to collect you. I pointed out we wanted to keep the knowledge closely held, that he knew as much as anyone, and that our people had a high regard for him." The ambassador cocked his head slightly to one side. "All that is true, so far as it went--but there was more to it, of course. It was a way of my paying a compliment to the Kendari, and conceding that harm had been done to them and not us. And it said we trusted that Brox wouldn't try to escape--but Brox was going to be on a Vixa ship, then in BSI custody, then returning on the same ship. For all practical purposes, he was just as confined to quarters as the rest of us--even if he was traveling the devil knows how many light-years in one day."

"Whose idea was the lockdown?" Mendez asked.

"Well, Flexdal suggested it to me," said the ambassador. "I can't say he thought of it--but someone on that side of the wall did."

Mendez smiled. "I think you're starting to get the hang of this, sir."

"What reason did Flexdal give for wanting it?" Wolfson asked.

"Protection of evidence."

"But the joint operations room was locked down and had tamper indicators all over it. Why lock down both entire compounds as well?"

"Whoever committed this crime would have every motive to find a way past the seals on the joint ops center without disturbing them, so as to get in there and destroy the evidence before an outside investigator could arrive. For that matter, the killer might decide to get into the ops center no matter what, even if he or she did wreck the seals. Locking down the compounds was a way to prevent that."

"But wouldn't anyone going into the ops center be caught, or at least spotted?" Wolfson asked.

"Someone got into the ops center, somehow managed to get a cup of coffee into a Kendari, and got away. Someone else--or more likely the same person--got in there and left a handprint and, once again, got away. Maybe they could do it again in order to remove or destroy the evidence, or maybe the guilty party would be up to some other mischief. Maybe the killer wasn't from the embassy, but was instead from the human interest-groups encampment just up the road. If so, he or she would just want to get over the wall and get away."

"I can see why you wouldn't want anyone leaving the compound, or entering the joint ops center, but why order everyone into solitary?"

"Witnesses," said the ambassador. "And the prevention of witness tampering--and to keep everyone from gossiping among themselves, being influenced by each other, starting to spin theories or looking for evidence themselves--or even getting ideas about who must have done it, and telling each other about them. And, of course, if it
was
one of us who did it, that person would be doing his or her best to muddy the waters, throw people off the scent."

"But wasn't locking everybody in an extreme measure? And what would you do if there had been an emergency? A fire, or a riot? And, just by the way, who locked in the last of you?"

"This crime was exposing us to the very significant risk of losing humanity's chance to claim two habitable planets," the ambassador said stiffly. "Earth times two. Consider the amount of wealth involved in gaining us a new planet--and then double it. The continents. The oceans. The mineral wealth, the living things.
Two
Earth-like planets--plus all the other resources in that Pentam System, plus the benefits of controlling a strategic position in space.

"Asking twenty-odd people who had been working toward that goal, many of them for years, to allow themselves to be confined in relatively comfortable quarters for a day or two does not seem extreme to me in that context. And, I might add, that they
weren't
locked in. They were told to remain in their quarters in the embassy ship, and tamper-indicator seals were placed over the hatches.

"The worst-case scenario would be that a few hatches might be jammed open if the seals weren't removed carefully first. If there had been an emergency--more accurately, a
further
emergency--the necessary people could have been pulled out and put to work. And the chief engineer actually did lock himself into the embassy ship's engine room. He adjusted the entry hatch's lock so it could only be opened from the outside--then stepped inside and pulled the hatch shut."

"We'll need to check on him soon," said Mendez.

"I'll see to it myself, this evening as soon as we are done," said the ambassador. "I'm planning to release him, escort him to his own quarters on the ship, close his door, and use tamper strips on it as well. Unless you feel that you should do it, or that I should be reconfined until morning, or whatever."

"No," said Mendez, with a deadpan expression. "You've done things your way so far. You carry on. That way the results will be consistent."

It was hard to miss the sarcasm in his voice, but the ambassador was a diplomat, and a past master at pretending not to notice things. "Very well then," he said.

"Where, exactly, did you put everyone else?" Mendez went on.

The ambassador gestured out the window. "In the embassy ship, of course. Regulations require us to have accommodation for all of us on board, so that the entire contingent can be evacuated just by launching the ship. Given that an evacuation would very likely result in everyone's having to spend two or three weeks in transit home, under the best conditions, regulations also require that there be separate cabins for each single person, and for each family.

"This being viewed as a danger post, there are no children and no dependent spouses. There are four married couples, but in all cases both husband and wife work for the embassy. None of that is by chance, of course. An embassy this small, and with an enemy species literally right next door--plus a sometimes less-than-friendly host species--has to be a no-children, no-dependents post. This ship is designed to accommodate a slightly larger staff than we have. There are thirty cabins in all, so there was little difficulty. The cabins are very small, and rather spartan, and of course everyone normally lives in the prefab structures we've put up in the rest of the compound, so they all had to gather their personal items and bring them in--but it all worked pretty smoothly."

"We spent all of about two minutes in the Kendari compound, but it seemed more or less deserted. Did they agree to the same sort of voluntary lockdown for themselves?"

"Yes, of course."

"Was there any sort of verification agreement?" Wolfson asked.

It was clear Wolfson was asking the big-picture questions, and Mendez was focusing on details.
One for strategy, and one for tactics?
"No," he admitted. "The arrangements were made very quickly, under difficult conditions. You have to imagine my managing four calls at a time, with my staff all getting ready to confine themselves for what might turn out to be several days, and everyone working in the middle of the night. We had to work out all sorts of things very fast. Just to pick one, we needed to sort out communications--we needed, for example, for Dr. Zhen Chi to be able to receive medical emergency calls, but we also needed to make sure people didn't use their commlinks or the intercom system to talk among themselves. We solved that problem, but there were any number of such issues to sort out, in the dark, in a rush, and with the knowledge that any one of us could have been the one who killed Emelza 401."

"We can appreciate the difficulty," said Wolfson. "We've been in situations that weren't any easier."

"I sincerely hope that you are never in one that is any harder."

"I haven't seen any sign of the embassy staff coming out of confinement," said Jamie. "Have you informed them that they can come out now?"

"No, of course not," said the ambassador, slightly surprised.