"Amanda and another detective are calling the numbers and confirming the calls were vocal. We thought someone could have plugged a cybofax into one of the Abbey's terminals, the bit rate would be substantially lower, but you could still use it to squirt a virus into the Bendix."
"Yeah, assuming it was done on Thursday. There's nothing to prevent you from loading the virus a month ago, and putting it on a time-delay activation."
She gave him a disappointed look. "We had to start somewhere."
"Yeah, sure. Sorry. But nobody's going to remember a phone call from a month or half a year ago."
"I know, but what else can we do?"
"Nothing, it was only ever a very long shot, closing off options. I can't see anyone wanting to wipe the Bendix until after Kitchener was dead, not if the object was to destroy his work. To wipe it when he was alive would be counterproductive, he would be able to recreate his equations or whatever, and you'd alert him to the security problem. And if it was loaded a month ago, how did they know the timing, or when the students would stop accessing it. No, I'm sure it must have been done from within the Abbey after he was killed, that's the only scenario that makes sense."
"You're probably right. Anyway, while Amanda was running down the phone calls, I checked with RAF Cottesmore about the weather conditions on Thursday. There were winds up to a hundred kilometres an hour locally that night, some gusts reached a hundred and twenty. Here is their squirt."
"Bugger." He put down the lager and looked at the meteorological data which the cybofax was displaying. The purple and blue cloudforms of the weather radar image were super-imposed over a map of Rutland; pressure and wind velocity/direction captions flashed across it.
"Can you fly a microlight in that?" Eleanor asked.
"Not a chance. Even high level would be risky; low level with the microbursts you'd get in the Chater valley, impossible."
She rubbed his arm. "Couldn't they just bike in and out?"
"It's four kilometres to Launde from the A47 by the straightest possible route, eight there and back. The trip there would be in the middle of a hurricane, with a diversion round Loddington to be sure they weren't sighted, and carrying enough gear to melt through the security system. You wouldn't catch me trying to do it."
"But it could be done?" she persisted.
"Theoretically, yeah, an inertial guide would place you within a couple of centimetres. But that terrain, well, you saw it."
"Yes." She gave him back the glass of lager, and curled her legs up, resting her head on his shoulder.
He felt the kiss on the bottom of his jaw, then she was rubbing her cheek against his. Up and down, slowly. "You're all tensed up," she murmured in his ear. "You won't solve anything like that."
For a moment he thought of pulling away. But only for a moment. Besides, she was right, he wouldn't settle it tonight.
The bedroom overlooked the reservoir's southern prong, a long dark stretch of water with its wavelets and gently writhing curlicues of mist. Walls and furniture were silky white; vases, picture frames, curtains, sheets, and the bedposts were all coloured in shades of blue; the oaken floorboards smoothed down and waxed until they resembled a ballroom floor.
None of that really mattered, not the surroundings, just the bed, with Eleanor. Clad in black silk and lace, naked, provocative, sensual, demanding, submissive, thick red hair foaming down over her shoulders. She possessed a myriad sexual traits, combinations ever-changing, making each time different, unique.
The only light came from the bonfire on the opposite shore, a distant orange glimmer, barely enough to show him her outline. He undid the bows and buttons of her nightdress, licking at the flesh which was exposed tasting the salt tang of damp skin, the heat of arousal.
Embraced by the warmth and folds of shadow he had learned to cast off reticence, taking his lead from her. Eleanor didn't care, wasn't ashamed. Maybe rampancy was a gift of youth, or just part of her nature. So he was free to lose himself in the feast of sensuality, the feel of her body. Long powerful legs wrapped round him, big breasts weighed down his hands. He sucked on an erect nipple, caressed her belly. A tiny neurohormone secretion showed him her body's reactions, which action brought the greatest rapture. The material world faded to dream silhouettes, revealing Eleanor's nerve strands alive with neon-blue light, her naked excitement. He slid inside her, a drawn-out penetration accompanied by her fervid groan, and joined her at the centre of that blazing animal euphoria.
But afterwards intuition, or possibly plain confusion, played hell inside his skull and he couldn't let go of the case. He lay back on the crumpled sheeting, hands behind his head, staring up at the shivers of firelight on the ceiling. Snapshots of Launde, the students, Kitchener, police reports, they all chased across his consciousness in endless procession, sharp-edged and insistent.
"So much for my prowess," Eleanor grumbled softly.
"I thought you were asleep."
"No."
"Sorry."
"This really has got you bothered, hasn't it?" She sounded more concerned than annoyed. "You were never so intense about a case before, at least not since I've known you."
He rolled on to his side, his face centimetres from hers.
Warm breath gusted over his cheeks. "Tell you, what I don't understand, what's really got me beaten, is why bother?"
"What do you mean?"
"What is the point of murdering an old man in such a grotesque fashion? Even if one of the students had murdered Kitchener, it wouldn't be like that. You've read the statements, what happened when they found him. They were having fits. And I don't blame them, that hologram was bad enough. I'm bloody sure I couldn't do it, not like that. A maser beam through the brain, quick and clean, yes. But who could do that to someone else? Like Cecil Cameron said, it was one sick fucker."
"Sick enough for you to perceive with your espersense?"
"I would have thought so. That's one of the reasons I want to visit Liam Bursken tomorrow, so I know what mental characteristics to look out for."
"Urgh." She shivered slightly. "You're welcome to him. Even in the kibbutz we heard about him."
"Yeah, he was notorious enough. But he was mad. He didn't have a reason for killing. Somebody had a reason for killing Kitchener. And a lot of preparation went into it. But I just don't understand why the tekmerc used that method.
"It can't be an attempt to throw us off the scent, because even the police were convinced it wasn't one of the students. And that was before my interviews backed up their alibis. So why bother? Why not just send a sniper into Launde Park on a clear night? It doesn't make any sense!"
Her forefinger traced a line from the corner of his eye to his mouth. He sucked the tip gently.
"Like you said; this tekmerc is good," Eleanor said. "The snuff was done this way for a purpose. We don't have all the facts yet, that's why it seems so weird."
"Yeah. Paradox alley, and no messing." He frowned, trying to remember some scrap of conversation; word association was involved. "Hey, do you know what CTCs are?"
"Aren't they the things which helped to screw up the ozone?"
"I don't think that's what he meant."
Eleanor's finger had reached his chin, she tickled his stubble. "Who?"
"Nicholas Beswick."
"The wimpy one?"
"He's not wimpy, just very innocent. You'd probably like him. Trigger your maternal instinct."
She made a fist and rapped on his sternum. "Chauvinist!"
"Parental instinct, then. I went easy on him; anything else would have seemed like bullying. It was like coaxing answers out of a ten-year-old."