“Val seems to think going there will help Nadine.”
“Not for me to say, sir. Oh, while I think of it, if you go, use GPS rather than trying to home in on the prang.”
“Has it been removed?”
“No. There’s an odd bit of jurisdictional flap with that. The scene analyzer wasn’t ours, wasn’t the army’s, and wasn’t one of the constabulary’s. Has to be a records glitch somewhere. Who is supposed to collect it up has become a bother, as well. All the same, the signal’s dead.”
I frowned. “Dead?”
“Day by day the signal grew weaker, then all of a sudden died. The bloody thing can’t even maintain memory, sir, much less project the crime scene.”
“Who copied it for the inquiry file?”
“That jurisdictional thing again, sir. Everyone assumed that the authority who placed the prang also copied it.”
“So no one copied it.”
“A proper cock-up,” he stated.
I looked down at the Persian rug on the floor, its design filled with happy blues and yellows. Whoever set the trap attached that scene analyzer to the logan stone. That’s why the unit’s serial number appeared in no one’s records. It was a real prang, though, authentic enough to get Shad and me there. It was the genuine article. The power supply, therefore—
After a beat of stunned silence, my headache was temporarily forgotten. “Thanks for ringing me up, Parker. I appreciate it more than I can say.”
“Not at all—”
I hung up, stood, and limped down the hall into the kitchen where Walter, our Rent-A-Mech, was finishing up the breakfast dishes.
Walter was one of thousands of the same model mechanical purchased years ago by Exeter’s Rent-A-Mech, Ltd. to go in service on a lease basis only to have all of their workers emancipated by Parliament because modified human engram based artificial intelligence was included in the Parliamentary Reform Act of 2132. The mechs, in response, bought the firm from the owners whom they kept on to run the company. All Rent-A-Mechs in the city looked like twentieth-century actor Stephen Fry in his role as Jeeves, had that venerable valet’s epidermis been made of brushed titanium. Since the takeover, however, the livery in most cases had been traded in on more casual wear. It depended on the client. Walter wore earth tones and corduroy at our place.
“Walter,” I said, “are you free for the remainder of the day? I know you have other clients.”
“I am yours to command, sir. If dinner is to be served here at the usual time, however, I should begin preparations at around five.”
“Can you drive Val, Nadine, and me out to the north moor near Okehampton?”
“Indeed I can, sir. When would that be?” I’d urged him to call me Harry, but Walter said it just wouldn’t do.
“Right now. It’s rather urgent.”
“Very well, sir. I’ll bring my electric around, shall I?”
“Thank you.”
I hobbled up the stairs to the guest room where Nadine had been staying since the news about Shad. It was smallish, a single window looking over the garden, pale peach walls, and a single bed with a powder blue coverlet. Val and her friend were both sitting on the bed. “Walter’s going to drive us out to the moor,” I said to Val. “He’s bringing his car around now.”
“Thank you, Harry,” said Nadine. “It’s a terrible imposition, I know.”
“Not at all.” I debated offering my possible piece of news. False hope and such. However, it was either tell Nadine now or at Hangingstone Hill.
“Harry, what is it?” asked Val.
“There is a possibility,” I looked at Nadine, “just a possibility, mind you, that Guy is still alive.” As they started to speak all at once I held up my hands. “A slim chance, but a chance. I’ll explain in the car. Let’s get going.”
As I stood aside, allowing the two cats to run out of the room ahead of me, I saw—my cautionary probabilities notwithstanding—Nadine and Val both had only heard that Shad was still alive.
Walter’s car was an MG ground electric, which would have been cramped had Val and Nadine not been cats. Once we were off the Alphington Spur headed west on the A 30, Walter and I up front and the cats on a blanket in back, I turned half around and explained. “It has to do with the Vader prang—the mounted scene analyzer—at the site. That particular model is about fifteen centimeters long and a bit more than half a centimeter thick.”
“What about them?” asked Val. She knew as much about the purpose of prangs as I did, but she knew I was after something else.
I turned to Nadine. “This kind of scene analyzer is arguably the most indestructible instrument in the world, Nadine. The case is made from high-density ceramic composition titanium, and the power supply is designed to take and retain its scene forensic data indefinitely. Crime scenes sometimes need to be maintained for years—even decades. That’s what the prang does: It records everything in place at a particular point in time, in detail, and can project that detail upon the scene long after the elements of that scene have changed. Hence scene analyzers must be able to withstand the elements, attempts at tampering, and efforts of miscreants to destroy them. In all my time in law enforcement I have never known a scene analyzer to fail.”
“What does this have to do with Guy?” asked Nadine.
“The prang out at Hangingstone Hill failed.”
“Surely, sir,” began Walter, “if an artillery shell went off next to one of those instruments ... well, doesn’t that seem likely as a cause?”
“Certainly if it failed completely and right away, Walter. But Parker said that the prang’s signal at Hangingstone declined in strength over two days, then suddenly died.” I looked at Nadine. “I believe Guy might have had time enough before the explosion to copy into one of the smaller mechs and has since been drawing power from the scene analyzer.”
“If that’s true,” said Val, “Guy must be able to move about. Why didn’t he let Ralph Parker or the police know when they were out there?”
“I’m not certain. It might have to do with concerns about being observed.”
“By the person or persons who planted the bomb?” asked Walter.
“Yes.”
“Sir, if I may?”
I nodded permission.
“Thank you, sir. Given possible post-incident observation, is it likely that such an offender may have a continuing interest in any subsequent inquiry or activity concerning said hill, including ours?”
“Quite likely,” I answered.
“Might I suggest, then, we enter the moor farther to the east instead of taking the obvious route through Okehampton past the army camp?”
“Can you find the hill using another route?”
“Indeed I can, sir. As I was driving I downloaded the Ordinance Survey map of the area.”
“Good thinking, Walter. Very well, we are in your capable hands.”
“Very good, sir.”
He got off the motorway at one of the South Zeal exits, went through the villages of Sticklepath and Belstone, where we came onto a brain-shattering unpaved track called Tarka Trail, which took us up onto the moor just as a light rain began falling. As we traveled the trail Walter identified the features we crossed: Scarey Tor which wasn’t; East Okemont River ford, where we almost became mired; a boggy stretch between East Mill Tor and Oke Tor, where we forded the tributaries to the previously forded East Okemont River, climbed and crossed Okement Hill, then traveled down the hill to ford one of the River Taw tributaries. Following that, the car climbed the north end of Hangingstone Hill, where we at last came to a stop a few meters north of the old observation post where several other ground cars and two Air Rovers were parked. Walter parked his MG between a late model gray Ford Virgo and a burgundy Renault Festiva that had seen better days. The moment the MG stopped, Walter had a headache preparation ready for me. As I drank that, Walter exited the car, held his seat forward for Val and Nadine, and came around to the passenger side, umbrella in hand for me. Terribly efficient personnel at Rent-A-Mech. I cannot recommend them too highly.