As the Ooloms clung to their trees, I stood smack in the middle of the clearing by the old mine’s mouth. Waiting to see the corpses. To see the truth.
The Ooloms behind me started whispering to each other — they heard the approach of footsteps ten seconds before I did. Clop, clop, clop coming up the mine’s stone floor.
Then a human figure stepped out of the tunnel’s gloom, cradling a body bag like a child. The bag’s plastic had melted through in several spots; Oolom skin, burnt to caramel, showed through the gaps.
The figure carrying the corpse came straight to me and laid the body bag at my feet, like an offering. I don’t know why — some quirk of its programming. Since the mine was unsafe for people, the bodies were being hauled out by robots: lifelike human androids dressed in mourning clothes. The organization that paid the bill called this a gesture of respect toward the dead… better to use robots that looked like solemn people, rather than forklifts, ore-carriers, steel on wheels. (It would have been even more respectful to get robots that looked like Ooloms; but Homo sap models cost less off the shelf.)
Two dozen androids worked to exhume the bodies that long-ago afternoon. Now, I couldn’t help wondering what happened to those robots once the job was done.
ROBOT-POPPERS
We stayed the night at the guest home. When I called my family to tell them, wife Angie answered and straightaway got a case of the bubbles: a beaming smile that filled the phone’s vidscreen. "Finally, Faye! It’s really really important to get in touch with your birthwater angst."
"I don’t have any angst," I muttered. "I’m on a job."
"And it took you to Sallysweet River?" she said, eyes wide. "Faye, it’s fate! Synchronicity!"
"Coincidence."
"Does it really feel that way to you?"
I stared at her beautiful open face on the phone screen. "No," I finally answered. "It doesn’t feel like coincidence. It feels precious creepy, if you want the truth. So don’t let’s talk about me having an emotional breakthrough, all right? I’ve got the squirms as it is."
"Oooo, Faye, you used the words emotional breakthrough! I’m so proud. Love you to pieces!" She blew a kiss at the screen before clicking off… and I just knew she was going to run babbling about "spiritual rebirth" to all the others: my husbands, my wives, the kids, even Barrett’s dogs if they’d sit still long enough.
Angie, Angie, Angie. I know she sounds witless, but here’s the thing: she’s hands-down brilliant when she wants to be. Just that on her fourteenth birthday, she announced she would never let her brains get in the way of her enthusiasms… and she’s had the breathless iron-gripped willpower to keep that resolution ever since.
A modern miracle. More magic from Sallysweet River.
If I experienced any angst that night, birthwater or otherwise, it came when I charged my room to the Vigil. Yes, I had an expense account; and yes, I felt guilty using it. My very first expense — checking into a luxury resort.
So then I spent my time gamely trying to justify the cost by doing as much Vigil work as I could. Tagging along with Bleak and Fellburnie. Scrutinizing the bejeezus out of their plodding methodical questions to staff and guests. Learning nothing new.
Around midnight, the detectives ran out of people to quiz, so we all returned to the lounge. Cheticamp and Tic sat by the fire… not talking, just staring moodily into the flames. "The ScrambleTacs came back a few minutes ago," Cheticamp told us. "Cuttack isn’t camped at any of the known sites."
"If you ask me," Bleak said, "the only place we’ll find her is the bottom of Bonaventure harbor."
"How so?" Tic asked.
"The woman looks clean," Bleak answered. "No one could say a bad word about her. So the way I read it, she had a fling going with Chappalar. She spent the evening with him, or maybe the night, but eventually the two parted company. All that time, the bad guys were watching… so when Cuttack set off on her own, they snatched her, sweated information out of her, then dumped her into the bay. Or a shallow grave, or a furnace, or a waste-recycling vat. That’s why no one’s seen her since Chappalar’s death — the woman is fertilizer."
Cheticamp’s expression had gone sour. "I don’t like it," he growled.
"Why not?"
"Because it makes sense. And it puts us back to square one: Cuttack isn’t connected with the killers, so we’re no farther ahead than when we came out here. In fact, you’re saying there’s probably another murder victim we haven’t found yet. Bloody wonderful."
Tic cleared his throat. "Aren’t you forgetting the expensive clothes and perfume we found in her room? In her letter to Chappalar, she implied she didn’t have much money. That’s modestly suspicious, isn’t it?"
"So she was playing the system," Fellburnie said. "Rich people do. Why pay to go through proper channels if a proctor can arrange it for free?"
A valid point. God knows, our profs at college warned us against wheeler-dealers trying to exploit the Vigil for private ends. Lots of affluent people are devoted to the belief that every system is built for someone’s personal gain, and the only trick is learning how to use it for yourself. The slimy buggers are often right… which explains how they slithered up to affluence in the first place.
Cheticamp drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair, then pushed himself to his feet. "Nothing more we can do here tonight." He looked at Tic. "You two want to stay or go back to Bonaventure?"
"Stay," Tic answered immediately. He’d made that decision long ago, when he told me to book a room.
The captain didn’t waste a glance in my direction; never mind that I was official scrutineer on this outing and should’ve had the last word. "Then stay," Cheticamp said. "I’ll leave you a pair of ScrambleTacs as bodyguards. The rest of us will head home."
He looked at Bleak and Fellburnie; they both nodded agreement. I could tell all three had decided Maya Cuttack was a dead end… a dead dead end. Which meant that leaving us in Sallysweet River was as safe as anywhere else, and would keep us from walking whatever real investigations might be unfolding in Bonaventure. The bodyguards were just insurance, in case the killer or killers went on another spree.
We all said good night and the cops galumphed off on their flat-footed way. Leaving Tic and me in silence… except for the dying crackle of the fire. It was late, and the bluebarrel logs had almost burned themselves out.
I flopped down into a chair beside Tic. "What now?"
He didn’t answer for several seconds; firelight wavered flickerish on his pouchy face. "We’ll keep searching for Maya," he said at last. "Or at least that promising archaeological site she supposedly discovered."
"Why?"
"Because it piques my curiosity. Or because my oneness with the universe tells me this is the right way. Or because I’m a total loon." He folded his hands placidly across his stomach. "We’ll rent a skimmer in the morning and see what we can find."
"You are a total loon," I told him. "It’s a big country, city boy, and you’ll have to be god-awful lucky to spot a single tent in the wilderness. Especially if the tent happens to be pitched inside a mine that no one’s ever noticed before."
"Do you have a better suggestion?" he asked.
"Sure. Instead of flying around haphazard in hopes we stumble across the camp, let’s get some gear that will do the search for us."