“Officially: Francis Rowden, son of a landowner, which is how he can afford to travel to the Commonwealth. He was going to enroll at a university on Kolhapur, a two-year agricultural course. We checked; they have no record of him.”
“He’s a Guardian,” Alic said happily.
“Why do you think that?” Renne asked.
Alic’s good humor flickered slightly, but nothing could tone down his enthusiasm. He held up his hand and started ticking off points. “Okay, one, he’s a Far Away native, so what other faction could he belong to? Two, he’s sent on tough assignments to benefit them, I mean really tough. Our boy is wetwired to the back of his ears with weapons. He’s their new enforcer.”
“How did the Venice Coast hit benefit them?” Renne asked quickly.
“Valtare Rigin was fucking them over. He had to be. He was a black market arms dealer. These guys don’t exactly have corporate mission statements. He saw a chance to switch cargoes or make a low-grade substitution or he was holding out for more money. Whatever. They caught him red-handed. What are they going to do? Sue him? Shake hands and say sorry? No, they close the deal their way. They’re terrorists, remember. The most lethal bunch of psychotics we’ve ever had running around the Commonwealth. This is what they do: kill people.
“Thompson Burnelli, well, that’s obvious. He’d just pushed through an inspectorate division which is going to screw every clandestine weapons shipment back to Far Away. Blam, out he goes. Revenge, a warning to others that no one is safe, none of you are beyond our reach. Murdering a senator shook the whole political establishment to its core. Then there was McFoster. He betrayed the Guardians; they killed him for it.”
“How did he betray them?” Tarlo asked.
“Justine Burnelli,” Renne said in a flat voice. She could see how Alic Hogan’s mind was working, and didn’t like it.
“Exactly,” Alic said, on a roll. “They find out McFoster visited Senator Burnelli, that the two of them are lovers. The next thing they know, he’s got a navy squad tailing him. They thought he was about to lead us to them.”
“How did they find that out?” Renne asked.
Alic treated her to an expression of mild scorn. “The trip to the observatory. His colleagues were watching him the whole time, a backup team. And we had that local office idiot…” He snapped his fingers.
“Phil Mandia,” Renne supplied reluctantly.
“Right: Mandia. He was following McFoster in a convoy of four-by-fours through the mountains. The Guardians saw us. They put it together. It wouldn’t matter to them if McFoster had actually clued Senator Burnelli in on what was happening or not. Whatever he said to her, it betrayed them. And there he is again, this Frances Rowden, waiting at LA Galactic. There on the right concourse exactly when the loop train pulled in, knowing he’s got our squads to dodge as well.” Alic beamed contentedly.
The trouble was, Renne admitted to herself, the facts fitted. Not only that, she couldn’t see a flaw in the Commander’s line of reasoning. Granted, a lot of it was speculation, but logical speculation; the kind of argument a jury would convict on.
It was also politically expedient, which fueled her unease. That same nagging little uncertainty she’d experienced when she walked into the Halgarth girls’ loft apartment on Daroca. No reason for it. Just her own awkward intuition. A detective knowing instinctively when something is out of kilter.
Everything Alic claimed was possible. Yes.
Believable? No.
“I’m going to enjoy this,” Alic said. “Certain people in Senate Security are going to be extremely upset when they access this case file now we’ve solved it for them. It doesn’t leave any room for her stupid conspiracy theories.”
Renne tried to catch Tarlo’s attention. She couldn’t, which she suspected was deliberate.
“Thank Foster Cortese for me,” Alic said. “He’s done a good job. Credit where it’s due.”
“Will do,” John King said.
He ran a program, Renne thought in disgust. She could see what Alic was doing, pulling the staff into his orbit. Team building with the completely wrong motivation behind it. They’d wind up producing politically required answers for him, not the right ones.
And why am I so cynical about this? That bullshit theory about Francis Rowden. Am I just jealous I didn’t put it together? It is simple enough. Why do I think it’s not right?
“I’m going to need another warrant,” Tarlo said.
“What for?” Alic asked.
“The Pacific Pine Bank records have been quite useful,” Tarlo said. Now he allowed eye contact with Renne, giving her an I-told-you-so smile. “The Shaw-Hemmings finance company on Tolaka transferred a lot of money into Kazimir’s account. I’d like to see where it came from.”
“How much money?” Renne asked.
“A hundred thousand Earth dollars.”
She pursed her lips, impressed.
“You’ve got it,” Alic said. “Renne, how is it coming with the Lambeth Interplanetary Society?”
