Marek Huberath - Nest of Worlds

“But you haven’t looked inside her yourself,” he argued. “You haven’t opened her up.”

Nott was implacable. “I’ve seen. Two days ago we did an MRI. One hundred and forty-four sections. Do you know how much that cost the government of Davabel?”

“Less than to arm one soldier.”

“A little less. But that’s beside the point.” She waved a hand. “In practically every section you can see the damned things growing…”

They stopped, because Ra Mahleiné entered. In a flannel blouse and sleek slacks, and with her tan, she was in good form, not looking like a woman terminally ill. True, she walked slowly and tried not to bend, so it wouldn’t get dark before her eyes.

“You see, Dave,” Dr. Nott whispered.

Ra Mahleiné said, “Some official type has come with the supply van. He claims to be the attorney general. Do you want to talk to him?”

“It’s Fernandez,” said Dr. Nott. “He’s conducting an investigation into the matter of those guardsmen.”

Is an epidemic of death in Davabel necessary, Gavein wondered, for Ra Mahleiné to live? To preserve some kind of balance in nature, has one fluctuation given rise to an equal but opposite fluctuation…? If so, she has every right to live. I don’t regret the thousands—they died natural deaths, didn’t they, fulfilling a condition of nature, however unusual. Davabel murdered Ra Mahleiné on its ship, so let it now redeem her life.

He chuckled. “The attorney general himself asks if I will see him? Being Death has its advantages.”

Fernandez was a fairly young man, with a large, heavy head that dipped forward. He looked at you from under his brows with the mournful gaze of an ox. The wide skull showed a glistening bald spot framed with short dark hair combed back. His thick features were accented by a closely trimmed mustache. In greeting, he held out a large, sweaty hand.

Gavein shook his hand, discreetly wiped his hand on his pants, and nodded for everyone to sit, but Fernandez remained standing. He had an unpleasant way of speaking, positioning himself behind you and observing you over your shoulder. Gavein supposed this was out of professional habit.

“You can guess why I came…,” Fernandez began, shifting the burden of the conversation to him, the other person, also a tactic of the trade. He spoke quietly and clearly, perhaps because his words were off the record.

“You tell me,” returned Gavein. He hated these police ploys. Let the man go to a little trouble.

Fernandez hesitated. “All right. It concerns the murder of the residents of this house. That is…” From a transparent attaché case he took out one of the documents. “Edda Eisler, R, the owner; Myrna Patricks, R; Anabel de Grouvert, B; Fatima and Massmoudieh Hougassian, no category; and Brenda Wilcox, also no category.”

“And?” Gavein gave him a searching look.

“Our investigation is also looking into the death of Dr. Yullius Saalstein, B, an employee of the DS,” the attorney read. “But you can see for yourself.” He handed Gavein the document. Where Fernandez had touched the attaché case, it was wet and slippery, like the skin of a carp. He held the case in a different place, but the sides bent and the zipper stuck. He put it on the sofa and pulled out one of the pages. It was a list of names of the Guard’s brigade: Sergeant Gavril Kurys, B; Corporal Hans Jura, R; and privates Benter Crain, G; Manuelo Bobrov, G; Frank Kratz, R; Eberhardt Ziaia, G; Constantine Dell, R. Someone was missing.

“In that brigade there was another man, short, pudgy… They called him Olsen.”

“You’re sure that a person of that name was in the brigade?”

“I’m sure.”

“In the Guard there is only one man with that name, Private Vandy Olsen, distinguished with a medal for saving a burning armed transporter and its badly injured crew. We have reason to believe that he didn’t take part in the massacre.”

“But he belongs to the brigade?”

“Yes.”

“All you need to do is check Kurys’s morning report.”

“It wasn’t made. They left without it.”

“That’s a breach.”

“You are right. But we cannot place the dead under arrest.”

“And the statements of the accused?”

“There are no statements. The men all burned before they could give a deposition. Kurys survived, true, but has not regained consciousness. He’s in a neurological clinic now. His injuries are serious and probably permanent.”

“Olsen lives, and you are protecting him? The others are outside your jurisdiction now.”

“You insult me,” said Fernandez quietly.

The remark was part of the game, and that is how Gavein took it.

“I state in front of witnesses”—Gavein indicated Dr. Nott and Ra Mahleiné with a nod—“that among the murderers was a man named Olsen. One of the soldiers spoke his name. And the brigade numbered eight men, not seven. Both Lorraine and my wife have testified to that.”

This concluded the interview with the attorney general.

How many more pointless exchanges will there be? Gavein wondered.

Every morning the ritual was the same: trucks leaving with lights flashing, then a Davabel breakfast: cottage cheese, an egg, ham, ketchup.

Ra Mahleiné, heavily medicated by Dr. Nott, felt no pain. After breakfast, she would sit in the armchair in front of the house and do a little knitting; Lorraine hunkered next to her. Gavein brought out another armchair and set it on the sidewalk. The days were almost balmy now. All was still and pleasant on the deserted street. Overhead, the exploding helicopter cast shadows. A ball of fire speckled with dozens of fragments, it paled slowly in the sky. Its crew was long dead.

Gavein opened the book.

I write the numbers of the nested worlds—3, 5, 8, 13—but can’t find a formula for them. A tough froze! Without the 8, they would all be odd numbers, increasing. But that’s not much of a pattern; it doesn’t have the precision of the others. If you put 7 or 11 in the place of the 8, you have a sequence of primes, but then there’s no 2. I don’t know.

Finally a little humility in that redhead, thought Gavein.

In the Bolyas’ old apartment several creeps moved in, the kind who shaved their heads. They usually wore green tunics with red epaulets. Two girls and three guys, dividing the rent among them equally. Daphne was suspicious. She counted the dozens of beer cans thrown in the garbage. The cans were neatly stuffed into plastic bags, but one time squirrels tore open a bag, and they spilled out. The people drank quietly, without uproars.

Gary and Daphne, on the other hand, threw a party with much stamping of feet and bottles of port. The occasion was the publication in a local paper of Daphne’s article on what movers did: two whole columns of text. A bottle was overturned, and port got into the upholstery of the divan. Worse, the tub drain clogged and water seeped through the ceiling of the creeps below. An apology had to be made.

The girl who opened the door was thin as a rail. An even line of straight hair fell over half her face; the other hemisphere of her skull was shaved to a brushlike stubble. Her green tunic ended at mid-thigh, and her legs were bare.

The explanation Gary launched into became increasingly awkward.

When he finished, the girl said, “I’m Margot.”

He realized he hadn’t introduced himself. He did.

“No problem with the water,” she said. “We’re going to be painting anyway. But you won’t be doing that again, right?”

They exchanged phone numbers: simpler to call than walk down.

The new neighbors were OK.

One afternoon he and Daphne returned from the market. (Although Gary drove a truck, he didn’t own a vehicle privately; for marketing he had to use mass transit.) Furniture was being delivered to the people below. The three guys in green tunics struggled with the heavy pieces; the girls carried the lighter things: stools, flowerpots.