Tuning William - Fuzzy Bones

Steefer nodded and drew a line under something on his note pad.

"The other thing, Harry," Grego said; "I know Gwen was calling from a public screen. I could see the esplanade in the background. I think it was Pequod Plaza, but I'm not sure. In any case, it's a good place to start looking.

Questions?"

"No, Mr. Grego," Steefer said.

"Good," Grego replied. "I'm going to call Gus Brann-hard now and have him put the City Police on it, so you should be hearing from Al Earlie by the time you get to your office. Now, you guys squabble out who's in charge of the operation any way you want to, but be prepared to set up a command post in Junktown if you don't turn her up right away and start calling in off-duty detectives."

"Yes, sir," Steefer said.

Grego could see a perplexed-looking Mrs. Steefer in the background of the screen pickup. Don't worry about it, Mrs. Steefer; you married a cop, not an accountant. "Remember, Harry. . ."Grego said.

"Yes, sir?" Steefer inquired.

"Find that girl!"

Grego was mildly stunned at the sight of Gustavus Adol-phus Brannhard in his pajamas. Then he realized that he had always supposed Gus slept naked in the crotch of a tree, with a bottle of whiskey cradled in the crook of his arm.

"Oh. Victor." Gus said and yawned. "It's you. What's up?"

"Sorry to wake you, Gus," Grego said.

"That's all right," Gus said. "I had to get up to answer the screen anyway."

His shaggy chest hair was curling out of the pajama collar and wisps of it

protruded from the spaces between the buttons.

"Look, Gus," Grego said. "We're onto something very important, here. Why don't you have a jolt to get your heart started and I '11 tell you about it. You'll be fascinated; guarantee it."

"Good idea," Gus said. "Be right back."

"I'll hang on," Grego said.

When Gus Brannhard returned to the pickup area of his screen he had a half-glass of amber fluid in his hand and a sparkle in his eye. "Shoot," he said.

Grego narrated the events of the past half hour. When he got to the

"Ingermann. It's Ingermann" part, Gus leaned forward attentively. Trying to find a charge he could make stick to Hugo Ingermann was Gus's hobby.

"Ohhhhhhh," he said. "Ahhhhhhh. I think we have a tiny match here with which we can burn down Ingermann's house."

"I do, too," Grego said, "but only if the girl is still alive and we can find her before someone realizes they've blundered and try to make sure she's shut up for good."

Gus set down the glass and nibbed his palms together gleefully. "I'll get Al Earlie right on it," he said, "and I'll have Colonel Ferguson put the Colonial Constabulary on alert and seal off the city. Let's see-I better wake up Max Fane. We'll probably need some warrants before this is done with. Besides, he'd never forgive me if he wasn't on it from the beginning."

"Good," Grego said. "Keep me posted. I'll be right here and I'm staying up until we have something definite-one way or the other."

Alex Napier turned off the lights in his cabin and climbed into his bunk. As he pulled the sheet up under his chin he was thinking that a lot more people knew what might be up, now, but he was pleased with the way the briefing had gone this evening. Sharp young lad, that Gilbert, too; sharpest he'd seen in some time. When the question was put to him while they were having a nightcap, he had already figured out what the rest of his mission was to be after all the scientific findings were in, the duplicate folio built up, and the "armed copy boy" phase of his assignment completed. Yes, have to keep an eye on young Gilbert. He might be going places in this man's Navy. He slept.

Having done everything he could do, for the moment, Victor Grego opened the terrace doors, picked up his brandy snifter, and went outside. He liked to sit there, in the quiet of the night, and listen to the city. Sometimes Mallorysport would speak to him by the distant hum of human activity that drifted up to the top of Company House. Sounds from far away were all blended together at that altitude and the result was that the character of the city at that moment would effulgently come to his ears.

Tonight, there seemed to be a suspiring murmur of discontent bordering on misery. And small wonder; Mallorysport was still digesting an enormous helping of immigrants. The poor, the poor; why are the poor always with us? We have conquered the very stars, and with all our science and all our pluck and all our will to cross the endless gulfs of space, we have not been able to lift the human spirit high enough to erase poverty and its children-the broken, the pitiful, the helpless. . .

His ruminations were cut short by the soft chiming of his private screen. He

rushed back inside and opened the key. It was Harry Steefer. "Yes, Harry,"

Grego said matter-of-factly.

Steefer was obviously pleased with himself. It was now less than an hour since Grego had put him to work. "We've got her, Mr. Grego, "he said. "Her name'sG

wen Ramsey."

"Is she . . . ?" Grego ventured.

"Yes," Steefer said, "she's still alive. She's in Mallory Memorial with two slugs in her. They 're going to dig 'em out as soon as they can get her stabilized. They won't let anybody talk to her till after ,that. She's out, anyway, so there's no point to try until she comes out of post-op."

"You have a forensics man there with an envelope-in the operating room-so he can positively testify that those are the bullets that came out of her. If we get lucky enough to bag Ingermann with a gun on him, I bet you a five-sol that they'll match it,"

"Been taken care of," Steefer said.

"What kind of odds are we looking at?" Grego asked.

"Not too bad," Steefer said. "The next twelve hours are crucial. If she makes it through that, the doc says she has an excellent chance."

"I want two cops on this around the clock, Harry," Grego said. "One of ours and one from the city. I want them so close to that girl they can hear her breathing."

"Been taken care of," Steefer said.

"Nobody talks to her but you, Al Earlie, Gus, or myself until we get a veridicated statement from her. When they find out she's still with us, somebody will try to get in and finish up the job they botched."

"Wouldn't do 'em any good," Steefer said smugly. "We have an eyewitness."

"An eyewitness! That sounds too good to be true," Grego exclaimed.

"Yes, sir," Steefer said. "The first thing my people did was to check in with all their informants. OldJ.B. was sitting on a bench and saw the whole thing.

Of course, he dived behind the bench when the first round went off, but he has already picked Ingermann's face out of the book. Old J.B. tells us interesting things from time to time and we give him a few sols from time to time. He was the one that called the ambulance."

"Wonderful," Grego said. "You guard him like he was the Company sunstone vault-and get a veridicated deposition."

"It's being done right now," Steefer said.

"Anything else happen tonight that might bear on this?" Grego asked.

"Well-" Steefer hesitated. "I don't know if it's tied in or not. Al Earlie's boys picked up a couple of drunk Marines tonight for disturbing the peace.

They told the interrogator a fascinating yarn about a mountain of suns tones on North Beta. The hell of it is they had some sunstones on them and their story holds up under veridication. They might have told Ingermann the same thing. You know how sunstone-happy he is. Something like that could tip him

over the edge and make him do something foolish-the something foolish that he did."

Several things came together in Grego's mind and a picture started to form.

"Very interesting," he said. "Have Al hold them for a day or so. I'd like to talk to them in the morning. We've got a leasehold-at very high royalties, I might add-on a rich deposit over there on the Fuzzy Reservation. Don't let them bail out until I talk to them. If somebody shows up with a habeas corpus order, we'll have something to dig at. Anything else?"