Alex Benedict 9 - Village in the Sky, page 9
Meantime, Mary Everson, one of the Hochman anchors, conducted a sit-down talk with Quaid McCann. McCann looked tired and unhappy, seated in a worn terra-cotta-colored armchair. His left leg was crossed over his knee, while his jaw rested on one palm.
“It must be frustrating,” Everson said. “You made one of the great discoveries ever and it’s been taken away from you.”
McCann frowned. “I can’t entirely agree with that, Mary. The village was there. We saw it. We got pictures of it. The discovery was made not only by me, but by the research team. And even if the village never existed, there was a satellite out there. So there were aliens. At the moment we just can’t explain any of it, but there is someone out there.”
“Professor, I’m sure you’re aware that there are a lot of people saying the whole thing’s a hoax. To get more funding for DPSAR research.”
“How do you explain the satellite?”
“It might have been manufactured and taken out on the Harbinger. Or by somebody else.”
“That’s ridiculous. The silliest explanation I’ve heard. Look, Mary, everybody who was on the Columbia saw the village. Vince Reddington saw it. He was on both flights. It’s a long haul out to that place. Does anyone honestly think he’d have gone on the follow-up mission if he’d known it was all a lie? If you knew these people as well as I do, Vince and Sam and Jennifer and a couple of the others, you’d be aware that they would not go along with anything like that.”
They sat a few seconds, staring at each other. Then Everson continued, “I can’t imagine what kind of effect this must be having on you, Professor McCann. Can you tell us how you’ve reacted to it?”
“It’s been painful. I won’t deny that. But eventually the truth will come out.”
“Have you any kind of explanation as to why whoever was there would have left? Could it have had to do with their sighting the Columbia? Did you guys do something out there that alerted them to your presence and scared them off?”
“I guess anything’s possible, Mary. As far as I know, they were never aware of us. But we’ll just have to wait until we get more information. The only thing I can say is that they were there. Why they left, or where they went, I have no idea.”
“Is it possible the Harbinger just went to the wrong location?”
“I can’t see how it could have. Eventually we’ll figure it out. But to answer your earlier question, Mary, yes, it hurts when my colleagues suspect there’s even a possibility that we made this whole thing up. The town was there. I have no explanation for how they moved the buildings, especially the big ones. One of them was a block long. But they brought it off. And I would expect that instead of bogus accusations, we’d be talking about how they could have managed it.”
* * *
The mail arrived as the interview ended. Two packages for Alex. He was sitting at his desk, staring out the window at sunlit trees. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen him look so supremely satisfied. It was obvious he hadn’t been watching the McCann interview. I stood in the doorway to his office with the packages, one of dental supplies and the other unmarked but apparently clothing. His monitor carried the display of the alien village, but he was concentrating on the trees. My first impression was that he’d come up with an explanation. But then his expression changed to one of annoyance. He needed a few moments to realize I was there. When he did, he waved me in.
“Good morning, Chase.” He cleared a corner of the desk for the packages.
“You okay?” I asked as I set them down.
“Sure. Something wrong?”
“No. I’m good.”
“Anything new on the Korella story?”
“No. Not that I know of.”
“I think we got a pretty big break,” Alex said.
“How’s that?”
“We’re looking at probably the most gripping historical mystery ever. It couldn’t be better for us. At least, not after they found the backpack.”
“Alex, I have no idea what you’re talking about. Other than it sounds as if you’re planning to go out there.”
“You’re reading my mind again, Chase. Yes, I’m interested in going out there. Assuming we can find out where the place is. You want to come?”
“To hunt relics? Is that why you’re going?”
“It’s as good a reason as I can think of.”
“Chances are there won’t be any more. Even if there are, we’d spend the better part of three months in the Belle-Marie. And the best we could hope for would be a few artifacts.” His eyes narrowed. I knew that look. “You want to figure out how they moved the village.”
“Well, that too.”
“That too? Alex, what’s this about?”
“If we can find some artifacts, they may tell us what happened to the village. If we succeed in doing that, I’ll sleep well again at night. I think, though, that we won’t have much luck tracking the village down. This doesn’t feel like a puzzle that’s going to be easy to solve. But that’s okay. We’re probably better off if it doesn’t get solved.”
“What do you mean?”
“Chase, it’s all about artifacts. We’re looking at one of the most mysterious events in human history. So if we can come up with some antiquities, they’ll be pure gold to collectors. But probably less so if we can explain what happened to the village.”
Alex is a good-looking guy, brown hair, dark brown eyes, clear features, slightly more than average height. In his longtime career managing artifacts for collectors and buyers, he’s been a genius. And he’s also as good a boss as anyone could want. He doesn’t hesitate to ask my opinion. He encourages me to talk even after he decides I’m on the wrong side of an issue. On this occasion, his tone suggested he wanted me to contribute something. I knew him well enough, though, to be aware his mind was made up. And he was right. If no one ever figured out what had happened to the village, any more remnants—backpacks or clocks or speakers or whatever—would be priceless. “One of the people who was on board the Columbia,” he said, “called this morning. He had one of the ship’s coffee cups. Thought it might be worth something.” His eyebrows rose. “It is. Eventually, depending on what happens next, it might be worth a great deal.”
“Pity,” I said, “he didn’t find a cup on the ground somewhere. Preferably with an alien symbol.” We were in the process of selling one of those, left behind by the Ulakans ten days earlier. One of them had apparently been drinking from the cup when he came off the ship, took it into the Dellacondan Restaurant on Skydeck, and left it on a table. It had a symbol that matched one of those on the hull of the alien ship. The woman who’d salvaged it asked Alex whether it was worth keeping. It went to auction and the bidding had gone through the roof.
“I assume you didn’t see the McCann interview?”
“No,” he said. “How’s he taking it?”
“He’s rattled, but he’ll survive. So when are we leaving?”
“We’ll need some time. You game for it, Chase?”
I needed a minute to think about it. It didn’t feel like an effort that had much chance of success. And my personal life had become especially enjoyable. I wasn’t anxious to leave Chad to sit inside the Belle-Marie through what remained of the summer. “How optimistic are you?”
“Not very. If it were easy, we wouldn’t be able to cash in on it.”
“Is Gabe coming?”
“I haven’t said anything to him yet. I wanted to check with you first to be sure you were on board.”
Chad would have a heart attack. Still, I knew Alex thought of me as a valuable aide, and I didn’t want that to change. And I trusted him. He was good at this stuff, and I suspected that if there was anything on the ground, we’d find it.
“Okay, Alex. I’ll go.”
“Excellent. And for the record: the goal of the mission is strictly to salvage artifacts. Nothing else.”
“I’m not clear yet on the real reason we’re going. What do we do if we find the villagers? We can’t contact them.”
“We’ll figure out the details if it actually happens. In any case, there’s a special circumstances provision to the no-contact mandate. I suspect we already have sufficient special circumstances. How else would you describe a first step toward understanding how they moved the village?”
* * *
“I’ve been waiting for you.” Gabe was relaxed in his recliner when we walked in. His notebook was open, lying beside him.
Alex grinned. “Am I really that predictable?”
“This one is perfectly designed for you. Nobody knows what’s going on, and there’s a good chance to walk away with a substantial paycheck.”
“I can’t imagine you’d be happy to stand by and let me do that.”
“When are you planning to leave?”
“We have some work to do yet.”
He looked at me. “I assume you’ll be going too, Chase?”
“Yes,” I said. “I wouldn’t want to miss the next round.”
His eyes settled on Alex. “How are you going to find out where the place is?”
“The follow-up mission has been there and got nothing. There’s nobody there, so the first-contact rules don’t exactly apply. It should be easy to pin down the location.”
“Okay. I can see why you’re interested. But I’m going to pass. This thing would just be too time-consuming.”
“All right, Gabe. If you change your mind, let me know.”
“Good luck with it. Nobody seems to have ever heard of Korella prior to the Columbia mission.”
“The name was dredged up by the Columbia,” Alex said. “Apparently on the day they discovered the village. That would have been when they realized they needed a name. McCann has an uncle Korella.”
“I missed that,” said Gabe.
“I checked his family tree.” Alex grinned. “Of course it might be a coincidence.”
“We’re going to have to get somebody to talk to us,” I said. “How about McCann?”
Alex shook his head. “I’ve already tried him. He says he has nothing to say. Cassell is due back in a couple of weeks. Maybe he’d be willing to tell us where the village is. Or somebody else on the Harbinger.”
7
There is nothing so compelling as an event that defies explanation. Whether a scientific issue or the disappearance of a gold reserve from a sealed vault or a man murdered in a locked room high in a skyscraper, it does not matter. Everyone loves a mystery.
—Maria Sumter, creator of fictional detective Maxwell Pelham, fifth millennium
The media were out in force when the Harbinger docked. It was the middle of the afternoon in Andiquar. We’d known for a couple of days that the ship had surfaced and arrival was imminent. I watched on my office HV while they came in. The exit tube lit up. Sam, Jennifer, and Autumn were the first ones to come out onto the concourse. As a result of the constant media coverage, they seemed like longtime acquaintances. They tried to avoid the picture-taking and the questions, but in the end they gave in. The missing village had been disappointing, they said. And strange. Sam and Jennifer both threw up their hands and admitted they weren’t sure they’d arrived at the right location. It looked the same as the pictures, but that was the only explanation they had that made any sense. Autumn shook her head and said she just didn’t know what was going on.
I switched over to the Hochman Network, where Wilkinson was having a few final words with Henry Cassell in the passenger cabin. “So, Henry,” he asked, “what happens now? Where do we go from here?”
The director’s eyes closed momentarily. “We simply forget the whole thing, Lester. It’s over.”
“Would you encourage anyone else to go out there?”
“No. Absolutely not. It would be a total waste of time.” He picked up a bag from one of the seats and looked toward the exit. “Time to go.”
“Okay.” Wilkinson was carrying nothing. It looked as if most of the luggage had been removed. “And thank you for allowing me to accompany you and your colleagues on this mission.”
Henry responded with a smile that was almost pitiful. “I wish we could have had something more for you.”
* * *
Alex waited a few days for the media coverage to go away. Then he called McCann. The automated response replied, “Professor McCann is not currently available. He will be informed of your call.”
I was in Alex’s office the following afternoon when Jacob told us McCann was on the circuit. “Put him through,” Alex said. He signaled me to stay, but to retreat to the armchair beside the door, where I wouldn’t be visible to McCann. Alex sat down behind his desk and McCann blinked on in the middle of the office. He was accompanied, off to one side, by an armchair, though he wasn’t using it.
“Mr. Benedict?” he said.
Alex leaned forward. “Thanks for getting back to me, Professor. Please, take a seat.”
“It’s good to meet you, Mr. Benedict.” He remained standing, ignoring Alex’s invitation. “I assume you want to go hunting for artifacts?” McCann had obviously done his research.
“Yes, sir. If we can find any, they will eventually become historical treasures.”
“I suspect you’ll understand that I don’t want anything more to do with that place.”
“I’m sure what happened with the Harbinger has been frustrating for you, Professor. But you’ve made a major contribution to our knowledge of the Orion Nebula.”
“And what was that, sir?”
“We know now that there is another civilization out there. Somewhere. And with the arrival of the Ulakans a few weeks ago, we don’t feel nearly as alone as we used to.”
“Yes, that was quite an experience, wasn’t it? I would love to have had a chance to say hello to them. I don’t suppose you had the chance to actually meet any of them?”
“No, I didn’t, Professor.”
“Call me Quaid.”
“I’m Alex.”
“Indeed. Before we go any further with this, I can see only one reason that would have prompted you to get in touch with me, Alex. And I have to tell you up front that I have no inclination to reveal the location of Korella IV. We have to maintain control over attempts at contact.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, Quaid, but I understand.”
McCann stood quietly for a moment. Finally he lowered himself into the chair. “It’s essential that we not reveal the location of alien worlds.”
“That place doesn’t seem to be an alien world.”
“Of course it is. Aliens were living there when we arrived.”
“The evidence suggests they were not natives. You guys and the Harbinger both ran long searches and found no one else anywhere on the planet.”
“Searching an entire world for small towns or villages isn’t easy, Alex. It takes a lot of time. You of all people should be aware of that. And finding nothing doesn’t mean they aren’t there. But okay, you may be right. Maybe the world is deserted now. We just don’t know. In any case, yes, we are aware that aliens have been there. The Harbinger brought back a satellite. So there’s no question that they existed. We don’t want our people going out to the place and taking it over. Once the location gets out, there’d be no way to protect it.” He raised his left hand. “And to be frank, I don’t know where the place is. If they’d needed me to help them, they’d still be drifting around looking. The reality is that even if I wanted to help, I wouldn’t know how.”
* * *
“There’s one other possibility,” Alex said. “Robbi Jo Renfroe is an old friend of yours, isn’t she?”
I wasn’t surprised that he knew. I couldn’t recall ever having mentioned our connection, but if Alex was persistent at anything, it was research. “Yes,” I said. “We go back to early school days.”
“I assume you don’t want to ask her if she’d be willing to help.”
“I don’t like putting her on the spot.”
“She’s pretty much all we have left. You wouldn’t have to put any pressure on her. Just let her know what we’re planning and give her the opportunity to make an offer.”
I hated going near her with the issue. If she broke ranks and gave us the Korella location, her career with DPSAR would be over. I’d been hoping Alex would make an effort to win over somebody from the Visitation Project, but he’d presumably already looked into that. The only ones who knew the details of the mission were very likely the pilots. Even Henry probably didn’t know.
Alex read my reluctance. “If you have to pass on it, Chase,” he said, “I understand.”
I came close. If there’d been another option, I’d have backed off. But there wasn’t, and I could sense the passion in his voice. He’d talked about money. But the money wasn’t at the heart of this. He collected artifacts because they were a way to touch history. If we could come up with something on Korella, it would be the ultimate historical connection in his career.
* * *
Robbi Jo lived in Parnau, about six hundred kilometers north of Andiquar, at the foot of the Konjour Mountains. I settled in behind my desk and called her. She picked up. “Hi, Chase. I’ve been meaning to get back to you. It was great to hear from you.”
We had a bad connection; her image flickered, faded, and was gone. Then it came back at full clarity. She was seated in a chair, dressed for mountain climbing or maybe just camping, with gray leggings and a heavy pullover shirt. Two boots were on the floor in front of her. “Hello, Robbi Jo. How you doing? Hope all’s well with you.”
“I’m fine, thanks.”
Robbi Jo had looked pretty good during her high school years, and she’d lost nothing. Her eyes gleamed. She was blond, with congenial features and an easy manner that indicated the relationship between us had not aged. Two windows provided a view of a sloping landscape. She wasn’t alone. She made hand signals, and a moment later I heard a door close.
