Judas Unchained

“He slept with her?” Justine couldn’t help the indignation. She pursed her lips, vexed with herself for caring. After all, they hadn’t been married for eighty years. Still…he’d done it under her roof, technically.

“It was even Ramon’s parallel development idea which helped the agency move all the starship production facilities to the High Angel with the minimum of fuss,” Gore said.

“Which he produced on Sunday morning,” Justine said coldly. “I suppose we’ll never know who actually came up with the idea.”

“I assumed it was Patricia, who relayed it through Isabella,” Gore said.

“It’s the kind of compromise a presidential aide could come up with in an instant. Now, though, we’ll never know.”

“You could ask him,” Paula said.

Justine finished off the last of her antacid drink, which might have accounted for the little grimace of distaste. “Yes, I could. I’m not sure he’d give me an answer.”

“He will,” Gore said. “You know he will.”

“Maybe, but he’d want to know why.”

“Is he strong enough to join us?” Gore asked. “We need allies.”

“He’d need some very strong proof,” Justine said carefully. “I’m not sure what we’ve got right now is enough.”

“What more can we give him?” Gore asked. “For Christ’s sake, Ramon isn’t stupid.”

“I’m not about to tell him we suspect Nigel Sheldon of being behind the greatest antihuman conspiracy there’s ever been. He’d shoot us down in flames.”

“You’ve got to find a way to get to him.”

“I’ll try.” She thought of how she’d have done that in the old days. A hotel in Paris maybe, a weekend spent together, restaurants, fine wines, coffee on the left bank, talking, arguing, laughing, theater in the evening, long passionate nights in bed. How she missed those simple times now.

“This still doesn’t tell us which of them was pulling the strings, Patricia or Isabella,” Gore said. “And were they working in conjunction with the Sheldons?”

“We don’t know Nigel is a part of this,” Justine said. “Not yet.” She told her e-butler to run a full background check on Isabella and Patricia.

“It would be logical for Isabella to be a courier to the Starflyer network,” Paula said. “Kantil would be working deep cover, taking her time to infiltrate the Commonwealth political structure. The unisphere shows are full of innuendo that Doi is heavily dependent on her advisors and opinion polls.”

“Which is why I was suspicious about her original backing for the Starflight agency,” Gore said. “Spending that much tax money was never going to be a vote winner before the barrier came down. She took a very uncharacteristic risk backing the formation. Something pushed her into doing that.”

“I don’t have any grounds to arrest Kantil and subject her to a forensic neurological examination,” Paula said. “We ran similar appraisals on suspects yesterday, which came to nothing.”

Justine listened to them discussing options while the data on Patricia and Isabella ran across her virtual vision. Patricia’s background was well documented, and verified by investigative reporters eager to find the smallest discrepancy in her official history and so prise open a covered-up scandal. Less information was available on Isabella, primarily because of her youth and the fact that she’d spent a lot of her life on Solidade. The Halgarths’ private world didn’t have public records. Justine started to review associated files which the e-butler’s cross-reference function had thrown up.

“Wait a minute,” Justine said. “Isabella’s father, Victor. Fifteen years ago he was appointed director of the Marie Celeste Research Institute on Far Away. He ran it for a two-year term before moving back to EdenBurg, where he secured a vice presidency in a Halgarth Dynasty physics laboratory.”

“That’s how it got to her,” Paula said with satisfaction. “She was just a child. I didn’t understand how anyone that young could be involved.” She frowned. “Neither did Renne.”

“If Isabella is a Starflyer agent, then her parents have to be as well,” Gore said.

“Yes,” Paula said. “We must watch what they’re doing. However, there is a limit to how many observation operations Senate Security can mount. It is not a huge organization.”

“Our family has a decent-sized security team,” Gore said. “Be good for them to get their asses out of the office and do some fieldwork for a change. I’ll organize something.”

“I appreciate that,” Paula said. “But I can arrange for the Halgarths to be watched. I have a well-placed friend in the Dynasty. There is something else I need you to help me with. Hoshe has established that Bose’s original astronomical observation was financed by the Starflyer. Someone in my old Directorate’s Paris office covered up the information when I was investigating him. I’m running several entrapment operations on the personnel to find out which one. But I’d like a proper financial analysis of Bromley, Waterford, and Granku. That could result in some important leads.”

“I know that company,” Gore said. “Legal firm here in town.”