Agent of Change Read online

  She caught the headshake and smiled a ghastly smile that consisted only of bending her sealed lips and creasing her cheeks.

  "You do think I look nice, doncha?"

  He folded his arms on top of the 'chora and nestled his chin on a forearm. "I think," he said clearly, "that you look like a whore."

  She laughed, clapping ring-laden hands together. "So did the woman at the collection firm!" She sobered abruptly, slanting lusterless eyes at him. "Your face was wonderful! I don't remember the last time I saw somebody look so surprised." She shook her head. "Don't they teach you anything in spy school?"

  He grinned. "There are some things that even spy school cannot erase. I was raised to be genteel."

  "Were you?" She regarded him in round-eyed admiration. "What happened?"

  He ignored this bait, however, and nodded toward the comm. "Murph?"

  She sighed. "On vacation with his fiancée in some place called Econsey—southern hemisphere. That's what I know. I was gonna see what else the comm knew when you came in and insulted my hairdo."

  "Econsey is situated on the eastern shoreline of the southern hemisphere," he told her, singsonging slightly as he read the information that scrolled before his mind's eye. "It sits at the most eastern point of a peninsula and is surrounded on three sides by the Maranstadt Ocean. Year round population: 40,000. Transient population: 160,000, approximate. Principal industries: gambling, foodstuffs, liquors, hostelries, entertainment, exotic imports." He paused, checking back, then nodded. "Juntavas influenced, but not owned."

  Miri stared at him; whatever expression may have been in eyes and face was shielded by the makeup.

  "Mind like that and it's all going to waste."

  Irritation spiked from nowhere and he frowned. "Will you go wash your face?"

  She grinned. "Why? You think it needs it?" But she rolled to her feet, box in hand, and headed for her room. Behind her, Val Con flipped open the cover and touched the keyboard plate.

  In the bathroom, Miri stripped the rings from her fingers and the bobs from her ears, jangling them along with the necklet and hair jewelry into the valet's return box. A glance at the readout showed that her leathers were at long last clean and the jumpsuit joined the gaudy jewelry. She closed the lid, hit the return key, and turned to the sink.

  It took longer to scrape the gunk off her face than it had to put it on—the eyeshadow was especially tenacious—but a clean face was eventually achieved and, moments later, a braid was pinned in a neat crown around her head.

  Her leathers slipped on smoothly, sheathing her in a supple second skin; she stamped into her boots, tied the knot in the arm-scarf, and carried the belt with its built-on pouch back to the sleeping room.

  Sitting on the edge of the tumbled platform, she picked up the lacquer box and spun it in her hands like a juggler, hitting each of the seven pressure locks in unerring sequence. There was a click, loud over the soft drift of 'chora music from the other room. Miri set the box down and raised the lid.

  Opening the belt-pouch, she pushed at the back bracing wall until she coaxed the false panel out, and laid it aside.

  From the box she took a key of slightly phosphorescent blue metal, a thin sheaf of papers, a badly-cut ruby the size of a Terran quarter-bit, a loop of pierced malachite, and a gold ring much too big for her finger, set with a cloudy sapphire. She stowed each item in the secret space in the pouch. Then she removed the last object, frowned, and sat balancing it in her hand.

  The room's directionless light picked out a slash of red, a line of gold, and a field of indigo blue. She flipped it to the obverse, and light skidded off the polished metal surface, snagging on the roughness of engraving. As she'd done a hundred times since she'd gotten the thing, she ran her finger over the engraving, trying to puzzle out the alien characters.

  In the room outside her door, the comm unit buzzed once ... twice.

  Miri dumped the disk among her other treasures, sealed the hiding place, and was on her way to the door, threading the belt around her waist as she went.

  * * *

  VAL CON WAS on his feet and moving as the comm buzzed a second time. He touched BLANK SCREEN and GO.

  His eyebrows shot up as he saw one of his four captors of the night before standing in the lobby below, a squad of six ranged at his back, and he shook his head to banish the feeling of creeping déjà vu.

  "Mr. Phillips?" demanded the man he recognized.

  "Yes," Val Con said, taking the remote from its nesting place atop the comm.

  "Mr. Connor Phillips," the leader insisted. "Former crew member on the Salene?"

  Val Con strolled across the room to the bar. "It would be useless to deny it," he told the remote. "I was Cargo Master on Salene. To whom am I speaking? And why? I left instructions that I was not to be disturbed." He set the remote on the shiny bartop and activated the refreshment screen.

  "My name is Peter Smith. I'm working with the police in the investigation of the explosion that took place at Terran Party Headquarters last night."

  Val Con dialed a double brandy from the selection list "I am unenlightened, Mr. Smith. Unless I understand you to say that I am suspected of causing an explosion in—where was it? Terra Place?"

  "Terran Party Headquarters." There was a real snarl in that correction, then a pause, as if for breath. "We're looking for a man named Terrence O'Grady, who caused the explosion and disappeared. We're asking everybody who's come on-world during the last fifteen days to answer a few questions about the—incident. Refusing to assist in a police investigation, Mr. Phillips," Pete said, with a very creditable amount of piety, "is a criminal offense."

  Val Con dialed another brandy. "I am chastised."

  Across the room, the door to Miri's bedroom opened and she came out, buckling her belt as she walked. She paused briefly in front of the comm screen before continuing on to the second bedroom.

  "Mr. Smith," Val Con said, dialing yet another brandy. "It is really of no interest to me whether or not you catch this—individual—who blew up these headquarters. However, since you have already disturbed me, and since I have no wish to be treated as a criminal, you may as well ask your questions."

  "That's fine," Pete said. "Now, if you'll tell the receptionist to let us up, we'll just take a few minutes of your time—"

  "Mr. Smith, please. I said you may as well ask your questions. I did not say that I would welcome you into my home. The presence of a police representative would place me in a very awkward negotiating position at this moment."

  Miri laid his gun silently on the bar and was gone, vanishing into the kitchen. Val Con dialed a brandy, clipped gun to belt, and waited.

  After a pause, Pete's voice came again. "Okay, Mr. Phillips, if that's how you want it. Where were you last night between 10:45 p.m. and midnight?"

  Miri reappeared, raised her brows at the row of brandy snifters on the bar, and passed silently on to survey the comm screen.

  "Last night," Val Con said easily, "I was engaged with friends. There was a party, with fireworks and conversation." He dialed another brandy.

  "I see. You can, of course, supply the name and address of your friends," Pete said. In the lobby, he jerked his head and two of his squad moved toward the elevators. Miri walked back to the bar.

  "I can," Val Con was saying. "I won't. But I can."

  "I see," Pete said again. "Mr. Phillips, do you know a man named Terrence O'Grady?"

  "No." Val Con handed two brandies to Miri and waved toward her bedroom. She stood still, frowning; he reached into the depths of the bar, produced a flamestick, and tucked it in her belt. Enlightenment dawned with a grin of delight, and she departed on her mission.

  "Mr. Phillips, I'm going to have to insist that I see you."

  "Mr. Smith, I'm going to have to insist that you produce a legal document giving you the right." Miri was back for two more brandies, which she carried into the other bedroom. Smoke was beginning to waft from the doorway across the room.

 
"Have you any other questions?" he asked Pete.

  "Why did you leave your post on the Salene?"

  "It was not as profitable an association as I had hoped for, Mr. Smith. But I fail to see what that has to do with your problem. Salene did not ship explosives. I met no one there named O'Grady. I have met no one named O'Grady since I have been on Lufkit. I doubt if ever in my life I have met anyone named O'Grady, but I give you leave to explore the possibility." Smoke wisped sweetly from his former bedroom to billow with the smoke from Miri's.

  He stopped dialing brandies and splashed the contents of one of the remaining snifters on the carpet around the bar. Miri appeared, picked up two more glasses, and carried them to the comm chair and the sofa, touching the flamestick to the cushions.

  "Mr. Smith?" Val Con asked the remote.

  Miri came back for the remaining snifters and began to splash the carpet.

  "What?" Pete snapped.

  "Have you other questions? I really must return to my own business." He held up a hand, stopping Miri from igniting the carpet.

  "Any other—yeah, I do." Pete took an audible breath. "Are you a geek, Mr. Phillips?"

  "Are you a horse's ass, Mr. Smith?" Val Con hit DISCONNECT. Miri touched the flamestick to the carpet.

  Somewhere within the building, bells began to ring; a hiss of water striking flame came from Miri's bedroom as the sprinkler system activated itself. There were shouts from the hallway.

  Miri and Val Con were already through the kitchen escape hatch. He slammed it to, twisted two knobs, and spun to find her shaking her head.

  "Real genteel."

  He grinned. "Thank you."

  Then they were moving without haste down the small service corridor, toward the larger world beyond.

  Chapter Five

  HE WAS MALE, though that rarely mattered to him. Indeed, he was hardly male at all, in the sense of lyr-cat, bearded Terran stud, or mouse. What mattered more to him was his name, which might take up to three hours of introduction when spoken to humans and, spoken fully, might consume nearly twelve hours. For purposes of the visas and other official papers that hasty humans required of one, there were several short forms of his name, which pleased him.

  He was regal, as befitted a T'carais and a being more than nine hundred Standard Years old, though among his race he was known for his occasional hasty action. On visas he was thus: Twelfth Shell Fifth Hatched Knife Clan of Middle River's Spring Spawn of Farmer Greentrees of the Spear-makers Den, The Edger.

  Some few of the Clans of Men—Terran and Liaden separately they named themselves—knew him reasonably well as Edger. He enjoyed this informality; it reminded him of those early days of learning his trade and life role.

  With him now traveled other functionaries of his Clan: The Handler, The Selector, The Sheather, and, off-planet, The Watcher. Most of the Clan was home, growing knives in the cold, beautiful caverns of Middle River. His group of five had been sent by the Elders out into the wide universe to discover what knives were required. "Market research" his visa named this vast adventure, though Edger himself thought of it more fully as "Education." After all, one had to discover the uses and users of a knife before one could know what blade to grow, what edge to encourage, what handle to smooth, what sheath to mold. He never doubted that knives were needed, or that knives from the Knife Clan of Middle River were needed most of all.

  So far, they'd been seven years on this hectic trip. Edger felt confident that another seven would yield all the information the Elders required.

  Being relatively young, Edger did not regard himself as large; his twelfth shell had been still dangerously soft when they'd begun their journey, and even now was barely set. Yet people not of the Clutch regarded him with awe, for few of the working class traveled, and his four-hundred-pound bottle-green frame was fully one-third larger than the svelte and speedy persons the Ambassadorial Clans sent to human worlds.

  Being young, Edger was fond of entertainment. In fact, it was for this purpose that he and his three companions were now moving with ponderous haste down the wide walkway of a neighborhood consisting of very tall, pastel-colored buildings. There was a piece of music to be performed in a building just a little farther down this street and then somewhat farther down the next. One could have argued that the briefness of the piece—barely longer than the speaking of Edger's full name in Terran—hardly justified walking such a distance at such a pace. But Edger's delight in music was well-known to his kin, and they were disposed to accompany him to this pleasure.

  Thus they walked, taking care to keep to the strip of soft material Terrans lined their walkways with. And why not use stone, which endured at least a generation or two, demanded Selector, who had an acid tongue. Why use this—this concrete, which wore so quickly? Were the Clutch to use such material, nothing would be accomplished save the constant repaving of the roads.

  Handler reminded Selector of the briefness of human lives. "Therefore, many of their own generations may walk upon this surface before it wears to nothing. And, in their hastiness, they may by then have decided upon the use of another material altogether so that it is not a waste for them, brother."

  What reply Selector may have made to this gentle reproof was not to be known, for it was at that moment that the howl of a siren sounded behind them, echoed by another in front. Directly across the street from the group of Clutch members, a building chimed a shrill song to itself.

  Edger stopped, enchanted.

  The building continued its song while people gathered around it, each crying out in what could very possibly be some hasty new harmony. This was counterpointed by the screaming sirens atop the two bright red vehicles which had so recently arrived on the scene.

  Edger left the walkway and moved across the crowded street toward the building that sang. His Clan members, seeing him in the throes of his passion, followed.

  They moved through the crowd at the entrance very like a herd of elephants moving through grassland, and they did not stop at the policeman's order. Possibly, he had not been heard. Or his voice might merely have been approved for its place in the song, the words disregarded in the present of the experience.

  Rapt, Edger came into the lobby, kin trailing after. Here, he noted, the sound of the sirens was not so shrill; the rich counter-harmony of the singers faded to a primal growl over which the solitary, single-noted song of the building soared triumphant, nearly incandescent.

  And there were other textures herein encountered, doubtless meant as a frame to the piece: the softness of the carpeting beneath his feet; the clearness of the colors; the harshness of the light reflected from the framed glass surfaces. Edger stepped deeper into the experience, opening his comprehension to the wholeness of this piece of art.

  Patiently, his Clan members waited.

  * * *

  TOO DAMN EASY, Miri thought with habitual distrust of easiness. The service corridor formed a small cul-de-sac off the first-floor hallway, and they had loitered there until the evacuation team arrived and began knocking on doors and hustling people to safety. Val Con had stepped quietly into the group of refugees, Miri at his shoulder, and so they had gotten rescued, too.

  When the group hit the lobby, he as quietly dropped out, slipping ghostlike into the foliage of an artificial oasis. Intrigued by this return to complexity, Miri dropped out with him.

  In the next few minutes, the situation in the lobby had grown noisier and more confused. Cops and firefighters were everywhere, yelling and pushing people around. Miri caught sight of two rescue workers shoving Peter Smith toward the door, and grinned.

  "Tough Guy?"

  "Hmm?" A gaggle of turtles had wandered into the lobby and he was staring at them, brows pulled together in a half-frown.

  "Do you know Terrence O'Grady?"

  The green eyes flicked to her face, his frown smoothing away to that look of bland politeness. Miri braced herself for a lie.

  One of his eyebrows slid slightly askew and he took a delibe
rate breath, then released it.

  "I don't know Terrence O'Grady," he said slowly. "But, for a few days, I was Terrence O'Grady."

  The truth, after all. Miri blinked.

  "I was afraid of that." She jerked her head toward the aliens in the lobby. "Friends of yours?"

  He returned to his study. "It is difficult to be certain at this distance. They may actually be—kin."

  She looked at him blankly and saw his face go from intent concentration to extreme pleasure as one of the Clutch began expounding incomprehensibly in its foghorn voice.

  "That's Edger."

  "It's what?" she demanded, dropping a wary hand to his arm.

  "Edger," he repeated. "The big one in the middle is my brother Edger."

  "Oh." She frowned at the group, and then at him. Maybe he's flipped, Robertson, she thought nervously. Don't look it, though.

  The Clutch members were standing together, three of them waiting with visible patience, looking at nothing in particular, while the fourth—the loud one who stood a large head taller than his fellows—was in an attitude of animated attention. Edger, Miri reminded herself.

  "Okay," she said, going with the gag for the moment. "What's he doing here?"

  "I think . . . ." He paused, eyes on the four aliens. "I think that he must be listening to the music."

  Miri grabbed at the ragged edge of her patience. "What music?"

  Her partner waved a slim hand, encompassing the pandemonium within and without. "Edger is a connoisseur of music. I met him when I was training as First-In Scout. I had a portable 'chora with me . . . ." He shook his head, eyes still on the Clutch members, face relaxed, lips half-smiling.

  "He enjoyed my playing. After I—got to know him, he offered me a place in his household, as Clan musician." The half-smile became a full smile briefly. "He also offered to import a lifemate for me, or a series of pleasure-loves, so I wouldn't sicken for my own kind."

  Miri was staring at him. "First-In Scout?" she repeated, in whispering awe.

  His face closed like a trap, skin pulling tight over his cheekbones and tiny muscles tensing around the eyes; the smile was gone as if it had never been.