Time Crime
answered for them. "The packs have been taken to my house, where our
friends will stay. We can bring a few to show you, the hour after
evening prayers."
Nebu-hin-Abenoz shot a keen glance at his brother-in-law's son and
nodded. "Or, better, I will come to your house then; thus I can see
the whole load. How will that be?"
"Better; I will be there, too," Cavu-hin-Avoran said, then turned to
Gathon Dard and Antrath Alv. "You have been long on the road; come,
let us drink cool wine, and then we will eat," he said. "Until this
evening, Nebu-hin-Abenoz."
He led his son-in-law and the traders to one side, where several kegs
stood on trestles with cups and flagons beside them. They filled a
flagon, took a cup apiece, and went over to a pile of cushions at one
side.
As they did, three men came pushing through the crowd toward
Nebu-hin-Abenoz's seat. They wore a costume unfamiliar to Gathon
Dard--little round caps with red and green streamers behind, and long,
wide-sleeved white gowns--and one of them had gold rings in his ears.
"Nebu-hin-Abenoz?" one of them said, bowing. "We are three men of the
Usasu cities. We have gold _obus_ to spend; we seek a beautiful girl,
to be first concubine to our king's son, who is now come to the estate
of manhood."
Nebu-hin-Abenoz picked up the silver-mounted pipe he had laid aside,
and re-lighted it, frowning.
"Men of the Usasu, you have a heavy responsibility," he said. "You
have the responsibility for the future of your kingdom, for a boy's
character is more shaped by his first concubine than by his teachers.
How old is the boy?"
"Sixteen, Nebu-hin-Abenoz; the age of manhood among us."
"Then you want a girl older, but not much older. She should be versed
in the arts of love, but innocent of heart. She should be wise, but
teachable; gentle and loving, but with a will of her own--"
The three men in white gowns were fidgeting. Then, suddenly, like three
marionettes on a single string, they put their right hands to their
mouths and then plunged them into the left sleeves of their gowns,
whipping out knives and then sprang as one upon Nebu-hin-Abenoz,
slashing and stabbing.
Gathon Dard was on his feet at once; he hurled the wine flagon at the
three murderers and leaped across the room. Antrath Alv went bounding
after him, and by this time three or four of the group around
Nebu-hin-Abenoz's chair had recovered their wits and jumped to their
feet. One of the three assailants turned and slashed with his knife,
almost disemboweling a Calera who had tried to grapple with him.
Before he could free the blade, another Calera brought a brandy bottle
down on his head. Gathon Dard sprang upon the back of a second
assassin, hooking his left elbow under the fellow's chin and grabbing
the wrist of his knife-hand with his right; the man struggled for an
instant, then went limp and fell forward. The third of the trio of
murderers was still slashing at the fallen chieftain when Antrath Alv
chopped him along the side of the neck with the edge of his hand; he
simply dropped and lay still.
Nebu-hin-Abenoz was dead. He had been slashed and cut and stabbed in
twenty places; his throat had been cut at least three times, and he
had almost been decapitated. The wounded Calera wasn't dead yet;
however, even if he had been at the moment on the operating table of a
First Level Home Time Line hospital, it was doubtful if he could have
been saved, and under the circumstances, his life-expectancy could be
measured in seconds. Some cushions were placed under his head, and
women called to attend him, but he died before they arrived.
The three assassins were also dead. Except for a few cuts on the scalp
of the one who had been felled with the bottle, there was not a mark
on any of them. Cavu-hin-Avoran kicked one of them in the face and
cursed.
"We killed the skunks too quickly!" he cried. "We should have overcome
them alive, and then taken our time about dealing with them as they
deserved." He went on to specify the nature of their deserts. "Such
infamy!"
"Well, I'll swear I didn't think a little tap like I gave that one
would kill him," the bottle-wielder excused himself. "Of course, I was
thinking only of Nebu-hin-Abenoz, Safar receive him--"
Antrath Alv bent over the one he had hand-chopped.
"I didn't kill this one," he said. "The way I hit him, if I had, his
neck would be broken, and it's not. See?" He twisted at the dead man's
neck. "I think they took poison before they drew their knives."
"I saw all of them put their hands to their mouths!" a Calera
exclaimed. "And look; see how their jaws are clenched." He picked up
one of the knives and used it to pry the dead man's jaws apart,
sniffing at his lips and looking into his mouth. "Look, his teeth and
his tongue are discolored; there is a strange smell, too."
Antrath Alv sniffed, then turned to his partner. "Halatane," he
whispered. Gathon Dard nodded. That was a First Level poison;
paratimers often carried halatane capsules on the more barbaric
time-lines, as a last insurance against torture.
"But, Holy Name of Safar, what manner of men were these?"
Coru-hin-Irigod demanded. "There are those I would risk my life to
kill, but I would not throw it away thus."
"They came knowing that we would kill them, and took the poison that
they might die quickly and without pain," a Calera said.
"Or that your tortures would not wring from them the names and nation
of those who sent them," an elderly man in the dress of a rancher from
the southeast added. "If I were you, I would try to find out who these
enemies are, and the sooner the better."
Gathon Dard was examining one of the knives--a folding knife with a
broad single-edged blade, locked open with a spring; the handle was of
tortoise shell, bolstered with brass.
"In all my travels," he said, "I never saw a knife of this workmanship
before. Tell me, Coru-hin-Irigod, do you know from what country these
outland slaves of Nebu-hin-Abenoz's come?"
"You think that might have something to do with it?" the Calera asked.
"It could. I think that these people might not have been born slaves,
but people taken captive. Suppose, at some time, there had been sold
to Nebu-hin-Abenoz, and sold elsewhere by him, one who was a person of
consequence--the son of a king, or the priest of some god," Gathon
Dard suggested.
"By Safar, yes! And now that nation, wherever it is, is at blood-feud
with us," Cavu-hin-Avoran said. "This must be thought about; it is an
ill thing to have unknown enemies."
"Look!" a Calera who had begun to strip the three dead men cried.
"These are not of the Usasu cities, or any other people of this land.
See, they are uncircumcised!"
"Many of the slaves whom Nebu-hin-Abenoz brought to Careba from the
hills have been uncircumcised," Coru-hin-Irigod said. "Jeseru, I think
you have your sights on the heart of it." He frowned. "Now, think you,
will those who had this done be satisfied, or will they carry on their
hatred against all of us?"
"A hard question," Antrath Alv said. "You Caleras do not serve our
gods, but you are our friends. Suffer me to go apart and pray; I would
take counsel with the gods, that they may aid us all in this."
* * * * *
Part 2
It was full daylight, but the sun was hidden; a thin rain fell on the
landing around at Police Terminal Dhergabar Equivalent when Vall and
Dalla left the rocket. Across the black lavalike pavement, they could
see the bulky form of Tortha Karf, hunched under a long cloak, with
his flat cap pulled down over his brow. He shook hands with Vall and
kissed cheeks with Dalla when they joined him.
"Car's over here," he said, nodding toward the waiting vehicle.
"Yesterday wasn't one of our better days, was it?"
"No. It wasn't." Vall agreed. They climbed into the car, and the
driver lifted straight up to two thousand feet and turned, soaring
down to land on the Chief's Headquarters Building, a mile away. "We're
not completely stopped, sir. Ranthar Jard is working on a few ideas
that may lead him to the Kholghoor time lines where the Wizard Traders
are operating. If we can't get them through their output, we may nail
them at the intake."
"Unless they've gotten the wind up and closed down all their
operations," Tortha Karf said.
"I doubt if they've done that, Chief," Vall replied. "We don't know
who these people are, of course, and it's hard to judge their
reactions, but they're willing to take chances for big gains. I
believe they think they're safe, now that they've closed out the
compromised time line and killed the only witness against them."
"Well, what's Ranthar Jard doing?"
"Trying to locate the sub-sector and probability belt from what the
slaves can tell him about their religious beliefs, about the local
king, and the prince of Jhirda, and the noble families of the
neighborhood," Vall said. "When he has it localized as closely as he
can, he's going to start pelting the whole paratemporal area with
photographic auto-return balls dropped from aircars on Police Terminal
over the spatial equivalents of a couple of Croutha-conquered cities.
As soon as he gets a photo that shows Croutha with firearms, he'll
have a Wizard Trader time line."
"Sounds simple," the Chief said. The car landed, and he helped Dalla
out. "I suppose both you and he know how many chances against one he
has of finding anything." They went over to an antigrav-shaft and
floated down to the floor on which Tortha Karf had a duplicate of the
office in the Paratime Building on Home Time Line. "It's the only
chance we have, though."
"There's one thing that bothers me," Dalla said, as they entered the
office and went back behind the horseshoe-shaped desk. "I understand
that the news about this didn't break on Home Time Line till the late
morning of One-Six-One Day. Nebu-hin-Abenoz was murdered at about 1700
local time, which would be 0100 this morning Dhergabar time. That
would give this gang fourteen hours to hear the news, transmit it to
their base, and get these three men hypno-conditioned, disguised,
transposed to this Esaron Sector time line, and into Careba." She
shook her head. "That's pretty fast work."
Tortha Karf looked sidewise at Verkan Vall. "Your girl has the makings
of a cop, Vall," he commented.
"She's been a big help, on Esaron and Kholghoor Sectors," Vall said.
"She wants to stay with it and help me; I'll be very glad to have her
with me."
Tortha Karf nodded. He knew, too, that Dalla wouldn't want to have to
go back to Home Time Line and wait the long investigation out.
"Of course; we can use all the help we can get. I think we can get a
lot from Dalla. Fix her up with some kind of a title and police
status--technical-expert, assistant, or something like that." He
clasped hands, man-fashion, with her. "Glad to have you on the cops
with us, Dalla," he said. Then he turned to Vall. "There was almost
twenty-four hours between the time I heard about this and when this
blasted Yandar Yadd got hold of the story. Of all the infernal,
irresponsible--" He almost choked with indignation. "And it was
another fourteen hours between the time Skordran sent in his report
and I heard about it."
"Golzan Doth sent in a report to his company about the same time
Skordran Kirv made his first report to his Sector-Regional Subchief."
Vall mentioned.
"That might be it," Tortha Karf considered. "I wish there were another
explanation, because that implies a very extensive intelligence
network, which means a big organization. But I'm afraid that's it. I
wish I could pull in everybody in Consolidated Outtime Foodstuffs who
handled that report, and narco-hypnotize them. Of course, we can't do