Flatlander - Larry Niven [126]
“In that case, I’m going to raise some hell,” I said.
“How do you mean that?”
I said, “The proceedings of the conference have been confidential so far—”
“And should be!” Bertha Carmody barked in my ear.
“Futz, Bertha, this is at the heart of what’s been blocking us all along! Mayor, there’s some question as to whether your law gives adequate protection to the defendant. Trials are over almost before they begin, and in twenty years not one sentence has been reversed. Naomi Mitchison’s trial is the first to be investigated by outsiders. We now have evidence that someone else wanted Chris Penzler dead all along. Your son has filed to obtain Mrs. Mitchison’s release. But when a committee member, me, checks with the mayor of Hovestraydt City, it turns out the conviction isn’t even under review!”
“Damn it, Gil, the conviction is under review, right now!”
“Good. How long would you expect it to take?”
“I have no idea. A reversal may have to wait until the new investigation is over.”
“Fine. In the meantime, get her out of the holding tank.”
“Why? Chris’s death may be unrelated to the first attempt.”
“Granted. I won’t try to guess the odds. I’ll put it to you that Naomi is likely innocent—”
“Likely is too strong a word.”
“—and a possible witness. Aside from that, the committee may want to call her to testify firsthand on how she’s been treated. We’ve examined exactly two trials under lunar jurisprudence, and the other one … ah—”
“Matheson and Company,” Stone put in helpfully.
“Yeah. That one looks kind of funny, too. And Naomi is still in a holding tank waiting to be broken up. How will all of this look to the newstapers?”
Bertha roared, “These proceedings are confidential! Hamilton, how can you think of exposing our deliberations to the news media?”
I said, “All right, Bertha. I’ll stick to my opinions on the Mitchison case.”
“I hope that that will not be necessary,” the mayor said. “I intend to order Naomi Mitchison revived at once. She will be returned here under arrest to play her part in the investigation into Chris Penzler’s death. Is that satisfactory, Mr. Hamilton?”
“Yes. Thank you.” I called off the phone, and Bertha called the meeting to order.
When we broke for lunch, I suited up and headed for the mirror works. I found Harry McCavity just outside the air lock, waiting for it to cycle.
“I’m beat,” he said. “It’s been a long night. Morning, Gil … no, let me show you something first, and then I’m for bed.”
He led me through the mirror works. “Penzler died from loss of blood,” he said. “He was wearing a skintight suit. Cutting his hand off didn’t release the pressure on his skin. But the blood must have jetted like a fire hose.”
“He used it to write with.”
“Drury told me. He’d have had to write fast.”
Penzler’s corpse was outside, in vacuum, under a silvered canopy to keep it cold. The dry remains had been sliced to obtain cross sections. They looked like petrified wood. Penzler’s skintight pressure suit was next to it, opened along the back and spread like a pelt. The golden griffin glowed on its chest.
Harry picked up Chris’s hand, a withered brown claw with four inches of wrist attached. He held it against the severed forearm. What with the shrinking of the flesh, it was hard to tell whether they belonged together. “Look at the bones,” he said.
The ends of the bones were quite smooth and fitted perfectly.
“And here.” He picked up the right glove from the pressure suit. “His hand was in it. Now look.” He held it against the sliced fabric of the pressure suit’s forearm.
There was almost no material missing. The laser had sliced through cleanly, at very high energy density, and no thicker than a fishing leader. Even laser beams spread with distance. “They must have been close together when it happened,” I said.
“Too right. Penzler and his killer couldn’t have been more than three feet apart.”
“Huh.” I