Flatlander - Larry Niven [134]
By then I had talked to Harry McCavity again.
Alan and Naomi were eating a huge breakfast together on the dining level. I managed to be at the buffet when Alan went for more coffee.
“I have to see you in private,” I said.
Coffee sloshed. I startled him, I think. He asked, “Isn’t it over yet?”
“Mostly it’s about you and your father.”
A momentary wariness showed in his face. Then, “All right.”
I ate breakfast while I waited. Presently Naomi left, and Alan came to join me. “She told me about yesterday,” he said. “He could have killed you all. I wish none of it had happened.”
“So do I. Alan, you’re leaving the moon.”
His mouth opened. He stared. “What?”
“Come on, you’re not that surprised. I made some promises to Mayor Hove, but I made them at gunpoint. Be off the moon within a week. Don’t ever come back. Or I’ll break those promises.”
He studied my eyes. No, he wasn’t that surprised. “You’ll have to spell it out for me.”
“I’m not enjoying this,” I said. “I’ll try to keep it short. Chris Penzler was close enough to get a good look at the man who killed him. We know it was a lunie. Even if Penzler didn’t know his name, he could have tried to describe the chest emblem. Instead, he left a reference to the attempt to kill him in his bathtub a week earlier. Why would he protect the man who murdered him?”
“Well?”
“You’re his son. Naomi finally saw it, and I should have. You’ve Hove Watson’s height, and I took that for genes, but it isn’t. You were raised in lunar gravity. Otherwise you look a lot like Chris Penzler and somewhat like your mother and not at all like Hove Watson.”
Alan was looking down into his coffee. He was quite pale. “This is all pure speculation, isn’t it?”
“It’s the kind of speculation that could finish Hovestraydt City, I think. You’re supposed to be the mayor’s son, the heir apparent. It’s bad enough if Hove killed Penzler for political reasons—”
“I know. You could be right.”
“Anyway, I did a little more speculating. Then last night I got Harry McCavity out of bed and made him check a certain pressure suit helmet for traces of dried blood.”
Alan looked up. I might have stepped out of a nightmare, the way he looked at me. I said, “What did he do, offer to legitimize you?”
“Offer?” Alan laughed out loud, an ugly sound, then looked quickly around him. Faces had turned. Alan lowered his voice. “He insisted! He was going to name me as his heir and bastard!”
“Did you kill him to get Naomi off the hook?”
“No, no. I wouldn’t have hurt him at all if I’d had time to think. I could have explained it to him, couldn’t I? He just didn’t know what he’d be doing to me.
“He said he was my father. He said he was going to announce it. He wouldn’t listen. And I was holding the laser. I lost my head. It was all over in a thousandth of a second. I sliced his hand off, and he pointed at me and sprayed blood in my face. Blinded me. When I wiped it off the glass, he was gone. I looked for him to get his suit sealed and get him to a hospital. When I found him, he was dead.”
“Uh huh.”
Alan was very pale. He wasn’t seeing me at all. He said, “His wrist was still bubbling.”
I said, “You could blame Chris for letting his gonads lead him around. You could blame Hove for trying to kill him. It didn’t work, but that’s what started Chris thinking about his children. Sure you’re bound to blame yourself, but Alan, it wasn’t all your fault.”
“All right. Now what?”
“If the truth came out, hell wouldn’t hold the political repercussions, and you’d be broken up for parts. I don’t want that. But I won’t have you in a position of political power, and there’s no way you can stay on the moon without becoming mayor. Get off the moon within a week or I’ll start talking.”
“I suppose you left a letter somewhere in case something happens to you?”
“Get stuffed.”
He stared. “But you’re giving me a week to kill you!”
I got up. “You’re not the type. And I meant it. I meant it all,” I said, and left.
The rules the committee laid down during the following week included provisions