Janet relieved the watch. Dalton returned to his quarters, showered and changed, went to the officers' mess for dinner, where, of course, the conversation focused exclusively on the lost ship. Tag MacAllen had a sister aboard the Abonai, and Boros Razkuli, a son. Everybody knew someone in the crew.
At midnight, when Dalton returned to his watch station, there was still no word.
Six days later, the Abonai was formally declared lost. An extensive search by a sizable portion of the fleet had revealed nothing.
A memorial service was held at Point Edward, and another at Toxicon, the Abonai's home port. To the dismay of the Celestine's crew, Admiral D'Angelo was extended. Investigations continued for a year and a half. All reached the same nonresult: The Abonai, its crew, and Admiral O'Conner were missing due to cause or causes unknown.
Jack McDevitt
Firebird
PART I
ONE
However useless your product, package it properly, and people will buy it. People will buy anything if the approach is correct. It is this happy truth that keeps the wheels of commerce rolling.
1434, RIMWAY CALENDAR. SIX YEARS LATER.
I was sitting in my office at the country house, watching the snow come down, when Karen Howard arrived. The storm had reached epic proportions, at least by local standards, and I'd expected her to postpone. But she appeared at the front door exactly on time.
The only things I remember about her were that she wore a big hat, and that she talked in a loud voice. And, yes, that she was short. When she'd called for an appointment, she'd dodged explaining why she wanted to see us. “I have something to sell,” she had said. “I know you'll be able to get a good price for me. It's all quite valuable.”
But no details. That kind of approach is usually a guarantee that the prospective client is trying to get away with something. The antiquities business attracts a lot of con artists. Particularly our specialty, which is handling objects that have specific historical significance. The original notebook, say, that Despar Kolladner had used when he was writing Talking with God, or a set of drums that had belonged to Pepper Aspin. People are usually quite good at creating and producing supporting documents, but Alex is hard to fool. It's only happened once, and it cost us. But that's a tale for another time.
Karen came into my office, shook off the snow, and removed the hat but held it close to her blouse as if it would one day be a collector's item. “I'm Elizabeth Robin's sister,” she said, in a tone suggesting that explained everything.
I invited her to sit, but she remained standing. So I got up and came around in front of the desk. “I'm Chase Kolpath, Ms. Howard. How may I help you?”
“You're the person I talked to?”
“That's correct.”
“Is Mr. Benedict available?”
“I'm his associate.”
“You didn't answer my question.”
“At the moment, Ms. Howard, he's busy. I'm his associate. What can I do for you?”
She frowned. Took a long look at me. Apparently decided she could make do. “You may know that Elizabeth died last year.” I had no idea who Elizabeth Robin was, but I nodded and managed to look sympathetic. “I've inherited the estate,” she continued. “And I have some items connected to Christopher that I'm going to make available. I'd like your help getting a good price.”
An old Ray Cammon song, “Love Is All There Is,” was playing quietly in the background. “Who,” I asked, “is Christopher?”
She just barely avoided rolling her eyes. “Chris Robin,” she said. “Of course.” Then, seeing that I needed further explanation: “Elizabeth was his wife.”
“Oh,” I said. “Chris Robin the physicist?”
“Yes. Who did you think?” Now she sat down.
“He's been dead a long time,” I said.
She smiled sadly. “Forty-one years.”
“I see.”
“Maybe I should be speaking with Mr. Benedict?”
“You should understand, Ms. Howard,” I said, “that artifacts connected with physicists- Well, there's just not much of a market for them.”
“Christopher wasn't just any physicist.”
“Did he accomplish something special?”
She sighed, reached into a handbag, and pulled out a book, an old-fashioned collector's edition, with his name on it. Multiverse. “Here's part of what he did,” she said.
“Well-” I wasn't sure where to go from there. “It looks interesting.”
“He accomplished quite a lot, Ms. Kolpath. I'm surprised you don't know more about him. I suggest you read this.” She laid the book on my desk. Then she reached back into the bag and brought out a small box. She opened it and handed it to me. It contained a wedding ring with engravings of Liz and Chris, with the inscription “together forever.” There was also a diamond-studded comm link. “This is the one he always wore,” she said, “on special occasions. Whenever he received an award. Or spoke at an event.”
“Okay,” I said.
She produced a chip. “I wanted you to see some of the other items. Do you mind?”
“No. Of course not.”
The chip activated our projector, and a pair of lamps appeared. “They were custom-made to his order.” The lamps were ordinary flexible reading lamps, one black, one silver. Documentation consisted of two photos of Robin, one at his desk writing by the light of the black lamp, and one in which he was relaxing on a sofa, reading, with the silver lamp behind him.
“I have a large number of his bound books. He was a collector.” She showed some of the individual volumes to me. Mostly they were physics texts. There was some philosophy. Some cultural commentary. Danforth's History of Villanueva. “One problem is that he was always writing in them. Elizabeth said he couldn't sit down with a book without writing in it.” She shrugged. “Otherwise, they're in excellent condition.”
For significant people, of course, writing in a book inevitably increases its value. I wasn't altogether sure whether Robin qualified for that classification.
“There are other items as well. Some of his lab equipment. Some wineglasses.”
She showed me those, too. None of them would be worth anything. There were several other photos, some taken outside, usually of the happy couple, posed in starlight or beneath a tree or coming up the walkway to the front door of what appeared to be a small villa. “It's their home,” she said. “On Virginia Island.” A few were limited to Robin himself. Robin lost in thought by a window, Robin biting down on a piece of fruit, Robin throwing a log on the fire.
