Caliban

Alvar Kresh stood up and paced the interrogation room. He was eager, anxious. Things had shifted suddenly. He could not explain how, or why, exactly, but nonetheless they had. The access recorder data was part of it, but not all of it. All it did was suggest certain things. It would be up to Kresh to prove them. He sensed that he was suddenly on the verge of answers, knocking on the door of a solution to this whole nightmare fiasco. All he had to do was press, push, bear down, and it would come.

Gubber Anshaw. Kresh dropped the notepack onto the table and thought about Anshaw. The interrogation that had been put off, delayed, pushed back, forgotten, lost in the chaotic shuffle of events again and again. And now, with the access recorder data in his hand, with the fact of Ariel’s presence at Anshaw’s home last night, it was suddenly clear that this was the interrogation that could break this case wide open. This was the man who knew things.

Alvar Kresh paced twice more up and down the room, but then forced himself to sit down and wait.

The door opened, and Donald ushered in Gubber Anshaw.

Alvar Kresh waited for Anshaw to sit down in the chair on the opposite side of the table. Then he set his hands palm-down on the table and leaned forward. Then he looked the robotics designer in the eye.

It was time for the real investigation to begin.

17

“SO how long have you and Tonya Welton been romantically involved, Anshaw?” Alvar Kresh asked, his voice low and calm.

Gubber’s mouth dropped open, and he stared at Sheriff Kresh in horrified astonishment.

Kresh laughed. “Let me guess. That was the one thing you had been most determined to hide, the one thing that made you lie awake last night, scheming over the best way to conceal it from me—and we know it already.”

“How did you know that?” he asked, his voice little more than a high-pitched squeak. “Who told you?”

“No one had to tell me, Anshaw. And I didn’t know it for sure until just now. But it was simply the only explanation that made sense. It’s been staring me in the face from the start. The devil himself knows how I missed it.

“Tonya Welton arrived at the crime scene five minutes after I did. She had no reason to insert herself into my investigation. At least no professional reason. Therefore, she had to have personal reasons.

“But that’s not the time frame I’m interested in. Perhaps you could explain what she was doing—and you were doing—at the lab at the time of the attack on Fredda Leving.”

Gubber Anshaw opened his mouth, but found that he had no words. No words at all.

Kresh pressed home his advantage. “We’ve got the access recorder data, Anshaw. We know who was there, and when they were there. Three names stick out. Tonya Welton, Jomaine Terach—and you. Gubber Anshaw. All of you, and no one else, besides Fredda Leving herself. Medical evidence gives us about a one-hour period during which the attack could have happened— and you four were all in and out of that building during that time period. No one else.”

“Ah—ah—ah…” Gubber tried to speak, but nothing would come.

“Settle down, Anshaw. Tell me. Answer the questions I’m going to ask, or else you’re going to be in far deeper trouble than you are right now. Did you conceal the fact that she was there to shield her? Did you think she attacked Leving?”

“Oh dear! Oh my!”

“Answer!”

“Yes, then. Yes. I don’t believe it now, of course. But that night—it was all so frightful. I did not know what to think. And she and Fredda had argued terribly that night.”

“And why did you suppose that she would attack your superior?”

Silence. Kresh pressed harder. “Talk, Anshaw. Talk now and talk well. Tell me what I need to know. That is the best thing you can do to protect Tonya Welton. Silence and lies can only hurt her now. Now I ask you again— what made you think Tonya Welton deliberately attacked your superior?”

“Oh, I don’t think she did it deliberately,” Gubber said all of a rush. Then he realized the gaffe he had made. “That is, now, of course, I do not think she did it at all. But, but, at the time I thought that she might, just might have done it, out of anger, in a rush of temper, perhaps.”

“All right, then. Now she concealed the fact that you were there,” Kresh said. “Did she do that to shield you? Did she think that you might have committed the attack?”

Gubber looked up, a little confused and distracted. “What? Oh, yes. I suppose so.” He thought for a minute, then went on a bit more eagerly. “Fredda and I—Dr. Leving and I—had argued as well, rather often. Tonya could have thought I was angry enough to commit the attack—but if she thought that was possible, then that proves that she could not have done it herself!”

“Unless she did commit the attack, and is doing everything she can to act innocent. Maybe she’s feigning innocence and planning to frame you. Or didn’t that occur to you?”

Anshaw’s face fell. Clearly he had thought Kresh would find his logic convincing. “No, no, it didn’t. And I still don’t believe it. She is not that kind of person. She could not have attacked Fredda that way.”

“You thought she could have at the time. Why do you think you were wrong then and are right now?”

“The night it happened, I wasn’t able to think clearly. When I found the body, I was so scared and surprised, I did not know what to think. When I had time to think about it, I knew it was impossible.”

When I found the body. It took all of Alvar’s training not to leap onto that slip immediately. But that could come later. Anshaw was not aware of what he had said, and the longer he was off guard the better. Let it ride, Kresh thought. Come back to it later. He chose another point to pursue, almost at random.

“You said that you and Leving had been having arguments. What were they about?”

Gubber drew himself up to sit straight in his chair, and folded his hands. “I did not approve of what she was doing.”

“What was it you objected to?”

“The New Law robots. I thought and think it is possible they are a very dangerous idea.”

“But you went along with the project, anyway.”

Gubber rested his hands flat on the table for a moment, but then knitted his fingers together. His hands were clammy with sweat. “Yes, that is true,” he said. He looked up at Alvar, and there was suddenly something bright, sharp, fierce in his eye. “I invented the gravitonic brain, Sheriff Kresh. It represents a tremendous advance over the positronic brain, a breakthrough of huge proportions. My gravitonic brain offers the chance for whole new vistas of research, vastly increased robotic intelligence and ability. I had the notes, the test materials, the models and designs, to prove that it would work. I took them to every lab on the planet and sent inquiries to half a dozen other Spacer worlds as well. And no one would listen.

“No one cared. No one would use my work. If it wasn’t a positronic brain, it wasn’t a robot. My brain couldn’t go in a robot. That was an article of faith, everywhere I went. Fredda had rejected my ideas as first. Until it dawned on her that I was offering a blank slate upon which to write her New Laws.”

“So you swallowed your objections to her ideas to prevent your own work from getting lost.”

“Yes, that’s right. She was the only one who cared about my work, or would even give me the chance to complete it. Fredda Leving wasn’t—and isn’t—much interested in the technical improvements the gravitonic brain offers. To her, gravitonic brains were nothing more than robotic brains that did not have the Three Laws. That was her sole interest.”