'Munchausen man,' Milo muttered.
Huenengarth shot him a sharp look.
I said, 'He's got an office at the University of Maryland. I spoke to his secretary.'
He lifted his cup, took a long time drinking.
I said, 'Why was itso important for Ashmore to work out of the hospital?'
'Because that's where Jones's main terminal is. I wanted him to have direct access to Jones's hardware and ~~it~~~~~ 'Jones is using the hospital as a business center? He told me he doesn't have an office there.'
'Technically that's true. You won't see his name on any door.
But his apparatus is buried within some of the space he's taken away from the doctors.'
'Down in the sub-basement?'
'Let's just say buried deeply. Somewhere hard to find. As head of Security, I made sure of that.'
'Getting yourself in must have been quite a challenge.'
No answer.
'You still haven't answered me,' I said. 'Why'd Ashmore die?'
'I don't know. Yet.'
'What'd he do?' I said. 'Make an end-run around you? Use what he'd learned working for you to extort money from Chuck Jones?'
He licked his lips. 'It's possible. The data he collected are still being analyzed.'
'By whom?'
'People.'
'What about Dawn Herbert? Was she in on it?'
'I don't know what her game was,' he said. 'Don't know if she hadone.'
His frustration seemed real.
I said, 'Then why'd you chase down her computer disks?'
'Because Ashmore was interested in them. After we started to decode his files, her name came up.'
'In what context?'
'He'd made a coded notation to take her seriously. Called her a negative integer'-his term for someone suspicious. But she was already dead.'
'What else did he say about her?'
'That's all we've gotten so far. He put everything in codecomplex codes. It's taking time to unravel them.
'He was your boy,' I said. 'Didn't he leave you the keys?'
'Only some of them.' Anger narrowed the round eyes.
'So you stole her disks.'
'Not stole, appropriated. They were mine. She compiled them while working for Ashmore, and Ashmore worked for me, so legally they're my property.'
