Yeah, real likely, and maybe a morey would get elected president. Nohar told the comm, "Classify. Phone messages."
"two messages. July twenty-ninth, message one, ten-oh-five a. m. unlisted number—"
The voice of the computer was a flat, neutral monotone. Nohar never understood the urge people had to make computers sound like anything but. He told the comm, "Play."
Nohar didn't like calls that didn't ID themselves. People who called from unlisted locations generally had something to hide.
This caller definitely had something to hide, the screen came up a generic test pattern. This guy either didn't have a video pickup, or had turned his camera off.
"I hope to reach you, Mr. Rajasthan." The voice that came over the comm sounded like it was at the bottom of a well. It sounded bubbly. The words oozed. "I have need of the service of a private investigator. Please meet me at Lakeview Cemetery today at one-thirty p.m. This is not something I can discuss on a phone. I look for you by the grave of Eliza Wilkins."
That was the end of the message.
"Damn. It was a client."
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"instructions unclear." The comm thought Nohar was talking to it.
Nohar told it, "Comm off," and the comm shut off obligingly.
It was a client, and a damn secretive one at that. Nohar didn't trust the situation one bit. There was little he could do about it. Nohar was so low on cash that he would have to at least meet the guy—
Nohar suddenly realized that it was already fifteen after one.
It took him two minutes to dress and another five to call Lakeview and get a plot number for Wilkins. Nohar did it with the video off, because if they saw he was a moreau it would have taken five times as long.
The first thing to greet him as he walked out into the misting rain was the acrid smell of burning plastic. The smoke made his nose itch. He realized the smell was coming from a burning car up by the traffic barriers.
Across the street from his apartment was an abandoned bus. There was a fresh graffiti logo on it. "ZIP-PERHEAD-Off The Pink."
Another gang with it in for humans.
He walked up Mayfield, toward the cemetery, passing a knot of pink cops at the traffic barrier. Apparently this was the latest violence the news was going on about when he woke up. The fire was burning a prewar Japanese compact, an ancient Subaru. The car was wrapped around one of the concrete pylons. The way the thing had gone up—was still going; the cops were letting it burn itself out in the middle of the street—it had to have been wired with explosives. Inductors might explode, but they don't bum very well.
The cops didn't stop him—any other part of town and they probably would have on general principles.
The car wasn't all. It had been a busy morning. A block past the cops, things got ugly. Upwind of the burning plastic, Nohar could smell the scent of some-
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one, multiple someones, who had bought it nasty. He smelled blood, fear, and
cordite. The victims smelted
canine.
He rounded the old cemetery gate—sealed by a solid four meter concrete wall behind the flaking wrought iron—and headed down toward Coventry. When he turned the comer, he could see the medics loading body-bags—three vans' worth of body-bags. Canine had been a good guess. Nohar caught sight of one of the victims before the black plastic was zipped over the face. The body was a vulpine female with a small caliber gunshot wound to the right eye. One of the Hispanic medics saw him looking over. There was the fresh smell of fear from the pink.
Another day, Nohar would have ignored it. Today, however, he had just had a case blow up in his face, the Fed was taking an unhealthy interest in him, the record July heat and the misting rain were making his fur itch under his trench coat, and—if his luck held— he was going to be late and miss his potential client. Today he was in a particularly bad mood. Nohar could not resist the urge to smile. Some moreaus don't have the facial equipment to produce a convincing smile, but Nohar's evolved feline cheeks could pull his mouth into a quite perceptible arc. The same gesture also bared an impressive set of teeth. Predominant among which were two glistening-white canines the size of a man's thumb.
The poor guy didn't deserve it. Nohar could tell he was nervous enough just being in Moreytown. He didn't need to have a huge predatory morey looking at him like he was lunch.
Nohar didn't hang around for the reaction. He was still running late. Two blocks further down, at the intersection of Mayfield and Coventry, was the only open gate on this side of Lakeview Cemetery—seemed appropriate that it was into the Jewish section.
When he reached the right monument, "Eliza Wil-kins, 1966-2042, beloved wife of Harold," it was FORESTS OF THE NIGHT
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thirty-two after. He was in time for the show. A funeral was progressing below him.
He was out of sight of most of them, and it was probably a good thing. They were planting someone of consequence, and from his vantage, it was pinks only. He thought he saw a morey in the crowd, but— damn his bad day-vision—it turned out to be a black pink with a heavy beard.
Not a morey in the lot, and the whitest bunch of pinks he had ever seen. Especially under the canopy. There, he figured on fifty people who got to use the folding chairs, at least another fifty standing back under cover, and a hundred or so milling about beyond some sort of private security line in back of the paying customers. Even with his poor eyesight he could make the types. The pinks who knew the corpse were obvious, they wore their money—he could see the glints of their shoes and jewelry whenever they moved—and they were, with few exceptions, white. The pinks who wanted to know the corpse were just as easily made, and they were closer to the normal mix of human coloring, a few blacks, orientals, hispanics. The black cops were totally out of it, with their cheap suits and their attention on everything but the service. The private security goons—they were white—were better dressed than the cops and were intent on keeping the flow of riffraff behind the tent. Then, in the back with the crowd, were the vids. Cameras and mikes at the ready . . .
Some of the riffraff—mostly blacks and orientals-were carrying signs. Looked like a full-fledged protest was going on. The vids were paying as much, if not more, attention to the riffraff than to the service. Nohar wished he could make out more of the signs, but the best he could do was read the occasional word. Lots of isms, "Racism," "Sexism," "Speciesism." The signs that weren't isms seemed to mention capital-R Rights.
The Right to what, Nohar couldn't read.
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Nohar wondered who had died—irritating, because he thought he had heard something about this, and the job his anonymous client had in mind probably involved the stiff. Perhaps the guy left all his money to some morey squeeze and they needed to track her down.
Nohar heard a truck, and hoped it wasn't security. The pinks might take offense at a morey walking around the human part of the cemetery. But instead of security, Nohar saw an unmarked cargo van. A Dodge Electroline painted institution-green. It was window-less, boxy, cheap, and either remote-driven or programmed. It wasn't the kind of vehicle Nohar expected to see in a cemetery. It pulled on to the shoulder and backed toward him. When it stopped, the rear doors opened with a pneumatic hiss.
The smell was overpowering. His sensitive nose was suddenly exposed to an open sewer. Nohar was enveloped by the odor of sweat, and bile, and ammonia. Even a pink would've been able to sense it.
He had no idea what this guy was supposed to look like, or who he was—but Nohar did not expect another frank. They were supposed to be rare. Despite that, what the opening door revealed couldn 't be anything but a frank. And a failure at that.