I’d expected the writer-in-residence to be a mousy academic, like Pickover. But when the green door slid open, it revealed a statuesque biological woman in her late twenties with flawless chestnut skin, sexy brown eyes behind long lashes, and a gorgeous mane of brown hair tumbling over her shoulders. The only thing remotely writerly about her appearance was that she wore honest-to-goodness eyeglasses, something I don’t think I’d seen on anyone since leaving Earth.
“Hi,” I said, smiling broadly. “I’m Alexander Lomax. I hear you’re writing a book.”
“I’m trying to,” she said, without warmth. “I came here for peace and quiet.” She crossed long arms in front of a lovely pair of breasts. “But people keep disturbing me.”
“Sorry. I wanted to call ahead—but there’s no listing for Shopatsky House in the directory.”
“That’s rather the point.”
“You’re writing about the B. Traven, right?”
She warmed a little at that. “Yes.”
“I’m a private investigator. I’m looking into a matter that involves the Traven.”
“I really do jealously guard my time, Mr. Lomax. But as a writer, I often impose on others for help with my research—professors, doctors, scientists, what have you. And so, to keep the karmic balance, I’m always willing to help others who are looking for information, if they’ve done their homework.” She peered at me over the top of her glasses; it was a look that was sexy when I’d seen it in old movies, and it was sexy here, too. “It’s rude to just waste somebody’s time asking them questions you could have answered on your own. So, let’s see if you’ve done your homework. Why was that ship called the B. Traven?”
There’s a pub trivia league that meets at The Bent Chisel. I used to make fun of its members—why bother to remember stuff, when your phone could tell you the answer to any question? But the name did faintly ring a bell, and—
And those who said I spent too much time watching old movies can suck it. “After B. Traven,” I said, “who wrote the novel The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, the basis for the movie of the same name.”
Luscious lips curved in a smile, and we both spontaneously said in unison, “‘Badges? We don’t need no stinkin’ badges!’” She was grinning broadly now, and I added, “Of course, that’s a misquote. What Gold Hat actually said was, ‘Badges? We ain’t got no badges. We don’t need no badges! I don’t have to show you any stinkin’ badges!’”
She nodded. “Just like no one actually said, ‘Play it again, Sam.’”
I did my best Bogey—an impression that hardly made an impression on anyone these days. “‘Play it, Sam. You played it for her, you can play it for me. If she can stand it, I can stand it.’”
“Mr. Lomax,” she said, stepping aside and gesturing, “won’t you come in?”
It was too early to say, “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship,” so I didn’t—but I thought it.
Shopatsky House looked very comfortable. Most furniture on Mars was printed here, rather than shipped in from Earth, but a couple of these pieces looked like real wood—including the… the… I dug through my memory for the term; I’d only ever seen such things in movies before: the roll-top desk. Sitting on it was a red cube about ten centimeters on a side; a household computer. Damn things didn’t have to be that big, but people tended to lose them if they were smaller.
There was also another piece of furniture I’d never seen in real life: a filing cabinet. If I had one, I’d keep bottles of booze in it; I didn’t know anyone who had paper files.
I realized I’d lucked out with her little test. I’d seen that movie a hundred times, and back when it was made, it was normal for only a few names to appear on the credits, instead of every damn catering assistant and holography technician. The author’s name had caught my eye because it had included just a single initiaclass="underline" “B. Traven.” That film—about the quest for gold in Mexico—did have interesting resonances for the hunt for fossils on Mars.
But if this gorgeous writer’s trivia question had been a more prosaic one—“What’s my name?”—I would have failed. My detective skills quickly came to the rescue, though, because there was a third piece of furniture I’d never seen used for its intended purpose before: a bookcase. Every set of boxed-in shelves I’d ever encountered simply displayed curios, objets d’art, or—here on Mars—interesting rocks or fossils. But this one, made of reddish brown wood that had a warmth to it that none of the reddish things native to this planet had, was partially filled with real printed books—doubtless the single biggest repository of such things on all of Mars.
The first two shelves contained volumes by Stavros Shopatsky with lurid titles like The Wanton Savior, The Shores of Death, and Pirates in the Wind. The subsequent shelves had books grouped by authors—but not alphabetically. First Hayakawa, then Chavez, then Torkoff, then Cohen. “Are these the other writers who have been in residence here?” I asked.
“That’s right,” she said, nodding that lovely head of hers. “We’re each supposed to bring at least five kilograms of our own books as part of our personal mass allowance. If our books are only in e-editions, we’re to have leather-bound copies produced to bring with us.”
My eyes tracked to the second shelf from the bottom, which was partially full. An odd little L-shaped thingy pressed against the last book to keep them all from toppling over. The name on the spines of the last three books was Lakshmi Chatterjee. I reached down and extracted the final volume; its title was Lunaport: Valor and Independence.
“And now you’re writing about the B. Traven?”
“Exactly.”
“I’m trying to find out who smuggled the explosives aboard the Traven.”
“Ah, yes,” she said. “The land mines.” She headed into the living room and motioned for me to sit down. I’d hoped she was going to take the green couch, meaning I could move in next to her, but she took the matching chair instead.
I leaned into the corner of the couch and swung my legs up, leaving my feet projecting off the cushions into the air. “How much longer will you be on Mars?” The question had nothing whatsoever to do with the investigation.
“Another seventy-one days.”
I smiled. “Not that anyone’s counting.”
“The next writer is coming in then; I go back on the ship that’s bringing him.”
“You looking forward to going home?”
“Somewhat. I like it here.”
“Where is home for you?”
She crossed her long legs. She was wearing tight-fitting pants that looked like black leather and a tight-fitting black top. “Delhi.” She looked at a wall clock—an analog wall clock; it always took me forever to decode those. But the point was plain; I should move things along. “Do you know who brought the land mines aboard the Traven?”
“Sure. It was Willem Van Dyke—the same guy Weingarten and O’Reilly had taken along on their second voyage.”
I shook my head. “I’ve seen the passenger manifest. He wasn’t on the Traven, at least not under that name.”