"John Dalmas - The Puppet Master" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dalmas John)

These stories are set in a time line that branched from yours and mine sometime after the close of World War
Two. Much in it remains familiar; some things are very similar. But major differences have developed. The geo-
gravitic power converter has energized economies while greatly easing energy, water, and pollution problems.
But the blessing is mixed. The GPC has brought more than cheap, clean, abundant energy and the new
physics: The resulting flood of scientific and technological innovations is accelerating changes in society, with
outgrowths positive and negative, attractive and ugly, exciting and fearsome.
Homo sapiens has major adjustments to make.
A MOST SINGULAR MURDER
тАФ
a novella
 1

My name is Martti Seppanen, and I work for Prudential Investigations and Security, Inc. Things had been slow,
and IтАЩd had nothing much to do for a day and a halfтАФsince IтАЩd finished rounding up the collusion evidence
against Funsch, Carillo, and Wallace. So I stood there in my two-by-four officeтАФten by ten feet, actuallyтАФ
looking westward across the L.A. basin toward the higher rises of Lower Wilshire. While drilling Spanish.
I donтАЩt mind days like that. But there was the nagging worry that if business didnтАЩt pick up, Joe might have to
lay people off. Me for example. Times like that you can wonder whether it had been a good idea when Joe leased
the whole ninth floor of this high-rent high rise. Of course, the old building got sold out from under him and
knocked down. The old buildings are disappearing.
Besides, when I donтАЩt have a case, I get the munchies worse than usual, and I gain weight too easily.
I kept drilling, using a question and answer program on intermediate spoken Spanish. The computer would
voice a question in fairly simple Spanish, and IтАЩd answer it. Or it would tell me to discuss some simple thing.
Then it would critique my diction, grammar, and pronunciation, and weтАЩd repeat it till the program was satisfied
with my performance.
┬┐┬лDonde guardan los documentos financiales┬╗? the computer asked me. (тАЬWhere do you keep your financial
records?тАЭ) The program is part of the departmentтАЩs advanced language training.
┬лDebajo de la ba├▒adera, I answered, donde nadie los buscaria┬╗. (тАЬUnder the bathtub, where no one would
ever look for them.тАЭ) You do enough of those drills, you learn what the program will accept.
ThatтАЩs where things stood when Carlos looked in on me. тАЬCome in my office,тАЭ he said. тАЬWeтАЩve got something
for you.тАЭ
тАЬWeтАЭ meant himself and Joe Keneely. JoeтАЩs the founder, principal shareholder, and CEO of Prudential. Carlos
is the senior investigator, and I was his prot├йg├й, top of the list of junior investigators. And the something would
be an assignment.
I followed Carlos down the hall. His office was big enough for a small conference without people sitting in
each otherтАЩs laps. He sat down behind his desk, and I took the chair across from him. Fingering his computer, he
turned on the wall screen. A picture formed and stopped. It showed Joe KeneelyтАЩs office, with Joe and Carlos,
and some guy IтАЩd never seen before.
тАЬThe client is Donald C. Pasco,тАЭ Carlos said. тАЬAll the way down from Sacramento. Joe just signed a contract
with him.тАЭ He said it as if it tasted bad. IтАЩd heard of Pasco. He was director of the Anti-Fraud Division of the
California Department of Commerce, and had a reputation as an aye-aitch.
The picture came to life, and I watched their conference. Actually I watched Pasco bitch and snarl. About
three weeks earlier, an astronomer named Arthur Ashkenazi had read a paper to the California Section of the
Astronomical Society of America, at the sectionтАЩs annual meeting. The paper was what had gotten Pasco upset.
Pasco didnтАЩt have much presence, but he had rank and venom. After playing back the meeting with Pasco, Carlos
ran AshkenaziтАЩs talk for me. IтАЩd been aware of it before, just barely. It had been written up in the papers, but I
hadnтАЩt read it. I read fast, but the L.A. Times is thick, and the talk hadnтАЩt had any significance for me.
Now, watching him deliver it, it turned out to be pretty interesting. It didnтАЩt offend me at all, but it had
offended AshkenaziтАЩs audience. HeтАЩd hardly gotten well underway when people started to leave. тАЬStalked outтАЭ is