Saturn

“Well, now he’s got me, too,” Holly said.

“Yes, I’m afraid so.”

SATURN ARRIVAL MINUS 3 DAYS, 45 MINUTES

Eberly frowned as Kananga shooed the last of the well-wishers out of his apartment. He had enjoyed his triumph at the rally, gloried in the crowd’s adulation. Carried off on their shoulders! Eberly had never known such a moment.

Now, as midnight approached, Kananga officiously shoved the last starry-eyed young woman out into the corridor and slid the apartment’s front door firmly shut. Morgenthau sat on the sofa, nibbling at one of the trays of finger food that had been set out. Vyborg hunched by a three-dimensional image of the newscast, already showing a rerun of Eberly’s minidebate against the red-haired scientist.

“You’ve got them,” Vyborg said. “They all want to get rich. Most of them, at least.”

“It was a brilliant stroke,” Morgenthau agreed.

Still leaning against the door, Kananga snapped, “Turn that thing off. We’ve found her.”

A surge of sudden fear cut through the elation Eberly had been feeling. “Found her? Holly?”

Smiling grimly, Kananga said, “Yes. She tried to sneak into Professor Wilmot’s quarters. Looking to him for help, I suppose.”

“Where is she now?”

“Still there. My people have the apartment sealed off. I told them to cut Wilmot’s phone off, too.”

“What are you going to do with her?” Morgenthau asked.

The euphoria ebbed out of Eberly like water swirling down a drain. Morgenthau had asked Kananga, not him.

“We’ll have to eliminate her. Permanently.”

“Tricky,” said Vyborg. “If she’s with Wilmot you can’t just go in there and snap her neck.”

“She can always be killed trying to escape,” Kananga said.

“Escape how?”

Kananga thought a moment. Then, “Perhaps she runs away from my guards and goes to an airlock. She puts on a spacesuit and tries to go outside, to hide from us. But the suit is defective, or perhaps she didn’t seal it up properly.”

Morgenthau nodded.

Spreading his hands in a fait accompli gesture, Kananga said, “Poor girl. She panicked and killed herself.”

With a mean chuckle, Vyborg said, “She always was unbalanced, after all.”

The three of them turned to Eberly. This is getting out of control, he thought. They’re making me a party to their murders. They’re forcing me to go along with them. They’ll be able to hold this over my head forever.

And after tomorrow, when I’m the elected head of the government, they’ll still have power over me. I’ll be a figurehead, a puppet dancing to their tune. They’ll have the power, not me.

Kananga slid the door open. Eberly could see that the corridor outside was empty now. It was late. All his adoring crowd had gone to their own homes.

“Shall we go pick her up?” Kananga said.

“I’ll go,” said Eberly, trying to sound firmer, more in control, than he really felt. “Alone.”

Kananga’s eyes narrowed. “Alone?”

“Alone. It would be more believable if she escaped from me than from two of your thugs, wouldn’t it?”

Before Kananga could reply, Vyborg said, “He’s right. We’ve got to make the story as plausible as possible.”

Morgenthau eyed Eberly carefully. “This young woman is a definite threat to us all. Whether we like it or not, she’s got to be eliminated. For the greater good.”

“I understand,” said Eberly.

“Good,” Morgenthau replied.

Kananga looked less agreeable. He obviously wanted to take care of this himself. Eberly pulled himself up to his full height and stepped to the door. He had to look up to see into Kananga’s eyes. The Rwandan tried to face him unflinchingly, but after a few heartbeats he moved away from the door. Eberly walked past him and out into the corridor.

Not daring to look back, he strode down the hallway toward the outside door.

Standing in the apartment doorway watching him, Kananga muttered, “Do you think he’s strong enough to carry this out?”

Morgenthau pushed herself up from the sofa. “Give him a few minutes. Then you go to Wilmot’s building and take the guards away from his apartment door. Wait for him and the girl outside the building. When Eberly brings her out, you and the guards can take over.”

Vyborg agreed. “That way he’s not party to the killing. Good.”

Morgenthau cast him a contemptuous glance. “He’s party to it. We’re all party to it. I want to make certain that the girl is taken care of properly.”

Holly came out of Wilmot’s bathroom and sat tiredly on the sofa. The digital clock showed it was past midnight.

“My phone doesn’t work,” the professor grumbled. “They really want to keep us incommunicado.”

“What’s going to happen now?” she wondered.

With a sigh that was almost a snort, Wilmot replied, “That’s in the lap of the gods. Or Eberly and his claque, rather.”

“I wish there was some way I could talk to Kris Cardenas.”

“Dr. Cardenas lives in this building, doesn’t she?”

“Yes.”

Wilmot glanced at the door. “With those two guards outside, I don’t suppose we’d be able to get to her.”

“Guess not.” The sofa felt very comfortable to Holly. She leaned back into its yielding softness.

“It’s rather late,” said the professor. “I’m going to bed. You can stretch out on the sofa if you like.”

Holly nodded. Wilmot got up from his armchair and walked slowly back to his bedroom.

He hesitated at the bedroom door. “You know where the bathroom is. If you need anything, just give a rap.”

“Thank you,” said Holly, suppressing a yawn.

Wilmot went into his bedroom and shut the door. Holly stretched out on the sofa and, despite everything, fell into a dreamless sleep as soon as she closed her eyes.

Thinking furiously, Eberly walked slowly along the path that led from his apartment building to Wilmot’s.

The voting starts in a few hours, he said to himself. In twelve hours or so I’ll be the head of the new government. I’ll have it all in my grasp.

But what good will that be if Kananga and the rest of them can hold their murders over my head? They’ll be able to control me! Make me jump to their tune! I’ll just be a figurehead. They’ll have the real power.

It was enough to make him weep, almost. Here I’ve struggled and pla

What can I do? What can I do? They’ve put me in this position and they’ll never let me out of it.

As he came up the walk in front of Wilmot’s building he saw that one of Kananga’s guards was standing outside the front door, waiting for him.

Of course, Eberly thought. Kananga’s already talked to him, told him that I’d be coming. Kananga and the others are probably coming up behind me.

And then it hit him. He stopped a dozen meters in front of the black-clad guard. The revelation was so powerful, so beautiful, so perfect that a lesser man would have sunk to his knees and thanked whatever god he believed in. Eberly had no god, though. He simply broke into a wide, happy smile, gri

The knock on the door startled Holly awake. She sat up like a shot, fully alert.

“Holly, it’s me,” came a muffled voice from the other side of the door. “Malcolm.”

She got up from the sofa and went to the door. Sliding it open, she saw Eberly. And only one guard in the corridor.