Eros at Zenith: Book 2 of Tales of the Velvet Comet Read online

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  Copyright ©1984 by Mike Resnick

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  Prologue

  The Velvet Comet spun slowly in space, resembling nothing more than a giant barbell.

  Its metal skin glistened a brilliant silver, and its array of flashing lights could be seen from literally tens of thousands of miles away.

  Seventeen different engineering firms had worked on its design, thousands of men and machines had spent millions of hours on its construction, and it housed a permanent staff of more than six hundred men and women. Owned and financed by the Vainmill Syndicate, the largest of the Republic's conglomerates, it had been built in orbit around the distant planet of Charlemagne, but now it circled Deluros VIII, the huge world that would someday become the capital planet of the race of Man.

  During its forty-six years of existence it had become a byword for opulence and elegance, a synonym for hedonism and dissipation. Its fame had spread to the most remote worlds of the Republic, and while its Sybaritic luxuries and even its air of exclusivity were often imitated, they were never equalled.

  The Velvet Comet, after more than three decades of gestation, had been born in space, and less than a century after its birth it would die in space, mourned by few and forgotten by most. But in the meantime, it did its living with a grace and style that would not be seen again for many millennia.

  It was the crown jewel in the Syndicate's Entertainment and Leisure Division, a showplace where the rich and the famous—and occasionally the notorious—gathered to see and be seen, to conspicuously consume, and to revel in pleasures which were designed to satisfy even the most jaded of tastes. For while the Velvet Comet housed a compendium of the finest shops and boutiques, of gourmet restaurants and elegant lounges, while it boasted a fabulous casino and a score of other entertainments, it was first and foremost a brothel.

  And it was the brothel, and the promises of secret delights that it proffered, that enticed its select clientele out to the Comet. They came from Deluros VIII and a thousand nearby and distant worlds. Money was no object to these men and women; they came to play, and to relax, and to indulge.

  And one of them came to kill.

  Chapter 1

  “Name?”

  Crane stared impatiently at the security woman.

  “You know perfectly well who I am.”

  “I'm sorry, sir,” she persisted. “But I can't pass you through the airlock unless you tell me your name.”

  Crane looked briefly at the other people lined up behind him, shrugged, and turned back to the security woman. “Andrew Jackson Crane,” he said at last.

  “Point of origin?”

  “Deluros VIII.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Crane,” she said, looking down at her computer. “Your voiceprint has been cleared and you are free to enter the Comet.”

  “Fine. What do I do now?”

  “Step through into the Mall. I have been informed that someone will be waiting for you.”

  Crane grunted an acknowledgement and walked out into the Mall, the opulent two-mile-long row of shops and boutiques that formed the bar between the two bells of the Velvet Comet. There was a strip of parquet flooring some sixty feet wide running down the entire length of it, which in turn was flanked by two slidewalks that slowly moved past the shops.

  “Mr. Crane?”

  Crane turned and found himself facing a short, rather stocky man dressed in the green uniform of the Comet's security crew.

  “Yes?”

  “My name is Paxton Oglevie,” said the man. “My instructions are to take you to see the body.”

  Crane frowned. “And who gave you those instructions?”

  “The Chief of Security, sir.”

  “Why isn't he here to greet me himself?” demanded Crane.

  “Herself,” corrected Oglevie. “I really couldn't say, sir.”

  “Well, I could. She may not like the fact that I've been put in charge of this case, but that's no excuse for her not to be here.” He paused. “Where's the body now?”

  “In the hospital.”

  “Where's that?”

  “About half a mile to your left, sir.”

  Crane looked down the Mall in the direction indicated. “Don't you have an infirmary in the crew's quarters?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Oglevie.

  “Then why carry it through the Mall when we're trying to hush this thing up?”

  “Because the infirmary doesn't have the facilities to store dead bodies, sir,” replied Oglevie. “I assure you we were very discreet.”

  “I'll just bet,” muttered Crane. He turned back to Oglevie. “Have they performed an autopsy yet?”

  “We were awaiting your instructions, sir.”

  “First thing you've done right so far,” said Crane.

  “Well, it's waited this long; I suppose it can wait another hour. Take me to the Black Pearl.”

  “The Black Pearl, sir?” repeated Oglevie.

  “She's in charge of this place, isn't she?”

  “Yes. But my orders were to —”

  “I'm giving you new orders,” said Crane firmly.

  “She's quite busy, sir,” protested Oglevie.

  “She'll see me.”

  “But —”

  “I haven't got all day,” said Crane, heading off toward a slidewalk. “If you won't take me to her, I'll have to find her myself.”

  “Just a moment, sir,” said Oglevie in resignation.

  Crane stopped and turned to him.

  “That slidewalk goes to the Home,” explained the security man.

  “The Home?” repeated Crane.

  “The crews’ quarters. You want the Resort,” he said, heading across the parquet flooring toward the other slidewalk. “If you'll follow me, sir.”

  Crane fell into step behind him, and a moment later was gliding silently past the exclusive shops that catered to the refined and cultivated tastes of the Comet's clientele. There were softly-lit jewelry stores specializing in gems totally unknown to human worlds, tasteful art galleries offering the finest work of a dozen different races, stylish dress designers whose offerings ranged from the bizarre to the unique, haberdashers who would create a complete wardrobe before the patron's stay aboard the Comet was over, exquisite antique shops (one of which actually displayed a shelf of leather-bound books from Earth itself), a dozen exclusive lingerie shops dealing in the erotic and the merely exotic, half a dozen branches of well-known brokerage houses, a tobacco shop that stocked the finest cigars of a hundred worlds, an incredibly expensive florist that imported fresh flowers daily from Deluros VIII, and literally hundreds of other shops and boutiques.

  Crane watched the shops glide by until his initial fascination wore off, then began scrutinizing the shoppers, trying, for his own amusement, to separate the prostitutes of both sexes from the patrons. Sometimes, especially when the patron was showing signs of age, it was a simple matter; but frequently, to his surprise, it was not. Most of the people he observed were dressed tastefully, and even those wearing revealing apparel seemed more elegant than blatant. Most of them seemed happy and content, and he concluded that this was perhaps the one place they could relax witho
ut the continual fear of robbery, kidnapping, or worse.

  Which brought him back to business.

  “Have you turned up any fingerprints?” he asked Oglevie.

  “Not yet, sir. It looks like a careful, professional job.”

  “Any trace of the murder weapon?”

  “None.”

  “I thought your security system was supposed to be tamperproof,” said Crane. “Has anyone figured out yet how the killer got around it?”

  “No, sir.”

  Crane frowned. “Has anyone done anything yet?”

  “I assume so,” replied Oglevie noncommittally. “I was in the Resort when it was discovered,” he added.

  “When I reported back this morning, I was told to meet you at the airlock.”

  “What's your Security Chief ‘s name?” demanded Crane.

  “The Dragon Lady.”

  Crane snorted. “Dragon Lady. Black Pearl. Doesn't anyone use a real name around this place?”

  “Very infrequently, sir,” answered Oglevie. “It tends to spoil the illusion.”

  “What's your real name?”

  “Paxton Oglevie,” replied the security man. “But of course, I rarely deal with the patrons.”

  “Well, Paxton Oglevie, once I get to the Black Pearl's office, wherever that may be, I suggest that you hunt up your Dragon Lady and tell her I want to see her as soon as I've examined the body.”

  “And how soon will that be, sir?” asked Oglevie, nodding politely to an extremely handsome young man who waved to him from the opposing slidewalk on the far side of the strip of parquet flooring.

  “I haven't the slightest idea,” said Crane. “Maybe an hour, maybe two.”

  “Wouldn't it be easier to summon her when you're ready, rather than —?”

  “First of all, Oglevie, that wasn't a request,” said Crane. “Second, a murder has been committed here, and the Chief of Security had better not have anything better to do with her time than help me solve it.” He paused. “And third, I tend to become very unpleasant when my authority is questioned.”

  Oglevie shrugged and said nothing.

  They rode the slidewalk another half-mile in silence.

  Then Crane turned to the security man again.

  “What's that vibration beneath us?”

  “The tramway, sir.”

  “That's where you found the body?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  'It runs the whole length of the shopping mall?” asked Crane. Oglevie nodded. “And also stops at the airlock?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Are there any other entrances or exits to it?”

  “None, sir. The tramcar stops only at each end and at the airlock.”

  “And of course only the Comet's personnel are permitted to ride it, so that the customers will have to pass by all the stores on the way in and again on the way out, right?”

  “Yes, sir—and we call them patrons.”

  “Call them anything you want,” said Crane. “I'm not one of them, and the next time I direct you to take me somewhere you can skip the scenic route.”

  Oglevie made no reply, and in another three minutes they reached the end of the Mall.

  “Follow me, sir,” said the security man, stepping onto the parquet flooring and heading off toward an ornate reception foyer.

  “What level are we on?” asked Crane.

  “The main one, sir,” replied Oglevie. “There are three levels beneath us, composed entirely of suites for our patrons.”

  “And above us?”

  “Various recreational areas.”

  “The fantasy rooms that I've heard so much about?” asked Crane.

  “Yes, sir. And now, if you'll just wait here for a moment, I'll inform the Black Pearl that you've arrived.”

  Crane watched the stocky security man walk to a bank of computers that had been set into one of the foyer's walls, then examined his new surroundings.

  The foyer was an octagonal room, perhaps eighty feet across, with numerous plush couches and contour chairs, about half of which were occupied by couples and small groups. Clustered in one corner were a number of men and women who were watching stock market quotations and sporting results flash across a pair of large screens. Three elegantly-tailored cocktail waiters circulated through the foyer dispensing free drinks, while four young women worked a registration desk. Crane looked up and saw that the domed ceiling had an enormous pornographic tableau done in bas-relief.

  Finally he looked back down the Mall, which from this perspective looked like a polished chrome-and-glass corridor extending to infinity. He noticed that a magician had set up shop about eighty yards from the entrance to the foyer, and was amusing passers-by with his sleight-of-hand tricks. Then an elderly woman, weighted down with a massive diamond necklace and a totally unnecessary wrap made from the fur of some blue-tinted alien animal, walked out of a nearby boutique and began approaching the foyer. Crane studied her, put her age at somewhere between seventy and eighty, and spent a few moments appraising her jewelry. He had valued her multitude of rings and bracelets at somewhere between four and five million credits, and was just about to go to work on the necklace when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

  “She'll see you now,” said Oglevie.

  “Then let's go.”

  Oglevie headed off to his left, Crane followed him, and a moment later they began passing a number of restaurants, each unique in its decor. One resembled a sanitized and opulent version of one of the notorious drug dens of Altair III, another was a formal, candle-lit affair featuring crisp linen tablecloths, fine china and silver, and servants in powdered wigs and Revolutionary America costumes, while a third was simply a huge silk tent in which the customers sat or reclined on large cushions and ate off a long, very low table.

  “How late are these places open?” asked Crane, suddenly realizing that he hadn't eaten in quite some time.

  “Around the clock, sir,” replied Oglevie. “There is no day or night aboard the Velvet Comet.”

  “I thought I was told that the body was discovered at 0200 hours, ship's time,” said Crane sharply.

  “Two in the morning,” nodded Oglevie. “That would be about right, sir. When I said that we had no day or night, I meant of course that we are a 24-hour-a-day operation.”

  “Of course,” repeated Crane.

  They passed a cocktail lounge filled with angular chrome chairs and polished obsidian tables.

  “What the hell is that?” demanded Crane suddenly.

  “What, sir?”

  “That man with the make-up job,” said Crane, indicating a middle-aged man with bright red lips and black grease paint which had been applied in a diamond-shaped pattern that made it appear as if he were crying. “He sure as hell can't be a customer.”

  “No, Sir. He works here.”

  “Are you trying to tell me women find that attractive?” asked Crane. “Because if you are...”

  “I really couldn't say, sir. His name's Pagliacci. He works as a comedian in one of the nightclubs.”

  “I hope his jokes are funnier than his make-up.”

  “I've never caught his act, sir,” replied Oglevie.

  Crane took a final look at the comedian, shook his head, and once again fell into step behind Oglevie.

  After another few minutes they came to a large, ornate door.

  “This is the place?” asked Crane.

  Oglevie nodded. “I'll wait outside for you, sir.”

  “That won't be necessary. I don't know how long I'll be, so you might as well go back to work.”

  Oglevie looked relieved. “As you wish, sir.”

  Crane watched the security man walk away, then turned to the door. He was just about to reach out and press a small buzzer when it slid back into the wall, revealing a spacious and tastefully-furnished office.

  The beige carpeting was deep and luxuriant, there was a well-stocked hardwood bar on the back wall, and a pair of fur-covered couches faced each other across
a large chrome coffee table which he suspected was also a computer. Half a dozen computer screens were set unobtrusively into one wall, while holographs and paintings were carefully hung on the remaining walls. A pair of stylish chrome chairs faced an artificial fireplace that was made of highly-polished opalescent quartz which seemed to catch the indirect lighting of the room and reflect it back in a myriad of changing colors.

  As the door slid shut behind him, Crane stepped into the office and began scrutinizing it more carefully.

  The holographs on the wall instantly captured his attention, and he walked over and stood before them. There were eleven, each displaying the likeness of a lovely and exotically-clad woman, and he paused to examine them individually.

  “My predecessors,” said a feminine voice.

  He turned and saw a tall, slender, strikingly beautiful black woman standing in a doorway just to the right of the fireplace.

  Her hair was piled high atop her head, strung through with shining gold beads. Her single garment was a glittering strip of metallic gold cloth, carefully wound around her body in a series of spirals that exposed almost as much as it concealed. Large circular golden earrings, a number of golden bracelets, and a pair of delicate golden sandals completed the picture.

  “You're the Black Pearl?” he said.

  “Good old lucky Number Thirteen,” she replied with a grimace. “You must be Mr. Crane, here to bring the murderer to justice.”

  “There are only eleven holographs on the wall,” he noted.

  “The Corporation decorated my office, and for some reason saw fit not to display one of the holographs.”

  She smiled. “I assure you that there really have been twelve previous madams.”

  “I've never met a madam before,” he said awkwardly. “How does one address you?”

  “As the Black Pearl,” she replied. “It's my name.” She paused, obviously amused by his uneasiness. “I, on the other hand, have never met a detective before.”

  “For all I know, neither has your Chief of Security,” said Crane. “At least, she hasn't met this one.”

  “She's probably busy trying to solve the crime before you take over,” remarked the Black Pearl. “She's a very proud woman, the Dragon Lady.”