"Won't it?"
"I'll put the agents onto Abnethe at once. I see your point. If we assume that . . ."
"We assume," McKie said.
"The orders will be issued in your name, of course," Siker said.
"Keep your skirts clean any way you like," McKie said. "Now, have our people start probing into the Beautybarbers of Steadyon. She's been there, and recently. Also, I'll be sending along a whip she . . ."
"A whip?"
"I just witnessed one of the flagellations. Abnethe cut the connection while her Palenki still had an arm through the S'eye door. Cut the arm right off. The Palenki will grow another arm, and she can hire more Palenkis, but the whip and arm could give us a lead. Palenkis don't practice gene tagging, I know, but it's the best we have at the moment."
"I understand. What'd you see during the . . . incident?"
"I'm getting to that."
"Hadn't you better come in and put your report directly onto a transcorder?"
"I'll depend on you for that. Don't think I should show at Central for a bit."
"Mmm. See what you mean. She'll try to tie you up with a countersuit."
"Or I miss my guess. Now, here's what I saw. When she opened the door, she practically filled it, but I could see what appeared to be a window in the background. If it was a window, it opened onto a cloudy sky. That means daylight."
"Cloudy?"
"Yes. Why?"
"It's been cloudy here all morning."
"You don't think she's . . . no, she wouldn't."
"Probably not, but we'll have Central scoured just to be sure. With her money, no telling who she might've bought."
"Yeah . . . well, the Palenki. Its shell carried an odd design - triangles, diamonds in red and orange, and a rope or snake of yellow wound all the way around and through it.
"Phylum identification," Siker said.
"Yes, but what Palenki family?"
"Well, we'll check it. What else?"
"There was a mob of sentients behind her during the actual flogging. I saw Preylings, couldn't miss those wire tentacles. There were some Chithers, a few Soborips, some Wreaves . . ."
"Sounds like her usual patch of sycophants. Recognize any of them?"
"I'll try for ID's later, but I couldn't attach any names to this mob. But there was one, a PanSpechi, and he was stage-frozen or I miss my guess."
"You sure?"
"All I know is what I saw, and I saw the scars on his forehead - ego surgery, sure as I'm sniggering."
"That's against every PanSpechi legal, moral, and ethical . . ."
"The scars were purple," McKie said. "That checks, doesn't it?"
"Right out in the open, no makeup or anything to cover the scars?"
"Nothing. If I'm right, it means he's the only PanSpechi with her. Another would kill him on sight."
"Where could she be where there'd be only one PanSpechi?"
"Beats me. Oh, and there were some humans, too - green uniforms."
"Abnethe house guards."
"That's the way I made it."
"Quite a mob to be hiding away."
"If anyone can afford it, she can."
"One more thing," McKie said. "I smelled yeast."
"Yeast?"
"No doubt about it. There's always a pressure differential through a jumpdoor. It was blowing our way. Yeast."
"That's quite a bag of observations."
"Did you think I was getting careless?"
"No more than usual. Are you absolutely sure about that PanSpechi?"
"I saw the eyes."
"Sunken, the facets smoothing over?"
"That's the way it looked to me."
"If we can get a PanSpechi to make an official observation of this fellow, that'd give us a lever. Harboring a criminal, you know."
"Apparently, you haven't much experience with PanSpechi," McKie said. "How'd you get to be Director of Discretion?"
"All right, McKie, let's not . . ."