Different Senses Read online

  “What about searching the lab?”

  “This happened when? A couple of days ago? The thief’s had time to clean up and move anything they want.”

  “I sealed the workspace.”

  “Fine. But I want to talk to the people first. Tell me what happened.”

  “All right. It was just before noon. Jishnu Uin removed the evidence wallet from the secure repository, and put it on his table. Before he could open it, Jyoti called out for help so he rushed over to deal with the problem.”

  “Who’s Jyoti, and what was the problem? Was it real?”

  “Jyoti Hiranya, one of the junior techs. She’s new, uh....”

  “Since you fucked me over, yes. And the problem?”

  “A centrifuge began to emit smoke. She shut it down, but it gave her a bit of a fright.”

  “And what caused that?”

  “Jishnu couldn’t tell. We sent the machine to be serviced. He spent some time reassuring her and helping her sort out recovering the tubes and so on. When he returned to his worktable, the wallet was gone. He looked around for it, and when he couldn’t find it, called me.”

  “Elapsed time since he left his desk?”

  “Uh...at least half an hour. Obviously he didn’t expect to be gone so long or he’d have locked the wallet up again.”

  “Obviously.”

  Kirin glared. “You don’t have to be so sarcastic.”

  “One of your employees is a thief. They’re lying to you. You sound like a gullible idiot. Don’t expect me to agree with your assessments. I’m here to deal in facts.”

  “Like my lover being a thief when you have no evidence.”

  “My empathy tells me he’s feeling extreme guilt. That’s a fact. Now can we move on?”

  My suspicions immediately centred on this Jishnu and the junior tech because an equipment failure just at that moment was awfully convenient for our thief. But the table wasn’t isolated and three other staff had access to it. It might have been opportunistic, though if that were the case, the thief had to have some way of knowing what was in the wallet, or have enough time to look it over. “What searches did you do and did you check everyone as they left the building?”

  “At first we thought the thing had been mislaid, so the staff all joined in to look under tables, in drawers, checking files opened that morning and so on. It’s quite a small wallet.”

  “So the thief had more than enough chance to cover their tracks.”

  “Um, yes. When we didn’t find it, I arranged for everyone to be searched on departure. The wallets are tracked from room to room, but—”

  “It’s probably not in the wallet any more. Is it still showing on the system?”

  “No. Uh, the tracking device can be deactivated by someone who knows what they’re doing.”

  “And that would be....”

  “Everyone in the building,” he confirmed miserably. “I trust people, you see.”

  “Yeah. You might want to unlearn that habit, same as I did.”

  “Javen—”

  I held up my hand. “Save it. Right. Let’s talk to these people. Jishnu, then Jyoti, then they need to be.... Damn.”

  “What?”

  “Your security people. They were around at the time?”

  “Yes.” His expression changed as he worked it out. “Oh damn.”

  “Exactly. Should have called the police, Kirin.”

  “I couldn’t.”

  “Then this is what you end up with. I need the people I talk to, to remain isolated from the others and each other. Or at least somewhere they can’t compare notes. Who can you trust completely, and who wasn’t in the building at the time?”

  “Payal. My manager. You remember her?”

  “Sure. Call her in.”

  It was always possible that Payal was working with a confederate, but Kirin’s stupidity had compromised matters so much, no one was in the clear. None of this was ideal and only reminded me of my unwanted civilian status. But Payal, who I liked and trusted and who didn’t give off any suspicious emotion, understood what we wanted without needing elaborate explanation. She’d babysit those I interviewed until the process was done. It was bound to cause comment and resentment, but I didn’t have a lot of choice here.

  Jishnu strode in, and did a double-take when he saw me. “Javen. I thought...um, nice to see you again.”

  “You too,” I lied. I’d never cared for him particularly. “Jishnu, Kirin asked me to help him find this pendant, so I’ll be talking to everyone in the building at the time. I’m no longer with the police, so you don’t have to talk to me. But you probably realise how serious this is.” I kept speaking in a smooth, reassuring voice, but inside, excitement rose as I sensed the massive anxiety and fear coming off him. He had something to hide. What?

  “Yes, and I don’t mind talking.” He shifted nervously. “I already told Kirin everything. We looked everywhere. I mean, I knew I was the obvious suspect.”

  “You believe it’s been stolen?”

  “There’s just no way it could be an accident.”

  “Did you see anyone near your table? Do you suspect anyone?”

  “No. I was totally absorbed in helping Jyoti. I told you,” he said to Kirin.

  “What was wrong with the equipment, exactly?”

  “I don’t know. I smelled the smoke she saw, but there was nothing obvious. I logged it and called the maintenance contractor.”

  “And that’s it?”

  “Well, I unplugged it and walked it down to Dispatch.”

  “Right. Any background in mechanics, Jishnu?”

  The anxiety spiked. “A little. A couple of units of electronics, very basic, at university. I found it boring. What’s this to do with the pendant?”

  “Nothing. Just curious. Okay, that’s it for now.”

  “Jishnu, could you go to Payal’s office?” Kirin said. “We’re going to reassess security measures and she wants to talk to you about it.”

  “Sure.” Jishnu shot me a dark look, and left. His relief just added to my suspicions. He thought he’d put one over us.

  “Well?” Kirin asked.

  “He knows something, but it’s too early to know. Call Jyoti in.”

  I sat up in surprise as a tall, pretty banis woman wearing a protective white coverall walked in. I hadn’t realise Kirin employed any indigenous staff.

  “Hello, Jyoti,” he said. “Please take a seat.”

  She gave off a little fear and anxiety but nothing like Jishnu—more what I’d expect from someone in a new job facing an unexpected interview with the boss. Strangely, she made my head tingle a bit. Maybe because she was banis? I didn’t know.

  I gave her my little speech about helping Kirin and how she didn’t need to talk to me. “I have nothing to hide, sir. But I didn’t see anything either.”

  “Well, tell me what you did see, and if you noticed anyone walking around while you were talking to Jishnu. Start with the equipment. What happened?”

  “I started the centrifuge and a few seconds later, smoke came out of the base, near the motor. I yelped a little, and Sri Uin came over to see what was wrong.”

  “He said you called him over,” Kirin said. I frowned at him for interrupting.

  Her anxiety jumped a little. “Uh, I can’t remember. I might have. I wasn’t really paying attention to who else was around just then.”

  “Go on,” I said. “He came over....”

  “I’d turned the machine off, of course, and he lifted it up to look. By then the smoke had stopped. He told me not to worry and that these things happened. He said it was best to have it looked at and took it away.”

  “Okay. So while you were talking, did you notice anyone walking around the lab area?”

  “I definitely saw Sri Terben. He smiled at me.”

  Devi would, the little creep. “Anyone else?”

  “I don’t remember anyone else. The place was quiet because it was lunchtime.”

  “I unders
tand. Did you take part in the search afterwards?”

  “Yes. Everyone did.”

  “Right. Jyoti, do you like Sri Uin?”

  Her head came up, and I felt a flash of her anger. “Yes.”

  “Everyone else here?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  She was lying. “Not many of your people working in this field.”

  “No, sir.”

  “Okay. Well, that’s all for now.”

  Her nostrils flared as she left the room. She was furious with me. Didn’t blame her, really.

  Kirin tapped his pen against his note pad impatiently, a habit that had always irritated me. “What was all that about, Javen? You don’t mean to imply she took the pendant out of resentment?”

  “I was just curious. Trying to get a sense of the dynamics. For what it’s worth, I think she’s not the one.”

  “Oh good. She’s a hard worker. As you said, not many indigenous work in this area so I thought it was a good thing to encourage it. You know, help raise their standard of living.”

  “I know how saintly you are, Kirin. Let’s have the shithead next.”

  “Javen, please.”

  I ignored him, and after a little bit, he called the weasel in.

  Devi slipped into the room, still radiating guilt. “Sit down,” I snapped, “and tell us where you put the pendant.”

  “Javen!”

  “Stay out of it, Kirin. He’s guilty as hell, and I want to know why.”

  Devi sneered. “You’re not a cop any more, Javen. Kirin, do I have to answer his questions?”

  “No, but it would—”

  “Then I’m not going to. If either of you want to talk to me about this again, you can do it through my lawyer.”

  He flounced out, and I turned to my ex, grinning evilly. “There’s your man.”

  “All you proved is that you and he are no longer friends and that you’re really ungracious sometimes. Is that it? You’ll just lay it on him?”

  “Not yet. But I’m telling you, he’s hiding something. He was definitely at the scene at the right time, which is more than we have for the last two on your list. And you’re walking proof that living together doesn’t mean commitment.”

  He flushed. “You’re obnoxious.”

  “I’m pissed off. All right. If you insist. Let’s have the other two.”

  I’d met both Pritam and Waman before, which made Pritam’s reaction all the more interesting because he was even more guilty and anxious than Jishnu. Waman was calm and took it in his stride, even helpfully suggesting how he could look guilty if you squinted. I mentally crossed him off the list, which still left three—Jishnu, Devi and Pritam. Working together, or three separate reasons to be scared of me?

  I kept my assessment to myself as I dressed in protective overalls and hood since Kirin would probably tell Devi everything. If he did, he was only screwing himself, so what did I care?

  Kirin led me to the laboratory proper, explaining as we walked what the security protocols were to protect the chain of custody. My real interest lay in the wallet’s tracking tag which had mysteriously switched itself off during the frantic search after Jishnu raised the alarm. “So how exactly do you deactivate them?” I asked.

  “Strong magnetism, or an electric charge. It’s a tracking device, not an anti-theft tool.”

  “Might want to rethink that.”

  The work area was open, and since my interviewees had returned to their desks, what I was doing was no longer a secret. I asked Kirin to clear everyone away from Jyoti’s table and everything between there and Jishnu’s workstation. He and Jyoti watched me from a distance, their mixed hostility giving me a headache I did my best to ignore. I told Kirin to stand at Jishnu’s table, while I stood at Jyoti’s. That gave me a clear line of sight, and a good view of anyone walking between the two points. Pretty much the entire lab was visible to anyone paying attention. Jishnu hadn’t mentioned Devi, but Jyoti had. Significant? I didn’t know.

  I wanted to search the work area around Jishnu’s table. “But we went over the entire thing three times,” Kirin protested.

  I ignored him. He was a forensic scientist. I was the cop, or had been. Thieves were my speciality, not his.

  No point in checking fingerprints. Everyone wore protective gloves, and the search would have compromised every surface. I donned gloves myself and went to work, while Kirin watched and chewed a hole in his bottom lip.

  I found the wallet in under a minute, stuck to the underside of the bottom drawer in the workstation. Kirin gaped as I held it up. “How did you...?”

  “Perps do this all the time with stolen goods, contraband, weapons.” I checked the packet. “The pendant’s gone. Damn, I wish you had image surveillance in this area.”

  “We don’t employ thieves,” he said, but didn’t even convince himself, let alone me.

  I straightened and handed him the wallet. “You can try to get prints and DNA off it. I doubt you’ll find anything. Tell me, did you do a search as people left every day since this went missing, or just the first day?”

  “Just the first.”

  “Terrific.” So the thief could leave the wallet hidden until the fuss died down and then sail out of the building with the damn pendant in their shoe. “I think it’s long gone. You need to talk to the police and your insurance company.”

  He moaned. “It’ll ruin us.”

  “I’m sorry, but I can’t do any more. Okay...give it a day. Won’t make any damn difference. I want the names and details of the client and the court case, all the people involved. And I want to talk to Jyoti again, privately.”

  “Jyoti?”

  One of the technicians close by heard him and gave Jyoti a suspicious look. Great. “Yeah. I’m going to leave now. Send me that information, then ask her to leave in half an hour and to meet me at the chai house you found me at this morning. Don’t frighten her, and don’t make a fuss. She’s not a suspect, okay?”

  “Yes, I understand.” But he looked at her speculatively, as did a couple of others when they saw the direction of his gaze. I could have kicked myself for sowing seeds of suspicion about an innocent woman in the minds of her co-workers.

  “And keep your mouth shut, especially to Devi.”

  “I don’t think he’s talking to me right now anyway.”

  “I’m heartbroken, truly. I’ll call you later. Tomorrow, maybe.”

  He didn’t want me to go but there was nothing more I could do there for now and being around him was acid etching the glass shell of my soul. It gave me no pleasure to see him flailing so incompetently, though this was new to him, and honest citizens rarely did well when confronted with criminality. Seeing Devi’s face only made me want to punch it. I needed to get out of here.

  ~~~~~~~~

  I waited for an hour in the chai house, and was on the point of calling Kirin to ask what was taking so long, when Jyoti walked in. I stood to greet her, but though she responded politely, her resentment was clear. “Chai?” I offered.

  “No, thank you, sir.”

  “Jyoti, I need to apologise. I didn’t mean to draw attention to you and before I say anything else, let me make it clear—I know you had nothing to do with the pendant going missing.”

  “Because you are matos.”

  “Huh?”

  “Matos. Empathic.” She tapped her head in case I didn’t get her meaning. “Sri Terben told us. Uh...when you and Sri Nel—”

  “Broke up. Yes. What a surprise. It’s not like it was our private business or anything.”

  Some small sympathy under the irritation. “It’s nothing surprising for me. Everyone else was shocked.”

  “Is that why you haven’t told them you’re empathic too?”

  Her head jerked up. “How did you know?”

  “Well, the chances were good and while I was waiting, I did a little research about this tingle you give me in my head. Seems that’s something that happens when empaths are physically close. I won’t tell anyone,
I swear.”

  She sagged with relief. “Thank you. It’s difficult, being new and—”

  “The only banis in the building?”

  “Yes. They all think I took it,” she said, her anger flaring again. “I felt them, so suspicious. Even just after it happened. And now....”

  “I’m sorry. I made it clear to Sri Nel you’re not one of my suspects and in fact, that’s why I want to talk to you.”

  “Bit late now, isn’t it? Once you ruin my reputation, you think it will be so easy to mend it?”

  Her brilliant blue eyes bored into me above the weird high-angled cheekbones of her race. Her flame-coloured hair framed her features like a headdress, braided carefully and intertwined with fine purple ribbons. A beautiful woman, for a banis. “I’ll do what I can. If Kirin doesn’t support you, I can make his life merry hell.”

  “It’s too late. The chuma only need an excuse. Sooner or later, I’ll make a mistake, and they’ll be expecting it. Then I’ll have to leave.”

  She stared at me, willing me to contradict her. Sadly, she was probably right. “But if we find the thief, and with your help, you’ll be vindicated.”

  “A stranger naming one of their own as a criminal? They’ll hate me more, Sri Ythen.”

  “I’ve made a mess of this, haven’t I?”

  “Your people usually do.” She sighed. “But what is done is done, and the Spirit will give me strength to endure. So how can we find the thief?”

  “I found the wallet in Jishnu’s desk. Empty. Think back to the search. Not just who was where, who looked where, but how they felt to you. Did anyone’s emotions strike you as wrong?”

  “It was very hard to separate them. Ten people all frantic—” She put her finger on her lips as if something had suddenly come to her.

  “Someone wasn’t frantic?”

  “Hmmm. Sri Mlano was much more worried than anyone.”

  “Pritam? Why would he care so much?”

  “I don’t know, but he was desperate. Even more than Sri Nel at that time, though Sri Nel is more worried now.”

  That didn’t fit at all. “And Sri Uin? How did Jishnu seem?”

  “I wasn’t paying that much attention because I wanted to find the pendant. I knew because it had gone missing while I was around, people would suspect me. Sri Mlano stood out though.”