Zero Data Read online

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  ZERO DATA

  By CHARLES SAPHRO

  _All the intricate, electronic witchery of the 21st century could not pin guilt on fabulous Lonnie Raichi, the irreproachable philanthropist. But Jason, the cop, was sweating it out ... searching for that fourth and final and all-knowing rule that would knock Lonnie's "triple ethic" for a gala loop._

  Lonnie Raichi was small, heavily built, wet-eyed, dapper and successful.His success he attributed entirely to his philosophy.

  Not knowing about Lonnie's philosophy, the whole twenty-odd years ofLonnie's success was the abiding crux of Jason's disgust. And this, inspite of the more and more men Jason came to control and the fitfulstream of new techniques and equipment Gov-Pol and Gov-Mil Labs put athis disposal.

  Jason was a cop. In fact, by this Friday the thirteenth in the fall of2009, squirming on what had come to be his pet Gov-Park bench rightacross from the Tiara of Wold in the Fane, he was only one step short ofbeing the Head Cop of Government City. He was good. Gathering in a lotof criminals was what had brought him up the steps.

  But he hadn't gathered in Lonnie.

  It wasn't for lack for trying. Way back, when Lonnie was known simply as"Lonnie," Jason managed to get a little help from his associates andsuperiors. Sometimes.

  But as Lonnie came to be known as Lon Raichi, then Mr. Raichi, andfinally as "THE Launcelot Raichi" (to Everyone Who Mattered), and asJason's promotions kept pace with his widening experience andpainstakingly acquired knowledge; peculiarly, there seemed to be fewerand fewer persons around who could be made interested in "Lonnie."

  Inside Government and Gov-Pol-Anx as well as among the generalTwo-Worlds public.

  So Jason got less and less help, or even passive cooperation, from hissuperiors. As a matter of fact, the more men he could command, the fewerhe could use on anything that could be construed as concerning Lonnie.

  Equipment, though, was a little different matter. There was usuallyenough so that one unit of a kind could be unobtrusively trained on Mr.Raichi under the care of Jason's own desk sergeant. In 1999, forexample, Moglaut, that erratic and secretive genius in Physlab Nine,came out with a quantum analyzer and probability reproducer. The machineinstalled in Pol-Anx, reconstructed crimes and identified the probablecriminals by their modus operandi and the physical traces they couldn'tavoid leaving at the un-mercy of any of its portable data accumulators.

  On Jason's first attempt it almost came close to Lonnie. It did gatherin the hidden, dead, still twitching, completely uncommunicativecarcasses of the five men who actually relieved the vault of theCitizen's Bank of Berlin of its clutch of millions. It even identifiedthe body of the rocopilot found floating in the Potomac a few days lateras being one of the group, and the killer. It did _not_ locate thearsonized remnants of the plane, though, nor the currency; and onlyachieved the casting of a slight, or subsidiary, third-hand aspersion inthe direction of THE Launcelot Raichi.

  But Lonnie came up with an irrefutable alibi, somehow, and the hasslethat followed made Jason's luck run out. And on Jason's stubborn,secret, subsequent tries, all the analyzer could produce was a report ofzero data whenever Jason, reasonably or unreasonably, believed thatLonnie was involved.

  Every time.

  Zero data when Schicklehitler's marshal's baton disappeared from theBritish Museum.

  _Lonnie on his dream throne ... Jason at his instruments.Was the struggle endless between these two?_]

  Zero data when Charlemagne's Crown lapsed unobtrusively from its shrinein Vienna during the Year 2000 Celebration.

  Subsequently, Jason realized that the Berlin job in 1999 had markedLonnie's last essay after money. Other things seemed to occupy Lonnie'smind after he'd sprouted publicly into the status of full-fledged,hyper-respectable, inter-planetary business tycoon; complete with amany-tentacled industrial organization in Moon Colony and a far-flungprospecting unit headquartering at Mars Equatorial.

  Tycoonship was a status with which Everyone Who Mattered was alwayspleased.

  Jason's next attempt on Lonnie had to wait until 2005 and was the resultof two unconnected circumstances. The first was Physlab Nine's secretivegenius, Moglaut, evolving another piece of equipment, a disarmer, which,subsequent to its first use, saved countless cops' lives. The second wasthe discovery in the Valley of Kings, of Amenhotep III's own personalofficial Uraeus. Positively identified beyond the shadow of doubt.

  Jason, playing the hunch he'd built up about Lonnie, rushed a man, armedwith the brand new disarmer, instantly to the scene.

  The next morning, Amenhotep's Uraeus was gone and the corpse of Jason'sman was found--part of it. The right hand, arm, shoulder, and most ofthe head were missing; burned away. And of the disarmer, only a fusedhunk of mixed metals and silver helix remained.

  And the analyzer reported zero data.

  Lab Nine's taciturn and exasperating Moglaut failed to derive anexplanation for either circumstance.

  "I won't shut up," Jason said, standing on the carpet in front of hissuperior. "He did it. I don't know how, but he did."

  Another spasm of frustration shook him and he slammed his fist down onthe sacred desk. "I've known Lonnie all my life. I know he doesn't knowphfut about anything scientific, and yet he makes a horse's--"

  "Captain Jason, I insist that you stop referring to--"

  "Makes a--" Jason raised his voice, "horse's--"

  "CAPTAIN JASON!"

  Jason subsided.

  "Captain, Annex has been most forbearing all these years. We'veoverlooked your incomprehensible phobia--this--this confoundedlyunfounded impossible bias against such an irreproachable philanthropistas Launcelot Raichi--because of the sterling quality of your ... ah ...other work. However--"

  On the desk, the Commissioner's fingers took up a measured tattoo."--should this fixed idea begin to encroach on--uh--uh--"

  "All right ... Sir." Sullenly, Jason submitted. "I understand."

  With a self-congratulatory smirk up at the ceiling that separated themfrom Executive Level, the bland face of the Commissioner smoothed out."All right, Captain, as long as we understand each other ..."

  Sourly, Jason got himself back to his own office. Drumming his ownfingers on his own desk and glaring at his own desk sergeant, he purgedhis soul.

  "--damned equipment would only work, I'd gather him in! They couldn'tstop me, then! But--" Jason choked. When he could speak again, "He'snever studied a lick in his life, I tell you! Yet he makes a he-cow'sbehind out of the best man and the best scientific equipment Annex canprovide! How? How, I ask you! He doesn't know the first blasted thingabout any blasted thing in any blasted science!"

  * * * * *

  That was true. Conversely, Jason didn't know about Lonnie's philosophy.

  Nowadays, Lonnie called it a "philosophy." He told reporters it was"based on a triple ethic." (Inside his skull, a small boy jumped up anddown in glee over the magnificent language he was able to use.) But healways replied only with a superior smile when asked by reporters to putthe philosophy and the triple ethic into words. If pressed, heparaphrased an Ancient Man: "You know my works. Judge by them."

  He was referring, of course, to his having branched out into patronizingthe Arts. He'd even erected Raichi Museum just across the velvety greencircle of Gov-Park from Government's own Fane of Artifacts.

  The reporters would go away and write more articles about his modestyand the superlative treasures of Earth, Moon and Mars that weregathered in the Raichi Galleries; protected, the papers always boasted,by the same ultra-safety mechanisms that guarded the mile-long,one-gallery-wide, glass-fronted Fane itself. Government affably made uptwo of every anti-b
reak-and-entry device nowadays. One for the Fane andthe other for Raichi Museum.

  Despite occasional grumbles in the letters-to-the-editor columns, thepapers never seemed to inquire into why so many priceless trans-worldsartifacts got into Lonnie's private ownership instead of Government'spublic Fane. And while some artists and architects (unendowed by Lonnie)succeeded in publicly proclaiming Raichi Museum gaudy, such carpingswere but to be expected, particularly from modernists.

  Actually, Everyone Who Mattered felt Raichi Museum's granite walls weremuch more dignified than the narrow, glass-faced arcade that was theFane, wide open to the most disrespectfully casual public inspection allthe time. Why, even late at night gawking loiterers pressed their nosesagainst the glass; black, clumsy