The Cassandra Project by Jack McDevitt Page A

there, so we won’t pack up and stay at home the way the government did after it beat the Russians.” Suddenly Brent grinned. “You think there are any Moon men up there?” “Not yet,” said Bucky. “Ask me again in a few months.” He got to his feet. “Is anyone hungry?” “It’s awfully early,” said Gloria.
    “That isn’t what I asked.”
    “If you want to wait for Ed to contact you, we can have room service feed us right here,” suggested Gloria. “They have a splendid menu.” “It’ll take him at least another ninety minutes to get to Baltimore, even on my private jet. and he’ll probably have to negotiate the bribe for another half hour, maybe more. I could do with a walk, and a nice Greek meal—saganaki, dolmades, pastitsio, and top it off with some baklava for dessert.” “I could go for that,” acknowledged Gloria.
    “Let’s choose a joint with belly dancers,” suggested Brent.
    “Let’s choose one with the best menu, and if they have belly dancers, so much the better for you,” said Gloria.
    “Fair enough.” Brent turned to Bucky. “Boss, if we’re gonna walk, or even take a cab . . .” “I know,” said Bucky with an unhappy sigh. “The shaggy black wig, the shades, and the cane.” “Why let ’em know that they’re looking at a billion dollars on the hoof?” “It’s been a dozen years since I was worth
a
billion,” said Bucky, heading off to the closet and bringing out his wig, his sunglasses, his hat, his light overcoat, and his cane. “Am I properly generic now?” he asked a moment later.
    “You look like the local dope peddler and his muscle,” said Gloria, as he walked over and stood next to Brent.
    “Okay, let’s go sell some crack and have dinner,” said Bucky, leading them to the door.
    It was a sumptuous meal, and there
were
belly dancers. They spent two hours in the restaurant and, against Brent’s wishes, walked back to the hotel rather than take a cab.
    When they got there, they found an urgent message to contact Ed Camden. A moment later, his image was on the screen, staring at his employer.
    “What’s up?” asked Bucky.
    “You’re not going to believe this,” said Camden, a troubled expression on his face.
    “Try me.”
    Camden held a battered leather book up to the camera. “This is Aaron Walker’s diary. It cost you $300,000.” “I assume from your urgent message that it was worth it?”
    “You underpaid.”
    “Oh?”
    Camden nodded. “Yeah.”
    “Okay, what did my three hundred grand buy me?”
    “Let me read you an entry from January 19, 1979.”
    “Go ahead.”
    Camden turned to the proper page.
“‘Ten years and nobody’s even hinted at it. I can’t believe Washington could keep a secret for so long.’”
    “That’s it?”
    Camden shook his head. “Here’s December 1986.
‘It’s almost seventeen years, and still not a word of it. I must be one of the few guys left who knows the truth.’
” Camden turned to another page. “And January 19, 1988:
‘Another year of silence. Just amazing.’
” “Let me guess,” said Bucky. “January 19 is the anniversary of when the Myshko flight took off?” Camden shook his head and smiled. “Almost.”
    “Son of a bitch!” exclaimed Bucky. “It’s the anniversary of when it would have landed!” “Give the man a cigar,” said Camden.

6
    Jane Alcott lived with her husband and four kids in Sparrows Point, Maryland, outside Baltimore. They occupied a two-story white frame house with a large front yard in a neighborhood filled with trees. They were within a few blocks of Chesapeake Bay, the kind of place Jerry would have liked to settle down in if he’d had a family. He arrived in the early evening, as the sun was slipping below the horizon, and couldn’t help thinking how much easier his life might have been had he been living out here doing public relations for one of the TV channels and living with Mandy Edwards, the only woman he’d ever really cared about. But she