Jupiter's Bones (7 page)

“Do you remember any of the people there?”

“No, not really. Well, this one guy named Pluto. Short, obnoxious fellow. Hated me from the get-go simply because I was Jupiter’s daughter.”

“He’s still there.”

“It doesn’t surprise me. My dad likes people he can push around.”

Decker paused for just a fraction. “He was pushing Pluto around?”

“He was pushing everyone around. Dad always liked his underlings subservient.”

“Your father was a notable man,” Decker said. “I’m sure he had underlings in academics.”

“Yes, he had underlings, but he also had
colleagues
. Sometimes it’s hard to be challenged.”

“Your father felt that way?”

“I’m second-guessing, but yes, I think he didn’t like to be questioned. I think that’s one of the reasons he dropped out. As his ideas drifted farther and farther from the mainstream, he became a target for intense criticism. I don’t think that set well with him. But this is all very beside the point. I don’t know who called me. I certainly don’t know why she did. But I’m glad she did. It’s good to have the police involved.”

“Did anyone from the Order other than your father ever call you before this?”

“No.”

“So this woman who called you…it was the first time you had heard her voice?”

“Are you asking me if her voice sounded familiar?”

“Did it?”

“No. It wasn’t Venus, if that’s what you’re getting at.”

“I’m not getting at anything. How do you know it wasn’t Venus?”

She took down two mugs from the bookshelf. “Because I know what Venus sounds like. You see, Venus, née Jilliam Laham,
was
my girlhood best friend.”

Sipping coffee, her
feet propped on the desk, Europa said, “Once upon a time, I had friends just like any other little girl. Jilliam was one of them. We formed an alliance out of mutual loneliness. Both of us had absentee fathers and narcissistic mothers, but her situation was more extreme. At least my father and I had occasional talks because I was scientifically inclined. Jilliam and her father had nothing in common. He was a high-powered attorney who hated children but loved sex with teenage girls. Looking back, I suppose her relationship with Dad was a natural sequela of her own father’s misbehavior.”

She paused.

“Our mothers had points in common as well. Mine was self-absorbed, but hers was selfish and egotistical. We met when we were eleven. I took pity on her. She seemed needy.” She rolled her eyes. “Little did I know.”

Decker put down his mug. “When did she actually become involved with your father?”

“Hard to say.” She took another drink from her cup. “My father vanished when I was fifteen. When he was resurrected as Jupiter some ten years later, I knew I had to see him. Jilliam came with me for moral support. It was a reunion from hell.”

“In what way?”

Europa’s eyes glazed over. “I wanted a father.” A
pause. “I didn’t get one. I felt betrayed, but not surprised.”

“How did you find out about his return?”

Europa’s eyes took in Decker’s face. “A phone call.”

The room fell quiet, the only sounds coming from the wall clock’s ticking and ambient noise from down below.

“It wasn’t that he was cruel. He just couldn’t help being who he was. And that was good enough for Jilliam. She lapped up every word of his bizarre pseudoscientific ramblings. I don’t think she understood a word of it. But she did react to the force of his personality. Then I realized that the rapture was a two-way street. The way he
looked
at her—such naked hunger. Though in denial at the time, deep down I knew something was going to happen.”

“Do you think they had a prior relationship before that reunion meeting?”

“You mean
before
he disappeared? I doubt it.” A grimace. “She was only fifteen.”

“Was your father inclined to seduce women?”

Europa stared at him. “Why are you asking about Dad’s sexual proclivities?”

“Your father’s death is under investigation.” Decker tapped his pencil. “I was just wondering if your father could have angered someone—like an irate husband or jealous boyfriend.”

Europa immediately broke into laughter. It was so abrupt it took Decker by surprise.

She said, “Lieutenant, the more
appropriate
question is who in this world
hasn’t
my father angered. Before he disappeared, he must have burned every bridge in existence. Often my brothers and I would muse that he had disappeared because he had done something even more nefarious than ruin careers—which, by the way, was a favorite hobby of his.”

Quickly, Decker turned a page on his notepad. “Your father ruined careers?”

Europa started to speak, then stopped herself. She
peered at him with intense blue eyes. “Somehow you suckered me into talking about our family’s sordid saga. Although
what
it has to do with Dad’s death, I don’t know. No, Lieutenant, I really don’t think he murdered anyone. Back then, my brothers and I were engaging in childish fantasy, giving my father an exotic alibi to excuse his devastating and inexplicable behavior.”

But Decker was persistent. “How did your father ruin careers? Did he sabotage experiments? Did he steal someone else’s research?”

Europa stared out of the window. “No, nothing illegal. If he had done that, he wouldn’t have been so feared. Instead, he decimated within the proper channels.” She hugged herself. “To understand my father’s potency, you’d have to know the academic world.”

Decker said, “I’ve heard its moral accountability falls somewhere between politics and Hollywood.”

“You’ve got it.” Europa gave him a beleaguered smile. “In academia, to be associated with the right people is all-important. And Dad was
the
right person to know. His stamp of approval added prestige to anything it touched. He was on the board of many scientific organizations and peer-review journals. A good word from him could immediately advance a career just as a well-placed barb could set it back ten years. During his scientific years, Dad doled out much more criticism than praise. He had brought down many a promising career with a single, snide comment. Presenting a paper to Emil Euler Ganz was an ordeal akin to being placed on the rack. A few of Dad’s remaining colleagues have enlightened me as to how truly sadistic he was, taking pleasure in smashing someone’s life’s work.”

Decker formulated his question. “Of all the people your father…offended—”

“Ruined.”

“Is there any specific person that sticks in your mind?”

“No. My older colleagues might be able to help you.”

“I’ll ask around,” Decker said.

“Approaching my father’s colleagues might be akin to entering the enemy camp.” She smiled. “Maybe not now that he’s dead. I’m sure they got their revenge witnessing my father’s downfall in cosmology. Since Emil Euler Ganz had become an object of derision, Dad’s enemies could discredit his previous criticism of their past work.”

She seemed bitter. Decker asked, “When you entered the field, did they hold your father’s behavior against you?”

She thought for a moment. “I’m sure a few did. Mostly, people felt sorry for me. As a girl, I had been abandoned by him. As a scientist, I was now saddled with this embarrassing nutcase called Father Jupiter. In reality, even before Jupiter my father had lost his scientific luster.”

“Why was that?”

“He was espousing some way-out theories even before he took his famous hike. Now, the few times
I’ve
spoken to him, his mind was as scientifically sharp as ever. But we kept our conversation on neutral ground, never talking about his postulations.” She got up and poured herself another cup of coffee. “Which are not as crackpot
now
as they were then.”

Decker asked, “What kind of crackpot theories did he hold?”

Europa returned to her desk. “It’s a long story as well as a complicated one.”

“I’ve got time. Try me.”

“How’s your working knowledge of physics?”

“I know Newton had three laws of motion.”

“That’s a start.”

“Actually someone at the Order clued me into that one.”

“Who?”

“Someone named Bob.”

“Ah…” Recognition. “Tall, thin…I think now he sports a beard.”

“Goatee.” Decker tried to hide his surprise. “Does he have a last name?”

“Changes with the wind. When I knew him, it was Robert Ross.”

Decker wrote it down in his notes. “Where do you know him from?”

“From Southwest. We were fellow students—actually dated for a couple of months. He was a fanatic admirer of Emil Ganz the scientist. With my father gone, I was his sole link to the great man. But when Dad was resurrected as Jupiter, Bob went directly to the source. At one time, he had a working brain. By now I’m sure it’s mush.”

“He impressed me as being sharp. But what do I know?”

Europa shrugged. “Maybe.”

Decker regarded her with a swift glance. She wasn’t as separate from the Order as Decker had thought. She had kept in contact with her father via phone, she had dated one of the members, and had been best friends with her father’s woman. Also, she remembered Pluto, albeit not fondly. And this was what she
admitted
to. Who knew what she wasn’t telling him. He said, “Explain your dad’s whacked-out theories.”

She sighed heavily. “Dad had developed some far-out theories about teleportation and time machines into alternative universes—a combination of H. G. Wells and
Beam me up, Scotty
.” Again, a sigh. “Not that this bears any relevancy to your investigation.”

“Actually, it may be very relevant,” Decker answered. “Maybe he chose to end his life because he believed that he was transporting himself to a better place with a time machine.”

“Even so, why would that be relevant to the police?”

“Because we have to make sure no one tries to follow in your father’s footsteps. I don’t want another Heaven’s Gate—not anywhere and certainly not in my district.”

“How can you guarantee that?”

“With adults, we can’t. Kids are another story.”

“I see your point.” She held up a finger. “So you
are
viewing this as a suicide.”

“Everything’s open,” Decker said without emotion. “Especially since your father had enemies.”

“That he did.”

“Getting back to your dad’s theories…did any of them have any scientific bases?”

“Of course. Before my father vanished, he’d been working on superluminal loopholes—things that could scientifically account for instantaneous time travel, backward-in-time travel and faster-than-light travel.”

Decker raised his brow. “Okay.”

“Not a science fiction reader, Lieutenant?”

Decker smiled, “I liked it when Han Solo did that warp speed thing on the
Millennium Falcon
.” He leaned forward. “What travels faster than light?”

“Undiscovered subatomic particles called tachyons—”

“Undiscovered?”

“They’re out there. We just haven’t found them yet. Also photons coming from the same electromagnetic wave. Subatomic particles called kaons travel
backward
in time. With them, we see the result of the event before the actual event takes place.”

“I don’t follow you,” Decker said. “I was taught that nothing travels as fast as light. Are you saying that’s not true?”

“I believe you mean that you were taught that nothing travels as fast as electromagnetic radiation. Visible light is only one small part of the spectrum. You’ve got UV waves, microwaves, radiowaves, infrared waves…any of this ring a bell?”

“No.”

She tapped a pencil on the surface of her desk. “All right. I’ll try to sum up twentieth-century physics in a couple of paragraphs.”

“I’m taking notes.”

“Stop me if I lose you.” She finished the dregs of her
coffee. “For years, physics was based on Newton’s three laws of motion. The second law deals with the orbits of heavenly bodies. The fact that some of the orbits didn’t comply with Newton’s mathematics bothered no one. They just added a fudge factor, an arbitrary number that makes the math fit the physics.”

“You can do that?”

She chuckled. “It’s not ideal—something akin to smashing a square peg in a round hole—but physicists do it with theories that
almost
work until someone comes along with a theory that works better. Newton’s theories worked for most cases so why quibble with the few exceptions? Something wasn’t right, but no one knew how to fix it.”

“I’ve known a few cases of that.”

“I’ll bet.” Europa leaned over her desk. “Then along came Einstein, who ushered us into the modern world. His theories on the curvature of space explained the inconsistency in Newton’s planetary laws. But he is best known to the layman for his remarkable theory of relativity. It changed our concept of time from something absolute and immutable to something relative from party to party.”

“Which means?”

She stopped, took in a breath and let it out. It appeared as if she was used to confusing people. “Words don’t do it justice. The mathematics is beautiful, but that won’t help you either. Please interrupt me if I’m going too fast.”

“Oh, I will. Go on.”

“All right. This is the standard model used to explain it. Picture a train pulling away from a platform. To the person on the platform, it appears as if he is standing still and the train is moving, right?”

“Right.”

“But to the person on the train, it seems as if the train is standing still and the platform is moving—”

“But we know the train’s moving.”

“Only because you’ve been taught that it’s the train that moves.”

“But the train
is
moving. It’s going from place to place. The platform isn’t budging.”

“In space, Lieutenant, you have no way of knowing who or what is actually moving. You always have the option of assuming that you’re moving and other guy is standing still.”

Decker said, “But if you’re moving, you’re moving.”

“Sorry. Motion is relative. So is time, distance and mass. And the faster you go, the more relative it is. Now, at slow speeds, the relativity factor isn’t going to make much difference. Suppose you’re cruising at sixty miles an hour on the freeway and I’m stalled on the shoulder with a flat tire because I didn’t have the time to take my bald retreads into the garage. If you zoom past me at one o’clock in the afternoon, what time will my car clock read?”

Decker said, “It’s not going to read anything because your motor’s turned off.”

She laughed, showing teeth. She had a nice smile when she chose to use it. “It wasn’t a trick question, sir.”

Decker smiled boyishly. “One o’clock.”

“Brilliant.”

“Thank you.” Decker noticed that talking about science loosened her up. That was good. Loose people had loose lips.

She continued. “But as your speed approaches that of light, everything changes. For instance, say you’re in a spaceship going ninety percent the speed of light. Now, inside your ship, everything looks normal to you. The clocks run on time, your spaceship has the same dimensions and your clothes still fit you. Are you with me?”

“I’m here.”

“But to another ship out in space,
your
rocket will look shorter by a factor of two, your clock will appear to run half as fast and your weight will be twice as heavy.”

“So you’re saying fast speeds distort things. I can buy that.”

“But here’s the entire point of relativity. To your eye, everything inside
your
spaceship is normal. To your eye, it’s the
other
guy who’s distorted. His clock is slow, his rocket is shorter and his mass is twice as heavy. To
your
eye, he’s distorted. But to
his
eye, you’re distorted.”