Kate Wilhelm in Orbit, Volume 2 by Kate Wilhelm

Author:Kate Wilhelm
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Science Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Suspense, Mystery
Publisher: InfinityBox Press LLC
Published: 2015-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

I

When anyone asked Victoria what the GoMarCorp actually did, she answered vaguely, “You know, light bulbs, electronics, stuff like that.” When her father pressed her, she admitted she didn’t know much about the company except for her own office in the claims department of the Mining Division. She always felt that somehow she had disappointed her father, that she had failed him. Because the thought and the attendant guilt angered her she seldom dwelled on it. She had a good apartment, nice clothes, money enough to save over and above the shares of stock the company handed out regularly. She was doing all right. At work she typed up the claims reports on standard forms, ran a computer check and pulled cards where any similarities appeared—same mine, same claimants, same kinds of claims… She made up a folder for each claim, clipped together all the forms, cards, correspondence, and placed the folder in her superior’s in-basket. What happened to it after that she never knew.

Just a job, she thought, but when it was lunchtime she went to lunch. When it was quitting time, she walked away and gave no more thought to it until eight-thirty the next morning. Mimi, on the other hand, boasted about her great job with the travel agency, and never knew if she would make it to lunch or not. Victoria checked her watch against the wall clock in The Crèpe Shop and when the waiter came she ordered. She ate lunch, had an extra coffee; Mimi still had not arrived when she left the restaurant and walked back to her office. “Rich bitch, couldn’t make up her mind how to get to Rio,” Mimi would say airily. “I’m sending her by dugout.”

Late in the afternoon Diego called to say Mimi had had an accident that morning; she was in the hospital with a broken leg. “You can’t see her until tomorrow. They’ve knocked her out back into last week to set it, so I’ll come by later with the keys and maps and stuff. You’ll have to go get Sam alone.”

“I can’t drive the camper alone in the mountains!”

“Gotta go. See you later, sugar.”

“Diego! Wait…” He had hung up.

Victoria stared at the report in her typewriter and thought about Sam. He had worked here as a claims investigator eight years ago. She had been married then; she and Sam had developed a close nodding relationship. He was in and out for two years, then had grown a beard and either quit or been fired. She hadn’t seen him again until six months ago, when they had met by chance on a corner near the office.

His beard was full, his hair long, he was dressed in jeans and sandals.

“You’re still there?” he asked incredulously.

“It’s a job,” she said. “What are you up to?”

“You’ll never believe me.”

“Probably not.”

“I’ll show you.” He took her arm and began to propel her across the street.

“Hey! I’m on lunch hour.”

“Call in sick.”

“I can’t,” she protested, but he was laughing at her, and in the end, she called in sick.

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