"Hush, John," advised Hildy, frowning at him and shaking her head. "Let Tom talk."

Rising up on his hind legs, the cat bowed toward her. "You are a rose among thorns, dear lady," he said, settling down again. "For over a year themost expensive model cat has been able to talk. That was an innovation that Marijane came up with and-"

"I thought," said Jake, "you mentioned that she was intelligent."

Looking over at Hildy, the robot cat inquired, "How long have you been married to this gink?"

"Eleven years."

"Oy, such fort.i.tude," said Tom. "I happen to be the working model of the latest and most advanced robot cat. Marijane fin-ished me just three months ago and has been refining my-"

"You became independently wealthy in just three months?' asked Jake.

"Listen, bozo, I did that in three weeks," answered the cat. "The point is, I look upon Marijane with considerable fondness."

Hildy said, "Something's happened to her?"

"Exactly. Six days ago she disappeared."

Pilgrim added, "It's his belief that she disappeared. BotPets maintains that she sent in her resignation while visiting friends."

"Friends?" Tom arched his metallic back. "Who in the heck would have friends in the People's Republic of Ohio?"

Hildy said, "Ohio seceded from the Union back in 2027 and elected that fat guy Dictator."

Nodding, Jake said, "Vincent Eagleman, yeah, founder of the Homegrown Fascist Party. Why'd your friend Marijane journey to the People's Republic of Ohio?"

Tom gave a shake of his silvery head. "All she told me before she took off was that something seriously wrong was going on and she wanted to investigate."

Hildy asked, "Something wrong in Ohio? Something wrong at BotPets?"

"I suspect a conspiracy twixt the two, a conspiracy that involves both Vincent Eagleman and Ward McKey. They're quite probably in cahoots and up to no good."

"What are they conspiring about?" Jake sat up.

"I don't know for sure," answered the cat. "I'm a.s.suming, though, it involves one of the BotPets products."

"Whereabouts in Ohio did she go?"

"Youngstown, the capital of the republic."

"Did she contact you at all after she got there?"

"The first two days, yep."

"How?"

The robot cat scratched his silvery side with a hind paw. "Marijane installed a voxphone in my interior. That's not standard equipment, but she and I were pals, and she used to phone most nights after she got home and--"

She stopped communicating with you from Youngstown?" asked Hildy.

Exactly, ma'am. She ceased calling after the second day, and the RitzMussolini Hotel in Youngstown claims she checked out." "Going where?"

No forwarding address. She never came back to Greater Los Angeles, though," said Tom forlornly. "Two days after she disappeared, McKey voxed all the BotPets staff to announce that Marijane had resigned for personal reasons. He knew everyone would join with him in wishing her well wherever she decided to go."

"Which was where?"

"He didn't mention that."

Jake rose up out of his chair. "And she hasn't called you or contacted you since?"

"If she had would I have furtively arranged my escape from the R&D facility in GLA, given this bedraggled ambulance chaser an outrageous retainer and hired him to convey me to Odd Jobs, Inc. as secretively as possible?"

"Probably not," conceded Jake, starting to pace on the thermal rug. "What do you think, Hildy?"

"She found out something, they shut her down."

"She's not dead," insisted the cat.

"You can't be positive. And you have to be prepared for-"

"I told you, Marijane designed me to be a bit psychic. So I know she's alive."

"Be nice," said Jake, "if you were psychic enough to tell us where."

Hildy asked him, "Want to take the case? Sounds interesting."

Stopping near the piano bench, he frowned down at the robot cat. "Did Pilgrim explain our fee structure?"

"Sure. $100,000 in front-nonrefundable. Another hundred thou if you find her, no matter in what shape," answered Tom. "Plus a bonus of $100,000 should you also clear up whatever mess Marijane was looking into."

"Can you afford that?"

The cat made a brief metallic purring sound. "There's $100,000 in your Banx account as of now, Sherlock. So do we have a deal?" He held up his right forepaw.

Jake shook it. "Indeed we do."

As his skycar sped westward, the day ceased to wane and the sky outside commenced growing lighter. Pushing the Automatic Flight b.u.t.ton on the dash panel, Jake leaned back in his seat and rubbed the palm of his hand across his forehead a few times.

The pixphone buzzed.

"Okay, yeah," he said.

The slightly chubby bald man who appeared on the rectangular screen was wearing a two-piece plaid bizsuit and sitting on an under-inflated neoprene airchair. He was surrounded by modified computer screens, databoxes, and a jumbled a.s.sortment of electronic tapping equipment. "Did I outline my newbilling system thoroughly when you hired me a couple hours ago?"

"You did, Steranko."

Steranko the Siphoner said, "So my initial bill of $1,000 won't shock or stun-"

"$850 was the aforementioned quotation."

"Naw, it couldn't have been, Jacob, my boy, since my new fee list has been in effect since last Xmas."

"$850 is all that Odd Jobs, Inc. is going to pay, be that as it may."

The small informant sighed, and at the same time an exhalation of air came wheezing out of his inflated chair. "Were it not for the fact that I've been doing business with you and that scrawny missus of yours for untold aeons, Jake, I would never put up with your high-handed-"

"Before any more aeons unfold, Steranko, tell me what you've found out so far. a.s.suming you have found out anything."

"Hey, I happen to be, as you well know, chum, the best tapper on Earth," he said. "Or on the Moon for that matter. How about $900?"

"$850.".

Sighing again, Steranko reluctantly said, "All right. Here's a one-minute animated ID pic of Ethan Greenway, the lad your client claims was the missing Marijane's dearest friend at BotPets."

A tanned, just barely handsome man of forty appeared on the screen.

Smiling amiably, he displayed his full face and then his left and right profiles.

"My name is Ethan Greenway. I'm the a.s.sociate Copychief in the Fido Division of BotPets International."

"You emphasized the word claims. You think this guy wasn't her beau?"

"Far be it from me to contradict a robot kitty gifted with speech," said the Siphoner. "Marijane and this b.o.o.b did date now and then . . . However."

"However what?"

"I have to dig into this a bit further, Jake, but I'm already getting strong hints that friend Greenway was actually an Internal Affairs Agent for BotPets. A fellow who checked on employees who weren't trusted completely."

"Meaning he might have had something to do with her vanishing?"

The hairless Steranko shrugged one shoulder. "I'd seriously consider that possibility, yes."

"Where can I find him?"

"At the moment he's attending the West Coast Robotic Pets Trade Show in the Malibu Sector of Greater Los Angeles. It's being held at the Malibu Stilt Ritz Hotel now through Friday."

Jake nodded. "What about Marsha Roebeck?"

"You now see her before you."

A heavyset woman of about fifty, with short-cropped gray hair, appeared on the screen and went through a ritual similar to Greenway's. "I'm Marsha Roebeck, a Director Second Cla.s.s of the TomCat Division R&D Departmentat BotPets International."

"Okay, she's the one Tom says helped smuggle him out of the joint," said Jake. "If I can talk to her, I can maybe-"

"That, old buddy, is going to be tough," cut in the plaid-suited informant.

"Apparently the lady came down with a rare Moon Base virus and is in the Isolation Ward at the Thorpe Private Hospital in the Santa Monica Sector of Greater LA."

"No visitors, huh?"

"Only medics."

"I can impersonate one if need be."

"Be careful, since the lady is being very closely and belligerently guarded."

"All the more reason to have a talk with her," said Jake. "Did you come up with anything else?"

"You've already had more than $850 worth of pertinent infor-mation."

"Okay, dig us up another $850 batch, and I'll get in touch with you once I get to SoCal."

"How much is that p.u.s.s.ycat paying you folks?"

"Sufficient."

Steranko said, "It's a pity you don't pa.s.s along a bit more of the outrageous fees you bilk out of gullible customers. Were this an equable society, my share would automatically-"

"Talk to you again in a few hours." Jake ended the call.

The robot security guard gave a long, low appreciative whistle. "Gosh all hemlock," he exclaimed out of his coppery voxgrid, "you surely are right pretty, Miss Beemis."

"I am that," agreed Hildy, holding out a packet of expertly forged IDs to the mechanical man at the entrance to the Bingo Heaven Multidome in the heart of Youngstown. She was a silvery blonde now, deeply tanned, wearing a short one-piece sinsilk skirtsuit. "I have an appointment with Mr. Leon Bismarck."

After ogling her again, the robot said, "I hope you'll forgive my overtly masculine reaction, Miss Beemis, but I used to be a doorman up in Orbiting Vegas II, and I was programmed to react positively to chorines."

"One wouldn't think such behavior would be considered acceptable in the more conservative Republic of Ohio."

The big coppery hot nodded in agreement. "I was rushed down here to fill in after some malcontents blew up my predecessor," he explained. "I haven't had my outlook modified." He held her fabricated credentials up to the scanner panel built into his wide coppery chest. "Ah, Miss Theresa Beemis, Contributing Editor of Militant Chic. Isn't that the multimedia mag with nearly 6,000,000 subscribers per week in fascist dictatorships worldwide?"

"Nearly 7,000,000," Hildy corrected as he returned her IDs.

"My statistics base hasn't been upgraded since they dumped me here either,"the robot told her. "Well, you'll find Mr. Bismarck's office in Dome Three of Bingo Heaven. On the second level right above the Virtual Bingo pavilion."

Thanks, and good luck on your eventual overhaul."

"You sure are some looker," said the robot, standing aside to let her pa.s.s into the building.

"Orderly, get over here at once!" cried Jake.

He now had s.h.a.ggy blond hair, spurious retinal patterns, altered fingerprints, and a small fuzzy mustache. He was wearing a two-piece off-white medsuit and standing at the reception desk of the Isolation Ward on the Second Below-Ground Floor of the Thorpe Private Hospital.

The middle-sized human orderly came trotting over. "May I be of service, Doctor ..." He leaned closer to read the name on Jake's counterfeit digital name tag. "Doctor Bushw.a.n.ger."

Jake, a bit disdainfully, pointed at the android nurse sitting behind the aluminum reception counter. "This mechanism is obviously malfunctioning, which I must say does not speak highly of your facility."

Blankly staring, the white-clad android said, "Gulp gulp gulp," paused and then said it again.