Chapter Five – The Monk
It was on the way back to Melbourne that Richardson diverted the helicopter to a deep mountain valley. On the valley floor was a ramshackle collection of buildings centred round a large homestead. This had once been the home of a wealthy pastoralist but now it formed the core of St. Bernard’s Monastery. The helicopter set down on the lawn and half an hour later Detective Inspector Richardson was sitting next to a log fire in a stone fireplace, facing a tall, grey-haired monk with piercing blue eyes. Once again, Sergeant Wilson remained standing, leaning against the wood panelled wall.
“Dr O’Connor,” Detective Inspector Richardson began, only to be interrupted.
“It’s Brother Columba now,” the monk told him gently. “I haven’t used the other name since I entered the monastery.”
The detective nodded, accepting this. “That was not long after you returned from Mars on the Ares II?” he asked. Brother Columba nodded. “You are aware that the Prometheus has been found?”
Brother Columba smiled as he answered. “Yes, the abbot told me this morning after Lauds. Although technically, we always knew where it was, so it hasn’t been so much found as visited. Do you have news on how they died?”
“I do, in fact,” the detective said. “We believe they were murdered.”
Brother Columba was surprised but he wasn’t as shocked as the other two. “No,” he said. “It may look like it but I don’t believe it. Why would anyone do that? It makes no sense. It’s far more likely to be some sort of accident.”
“We don’t think so, Brother,” the detective said. “The conditions strongly suggest foul play and we need to interview all the Ares II crew members. One of them is a murderer.”
Brother Columba still shook his head. “As I said, it may look like it,” he said. “My guess is that Dr DeWitt made some stupid mistake that no safety manual had ever anticipated and caused an accident that just looks weird. Poor old Simon was a brilliant exobiologist but a terrible astronaut. The whole trip, he was just a serious accident waiting to happen,” There was a tone of contempt in his voice.
“You didn’t like him much, did you?” Richardson asked.
The monk paused and looked into the fireplace. “No, I didn’t, God help me,” he said, after a short pause. “He was not a very likable man. He thought it was hilarious that Elise and I would take time to pray and he made sure everyone knew it. Mind you, I was far from being on my own in having reason not to like him. Lisa Proctor couldn’t stand him. Lisa was too hard-headed, too evidence-based to give his ideas the respect he thought they deserved.”
“What ideas were those?” Richardson asked.
“Ideas about the likelihood of finding life on Mars,” Brother Columba replied. “Of course, Lisa was right.”
“DeWitt wrote something on the inside of the lander before he died,” Richardson said. “He wrote: ‘They’ve got to me. I should have known they would. I was so close. I wish I had time to write the details.’ Any idea what he meant?”
Brother Columba shook his head. “No,” he said. “But I think you can be pretty sure it’s fantasy. DeWitt was a sad man in many ways. I think he probably couldn’t face the idea he had caused the disaster and convinced himself that it was the work of aliens, trying to keep him from the truth.”
“The ‘they’ in the message could have been the crew of the Ares II,” Richardson said. “Perhaps he thought they had all ganged up to murder him.”
“Maybe,” the monk said with a shrug. “Like I said, fantasy. I really can’t see this as a murder. It will have been a weird accident and DeWitt will have been the cause.”
The detective consulted his data terminal. “That’s the second theory I’ve been given today,” he said. “Samuel Carter thinks it was Chinese sabotage.”
The monk smiled. “How is Sam?” he asked. “I’d heard he’d had a hard time of it.”
“He seems to be getting things back together,” Richardson replied. “Hopefully, this investigation will give him some sort of closure. You don’t believe his theory?”
“No,” Brother Columba said. “The Chinese certainly wanted the mission. They had this idea that the Hellas Basin would be the best spot for a Mars colony. As it turned out, they were dead wrong but they were certainly annoyed when the Hellas mission went to Australia. Still, the rules said it was Australia’s turn, so they couldn’t really complain. But if they’d really wanted to stop the mission, there were many far less dramatic ways they could’ve done it: stopping the funding, for one. No, in the end you’ll find it was just a bizarre accident.”
“Maybe,” the detective said, “but in the meantime I need to ask you some more questions. You were the geophysicist on the mission and your work involved a spectrographic imaging system and a microwave sounder, is that correct?” The monk nodded. “What were you working on at the time?”
“I was doing a spectrographic analysis of some rock outcrops in the Hellas Basin floor, proving to the Chinese that this was a terrible place for a base,” the monk said.
“You weren’t using the microwave sounder?” Richardson asked.
Brother Columba shook his head. “No,” he said firmly. “We had completed the sounding survey the week before. It would be too dangerous to operate the MMS while there was a ship on the surface.”
“You shared that instrument with Professor Freeman. Could he have been using it?”
The monk gave a non-committal shrug. “I guess so,” he said. “You could check the instrument logs. It would’ve been quite safe for him to do the sort of work he did. He used the MMS in a completely different configuration: one with a minimal power output. Charlie’s work would’ve been no threat to anyone on the surface.”
“How much power would these instruments use?” Richardson asked. “Would it be possible to monitor the instrument use by looking at the power consumption?”
Brother Columba shook his head. “Not really, their power use was minimal,” he said. “The only exception was when we used the MMS for deep crustal soundings. To run it on that power setting, you basically had to shut down the rest of the ship. But we had completed our crustal surveys long before the Prometheus ever left orbit, so power management was no longer a problem.”
Richardson spent a moment looking at his wrist data terminal, verifying the information he had just been given. “I’ve been told you were good friends with Colonel Prentice,” he said. “Is it true that you two had a falling out just before she left for the surface?”
The monk only smiled. “No, and it wasn’t the sort of friendship you’re suggesting,” he said. “The commander would have come down very hard on anything like that. No, it was just that we were both Catholic and we would get together to pray. I had a lot of time to think on the way out to Mars – you have no idea how boring interplanetary travel can be. I was already well on my way to this place while I was still on my way to Mars. I wrote a book about it all when I got back.”
The detective nodded and casually consulted his wrist data link. “So I’ve been told,” he said. “Still, I’m sure you can see my concern. A beautiful young woman is murdered and a close friend is not only among the list of suspects but has control of a dangerous microwave instrument. Then, on return to Earth, he gives up his opportunity for a lucrative career to join a monastery. A suspicious person might think that it was not so much a religious calling as guilt – trying to cope with what you had done.”
The monk shook his head, still smiling. “You should take up a career in fiction, detective,” he said. “No, that story won’t wash. First, Will Chang was a very good commander and he was very careful about ‘inappropriate’ relationships. You need to be in space. He was especially careful with relationships around Elise who was, as you say, very attractive. Secondly, you only have to check the instrument logs to see what I was working on and where. Thirdly, a religious vocation based on guilt would most certainly fail. I would’ve been out of this place years ago. I’m still sure that it’ll turn ou
t to be an accident.”
This time the detective shook his head firmly. “No. We know that they were murdered,” he said. “There is no natural force or accident that could produce the circumstances of their death.”
“Look, I know the circumstances might seem strange,” the monk replied. “But I’m still sure it’ll turn out to be an accident. You have no idea how far out in left field Simon DeWitt could be.”
Detective Inspector Richardson considered the man dressed in black robes. He was used to the guilty making up strange theories to cover their guilt but this man was as cool as an iceberg. He showed no nervousness at all. Richardson didn’t know quite what to make of it.
“There is another possible motive we need to explore,” he said. “The propulsion failure on the Prometheus would have meant a long delay in your return to Earth. Would the mining company have held your position open that long? Those high-profile positions are very competitive. Perhaps you decided you couldn’t risk losing the job, used your microwave thing to destroy the spaceship so that you wouldn’t miss the Earth orbit insertion window. Then, on the way back, you have an attack of guilt and decide to punish yourself by coming here.” Again the monk smiled broadly – not one of the reactions Richardson was expecting.
“Really, Detective, you should consider a career in fiction,” he said. “No, I had already decided not to take that job before the accident occurred. At that stage I didn’t know I would be coming here but I did know I wouldn’t be going asteroid mining. I’d already let the company know. You can check with them.”
Richardson sat looking at the monk in silence for a long time. Then he sighed and stood up. “We will,” he said. “Thank you for your time, Brother. Normally, I would ask you to let us know about any travel plans but I guess that’s not necessary in your case.”
The monk smiled as he shook his head. “No,” he said. “I’m not going anywhere.”
As they were walking back to the helicopter, Wilson asked, “What do you think about him, boss? Is he on your list of suspects?”
Richardson nodded. “Yes,” he said. “He had both opportunity and means. But if that message to the mining company pans out, I just can’t make out a motive and my gut is telling me that motive is the key to this case. We know how they were killed, we just don’t know why.”
“He seemed pretty cool under pressure,” Wilson noted. “Your accusations didn’t bother him at all.”
Richardson frowned. His sergeant was right and that was either very good or very bad. He just didn’t know which. “Run those checks on him as fast as you can,” he said. “I’d like the results before we get back to Melbourne.”
“Sure thing, boss,” Wilson said as he climbed into the helicopter.