Gumshoe left quietly, the silence only broken by the rumble of him starting his ancient car outside. After he left, I turned to my brother.

"Are you sure there's nothing else you want to tell me, Neth?"

He shook his head sadly.

"There's nothing else I can tell you," he said with a strange inflection, "I am relying on you, you know."

"Yeah, okay," I replied, "You look after your tame human, and I'll get going."

"Look after yourself, too," he urged, "Those are tough worlds out there, okay?"

I nodded and adjusted my hat to maximum tilt. Time to up my attitude a notch or two.

Captain Luncardy's office was just as cool and organised as the last time I was there. The same could be said for the Captain herself. As I was escorted in, she held her long elegant cigarette holder in one hand, forgotten, smoke trailing lazily to the ceiling, as she studied the contents of a thin manilla folder intently. She looked up, frowned slightly at me, then placed the report carefully back on the polished surface of the desk.

"You're late," she said bruskly, conveying with a series of economical gestures that the copper who was my escort should leave and I should sit.

I sat and looked at my watch. Three minutes after the time she had stipulated; not bad by my standards. Once again, I was reminded how very glad I was that I did not have Luncardy for a boss.

The Captain regarded me coolly for a long moment. I toyed with my hat in my hand, waiting for Luncardy to speak. She was the kind of person who would say what she had to say, only when she was good and ready.

"I have to confess that you have managed to interest me, slightly," she said finally, contriving to sound as if this was entirely against her better judgement, "It seems that your mysteriously-disappearing brother has a connection to somebody who I have been investigating for quite some time now."

"How so?" I asked, trying with modest success to keep the sudden interest out of my voice. I don't think I was successful.

"Your brother was on the Missing Persons list for a long time," Luncardy snorted, "Yet his file is surprisingly thin. He seems to have pulled down the curtain quite successfully for a considerable period. Nobody seems to know where he's been and there's certainly nothing definite on his whereabouts in the file at all."

Luncardy paused, puffed on her smoking stick for a moment and blew smoke over her shoulder.

"About the only concrete thing that is in the files," she resumed, "Is a reference to one Coupar Angus, who's got a very curious reputation on the street, and is somebody I would very much like to interview."

"Why don't you just pull him in?"

"Because he's done nothing illegal, at least anything that we have any chance of proving," she growled, "And, contrary to popular belief, we do have to have a reason to bring people in for questioning."

"So who is this Coupar Angus?"

"He's in business as a Realtor," Luncardy said thoughtfully, "Offices in several caverns. Fair enough. But he seems to have a very odd client list: bankers, racketeers, gamblers, the occasional politician. Lots of people who might just have money acquired in, shall we say, ways that we, or the tax office, might want to know more about."

I had been trying without success to crane my neck to read the notations in the file that Luncardy was holding. All I could be sure was that the file had Nether's name on the front.

"Okay, so he might have information about what Nether's been up to," I said uncertainly, "Where will I find this Angus guy?"

"Huh. Use the Telephone Directory. Let your fingers do the walking."

Luncardy took another drag on her cigarette and added, "Or, even easier, you could just ask your sister. She's had business dealings with him, not so long ago."

I hate coincidences. Both my siblings turn up and employ my professional services, within hours of each other, and now they've got a disreputable businessman in common, and a dodgy import-export business. It looked like I was being taken for a patsy, again. Not good, Gask.

The Captain shook her head, then leaned forward, gathered up the papers on her desk and slipped them back into the file.

"That's what I've got. More than you deserve," she said curtly, "And don't make a habit of turning up like this. I've got plenty of real police work to do."

She slid Nether's slim file to one side and picked up up another, fatter folder that sat hitherto unregarded on the other side of the polished desktop. She opened it and started reading. It seemed I had been dismissed. I stood up and put my hat back on.

"Oh, and Gask," she said, looking up again just as I was about to leave, "One last thing. You might find out why your brother's file has an FI stamp on it."

Federal Interest. Just my luck. I would be asking my brother some much more pointed questions when I next got my hands on him.

Part 38

Part 40