Page 173 - Labelle Gramercy, Detective

Slow Burn

“Let me see. The clerk, Mr. Digambara, was watching a soccer
game on his portable TV. To be polite, I asked him how the game
was going, and he said that the Seychelles had just scored their first
point against Dominica. I guess he could confirm that, if he
remembers.”
“And the scoring times can also be checked, I’m sure,” said
Labelle, looking at me. “That’s all for now, Mr. Carbone. We’ll be in
touch. Don’t leave town.”
He smiled, a totally false facial expression he must have learned
from a drama coach. “I hadn’t intended to.”
We exited. My lunch was not sitting well, but I didn’t let on to
Labelle. The last thing I wanted was a replay of her opinions on my
diet. As we headed for the next questionable quintuplet, I asked, “So
I have more things to check out. What is Quarles’ window of
opportunity?”
“Fifteen minutes each way to his uncle’s place. If his alibi checks
out, he’s in the clear.”
“I’m glad. He seemed like a nice enough fellow, trying to make an
honest buck the hard way.”
“He isn’t, Duncan—but the degree of illegality attaching to his
enterprise is very small.”
“Oh.”
“Those stars he is naming have already been named; his is a budget
version of a more sophisticated scam doing the same thing for a
more affluent audience via higher-priced magazines. The system of
‘official’ star names is an alphanumeric code for a good reason:
billions of stars in distant galaxies will never be reached by any
possible spacecraft or even individually photographed. You may as
well buy title to grains of sand on the beach; your claim will not be
disputed, no more than it can be established.”
“You mean the same code could be sold more than once?”
“The purchasers are unlikely to discover each other, don’t you
think? And if such a contention did, somehow, arise, I don’t think the
astronomical establishment would get involved in resolving it. You’re
buying nothing but a meaningless certificate. Perhaps for Quarles it is
kind of ironic revenge on Galactomalt, which sold him as a star and
treated him as a number.”

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