On the way back Bull thought of two things: What he’d found, and what he was going to do about Valence.
“Honey, I wonder how many other people he’s scammed like me. Bring up a list of his firm’s cases in the last five years that involve a charge of relative abuse or fiduciary irresponsibility.”
“Should I look for the judgments?”
“No, start by looking at filings. I suspect most or all of these were settled out of court.”
“This may be difficult. There are a lot of courts on Earth.”
“So true, so true. … Wait! How did you find out about Lester Walsh’s connection to Valence?”
“Once you had detected the pattern, it wasn’t difficult.”
“Right! And he’s likely to be using that same pattern! Search out all the other lawyers that Valence has associated with, and see which of them have the same kind of sinusoidal finances curves that Walsh does. Those will be ‘traitor lawyers’ who’re extorting their clients.”
“Case search canceled. I’ve started the traitor lawyer search.”
Bull headed for the lab. Now that new data wasn’t flooding in, looking through his finds had become relaxing … mostly.
That it was such a hodgepodge was still a little disturbing. The net he’d first found seemed to be from one technology, the “bug suits” from another, the “bear suits” from still another—as best as he could determine, he’d found pieces of ten different technologies, and most of them at approximately the level of Earth technology—at most a few hundred years advanced, and still quite understandable as technology.
All except for the Honeycomb structure itself. That seemed to be technological, but truly strange, not a linear evolution from contemporary Solar System technology.
The storage boxes he’d found the first day above rubble turned out to be the only ones. Whoever had looted the place did so quite thoroughly, or there had been multiple lootings.
As he sat contemplating the commercial applications of his finds, Bull realized he’d solved the Jack problem and sent him a message: “Jack, we need to set up a new encryption system, from the ground up. I want this one state-of-the-art secure.
“Signing off, Bull.”
A week later, when the new system had been set up and tested, he sent another: “Jack, you were straight with me when you said you’d leave after this mess got straightened out. Now I’m going to be straight with you: You don’t want to do that.
“Jack, I’ve hit paydirt—big paydirt. I’m bringing home stuff that is so valuable it will put my past holdings to shame. The hobby has paid off in spades, and you should be with me to cash in on it.
“As a security precaution, I’m sending my data records to you over this new channel, sealed. These are my backups. But they’re also … collateral, if you will, that I still trust you, have faith in you, and want to see that you get rewarded for sticking with me. If for some reason I don’t make it back, break the seal and treat the records as part of my estate.
“Please stay with me, Jack. We have some sweet times coming. As I approach the Inner System, and it gets to be time to show off what I’ve found, I’ll fill you in on details. Say you’ll stay with me and we can start that revealing process right away.
“I know this will take some thinking about on your side, but let me know as soon as you can.
“Bull, out.”
He leaned back, mentally crossing his fingers. Jack had been good to work with, and having him in on this would sure beat bringing in someone new.