



— I wouldn’t be surprised if the body belonged to the delivery man with the strange limp. You never did see him leave the house.
— What about the gardener? He was there too.
— Too tall. Even the primitive forensics of the mid-twentieth century would have determined that.
When I was quite young, I wanted to take a trip to an arboreal planet near our system. It was a park of sorts, with a great variety of exotic animal life. Some friends and I had planned the journey for months, but the week before I was supposed to leave, one of my grandmothers took me aside and told me I couldn’t go. She said the planet was tainted. Antarans had lived there once. Even though they’d been gone for years, she believed the place had been spoiled by their presence. When I had children of my own, I took them there. I was determined not to raise them as I was raised.
Fine. Your rules, but we’d better get to it.