Murder in Orbit Read Online Free PDF

you’re dealing with a living legend, you want to do things right. Feeling like an idiot, I floated beside the door, dithering over what was the best approach. Finally I figured I’d rather be safe than sorry, and knocked.
    â€œOh, for God’s sake, come in!” bellowed a voice from the other side. “I haven’t got all day!”
    So much for etiquette.
    I took a deep breath and touched the sill. The door slid into the wall, and I pulled myself into the room.
    Even my sometimes overactive imagination hadn’t prepared me for what was waiting inside.
    The center of the room was occupied by an enormous desk. When I say center, I don’t mean the middle of the floor. Dr. Puckett’s desk was in the true center of the room—which means it was floating midway between the ceiling and the floor. It was anchored in place by floor-to-ceiling cords that kept it from drifting too far in any direction.
    Unlike the first room, this one was not totally covered by books. They took up only four walls. One of the remaining walls was given over to diplomas, citations, and photographs. The other was made entirely of glass and looked out onto the hub’s popular null-gravity swimming pool, where about a hundred people were splashing around and alternating between floating in the water and floating in the air.
    To tell you the truth, I don’t know if I really saw all that then, or if I just picked it up later. I do know that most of my attention was taken up by the man floating behind the desk. Dr. Puckett was the biggest man I had ever seen.
    Dr. Puckett. How can you describe a man like Elmo Puckett in just a few words? He deserved a whole book. (“Book!” I can hear him snort. “It would take an encyclopedia to do me justice!” The most annoying thing about statements like that is that they’re true. Though it took me a while to realize it, Elmo Puckett wasn’t a raging egomaniac. He was just realistic.)
    Anyway, the first thing you noticed about Elmo Puckett was his size. I found out later his height was just a centimeter shy of a full two meters. When you figure that he packed a hundred and fifty kilograms onto that frame, you begin to get the picture.
    He had thinning white hair. His skin was very fair—though his nose was crisscrossed by a small highway map of thin red veins. His eyes were a shocking electric blue.
    â€œSo, you’re Simon McPhee’s grandbrat,” he said, shoving himself away from the desk.
    The desk quivered, held in place by the anchor ropes. Dr. Puckett himself floated backward to the window, bounced off at an angle, hit another wall, and then, using one of the anchor ropes for a brake, came to a stop a few feet in front of me. It sounds simple, but if you’ve ever maneuvered in a null-grav situation, you have an idea of how much skill it took to pull it off.
    I was appropriately impressed.
    â€œPeople call me Rusty,” I said, putting out my hand.
    â€œI can see why,” replied Dr. Puckett, glancing at my carrot-colored hair while he reached for my hand. “I’d offer you a seat, but as you can see, it’s not really necessary.”
    I took his hand. It was enormous, and mine almost disappeared inside the cool flesh. My eye caught a set of deep brown stains on his fingers.
    â€œTobacco,” said Dr. Puckett, following my gaze. “I used to be a heavy smoker. Still would be, if I could find someone up here who would grow me some of the stuff.”
    I was amazed. Tobacco is illegal out here, of course. But most people are so disgusted by the very idea of smoking that the law is considered almost frivolously unnecessary. I couldn’t believe someone would actually want to do that.
    â€œSo, what’s the emergency?” asked Dr. Puckett. He reached behind him, grabbed one of the anchor ropes, and flipped himself backward over the desk, managing to end up just about where he had started. “Your