“I never heard of him.”

“How about Heinrich Klausmeier?” she asked.

“The name’s totally unfamiliar to me.”

“They both worked for you,” she said. “And they were both murdered.”

“What’s this—some last-minute smear campaign?” he said coldly. “Because if it is, you’ve come to the wrong place. Anyone who wants to can go over my record. I have nothing to hide.”

“I think you have a great deal to hide, Mr. Sokol,” said Virtue. “Such as a smuggling ring on Binder Ten.”

“I haven’t been to Binder in five years,” he replied. “Besides, the press tried to pin that on me the first time I ran for office. You won’t get any further with it than your colleagues did, for the simple reason that I am not a criminal.”

“My predecessors didn’t know what I know.”

“What do you think you know?” he asked, unperturbed.

“I know that if you don’t point me in Santiago’s direction, there’s going to be a very interesting piece of investigatory reporting on your videoscreen before the week is out.”

He looked long and hard at her, then smiled confidently. “Do your worst. I never heard of anyone called Peru or Klausmeier.”

She stared at him. There was no question in her mind that he knew exactly what she was talking about; the only question was how well insulated he thought he was. She decided to take one more shot at it.

“That’s not what Salvatore Acosta told me before he died,” she said.

He snorted derisively. “Another mystery man. Who the hell is Salvatore Acosta?”

“He used to work for you, a long time ago.”

“Nobody named Acosta has ever worked for me.”

“I have a tape of him in which he implicates you in the murders of Peru and Klausmeier.”

“I very much doubt that.”

“Can you afford to take the chance?” she said. “Maybe it won’t hold up in court, and maybe it will—but it will sure as hell cost you a post on Lodin Eleven.”

“You don’t have any such tape—and if you do, then the man’s a liar.”

She shrugged and walked to the door. “You’re welcome to your opinion.” She turned to him. “Our editing lab can’t go to work on your interview until we have a signed release; I’ll send over a blank form tomorrow morning.”

Sokol stared at her.

“You know, you could have made this much more pleasant for yourself if you’d simply been open and straightforward with me,” he said at last.

She laughed. “How much more straightforward can I be?”