Yes, your honor, I killed Duane Montenegro. Yes, cold
blood. Uh huh, with malice aforethought. And yes, I believe
there were extenuating circumstances.
Well, sir, as you know, I am off the Professor Harold Hill.
Who was that? Damned if I know. We set down on planet about 17
standardays ago, just barely making it down with a failing mass
attenuator. And no money to buy a new one. So here we are on
McGillicutty's Reek, no money, 100 hungry adolescent boys, and a
dead mass attenuator.
The boys? Oh, I thought you knew. We are a traveling boys
choir. Professor Harold Hill's Boys' Choir, Inc., to be exact.
We adopt space waifs and teach them trades. The choir part is
just to raise money for it. So here we are stuck on the Reek,
and I have 100 hungry kids yapping at my heels, "Maude, Maude,
what's for lunch, what's for dinner?" Broke my heart, I'll tell
you, judge.
Get on with it? OK, but all of this really is necessary for
my defense. Anyway, I had finally scraped together a little
money for food for the kids, and was on my way to the market when
Duane stopped me in the hall outside the purser's office. "Oh,
Maude, what luck. I was looking for you. Shh. Look in my of-
fice."
One peek, your worshipfulness. One peek. That's all I
needed. Do you know what a Foy is? No? They're about the rar-
est of the sentient species at least on this arm of the galaxy.
Big purple monsters, normally, and the only totally hypoallergen-
ic DNA in known space.
What's that mean for us? Well, couple that with the fact
that they have twelve hearts, six large and six small, and you
get a heart donor capability for every species. In this guy's
case, though, he was turning green, which meant his minor hearts
had failed. In short, he was dying, probably only had a few
hours to live. "OK, Duane," I asked, "What's he doing in your
office? He's dying, you know."
"Well, he came to help us, Maude. He knows he's dying, and
like all Foys, he wants to be buried on Sordid Beacon. But their
fleet is headed inbound on the other arm. If we don't help
they'll have to freeze his body and keep it here on the Reek for
about 40 stanyears. He wants us to rendezvous with the fleet so
they can take his body back."
"So how does that help us?"
"Oh, it helps us in spades. He's going to donate his six
large hearts for transplant purposes if we agree to take the rest
of him back home. And each heart is worth about 3 million galac-
tic credits."
Yes, your honor, three million each. That would be enough
for a complete overhaul of the Harold Hill from radome to back
door. We'd be able to operate the boys' choir forever with that
kind of capital. When I finally got my own heart under control,
I asked "Duane, are you sure? That sounds extremely generous of
a Foy we don't even know.
And that's when I killed him. His dying words were "I'm
sure. Just before I left the office looking for you, he said
'Give my big hearts to Maude, Duane. Dismember me for Harold's
Choir. Tell all the Foys on Sordid Beacon's Fleet that I will
soon be there.'"
Not guilty? Justifiable homicide? Thank you, your honor.
