“No.” His expression was blank. “I don’t think I can.”
I thought of the jagged and spherical shapes the scanning electron microscope had revealed to me, and tried again.
“Why would someone melt uranium two-thirty-eight? Why would they shape it with a machine?”
Still, he did not seem to have a clue.
“is depleted uranium used for anything at all?” I then asked.
“In general, big industry doesn’t use uranium metal,” he answered. “Not even in nuclear power plants, because in those the fuel rods or pellets are uranium oxide, a ceramic.”
“Then maybe I should ask what depleted uranium metal could, in theory, be used for,” I restated.
“At one time there was some talk by the Defense Department about using it for armor plating on tanks. And it’s been suggested that it could be used to make bullets or other types of projectiles. Let’s see. I guess the only other thing we know that it’s good for is shielding radioactive material.”
“What sort of radioactive material?” I said as my adrenal glands woke up. “Spent fuel assemblies, for example?”
“That would be the idea if we knew how to get rid of nuclear waste in this country,” he wryly said. “You see, if we could remove it to be buried a thousand feet beneath Yucca Mountain, Nevada, for example, then U-238 could be used to line the casks needed for transport.”
“In other words,” I said, “if the spent assemblies are to be removed from a nuclear power plant, they will have to be put in something, and depleted uranium is a better shield than lead.”
He said this was precisely what he meant, and receipted my sample back to me, because it was evidence and one day could end up in court. So I could not leave it here, even though I knew how Marino would feel when I returned it to his trunk. I found him walking around, his sunglasses on.
“What now?” he said.
“Please pop the trunk.”
He reached inside the car and pulled a release as he said. “I’m telling you right now, that it ain’t going in no evidence locker in my precinct or at HQ. No one’s going to cooperate, even if I wanted them to.”
“it has to be stored,” I simply said. “There’s a twelvepack of beer in here.”
“So I didn’t want to have to bother stopping for it later.”
“One of these days, you’re going to get in trouble.” I shut the trunk of his city-owned police car.
“Well, how about you store the uranium at your office,” he said.
“Fine.” I got in. “I can do that.”
“So, how was it?” he asked, starting the engine.
I gave him a summary, leaving out as much scientific detail as I could.
“You’re telling me that someone tracked nuclear waste into your Benz?” he asked, baffled.
“That’s the way it appears. I need to stop by and talk to Lucy again.”
“Why? What’s she got to do with it?”
“I don’t know that she does,” I said as he drove down he mountain. “I have a rather wild idea.”
I hate it when you get those.”
Janet looked worried when I was back at their door, this time with Marino.
“Is everything all right?” she asked, letting us in.
“I think I need your help,” I said. “Strike that. What I mean is that both of us do.”
Lucy was sitting on the bed, a notebook open in her lap.
She looked at Marino. “Fire away. But we charge for consultations.”
He sat by the fire, while I took a chair close to him.
“This person who has been getting into CP&L’s computer,” I said. “Do we know what else he has gotten into besides customer billing?” -f can’t say we know everything,” Lucy replied. “But the billing is a certainty, and customer info is in general.”
“Meaning what?” Marino asked.
“Meaning that the information about customers includes billing addresses, phone numbers, special services, energyuse averaging, and some customers are part of a stocksharing program-” . “Let’s talk about stock sharing,” I stopped her. “I’m involved in that program. Part of my check every month buys stock in CP&L, and therefore the company has some financial information on me, including my bank account and social security number.” I paused, thinking. “Could that sort of thing be important to this hacker?”