Meaner Things

by David Anderson

  “Who did this?” she asked.

  “Wark,” I replied. “We’ll talk about it later. First we have to debug your suite.”

  She nodded and we went up the elevator to her floor, Charlie hauling a heavy bag of equipment. I stopped at her door and leaned close to her.

  “I can’t go in yet, in case there’s a hidden camera. Charlie will block anything that’s spying on you. Then he’ll find it and dispose of it. Once I get his ‘all clear’ I can go in.”

  “OK.”

  Charlie took a bulky electronic gizmo resembling a Geiger counter out of his bag and switched it on. “Let’s get to work,” he said.

  They disappeared behind the door and I hung around in the little foyer outside her suite. Half an hour passed and I began to get restless. I knocked gently on the door, a gap opened and Emma looked out.

  “He’s still working at it,” she said.

  “Found much?”

  “He won’t tell me; won’t even let me in the same room.”

  I grinned. That sounded like Charlie. “I’m thirsty,” I said.

  “I’ll get you some water.”

  She came back a minute later, gave me a bottle of Evian, and closed the door. I drank away at the water and another thirty minutes passed.

  At last the door opened again.

  “All clear,” Charlie said.

  I went in and he showed me two little electronic bugs, one from behind the Alex Colville painting, the other from a bedside lamp.

  “The one I took from the painting is actually a camera,” he enthused, “Very sophisticated. The one from the bedroom is just audio.”

  “Thank goodness it wasn’t the other way around,” Emma said with obvious relief.

  I didn’t want to think about what she meant by that. “Now call a locksmith and have the locks changed,” I said to her, “Don’t leave here until they’re changed.”

  “I’ve just called them,” she said. They’ll be here in a couple of hours.”

  “Good. Now we need to talk.” I started towards the living room.

  “Wait,” Charlie said, “Emma should close the blinds over that big window. Zheng might have someone in another building with a telescope or binoculars.”

  I thought of Wark and nodded to Emma. She closed several blinds until the entire curved wall of windows was obscured. We sat in easy chairs and Emma brought more water.

  “Better,” said Charlie, looking around but evidently now satisfied.

  I took a deep breath and explained to both of them what had happened at Zheng’s house last night. It took a while and I didn’t spare the details, even though it must have embarrassed Emma.

  “Wow,” Charlie murmured, “Zheng really opened up, eh? Trafficking young girls and using them as diamond mules. What an evil bastard.” He glanced guiltily at Emma, who made no response. “Can’t you turn him in?” he added, looking now at me.

  I shook my head. “He’s a total shit. But he’s a smart, very powerful, very rich one.”

  Charlie saw my point. “One law for the rich, another for you and me.”

  “Exactly. Going to the authorities would just get us in trouble. Our only hope of bringing him down is to do it ourselves, Emma and me.” I paused. “What I need to know Charlie, is will you help us?”

  “What do you have in mind?” he replied, “You and I do Zheng’s house, is that it?”

  I shook my head. “No. It’s much bigger and harder than that.”

  Charlie’s eyes visibly widened. “This I gotta hear,” he said softly.

  I explained to them the outline of my plan to bring Zheng to his knees, emphasising how it necessitated going for his building downtown, where all his real wealth lay, rather than his home in West Van. At first Charlie looked dubious, but quickly changed once I explained that the Zheng Building was a public office complex and therefore would be easier to infiltrate than his high-tech, high security mansion. As Charlie listened, his little coal black eyes began to glow with excitement. Obviously the prospect of acquiring millions of dollars-worth of untraceable diamonds had a deep appeal for my friend.

  “Emma, how do you feel about it?” I needed her one hundred per cent on side too.

  “I will get the divorce,” she said, “He can’t stop it forever. But there’s no way around the prenuptial. If I’m to get anything at all I’ll need leverage.”

  “That had occurred to me too,” I replied. “There has to be documentation of what he’s up to, and there’d be no safer place for him to keep it than in his high security vault. If I can pull this off, you’ll have all the leverage you need.”

  She looked thoughtful. “Then I’m in,” she said, “And not just for selfish reasons. I’m in because Jonathan Zheng needs to be put out of the human trafficking and blood diamond businesses.” She shrugged, then slowly grinned. “And because I think you can pull it off.”

  I was pleased to see that she was confident that I could do it. But I wanted to be cautious about involving her. We agreed that her role would be to keep her eyes and ears open, find out any new information she could about Zheng’s habits, and cover operational expenses. Otherwise she’d take a backseat. Charlie and I would actually perform the heist.

  I could tell that Charlie was happy with that arrangement. He was our locks and electronics expert and would construct the hardware we would need to infiltrate the building and crack the vault. There would be plenty of that to be getting on with once we’d acquired the necessary information.

  To get that information, we’d need to have regular legitimate access inside the Zheng Building downtown. Charlie would never pass for a business executive; his application for tenancy of the building would have aroused immediate suspicion. So that meant I would take the upfront role. Zheng knew what I looked like and, for all I knew, had my image on a security database somewhere. Hence, I’d need an alias and a disguise.

  “Are we crazy?” Emma said at the end, looking at me. I saw hope, perhaps pride, but also fear in her eyes.

  “Not at all,” I replied with more bravado that I felt. “It’ll be a walk in the park.”

  *

  I looked up at the dull grey façade of the high-rise building in front of me. It was dwarfed by even taller ones around it, their brilliant plate glass windows reflecting opposing structures like a giant hall of mirrors. By comparison, this building seemed a relic of the past, the one home on the block that hadn’t been kept up. I prayed that impression was accurate.

  A large concrete block in front of the main entrance doors proclaimed the name of the structure in plastic Helvetica letters: Zheng Building. The lettering was slightly askew, a little off true horizontal. A closed-circuit television camera above the front entrance recorded people walking in or out of the building. No doubt it was the first of many. A few more steps and I’d be within camera range.

  I took a deep breath and tried to relax. It was a grey morning, a slight breeze cooling my face, perhaps the first slight hint of autumn on its way. But, in a few hours’ time, the sun would be high up over even these tall downtown buildings. By then I hoped to have accomplished the first stage of my plan.

  If everything went well over the next few weeks, I wouldn’t need to concern myself with cold, dreary winters ever again. I fantasised about spending the coming Christmas in Barbados with Emma. To achieve that, my plans would not just have to go well, they would have to go perfectly.

  I was wearing a pair of black-framed, non-prescription glasses that Charlie had given me, plus a short blonde wig for men picked out by Emma. I’d worn them inside the apartment for the last four or five days, to get thoroughly used to how they felt on me. They still felt false, obvious, silly. Emma and Charlie assured me that they were none of those things. I was also wearing a five-hundred dollar suit, one of two that Emma had bought me from a Robson Street tailor. Though I hated the feel of one around my neck, I even had three fifty-dollar ties to go with the suits, and half-a-dozen expensive white shirts from Hudson Bay. It was essent
ial that I looked the part.

  Acting it would be the hard bit. I pulled a few strands of blonde hair down over the top of my left ear to hide one of Wark’s cuts that hadn’t fully healed yet. When I breathed deeply I felt a sharp pain in my ribcage and I still had multiple bruises that the suit and tie conveniently hid. Emma had wanted me to wait and get completely better before triggering my plan, but I was tired of moping around the apartment and eager to get started.

  I straightened my shoulders, gripped my black leather briefcase a little tighter, and tried to get into my role. Act like you own the place, Charlie had said.

  I fully intended to own the place, or at least everything of value in it.

  *

  “Thank you very much,” I said with a smile. Building manager Daniel Boylan, tall, imperious, long greying hair swept back, had just handed me unhindered access to the building I planned to rob. I jangled the set of keys in my hand. So far, so good.

  As far as Boylan was concerned, I was simply a new tenant filling a vacant office space on the twelfth floor of the building. No doubt he was pleased to have leased it so easily, to such an easy-going, non-quibbling tenant. I’d told him that I was involved in the jewellery wholesale business, importing and exporting via Asian markets. He hadn’t asked any questions. There were multiple businesses renting office space in the building, many of them dealing in similar ventures, so my explanation could not have sounded more mundane. As indeed it was intended to do.

  I must admit, though, I was relieved at the easy way things had progressed. I had expected a bit more of an interrogation from the middle-aged, but bursting with energy, Boylan. I had spent tedious hours forging official-looking documents and had had glossy brochures printed up of non-existent products. In my briefcase I was carrying ‘samples’ – cheap tat for Boylan to look down his nose at, and over the last few days I’d swotted up on the Asian jewellery market. It had all been for nothing. Boylan seemed not remotely interested.

  “Can I give you a tour of the facility?” Boylan asked.

  “Yes, I think I’d better have that,” I replied, sending him my most affable and accommodating smile.

  He led me through the foyer and, for some unknown reason, went through his sales spiel again. “This is a really smart choice for a merchant like you, Mr. Robie. At a very competitive rent you get an office in the heart of the downtown commercial district, conveniently located within a few blocks of almost any business or service you might require.”

  Boylan droned on, reciting the building’s amenities, eyes gleaming behind his little wire glasses. I felt like screaming at him: Shut up! I’ve already rented the blasted place. But I kept silent and made sure my smile remained firmly cemented in place.

  What I was really interested in, of course, was the building’s security features. The exact workings of which I’d have to find out for myself.

  I’d already noted the video cameras positioned in the hallways. No attempt had been made to hide them from view. On the contrary, they had been positioned as obviously as possible in order to deter anyone walking around who might be contemplating theft. On the way to the elevators we passed a security room with glass-panelled walls, situated at an intersection in the main corridor, again for all to see. Through the glass I noted monitors displaying images of tenants coming and going. I’d have to walk past here again in the coming days, loiter a bit if I could, tie my patent leather shoes or whatever. Did the cameras record digital images on a computer hard drive or onto videotape? If it was an old system that hadn’t been updated, it would be the latter.

  The difference was critical, and just one of many things I planned on discovering with my newly acquired access.

  We took the elevator up to the twelfth floor, turned into a narrow hallway with doors on both sides – private offices similar to the one I was renting – and approached yet another video camera at the end of the corridor. Boylan unlocked door number 1207 and motioned me inside.

  The office was plain as could be, with cream coloured walls that hadn’t seen fresh paint in years, and furnished with just a desk, an old metal filing cabinet, and a couple of chairs. Fluorescent tubes flickered and hummed overhead and the floor was covered in a brown commercial carpet. At least there was plenty of light: three windows overlooked a gravel alleyway and some overgrown vacant lots behind the building. Tenants on the other side enjoyed the better view and, no doubt, higher rents.

  “Yes, this is more than satisfactory, thanks,” I told Boylan, expanding my smile a little more. “Good. I understand you’re also wishing to rent a safe deposit box?”

  I nodded, as if he’d just reminded me of something relatively unimportant that nevertheless had to be attended to.

  Boylan led me back to the elevator where he pressed the button for Floor -2, two levels underground. The vault. I kept my breathing slow and measured. The doors slid open and we turned left into a foyer room. Unlike the main foyer above us, there had been no attempt to make this area plush and comfortable. On the contrary, the stark fluorescent light bouncing off the white walls and white tile floor made me think of an antiseptic surgery or operating theatre. Yet another Siemens video camera hung from the ceiling, sending television studio quality images up to the security room. I realised that, apart from the few minutes in my newly-rented office, there had not been a single moment since I’d entered the building when I was not being observed and my movements recorded.

  “You have good security in this building,” I said. It was not really a question.

  “The best,” Boylan replied, “Surveillance of course, and security guards on duty twenty-four seven.”

  “I’ve seen a couple of your guards,” I replied, “Nice uniforms.”

  “Armed too.”

  “Bit American, eh? Is that legal in Canada?”

  Boylan frowned and I made a mental note to lay off yanking his chain for a while. “Not normally in British Columbia, but we have a government permit allowing it. Our guards come under armoured car legislation.”

  “I see.” It would be my luck to have to rob the only commercial building in the province with its own pistol-wielding security guards.

  At the end of the room, taking up the entire wall, stood the vault. The massive door was wide open, extending out into the foyer. I’d expected it to be an impressive sight and it was: an enormous circle of gleaming brushed steel, thick cylindrical door bolts splayed all around the inside giving it the appearance of a giant, immovable wheel. A shallow ramp led over the lip of the door frame to an inner steel-grilled gate blocking entry to the vault itself.

  “Impressive,” I murmured. What else could I possibly say?

  No doubt Boylan had heard it a hundred times before. He rattled off the vault’s security features as we walked up to the gate. I peered through the bars into the vault while Boylan explained that the vault door was thirty centimetres thick and made of layered iron and steel.

  “We keep the door open during business hours, Monday to Friday seven a.m. to seven p.m., but the day gate is always closed and locked. To get in you have to buzz the security room on the main floor. The intercom is right here.” He pointed to a box on the wall beside him. “A guard will check your credentials on the video monitor and press a button that will unlock the gate. Here, I’ll show you.”

  I followed his lead and we both stared into the electronic eye of the video camera. There was a sharp click from the gate. He pushed it open and we stepped inside.

  The vault was the size of a small room and almost perfectly square. It too was brightly lit with strip lighting along the low ceiling. It looked sparse, almost empty, apart from the rows of safe deposit boxes lining both walls.

  “The one hundred boxes on the right are for Zheng Corporation use only,” Boylan explained, following my gaze. “But the boxes on the left wall are available for rental to office leaseholders.”

  I looked away from Zheng’s side of the room and towards the wall where I was renting a box. The boxes on both sides we
re identical. Another crucial factor had just fallen into place. Each had a keyhole and three metal dials; tenants needed both the key to their box and an alphabetic combination of their own choosing to access their box’s contents.

  I took a last quick look around the room. High up on the back wall, far away from the door, there was a combined motion detector and infrared light sensor. Even if I could get through the vault door, I wouldn’t be able to move inside the room itself without setting off one or both of these alarms. I wouldn’t even be able to turn on the light, much less crack open a hundred safes in the space of a few hours.

  The vault was closed at seven p.m. each Friday evening and not opened again until seven a.m. on Monday morning. “No exceptions,” warned Boylan. “So best not to leave your passport in here if you’re flying over the weekend.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” I said, grinning inanely as if I’d just thought of a tremendously funny joke. “I wouldn’t want to have to break in here.”

  Boylan gave a short staccato laugh. “Not much chance of that, Mr. Robie. Let me show you something.” We stepped outside the vault and stood in front of the enormous round door. “See this thing here?”

  I nodded. He was pointing to what looked like a metal brick attached to the edge of the door.

  “This is a magnetic alarm. Like the sensors inside the room, it’s monitored twenty-four seven by an offsite security company. When the door is closed, it connects to this other magnet bolted on the door jamb. Outside office hours, opening the door breaks the magnetic field, triggering the alarm.”

  “Which no doubt brings the police running?”

  “Within ten minutes, maximum.”

  “Well, I’d best not leave my glasses in there on a Friday night, eh?” I gave him a friendly nudge with my elbow. “I’m blind as a bat without them, you know.”

  He seemed amused by that thought too. “Perhaps one of the security guards will spot them and leave them out for you,” he replied. “There are always two on duty here overnight, after we lock up the vault.”