All Cry Chaos

by Leonard Rosen

  "Not my system," said Poincaré. "Not yet. Not ever."

  "I am so sorry for your pain, Inspector. From inside a system in chaos, you can't know what the new order will look like or when it will come. But in time, disorder will yield to order. It always does. The new, ordered state will differ from the previous one. Sometimes, it may even be adaptive as in the case of evolution. A new, more resilient species can emerge from chaotic episodes."

  Poincaré heard this and something savage in him rose. "There's a man sitting in The Hague who hired assassins to destroy my family! Before that he massacred half a village. You're calling his rampages adaptive?"

  "I'm saying it's possible. I'm saying there was a puff in this man's life just as there was in Quito's. That excuses nothing. But any complex system, including any one of us or any group of us, can be turned to madness. There was a shirt factory fire in New York in the early 1900s, and nearly 150 people burned to death. That localized chaos could not have been worse for the victims or their families. But laws protecting workers followed. Nothing like that happened again. The system state changed between employees and employers."

  The past months had cast him into the very pit of blackness. But if Chambi was right, that pit had a false bottom. One could fall further, to indifference. "Are you saying there's no forward motion without destruction?"

  "Who knows if the motion is even forward, Inspector. The beauty James saw is a terrible beauty. His equation is neutral on the death of the workers in the factory. Neutral on the death of your granddaughter. The equation is neither moral nor immoral, I'm afraid. These are human categories, not Nature's."

  He turned away and more to himself than to Chambi said: "I don't know a soul who'd willingly choose such a world."

  She rose from the bench. "Don't you see, it's beside the point whether you would choose it or not because this is our world, which happens to be held together by a rule. At first, I thought the news would change everything. We wouldn't have to talk about believing anymore. There would be no more religion without evidence. No more debate about Jesus or Buddha, who merely saw what James did without the mathematics. This is replicable science, Inspector, and it could have marked a new direction in the human story, a fresh start because no sane person could regard James's work and still think the Universe random.

  "Do you recall my student's question in the class you attended? The inference was correct: if there are rules, there must be a rule maker. I can draw no other conclusion. Believe me, I've tried resisting it, and I have colleagues who insist that complex systems order themselves. But my colleagues have no concept . . . they have no language to explain how all systems could spontaneously create the same order, could arise from a single equation. It was James's shattering insight. It changes everything. But the world isn't nearly ready. . . ."

  When she stopped, he listened to the rain and to the wind. He looked across the valley to the mountains, where water bound up in ice for millennia leapt from the glacier with a roar. Downstream there would be farms and barge traffic, cities and people. Here the world was simpler, though hardly simple. In the line where the mountains met the sky he saw a boundary as jagged and cruelly beautiful as his own life. The world ended at that jagged line. Ended. Where was Chloe? He wanted her back. He wanted Claire to whisper his name.

  He said: "When Fenster dies—when he dies for real—what becomes of his work?"

  "There's a box in Zurich with instructions," said Chambi.

  "Could Quito do this himself—what Bell's trying to do: pay others to discover the equation? What are the chances of another scientist replicating Fenster's achievement?"

  Chambi laughed bitterly. "It would be like your great-grandfather at the height of his powers competing with children in a math contest. It will be centuries before someone replicates James's work—at which point, unless people are a great deal better than they are now, we really will be talking about the End Times. The Quitos and Bells will tear each other apart grasping for money and power. James's insight even allows for this, for humans destroying themselves. It would be as natural as my niece choosing to skip, not walk, down the street. James's equation is indifferent as to whether we do or do not survive as a species."

  "And this is how your Rule Maker provides, Ms. Chambi?"

  She adjusted her scarf. "James saw God. He never claimed God cared."

  Poincaré was silent for a time. Even if he lacked the knowledge to understand all she said, he had seen enough to know it was true. In two hundred years, he would not be around to stop the machinations of a future Eduardo Quito. He could stop this one, however, both for James Fenster's sake and his own. He could, at least one more time, for one more dance, be an instrument of order. "We'll end this," he said.

  "How?"

  A career distilled to a single act. He spoke without thinking, certain of what must come. "You and I will meet on the morning of August 15th," he said. "In Amsterdam. You will have a life again. The equation will be safe, and James Fenster can finally live in peace with Madeleine Rainier. He deserves that. I suppose they've married by this point."

  She looked at him, bewildered.

  "What?" he said.

  "I thought you knew, Inspector. James is Madeleine's older brother."

  CHAPTER 42

  August 15th. The Lord's Day.

  The thousands who gathered in Dam Square for the 11:38 AM arrival of Christ milled about in the carnival of a lifetime. Poincaré arrived just after sunrise to a sea of tents and sleeping bags, and—no surprise—to a maximum security zone. One at a time, both those who came to be Raptured and those looking for lunchtime entertainment passed through metal detectors, then chemical residue detectors. Random body searches followed; all bags were x-rayed. When Poincaré's turn came, he identified himself as an Interpol agent. He placed a brown paper bag on a table and declared his weapon, a 9mm Beretta wrapped in its holster. Because he could provide no credentials, having returned those to Felix Robinson three weeks earlier, he expected what followed: the officer at the checkpoint confiscated the weapon and detained him.

  "Gisele De Vries," said Poincaré, as he was being cuffed to a metal bar in a van.

  "What did you say?"

  "Lieutenant De Vries will vouch for me. I've lost my credentials. I'm here on assignment. She and I worked together earlier this year at the World Trade Organization meetings. Call her."

  "The lieutenant is in charge of security for Dam Square, today," said the young man. "Wait here." Poincaré knew this, having devoted the week to preparing for his encounter with Charles Bell and Eduardo Quito. Aside from studying maps of Dam Square and surrounding buildings, he scoured the Dutch National Police database for details of the security arrangements for August 15th. He assumed De Vries would be involved since she had worked the WTO meetings; he thanked his good fortune that she would be directing the show. Perhaps the buffalo nickel was changing his luck after all.

  When the officer left to find her, Poincaré figured he might as well get used to the view from inside the police van, given his plans for that morning. He sat on a metal bench within metal walls; metal fencing bolted from the outside covered a ventilation hole. Austere, he thought, like Peter Roy's office. If it came to that, he would contact Roy for legal advice. Minutes later, the door swung wide and De Vries, looking surprised, said: "Release this man and return his weapon. . . . Inspector Poincaré, why are you here? You should have called ahead for clearance. I apologize."

  As planned. Rubbing his wrists where the cuffs had pinched him, he said: "I only just determined that I had to come. I'm still on the Fenster case . . . and have reason to believe the Soldiers of Rapture who were involved in that bombing will be in Dam Square today."

  "The bombers—here?" The alarm was real. "At all costs we're working to avoid violence. Who can understand these people? According to their own logic, there should be no trouble today of all days."

  "Well, then," he said. "It would seem we're partners once more."

  Tha
t Poincaré was using her distressed him. But the morning was all about crossing inviolable lines, and this one in the scheme of things was minor. He followed her into the command center and spun a fiction about losing his credentials, ending with details of the supposed threat. She issued a badge that he clipped to his jacket. "My people will leave you alone," she said. "Good luck."

  Why not, he thought. For once.

  Already, vendors selling breakfast fare were hard at work, and the smell of fried dough and sausages was pleasant on this fine morning in high summer. The pilgrims who had camped in the square were soon packed and tending to the serious business of Rapture. Some had set up portable baptismal fonts—kiddie wading pools filled with water from public spigots. Many were dressed in tailored white robes, some in improvised bed sheets. One man called to Poincaré: "Brother! Come for holy water and a chance at Eternity!" One splash would cost five euros. In front of the De Bijenkorf department store, a competing Baptist was selling salvation at twice the cost, claiming her water came from Lourdes. A girls' chorus sang hymns before the Royal Palace. The bells of the cathedral rang. He saw jugglers and street musicians and vendors selling shades to protect people's eyes from the Lord's fiery descent. Poincaré declined invitations to have his portrait painted alongside a radiant likeness of Christ. Only ten euros. Like anxious tourists searching for a lost watch, some Rapturians walked the square on their knees in a final show of humility. Come one, come all, thought Poincaré: the penitent and the huckster, the policeman and the pickpocket—and, in time, the financier and the killer. The sun around which this chaos lurched was an enormous digital clock counting down the minutes and seconds to Redemption: 5:12:13. 5:12:12. 5:12:11.

  "Hallelujah! Hallelujah Halleluuuujah!" a man in a business suit shouted. Poincaré declined his offer to clasp hands and wait for Glory. Having made several tours of the square, he walked to the northwest corner, where he would meet Quito and Bell. Snaring them had been easy. Poincaré contacted Eric Hurley in Cambridge and asked that he call Charles Bell with a proposition. Given that public servants in the city were underpaid and that he, Hurley, was set to retire on a less than adequate pension, funds contributed to a policeman's benevolent association might go a long way to securing a certain hard drive. Hurley wired himself for the occasion. When a large sum was transferred to the charity in question, he arranged a second meeting and passed Bell a note: Dam Square, August 15th, 11:00 AM. Corner of Royal Palace and Nieuwe Kerk. As for Quito, Dana Chambi merely sent an e-mail in which she expressed exhaustion and regret: I can't run anymore. I have what you need. You were right. Our cause means everything. Same date, same place. 11:30.

  According to close readings of Scripture, the Rapture would occur at 11:38, local time, around the world. That is, it was to be a rolling Rapture that would not inconvenience people in Los Angeles by asking them to stay awake until 2:38 on the morning of the 15th. For reasons Poincaré never understood, Christ was to appear first in the Central European Time Zone, which meant that those in a band extending from Riksgransen in Swedish Lapland all the way to Lubango in southern Angola would have the honor of standing first in line for Redemption. He was not surprised to learn that travel agencies in every time zone outside CET had arranged special Rapture packages to ferry the especially fervent into what they were calling the "first tier" Rapture—on the theoretical possibility that the sky would fill and there would be no spots left at Christ's right hand. Deluxe packages included hotels, meals, linen robes, airport transfers, and bronze name-tags to be worn around the neck. Inevitably, protesters gathered to advertise their causes in the event the world and its troubles survived until the 16th. Poincaré read signs denouncing the occupation of Tibet and the junta in Myanmar. Prochoice activists shouting slogans competed with soapbox prophets decrying everything from the diminished nutrient value of irradiated foods to the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. A child tethered to her mother wore a sign that read: "God doesn't fix the World. We do!"

  The media caught it all: the penitents, the vendors selling Stroopwafels and herring, the orderly queues at the portable toilets, the singers and the dance troupes, the baptismal pools. Major networks sent reporters and cameramen into the crush, their images projected onto large screens above the platforms that rimmed the square. Several of the faithful who granted interviews showed off what they called "bloodied knees for Christ" and declared how good it would be to meet their Maker. On the news platforms, anchors carefully balanced the opinions of fundamentalists who took time out of their preparations for Rapture with the views of secular experts who tried, as one put it, "to situate this hysteria in its proper historical context." In a word, Dam Square was the circus Poincaré hoped it would be.

  At 10:38, the Countdown Clock at 01:00:00, a robed woman climbed the largest of the platforms and stood at a lectern flanked by enormous speakers, below the De Bijenkorf sign. "Sisters and Brothers in Christ," she began, her voice silencing all competitors. "Let us be comforted in this hour by the words of Paul to the Corinthians:

  Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed—in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.

  Thousands turned as if obeying a summons. The woman's voice had the quality of one's earliest church service, when what flowed from the pulpit to young ears was the voice of Heaven itself. She worked the scale of human possibility, and one hardly needed to understand the words to know that Doom and Salvation hung in the balance. Up until this point, the mood had been festive. When she began, however, Poincaré felt a change as if, in unison, the multitude recalled the seriousness of the moment. Believers bowed their heads. The equivocal, hedging bets, maintained a respectful silence. Even those determined to sneer and watch the supposed end of the world come and go looked on with something approaching dread. For if the woman's call to Rapture were true, where, exactly, would they and all their cynicism be then?

  The speaker moved on to Acts 2:38: "Peter said to them 'Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.' "

  Chambi arrived on schedule. She turned a corner at Mozes en Aaronstraat and met Poincaré by the Royal Palace, beside the cathedral.

  "Are you ready?" he asked.

  "For Charles, yes. He's a bully and he's greedy. But he's no Eduardo. I don't think he'd actually hurt anyone—even though he makes so much noise."

  A man holding a camera interrupted them. "Would you mind? My wife and I want proof we were here when the world ended." He pointed to a shopping bag filled with hats and gloves. "Just in case we don't get called to the sky and have to deal with next winter!"

  Poincaré snapped the picture. A teenager on a unicycle, juggling bowling pins, wheeled by. "All you need to do is what we rehearsed," said Poincaré. "Walk off, across the square—there." He pointed to the far side of the Royal Palace. "I'll be standing here, and Bell will approach. When you see us talking, cross the square and stand at my side. He will be surprised. I will say something to him in your presence. If he responds as I expect, you'll never hear from Charles Bell again. Then it will be Quito's turn. He'll find you, where I'm standing now. Then I'll join you, and you will walk away. I'll handle the rest."

  "What do you mean handle the rest ?"

  "The problem will go away, Ms. Chambi."

  "How?"

  "Trust me."

  "I do, but I'm scared."

  "Good. People without fear tend to die, and I don't expect to die today. I'm quite sure you won't."

  "You mean you're scared, too?"

  "Let's say that I'm alert, Ms. Chambi."

  "But Quito. He's—"

  "I know exactly what Quito is. You'll do what we rehearsed. I'll take care of him. Now get to your position." Poincaré checked his watch. "We'v
e got a few minutes. Why don't you try one of those Stroopwafels. They're very good."

  "But my stomach—" She started off to find a vendor then paused, looking back over her shoulder. "Are you baptized, Inspector?" A clown with orange hair and a red putty nose walked by, banging a drum and singing The Lord's day, the Lord's day, elders weep while children play. Poincaré smelled madness in the air, desperation posing as devotion. From the platform, the woman's voice rose: If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you. . . .

  He smiled, shaking his head. "My wife's been trying for decades."

  "I think I'll buy some holy water from that man over there," she said. "A little sprinkle couldn't hurt."

  "I thought you were a scientist," he laughed.

  "I'm a good Catholic and a good scientist, Inspector. I never understood why people call it a contradiction. The water's for you!" She adjusted her scarf. "Did I dress properly for the end of the world?"