Turing's Delirium
Page 29
Once Baez has finished talking, Kandinsky is convinced that the plan, as risky as it is improbable, is worthy of his admiration. For the first time ever, he finds himself in front of someone who he feels is more intelligent and passionate than himself. And the ironic thing is that this person admires him and has just used his intelligence and passion to offer him an escape route. Kandinsky should really tell him that he is the one who should sacrifice himself to let Baez escape.
He does not. He approaches and embraces Baez.
"I hope you'll visit me in jail one day," Baez says. "Using a different identity, of course."
Kandinsky watches Baez's face. A shadow has fallen over it, and there is something tragic that does not match his joking tone of voice.
Two days later, Kandinsky learns of Baez's death during a shootout at the Black Chamber. The media splash color photos of an adolescent Baez and speak of the end of Kandinsky and the dismantling of the Resistance. Montenegro's only victory amid so many recent failures, they say.
Upon seeing the photos, Kandinsky understands what led an anonymous person to choose such a glorious death. He understands better why Baez did everything that he did. There had been a strange mix of arrogance and generosity in his plan. Baez had decided to leave the world by playing God, and while he was at it to create a heroic past, a mythology that would save him from obscurity. Kandinsky is alive, but he feels that his identity has been usurped. He hadn't thought of it like that when he accepted Baez's plan. Perhaps he should have just continued to be Kandinsky—whoever he was—until the end.
There is no time for lamentations. Kandinsky has to think about what to do next. His fingers drum painfully in the air. The first step: go see a specialist.
When he is discharged from a clinic in Santa Cruz with his hands bandaged, he at last feels free to go home to his parents' house. His brother watches him get out of a taxi and come inside with the taxi driver, who is carrying his suitcase. Esteban doesn't stop him; perhaps he has been caught off guard by the determination in Kandinsky's gestures, his decisive steps, his conviction at reclaiming a space that never entirely ceased being his.
Kandinsky will hug his parents and tell them that he has missed them. They will ask about his hands, and he will tell them that he fractured a couple of fingers during a fight. He will set himself up in what was once his room, asking his brother to forgive the intrusion, promising not to bother him. He will roll out his sleeping bag on the floor and take a long nap. When he awakes, he will prepare for more questions during dinner. He had better tell them the truth about his hands; after all, it isn't anything compromising. He will invent an identity like Baez's: he had been certified as a programmer, started to work for the company in charge of Playground, then quit because he felt he was working for the enemy. Poetic justice, after all.
He hopes to stay at his parents' for a few months, at least until he turns twenty-one. He will spend that entire time away from computers, letting his fingers rest. Then he will return to the attack. He has already thought of the name for his new group: KandinskyLives.
Acknowledgments
This novel is a corrected and improved version of the original in Spanish, thanks to the excellent suggestions made by Anton Mueller, my editor at Houghton Mifflin. The entire editorial team is first-rate and I am glad to be part of this publishing house. Lisa Carter worked so hard to achieve an impeccable translation that I will forever be indebted to her. My wife, Tammy, revised the manuscript with me and is my greatest support. Willie Schavelzon, my agent, has always believed in me and gently pushed me when necessary; I thank him and everyone who works with him at the agency for their constant efforts to spread my work.
Every novel needs many books behind it in order to provide texture. I will mention three about cryptanalysis that helped me when writing Turing's Delirium: The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography by Simon Singh; The Codebreakers: The Comprehensive History of Secret Communication from Ancient Times to the Internet by David Kahn; and Code Breaking by Rudolf Kippenhahn.
Ithaca, January 2006