The Immortal Game

by Mark Coggins

  Duckworth went into the kitchen and started pulling open cupboards and drawers and clinking glasses. I sat down with the laptop in a canvas director’s chair and looked around. The place was decorated in quirky modern. There was a low couch with a fantastic curved back upholstered in a shiny blue material. In front of that was a round coffee table made of burnished aluminum, and on the walls hung a pair of spare line drawings that were either abstract nudes or renderings of the twisted wreckage of the Hindenburg-I wasn’t sure which. There was also a fairly conventional table with a set of four chairs that had bright orange seat cushions. The kicker was a parking meter on a five-foot metal pole, embedded in a concrete block. It was rooted next to an arm of the couch, giving the impression you had to feed it for sitting time.

  Duckworth came back from the kitchen and handed me a tumbler of caramel-colored liquid. I sniffed it and took a sip. Jack Daniels: a far cry from rotgut. “Nice place,” I said. “But I wasn’t aware the Department of Parking and Traffic was in the habit of loaning its meters.”

  Duckworth plunked down on the couch with a glass of white wine. He smiled. “It’s possible they are not fully apprised of the arrangement. They were widening Church Street and my friend and I requisitioned this one from the fenced area where the meters were stored. Maybe like you requisitioned that laptop. Are the police in the habit of loaning out evidence in a murder investigation?”

  “Touché. But right now there’s nothing that says it’s evidence of diddly-squat. I’ll turn it over if we find anything relevant.”

  Duckworth took a sip of wine, pinkie finger extended. “August,” he said. “I saw that article in the paper about Teller’s death. The one with your picture. It said you were a suspect. You didn’t really have anything to do with it, did you?”

  I grinned at him. “Yes, once you told me Teller had fired you I went right out and plugged him. You’re giving me too much credit-or too little. I try not to be on the business or trigger end of a gun if I can avoid it. Anyway, the person the cops actually suspect is Terri McCulloch. They’re probably right, but I do have some evidence to the contrary.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I told him about Terri’s late night call at my apartment. I meant to stop at that, but couldn’t think of a reason not to bring him fully up to date with the events of the day. “So if you believe Hastrup,” I said at the end. “Nagel is an independent. And Jodie... well Jodie is at least not working with Hastrup. She could still be working with Nagel and/or Terri or she could be on the level.”

  “How will you find out?”

  “I think I’ll tackle Nagel next. I know he lives in Daly City, so it shouldn’t be too hard to locate him.”

  “While you chase down Nagel, why don’t you let me check out Jodie for you, August? She’ll have no idea who I am, so it’ll be easy for me to sneak up on her and stake her out-or whatever you call it.”

  I held up my hand. “We’ve already been over this. I appreciate the offer, but this is the kind of work I have to do by myself. I’m not even getting paid at this point.” I hefted the laptop. “Here’s where I can use your help. Now how’s about we do a little electronic gumshoe work?”

  Duckworth reached over and took the laptop out of my hand. “Jeez, August,” he said with disgust. “Don’t try to dress it up by calling it ‘gumshoe’ work. I’m not that gullible.”

  He put the computer on the coffee table and powered it up. I brought my drink and chair around so I could watch the screen while he worked.

  “I couldn’t find the chess program on the desktop,” I said. “Of course, what I’d really like to find is the source code so I can bail myself out with Bishop.”

  Duckworth did some manipulations with the mouse and brought up a new window, typed in some gobbledygook, and clicked the Search button.

  “I just entered a search pattern to match the name of the chess program file,” he said. “Not every application on a computer’s hard disk has to appear on the desktop. If Teller wanted to be a little more discreet, he might have installed it in a way that kept it off. But even if he has the program, I doubt he will have the source. Teller wasn’t technical enough to make use of it-and it really wouldn’t make sense for him to go parading around with a valuable corporate asset like that loaded on his laptop.”

  As Duckworth was talking the computer popped open a file folder with a graphic icon. “That’s it,” he said. He double-clicked on the icon and after a moment a chessboard was painted on the screen. “This is an alpha test copy. That may be why Teller didn’t have it formally installed.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Let me make sure I understand something. This is the same program you showed me at The Stigmata, even though it doesn’t have all the virtual reality hocus-pocus.”

  “I could set up the board in the same position from Anderssen and Kieseritzky’s ‘Immortal Game’ to prove it, but there’s no need. I recognize the software. Like I said before, just because the user interface is different, doesn’t mean the underlying smarts are different. Think of it like a brain transplant. The same brain can run the virtual reality version, the PC version, and in fact, there’s even a third.”

  “What would that be?”

  “It looks like a regular chess board with real chessmen, but there are pressure-sensitive pads in the board to track the position of the pieces as you move them and a microprocessor that runs the software. But chess computers like that have been available for years. The new virtual reality interface is the thing with sex appeal.”

  “Yeah, maybe for nearsighted fourteen-year-old boys with bad skin.”

  Duckworth rolled his eyes. “It’s just an expression. A marketing term.”

  “All right, enough about the attraction of modern technology. What about the source code? Is it there?”

  “I don’t think so. The search pattern I used before should also have found at least a few files in the source tree. I can try looking for any C++ files on the hard disk. I know the program was written in that language.” Duckworth went through some more machinations, but after waiting for a time with the cursor changed to an hourglass, the program spat back: “No matches.”

  He shook his head. “Sorry August.”

  I took a big slug of my drink. “I guess that’s it, then. There’s no point in giving the program we found to Bishop. You can’t recreate the source code from a program, can you?”

  “Nope. You can decompile it into assembly language, but that’s not the same thing. But don’t throw in the towel yet. Don’t you want to see what else we can find?”

  “Give me a for instance.”

  Duckworth picked up his wine and swirled it around. He smiled. “Well, I for one would have loved to have hacked Teller’s e-mail while he was alive. I’m all the more interested now that he’s dead.”

  “What? You mean you can dial into work and look at his e-mail messages?”

  “No, we would have to have his password for that. But we can read any messages he might have retained on his laptop. You see, there’re basically two kinds of e-mail programs: those that keep your e-mail messages on a central file server and let you read it from there, and those that copy it into a local file for you to view. At Mephisto, most everyone used the second sort, so it’s entirely possible there will still be a snapshot of Teller’s correspondence on the laptop.”

  I gestured with my glass. “Hack away, geek boy.”

  “Way to galvanize me into action,” muttered Duckworth. As it turned out, there was very little action required. He simply located the e-mail program on the desktop menu and started it up. I was a little embarrassed I hadn’t thought of it on my own. The window for the program popped up, and we could see a listing of about a dozen e-mail message headers. Each header showed the message subject, the name of the sender and the date it was sent. I immediately saw two headers of salient interest, but Duckworth’s eye was drawn elsewhere. “Look at that,” he said. “The bastard wrote an e-mail about me.” Duckworth double clicked on
a header that had his name in the subject. Another window opened with the message:

  To:nopenshaw (Nancy Openshaw)

  From:rteller (Roland Teller)

  Cc:rteller (Roland Teller)

  Subject: Chris Duckworth

  Nancy,

  As I have mentioned to you before, Chris Duckworth’s behavior is often insolent and flippant, so much so that it borders nearly on insubordination. This morning as I came through the lobby I found him combing out a woman’s blond wig on a Styrofoam head. When I told him that I didn’t consider this an appropriate activity for the company receptionist to engage in, he told me “not to get my knickers in a twist” and suggested that he could comb out my toupee when he was finished.

  I do not wear a toupee!

  Nancy, as head of Facilities, all shared administrative personnel report to you, including Chris Duckworth. I expect that you will make clear to him that this sort of performance will not be tolerated. Furthermore, I strongly suggest that you place him on probation with the understanding that one more incident like this will result in his termination.

  Thank you.

  --Roland

  “I’m so misunderstood,” sniffed Duckworth, and wiped an imaginary tear.

  “Yes, I see how everyone misinterprets your attempts to reach out. Now if you are done wallowing in the artifacts of your wrecked career at Mephisto, I would be interested in reading the pair of e-mails Teller seems to have exchanged with Terri McCulloch.”

  Duckworth returned to the list of headers and double clicked on a message that had apparently been sent to Teller by Terri about two months prior. It read:

  To:rteller@mephisto.com (Roland Teller)

  From:mantis_girl@aol.com (Terri McCulloch)

  Subject: Software Licensing Proposal

  Dear Mr. Teller,

  My name is Terri McCulloch and I represent Edwin Bishop. As I am sure you are aware, Mr. Bishop is a very well respected name in the software game industry. In addition to personally developing a number of extremely successful game programs, including the seminal video arcade game “Pest Control,” he founded and took public the game company, Ajeeb, which today has a market capitalization of over $750 million.

  While Mr. Bishop has set aside the burden of corporate operational management, he continues to have a strong interest in game development. His most recent effort in this area is a computer chess program dubbed “The Turk,” which we can say with confidence is vastly superior to any chess program on the market. Mr. Bishop has matched The Turk against several highly ranked Grand Masters in tournament play, with the result that The Turk has defeated the human players in eight out of ten games.

  Mr. Bishop is now seeking a publisher to distribute his game. He has a great deal of respect for Mephisto, Mr. Teller, and is particularly impressed with the user interface technology in your company’s offerings. We believe that the marriage of The Turk’s underlying chess strategy engine with your user interface technology would be an unbeatable combination.

  With this goal in mind, Mr. Bishop has asked me to contact you to open negotiations for licensing his game to Mephisto. If you are interested, please respond by return e-mail and suggest a time when we might meet for a demonstration of the program and an initial discussion of terms.

  Thank you for your consideration.

  Regards,

  Terri McCulloch

  “There’s your smoking gun on the software theft,” said Duckworth. “If you needed one. What’s with McCulloch’s ‘mantis girl’ e-mail alias do you suppose?”

  “You don’t want to know. Let’s take a gander at the next message.” Duckworth brought up the text:

  To:mantis_girl@aol.com (Terri McCulloch)

  From:rteller (Roland Teller)

  Cc:rteller (Roland Teller)

  Subject: Re: Software Licensing Proposal

  Dear Ms. McCulloch,

  Thank you for your recent e-mail regarding the possibility of licensing Edwin Bishop’s new chess software. While I respect Mr. Bishop’s work and would very definitely be interested in exploring an arrangement to license the game, your method of approach is a little unusual.

  I’d like to suggest that you call me at the Mephisto offices so that I can get a better understanding of your authority to negotiate on Mr. Bishop’s behalf. I’m sure you can appreciate that it would be very easy for someone outside Mr. Bishop’s circle to send an electronic mail message claiming to negotiate for him, especially as he is not a public person and tends to reclusion.

  Also, as you are perhaps aware, Mr. Bishop and I once had a business dispute of a relatively serious nature. Therefore, I am somewhat skeptical of his interest in negotiating with me now.

  In any case, I will look forward to your call. Best regards, Roland Teller

  Duckworth leaned back on the couch and locked his hands on top of his head. “Hmm,” he said. “I guess Teller wasn’t quite so dumb after all.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I’m sure he was fine until he talked to McCulloch- and more importantly-saw her. Then she probably put a collar on him and led him around the block on a leash.”

  “Ha! And you still don’t think she murdered him?”

  “I never said I didn’t think she murdered him. I just said there was some evidence to the contrary.”

  “You should get a job in physics splitting atoms,” said Duckworth. “You do a great job on hairs.”

  “Right. You got any more tricks in your bag?”

  Duckworth sipped his wine, and then began manipulating the mouse and the keyboard. “There are two more things we can try that might be of interest. First of all, we can bring up his word processing program. Almost all word processors keep track of the last four or five files that you’ve edited on the file menu. If we see anything interesting we can bring up the document and look at it. Sort of like pressing the redial button on a phone.”

  A word processor came up on the laptop screen. Duckworth went to the file menu and clicked the left mouse button. A list of four files was shown at the bottom of the menu before the exit option:

  1 C:DOCCompany Address.doc

  2 A:To-Do.doc

  3 C:DOCBishop Agreement.doc

  4 C:DOCBoard Meeting.doc

  Duckworth immediately selected the “Bishop Agreement” document. “File not found,” came the response.

  “Nuts,” said Duckworth. “He must have deleted it.”

  “If it was the contract for licensing the software, I’m almost surprised he had a copy in the first place. You’d expect the company lawyers would prepare that.”

  “He could have asked for a soft copy to review,” said Duckworth reasonably. “Or it might have just been the rough terms for the agree-ment-not the final contract.”

  “Yes, I suppose. What about the to-do list? Can we look at that?”

  “Sorry, August. The entry references the floppy drive and there’s no floppy loaded.”

  “Okay, what was your second idea?”

  “It’s similar. We can bring up his web browser and look at the bookmarks he’s set up to see what web sites he’s been visiting.” Duckworth killed the word processor and double clicked on the icon that represented the web browser. As it came up, the program complained that the computer wasn’t connected to the Internet, but Duckworth was still able to select the bookmarks menu entry. He laughed when he caught sight of the listing:

  1.http://www.playboy.com

  2.http://www.penthouse.com

  3.http://www.animal-instincts.com

  4.http://www.bootybarn.com

  5.http://www.pantyman.com

  6.http://www.girlswithgirls.com

  7.http://www.pornobuffet.com

  8.http://www.pussy4free.com

  “It’s all the same with you breeder boys,” he said. “Big tits make the world go round.”

  “I don’t even want to know what you think makes the world go round.” I slugged down the rest of my drink and stood up. “Thanks for your help, Chris. I’ll be sure
to give you a whole chapter in my memoirs.”

  Duckworth chuckled. “If you want, I can hang onto the laptop and do some more digging. There may be other stuff I could turn up with a little more time.”

  “No, given what we found, I think we have to turn the computer over to the cops.” While Duckworth powered off the laptop and folded it up, I walked over to the parking meter and plunked in a quarter. “There’s a little hard currency for your efforts,” I said.

  “My appreciation knows no bounds,” he said and passed over the computer.

  I said good-bye and drove home to my first night of normal sleep in what seemed like a very long time.

  DALY CITY BONDAGE

  I HAD SEEN TODD NAGEL’S ADDRESS WHEN I looked at his wallet at Fisherman’s Wharf, but I could not recall the street or the number. Finding them turned out to be as easy as calling information and asking. He lived in the 300 block of Palisades Drive, a street that paralleled the Pacific Ocean in the northwest part of town, less than two miles from the San Francisco city line.

  I was feeling well rested, well breakfasted and peaceful, so rather than jumping on the freeway with all the morning commuters, I got on Geary and drove west to Point Lobos and the start of the Great Highway, which ran north and south along the beach. I drove south past the Cliff House and the ruins of the Sutro Baths, through Golden Gate Park and by the Dutch Windmill that looked out on the area where the Bay to Breakers race finished, down a long stretch of the highway-where sand dunes and bicyclists bundled against the morning chill were the main features of interest-onto Skyline Boulevard, past Lake Merced and the attendant golf courses, and across the line into Daly City. The sky and ocean remained a featureless gray, and there was a heavy moisture in the air that had me running the creaky wipers on the Galaxie the whole way down.

  Nagel’s house was in a neighborhood filled with houses exactly like his. It was a two-story California stucco special, with the bulk of the living space layered on the second floor above the garage. The main things that distinguished the house from the rest on the block were the fresh yellow paint job, the well-manicured lawn with a plot of yellow and purple flowers I didn’t know the names for, and a “For Rent” sign tacked on the garage door. I couldn’t see into the back yard, but from looking at a map I knew the lot must butt against a strip of parkland that ran along the ocean in this area. Daly City was not exactly a top-drawer address, but given the ocean view, the size and the condition of the property, and the general prosperity of the neighborhood, this was a house that must rent for at least sixteen hundred dollars a month. Somehow Nagel and sixteen hundred dollars a month did not seem to go together. I wondered if the landlord was trying to evict him so that he could rent the place to a better prospect.