Murder in the Fabric

by Andrew Jennings

Simonovic and the girl arriving at work. The wonder of computers, so literal.

  “Exclude locations inside their work location.”

  There was a visible pause. George liked it when the wall paused. It meant he was asking questions that made use of all of that massed computer power. He half expected a zero tally from this. But there were ten videos including them both.

  A street. A cafe. First his car. Then hers, minutes later. Even better, she looked around as if to check whether they were followed. He checked twice, to make sure they went into the same place.

  George turned to Alice.

  “How upset was she?” he asked

  “You mean was she sobbing because she had engaged our fancy hardware hacker to dispose of him?” she said

  “No, of course not.”

  “On a scale to 10 of grief stricken, I’d put her at a seven.” she said

  He scrolled through the videos. Cafes. Not the same one. Did the shift in location signify anything?

  “What do you make of this?” George asked Alice.

  “A relationship of some sort. It might be completely innocent.” she said.

  “And it might not be.”

  He was half inclined to ask the wall ‘Find the two of them in bed together’ and expect to get an answer. He smiled to himself.

  “So you want to know whether they were doing the horizontal jogging.” Alice said. “Why not just the old fashioned way. Find her best friend and ask her.”

  “Associates. Girl in video.” George said to the wall. He didn’t even need a name. It would do that.

  “Name of all.” he said. Finally.

  It gave him the name of the girl: Amy Christensen. It gave him a list of friends, with pictures.

  “You up for chasing the girlfriends?” George asked Alice.

  “Tea and sympathy.” she said.

  “Yes or no.” he said.

  Of course the answer was always going to be yes. So as Alice trudged off to chase the girlfriends, George was left with his thoughts and the wall.

  “Financial analysis. Simonovic.” he said.

  The wall threw a whole array of graphs at him. He turned to Steve.

  “Can you make anything of this?” he asked.

  “Nothing unusual. Family expenses. Try this.” Steve said, turning to the microphone.

  “Time based. New transaction types, last three months.” he said to the wall.

  Another set of graphs came up.

  “Look at that.” Steve said.

  “At what.” George asked. It was a bit abstract.

  “Cafe receipts.”

  “We knew that from the video.” George said.

  “Unusual cash withdrawals.”

  “Motels.”

  “Worth a search?” Steve said.

  “But how do we do that? If he’s paying cash.”

  The wall was very powerful. But you had to know how to drive it. These were not stupid people. They knew that if they showed their faces in a motel foyer, or outside in the street then it would be recorded. Once it was recorded then it was up for search. Once it was up for search then it was going to be discovered.

  “Hm. They are not going to leave a trace, are they?” Steve asked.

  “No.”

  // Robert

  It must have been one of his earliest memories. The train from New Jersey sliding into Grand Central Station. Up the stairs and onto the street it was a different universe. A universe where the buildings were tall and shining. He liked this universe. It seemed to have all of the things that were not at home. Money. Excitement. Possibilities.

  As he held his mother’s hand and stared up at the glass he made plans. He wasn’t aware of it, but one of the buildings was the Defigo building. Beckoning.

  At school he found a way. He asked the teachers how he might get there. They told him that mathematics and physics might get him a ticket. It was the only hint he needed. There was a well worn path from MIT to Defigo. He got on it.

  // Mia

  Her thoughts returned to the bank, and Oscar. As she entered the flat he was asleep on the couch. He stirred momentarily.

  “Nice work if you can get it.” she said

  He smiled, and returned to his dreams.

  It wasn’t just a matter of breaking into the bank’s networks. That was hard enough, and why the girl was needed. But this on its own would not really inflict any lasting damage.

  Mia searched, curious as to why the backers wanted this outcome. Try as she might she could not help but be curious as to who they were. Apart from anything else her whole future was inextricably tied up with them. She only slowed down slightly as she walked down Swanston Street towards the apartment. Melbourne still worked its magic on her, but now it was part of every day it was harder to notice.

  “Great to see you in the land of the living” she said to Oscar, as he stirred to life.

  “Hard night partying. Reminiscent of my bad old days” he said

  “Before you became an upright citizen.” she said.

  “The bank.” he said

  “You think it’s time?” she asked

  “Well I think she’s up for it. I’ve sold it to her as a protest thing. Big bad bank suffers a slight hiccup for a while. Just a protest at their outrageous profits.”

  “How much do you think she knows?”

  “How much do we know?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “She’s smart, in that non street-smart way. That I’m not exactly who I say I am. Adds to the thrill I think. Still angry with mummy and daddy for being rich and indifferent. That sort of thing.”

  “She won’t run?”

  “No.”

  “Exactly how do we do this?” she said

  “Treacle.” he said

  “What?”

  “They assume that attacks are for the purpose of stealing money. Not a hard call when you are a bank.”

  “Sure. Treacle?”

  “Slow everything down. To a crawl. We bog down the main servers doing useless stuff.”

  “You’re confident?”

  “I can show you the simulations.”

  // George

  George looked away, in the direction of the wall. Struggling to come up with a query that would progress things. Sometimes all of that computing power was not very useful. So he went for a walk. He headed west down past the stadium towards Docklands proper.

  Docklands had been the subject of endless criticism from the city. ‘This is what happens when developers control things.’ had been the mantra. Lots of open space, no life. The ‘real Melbourne’ was in the tiny lanes leading away from Flinders Street station. As if things had to be Tokyo scale before they were human. It stung, all that criticism. About ten years ago they had migrated artists into Docklands with free rent. Ever so gradually it became more human. There was nothing about open space that couldn’t be humanised.

  George admired the sculptures, and the 3D media spaces. A straggly crowd, some young families. It pleased him that it had changed. Reinvention. That sort of thing. He tried not to think about the case. It was that time, when the progress versus time flags would trigger. Soon he would be sitting in Kate’s office explaining, or trying to explain, his lack of progress.

  He reached the edge of the water, and the yachts moored. When did these things ever get some use? Were they just trophies? He’d never understood the urge to float about in the water.

  Turning back towards the fun palace, slowly walking up the hill his thoughts returned to the car diving across the freeway divide. It was such an elaborate way to kill someone. If they had the capability to modify the car’s code almost without leaving a trace, surely there was a less spectacular way of achieving the objective? Was it a message?

  Alice and Steve looked up as George came in. As if expecting him to have found the missing pieces in his walking. He just smiled at them.

  “Going out again.” he said.

  He didn’t ne
ed to explain. They knew the patterns. After taking the train, George was early. He was always early. On a bench in the rotunda, at the hill above Sandringham beach. You could see the curve of the coastline. In the late afternoon the wind had come up, strong enough to blow white into the top of the waves.

  Joggers were passing him at the edge of breathlessness. But when George walked down the track he was in no hurry at all. Almost a funereal pace. Watching the edge of the light as the sun descended. The last windsurfers tracking across the field of view, holding the wind until they were forced, finally, to tack. Throwing the sail and standing still for a brief moment, at the point of balance. Then rushing back, with the wind at their backs.

  He followed the narrow headland track around as far as the where the road diverged down to the marina. He turned slowly and headed back towards the lights. Toward the cafe.

  George and Alex Marchetti went way back. Not back to school, but to University. They were part of the same crowd. That went to the same places, the same parties. Alex would catch George’s eye, or vice versa. She was tall, dark, tanned. George was fit in those days. He was tall, and had that hint of good looks. The slightly unshaven look. Then came that summer. All of them. All twenty of them. On a train, a bus. To a caravan park at Marlo for the whole summer. Just a short walk to the pub. So days would be the beach, surfing or swimming. Nights would be sessions at the pub. Long sessions.

  George and Alex had both had partners. As much as anyone had partners. It was a bit of revolving circus, but there were attachments. Nobody was supposed to get too jealous, and nobody was supposed to cling too tight. George and Alex would often be seen sitting, talking.

  The fateful afternoon. They had both stepped away, to walk along the beach together. Nothing unusual about that. Happened all the time. Nobody gave it a second glance. Alex