by Mark Lingane
Joshua put his shoulder to the door. He had guessed correctly. The door moved a fraction of an inch, and he leaned his weight to it. It swung another few precious inches and he ducked his way in. The door swung back on its hinges with a resounding thud. He was in.
Next was the secretary. He had already seen the interior of the building so its gaudiness offered no threat. She sat behind her immense desk filing her nails. She didn’t bother to look up.
“Now listen here, young lady. I want to know who wrote this letter to me.” He hammered his umbrella viciously on the desktop.
“If you have a complaint write to The Phone Company,” she said. She still didn’t bother to look up.
“I’ll have you know I’ve already done that.”
“Well, what’s the problem then?”
“I want to know who wrote the reply to my letter.” He brought out a piece of paper and waved it in the air vaguely but not too close to the receptionist.
“They wrote back?” she said in disbelief. She looked up.
Success, he thought.
“Someone here wrote back?” She shook her head in disbelief. “It certainly wasn’t me.” She folded her arms and glared at Joshua. There was a moment’s pause. She unfolded her arms and leaned forward. “In fact, I don’t believe you. I think you’re making it up. Let’s see this so-called letter from The Phone Company.”
He had been prepared for this. He flourished the paper in front of the secretary and she, with lightning speed, grabbed it from him. He had spent some time researching the type of paper and the typeface they used. When he and Damien had created it, it had looked authentic—after he had corrected Damien’s spelling errors. Deliberate, Damien had protested, because anyone who worked in a place like that obviously wouldn’t know how to spel. A point to which Joshua was quite ready to agree except for the inclusion of spellcheckers in their word processors, including the ones owned by the executives. And Damien had pointed out that they didn’t have to use them.
Keeping her hand on top of the piece of paper on the desk and one eye on Joshua, the receptionist pulled a magnifying glass and a pair of tweezers out of her desk drawer. “I don’t know,” she said. “There are no spelling errors in this letter. We all know that none of them can spell.”
“I think you’ll find that they have spellcheckers with word processors these days,” he said.
“Yeah, but it doesn’t mean they use them,” she replied in an even slower tempo. She continued with her close examination of exhibit A. Joshua was just about to break into a sweat when she said, “It seems authentic, but I don’t know. This is most unusual. I mean just look at this. They’ve used words like ‘apologize’ and ‘inconvenience’. Where did they learn these words? Not here, I can assure you.”
“Well, there’s only one way to solve this problem, isn’t there?” Joshua said.
“I forget all about it? You go home and leave me alone?”
“No. Let’s find out who this D.R. is, then ask him.”
“Oh,” she said. “Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know about you, but I prefer my idea.”
“Tell you what I’ll do. You give me your internal phone directory card and I’ll look up him or her and liaise. You can go and do whatever it is that you do here.”
The receptionist thought about this. The idea certainly had merit. That way he could do all the work. “Deal,” she said finally. “But you won’t be able to work here. You’ll either have to take it home or do it in the security surveillance room over there under the watchful eye of our head of security.”
“Hmm, I think I’ll take it home and bring it back tomorrow, if that’s all right.”
“Tomorrow!” she screamed. “It certainly isn’t all right. What if someone wants it tomorrow? They’re going to come in and ask for it, and if it’s here I’ll have to give it to them. They’ll start asking questions, and I’ll still end up doing extra work. Keep it for a week and not a moment less.”
Joshua said his thanks and made a desperate leap for freedom out the front doors, the internal directory securely tucked into his jacket inner pocket.
Dealing with the security guard was going to be a problem. He was clean out of ideas for disguises. It was the last straw. He would have to rely on honesty. He wandered down the alleyway toward the rear entrance, being as conspicuous as possible. The entrance was a glass door set into the wall. The guard was situated behind a thick glass cabinet to the side of the door. The man noticed him and nodded.
Joshua nodded back. “Evening, sir. TOTD to you.”
“Ah, yes. Evening to you too.”
“Can I help you with anything? An EP or TTTD?”
“As a matter of fact, you can,” Joshua replied, ignoring the bit he didn’t understand.
Joshua leaned on the external counter. “My name is Joshua Richards. I’m a private investigator.” He flashed his Tesco card. “It seems that several days ago someone gained entrance to the building and used some of the equipment in the tech room for illicit reasons. I’ve been hired to have a bit of a snoop round.”
“It wasn’t me.”
“Hey, don’t get me wrong, I’m not accusing you of anything. I’ve come for your professional advice.”
The guard swelled with pride.
“Is it possible? Could it happen? Would an outsider be able to get in easily? I know you guys run a pretty tight ship here, security-wise. Or do you think it was an internal job?”
“It’s just about impossible for an outsider to get in. There are only two entrances: the front and this one here. You’ve seen the front, haven’t you?”
Joshua nodded.
“You know that’s not a real possibility so that only leaves here as a possible entrance point. Now, for someone to get in here it takes two things. A pass and me, or whoever is on the gate, entering the details on the computer here.” He indicated a small terminal next to him.
“Wouldn’t that slow entry down?”
“With the TMS plus the IDV it’s not too bad.”
Joshua nodded his head in the understanding way of bar patronizers everywhere who can’t hear what the person next to them is saying. “Yes,” he said. “The IDV.”
“Actually, it would be better, a lot better, if they would install one of those new BCRs.”
“I see.”
“But, as a whole, it’s terribly slow but people get used to it. Remember, it’s the public service here. It’s like they’ll accept anything that lets them do less work, like getting to work ten minutes later. Anyway, it makes sure no one unauthorized gets in. It’s slow but it works.”
“OK. So you’re saying this is an internal job?”
“The odds are with it. I mean we’re not G4S+, but we do try to do the best we can.”
“Hmm … the IDV. Yes.” Nod. Tilt head to side. Consult notepad. Nod again. “This might be a long shot but do you keep records on that thing?” Joshua indicated the guard’s small computer.
“What? This LTPC?” He pointed down at the computer on his desk and smirked. “Only for two weeks.”
Give a look of mild surprise and half nod. “That might be just long enough. Can you do a search on someone with the initials D.R.?”
The guard looked at Joshua for a few seconds and then, after what seemed like an internal decision, nodded. He turned and tapped the initials into the small machine. It buzzed for a few seconds and came up with a screen full of information.
“You know, it would be a lot faster if they gave me one of those H250s. I could really zip through the work then and everyone could get through in half the time. Even with an old H120 or even an S3X. But, no, they give me this ancient technology. It must be at least, what,” he shrugged, “eight or nine months old?”
Joshua nodded sympathetically. “I suppose they don’t want to get in too quickly.”
The LTPC beeped.
“OK. We have two hundred and thirty-five recorded entries of people with the ini
tials D.R. Any other ideas?”
“In two weeks?”
“They go out for coffee a lot.”
Joshua thought momentarily. “Ah. Has a D.R. come in only once in that time period?”
The guard squinted at his screen. “I wish they would get me a proper display.” His finger trailed down the screen. He muttered some numbers under his breath. “We have one here that has two listings only. All the others have at least nine. I’ll just pull up the information on that one.” He again pressed some buttons and there was more buzzing from the machine. He folded his arms while he waited for the machine to return the results. “They don’t give me the best of equipment, you know.”
“Yeah. They can be bastards like that. Arnie was complaining to me about that.”
“You met Arnie then?”
“Yeah.”
“Bit of a character, Arnie. Been here as long as I can remember.” The guard laughed and shook his head. “He used to be a real lad, too, getting up to all sorts of mischief with his high-tech toys down there. You know, I think that’s half the reason they took all the stuff away from him. He made too many of the big guns look like idiots. Let’s face facts, they pretty much are, aren’t they. You met many of them?”
“Well, as a matter of fact …”
“I know what you mean. They’re meant to work here and how often do you think I see them come in here? Not nearly enough, I’ll tell you. Ah, here it is.”
Joshua craned forward trying to make out what was on the screen but light reflected off it, making it impossible.
“Well, well, well. Would you look at that?”
“What?” said Joshua, desperately trying to look at it.
Somewhere someone thought, computers calculated, a decision was made, and something happened.
It was only a short walk from The Phone Company to Damien’s apartment and within half an hour Joshua was knocking on his front door.
Damien’s depressed face appeared around the door. “Oh, it’s you. Come in.”
Joshua forced his way through the barricade of pizza boxes. “Cheer up, chum. I need your help.”
Damien brightened a bit but not too much. “Help? From me?”
“Yep. In a case I’m currently working on.”
“A real case. You want me to help on a real case?”
“Yep.”
“Wow. What do you want me to do?” Damien stuck out several chins and his chest collapsed.
“I have a card here that I need read.”
“Oh. Is that all?” Damien deflated a bit.
“It’s got classified government information on it,” he said, one hundred percent truthfully.
Damien puffed up. “Classified, you say?”
“Highly secret.”
“Gosh. What is it? Defense? Military? Personal records of important officials?”
“Ah, maybe. Yes, why not?”
“Well, let us go forth to the den and read away.”
Damien led the way to his terminal. He rummaged around underneath it, making various grunting and groaning noises. He extracted himself and banged his head on the underside of the desk. He produced an old reader and held it up triumphantly. “Ta-da.”
“Does it work?”
“Of course it works.”
“You own something that works?”
“Well, um, it’s not actually mine.” Damien plugged it into a port on the holo-monitor face and touched the chip on the smartcard to the reader’s dark face. The list of phone company employees appeared in the air in front of the two.
Damien turned and looked expectantly at Joshua. “OK, what now?”
“We need to do a search on it.”
“That could be a bit tricky.”
“Why?”
“Well, it’s just straight data. I’ll have to run it all through a database program. Then we can manipulate it. Search and stuff.”
“Will that take long?” Joshua said, looking at his watch.
“No, not at all. I’ll whip it through in a couple of minutes.” Damien turned back to his terminal. He whizzed his mouse around the display hovering in front of him. Clicking here and dragging there, he muttered to himself for several minutes. “OK, I’ve organized it into a database and we can now search.”
“Good. I’m looking for someone with the initials D.R.”
Damien busily typed on his keyboard and sat back. “Now we wait.”
“For how lo—”
“Finished. OK, we have two listings. I’ll just call them up.”
Joshua craned over his shoulder to look at the display. The names had just come up on the holo-monitor. Neither of them were David Reaper. “Can you tell when they were entered into the directory?” he said.
“Yes. I did it just then.”
“No, not your one. I meant the card.”
“No problem.” Damien again took to the keys. “One was entered five years ago and the other just a year ago.”
“Oh well, the information I was hoping would be there isn’t.”
“Oh.” Damien looked sad again. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be any more help.”
“You did fine, a good job. It’s not your fault the information wasn’t there. Anyway, I got to go.”
“Why are you in a hurry?”
“I’ve got a da—” he stopped himself. “I’ve got a da-livery to make. Yeah. You know, sneak into somewhere and drop the card back before they notice it’s missing. You know.”
“Gee, I wish I was a detective. I bet you wouldn’t meet women.”
“Well, not for long. Someone usually shoots them. It’s not all it’s cracked up to be. I think your way of not meeting them is less life threatening.”
“How can not meeting women be life threatening?”
“Your defenses are down when you’re not meeting them. Anyway, I really do have to go.” Joshua got up and raced to the door. He raised his hat, wrenched open the door and leaped out.
16
AT EIGHT O’CLOCK JOSHUA wandered into the Blind Duck. Smoke was there and so was atmosphere and it promised to be that kind of night. He felt strangely nervous. He tried to savor the feeling. It seemed so long since he had felt like this. It was like the first time, again. Maybe it was. He knew this meeting meant something because he had washed and shaved.
“What’s all this, then?” Pete asked as Joshua sat at the counter. “Washed and shaved. My, my, would this be in aid of impressing a certain lady who was, like, ’ere yesterday?”
“None of your business,” Joshua said, grinning from ear to ear.
“What, I’m not allowed to be a detective no more?”
“I think you should keep in the drink-serving business.”
“Ah, well, there’s a thing.” He picked up a glass and started to dry it. He seemed to be taking an excessively intense interest in the glass.
“What?”
“Like you said yesterday about the country being a better place.”
“Did I?”
“Yeah. Well, I’ve decided to do the big move.” Pete was having trouble saying this. He put the glass down and leaned toward Joshua. “I’m gonna cash in me chips and get a nice little place in the countryside where there’s trees and stuff, and not as much rain.”
“That’s a quick turnaround. I thought you liked it here.”
“I do but, you know, there comes a time in every man’s life when he has to change. I want to get back to people.”
“But you deal with people all the time.”
“Yeah, but they’re city folk. Too stressed. Anyway the way things are going I reckon machines will replace people in ’ere soon, too. Just look at the world. It’s all run by computers and stuff. People aren’t important anymore and I’ve had enough.”
“But the countryside is so … different.”
“Yeah, well, I’ll try and pick things up as I go along. Like milking”—he paused, taking a guess—“cows and chickens and things.”
“Milking chickens?”
“Yeah. Well, where do you think …” he paused again and guessed “… you get eggs from? I’m pretty sure it’s chickens.”
“Aren’t eggs laid?”
“What? Like bricks.”
“I … don’t think so.”
“Nah. You gotta milk ’em to get the eggs out. Yeah, that’s right.”
“So, when is this going to happen?”
“Soon. Real soon. Got a potential buyer comin’ round tomorrow. If he likes the place then we sign and seal the deal, and by this time tomorrow I’m a free agent, like.”
“I’m amazed. Well, more shocked. But amazed too. Pete is going to the country so he can milk chickens.” He smiled.
“And cows.” He grabbed a bottle from the shelf behind him.
“Cows, yes. How could I forget?”
“Anyway have a drink on the ’ouse.” He poured Joshua a large helping of brain-cell death.
“I’m dreaming. Somebody pinch me. Hang on. If it means free drinks then don’t pinch me. If drinks be the food of dreams then sleep on.”
Pete looked hesitantly at him. “Yeah. Whatever. Anyway, come around tomorrow after eight and we’ll have a couple of quiet ones just before I go.”
“Does this mean more free drinks?”
“S’pose so.”
“I’m in.” Joshua slapped his hand down on the countertop.
Marianne entered the room and walked back to the smoky depths. All eyes in the room turned to watch her. She crossed the room with a determined look on her face. Her eyes didn’t waiver from her destination, as the rest of the room held no interest for her. The smoke curled around her and left a ghostly image in her wake. She still looked professional and utterly desirable.
“Hey, your missus is ’ere.” Pete nodded after Marianne’s disappearing form through the opaque smoke. “She looks all right, you know. ‘Specially after a few of these.” He held up his empty beer glass.
“ ’Tis the yeast,” Joshua nodded. “And Marianne is my fun.”