The Silk Code

by Paul Levinson

  “Dammit, Michael—how the hell can I believe anything you say now?”

  “Because I’m telling you the truth, Phil. Like you said in that conversation we had in the Yorkville, there’s no way I can prove it to you, but I’m telling you the truth. I care about Amanda. I’ll even admit that I know a bit more here and there than what I’ve let on. But when it comes to the murders, to what happened to Amanda in New York, to Antonescu missing—you’ve got to believe me, I’m as much in the dark about this as you.”

  I shook my head and turned away.

  “In fact, I’ve been thinking this through,” Mallory continued, “and I firmly believe you may be closer to getting at what’s going on here than anyone. I may have been wrong about London and Toronto. I don’t care how much your fine mayor has cleaned up your city, it’s still a goddamn shithole. The answer lies there.”

  EIGHTEEN

  Jenna looked at our grocery bag as the clerk squeezed in two bottles of Valpolicella.

  “Too heavy for you,” she said to me. “Could you put the wine in a separate bag please?” she asked the clerk.

  I started to object, but knew better. I took the bag with the steak, salad, crusty bread, and two half gallons of Tropicana, and let Jenna carry the wine. I looked at her face and realized how much I was looking forward to seeing it in the candlelight flickering off the red wine tonight.

  I opened the door of the store to big warm raindrops—the kind you find in New York only in August, maybe the beginning of September. “Should we make a run for it or wait?”

  Jenna smiled. “I’ve never known you to wait for anything.”

  We ran for it, and I wondered the same thing I always did when I was carrying something heavy: was it less strain on the body to move fast and get the heavy carrying over with quickly, or walk slowly, which required less energy per step but took longer? I’d never been able to figure that one out, and so always just moved as quickly as possible. Jenna kept up, hugging her paper bag, chin just peeking over the top, as we scurried across the street against a changing light.

  “My neck itches,” she said, as we turned on to 85th Street.

  “It’s probably the wet edge of the paper bag against your skin.”

  “No, it’s something else. I always get this feeling when I think that someone’s following me.”

  I turned around and peered into the rain, which had gotten heavier.

  Jenna clutched her bag tightly and increased her speed. She pulled ahead of me, then turned around quickly, and nearly bumped into an elderly man struggling along with a cane. I swerved out of the way of two small dogs yapping on chains…

  Then—what was that, across the street? It looked like someone familiar. But on more careful, watery scrutiny it was just a tin garbage can at a peculiar angle in the rain…

  Our brownstone was up ahead. “We’re almost there!” I called out, as cheerily as I could.

  “Good!” Jenna called back.

  We rushed up the outside stairs. Jenna groped for her keys. “I’m sorry for overreacting—” she started to say.

  A hand touched my shoulder—

  I whirled around—

  Jenna screamed and dropped the wine.

  “Dr. D’Amato? I’m sorry if I frightened you—”

  “That’s OK,” I said. It was Mrs. Devlin, the busy-body from the ground floor. Every apartment house in the city had one.

  “Someone was here looking for you before,” she said. “Did he find you?”

  “No. Did he have a uniform?”

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Did he look like a caveman?”

  Mrs. Devlin gave me a look. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “Well, I’m just trying to figure out who—”

  “I’m surprised at you, Dr. D’Amato. Someone of your intelligence and education should know that looks don’t count. People are all the same. Black and white, men and women, young and old, I don’t see any differences. We’re all of us God’s children…”

  My eyes wandered off during the lecture to find Jenna. She was at the bottom of the stairs, putting the bleeding paper bag with the broken wine bottles into the trash. The rain had stopped and the sun was out. “I’ll go back and replace these,” she half said and signalled to me, smiling that everything was all right now—

  “No, I will—”

  “Dr. D’Amato! Are you listening to anything I’ve been saying? That’s the trouble with everyone these days—no one listens anymore. All people do is talk, talk, talk…”

  For an instant I contemplated throwing her down the stairs, and running after Jenna. Or maybe asking Mrs. Devlin to hold my bag, as I went after Jenna. No, I’d enjoy throwing her down the stairs more… But Jenna was already out of sight, so I decided to spend a few more minutes questioning Devlin.

  “Did the man have any facial hair that you can recall. Beard? Moustache…”

  DEVLIN COULDN’T HAVE been more unhelpful if she’d tried. The more I pushed her for details, the more she receded, until she offered that she wasn’t even sure whether the man who was looking for me had come by today or the day before. The heat was up after the rain, our salad was in danger of wilting, so I ended the useless conversation and dashed upstairs.

  Three messages were waiting for me on the answering machine, all in response to calls I had made in the morning.

  “Phil, glad you’re home,” the first message said. “We have to talk about some things. Stop breaking Herby Edelstein’s balls on that handkerchief thing—you can’t push people so hard. That’s not the way we work—you know that. Things take a hike from the property room once in a while, that’s just the way it is.” I pressed fast-forward and turned Dugan’s voice into a screech.

  “This is Maria Heske from the Bobst Library at New York University returning Dr. Phil D’Amato’s call,” the second message told me, officiously. “Ruth Delany is out of the office today, but will be available to receive your call after nine o’clock tomorrow morning.”

  Thank you.

  The third message was from Jenna’s friend Bonnie—the one she’d consulted here about the Tocharian…

  “Bonnie Mitcham calling at 2:15, returning Phil’s call. Actually, I was thinking of calling you anyway. Phil, I was wondering how your meeting went with Pedro Sanches in London? I sent him some e-mail yesterday about a thought I had about how we might interpret the manuscripts. Sort of a reversal of what—well, no need for me to go into that now, that’s not why I wanted to call you. Pedro—Dr. Sanches—usually responds to my e-mail promptly the very next morning, and, well, I haven’t heard from him yet today, and I know it’s only the afternoon, but, well, I guess I’m jittery about all of this and just wanted to make sure everything was OK…”

  One of those jittery days for everyone, it seemed. I listened to Bonnie’s message again, then picked up my phone and pressed *69 for call return. Great, she had it blocked, and hadn’t left her number in the message. All right, let’s see…

  I rifled through the papers on Jenna’s desk. She always kept her most important phone numbers scribbled on papers on her desk… She should be home any minute, in case I couldn’t find it, but…

  Ah, here it was…

  Bonnie’s number rang and rang. No answering machine.

  I put the phone down and thought. I picked it up and dialed Mallory at his office. No answer—of course not, it was past ten in the evening there already.

  I got out my old-fashioned Rolodex, and called him at his home.

  No answer there either. Didn’t the kids have school tomorrow? Nah, I guess not, it was August…

  I thought a bit more, and put in a call to Amanda’s home number. She’d left it, amazingly, on the card she’d given to Amos—in case he or Lapp thought of anything else they’d like to share…

  Her phone began that British chirping ring…

  “MMMM, I’LL LET the machine take that,” Amanda said. “See how much I missed you? That could be an important lead
on the phone, but I’d rather stay right as I am with you.” She put her head on Mallory’s chest. “I missed your heartbeat.” She kissed his breast and sighed contentedly.

  “We’re becoming too attached,” Mallory replied, and ran his hand down her back. “We’ll just have to do something about that, now won’t we.”

  “Oh yes? And what might that be?” She extended her legs, so her toes were just on top of his in the bed.

  “Dunno,” Mallory said. “I guess see more of each other.”

  “But you’re a married man.”

  “I know,” Mallory said, and pulled away. “OK, enough of this, then. Let’s talk about the case.”

  “Mmmm, don’t.” She pulled him back and snuggled. “I’m sorry for raising that dreadful issue. I promise I won’t mention it anymore, this evening.”

  “Right, that’s all right,” Mallory said. “We need to talk about the damned case anyway.”

  “See what a good lay will do for a journalist?” Amanda said. “My colleagues at the Beeb say they have to talk to you until they’re blue in the face to get the slightest information from you, and even then they’re never sure you’re telling the truth.”

  “It’s not just that you’re a good lay, you know.” He draped his hand over the back of her thigh. “Working for New Scotland Yard yourself may have something to do with it.”

  “Mmmm…” She put her mouth against his, stretched out more fully on top of him, and was glad to feel how aroused he had become again…

  “Oh all right,” Mallory said. “We can talk about the case later…”

  AMANDA DROPPED ICE cubes in a glass. “What’ll it be, love?”

  Mallory was sitting up, leaning back against the big mahogany headboard on Amanda’s bed, hands clasped around the back of his neck. “Just ginger ale for me. I decided to go on the wagon, at least until this ugly business is over.”

  “That bad, eh? When did you decide to do that?”

  “Just now,” Mallory replied. “Looking at you, thinking what happened to you in New York. I don’t like feeling so out of control.”

  “We don’t really know what happened to me in New York. I just woke up on the floor down there, remember? Even under Soames and his trance, I hadn’t a clue of recall about who brought me down there.”

  “Exactly,” Mallory said. “That’s the problem—we don’t know enough.”

  “I’ll tell you one thing,” Amanda said, with a sudden surge of anger. “Don’t ever stick another bug under my skin when I’m sleeping—not if you want to see me again.”

  “OK.” Mallory had told her how he’d rubbed some powerful local anaesthetic on her shoulder while she was asleep, the night before her trip to the States, and inserted the tiny bug. No point lying about that now—they needed to get everything out in the open. “I did it in part to protect you.”

  “Didn’t work very well, then, did it?”

  “No, apparently not. Look, I’m sorry—”

  “It’s OK.” Amanda came back with his ginger ale, and a Perrier for her. “I forgive you.” She kissed him.

  “So let’s talk about the States,” Mallory said.

  “You heard the tapes that you got off the bug—you know, I promised those people that I wasn’t taping them.”

  “I said I was sorry,” Mallory said.

  Amanda snorted. “Well there’s not much more I can think of than what’s already in those interviews. None of those people seem like murderers, that’s for sure. The Neanderthal man was a real gentleman, the Amish man’s got a bit of a stick up there for sure, but he’s sincere too—”

  “So the Neanderthal seemed like a real gent to you, did he?”

  “Yes, he did,” Amanda said. “Why—”

  “And you would be in a good spot to know that, wouldn’t you?”

  “Yes, I mean, what exactly are you—”

  “One might even say, you have the right genetic endowment for that?”

  Amanda said nothing.

  “You see my problem, then.”

  “How did you find that out?” Amanda finally asked.

  “From Phil Fucking D’Amato,” Mallory answered, pronouncing the last name so that it sounded like someone he’d imagine in Brooklyn pronouncing tomato. “I covered as best I could—pretended I already knew. Managed to stammer something out about your plastic surgery. Just who the hell are you? You work for us, you work for the BBC—who else do you work for?”

  “You think, what? I’m part of some secret society of people with Neanderthal genes plotting to take over the world?”

  “You tell me,” Mallory replied.

  “I’d wager there are millions of people on this Earth today who have some genes like mine,” Amanda said, quietly. “Some of them have formed groups, certainly. Some are indeed very old. Just like there are very old ongoing groups of Homo sapiens sapiens. For God’s sake, Christianity is two thousand years old. Judaism is even older.”

  “Indeed,” Mallory said. “And does your group have a bible?”

  “No, of course not,” Amanda said. “You’re not listening. It’s not formal like that. We don’t take our marching orders from some central authority.”

  “No? How then does the ‘we’ that you keep mentioning keep in touch?”

  “Mostly memes in the music,” Amanda said. “Melodic phrases, catchy pieces of lyrics. They may be composed by Homo sapiens sapiens, but others—we—use them for our own purposes. It’s, I don’t know, I guess a whole subterranean communication system. It’s been going on for millennia, in folk songs and the like, but radio and rock ‘n’ roll did a lot to help us. You know how it works? There’s a musical riff from a Beatles song, or an old rhythm and blues song, and it shows up on lots of new songs, and each time we hear that riff it conveys something to us. Sometimes it evokes a specific past experience—I’ve heard older people say that when they hear an early Beatles song, they immediately think of the death of JFK. I think all Homo sapiens respond in that way. But, for us, its also something deeper. If Plato was right that we have innate knowledge, even recollections of things that happened before we were born—genetically conveyed knowledge, we might now call that, or maybe a Jungian innate archetype—then for my kind, certain types of music actually trigger certain kinds of genetic memories, certain kinds of knowledge. I guess you have that too, when a minor chord makes you sad or restless, and a major chord makes you feel happy or complete. With us, that general feeling is just more precise, more specific, in terms of telling us things. Does that make sense? I don’t know—I don’t fully comprehend it, myself.”

  “Tell me about our mummy, Max Soros,” Mallory urged.

  “Soros was alive after the LSE mummy was discovered,” Amanda said. “He and our mummy were two different people—like Stefan and the mummy in New York.”

  “So where is Soros now?”

  “Dead,” Amanda replied. “Likely at the hands of the same person or persons unknown who lured me down to that lobby in New York.”

  Mallory touched her face with his fingertips, tentatively at first. Then he pulled her close to him, kissed her head, until she stopped shuddering.

  NINETEEN

  I awoke with a start, and looked at my watch. Goddamnit, I close my eyes for a moment, and here it is an hour later.

  “Honey? Jenna?”

  No answer.

  She definitely should have been home by now.

  I rubbed my eyes. I was bone tired—still on British time. No response yet from Mallory or Amanda on the message I’d left about Pedro on her machine—who knew if Mallory even had heard it. Well, I’d have to leave England to its own devices a little longer. Jenna was my first priority.

  I’d trace her steps to the liquor store. I’d throttle that busy-body on the ground floor’s neck until she told me who the hell had come looking for me this morning…

  I grabbed my wallet and keys, yanked open the door—

  “Jesus Christ!” Jenna screamed. “You almost gave me a heart attack—w
hat are you doing opening the door so suddenly like that?”

  I put my arms around her and held her…

  She kissed my ear. “I miss this when you’re away.”

  “Me too.” I felt something crunchy, glassy, under my feet.

  Jenna looked down. “Two bottles of red wine. Hopeless case for us today. I went over to Maurino’s on Second Avenue—he closed early for some unknown reason—so I had to trudge all the way over to Lexington and 86th. And then I ran into that guy from the bookstore on the way back—he wants you to talk at that panel they’re doing on strange detectives.”

  “It’s OK,” I said. “I mean, I’m sorry I made you drop the wine.” I knelt down and carefully picked up the oozing bag. “Hey, it looks like one of the bottles may have survived my panic attack.”

  “Good,” Jenna said. “I also bought coffee ice cream and morello cherries, so it wouldn’t have been a total loss in any event.” She held up the small bag in her hand that I hadn’t noticed at first.

  “Impossible for anything to be a total loss where you’re involved.”

  THE PHONE RANG the next morning—it hurt like hell.

  Jenna got it. “…Oh, I’m fine. Thanks… Sure, hold on a minute, he may be in the shower.”

  She came over with the portable phone, on hold. “Jack Dugan. Should I tell him you’ll call him back? I’ve got breakfast for you in the kitchen. No point in my asking him to give me a message for you—he never does.”

  “Nah, I’ll talk to him now,” I said, and rubbed my stomach. It felt like an elephant herd had been trampling over it all night. Damn jet lag—took me days sometimes to get over it, even on this side of the Atlantic. I’d once heard of some head of some huge corporation who insisted that all his employees operate on his time, wherever in the world he went. Nice perk if you could get it…

  “Jack,” I sounded as crisp as I could. “How are you doing?”

  “Fine, Phil,” he said back, even more crisply. “I’ve got something to brighten your day. And I hope you learn something from this: you’ve got to lay back more, let events take their course. You can’t always force everything on to your schedule.”