The Music of the Spheres

by Allister Thompson

  After Hastings had finished his story, Gonzalez smiled ruefully. “A very tall order you wish to set me. As you can see, dark-haired men in baggy suits aren’t exactly uncommon here. And the name he used in New York was no doubt false.” He paused. “Nonetheless, I will take on this case, for the sake of your loyalty to your friend and for a good-sized fee payable upon satisfactory completion. I admire any man who devotes his time to trying to free people from the chains of such governments as we now have in this oppressive world.” His blue eyes glowed passionately from under dark brows.

  Hastings was somewhat taken aback by this outburst. “Everyone I’ve seen here seems fairly happy.”

  “You haven’t visited the barrios, my friend, where the majority of the population lives. The whole country is under the thumb of the cartels, and the few wealthy people all work for them,” Gonzalez growled. “The image of freedom presented to foreign tourists is false. If any man manages to escape from this cocaine-induced trance that they keep us in and dares to speak his mind, he very likely won’t see another morning.” He walked over to a cabinet in the corner and unlocked it. Inside were several oxygen tanks. “Many times each day I have to try to clear my head in order to retain my freedom. You people up in the Virginias, you think that drugs are wonderful, that these companies provide their products generously for the benefit of humankind. They are parasites whose growth can’t be stopped. They govern this world, those makers of drugs, along with other corporations, not our so-called elected governments. They keep your people in thrall just as easily as they govern these grinning half-corpses, my countrymen. People are much more pliable when they are stoned by the TV or by ‘recreational pharmaceuticals.’” He stopped suddenly and sat down.

  “Look, friend, I’m well aware of the problems of the modern world. I don’t like it any more than you do, but you’ll have to excuse my ignorance of a country I’ve never visited. Now, are you going to help me or not?” said Hastings.

  He didn’t much like being lectured; it had always been the only source of friction between himself and Guy, aside from Guy’s predilection for homemade fixes. And Gonzalez’s speech had caused an unexpected bubble of guilt to rise to the surface; was his whole generation of rebels merely a stooge for international capitalists? He quickly repressed the thought.

  Gonzalez had sat down with his head in his hands after his outburst, recovering his equilibrium. He raised his head and smiled slowly. “I’m sorry, amigo. The strain of trying to keep a clear head in a city where my government puts drugs into the air to keep me from thinking for myself wears me out. It’s a wonder that we are not all insane here. Of course I’ll help you, for a price to be determined. It will be affordable, I assure you.”

  “Why don’t you move away?”

  “It’s not that easy. I work sometimes for the government, and that’s why I’m allowed to stay in business. The good money is accompanied by certain disadvantages, one of which is that I know too much about the inner workings of our society, and if I tried to leave, I would probably be jailed … or killed. I chose the wrong line of work. But enough of this. I doubt that the government, or the Cartels for that matter, will object to you trying to track down a criminal who may or may not be working on his own but is either a pharmaceutical smuggler or a man who concocts his own chemicals — a madman. Such activities are, of course, the worst crimes that that can be committed in our country, since they take profits directly out of the coffers of the Cartels. I would avoid dealing with our authorities, though, if I were you. As high as my price is, theirs would be higher and potentially much less … pleasant. I will make inquiries. You go to your hotel and wait for my call. When I have some information, I will contact you.”

  “You’re sure that this man isn’t working for the Cartels?”

  “If he was, you would never have seen him. The Cartels have a hundred years of homicidal experience behind them, and they don’t countenance mistakes from their operatives. He is likely not working alone, but my supposition, for the time being, is that he’s not in the employ of the corporate masters of Colombia. And besides, I know the Cartels’ product list very well, and those that our quarry was selling don’t sound familiar at all.”

  “Where will you start?”

  “Not many Colombians visit Virginia for any length of time. This man will have had to give his real name to reenter the country. I have friends in customs at the airport who may remember him. Naturally, he may have contacts there as well, or he would never have gotten out in the first place. Nonetheless, I may have some success if he was not too careful.” He extended his hand once more and ushered Hastings to the door. The secretary didn’t even look up as they passed her.

  Out in the light again, Hastings found that the street life, which had seemed so gay and lively earlier in the day, now seemed unnaturally vibrant, as though the people were animated puppets possessed by a malignant will. Their smiles looked ghastly in the red glare of the setting sun. A profound depression fell on him. When he reached his hotel, he decided to skip dinner and went straight to his room. He was glad that he had brought his portable tape player. Lying on the sheets of the queen-sized bed, which reeked of ingrained smoke, he fixed the reels in place, put his headphones on, and set his pack of Silk Cuts beside him. The sound of the new Delia Derbyshire album, his latest favorite, soothed his ears with layers of buzzing synthesizer. He fell asleep during the second piece.

  The phone rang shortly after 11:00 p.m.

  From The Modern City: An Urban Theorist’s Travelogue

  by Prof. S.R.J. Kilbey

  Surely the greatest affront to good taste in the world today is Bogotá, Colombia, the largest city in this rapidly developing country. Like all such countries, Colombia contains two solitudes, which rarely meet: a small, extremely wealthy ruling class and the great mass of peasants who serve them and starve for them. The middle class, mainly made up of tradesmen, is growing but small.

  It is truly disgusting that in a country where the majority of people live in abject poverty, the city’s government, at the bidding of the all-powerful Cartels, which dominate the political and economic life of the nation, has spent an undisclosed sum that may venture into the trillions erecting the famous dome, the so-called newest Wonder of the World. All readers should be familiar with the appearance of this dome; we have seen it on countless television programs and tourist brochures. This dome serves no apparent purpose but to appear grand and imposing, and it certainly is an engineering marvel (for which Germans were responsible). It is also expensive to maintain, since the temperature inside would be unbearable on sunny days without some regulation (it is, nonetheless, kept at a tropical temperature much of the time, possibly to keep the populace in an enervated state). The dome houses much of the government, embassies, and the business district, as well as wealthy and middle-class neighborhoods. Barrios cling to the outside of the dome like limpets on a rock, hence most tourists wisely choose to stay within the dome’s welcoming interior, stimulated by the trace amounts of cocaine in the atmosphere.

  The money pit of a spectacle, combined with the absolute indifference of the city’s government to living conditions outside the dome, earns Bogotá my lowest rating. Only through a healthy infusion of proper democracy will this city ever be restored to the provincial beauty that it once possessed.

  seven

  “I’ve been lucky, Mr. Hastings,” Gonzalez said, sitting at ease on a chair in Hastings’ room. “My contact has access to some pretty complete records at Bolívar Airport. Because of security features embedded within, it is nearly impossible to fake a Colombian passport, so our friend, whose real name is Ramón Rosas, has had to come and go under his own name, which I’m sure does not please him. But he wouldn’t have expected to be followed here, or even to be suspected of this murder in any way by someone so far away. He would have little cause for fear. I have looked him up, and I have a good idea of where he can be found.”

  “Very well,” Hastings replied. “You d
o work fast.”

  “Of course. I am the best, and I’ve spent my whole life learning the darkest secrets of this city. Do you know how to fire a gun?”

  “Of course not!” Hastings was shocked. “I am, in case you haven’t noticed, what people like to call a hippie. I don’t believe in the things.”

  Gonzalez threw back his head and laughed loud. “And what, my dear Mr. Hastings, did you expect to do when you came here? Did you think that when discovered Rosas would happily offer to hand himself over to the authorities? We need to bring this man in ourselves if we want the police to do anything. It’s the Colombian way.” He held out a shiny black pistol. “Careful, it’s loaded.”

  As he regarded this symbol of everything The Spheres stood against, Hastings began to feel that this trip had been a rash idea after all. But he had come all this way to bring the killer of his best friend to justice, and this was no time for faintheartedness. He wrapped his shaking fingers around the barrel, wincing in disgust. Gonzalez watched him with amusement.

  “Well, it seems you have gained some resolve. We’d better go. I will tell you about the illustrious career of our friend Rosas on the way. We’re going to a very interesting part of town, where a handgun is a necessary part of one’s wardrobe. My car is outside.”

  The night was jet-black and cloudless as they walked out of the lobby. Most of the streetlights appeared to be inactive, and only a few cars and no pedestrians were out on the roads. The air was perfectly still under the windless dome. Hastings noticed with astonishment that there were several strange lights, like hovering UFOs, placed at even intervals in the blackness. Then he realized that these were the night beacons, designed to warn airplanes away from the dome. Gonzalez’s car, a beat-up old Holden from New Wales, was parked at the curb.

  “I have another car, a much nicer German model, but we don’t want to draw attention,” he said, holding the passenger door open. “You are going to see the real Bogotá, the bars of the barrio, which the criminal elements tend to frequent.” The engine started with a cough.

  “You already know exactly where to find him?” Hastings asked skeptically as the car sputtered onto a main street.

  “Please give me some credit, Mr. Hastings!” Gonzalez puffed cheerfully on a cigarette and offered him some oxygen from a small cylinder. “We’ve got to have our wits about us. Well, Rosas was indeed already in my files, which made the job quite easy. I even have a photograph, in case you’ve forgotten what he looks like. A very dangerous man, perhaps even a wanted man, with some dangerous friends. He was extremely lucky to make it past the officials at the airport. He used to work, many years ago, for the Cartels, in their security department, which means that he has much blood on his hands. He was fired, reputedly for some clumsy overenthusiasm — massacring a whole village, I believe — and somehow managed to evade his own executioners or was for some reason allowed to escape. Since then, he’s made his living peddling homemade concoctions and serving as a part-time contract killer for small-time criminals. Not a skilled killer, but a ruthless one. He also has contacts in the slave trade. I don’t know where he holes up, but judging by his extrovert behavior in New York, I would say that there are three or four bars where he’s likely to spend his time.”

  “Won’t someone recognize you?”

  “That’s a risk we’ll have to take. However, there are almost as many investigators and informants as there are criminals in Bogotá, and I always take precautions. But, Mr. Hastings—”

  “Yes?”

  “I would recommend that you not speak while I make the inquiries. British subjects, and foreigners in general, are not highly regarded here.”

  The landscape had gradually begun to change during the drive. The streets around the hotel and business district had been deserted but clean, with few open establishments. Now, every second storefront seemed to be a bar of some kind, and the buildings were gradually becoming more run-down. There were many more people walking the streets, which were littered with refuse. Obviously, the wealthier neighborhoods were better served by the city, just as they were in any city in the world.

  The car approached what looked like a border crossing post.

  “What’s that?”

  “We are about to go outside the dome. The barrio has grown up outside the city limits, and there are too many people living in it for the government to be able to wipe it cleanly from the map.” Gonzalez chuckled. “Their location outside our beloved plastic home may explain why the inhabitants of the barrio, despite their poverty, seem to be lot more sharp-witted than my dome-dwelling neighbors. As a respectable citizen with a good business front, I am allowed to enter and exit the dome as I please, a luxury not afforded to the poorer citizens. I suggest again that you don’t speak. If we aren’t allowed out, we may never find our man.”

  The car drew up to the booth, and a blue-uniformed guard approached. He looked in, his gaze lingering disapprovingly on Hastings, who was starting to wish he’d brought different clothes and got a “straight” haircut. Gonzalez spoke in Spanish, and the guard grunted. He looked over Gonzalez’s papers for a few moments then gestured threateningly at Hastings. Gonzalez hurriedly added something else, which must have worked. The guard let out a gruff guffaw, smacked Gonzalez hard on the shoulder, winked exaggeratedly at Hastings, and waved the car through. Gonzalez sighed with relief.

  “What did you say?”

  “I told him you are a visiting client, a soft-drink importer from New Orleans, and that I am taking you to the barrio to pick up some whores. These fellows appreciate that sort of thing.”

  The neighborhood they were now in was one of the strangest places Hastings had ever seen. It was a shantytown. All of the one-story buildings were either constructed out of corrugated sheet metal or rough wooden planks. There were neon signs on many of the buildings, and large groups of ragged but lively-looking people, mostly men, stood clustered around the entrances. Many were either staggering about or holding each other up. Here and there a scantily clad woman teetered around on high heels from group to group, soliciting business. Even larger piles of garbage filled the gutters. Just as in Spanish Stockholm, there were street musicians playing on many of the corners.

  Gonzalez parked. “Welcome to the barrio. Better leave the car here. They don’t see many vehicles around here.”

  The air was palpably thicker when they got out of the car, the remnant of the day’s equatorial humidity. After passing a few shadowy side streets, presumably the residential areas of the barrio, they came upon a metal edifice larger than any they had come across, a sheet metal palace. It had a massive neon sign flickering above the door shaped like a nude woman, with the words La Virginiana emblazoned across her breasts.

  “A likely criminal hangout!” Hastings said.

  “Exactly. There are more dangerous felons here tonight than there are in the government jails.” Gonzalez grinned maliciously. “So try to look as evil as possible, my dear hippie.”

  A bouncer who looked about eight feet tall glared down at them as they went by. Inside, the bar was unbelievably crowded and noisy. There was no live entertainment, but the sounds of the jukebox and of the shouting and laughing and breaking glass created an almost unbearable cacophony. The air reeked of beer, tequila, and stale sweat. The male patrons seemed to be divided by two fashion styles. About half of them wore zoot suits in pastel shades, some with fedoras and all with dark hair slicked back rakishly. The other half wore leather or denim vests that revealed enormous hairy arms and violent-looking tattoos. Some of these men were shaved bald.

  “Even here, there is something of a social divide,” Gonzalez remarked over the racket as Hastings nervously glanced around him. “The men in the vests are mostly gang members. We’ll try not to talk to or even look at them. The suits are criminals of a more sophisticated stripe, white-collar crooks. Keep an eye out for our man Rosas.”

  They began to push their way delicately through the crowd. Most of the men paid no attention to them,
but some shoved back aggressively. Hastings was careful not to look into their faces as he hurried quickly past. After a few difficult turns around the room, Hastings touched Gonzalez on the arm and shook his head. Gonzalez gestured toward the door.

  Back out in the night air, Hastings breathed in deeply. “Lovely place. We may as well look for a needle in a bloody haystack.” The phrase sounded oddly familiar. Hadn’t someone he knew used it recently?

  Gonzalez patted him reassuringly on the back. “We’ve only started, dear fellow. Stiff upper lip, isn’t that what you British say? My first day on the case, and you’re ready to quit! If we don’t find him in the places I’ve chosen for tonight, I’ll do more research tomorrow. I am the best, after all.”

  “You’re right.” Hastings smiled as he accepted another cigarette. “Sorry. It’s been a long—” He froze, staring across the street.

  “What?”

  “Quick, get your photo out. I think it’s him!”

  Gonzalez swung around, feeling inside his jacket. There was a group of three men in suits standing outside another, smaller bar, engaged in animated conversation. All three appeared to be fall-down drunk. Rosas was holding the floor, waving his arms as he told some anecdote, at which the others laughed raucously. There was no doubt as to his identity — the longish, greasy hair, the diminutive stature. These things had all been tattooed on the back of Hastings’ skull the night he stood on the stage at Elysian Fields and watched Rosas smile in satisfaction as Guy’s life ebbed away.

  Gonzalez looked discreetly from the photograph to the man on the other side of the street for a few moments, frowning. “That’s him, all right. This is lucky, almost too lucky. I’m not sure I’m comfortable with such quick results. We’ll just wait and see what his next move is.”