Terminal Experiment (15 page)

Detective Inspector Alexandria Philo had a love-hate relationship with this part of her job. On the one hand, questioning those who had known the deceased often provided valuable clues. But, on the other, having to pump distraught people for information was an unpleasant experience all around.

Even worse was the cynicism that went with the process: not everyone would be telling the truth; some of the tears would be crocodile. Sandra’s natural instinct was to offer sympathy for those who were in pain, but the cop in her said that nothing should be taken at face value.

No, she thought. It wasn’t the cop in her that made her say that. It was the civilian. Once her marriage to Walter was over, all the people who had earlier congratulated her on their engagement and wedding started saying things like, “Oh, I knew it would never last,” and “Gee, he really wasn’t right for you,” and “He was an ape” — or a Neanderthal, or a jerk, or whatever the individual’s favorite metaphor for stupid people was. Sandra had learned then that people — even good people, even your friends — will lie to you. At any given moment, they will tell you what they think you want to hear.

The elevator doors slid open on the sixteenth floor of the North American Life tower. Sandra stepped out. Doowap Advertising had its own lobby, all in chrome and pink leather, directly off the elevators. Sandra walked over to stand in front of the receptionist’s large desk. These days, most companies had gotten rid of the fluffy bimbos at the front desk, and replaced them with more mature adults of either sex, projecting a more businesslike image. But advertising was still advertising, and sex still sold. Sandra tried to keep her conversation to words of one syllable for the benefit of the pretty young thing behind the desk.

After flashing her badge at a few executives, Sandra arranged to interview each of the employees. Doowap used the kind of open-office floor plan that had become popular in the eighties. Everyone had a cubicle in the center of the room, delineated by movable room dividers covered in gray fabric. Around the outside of the room were offices, but they belonged to no particular person, and no one was allowed to homestead in one. Instead, they were used as needed for client consultations, private meetings, and so on.

And now it was only a matter of listening. Sandra knew that Joe Friday had been an idiot. “Just the facts, ma’am,” got you nowhere at all. People were uncomfortable about giving facts, especially to the police. But opinions … everybody loved to have their opinion solicited. Sandra had found a sympathetic ear was much more effective than a world-weary get-to-the-point approach. Besides, being a good listener was the best way of finding the office gossip: that one person who knew everything — and had no compunctions about sharing it.

At Doowap Advertising, that person turned out to be Toby Bailey.

“You see ’em come and go in this business,” said Toby, spreading his arms to demonstrate how the advertising trade encompassed all of reality. “The creative types are the worst, of course. They’re all neurotic. But they’re only a tiny part of the process. Me, I’m a media buyer — I acquire space for ads. That’s where the real power is.”

Sandra nodded encouragingly. “It sounds like a fascinating business.”

“Oh, it’s like everything else,” said Toby. Having now established the wonders of advertising, he was prepared to be magnanimous. “It takes all kinds. Take poor old Hans, for instance. Now, he was a real character. Loved the ladies — not that his wife was hard to look at. But Hans, well, he was interested in quantity, not quality.” Toby smiled, inviting Sandra to react to his joke.

Sandra did just that, chuckling politely. “So he just wanted to put more notches on his belt? That was the only thing that mattered to him?”

Toby raised a hand, as if fearing that his words might be construed as speaking ill of the dead. “Oh, no — he only liked pretty women. You never saw him with anything below an eight.”

“An eight?”

“You know — on a scale of one to ten. Looks-wise.”

Pig
, thought Sandra. “I imagine in an advertising firm, you must have a lot of pretty women.”

“Oh, yes — packaging sells, if you’ll forgive me for saying so.” He seemed to be mentally thumbing through the company’s personnel files. “Oh, yes,” he said again.

“I noticed your receptionist when I came in.”

“Megan?” said Toby. “Case in point. Hans set his sights on her the moment she was hired. It didn’t take long for her to fall for his charms.”

Sandra glanced at the personnel roster she’d been given. Megan Mulvaney. “Still,” said Sandra, “did Hans have any particular likes or dislikes when it came to women? I mean, ‘pretty’ is a broad category.”

Toby opened his mouth, as if to say something stupid like, “so to speak.” Sandra gave him points for stopping himself before he did so. But he did seem quite animated, as if talking about beautiful women to a woman was in itself a turn-on. “Well, he liked them to be, ah,
well endowed
, if you catch my meaning, and, I don’t know, I suppose his taste was a little more toward the sultry than my own. Still, almost anyone was fair game — I mean, one would hardly call Cathy or Toni sultry, although they’re both quite attractive.”

Sandra stole another glance at the roster. Cathy Hobson. Toni D’Ambrosio. More starting points. She smiled. “Still,” she said, “a lot of men are all talk and no action. A number of people have mentioned Hans’s prowess, but tell me truthfully, Toby, was he all he was cracked up to be?”

“Oh, yes,” said Toby, feeling the need now to defend his dead friend. “If he went after somebody, he got her. I never saw him fail.”

“I see,” said Sandra. “What about Hans’s boss?”

“Nancy Caulfield? Now,
there’s
a character! Let me tell you how Hans finally got her…”

For Spirit, the life-after-death sim, there was no such thing anymore as biological sleep, no distinction between consciousness and unconsciousness.

For a flesh-and-blood person, dreams provided a different perspective, a second opinion about the day’s events. But Spirit had only one mode, only one way of looking at the universe. Still, he sought connections.

Cathy.

His wife — once upon a time.

He remembered that she had been beautiful … to him, at least. But now, freed from biological urges, the memory of her face, her figure, excited no aesthetic response.

Cathy.

In lieu of dreaming, Spirit cogitated idly. Cathy. Is that an anagram for anything? No, of course not. Oh, wait a moment. “Yacht.” Fancy that; he’d never thought of that before.

Yachts had pleasing lines — a certain mathematical perfection dictated by the laws of fluid dynamics. Their beauty, at least, was something he could still appreciate.

Cathy had done something. Something wrong. Something that had hurt him.

He remembered what it was, of course. Remembered the hurt the same way, if he cared to, that he could summon the memories of other pains. Breaking his leg skiing. A skinned knee in childhood. Bumping his head for the dozenth time on that low ceiling beam at Cathy’s parents’ cottage.

Memories.

But finally, at last, no more pain.

No pain sensor.

Sensor. An anagram of snores.

Something I don’t do anymore.

Dreams had been great for making connections.

Spirit was going to miss dreaming.

Even though Toby Bailey had given her some good leads, Sandra continued to work her way alphabetically down the roster of Doowap employees. Finally, it was Cathy Hobson’s turn — one of those Bailey had mentioned Hans had been involved with.

Sandra sized up Cathy as she seated herself. Pretty woman, thin, with lots of black hair. Good dresser. Sandra smiled. “Ms. Hobson, thank you for your time. I won’t keep you long. I just want to ask a few questions about Hans Larsen.”

Cathy nodded.

“How well did you know him?” Sandra asked.

Cathy looked past Sandra at the wall behind her. “Not very.”

No point in confronting her just yet. Sandra glanced at a printout. “He’d worked here longer than you had. I’d be interested in anything you could tell me. What sort of a man was he?”

Cathy looked at the ceiling. “Very … outgoing.”

“Yes?”

“And, well, a somewhat crude sense of humor.”

Sandra nodded. “Somebody else mentioned that, too. He told a lot of dirty jokes. Did that bother you, Ms. Hobson?”

“Me?” Cathy looked surprised, and met Sandra’s eyes for the first time. “No.”

“What else can you tell me?”

“He, ah, was good at his job, from what I understand. His end and mine didn’t intersect very often.”

“What else?” Sandra smiled encouragingly. “Anything at all might be useful.”

“Well, he was married. I assume you knew that. His wife’s name was, oh…”

“Donna-Lee,” said Sandra.

“Yes. That was it.”

“A nice lady, is she?”

“She’s all right,” said Cathy. “Very pretty. But I only met her a couple of times.”

“She came by the office, then?”

“No, not that I can recall.”

“Then where did you meet her?”

“Oh, sometimes the gang from here would go out for a drink.”

Sandra consulted her notes. “Every Friday,” she said. “Or so I’ve been told.”

“Yes, that’s right. Sometimes his wife would show up for a bit.”

Sandra watched her carefully. “So you did socialize with Hans, then, Ms. Hobson?”

Cathy lifted a hand. “Only as part of a group. Sometimes we would get a bunch of tickets to a Blue Jays game, too, and go down for that. You know — tickets given to the company by suppliers.” She covered her mouth. “Oh! That’s not illegal, is it?”

“Not as far as I know,” said Sandra, smiling again. “Not really my department. When you saw Hans and his wife together, did they seem happy?”

“I can’t really say. I suppose so. I mean, who can tell, looking at a marriage from the outside, what’s really going on?”

Sandra nodded. “Ain’t that the truth.”

“She seemed happy enough.”

“Who?”

“You know — Hans’s wife.”

“Whose name is …?”

Cathy looked confused. “Why, D … Donna-Lee.”

“Donna-Lee, yes.”

“You said it earlier,” said Cathy, a bit defensively.

“Oh, yes. So I did.” Sandra tapped the cursor keys on her palmtop computer, consulting her list of questions. “On another matter, a couple of the other people I’ve interviewed here said that Hans had a bit of a reputation as a ladies’ man.”

Cathy said nothing.

“Is that true, Mrs. Hobson?” For the first time, Sandra had said “Mrs.,” not “Ms.”

“Uh, well, yes, I suppose it is.”

“Someone told me he had slept with a number of the women here at this company. Had you heard similar things about him?”

Cathy picked some invisible lint off her skirt. “I guess so.”

“But you didn’t feel it worth mentioning?”

“I didn’t want…” She trailed off.

“Didn’t want to speak ill of the dead. Of course, of course.” Sandra smiled warmly. “Forgive me for asking this, but, ah, did you ever have a relationship with him?”

Cathy looked up. “Certainly not. I’m a—”

“A married woman,” said Sandra. “Of course.” She smiled again. “I do apologize for having to ask.”

Cathy opened her mouth to object further, then, after a moment, closed it. Sandra recognized the drama playing over Cathy’s face.
The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

“Do you know of anyone he did have a relationship with?” asked Sandra.

“Not for certain.”

“Surely, if he had that reputation, word must have gotten around?”

“There have been rumors. But I don’t believe in repeating gossip, Inspector, and” — Cathy rallied some strength here — “I don’t believe you have the authority to compel me to do so.”

Sandra nodded, as if this was completely reasonable. She closed the lid on her palmtop. “Thank you for your candor,” she said, her tone so neutral as to make characterizing the remark as either sincere or sarcastic impossible. “Just one more question. Again, I apologize, but I have to ask this. Where were you on November fourteenth between eight A.M. and nine A.M.? That’s when Hans died.”

Cathy tilted her head. “Let’s see. That was the day before we all heard about it. Well, I would have been on my way to work, of course. In fact, now that you mention it, that would have been the day I picked up Carla and gave her a lift to where she works.”

“Carla? Who’s that?”

“Carla Wishinski, a friend of mine. She lives a couple of blocks from where Peter and I do. Her car was in the shop, so I agreed to give her a lift.”

“I see. Well, thank you very much, Ms. Hobson.” She glanced down the list of names. “When you go back out, could you ask Mr. Stephen Jessup to come in please?”

Getting rid of Hans Larsen had been easy. After all, why worry about covering one’s tracks? Yes, the police would certainly investigate the crime, but they’d soon find that there were dozens of people who might have wanted to see the philandering Hans dead in the same poetic-justice fashion.

For the second elimination, though, the sim knew he would have to be more subtle. Something untraceable was called for — something that didn’t even look like murder.

With health-care costs spiraling ever upward, most developed countries were turning toward inexpensive prevention rather than catastrophic treatment. That required identifying risks particular to each patient, and for that a detailed knowledge of family history was invaluable. But originally not everyone had had access to such information.

In 2004, a group of adults who had been adopted as children successfully lobbied Canada’s provincial and federal governments to establish the nationwide Confidential Medical Records Database, or “MedBase.” The rationale was simple: all health records should be centralized so that any doctor could access information, with the names removed to protect privacy, about relatives of any of their patients — even if, as was frequently true in the case of adoption, the individuals in question didn’t know they were related.

The sim had to try more than twenty times, but it did eventually manage to find a way into MedBase — and, from there, a roundabout way to get the information it wanted:

Login: jdesalle

Password: ellased

Welcome! Bienvenu!

Health and Welfare Canada

Sante et Bien-e’tre social Canada

MEDBASE

[1] for English [2] pour Frangais

> 1

Enter patient’s province or territory of residence (L for list):

> Ontario

Enter patient’s name or Health Card number:

> 33 1834 22 149

Hobson, Catherine R. Correct? (Y/N)

> Y

What would you like to do?

[1] Display patient’s record?

[2] Search patient’s family history?

> 2

Search for? (H for help)

The sim selected H, read the help screens, then formulated his query:

> Familial Risk, Heart Disease

There was a pause while the system searched.

Correlations found.

The computer proceeded to list records for six different relatives of Cathy who had had heart problems over the years. Although no names were given, the sim had no trouble figuring out which one belonged to Rod Churchill, based on the age at which the coronary trouble had first occurred.

The sim asked for the full record for that patient. The computer provided it, again without listing the patient’s name. He studied the medical history minutely. Rod was currently taking heart medication and something called phenelzine. The sim logged onto MedLine, a general medical-information database, and began searching the literature for information on those drugs.

It took some digging, and the sim had to access an online medical dictionary continually to be able to wade through it all, but at last he had what he wanted.

Finally, the long day of interviews at Doowap Advertising was over. Detective Sandra Philo drove slowly back to her empty apartment. On the way, she took advantage of the car’s phone to check a few things. “Carla Wishinski?” she said into the dashboard mike.

“Yes?” said the voice through the speaker.

“This is Inspector Alexandria Philo of the Metro Police. I’ve got a quick question for you.”

Wishinski sounded flustered. “Uh, yes. Yes, of course.”

“Were you by any chance with Catherine Hobson on the morning of November tenth?”

“With Cathy? Let me bring up my scheduler.” The sound of keyclicks. “On the tenth? No, I’m afraid not. Is she in some kind of trouble?”

Sandra turned the car onto Lawrence West. “Did I say the tenth?” she said. “My mistake. I meant the fourteenth.”

“I don’t think — ” More keyclicks. “Oh, wait. That’s the day my car was in for service. Yes, Cathy picked me up and took me to work — she’s a sweetheart about things like that.”

“Thank you,” said Sandra. It was a standard technique — first determine that the person won’t issue a reflex lie to protect her friend, then ask the real question. Cathy Hobson apparently had a valid alibi. Still, if it had been a professional hit, the fact that she’d been somewhere else when the deed was done proved little.

“Is there anything else?” asked Carla Wishinski.

“No, that’s all. Were you planning on leaving town?”

“Umm, yes — I, ah, I’m going to Spain on vacation.”

“Well, then, have a nice trip!” said Sandra.

She never tired of doing that.

Spirit, the life-after-death sim, probed the net, looking for new stimulation. Everything was so static, so unchanging. Oh, he could absorb a book or a newsgroup quickly, but the information itself was passive, and, ultimately, that made it boring.

Spirit also wandered through the computers at Mirror Image. Eventually he found Sarkar’s game bank and tried playing chess and Tetris and Go and Bollix and a thousand others, but they were no better than the interactive games on the net. Peter Hobson had never really liked games, anyway. He much preferred devoting his energies to things that actually made a difference, rather than to silly contests that in the end changed nothing. Spirit continued to search, going through file after file.

And, at last, he came upon a subdirectory called A-LIFE. Here, blue fish were evolving, the ones judged most fit getting to breed. Spirit watched several generations go by, fascinated by the process. Life, he thought.

Life.

Finally, Spirit had found something that intrigued him.