The Fool's Run (21 page)

"Sometimes," she said, "you just have to look at the cards."

I looked at the cards. the magician, the tower, the bolt of lightning.

"Sonofabitch," I said.

What?

Igot it.

You got it?

The answer was typically tarot: outside what I'd considered the parameters of the problem, elegant, and slightly twisted. It took two days to confirm that it would work. It took three weeks-all four of us working twelve to fourteen hours a night-to get the code written, tested, and shipped out.

For the first two weeks I wandered aimlessly up and down the Mississippi River valley, sleeping late, painting in the afternoons, writing code at night. Twice I sent tubes of paintings to Emily in St. Paul to hold for me. I always mailed them from places I was leaving. In the third week, I turned west, across Arkansas, Oklahoma, a piece of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, heading for Las Vegas.

My rational tarot was talking, now that the possibilities were finite, and I spent a lot of time thinking about the cards. The time wasn't too bad, except for the loneliness. I was fond of my life in St. Paul, the apartment, my friends, even the cat. I wanted to get back.

We close now.

Youdebug last batch?

Stanford doing that. He close.

We should run command tests.

Yes. Start tonight.

We ran the tests. There were a few final bugs to hunt down, and then the attack programs worked fine. I was in Phoenix, in a nondescript motel off Interstate 10. It was hot, and the air conditioner smelled like somebody had dropped an aging cheeseburger on the compressor unit. I sat in my underwear and sweated and ran the tarot.

If you run the cards long enough, everything comes up; it's all meaningless. But it seemed that I saw a lot of the battle cards, the Five of Wands, the Seven of Wands, the Seven of Swords. None showed defeat, but none projected a clear victory, either. I finally turned the deck around and tried to run a spread from Maggie's point of view. That's not supposed to work. I came up with an Eight of Swords as the outcome, a woman blindfolded with her arms bound, surrounded by swords stuck point-down in the earth. That was good enough, and I quit.

The next day was a Wednesday, the last in October. It would be getting cold up north, but if I could back off the Anshiser crowd, I might be able to get my boat over to Vilas County, Wisconsin, for the November muskie rush. It's not that there's a rush of muskies; there's a rush of muskie fishermen, crowding in before ice-up. I decided to call Maggie the next day.

Years before, when I first started doing unconventional computer work, I had taken the trouble to construct an alternate identity. It wasn't particularly hard: a phony birth certificate acquired in Chicago, along with the Social Security number of a dead teenager who would never use it, got me a passport in the name of Harry Olson, of Eau Claire. A few customs stamps and stapled-in visas gave the passport a wearied look. Presented at a Wisconsin driver's examination office, the passport and Social Security number were good for a driver's license. The license and Social Security number produced a bank account. The bank didn't ask too many questions, since the documents were accompanied by a fat cashier's check.

That summer I rented a place on Grindstone Lake, near Hayward, in the name of Harry Olson. I spent the summer writing code, painting, hunting muskie, and collecting my mail, which included credit cards from Visa, Amoco and Exxon, and the local library.

When I left Hayward, I changed the address for the credit cards to a post office in Hudson, Wisconsin, just across the St. Croix River from St. Paul. I carefully used the credit cards and promptly paid the bills. I renewed the driver's license and over the years collected a variety of other forms of ID in Harry Olson's name.

Harry Olson checked into the Anshiser/Vegas at three o'clock in the afternoon. The desk clerk ran the Visa through the credit-checking machine, smiled, and handed me a room key.

"Let the bellman know if you need anything. The movies are turned on for your room. The key to the refreshments cabinet is on the credenza," he said. The bellman had a number of suggestions for the evening, including a private party with a couple of showgirls. I declined, but gave him ten dollars.

"Let me speak to Maggie."

"Kidd?"

"Yeah. I want to talk to Maggie."

"Just a minute." Dillon sounded stressed, but controlled. I had been out of sight for a month, though they suspected I'd tested their computer security. If Denzer told them about my visit to Miami, they would have that. Nothing else.

"Kidd." It was a statement, not a question.

"Yeah. How are you?"

She ignored the question. "What do you want?"

"Peace and quiet."

"That's going to be hard, now."

"Yeah, I know. I thought we should talk. Face-to-face."

"Where are you?"

"Flagstaff. I'll be in Vegas tomorrow. I'll meet you at the Anshiser/Vegas."

"What time?"

"In the afternoon, about three-thirty or four o'clock. I'll call your room."

That evening, I dropped seven hundred dollars at the blackjack tables.

Blackjack can be beaten. There are several methods of shifting the odds in your favor by keeping track of certain cards as they're dealt. You make your biggest bets when the deck is most in your favor; the rest of the time, you tread water. Casinos don't like card-counters.

With that in mind, a mathematician friend at the University of Chicago once spent some time refining a common card-counting routine. In essence, he built in a randomizing factor that disguised the bet-building. In my case, the disguise more than worked: I lost my shirt.

In the process of losing it, I thoroughly confused the dealer. She spotted me for a card-counter, I think, but I was leaking money at a ferocious rate. When I finally walked away, her eyes followed me all the way across the casino floor, as though she expected me to come back, pull out a surprise bet, and recoup all the losses. No such luck.

High-tech computer-assisted programs sometimes get out in the real world and get their ass kicked. Something to lie in bed and think about, as we made the torpedo run on Anshiser.

The casino was a bad idea. I'd picked one a few blocks from the Anshiser, just in case somebody was looking for my face. But on the way back, I almost bumped into Maggie.

She went through the lobby with a thin, dark-complected man in an expensive banker's pinstripe. His nose had been broken a long time ago, well before he acquired his current sheen, but he did not look at all like Mary's Little Lamb.

I was standing in the hotel gift shop, looking at magazines, and caught a flash of her in a mirrored pillar. I turned away and gave them time to get through. I bought a few magazines while I waited, plus two paperbacks. This time, I would stay in the room.

What?

Everything set?

Set and checked. Hacks on line. We'll trip you off exactly at 4. Then we'll have a cascade on the other plants.

Timing would be delicate. I debated calling her as early as 3:30, but we wouldn't have that much to say to each other. On the other hand, she might have people scattered around the hotel. She'd want them together before she came into the room. So when to call? I rehearsed the probable moves and finally decided there would be at least ten minutes to talk. And I should be able to stretch it out, if need be.

I would call at 3:40. At three o'clock, time started to slow down. I risked a trip to the Coke machine down the hall, got three, drank two, and looked at the clock. 3:15. I did a few desultory tarot spreads: not enough time now for the tarot to help. I watched television, paced. 3:30. More pacing. A pit stop in the bathroom, dumping the processed Coke. Last-minute thoughts. At 3:39 I dialed the operator and got her room number. She picked up the phone on the first ring.

"This is Kidd."

"Yes. I'm here."

"I'm in Room 2406. It's almost right straight below you. I'll wait five minutes, then I'm gone. And Maggie-you may be tempted to send in some shooters to take care of the problem. That would be a major mistake. You would remember it for the rest of your life as the mistake that ruined you. I don't have a gun, I just want to talk. Okay?"

"I'll be down."

I did have a gun, the MAC-10. I glued a fat strip of Velcro to the grip and stuck it on the side of the easy chair where I planned to sit. It was out of sight, in an unexpected place, all cocked and ready. It was too big and would be an awkward draw, but if they came in shooting, I would make it more than a simple execution. That was the idea, anyway.

After Maggie hung up, I unlocked the door, pulled the drapes, turned on the TV set and adjusted the sound until it was barely audible, got the last Coke, and sat in the chair. At 3:44, there was a knock at the door.

"Come in."

A short, tough-looking blond with a brush haircut pushed the door open with his finger while he stayed in the hall. He looked at me, nodded, took a slow step inside, glanced into the bathroom. The dark man with the broken nose was behind him, dressed in a different, but equally conservative, pinstriped suit. He waited in my line of sight, watching me, while the blond went into the bathroom and pulled back the shower curtain. The blond came back out, opened the coat closet near the door, looked in, then came into the room. The beds were on pedestals, but he looked between them and behind the one next to the wall. Finally he turned to the dark man.

"It's okay," he said. The dark man stayed where he was, and the blond went back to the hallway and came in with a briefcase. He opened it and took out a debugging loop and started working his way around the room.

"Look, it'll take an hour to find a bug if I put one in.

"We don't think you did. Nothing heavy, anyway. We're just making a quick sweep. We'd be embarrassed if you had something as crummy as a cheap tape recorder."

"I don't."

He smiled and followed the loop around the room. When he was satisfied, he folded it and shoved it back in the briefcase.

"I think it's clean," he said.

The dark man stepped into the room. "Mr. Olson," he said, nodding at me. Maggie was a step behind him.

"Kidd," she said. Her face was taut. Not frozen, but ready, like an athlete on the starting blocks.

"How's Anshiser?" I asked. The blond shut the door without locking it, and the dark man sat on a corner of the bed, looking at me. Maggie perched on the other chair.

"He's out of it," she said. "They're off the tumor theory. They think now it may have been a series of ministrokes over a period of time, killing his brain in such tiny increments it was impossible to find. They're still not sure. One of the doctors said the only way they'll ever be sure is with an autopsy. He's now in what they call a vegetative state."

"Tough. It's a bad way to go." I nodded at the dark man. "Is this the new boss?"

The dark man smiled, his even teeth glittering against his olive skin. With the broken nose and the good teeth, he would be devastating with women.

"I'm afraid you've got that backward, Mr. Kidd," he said mildly. "The board has chosen Ms. Kahn to run Anshiser. She's asked me to work as her executive assistant. Essentially, I have her old job."

"What about Dillon?"

Maggie shrugged. "Dillon is Dillon. He does the same thing. That's all he wants to do." When she first came in the room, her face was deathly pale. Now the color was coming back and the tension was seeping out. The situation was under control. The red numerals of the digital clock on the bedside table said 3:52.

"How's LuEllen?" Maggie asked.

"She's fine. She went back home."

"Was she the one who shot at me, back at the cabin?"

"Yeah. She was pissed about Dace."

"I thought it was she. I knew you were in the Army, and when I heard that machine gun going, and I didn't hear Frank's shotgun, I had an idea what happened. When I saw you coming around the corner with LuEllen and those guns, in those camouflage suits, I thought, Dear God, he's going to shoot me in the back."

"I thought about it," I said. "I had the scope right on your shoulder blades."

She shuddered.

"What happened to Frank and Leonard?", asked the dark man.

"I'm afraid they're, uh.

Maggie glanced at the dark man and then looked back to me.

"Most of the people involved in the decision to shoot Dace now agree it was a mistake. But it's a mistake that will be hard to walk away from. You and LuEllen could cause us an infinite amount of damage with a letter or a phone call, and you may have reason to do it. To get back for Dace," she said. She was using her business voice. The small talk was over.

I shook my head at her. "We won't do it. We want to cut a deal. You don't mess with us, ever, and we'll never mess with you. We've got our money and it's all over."

She glanced at the dark man again, and he said, "Ms. Kahn has suggested that you were too smart to expose yourself this way unless you had done something that would give you protection. Would you like to tell us what it is? A letter with a lawyer or something? A letter in a safety-deposit box?"

"Ah, no." I glanced at the clock. 3:56. "That, I'm afraid, could be managed. People could be bought, the charges denied, especially if LuEllen and I weren't around to back them up. Somebody might say the whole thing was a fantasy. and even the people who would believe it wouldn't have any way to prove it for sure. Besides, the instigator of the whole thing is a vegetable. You can't put a vegetable on trial."

"So what did you do?" Maggie asked.

I shrugged. "Same old shit you saw in the Washington apartment. A computer blitz. The fact is, if you mess with me or LuEllen, our friends on the computer net will take Anshiser right down the toilet. Right down."

Maggie glanced at the dark man again. He frowned and tipped his head back and stared at me, figuring, and finally said to Maggie, "I don't know."

She thought she did, though. She had decided it was a game, and looked at me with what may have been genuine regret.

"I'm disappointed, Kidd. We thought you'd be better than this. Let me tell you what we've done. We have the best people-the very best, better than you-watching every move that's made on those computers. It has been a major inconvenience, and it cost us a lot of money, but we'll get it back with the Sunfire contract. In any event, we know you're not in there. Just in case, we have backups of all our software, and all the daily work. We can shut down and sterilize our system in half an hour, and be back up with completely clean software. Everybody who does anything on the system is logged in and out, and the input is studied by the security crew. There isn't any way you can reach us. You just don't have the leverage for a deal." She shook her head and stood up. "I think it's time to leave," she said to the dark man.

The clock said 3:59.

"By the way, don't try to use your telephone. It won't work," she said, showing a few teeth. "I couldn't figure why you stayed in an Anshiser Hotel. You must know we could control the place."

"Don't go," I said. "We have more things to talk about."

"I don't think so," she said. A note of triumph had crept into her voice. The clock ticked over to four, and she started toward the door, the dark man standing to follow. The blond opened the door, and she walked away, giving it a little extra effort as she walked. At the door she paused, and seemed about to say something.

Then the lights went out.

Everything else went with them-the clock, the TV, the air conditioning. There was a stuttering, and emergency lights came on in the hallway. Somewhere, a smoke detector screeched, and doors started popping open down the hallway.

I had pulled the blackout drapes over the windows to intensify the effect. I waited for a few seconds, and reached back and pulled the drawstring. Daylight flooded the room, and the blond was standing just inside the door, pointing a small-caliber automatic pistol at my chest. A long, fat silencer was attached to the snout.

"Why don't you come back in and sit down?" I suggested.

Maggie looked shocked, but came back in. "What have you done?"

"I've shut down Anshiser," I said. "Or at least, my friends have."

"What are you talking about, we have the best security, there was no way.

"It's awful good," I agreed. "Too good to penetrate in the time that we had. So we had to do something different."

"What did you do, Kidd?"

"We went into the power company computers. We couldn't get every little dinky Anshiser operation, but we got all the good ones. All the hotels, all the factories, your headquarters back in Chicago. Not a single one of the big operations has power. If you call up your airframe fabrication plant you'll find they don't have a computer problem, they've got a problem with everything. They can't run a fuckin' power drill."