The Shadow Maker (14 page)

He shooed away a couple of smokers and they had the room to themselves. It was one of those communal office spaces that were always untidy - plastic chairs and tables, ashtrays, disposable coffee cups, a scattering of computer magazines. There were also vending machines, travel posters on the wall and a view over rhododendron bushes and recycle bins. The air-conditioning blew around an odour of stale tobacco.

She declined Flynn’s grudging offer of a drink and he went off and got a can of Coke from one of the machines. As they sat across a table from each other he flipped it open. She placed the Plato’s Cave card on the surface between them and watched his reaction.

‘What’s that?’ he said, picking it up.

‘That’s what I’d like to know,’ she replied. ‘Is it a Xanthus product?

A security smartcard for a customer’s new hi-tech system?’

He took a swig from the can and answered, ‘This is a games company. We don’t produce security hardware for any customers.’

He tossed the card back to her. ‘You’re wasting my time.’

Rita sat back and stared at him curiously. ‘Do you have a problem, or something?’

‘Of course I bloody do! I’m the poor mug who has to shoulder the responsibility around here. I’m the system administrator.’ He drank some more Coke. ‘Frankly I’m too damn busy to worry about anything other than getting the project done.’

‘What
is
the project?’

‘Can’t tell you.’

‘It’s obviously a software product.’

‘Obviously.’ He fidgeted in his chair. ‘I can tell you it’s a VR

game. I can’t say anything more.’

‘VR?’

‘Virtual reality. There’s a shitload of money riding on it, and I’m the poor bastard who has to deliver on time. It all comes down to me.’

She sensed someone who was ambitious and impatient, also highly strung. She wondered whether he was the sort of emotional inadequate who should never be a manager - the type who was capricious, abusive and vindictive and believed the future of the world rested on his shoulders. What he accomplished as a geek he probably lacked as a human being.

She put the card back in her pocket and asked casually, ‘Is Kelly Grattan back at work today?’

‘No. Why do you ask?’

‘I spoke to her at the hospital yesterday about the hit-and-run accident.’

‘Well her timing’s fucking great,’ said Flynn.

‘Who works closely with Kelly?’ Rita continued.

‘Barbie. She’s the link between us and him.’

‘When you say
us
, who do you mean?’

‘In practical terms mostly me, Maynard and Josh - the core team.

Otherwise she’s up at Barbie’s city office head-kicking his accountants and trying to outmanoeuvre him.’

‘You don’t like her.’

‘She’s pushy and manipulative - like a lot of women.’ He made sure she got the point with an acerbic look. ‘More interested in her own priorities than the team effort.’

It was a familiar theme, but her brief meeting with Kelly told Rita it could well be true.

She let Flynn finish off his drink then asked, ‘Have you ever noticed anyone following her, anyone showing an unhealthy interest in her?’

‘No I haven’t.’ He crushed the can in his hand. ‘Now can I get back to work?’

‘Of course,’ she said. ‘But I’d like a quick word with the other two you mentioned. What are their full names?’

‘Bruce Maynard and Josh Barrett. But only Maynard’s here at the moment.’ He tossed the can into the dustbin angrily. ‘I’ll send him down, but don’t arrest him for being a freak.’

Maynard entered the smoking room like a bad vibe - chewing his lip, hands jittery, his lanky frame clad in tracksuit pants and a Harry Potter T-shirt. He was self-conscious enough to be referred for immediate therapy, but Rita wasn’t here to assess personality disorders.

As he sat down she asked him, ‘Is your name Bruce Maynard?’

‘Yes, what’s yours?’ he asked her back.

She told him and said, ‘I assume you’ve heard Kelly Grattan ended up in hospital after being knocked off her bike.’ When he nodded she continued, ‘I’m investigating if she was the target of an attack.’

He didn’t respond other than to wring his hands.

She went on, ‘I want to know if she mentioned anyone who bothered her. Anyone who made her nervous.’

‘Nervous?’ He waved his hands around extravagantly. ‘Check it out - this isn’t an office, it’s a pressure cooker! We’re all nervous!

Everyone here’s a basket case.’

There was certainly something wrong here. Even for computer nerds these guys had a few wires loose. Add to that the reactions of the security guard and the receptionist and you almost had a case of group neurosis.

‘So, Bruce, what do you think of Kelly?’

‘Bloody sure of herself,’ he said, his tone resentful.

‘How do you get on with her?’ she asked.

He blushed, then said, ‘She mostly ignores me.’

‘Why is that do you think?’

He bit his lip again. ‘I have trouble telling her what she wants to know. Technical stuff. I can’t put it in simple terms.’

‘She loses patience with you?’

‘Yeah.’ He drummed his fingers on the table. ‘But that happens a lot when I talk to women. I get embarrassed.’

‘Like right now?’

He dropped his gaze and nodded.

‘Okay. That’s enough for the time being.’

As Rita got up to leave Maynard said, ‘I’ve seen you on TV. You deal with rape cases, don’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Must be mind-blowing.’

‘Interests you, does it?’

‘Yeah.’ He gave her an inappropriate smile.

‘Rape isn’t about sex, it’s about violence.’

‘Yeah, I know. Like the guy who blinded the prostitute.’

Rita didn’t answer. She just looked at him.

As she drove from the Xanthus premises, Rita wondered if the collective jitters were due to a multi-million-dollar deadline or symptomatic of something worse than corporate angst. She had no way of telling, and no legitimate grounds to probe any further. Her call on the company had produced nothing for the investigation, and now she must concentrate on the other software firms on her list. But as she looked in the rear-view mirror, watching the steel gates close behind her, she had the feeling the guard’s remark about maximum security was somehow significant, and that those inside had something in common with inmates. It seemed her suspicions about Martin Barbie’s true personality might have substance to them.

Martin Barbie peered down through the canyon of skyscrapers to where, far below, moved beetling queues of traffic and swarms of miniature pedestrians. Further along sprouted the antique architecture of church spires, dwarfed by the modern giants of the city. Beyond the office blocks, colonial buildings and shopping arcades, a thin ribbon of tramlines stretched along Collins Street to the horizon of the docklands. Barbie was viewing the panorama of the city from the vantage point of his business suite, occupying the thirty-seventh floor of the bank tower.

The voice of his private secretary came through the desk speaker.

‘The satellite link to Tokyo is up.’

‘Thank you,’ he replied.

He stood beside the plate glass window, his feet just inches from a sheer drop to the street below. Sometimes he felt he was walking on air, or even floating in space - gazing across the gulf to other glass-walled towers that were planted in the sky. He could see them peopled by neat men in neat offices with their rows of desks and screens and potted shrubs - huge buildings that were human filing cabinets, or something more apocalyptic, the hollow mountains of Nostradamus.

At night the vision was even more graphic, with the glass interiors glowing, the illuminated masts pointing heavenwards, a dusting of lights as far as the eye could see. There were silent moments when he felt like a lord of the dark, elevated into the firmament where he belonged. It was the nearest he came to a religious feeling.

‘Tokyo says Mr Jojima will be ready in ten,’ came the secretary’s voice again.

‘Good,’ said Barbie.

His office was different from all those around him. Not a shrub in sight. Just a swathe of carpet between the electronic decks that studded his desk and an interior wall covered in flat-screen televisions, dozens of them, their flickering transmissions from points around the globe. A glass cabinet displayed his collection of TV awards.

‘I’ll be there in five,’ he added.

Despite his personal, business and celebrity achievements, appearances were not all they seemed. In quiet moments such as this, alone with his thoughts, Barbie felt the nausea of self-doubt. It was nagging and persistent, a flaw beneath his gleaming surface, and each new success failed to erase it. And he knew why.

He was well aware of the illusions of the secular world. It had been beaten into him as a child, year after year in his Christian fundamentalist home, whipped into him with a leather belt, so he’d never forget. The metal buckle kept splitting the skin on his buttocks and thighs, his father shouting quotations from the Bible, in the upstairs bathroom that became a torture chamber. The beatings left drops of blood on the white tiles, the wounds cut deep in his memory, reminders of the shallowness of the world. And no series of triumphs could ever expunge them.

Barbie sat in his teleconference suite, conducting his private chat with Tokyo to finalise the schedule for the upcoming visit. The key decision-maker was facing him on the screen, going patiently through a list of questions. Kenshi Jojima’s English was flawless, and his expression - even across a video link - was implacable.

‘You can assure me,’ he was saying, ‘that the software will be ready?’

‘I can,’ answered Barbie firmly.

‘And the problems identified in your last progress meeting will be resolved?’

‘Yes. My system administrator Eddy Flynn and project manager Josh Barrett are the best in the field.’

‘That remains to be seen,’ said Jojima with almost lethal under-statement. ‘But what is more important is the marketing strategy.

We shall need convincing.’

He had the stern, unwavering focus of a corporate samurai - a man who made a powerful ally or a ruthless foe. If Barbie were to swing his multi-million-dollar deal, he had to win him over. This man was more than a software expert. He was the company executive who would lead the delegation from Japan, and his team would look at more than the computer game. They would examine the entire cross-media package. If he had any doubts he could veto the deal.

So Barbie was choosing his words carefully.

‘You know my track record,’ he said calmly, but with an assertive edge. ‘My last reality TV format is now global. But this computer game will be even bigger. The high-resolution virtual reality and internet tie-ins will make sure of that. But what will guarantee high-profile media interest is the content. Believe me, Kenshi, this product will generate its own publicity in the tabloids, as well as online.’

‘You are talking about hype,’ said Jojima fastidiously, and Barbie noted the implied scepticism.

‘Partly. But with all due respect, the power of the software mustn’t be underestimated. You’ll know what I mean when you examine it yourself.’

Jojima was silent.

Barbie folded his hands in his lap, breathed in quietly. He knew he was being probed in one of those disconcerting Japanese moments that wrong-footed garrulous westerners. Luckily he knew enough to keep his mouth shut. He didn’t mind playing these oriental games of patience. In a way it suited his temperament.

When the moment had passed, Jojima nodded, they exchanged courtesies, and the teleconference was over. But as the screen went blank, a frown darkened Barbie’s face.

He keyed in the mobile number of his system administrator and snapped at him when he answered. ‘Flynn, give me an update.’

‘I’ll give you an update!’ Flynn snapped back. ‘The test team are a bunch of clowns. Where did you recruit these arseholes, Luna Park?’

Flynn’s attitude was less than reassuring. It left Barbie worrying about how the software would stand up to scrutiny when the Japanese started testing it. It was a worry he could do without.

The voice of his private secretary interrupted his thoughts. ‘Kelly Grattan’s on the phone. She says it’s urgent.’

He bit his lip and grimaced. This was a call he had been dreading.

‘Okay,’ he said.

‘Putting her through on line three,’ said his secretary.

He watched it flashing, his hand hovering over the receiver before picking it up. ‘Kelly,’ he said, trying to sound matter-of-fact. ‘I’m glad you called.’

‘I’ll bet you are, you bastard.’

He bowed his head. This was going to be tricky.

Kelly Grattan was one of Barbie’s most trusted employees. She was sharp, diligent and attractively venal. As the business administrator at Xanthus Software she was also privy to sensitive information.

Her salary reflected that. A reward for making sure company data remained confidential. What he didn’t know was whether she would keep her mouth shut about the attempted rape. He hoped she was open to negotiation.

‘It’s obvious we need to talk.’ He cleared his throat with discomfort.

‘I appreciate it’s fairly urgent.’

‘More urgent than you think.’ The ice in her voice made him wince. ‘The police have already spoken to me and -‘

‘Let me stop you right there,’ he interrupted. ‘Are you calling on a mobile phone?’

‘Yes.’

‘Fine. Then don’t say anything more about the subject we’re discussing. We need to have the rest of this conversation face-to-face.

Not here in the office, of course. Somewhere discreet. How about my yacht at the marina?’

‘No, I don’t think so. I’d feel safer in a more public place.’

‘Okay. It’s your call.’

She thought for a moment, then said, ‘Young & Jackson’s pub.

The upstairs bar. In half an hour.’

The line went dead.

He put the phone down and sighed. Kelly was out for revenge, but she was still a smart operator. Was she ready to do a deal to forget what happened? Sounded like it. If so, how much would it cost him?

It was a short walk of several city blocks, but Barbie was perspiring from the heat of the day as he waited to cross with the traffic lights towards the pub. Behind him rose the Gothic Revival spires of the cathedral. Schoolgirls in uniform milled around its steps.