Play Dead (17 page)
My God, he really was just like a pint-sized Eli. I knew better than to pursue that line of questioning; I’d get the same kind of semantic runaround that always drove me crazy. I brought Jackie back into the conversation.
“On a more practical level, what exactly am I supposed to do about you, Jackie? I was hired to find you and get back what you took from Jessie, remember? And she’s paying me quite a bit for my services.”
“I still can’t believe you’re working for my mom,” Jackie said. “I’ve talked to a few people about you. I wouldn’t have thought you were the type.”
“You never can tell.”
She shrugged and reached into the shoulder bag she carried and took out a couple of CDs.
“Here,” she said. “The first one is the copy of Richter’s book I took—I scanned the pages into my laptop and then destroyed the book.”
She said this with the thoughtless arrogance of youth, unaware of the enormity of what she’d done. Eli would have called it a crime; he venerates books. It was like someone casually mentioning they’d burned a Shakespeare First Folio.
“And the other?” I said, reaching for the disks. There was no point in commenting on it.
“The other is the dirt on the Sun City deal. Cassandra told you about that, didn’t she? I’m not even keeping a copy of that one. I don’t care anymore.”
“Why is that?”
“There’s no point. If it’s not Sun City destroying Point Reyes, it will be someone else. There’s money to be made, billions, and as long as there’s big money involved, it’ll never end. Sooner or later the bad guys will win. They always do.”
“That’s a bit cynical, don’t you think?”
“Not cynical. Just realistic. This planet is already dead; it just hasn’t quite stopped breathing yet. But there’s still hope—you just have to think out of the box. That’s what this is all about, you know.” I didn’t know, but she wasn’t paying any attention to me. She had the slightly glazed look of a true believer in her eyes. “We’ve screwed up one world, and it’s too late to fix it now. But maybe if we could start over again, we’d do a better job.”
Now it was starting to make sense. Not actual sense; both of them were verging on bat-shit crazy in my book, but I could see where she was coming from.
“Not much of a student of human history, are you?” I said.
“On the contrary. That’s why it will work. But anyway, now you’ve done your job. You can give her the disks. Unless you’re planning on tying me up and delivering me to my mom in person.”
“No,” I said.
“Then why don’t you help us instead? It wouldn’t hurt you any and you’d be doing a lot of good, more than you know.”
“It’s an interesting proposal; I’ll give you that. But it’s something I’d have to sleep on.”
“Of course,” Malcolm said. “Who wouldn’t? But the experience will be more than worth it; that, I can promise. Trust me.”
I don’t think I’d ever heard anyone I’d just met say “trust me” before. It would have been another warning sign if it wasn’t clear that Malcolm was basically clueless about nuances. He’d make a lousy conspirator. I guessed he hadn’t spent a great deal of time around other people. Too much time exploring the phenomenon of singularities, perhaps.
“Hey,” I said to him. “You’re an expert on singularities, right? Supposedly.”
“I do have some knowledge, yes.”
“Well, the one I was in last week? The one Jackie set up? Something followed me out of it. Any idea what it could have been?”
The two of them exchanged a quick glance. So neither was very good at conspiracies. That was reassuring.
“Are you sure something came back with you? What did it look like?” Malcolm asked warily.
I thought for a moment of making something up, to test his reaction, but thought better of it. I was pretty sure he was lying anyway, so better I just play it straight and let him think I was unaware.
“I never got a look at it.” They both relaxed slightly.
“I can’t think of anything. Unless I’m very mistaken, nothing in that singularity had an independent existence—there’s no way anything from there could exist in the real world.”
“Huh. Well, maybe I was imagining things,” I said.
Malcolm nodded. “Stress can play tricks on the mind.”
“I guess.” Tricks were perhaps being played, but it wasn’t my mind that was doing it.
“So what do you think?” Jackie asked, still pressing.
“About your offer of a magical mystery tour? It’s not impossible. But as I said, I’d have to sleep on it.”
Jackie seemed to want to discuss it further, but Malcolm pulled her toward the door.
“Come on,” he said, in what he thought was a hearty tone. “Give the man some time.”
“Are you going to tell my mom I was here?” she asked.
“Probably. I have to hand over the disks, anyway. She’s going to ask how I got them.”
“You don’t have to tell her.” I didn’t say anything. “Fine,” she said. “Just don’t tell her about what we’re intending to do, okay? At least not until you make up your mind about if you’re coming or not. She’d interfere, and then you wouldn’t be able to make your own decision.”
That was a sad and clumsy attempt at manipulation on her part, reminding me that Jackie was barely more than a kid, despite being powerful and clever in many ways. But since I had no intention of telling Jessie any more than I had to anyway, it didn’t hurt to let Jackie think she’d succeeded in convincing me.
“All right,” I said, with seeming reluctance. “I’ll wait on that part of it, then. How am I going to let you know when I make my decision?”
“You’ve got my cell number, right? From Sherwood?”
She smiled mischievously, a subtle reminder of how easily she’d played Sherwood and me. I had to give her props on that one.
“Yeah,” I said. “Come to think of it, I do.”
As soon as she and Malcolm left I waited a few minutes and then went outside and walked around the entire building, checking the wards, just to make sure. Everything seemed tight.
I loaded one of the CDs into my computer, curious about what all the fuss was about. But I was in for a disappointment. It was a PDF file, obviously scanned in from the original book. Some of it was printed, and some handwritten in black ink. But the text was in German, with fancy lettering that I assumed was some sort of Gothic script. I couldn’t even identify some of the letters, much less understand what it said. Runes, numbers, symbols, and other things that were gibberish to me were scattered throughout. This was something for Eli to deal with.
It was a bit late to head over to Victor’s, so tomorrow morning would have to do. At least things were finally moving in some direction, although it wasn’t clear what that direction was.
TEN
NEXT MORNING I CALLED ELI, MADE IT OVER to Victor’s, and handed the disks over to Timothy. He loaded them up, made copies, and gave me back the originals. Then he scanned the monitor screen, briefly paging through the file. The first disk was nothing but office memos, contracts, and e-mails, all relating to Sun City. But the second, the one I’d looked at briefly, was what Eli had been waiting for.
He’d canceled a class he was supposed to be teaching and rushed over; he was that eager to take a look at the fabled Richter book. He almost pushed Timothy out of the seat in front of the monitor to get a look. In addition to the treasure trove of scribblings in black ink, diagrams, and text, there were also drawings of plants and creatures, none of which looked familiar. And although the text was incomprehensible to me, Eli, naturally, had no problem with it.
“Wow,” Timothy said, looking over his shoulder. “This is amazing, whatever it is.” Eli just grunted, already engrossed.
“Does it make any sense?” I asked.
“ Hmm?”
“Can you read it? The disk. Is it full of secret knowledge, or just recipes for sauerbraten?”
“Recipes? Oh, a joke. No, it’s quite interesting.” He muttered something that sounded like “Fraktur,” whatever that meant.
I asked him a few more questions, but after answering abstractedly for a while, he started responding with incomprehensible mumbling sounds. So while he sat mesmerized, staring at diagrams on the screen, I talked with Victor. Malcolm’s proposal interested him. But he’d never heard of Malcolm, and my description of him didn’t jog any memories.
“Odd,” he said. “If he can do half of what he says he can, he’d be an amazing talent. You’d think we’d have at least heard of him.”
“Well, I couldn’t sense any talent,” I said, “for whatever that’s worth. Maybe he’s a reclusive genius, hiding out from the world. He doesn’t seem that good with people.”
Something of our conversation must have filtered through to Eli’s consciousness because he suddenly swiveled around in his chair.
“Oh, you have to take him up on it,” he said.
“You think?”
“Absolutely. Who knows what you’ll find there, what questions could be answered?”
“The last time I did something like this I was looking for Lou, and the only question was whether we’d get out alive.”
“I think this is very different. This Malcolm is talking about a world, a society, and Lord knows what else. I seriously doubt that anyone could
create
such a thing, but he might be able to access some place that’s already there. And who knows what it might lead to?”
create
such a thing, but he might be able to access some place that’s already there. And who knows what it might lead to?”
Victor wasn’t quite so enthusiastic, but he agreed. “They’re up to something,” he said.” And I don’t buy that they just want to test it out. They know what they’re doing. There’s a purpose behind it.”
“Maybe they’re hoping to find something there,” I said. “Something not available in this world, like those rune stones that gave us so much trouble.” Victor nodded.
“Not a bad thought. But again, what? The only way to find out is to take him up on his offer.”
Truth be told, I was curious myself. The singularity Jackie had created was impressive enough, and if Malcolm could go her one better, it would be quite a feat. Accessing a complete other world would be even more so. But curiosity has been known to kill more than cats.
“Be careful, will you?” Eli said, already lost back in the computer screen. He assumed I would jump at the chance, because that’s what he would have done.
“Always,” I said, but I doubt he heard me.
WHEN I CALLED JACKIE AND SAID IT WAS A GO, she told me to meet her and Malcolm at the north entrance to Mount Davidson at six. Jackie was acting subdued when I got there but Malcolm was upbeat and bouncy. He wore a fanny pack around his waist, much like the one Victor carries for magical forensic investigations.
Mount Davidson is an odd place, a thousand-foot-high hill covered with tall eucalyptus trees and choked with thick undergrowth. It rises up unexpectedly from an area of residential streets, and a narrow path leads up to the summit where a massive hundred-foot-tall white concrete cross dominates the clearing at the top.
Malcolm and Jackie led the way with Lou and me trailing behind. Neither of us wanted to walk up that narrow path with the two of them at our backs. A lot of people enjoy Mount Davidson, but I’ve always found it just the slightest bit creepy. It has an amazing microclimate, like something plucked from the Pacific Northwest coastal rain forest and set neatly down in the middle of San Francisco. Even on sunny days the light doesn’t quite penetrate all the way down to the forest floor, and the fog lingers there long after it’s cleared away from the rest of the city. The tree trunks are perpetually damp, the dirt path always muddy in spots.
Rarely do you see a bird in the surrounding woods, although you can often hear crows squawking in the distance. Flowers are few and far between, and sound is muffled. The narrow path winds up to the top of the hill, and you can’t see much of anything except the trees, even when you’re within fifty feet of the summit. But when you finally crest the lip at the top and reach the clearing, it all changes. The sky overhead glows blue and the city stretches out in the distance like a panoramic postcard. And best of all, the huge white cross that dominates the clearing exudes a quiet peace, no matter your religion.
The sun was low when we arrived at the summit and its rays lit up the top of the cross, adding to the supernatural sheen. I saw why Malcolm had picked this place.
“Impressive, isn’t it?” he said, following my gaze. “Richter lived in nineteenth-century Austria, so of course he was surrounded by Christian symbology. Many of his rituals and instructions depend on them—I probably could get much the same results using different symbols, but why mess with that when you have something that you know will work?”
“Don’t fix what ain’t broken.”
“Exactly,” he said, as if I’d uttered a profound truth.
He reached in the fanny pack and pulled out some crystals, which is standard for rituals. Then a glass bottle full of a grayish powder. He laid down a trail of parallel lines that led to the other side of the clearing, maybe ten feet or so, like a gunpowder trail leading to a powder keg. Arranging the crystals in a semicircle, he stepped back, considered them, and then, obviously dissatisfied, rearranged them. The next things out of the pack were a plain wooden cross, maybe six inches long, and a vial of liquid, dark red and viscous. I looked a question at him.
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