Текст книги "Death Match"

Автор книги: Lincoln Child

Соавторы: Lincoln Child
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“Does she know we’re here?”

Silver nodded toward a video monitor set high in one wall. “Yes. But her processing isn’t currently focused on us.”

“Earlier, you said you needed to access Liza directly for complicated work. Such as?”

“A variety of things. She runs scenarios, for example, that I monitor.”

“What kinds of scenarios?”

“All kinds. Problem-solving. Role-playing. Survival games. Things that stimulate creative thinking.” Silver hesitated. “I also use direct access for more difficult, personal tasks like software updates. But it would probably be easier just to show you.”

He walked across the room, slid open the Plexiglas panel, and took a seat in the sculpted chair. Lash watched as he fixed electrodes to his temples. A small keypad and stylus were set into one arm of the chair; a hat switch was mounted on the other. Reaching overhead, Silver pulled down a flat panel monitor, fixed to a telescoping arm. His left hand began moving over the keypad.

“What are you doing?” Lash asked.

“Getting her attention.” Silver’s hand fell away from the keypad and fixed the lavalier mike to his shirt collar.

Just then, Lash heard a voice.

“Richard,” it said.

It was a woman’s voice, low and without accent, and it seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. It was as if the room itself was speaking.

“Liza,” Silver replied. “What is your current state?”

“Ninety-eight point seven two seven percent operational. Current processes are at eighty-one point four percent of multithreaded capacity. Thank you for asking.”

The voice was calm, almost serene, with the faintest trace of digital artifacting. Lash had a strange sense of déjà vu, as if he’d heard the voice before, somewhere. Perhaps in dreams.

“Who is with you?” the voice asked. Lash noticed that the question was articulated properly, with a faint emphasis on the preposition. He thought he even detected an undercurrent of curiosity. He glanced a little uneasily up at the video camera.

“This is Christopher Lash.”

“Christopher,” the voice repeated, as if tasting the name.

“Liza, I have a special process I would like you to run.” Lash noticed that when Silver addressed the computer, he spoke slowly and with careful enunciation, without contractions of any kind.

“Very well, Richard.”

“Do you remember the data interrogatory I asked you to run forty-eight hours ago?”

“If you mean the statistical deviance interrogatory, my dataset has not been corrupted.”

Silver covered the mike and turned to Lash. “She misinterpreted ‘do you remember.’ Even now, I sometimes forget how literal-minded she is.”

He turned back. “I need you to run a similar interrogatory against external agents. The arguments are the same: data crossover with the four subjects.”

“Subject Schwartz, Subject Thorpe, Subject Torvald, Subject Wilner.”

“That is correct.”

“What is the scope of the interrogatory?”

“United States citizens, ages fifteen to seventy, with access to both target locations on the stated dates.”

“The data-gathering parameters?”

“All available sources.”

“And the priority of this process?”

“Highest priority, except for criticals. It is vital we find the solution.”

“Very well, Richard.”

“Can you give me an estimated processing window?”

“To within eleven-percent accuracy. Seventy-four hours, fifty-three minutes, nine seconds. Approximately eight hundred trillion five hundred billion machine cycles.”

“Thank you, Liza.”

“Is there anything else?”

“No.”

“I will begin the expanded interrogatory now. Thank you for speaking with me, Richard.”

As Silver removed the microphone and reached again for the keypad, the disembodied voice spoke again. “It was nice meeting you, Christopher Lash.”

“A pleasure,” Lash murmured. Hearing this voice speak to him, watching the interaction between Silver and his computer, was both fascinating and a little unsettling.

Silver plucked the electrodes from his temples, put them aside, and got out of the chair. “You said you’d go to the police if you thought it would help. I’ve just done something better. I’ve instructed Liza to search the entire country for a possible suspect match.”

“The entire country? Is that possible?”

“For Eden, it’s possible.” Silver swayed, recovered. “Sorry. Sessions with Liza, even brief ones, can be a little draining.”

“How so?”

Silver smiled. “In movies people talk to computers, and they talk glibly back. Maybe it will be that way in another decade. Right now, it’s hard work. As much a mental exercise as a verbal one.”

“Those electroencephalogram sensors you wore?”

“Think of biofeedback. The frequency and amplitude of beta or theta waves can speak a lot more distinctly than words. Early on, when I was having troubles with her language comprehension, I used the EEG as a shortcut. It required a great deal of concentration, but there was no confusion over dual meanings, homophones, nuances of intent. Now, it’s too deeply buried in her legacy code to change easily.”

“So only you can communicate with her directly?”

“It’s theoretically possible for others to do so, too, with the proper concentration and training. There’s just been no need.”

“Perhaps not,” Lash said. “If I’d built something this marvelous, I’d want to share it with others. Like-minded scientists who could build on what you pioneered.”

“That will come. So many other enhancements seem to occupy my time. And it’s a non-trivial task. We can discuss the details some other time, if you’re interested.”

He stepped forward, put a hand on Lash’s shoulder. “I know how hard it’s been on you. It hasn’t been easy for me, either. But we’ve come this far, done this much. I need you to stick with it just a little longer. Maybe it isjust a freakish tragedy after all, two double suicides. Maybe we’ll have a quiet weekend. I realize it’s hell not knowing. But we have to trust Liza now. Okay?”

Lash remained silent a moment. “That match Eden found for me. It’s on the level? No mistakes?”

“The only mistake was sending your avatar to the Tank in the first place. The matching process itself would work for you as it does for everybody else. The woman would be perfectly suited to you in every way.”

The dim light, the whispered hum of machinery, gave the room a dreamlike, almost spectral air. Half a dozen images flitted through Lash’s head. The look on his ex-wife’s face, that day in the blind at the Audubon Center when they separated. Tara Stapleton’s expression at the bar in Grand Central when she told him of her own dilemma. The face of Lewis Thorpe, staring at him out of the Flagstaff television screen.

He sighed. “Very well. I’ll stay on a few more days. On one condition.”

“Name it.”

“That you don’t cancel my dinner with Diana Mirren.”

Silver pressed Lash’s shoulder for a moment. “Good man.” He smiled again, briefly; but when the smile faded, he looked just as tired as Lash felt.

TWENTY-NINE

Seventy-five hours,” Tara said. “That means Liza won’t have an answer until Monday afternoon.”

Lash nodded. He’d summarized his talk with Silver, described in detail how the man communicated with Liza. Throughout, Tara was fascinated – until she heard how long the extended search would take.

“So what are we supposed to do until then?” she said.

“I don’t know.”

“I do. We wait.” Tara raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Shit.”

Lash looked around the room. In size, Tara Stapleton’s thirty-fifth-floor office wasn’t that different from his own temporary space. It had the same conference table, same desk, same shelving. There were a few distinctly feminine touches: half a dozen leafy plants that appeared to thrive on the artificial light, a paisley sachet of potpourri hanging from the desk lamp by a red ribbon. Three identical computer workstations were lined up behind the desk. But the most distinctive feature of the office was a large fiberglass surfboard leaning against a far wall, badly scored and pitted, the stripe along its length faded by salt and sun. Bumper stickers with legends like “Live to surf, surf to live” and “Hang ten off a log!” were fixed on the wall behind it. Postcards from famous surfing beaches – Lennox Head, Australia; Pipeline, Hawaii; Potovil Point, Sri Lanka – were taped in a row along the upper edge of the bookshelf.

“Must have had a hell of a time getting that in here,” Lash said, nodding at the surfboard.

Tara flashed one of her rare smiles. “I spent my first couple of months outside the Wall, auditing security procedures. I brought in my old board to remind me there was a world out there beyond New York City. So I wouldn’t forget what I’d rather be doing. Audit finished, I got promoted, transferred inside. They wouldn’t let me take the board. I was ripshit.” She shook her head at the memory. “Then it appeared in my office doorway one day. Happy first anniversary, courtesy of Edwin Mauchly and Eden.”

“Knowing Mauchly, after having been scanned, probed, and analyzed six ways from Sunday.”

“Probably.”

Lash glanced at the clutch of emerald-green postcards. A question had formed in his mind – a question Tara could probably answer better than anybody.

He leaned toward the desk. “Tara, listen. Remember that drink we had at Sebastian’s? What you told me about your getting the nod?”

Immediately, he felt her grow more reserved.

“I need to know something. Is there any chance that an Eden candidate who gets turned down after testing might end up getting processed anyway? Go through data-gathering, surveillance – the works – and ultimately end up in the Tank? Getting matched?”

“You mean, like a mistake? Obsoletes somehow making their way through? Impossible.”

“Why?”

“There are redundant checks. It’s like everything else with the system. We don’t take any chance that a client, even a would-be client, could suffer embarrassment from sloppy data handling.”

“You’re sure?”

“It’s never happened.”

“It happened yesterday.” And in response to Tara’s disbelieving look, he handed her the letter he’d found waiting outside his front door.

She read it, paling visibly. “Tavern on the Green.”

“I was rejected as an applicant. And pretty definitively. So how could this have happened?”

“I have no idea.”

“Could somebody within Eden have doctored my forms, guiding them through instead of shunting them toward the discard pile?”

“Nobody here does anything without half a dozen others seeing it.”

“Nobody?”

Hearing the tone of his voice, Tara looked at him closely. “It would have to be somebody very highly placed, somebody with world-class access. Me, for example. Or a grunt like Handerling who’d somehow hacked the system.” She paused. “But why would anybody do such a thing?”

“That was my next question.”

There was a silence. Tara folded the letter and handed it back across the table.

“I don’t know how this happened. But I’m very, very sorry, Dr. Lash. We’ll investigate immediately, of course.”

“You’re sorry. Silver’s sorry. Why is everybody so sorry?”

Tara looked astonished. “You mean—?”

“That’s right. Tomorrow night, I’m stepping out.”

“But I don’t understand—” The flow of words stopped.

I know you don’t, Lash thought.

He didn’t exactly understand himself. If he’d worked at Eden, like Tara – if he’d been influenced by what insiders called the “Oz effect”—he might have torn up the letter.

But he had not torn up the letter. The peek behind the scenes, the rabid testimonials of Eden clients, had piqued his interest almost without his realizing it. And now he’d been told a perfect mate had been found for him – Christopher Lash, so expert at analyzing other relationships yet so unsuccessful in his own. It was simply too powerful a lure to resist. Even the knowledge of why he was here in the first place was no match for the curiosity of meeting – just perhaps – an ideal partner.

But that meeting would come tomorrow. Today, there was something else on his mind.

“It’s not a coincidence,” he said.

“Huh?”

“My application getting processed. It might be a mistake, but it’s no coincidence. Any more than the deaths of the two supercouples are coincidence.”

Tara frowned. “What are you saying, exactly?”

“I’m not sure. But there’s a pattern here somewhere. We’re just not seeing it.” Mentally, he returned to last night’s drive home, when he’d refused to listen to the voice in the back of his head. Now he tried to recall the voice.

You murdered the first two supercouples, in order, Mauchly had said to Handerling during the interrogation. Now you’ve been planning to stalk, and kill, a third.

In order…

“Mind if I borrow this?” he asked, taking a notepad from the desk. Pulling out a pen, he wrote two dates on the pad: 9/17/04. 9/24/04. The dates the Thorpes and the Wilners had died.

“Tara,” he said. “Can you pull up the dates that the Thorpes and the Wilners first submitted their applications?”

“Sure.” She turned toward one of the terminals, typed briefly. Almost immediately, the printer spat out a sheet:

Nothing.

“Could you widen the search, please? I want a printout of all relevant dates for the two couples. When they were tested, when they first met, when they were married, everything.”

Tara looked at him speculatively for a moment. Then she returned to the keyboard and resumed typing.

The second list ran to almost a dozen pages. Lash turned them over, one after another, running his eyes wearily down the columns. Then he froze.

“Jesus,” he murmured.

“What is it?”

“These columns labeled ‘Nominal avatar removal.’ What do they stand for?”

“When the avatars were removed from the tank.”

“In other words, when the couples were matched.”

“Right.”

Lash handed her the sheet. “Look at the removal dates for the Thorpes and the Wilners.”

Tara glanced at the report. “My God. September 17, 2002. September 24, 2002.”

“That’s right. Not only were the Thorpes and the Wilners the first two supercouples to be matched. They also died preciselytwo years after they were matched. Two years to the day.”

Tara dropped the report on the desk. “What do you think it means?”

“That this dog’s been sniffing around the wrong fire hydrant. Here I’ve been digging into the psych tests and evaluations, assuming there might be some human flaw your examinations missed. Maybe instead of examining the people, I should have examined the process.”

“The process? What about the suspect match? Liza’s search?”

“That won’t be done until Monday. I don’t plan to spend the next seventy-odd hours sitting on my hands.” He stood up and turned toward the door. “Thanks for the help.”

As he opened the door, he heard Tara’s chair roll back. “Just a minute,” she said.

He turned.

“Where are you going?”

“Back to my office. I’ve got a lot of evidence lockers to search.”

When Tara came around the desk, there was no hesitation. “I’m coming along,” she said.

THIRTY

Seen my traveling kit, babe?” Kevin Connelly called out.

“Beneath the vanity, second shelf. On the left.”

Connelly padded past the sleigh bed, past the bars of yellow light that slanted in through the windows, and knelt before the vanity sink. Sure enough: second shelf, tucked carefully against the wall. Back in the day he’d have spent half an hour tearing up the bedroom in search of it. But Lynn seemed to possess a photographic memory for the whereabouts of everything in the house: not just her stuff, but his as well. It wasn’t anything conscious, it was just there all the time, sticking to everything it touched, like flypaper. Perhaps that’s part of what made her so good with languages.

“You’re a treasure,” he said.

“I’ll bet you say that to all the girls.”

He paused, crouching before the vanity, to look over at her. She was standing just within the closet, staring at a long rack of dresses. As he watched, she took down one, turned it around on its hanger, replaced it in favor of another. There was something in the way her limbs moved – lissome, unself-conscious – that even now quickened his pulse. He’d been deeply offended when, the other week, his mother had labeled her “cute.” Cute? She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

She left the closet and walked the newly selected dress over to the bed, where a large canvas suitcase lay open. With the same economy of motion, she folded the dress in half and placed it within the suitcase.

He’d taken the afternoon off to help his wife pack for Niagara Falls. It was a kind of guilty pleasure that, for some reason, he’d be embarrassed to confess to anybody. They always packed days in advance of a trip; somehow, it seemed to extend the vacation. He’d always been a premature packer, for the same reason he always liked to get to the airport early – yet as a bachelor it had been a hurried, slovenly affair. Lynn had shown him packing was an art, never to be rushed. And now, the process had grown into one of those intimate little rituals that made up the fabric of their marriage.

He stood, came up behind her, put his arms around her waist. “Just think,” he said, nuzzling her ear. “Another couple of days and we’ll be in front of a roaring fire at the Pillar and Post Inn.”

“Mmm.”

“We’ll have breakfast in bed. Maybe lunch in bed, too. How does that sound? And if you play your cards right, you just might get dessert, as well.”

In response, she leaned her head a little wearily against his shoulder.

Kevin Connelly knew his wife’s moods almost as well as his own, and he drew back. “What is it, babe?” he asked quickly. “Migraine?”

“Maybe the beginnings of one,” she said. “Hope not.”

He turned her toward him, kissed her gently on one temple, then the other.

“Some perfect wife, huh?” she said, raising her lips to his.

“You are the perfect wife. Myperfect wife.”

She smiled, laid her head against his shoulder again.

The doorbell rang.

Kevin gently detached himself, then trotted out into the hall and down the stairs. Behind, he heard Lynn’s quiet footsteps, moving more slowly.

A man with an enormous wrapped parcel waited at the front door. “Mr. Connelly?” he said. “Sign here, please.”

Connelly signed on the indicated line, then gathered the package in his arms.

“What is it?” Lynn said as he thanked the man and pushed the door closed behind him.

“Don’t know. Want to open it?” Connelly handed the package to her, then watched, smiling, as she tore off the wrapping paper. Clear cellophane came into view; then a broad red ribbon; then the pale yellow of woven straw.

“What is it?” he asked. “A basket of fruit?”

“Not just fruit,” Lynn said breathlessly. “Look at the label. It’s red blush pears from Ecuador! You have any idea how expensive these are?”

Connelly smiled at the look that came over his wife’s face. Lynn was passionate about exotic fruit.

“Who could have sent this?” she asked. “I don’t see a card.”

“There’s a small one tucked in the back, over here.” Connelly plucked it from between threads of twisted straw, read the engraved words aloud. “Congratulations and warm best wishes on your upcoming anniversary.”

Lynn crowded close, headache forgotten. “Who’s it from?”

Connelly handed it to her. There was no name, but the card was embossed with the sleek infinity symbol of Eden.

Her eyes widened. “Red blush pears. How could they have known?”

“They know everything. Remember?”

Lynn shook her head, then began tearing the cellophane from the basket.

“Not so fast,” Connelly said in mock admonishment. “We’ve got some unfinished business upstairs. Remember?”

Now a smile brightened on her face, as well. And putting the basket aside, she skipped up the stairs after him.

THIRTY-ONE

Lash glanced up at the clock: a quick, disinterested look. Then he glanced again in disbelief. Quarter to six. It seemed only minutes since Tara, pleading a doctor’s appointment, had excused herself from his office around four.

He leaned back in his chair, surveyed the flood of paperwork covering the table. Had he really complained bitterly, once upon a time, about a lack of information? Now he had information, all right: enough to drown an army.

Discovering the deaths of the Thorpes and the Wilners were precisely timed to their matches was a critical piece of the puzzle – he just had to learn how it fit in. But with this embarrassment of data, he wasn’t likely to learn this afternoon.

His eye returned to the table, falling on a folder labeled Thorpe, Lewis – Process Inventory. He’d already flipped through it briefly: it appeared to be a system-generated list of all Eden systems Thorpe had interacted with. Lash sifted through the other flotsam until he found an identical folder for Lindsay. Then, walking to the far wall of the office, he rummaged through the evidence lockers until he’d located similar inventories for the Wilners, as well.

Maybe Silver was right – nothing would happen that weekend. If there was a murderer out there, maybe Eden’s surveillance teams would catch him before he could kill again. But that didn’t mean Lash was going to twiddle his thumbs. Comparing the data in the folders might turn up more pieces of the puzzle.

He slipped the folders into his leather satchel, stretched wearily. Then he made his way down the hall to the cafeteria. Marguerite had left for the day, but the counter person on duty was more than happy to make him a double espresso. Despite the late hour, the room was bustling, and Lash chose a corner table, grateful Eden maintained a three-shift operation.

Draining his cup, he returned to his office, retrieved his coat and satchel, then headed to the nearest elevator bank. Though most of the building remained a mystery to him, he’d at least learned to navigate his way to the lobby.

As Lash took up position in the queue for Checkpoint III, his thoughts returned to the couples. Before she’d left, Tara Stapleton had pointed out the third supercouple – the Connellys – had been matched on October 6, 2002. If the pattern he’d discovered held true to form, that meant the Connellys would experience their own tragedy – suicide, homicide – this coming Wednesday. That took a little pressure off, gave them some breathing room. But it also meant they had an ironclad deadline.

Wednesday. Any missing pieces of the puzzle had to be found before then.

He reached the front of the queue, waited while the glass doors slid open, then stepped into the circular chamber. Even this had become almost routine. It was an amazing thing, conditioning. You could get used to almost anything, no matter how remarkable. In the lab, he’d seen the effect in dogs, mice, chimps. He used it himself in biofeedback therapy. And here he was, a walking, talking example of its use in a corporate…

He became aware of a distant ringing sound. The light in the chamber, already bright, grew brighter. Ahead, beyond the second set of doors, he could see people running. What was happening – a fire alarm? Some sort of drill?

Suddenly, two guards appeared ahead on the far side of the glass. They planted themselves in his path, feet apart, arms at their sides.

He turned back the way he’d come, not comprehending. Two more guards now stood there. As he watched, more ran up behind them.

There was a brief series of tones, then the doors he’d passed through opened again. Guards advanced in two rows. One of the guards in the rear row, he noticed, held a stun device in one hand.

“What—” he began.

Quickly, and very firmly, the two lead guards hustled him back through the glass doors. The rest formed a security cordon around them. Lash registered a fleeting set of images – the queue falling back, wide-eyed; the walls of a corridor; a quick turn around a corner – and then he found himself inside a stark, windowless room.

He was guided to a wooden chair. For a moment, it seemed nobody paid any further attention to him. There was the sound of radios chattering, a phone being dialed. “Get Sheldrake in here,” somebody said. The door to the room closed. And then one of the guards turned to him.

“Where were you going with these?” he asked. In one hand he held up the four folders from the satchel.

In his confusion, Lash was unaware the satchel had been taken from him. “I was taking them home,” he said. “To read over the weekend.” Christ, how could he have forgotten Mauchly’s warnings? Nothing from inside the Wall ever went out. But how had they…

“You know the rules, Mr. – ?” the guard said, placing the binders inside what looked uncomfortably like an evidence bag.

“Dr. Lash. Christopher Lash.”

Hearing this, one of the security officers walked over to a data terminal and began to type.

“You know the rules, Dr. Lash?”

Lash nodded.

“So you realize the seriousness of this offense.”

Lash nodded again, embarrassed. Tara, stickler for protocol, would never let him live this down. He hoped she wouldn’t get in trouble; after all, Mauchly had put her in charge of—

“We’re going to have to keep you here until we’ve pulled your security history. If you already have a warning on your record, I’m afraid you’ll be brought before the termination review board.”

The security officer at the workstation looked up. “There’s no Christopher Lash in the Human Resources files.”

“Did we get your name right?” the officer with the evidence bag said.

“Yes, but—”

“I’m showing a Christopher S. Lash as a prospective client,” the officer at the terminal said, typing again. “Went through applicant testing last Sunday, September twenty-sixth.” He stopped typing. “The application was rejected.”

“Is that you?” the first officer asked.

“Yes, but—”

Immediately, the atmosphere in the room changed. The first officer stepped toward him quickly. Several others, including the one with the Taser, closed ranks behind him.

Christ, Lash thought, this is getting awkward. “Look,” he began again, “you don’t understand—”

“Sir,” the first officer said, “please keep silent. I’ll ask the questions.”

The door opened and another man stepped in. He was tall, and his shoulders were so broad the blond head atop them seemed too small for its body. As he came forward with an almost military bearing, the others stepped back deferentially. He wore a dark business suit, plainly cut. His eyes were an unusual shade of emerald green. He seemed vaguely familiar, but in his confused state it took Lash a moment to place him. Then he remembered: he’d glimpsed the man briefly, standing in the hallway during Handerling’s interrogation.

“What have you got?” the man said. His voice was clipped, accentless.

“This gentleman tried to slip concealed documents past the checkpoint.”

“What’s his department and rank?”

“He’s not an employee, Mr. Sheldrake. He’s a rejected client.”

The man’s eyebrows shot up. “Indeed?”

“He just admitted to it.”

Sheldrake stepped forward, crossed one massive arm over the other, and regarded Lash with curiosity. There was no look of recognition: it was clear he hadn’t seen Lash at the interrogation. The man uncrossed his arms again and drew back his suit jacket at the waist. Lash saw he was wearing a service belt, complete with automatic weapon, handcuffs, and radio. Plucking the ASP baton from his belt, Sheldrake extended it to full length.

“Crandall,” he muttered. “Look at this.” And he raised Lash’s sleeve with the nubby metal end of the baton, exposing the security bracelet.

The first officer – the one named Crandall – frowned in surprise. “How’d you get that? And what were you doing inside the secure perimeter?”

“I’m a temporary consultant.”

“You just admitted to being a rejected client.”

Lash cursed the secrecy under which he’d been brought in. “Yes, I know. But going through the application process was part of my assignment. Look, just ask Edwin Mauchly. He hired me.”

In the background he could hear more radio chatter. One of the security guards was pawing through his satchel. “Eden doesn’t hire temporary consultants. And they certainly aren’t allowed inside the Wall.” Sheldrake turned toward one of the others. “Alert the security posts, all down the line. We’re going to Condition Beta. Get an analyzer over here, see if the bracelet was tampered with.”

“Right away, Mr. Sheldrake.”

This was ridiculous. Why weren’t his more recent records appearing, the records of his successful match? “Look,” Lash said, standing, “I told you to speak with Mauchly—”

“Sit down!” Crandall pushed him roughly back into the seat. Another guard – the one with the Taser – stepped closer. Yet another opened a metal closet and pulled out a long, rake-like implement with a half-circle bolted to one end. Lash had seen the implement many times in the past: it was used to pin uncooperative psychiatric patients against a wall.

He licked his lips. What had been first embarrassing, then annoying, was quickly becoming something else. “Listen,” he said as calmly as he could. “I’m a consultant, like I said. I’m working with Tara Stapleton.”

“Doing what?” Sheldrake asked.

“That’s confidential.”

“If that’s the way you want to play it.” Sheldrake glanced over his shoulder. “See what doctor’s on call, get him in here. And call the security desk, alert the duty chiefs.”

“I’m telling you the truth,” Lash said. “You can ask Silver if you don’t believe me. He knows all about it.”

Sheldrake’s lips curled into a faint smile. “Richard Silver?”

“He knows all about it,” Crandall added. “Nobody’s seen the guy for a year, and he knows all about it.”

“I’ll go speak with him myself.” And Lash began to stand again.

Crandall shoved him back into the seat again. Another security officer stepped forward, and together they pinned Lash to the chair.

“Get the restraints,” Sheldrake said mildly. “And Stemper, use that Taser. I want this guy pacified.”

The guard with the stun device stepped forward. “Back on my signal,” Crandall muttered to the guard on the far side of the chair.

At that moment, the door opened and Mauchly stepped in.

“What’s going on?” he demanded.

Sheldrake looked around, stopped. “This man says he knows you, Mr. Mauchly.”

“He does.” Mauchly came forward. Lash began to rise, but Mauchly stayed him with a suppressing gesture. “What happened, exactly?” he asked Sheldrake.

“The man attempted to exit the secure perimeter with these in his possession.” Sheldrake nodded at Crandall, who handed the evidence bag to Mauchly.

Mauchly opened it, read the titles on the binders. “I’ll hang on to these,” he said.