Dante's Equation Part 23

There was the accident, and that was one thing. But there was alsothe technology .

It came with a s.h.i.+ver and a dawning horror. He remembered the day he'd gotten his first real whiff, complete with major goose b.u.mps, about the nature of the one-minus-one. He'd thought then that if their experiment was really doing what hethought it was doing, then this could be some seriously screwed up technology in the wrong hands. Whether or not the FBI was herelooking for the one-minus-one, they would find it in the course of their investigation. And if they found it, they would pa.s.s it on to . . . who? The U.S. government, of course, maybe the military.

Was the U.S. military the wrong hands?

Nate jumped to his feet.

He felt an urgent need to act. The lab was torched and what else was there? Stuff in Jill's office: his papers, the sim, and other files. At Jill's house there was the control group, probably her briefcase. G.o.d, herbriefcase ! She kept everything in there. He headed for the bus stop.

When Nate got to Jill's place it was nearly 2:00P .M. He paused at the end of the street, studying the scene warily. Her street was always lined with cars, especially on a Sat.u.r.day morning, but he didn't see anything particularly ominous-no black sedans, patrol cars, or men wearing suits. The house itself looked quiet.

Well,he told himself,I'll either get away with it or I won't.

He walked to her car and glanced in the windows casually. Her briefcase wasn't in the front or backseats, though it wouldn't have surprised him if she'd forgotten it there, as sick as she'd been lately. He knew it wouldn't be in the trunk; he'd never even seen her open the trunk. Hands in his pockets, he headed for the house. The front door was locked, but he had a key Jill had given him months ago. He let himself in.

He shut the front door slowly, trying not to make a sound. His ears strained for any noise. He heard nothing.

He sighed with relief. Still being quiet, but pretty confident now that he was alone, he surveyed the living room for Jill's briefcase. He didn't see it. He went into the small kitchen-nada. He rummaged around and found a large plastic garbage bag. He'd laid this all out in his head on the way over here like a criminal planning a heist-in and out in five minutes. He would collect the control specimens as well as any papers or records in the house and put them in the bag.

He went down the hall to the guest room where the control subjects were kept and opened the door. The room was empty. He gaped, then blinked hard, several times, as if to change the message being transmitted to his brain. Every piece of fruit, every virus dish, every mouse was gone. Only the barren card tables remained. It reminded him of the time he'd pulled the wool over Chalmers's eyes, hiding all their stuff in the next room. Now someone had pulled that switcharoo on him.

He went and checked the next room-Jill's bedroom. Her closet and bedside table had been rifled through, but they hadn't taken her clothes or even, he noticed, the pa.s.sport or small collection of family photographs in the open drawer of her bedside table. He paused, unable to resist looking at these pictures. Jill never mentioned family, ever. They looked poor, her mother washed out and old.

Jill was younger but just as feisty-looking. She took after her dad. Nate put the pictures back and checked the bath and hall closet. There was nothing in them but a few towels, shampoo, toothbrush-the basics. Everything related to the experiment had been taken from the house. The briefcase, if it had been here, was now in the custody of the FBI. He was too late. Nate slumped to the floor in the hallway, garbage bag useless at his side. So his intuition hadn't been wrong. This wasn't just about the explosion; they wanted information. And what were the two most important sources of information? He and Jill. They'd already be grilling her, and it was just a matter of time before they caught up with him.

He had a bad feeling about this. He had a very bad feeling.

He heard the front door creaking open, slowly, as though moved by the wind. He'd left it unlocked.d.a.m.n! Cautious footsteps. It was no wind. Nate panicked. The thought of him and Rambo alone was enough to make him gag in terror. But before he could do more than push himself to his feet, a figure stepped into the hallway. Nate screamed. He looked at the man; the man looked at him. My G.o.d,Nate thought, with a hysterical giggle,I'm hallucinating.Maybe he'd wake up to find this whole thing was some bizarre lucid dream caused by the negative one pulse. Because the funny thing was, the intruder looked exactly like an Orthodox Jew. There was the long beard, the black fedora and long black coat, black pants, black shoes. He could have walked out of Mr. Broadway's deli in New York. The man was studying him suspiciously.

"Who are you?" the man asked, as if this were his house and Nate had broken in. "Who amI? Who areyou?" "I'm looking for Dr. Talcott." "She's at the hospital." "I know that." The man put a finger to his lips, thinking. "So who areyou ?" "Who areyou? " Nate asked again, frowning. The man rolled his eyes. "This could go on all day. I'm tired, so I give up first. My name is Rabbi Aharon Handalman. I need to know what Dr. Talcott was experimenting with." Nate slumped against the wall. He'd accepted the idea that the government might be interested. That theOrthodox Jewish community might be interested-that was too bizarre. "How doyou know about Dr. Talcott?" "I have information. She'll want to talk; trust me. And who areyou ?" "I'm . . ." Nate hesitated but figured what the h.e.l.l. It was all over anyway. "Her graduate student, Nate Andros."

Rabbi Handalman sighed and closed his eyes. "Thank the Lord for that."

11.3. s.h.i.+mon Norowitz

Aharon Handalman had flown to Seattle.

s.h.i.+mon Norowitz had not been having the rabbi followed, hadn't given him that much credit. But he had put Handalman's name into the database of "people of interest," a list that would raise flags when processed by airlines, railways, and police departments or if they cropped up in the media.

Norowitz had his secretary call and inquire at the yes.h.i.+va. They told her Rabbi Handalman had a family emergency in America-a sick relative. Norowitz called Aharon's wife himself. She wanted to know who he was and sounded nervous. She told him the same thing-a sick relative. She was lying.

The Mossad subscribed to a service that gave them a daily summary of news throughout the world. He brought up the summary for the day Handalman left. There were more than fifty items. He saved it to a text file and brought it up in another window, did a search on "Seattle." He found an article about an explosion on campus at the University of Was.h.i.+ngton.

He clicked on a hyperlink under the heading. It took him on-line to theSeattle Times site. It was suspected that the lab of a physicist named Dr. Jill Talcott was the cause of the explosion, and the FBI was trying to rule out any possible terrorist connection.

Norowitz sucked on his mustache, considering it. He reread all the coverage carefully. There wasn't much there, really. He sucked on his mustache some more.

He picked up the phone and called one of his a.n.a.lysts. a.s.saf was a gifted mathematician and one of Norowitz's best cryptologists.

"a.s.saf, listen; bring up your search routine for the Kobinski codes. I want to try some keywords." Norowitz heard typing in the background. "Go ahead." " 'Seattle.' " Typing. "Nothing." " 'University of Was.h.i.+ngton' and 'Was.h.i.+ngton.' " "No." " 'Explosion'?" "Emm . . . no." " 'Smith Hall.' " "No." Norowitz could still taste hummus on his mustache from lunch. " 'Jill Talcott' or just 'Talcott.' " "Umm . . ." More typing. "Hit." "Yes?" "Hit." a.s.saf's voice was perking up. "I'm trying the . . . hit. Hit, hit, hit!" Norowitz hung up the phone. He sat there for a moment, staring at the CNN article. Then he picked up the phone and called the chief of the Mossad.

11.4. Denton Wyle

LOSANGELES.

FROMTHEBOOK OFTORMENT BYYOSEFKOBINSKI.

In my being, I represent the essence of opposites. I have striven for perfect balance and nearly achieved it. I have seen the greatest mysteries imaginable and wept for them. Now I struggle against a desire to pick up Hate like a cloak and put it on, sinking down into the depths of darkness like a stone. I could take up Hate like a harlot, brought home to shame my parents. I could wed Hate like a bridegroom. I could wrap my hand around it like a bottle of poison and drink it out of sheer perversity. Oh, Life, you are my enemy now. You have taken the heart from me and stomped it into the ground, and for this, I abandon you!

The Schwartz ma.n.u.script. Denton sat in the living room of his condo, the binder in his lap, trying to digest what he'd just read. It was at once wonderful and horrible and disappointing.

There were thirty-two pages of Kobinski material that Denton had never seen, and that was wonderful. There were several long entries going into detail about Kobinski's theory of "balance"- religious stuff. And there were new entries, quite shattering ones, about the camps and Kobinski's son, Isaac. Denton knew these had been written later than any entries he'd yet seen. They seemed to represent a rock-bottom point for Kobinski, a giving up or giving in. Denton got the feeling Kobinski had planned the escape attempt for Isaac's sake, but apparently it hadn't happened fast enough to save the boy. The kabbalist had written very little at the end.

It was exciting to read the new pages for the first time. But now the excitement faded and Denton was stuck facing the sum total of the ma.n.u.script as it now stood.

And he was disappointed. The new entries had a lot of emotional impact, but they did nothing for his whole kabbalah magic angle. Not one darn thing. There was nothing more about gateways or black holes or other universes, nothing about the last days of Kobinki's life or his disappearance, nothing that would give him the explanations he had been looking for this entire freaking time.How had Kobinski vanished? Where was the charm, the incantation, or at least a detailed scientific explanation? And where did he think he would go? An alternate universe? Heaven? William Shatner Land?Where, for G.o.d's sake?

All of that was echoingly absent. And Denton had to admit, now, that it had probably never been written and he would never find it. He wanted to sob, scream, run with scissors. How could Kobinski lead him on like this?

The worst part, though, the down-deep unsettling part, was that Schwartz's version of the ma.n.u.script was not the complete, cohesive package he'd envisioned. It didn't even include the pages from the Kroll ma.n.u.script, the pages stolen from Denton by that old man. Whatwas in Schwartz's version, between the Xeroxed pages of originals, was commentary, Schwartz's own commentary-that's what had made the binder so thick. There was lots of thoughtfully scribbled commentary, most of it tediously Orthodox and self-referentially Jewish and-snooze-totally unmagical and completely and utterly and spectacularly without interest to Denton Wyle or the readers ofMysterious World . Or, for that matter, anyone who might give him a movie deal or a book contract.

And that scared him. Because reading Schwartz's commentary made him suspect . . . It made him suspect that maybe Schwartz wasn't a Jewish Aleister Crowley after all. Maybe he was just an old fart conservative religious guy-not grand master of a cult, not a devious kabbalist magician, not any of those things he'd imagined.

It was even probable that Schwartz hadn't been behind the guy who stole the Kroll ma.n.u.script. Or even, and this was grim, behind the thugs who'd practically kidnapped him from the Kroll farmyard. Maybe Denton had let his imagination run a little too far ahead. Like Siberia.

Which was bad. Because if Schwartz was not the Evil Empire, that meant he, Denton Wyle, was not Luke Skywalker-just a thief.

You'll find a way to get what you want, Dent. You always do.

The phone rang, some woman probably. The machine picked it up. It was a woman-some friend of a friend he'd slept with last week. Nice hair. Big thighs. He didn't answer.

It all sank in, deeper and deeper, taking his spirits lower and lower. One by one, his illusions burst under the weight. There wasn't going tobe a book or a movie. This was just like all those other stupid cases he'd worked on, cases where no one ever actuallyproved there was a Loch Ness monster or UFOs or ESP.

And lower. He was never going to prove that people really did vanish in flashes of light. He was never going to prove thatcould have happened to Molly Brad. He was never going to know what had happened to her. His mother was never going to know.She was never going to believe him.

There was a knock on the door.

For once Denton was not in the mood for company. Then it occurred to him that company might help him forget, forget about Kobinski and Schwartz and his mother and all the rest of it. At the mere idea, in fact, he could already feel the faintest hint of a gust of wind, preparing to lift him off to some other mood, some other obsession, leaving all this angst and disappointment blessedly behind. When the going got tough, bunnies hopped elsewhere.

He opened the door, a smile on his face. A hand clamped over his mouth and he was pushed inside. The door thudded shut. Two men immediately began pillaging the living room. The charts and books, all of the stuff Loretta had sent him, got shoved into piles. His papers, his Kobinski work, including Schwartz's ma.n.u.script, were grabbed and stacked by the door.

He watched this, wide-eyed. It took him a moment to register the fact that he was observing this over someone's hand, the hand that was covering the lower half of his face, and the someone who stood behind him gripping his shoulder tightly with the digits not currently sealing his lips.

Denton rolled his eyes up and back to look at his captor. It was Mr. Edwards, the one from the Kroll incident. Edwards smiled h.e.l.lo and released him.

Denton was too indignant to be afraid. His mouth twisted in outrage. "You b.a.s.t.a.r.d! Who do you think you are?"

Edwards drew back a fist and sent it smas.h.i.+ng into Denton's face.

The next few minutes were surreal. In his entire life, Denton had never been struck. Not once. Ever. It was so beyond his experience, so unfathomable, that his mind could not keep up with the program. It could only jolt from sensation to sensation: the surprising weight of a blow, the immensity of the pain, the meaty thud of fists against his flesh, the jar of impact through his neck and body, the relentlessness of it, going on and on, the mechanical absence of pity. Mentally, he simply gasped from second to second, shocked into stupefaction.

He had probably only been hit six or seven times, but by the time he realized he was on the floor and that the blows had stopped coming it felt like he'd been beaten for hours. He felt very, very far away.

"Help me," someone said gruffly, and Denton was pulled to his feet. They propped him up on one of the chairs in the dining room, leaning him into the s.h.i.+ny mahogany table. Why, he could probably see his own reflection if he looked down. He didn't. He didn't want to see.

He could feel the pain all over now. It was bad. And it was sharper in his ribs when they moved him, like maybe something was broken. His right cheek stung like a sonofab.i.t.c.h. His nose was throbbing. He tried to sniff in, felt a blockage. Blood ran down the back of his throat. He started to cry.

Mr. Edwards sat companionably across from him. "Very good, then, Mr. Wyle. I'll keep this brief. We are taking all your Kobinski material. You will not get it back. You will tell us how you learned of Kobinski and what your interest in him is."

Denton hitched a breath. "I already told you in-"

"You will tell me again, truthfully this time. And you will drop all interest in Kobinski. You will not read, write, or speak about him ever again. You will not publish in any format, even on the Web. If you do, you will be very, very sorry. Understand?"

Denton nodded, tears mingling with blood on his cheeks. He did not feel far away now. No, the world was no bigger than this miserable dining room. "The editor atMysterious World magazine. He k-k-knows all about Kobinski."

Edwards took a small notepad from a pocket, flipped it open. "Name?"

"Jack Lorenz. Their a-a-address is in my files. His phone number is . . ." He slurped up blood from the bottom of his mouth.

"We have it from your phone memory."

"Oh . . . I'm sure he's talked about it to people. I haven't. I mean, I haven't discussed it with my f-ffriends or anything. Except one guy, Dave Banks. He works for Lockheed. And then there's my antiques agent, Fleck, and this r-r-rabbi, Schwartz. . . ."

Denton regurgitated everything, everything and anything he might have said or done, anything he'd everconsidered saying or doing. Edwards watched him coldly. Occasionally he made a notation, but mostly he just stared, as though this information were valueless. And Denton knew that it mostly was. He was babbling, but he didn't know how to stop. He even told them about Molly Brad and about stealing Schwartz's letter. Everything. Anything they wanted. Anything at all.

"We're done," one of the other men interrupted him.

"Take it all downstairs," Edwards said.

The two men carried out boxes of Denton's work. Denton watched them go, tears making his vision of the travesty mercifully dim. He let out a blubbering sigh.

"What are you going to do now?" Edwards asked, rising.

Denton looked up at him in confusion. "Wha . . ."

"I asked," Edwards said more firmly, "what will you do?"

"I-I-I. Nothing."

"Correct. Will you call the police?"

Denton tried to shake his head, but it hurt. "No." "Because it would be a waste of time and you'd be sorry." "I won't c-c-call them." "If your editor phones tell him you're no longer doing the story and hang up. You will not discuss it any more than that."

" 'Kay."

"And you won't speak about Kobinski again."

"I know."

"Or write about him."

"Or write about him."

Edwards put his hand on Denton's chin, pulled it upward-painfully-so that Denton's eyes

overflowed with fresh hot tears. "Because we'll be watching." "Yeah." Edwards left. In the hall, Denton could hear theding of the elevator. For a while he just sat there. Then the phone rang. He lost precious time staring at it, trying to decide if he wanted to answer it or not. He decided he wanted to. It might be someone who'd feel sorry for him, someone to come and tend his wounds. He started for the phone, but he had a dizzy spell as soon as he stood up. Blood gushed from his nose. At the feel of it, the taste and sight of it, he nearly pa.s.sed out, went white and clammy. He never could stand the sight of blood. He headed for the kitchen and let the blood drip bright and red onto a couple of dirty dishes in the sink. The answering machine clicked on. He heard his cheery message:Hi! This is Denton. I'm your humble servant, so . . . leave me a message! Beep.

"Denton, youa.s.shole ! I can't believe what you've done!"Jack Lorenz's voice, barely controlled fury. Blood spun lazily in the sediment of a soup bowl. "You aresofinished in this industry! Can you understand that, Denton? Can you understand that it'swrongto break into private property andsteal things?"

Denton pulled off a fistful of paper toweling, stuffed it in his face to stop the bleeding, and sank to his knees. "And don't bother to deny it. How could you be so stupid? They have a f.u.c.kingvideotape , Denton, of you prying open that whateveritwas in the library. A video! What were youthinking ! Did you notsee the camera or what? What am I saying? That's not even the point." Denton hobbled on two knees and a hand-the other hand holding toweling to his face-into the living room. He didn't pick up the phone, only fell down beside it, back propped up against the couch.

"I can't believe you did this. You're going to get us sued, and you know we don't have the money for that! I'll be surprised if we're notruined . After all the effort I've put into this magazine. I just-I can't believe you did this to me!"

Denton s.h.i.+vered with cold. He grabbed the silk throw off the couch and put it over his knees.

"So you can antic.i.p.ate a cla.s.s action suit against youpersonally -fromus . But then, you won't need your money anymore, will you, since you'll bein jail. Because that little stunt wasa felony , and I hope they-"

There seemed to be some background discussion going on. Denton pulled the toweling away from his face and looked at it. Bright red blood against the papery white. It reminded him of his entire life-an abortion.

"h.e.l.lo, Mr. Wyle?" A man's voice. "I'm Gip Bernstein, lawyer for Rabbi Schwartz. He does have an offer to make," officious clearing of throat. "a.s.suming we get back the property you took, of course, and the monies for the property damage you inflicted . . . well, against my better judgment, he's willing to not press charges. He says you purchased a ma.n.u.script in Germany recently, from a private family, the Krolls. He would like that ma.n.u.script, Mr. Wyle. If you turn it over to him in the next week he will not prosecute you for burglary. Please call my office at . . ."

The lawyer rattled off his number. Jack came back on the line. There was a bewildered silence in which Denton could hear him breathing.

"Um . . . Denton? Just . . . call me, okay?" Jack sounding confused. Jack thinking that if Schwartz wanted the d.a.m.n thing that bad, if it was that valuable, maybe the magazine wasn't completely through with Denton after all. Jack had a surprise visit coming from Mr. Edwards. Denton hoped they got along really, really well.

He was humming something in his throat. He heard it-it was "Mandy" by Barry Manilow. He stopped. He sat there while the sun set outside, the light from the window creeping away, making the condo dimmer and dimmer.

He must have fallen asleep. The phone rang again, startling him awake. He almost picked it up, then looked at it with a laugh.

Tee hee. Tee hee hee,he giggled stupidly. What now? His mother had died in a plane crash? Tibet had just succ.u.mbed to a gigantic earthquake? His latest lover had tested positive for AIDS? Nukes were headed this way?

The answering machine clicked on. "Denton Wyle? I hope you remember me." The voice was thin and papery, an old man's voice. "I, uh, was a friend of your father's. We met once, overseas. You liked the tattoo on my arm."

Denton grabbed the phone. " 'allo?"