Down in the Zero

'Yeah, okay. But if they thought you were with a…client, they wouldn't expect just one car, would they?'

'I…didn't think of that. Are you always so careful?'

'That's the real me,' I told her.

The back door was thick, with enough steel plate to do credit to a crack house. Fancy opened a metal box, pushed some buttons, waited.

Then she inserted her key. I heard heavy tumblers click as the deadbolt snapped open.

We walked inside. The front room was what you'd expect from a private club for rich people: heavy dark red velvet drapes, a long, plain wooden bench directly across from a checkroom with waist–high Dutch doors. The place was musty with that perfume–smoke–sweat smell…reeking of Last Night.

Fancy's heels tapped on the varnished hardwood. 'What do you want to see first?'

'It doesn't matter.'

'Okay, this is…what's that?' she yelped, looking at my right hand.

'It's a gun, Fancy.'

'I can see that. What's it for?'

'For whatever.'

'I don't like guns.'

'I don't like them either. Come on, let's just do it, all right?'

She gave me a sad–puzzled look for a second, then turned on her heel and played tour guide. Some of the rooms were spare, almost Oriental in furnishings, others were lush, Victorian. One even had a fireplace. The dungeon was garden–variety B&D— racks and restraints, even a metal bar set into the floor, with hooks for the ankle cuffs. I couldn't see a closet anywhere— no place to store what I was looking for.

'Does she have an office here? A private office?'

'Who?'

'Cherry.'

'Just a little one. We're not supposed to go in there,' she said.

'Show me.'

'Burke…'

'Bitch, I'm done playing. Any kind of playing, understand? Where is it?'

The door was behind a set of floor–to–ceiling royal purple drapes. The knob was tiny, a delicate piece of faceted crystal with a keyhole in the center. The lock was a joke. I loided it with one of Juan Rodriguez numerous credit cards— the only thing he ever used them for. Fancy stayed outside. It was just as well— the room was a small, windowless box, the walls lined with thick acoustic tile. The ceiling was covered with the same tile, the carpet industrial dark gray.

The only furniture was a slab of butcher block held up by sawhorses at each end and a simple swivel office chair. On the butcher block: a plain–paper fax machine, a three–line phone, a calculator, some kind of ionizer to keep the air clean. Another one of those dual–zone clocks, set the same way. And a laptop computer. Underneath it all, an anti–static plastic mat.

I sat down, pulled on a pair of surgeon's gloves, opened the laptop, turned it on, smoothing out the cheat– sheet the Mole had given me with one hand. The screen ran through a whole bunch of nonsense I couldn't understand, finally settled down into a menu.

WP

Optimize

AntiVirus

Park

I followed the Mole's road map, used the arrow keys, highlighted WP, hit the return. The computer cycled, and I got a blank screen. I hit F5. The screen listed one directory: DATA. No documents listed. I tried the C: prompt. All I got was:

AUTOEXEC.BAT 20 02/03/91 6:31AM

CONFIG.SYS 11 02/03/91 6:35AM

COMMAND.COM 29851 05/06/90 1:00PM

DOS <DIR> 02/03/91 5:44AM

WP5I <DIR> 02/03/91 6:47AM

NORTON <DIR> 03/03/91 7:04AM

I checked all the directories— they were all legit, no subdirectories, hidden or otherwise. The thing was empty— probably vacuumed before Cherry took off. I tried the other menu items in order, but they just performed as advertised. I finally hit Park, heard a couple of electronic beeps. The screen said: HEADS PARKED ON ALL DRIVES. POWER OFF THE SYSTEM NOW. I turned it off.

'Are you done yet?' Fancy asked from outside the door, tapping her foot.

'I'll tell you when I'm done— just keep quiet.'

The fax machine was empty of incoming. There was a row of direct–dial buttons on its face, sixteen of them.