leaving false trails and no true tracks. Now Randy felt electronically vulnerable for the first time in his life. He felt vulnerable in the real world, too, looking around himself for any sign of intruders who might storm in. He wondered if the place was bugged. He knew that his computer was being monitored.
“Damn,” he cursed. He had a great deal of work to do, and he must do it quickly. He began to make disk copies of all the investigative work he'd done thus far for Dr. Sanger in relation to the crossbow murders. He named the file Crossfire, labeled the two disks he'd filled, and collected them up. He gathered the rest of his things and made his way to the door, prepared to leave the office, taking the disks with him. His feelings of paranoia were running rampant, while one voice in his brain kept saying, “Hey, man, you wanted intrigue; you wanted to be Detective Pardee, asshole.”
Maybe it was just another prank from good ol' Terry and Stephen downstairs in programming and research. Those jerks had too much time on their hands. Yeah, perhaps it was just those two clowns. Maybe he was just overreacting.
But before he turned the doorknob, before he walked out, he decided to take one more step, just for insurance. He returned to his desk, placed the computer disks in a Jiffy Pak, labeled it in longhand, and walked it down to the mailroom. There he found Barney, the affable mailroom guy, and he got the proper postage on the envelope addressed to Dr. Sanger's home.
Barney said he'd shove it in the outgoing mail, but Randy said that he needed to put another item inside, just a note, so he'd take it with him.
Barney waved him good night. Outside the station house, he found the nearest mailbox and mailed the package to Meredyth Sanger, a small voice in his mind saying, I hope this isn't my last natural act on this planet.
“Don't be so dramatic,” he told himself aloud, dropping the package into the slot.
Still, as he walked to his car, he couldn't shake the feeling that people who normally didn't pay him any attention were interested in his every footfall. When he climbed into his car, he snatched out the two disks out of his jacket pocket-he'd only pretended to mail them-and when he put the keys into the ignition, sitting there in the sauna left by day's end, he hesitated, staring at the key. He foolishly wondered if anyone might have placed a car bomb below his little '84 Le Mans. He pleaded with himself to cut it out, to stop this nonsensical paranoia. He wondered if he had the stomach for this James Bond crap.
He bit his lip, grimaced, and manfully turned the key and cranked Lucy-the name he'd playfully given his car after a squat little Aunt Lucy-and expected it to explode in a ball of flame in his face, but nothing of the kind happened.
Maybe it had just been those goof-offs in programming. Sons of bitches…
Dr. Sanger used Lucas's telephone in the Cold Room to ring Randy, but she'd apparently just missed him. She cursed the time. Where had the day gone? She and Lucas had returned to the files here in the Cold Room to look for the tenuous threads between the cases they suspected were related.
But it was late and they'd been frustrated by the lack of connection between the judge, the doctor and the stockbroker.
“It's time to give it up here. Damn,” she muttered. “I hope Randy has more for us from his computer searches.”
“He's bound to. Do you know where he lives?”
“I've got his address, but if all the information is upstairs in the computer, that's not going to help us much.”
“How safe is it, in the computer, I mean?”
“It's coded; has a lock on it.”
“Do you know the code?”
“Yeah, sure I do.”
“Let's have a look-see, then.” They found their way to Dr. Sanger's office. The lights were out, and with a dark, rumbling storm blanketing the city now, the place was like a cave. But there was a light on. Randy's computer screen.
“Randy? Are you still here?” she called out.
Silence was their only response. A window in her office was open, the rain seeping in. Outside, a fire escape revealed nothing. They turned on lights and went to the computer screen. It was blank, filling now with an automatic screen saver, fishes in a coral sea.
“This is just not like Randy, to leave his computer on, and to leave my window open.”
“Maybe it wasn't Randy who left it on.”
“Well, if he rushed out in a hurry…”
“We should locate him.”
She nodded, a ball of gnawing, gloomy concern forming in the pit of her stomach. “Yeah, let's do that.”
764LTl: C42119Category… 42 — . -Topic 49LOG…. Message 440… Sat. July 30, 1996… 2:10:21
Questor 1… Helsinger's Pit…
Q1: There is a further threat. A new enemy has risen in perdition this realm, These are two enforcer demons-male and female. They must be stopped. Do all necessary to protect the brothers and sisters and children of Helsinger. Reply this board after evil is wiped out-God's speed to you. Questor 1.
END TRANSMISSION. Category 42, Topic 49LOG… 2:13:26
Category 42…. Topic49LOG… Message 441……Sat. July30,1996…3:55:20
Questor 2… from the Pit…
Q2: Understood. Will take care of perdition's problem.
END TRANSMISSION! Category 42, Topic49LOG… 3:57:02
Category 42…. Topic 41L0G…. Message 442… Sun. July 31…1996… 8:10:01
Questor 1…
Time to take out all threats. Set trap and exterminate the mice. No more fun and games. Eliminate the leaders of our enemy. See message drop, new station.
END FINAL TRANSMISSION THIS EMAIL.
TWENTY-TWO
Once at home, Randy snatched a frozen pizza from the freezer and slid it unceremoniously into his microwave, careful to follow the convoluted but well-remembered instructions on the box. He fed his fish, petted his cat and stretched out on his sofa, the disks having been safely tucked away. Maybe later he would bring up the stored information on his machine, have a closer look. Maybe he'd struck a sensitive nerve with someone, but he was damned if he'd noticed anything of worth in all the material flowing through earlier in the day.
Still, he might've missed something.
He turned on the TV, listened to a little MTV. He was nearly dozing when something awakened him. It sounded like a gunshot, but it was just the cat, who'd somehow gotten into the metal trays and pots and pans below the sink. He must have left the pantry door open for Muriel to discover.
Muriel had frightened herself and came racing out of the kitchen. At first he thought she'd been frightened by something other than inanimate objects, but no, Muriel was true to form.
As he began to wash and dry pans and trays that Muriel had left marked with her fur, he heard the noisy elevator moving up the shaft, which was adjacent to his apartment.
The damned thing went up and down all night. There was nothing unusual in hearing it now, but for some reason, tonight it sounded more ominous. He listened to hear what floor it would stop at. hoping it would stop on the floor below or above, but no, it stopped on his floor.
This was followed by silence, pure and deep and foreboding, filling Randy with an ancient gloom he must surely have shared with ancestors who stalked saber-toothed tigers and woolly mammoths. He could only imagine who was out there, who had gotten off the elevator. There was not a sound, no footsteps, no laughter or talking, just the damnable silence.
