human brain to get involved yet.
Using the trace program’s connection like a backdoor into Matt’s system, Leif went into the virtmail files. There it was — another message from “Dave Lowen.” Unless Andy Moore was trying some stupid prank, this had to come from the mysterious Deep Throat.
Working together, Matt and Leif’s computers ground along the virtmail message’s back trail. As he watched their progress along the twisty course, Leif found it reminded him of someone—
With a shock, he realized who that someone was — himself. The way the message bounced at high speed through heavily trafficked Net sites — the way it tried to camouflage itself within that traffic — he was looking at a near-copy of his Maximum Confusion program. And while Leif had tweaked it with a couple of additions he found useful, he hadn’t created it. He wasn’t a hacker, and neither, it seemed, was Deep Throat.
Maximum Confusion had cost him enough when he bought it from one of his less shadowy hacker contacts. By extension, the person he was looking for was probably a rich kid who liked to play on the Net. That knowledge was useful when the computers began having trouble figuring out some of the message’s wilder hops. Understanding how he’d tweaked the program helped him work back for a couple of more bounces — in fact, right to the point where the message had originated.
Unfortunately, that turned out to be a remote location, an empty suite in a no-name virtual office building. Again, that was a rich person’s response to maintain anonymity, actually renting a space. A real hacker could have wormed his way into a corporate address to download his naughty pictures, launch flame-mail attacks on rivals…or post virtmail messages to stir up the receiver without letting him know who the sender might be.
He was glad he didn’t have to raise the question with his Net Force Explorer friends. Megan O’Malley would have had an immediate answer—“Leif Anderson!”
Was he missing some obvious connection? Who had brought him into contact with Nikki Callivant, in Haddington of all places, with even the late Priscilla’s mother in attendance?
Doubling back on his failed trace, Leif reentered Matt’s computer. He’d only made sure that the virtmail posting came from Deep Throat. This time he’d read what the mystery meddler had to say.
The body of the message was a simple police report from forty-four years ago. Some hacking skills had probably been necessary to get it — much as Leif had abstracted information from the defunct files of the Delaware D.M.V.
What was the big deal with a New Jersey State Police bulletin? Leif read on. Apparently a classic car had been stolen in the town of Rising Hills — a red Corvette Stingray, 1965 model.
Leif checked the date. It was the day after Priscilla Hadding’s body had been found.
All of a sudden Leif remembered his last conversation with Andy Moore.
Matt frowned at the split display floating over his computer. The moment he’d come home, his system had told him to call Leif. Now Leif’s face took up the left-hand side of the display while the State Police report occupied the right.
The latest Deep Throat virtmail, even though the trace had petered out, offered serious food for thought. Matt was also annoyed that Leif had used the program he’d lent to get into Matt’s computer.
“It’s not as though I went on the unguided tour,” Leif said, beginning to sound annoyed. “I didn’t paw through your collection of bimbo-rock singers posing in swim-suits.” He grinned. “Or without.”
That was almost enough to make Matt check a few files, but he held back. “I don’t like people in my system — period,” he said.
Leif sighed. “Fine. Point made. But I thought it just might be an emergency — the way this case is going, the sooner we solve it, the sooner we’re all out of danger. So read your message. I’ll talk to you later.” He cut the connection.
Matt read the police report. Then he called up Andy Moore’s virtmail describing the life and times of young Clyde Finch, scowling as he winnowed the facts from between Andy’s wisecracks and self-congratulatory comments.
Finally Matt commanded his computer to project a map of New Jersey. “Locate Rising Hills,” he commanded. Then, “Locate Carterville.” He squinted as two red dots appeared on the map — quite close together. “Give me the distance between the two townships.”
“Distance approximately 13.72 miles,” the computer’s silver-toned voice replied.
Matt sat in silence, his eyes staring unfocused at the map. A real-life noir mystery story was playing itself out inside his head. Once upon a time, back in 1982, a rich girl died in Haddington, Delaware. First on the scene was a smart cop with a shady past. It took three days for investigators to get to the young man most likely to be connected with the girl’s death — and to get their hands on his car.
Meanwhile, just one day after the incident and three states away, an identical car disappears — where? Right near the clever cop’s old hometown, where he apparently has lots of car-thief connections. These were the days before people got fanatical about part serial numbers. With a change of license plates, the clean but stolen Corvette could become Walter Callivant’s car.
Add it all together, and what have you got?
For one thing, you’d have an explanation as to why the Callivants took on Clyde Finch as part of their security setup. He’d neatly packaged things so that an unpleasant scandal didn’t turn into a nasty court case.
Fast-forward about forty-odd years. Some person or persons unknown (aka Harry Knox) starts setting off alarms around the records dealing with Priscilla Hadding’s suspicious death.
Clyde Finch sees his work unraveling. What’s the worst-case scenario? More scandal for the Callivants. Finch losing his cushy job. Legal repercussions? He’s probably well past the statute of limitations for evidence tampering. But…if Walter G. Callivant turned out to be a murderer, there were no statutory limitations on that crime. He could still be tried for it. And Clyde Finch could be an accessory after the fact.
Matt blinked. It made an interesting story. Vivid characters, a couple of plot twists, conspiracy theory…there was even a little gore, if you threw in the “accidents” claiming the mystery gamers’ lives.
Unfortunately, Matt didn’t know the ending. And all he had was a wild bunch of theories with no actual proof. If he went to Captain Winters with this, the Net Force agent would recommend Matt for a future career as a mystery novelist. But he wouldn’t be able to use Net Force to take on Finch — or the Callivants — without a lot more evidence and a whole lot less conjecture than Matt could currently provide.
What would Monty Newman do in a case like this?
Lacking Lucullus Marten — or even Oswald Derbent — there didn’t seem much that Matt could do with his suspicions.
That was when the virtmail message came in. It just took over Matt’s computer, extinguishing the map of New Jersey and replacing it with a display of floating letters — no posting, no headings:
I know what you’re doing. We’ve got to meet. Buffalo Bridge, 45 minutes.
Even as Matt sat, gawking, the individual letters making up the message began to dissolve. The message turned into a gray smudge, then the display went completely clear.
Matt still sat, staring. Except for the fact that the Jersey map was gone, he could almost believe he’d been having some sort of daydream.
“Computer,” he suddenly snapped. “Display my most recent virtmail message.”
The item that swam into view was the “Dave Lowen” ancient police report, the time stamp falling during the time Matt had ridden home with Nikki Callivant.
“Not that,” Matt said, “the next one.”
“No other items received,” the computer replied.
