Bad to Worse Page 11
On the other hand, she obviously liked him; she had practically undressed for him after the last meeting. She would want to believe in his innocence. And even if there remained doubts, she might be forgiving. The main thing was to recreate that tenderness they nearly had together. He felt better thinking about it, about the white lace and the lovely smile and being alone together. He had to let her know how important she was to him, and as long as his wife wasn’t mentioned—that really did kill the mood last time—he could win her over and Mockingbird would become the last thing on her mind. He would shut down his link to it, stay with Mortiss Bros, and have assignations with Regan every working day. Now he was looking forward to seeing her.
The door opened and Saviccia appeared, looking shaken, and carrying a still-open laptop. He threw a dark look at Tweisser as he passed. Immediately, Tweisser’s name was called. He entered the boardroom and closed the door.
‘What the fuck is going on, Tweisser? What is Mockingbird?’
He wasn’t invited to sit down, and stood beside the chair he normally occupied at board meetings.
‘I hadn’t heard of Mockingbird until this morning, Ms Mortiss. I assume the attacker set it up as a facility for this super-fast transfer activity. That appears to be its function.’
That was good. He was sure that he sounded calm.
‘Wrong, Tweisser. Now we know what it looks like, we can see it in the archived transactions history. It’s been there two years, Tweisser. It’s an account. You’re the accountant. Explain it to me.’
Regan was seated in the chairman’s position, a laptop open before her. Her leather shoulder bag was on the table beside the computer.
‘Well?’ she said.
‘I know nothing about that account, Ms Mortiss. I thought it was newly created.’
Regan reached out to her bag. Her grasp seemed much less caressing than last time. She removed a pistol and placed it on the table, sat back, and looked at him coldly.
‘Tweisser. You’re lying. Whatever damage our hacker is causing, he has done the company one service. He found irregularities, and he’s told us about them. He tells us how much goes into Mockingbird and how much goes out. More importantly, where it goes when it leaves. Do you want to stop looking at my body and tell me where it goes, Tweisser?’
Tweisser felt weak. It wasn’t turning out the way he wanted. He couldn’t answer. He needed to tell her about his feelings. Regan filled the silence.
‘You’re a dumb-ass, Tweisser. It goes to a personal account in Oak Park. Where you live. The account has a number and a name. Your fucking name, Tweisser.’
She picked up the pistol and pointed it at him.
‘Ms Mortiss. You know I … I love … I loved …’ he said.
‘In that case you won’t resent my little upsets,’ she said.
Without getting up from her seat, she shot him through his pacing lead. Of course, that wasn’t visible to her and not what she aimed for; it was a chance hit. The intention was a lazy chest shot—fatal, but indifferent to exact anatomy.
Tweisser stumbled, reached for his director’s chair, and eased himself into it. He was staring down. From behind, he might have been the first to a board meeting, waiting thoughtfully for others to arrive. From the front, there was a bloody stain enlarging on his white business shirt.
‘Regan …’
For the first time, he dared to call her that. After all the fantasizing it was the most intimate moment he was ever to share with her.
‘Don’t over-dramatize it, for fuck’s sake.’
She returned the pistol to her bag and crossed to a telephone intercom on a drinks cabinet.
‘Tell Pastor Sendoff I want him here.’
Andrei Andreevich Sendoff entered the boardroom without knocking. Regan was seated before her laptop at the far end of the table, absorbed in the company crisis. Tweisser was still sitting halfway along, hunched forward and breathing stertorously, his hands clamped to the table edge for support. He managed to raise his eyes to look at Sendoff. Regan stood up.
‘Console me, Andrei.’
Sendoff glanced at Tweisser as he crossed the room to embrace Regan.
‘You have been bad, my little peasant undressant confessant.’
‘I am penitent, Father.’
She pushed against his body and kissed him, then threw him back. Her voice turned businesslike.
‘Get rid of him for me.’
Sendoff looked at Tweisser, who had managed to tilt his head slightly to observe their interaction.
‘He doesn’t seem quite ready. How long …?’
‘I know. He’s dragging it out, the asshole. It’s indecorous. Call the company removalists and we’ll hope he’s through in time,’ she said.
Sendoff went to the telephone and made a call.
‘Did you have a plan?’ he said to Regan, when that was done.
‘You’re leaning on it,’ she said.
Sendoff looked down at the drinks cabinet. If they emptied it of all the cocktail paraphernalia, they could easily conceal Tweisser and get him out of the building as a piece of furniture.
‘Brilliant.’
He began moving bottles of liquor to the board table.
‘Explain that we’re refurbishing, and we want to install this one in the saloon on the cruiser. Then, go with William on a fishing trip and dump it in the lake. Pack in some bricks to sink it.’
Tweisser groaned objection, struggling to raise his head. Sendoff and Regan observed him.
‘Isn’t it all a little prolonged?’ he asked.
‘He’s learning not to cheat on Mortiss Bros,’ she said. ‘The bigger the scam, the longer the lesson. Don’t you usually do last rites or something?’
Sendoff looked uninterested, but dutifully seated himself across the table from Tweisser. He waved his arms around.
‘Hoco poco witchimodo
Presso squero sensu fu
Ecce homo cum passis me
Orla bestia yuta yu
Orla bestia yu.’
He concluded with the sign of the cross, muttering what sounded like ‘Limbo, Limbo’.
Tweisser’s eyes were barely open, staring emptily at the ceremony.
‘Sometimes I think you aren’t a real pastor, Andrei,’ said Regan.
‘How hurtful you can be, my beautiful. That is the same Paleo-Romo-Moscovian prayer used by my father on the occasion of his fourth wife’s spontaneous combustion. I shall be pleased to incant the conjugal version when I shortly hear your confession upon this table.’
Sendoff moved to stand behind Regan, his hands fondling her shoulders.
Tweisser stirred and groaned loudly, trying to turn toward her. He was the one who had wanted Regan on the table.
‘Andrei, I’ve got a god-awful disaster unfolding here. Just get the damned cupboard ready and start dragging him over.’
Tweisser was now breathing rapidly and looking pale. Sendoff resumed the task of moving bottles.
‘What will you say to the family. Do you know if he has a wife?’ he asked.
Regan continued working for a few seconds before answering. She looked up when they heard a heavy thud as Tweisser’s head finally rested itself on the table.
‘I’ll tell her the truth. We had a meeting. I will say he was most endearingly affected when we spoke of her. But I thought he didn’t look well. When I last saw him, he was getting stuck into the liquor cabinet.’
It remains unclear, from the limited clinical description and in the absence of autopsy findings, precisely what injuries Tweisser sustained. It is possible that his underlying cardiac rhythm in the event of pacemaker disconnection was complete heart block. The slow, fixed rate would tend to reduce internal bleeding, accounting for his delayed deterioration, but also exclude a compensatory tachycardic response to progressive haemorrhagic shock. The agonal state was likely ventricular fibrillation, which might have been (at least temporarily) reversed if the cardioverter lead had not been shot through.
18 HABERDASH
The Princess Namok docked early morning, and suite guests were allowed to embark from midday. Worse collected Sigrid by taxi and they were driven to the Fremantle shipping terminal.
When they were through passport and security checks and finally on board, they took an elevator to the Sky level and found their suite. As Worse was touching his key card to the stateroom door, a white-jacketed staff member appeared, seemingly from nowhere. He introduced himself as Hilario, and said he was their dedicated steward for the trip.
Hilario followed them into the suite to explain some of the services. Their luggage had already been delivered. Worse asked Hilario where he stayed.
‘Just across the corridor, Mr Worse, but I do not sleep. You can call me at any time, day or night.’ He demonstrated how he could be summoned through the ship’s telephone.
Worse felt an instinctual trust of Hilario, and motioned him aside. He handed over a generous gratuity.
‘We value our privacy. Very much,’ emphasized Worse. Hilario nodded. ‘Mrs Worse is recovering from an illness and will want no interruptions.’ Hilario nodded again. Somehow the banknotes had disappeared from his hand without Worse seeing where they went. ‘We will dine at the late sitting, table for two only, beside the window. No children within hearing.’
Hilario picked up a suitcase and Worse motioned toward one of the bedrooms, at the same time indicating that the other case should go to the second room. He was pleased to see that Hilario’s face betrayed no sign of surprise or curiosity about this domestic arrangement.
When Hilario had left, Sigrid, who had followed her luggage into the first bedroom and begun to unpack, appeared at the doorway.
‘And what illness might it be that Mrs Worse is recovering from?’
‘You’re a psychiatrist; make one up.’
Sigrid’s look was unamused. She returned to unpacking. Worse stepped outside to survey the harbour from their balcony.
They weren’t due to sail until the following morning, as the shipping line was hosting a gala charity event with many non-passenger guests. Worse and Sigrid had declined their invitation.
That evening, there was a small queue of passengers outside the restaurant waiting to be shown to their tables. As Worse and Sigrid joined the line, Hilario appeared.
‘This way, Mr and Mrs Worse.’
He led them directly inside, politely positioned them before the mandated hand gel dispenser, then showed them to their table by a window. He introduced their waiter and sommelier before moving instantly out of sight.
‘Are you forming the impression that Hilario can materialize at will within the space-time continuum?’ asked Worse of Sigrid when they were alone.
Sigrid studied the menu.
‘I have noticed that. Sometimes I wish I had that gift, especially the disappearing trick during trying consultations.’
Worse smiled.
‘I am imagining being your patient: desperately unhappy, unloading my intimate, shameful secrets, verging on psychosis, and you suddenly dematerialize in your deep leather chair. How comforting would that be? What would that do to my tenuous grip on reality?’
Sigrid was unmoved.
‘You would need to adjust your assumptions about the world,’ she said. ‘Which, by the way, is often the key to psychiatric healing in any case. So, you’d feel better and I’d feel better. Slipping in and out of the continuum might be the answer to patient–therapist mutual wellness.’
‘Perhaps you should ask Hilario how he does it,’ said Worse.
The waiter took their order.
‘Speaking of disappearances,’ said Sigrid, ‘have you read Darian’s book yet?’
Worse stored the segue for later enquiry.
‘I have.’
‘And?’
‘Surprisingly good. Surprisingly accurate. How did he find out so much about what happened?’
‘Observation and induction. Every question a hypothesis test. Every interview a discreetly controlled experiment. Researched the literature. The scientific method, no less. I said he was a lot like you.’
‘Why did you link him to disappearance?’ asked Worse.
‘Oh, because he lacks an ordinary public persona. He’s very private. No one even knows where he lives, though they say he’s moved to Madregalo and possibly changed his name. One theory is that he’s actually gone into hiding. He’s Ferent-speaking, so he could easily blend in over there.’
‘Why would he do that?’
‘Well, he did offend a lot of people in that book. He’s probably barricaded himself from academic and literary reprisals.’
‘The very worst kind, I’m sure,’ said Worse. ‘I didn’t see anything offensive, other than invasion of our privacy. My criticism would be that it was irritatingly factual.’
‘Then you can look forward to more irritation, Richard. The talk amongst my friends in the history department is that he’s working on what publishers call an eagerly anticipated new work.’
Worse broke apart a bread roll.
‘Well, I hope we’re not in it.’
Back in their stateroom, Worse set up a work space. The ship’s internet service was suboptimal, and he established his own satellite link. He offered Sigrid the use of it, and gave her a password. She puzzled over it, and looked at him enquiringly. Worse shrugged.
‘Ask Darian,’ he said.
Worse went to his room and re-emerged in a dark tracksuit and black sports shoes, carrying a backpack.
‘You’re up to something, Richard.’
‘I thought it would be nice to look at the harbour for a few hours. I might be in quite late.’
‘What’s wrong with sitting on the balcony?’
‘The view’s too limited.’
Worse strongly suspected that Haberdash would be smuggled aboard to get him out of the country. Spoiling’s people were checking all the comings and goings on the shore side. Worse would stake out the harbour side, but he had noted earlier that from their balcony the view of the waterline was obstructed by projecting balconies on lower levels. He placed some packaged fruit and nuts in his pack.
‘See you in the morning.’
Worse opened their stateroom door and slipped into the empty corridor.
From an earlier reconnaissance during their lifeboat drill, Worse had determined that his best outlook was from the lifeboat deck, which was below the balcony levels. It was also the sporting deck, where passengers could walk or run the ship circuit for exercise. He would not be out of place in a tracksuit, though his choice of timing might seem odd.
He took the elevator down and stepped through a foyer door onto the outside teak decking. There was no one in sight, but the dim safety lighting made his presence obvious. He moved several metres aft to a point where there was least illumination, and looked upwards. Modern lifeboats were very big and stowed very high, he decided.
Worse grasped a steel column and climbed onto the deck rail. From there he could reach up to a crossbeam. Holding that, he walked up the vertical column until he was able to wrap his legs around the beam, then shimmy along to the davit. Once close, he pulled his weight around, stood up, then shuffled sideways to a point where the lifeboat appeared to have a flat upper section. Here, he placed one foot in a lifeline and pulled himself up.
He felt for the most comfortable place to lie down, positioning himself with his head outwards. Looking down, he had an uninterrupted view of the side of the hull to the waterline. S
everal decks below, close to the stern, there was a large open sea bay that cast yellow light far out onto the water. He checked the time: nearly midnight.
Worse took a scarf from his pack and wrapped it around his neck. He also removed a pair of night vision–recording binoculars and set their focus in day mode on the light from the sea bay. Then he waited.
Lights from other ships across the harbour were progressively extinguished. The sea bay below him went dark. The water was black, and there was no small craft traffic to capture his interest.
At about 3.30 he saw the sea bay light up. Though only momentary, it caught Worse’s attention. He raised the binoculars and scanned the river. A small motor launch was heading downstream toward them, with no navigation lights showing. From mid-harbour, it turned toward the ship, heading to the sea bay. When it came alongside, Worse saw a rope ladder dropped to the water line. A man reached out to grasp it and threw his weight across. As he began to climb, he turned his face in Worse’s direction while he waved off his boatman.
Worse filmed him until he disappeared into the ship. Then he moved the glasses to focus on the launch, following it until it was out of sight. Satisfied that the action was over, he packed away the equipment and prepared himself for the hazardous descent to deck level. Still lying down, he put on the backpack and turned himself around to look over the inside gunwale and ensure the deck was clear. He was very surprised at what he saw.
Extending from the deck to the hull of the lifeboat just below him, and looped within a lifeline at the top to secure it, was an extension ladder. Worse studied the situation for a full minute. No one was in view. He decided that the sensible thing to do was use it. When he reached the deck he set off for the door leading to the elevators. Before going in, he glanced back. The ladder was gone.
In the elevator, he phoned Spoiling. It was nearly 4.30 but the call was answered on the first ring.
‘You’re awake, Victor.’