"Love those considerate engineers," Jack said as he found the switches and hit the one that illuminated the section below.
"Conserve energy, Jack. Turn off the light in each section as you leave it."
"You do it your way, Dud. I"ll do it mine. I like to see where I"ve been."
"Turn me off until you see my handle on the twenty-first floor."
Jack found the off switch and continued his descent without a running narrative. The only sounds were his soft, echoing footsteps and his breathing. Farther down he found a big "21" in red marker facing him through the rungs of the ladder. Dud"s handle hovered under the curve of the "2" like a floating eye.
Jack turned on the Walkman.
"Okay, Jack. If you"re at the twenty-first floor, it"s time to leave the big vertical and enter the laterals via that opening on your left. These get smaller as we go, and unfortunately they"re not lit for us, so you"ll have to turn on the headlamp."
Jack swung off the ladder and into the smaller duct. It was perhaps half the width of the vertical. He adjusted the headlamp lens to the widest beam and began to crawl.
"At the first intersection you turn left. I"ve cleared the dust and left a little directional arrow. I"ve done that at each intersection-the black arrows for the way in, red arrows for the way out-just in case something goes wrong with the Walkman."
"What a comforting thought," Jack said. But he appreciated Milkdud"s thoroughness.
He found the first pair of arrows-bracketing Dud"s handle-and made the turn.
"And that"s basically it, Jack. The arrows will lead you to the return that services Haffner"s office. If you need any help, you"ve got the cell phone. The thing is to move slowly and carefully, easing yourself along. Sudden moves that bang against the sides will send the noise far and wide. Most people ignore an occasional rattle or such from a register. But give them a series of noises moving along above their hung ceilings and they start making calls, asking what"s going on. So take it easy, Jack. We"ve given you plenty of time. Good hacking, man. This is Milkdud, signing off."
Must think he"s Walter Cronkite or something, Jack thought as he turned off the Walkman and continued his crawl.
As he slid through the dark ducts, following the wavering beam of light stretching before him, he came to appreciate the coveralls. Its b.u.t.ton-free front surface allowed him to glide along smoothly and silently.
The ducts, as Dud had warned, did indeed get smaller. But Jack kept following the arrows. He was, he freely admitted, utterly lost. He knew he was on the twenty-first floor of the Hand Building, and that his body was horizontal, but any orientation beyond that was a guess. Was he facing east or west, uptown or downtown? He had no idea.
That Dud had managed to hack this place-doing the elevator thing, and finding his way through this labyrinth of ductwork-on his own was astonishing.
That anyone could call it fun fun was simply beyond Jack. was simply beyond Jack.
And then Jack came to a left-pointing arrow and saw-literally-a light at the end of the tunnel.
Slim bands of fluorescent glow angled up through the louvers of a register at the end of a small duct. Jack heard voices filtering through from the room beyond, but couldn"t catch the words. And even if he could, hearing was not enough. He wanted to see who was in that room, wanted to know who was saying what.
And he couldn"t do that from here.
He had to get closer, and that meant moving into this last duct. This small small last duct. last duct.
Jack stared into the narrow confines of the six-foot length of steel... just the length of a coffin. But coffins probably were a lot roomier. What if he got stuck in there?
Milkdud had given him a few hints on how to maneuver in a tight spot. This might be the time to try them out.
Jack turned off the headlamp. Then, with his right arm extended ahead and his left arm close against his side, he squeezed himself diagonally into the duct.
Tight. Very tight.
Now he truly appreciated what Dud had meant about claustrophobia being a deterrent to hacking.
Slowly, silently, he inched forward until he had about eighty percent of the office in view.
A plump, red-haired man in a white shirt-Gordon Haffner, Jack hoped-sat behind the desk, talking on the phone. Jack could hear him perfectly. As he watched, two other men entered. Jack recognized one from the van on Thursday night: Thomas Clayton. The other was new-dark-skinned, dark-haired, bearded, very intense-looking, with an accent from somewhere in the Middle East.
Jack smiled. He figured he was looking at Thomas Clayton"s backer-the guy who was killing anyone who stood between him and the Clayton House. Excellent. Now, if they"d all just be so good as to discuss exactly why they wanted the house so badly, Jack could get the h.e.l.l out of here.
But they didn"t. They talked about Alicia and how they hoped she"d come up with a sale price this morning so they could settle the matter of ownership, but the reason was never mentioned.
And what was Thomas doing here? Sean had told Haffner that Alicia didn"t want her brother present at the meeting. But here he was, and the clock was ticking, getting close to nine-thirty. He was sure Alicia would pop her cork if she saw him here. This was no way to get her to cooperate. What were they thinking?
And then Haffner"s intercom buzzed, announcing "Mr. O"Neill and Ms. Clayton." Haffner got up, slipped on his suit jacket, and said he"d be back as soon as he finished speaking to her.
Jack"s head jerked up and almost struck the ceiling of the duct.
What?
The meeting was supposed to be in Haffner"s office, just the other side of the register. Where the h.e.l.l was he going?
Not that the meeting itself mattered. Alicia could fill him in later on anything important. Jack had crawled through these ducts to hear the postmortem. If he had any chance of picking up some choice tidbits of unguarded conversation about the Clayton house, that would be the time.
But if the meeting was being held somewhere else, so might the postmortem.
He listened awhile to hear if Thomas and his Middle Eastern wallet man would drop anything worthwhile, but they didn"t seem to be buddies: Thomas read the paper while the stranger stood at the window and stared at the street below.
Jack eased back into the larger duct and checked out his options.
"What are we doing here?" Alicia said as Gordon Haffner ushered them into a mahogany-paneled conference room.
"Having a meeting," Haffner said. He looked confused as he laid a file folder on the gleaming surface of the oval mahogany table. "Isn"t that why you called? To have a meeting?"
"We met in your office last time, so I thought-"
"This is much roomier."
Alicia glanced at Sean O"Neill, who replied with a barely perceptible shrug.
"Is something wrong?" Haffner said.
Yes, but Alicia couldn"t tell him what. They"d set up this meeting to allow Jack to identify Thomas"s backers. But what if the backers met in here instead of Haffner"s office after the meeting? Jack would be eavesdropping on an empty room.
If she demanded to meet in Haffner"s office, would that make him suspicious? And what would that accomplish if the backers were set to meet here afterward?
Jack needed to know about this conference room. And she could think of only one way to do that.
"Wrong?" Alicia said, letting her voice rise. "You want to know if something"s wrong! wrong! Let me Let me tell tell you what"s wrong!" She raised the volume, pushing it to a shout. "Your client, my half brother Thomas Clayton, is what"s wrong! Do you have any idea what kind of a slug you"re representing? Do you know what he did to me Thursday night?" you what"s wrong!" She raised the volume, pushing it to a shout. "Your client, my half brother Thomas Clayton, is what"s wrong! Do you have any idea what kind of a slug you"re representing? Do you know what he did to me Thursday night?"
She saw O"Neill turn her way and give her a quick smile and a wink.
But as she started in on the details of her abduction, she found she no longer needed to force the volume, or act angry. Suddenly the rage was real and her pitch rose.
Gordon Haffner"s face went a little pale, and Sean O"Neill"s smile faded.
Alicia heard her own voice... screaming...
You"re beautiful, Alicia.
Jack smiled as he watched her wind down from her tirade. He"d been crouched outside the return from Haffner"s office, pondering his next move, when he"d heard a woman screaming. He hadn"t recognized the voice-a scream was a scream-but he"d followed the sound. After all, no one should be screaming in an attorney"s office, unless maybe it was a client who"d just got a bill.
A few turns this way and that, and here she was, sliced by the louvers of a register high in the wall of some sort of conference room, doing a very convincing Screaming Mimi.
Finally, she began losing steam. As she wound down, Jack eased back into the larger duct and positioned himself facing the way he"d come. He turned on his headlamp and narrowed the beam to check his watch. Barely past nine-thirty. He"d be back on the street before eleven-hopefully with the answers to some of his questions.
All he had to do was wait until the meeting was over, then see where the other side chose to hash over Alicia"s proposal.
Jack didn"t have to wait long or go far. Sean presented Alicia"s asking price of ten million dollars, Haffner expressed shock-genuine, Jack was sure-then tried to bargain her down. But Alicia held firm and finally Haffner said, Thenk-yew-veddy-much, and the room emptied out.
Jack gave them a few minutes, and was about to crawl back toward Haffner"s office when he heard the conference door open.
"You can have the room as long as you want," Haffner said. "I"ll be in my office should you need me."
Jack wedged himself into the duct in time to see the door close, leaving Thomas and the Middle East guy together. Neither sat down.
"Ten million," Thomas said, shaking his head in what might have been admiration. "Christ, she"s got b.a.l.l.s." He glanced at his companion. "Well, Kemel, what"s it going to be? Are your people going to go for it?"
"I do not see that we have a choice," the guy called Kemel said. His accent was definitely Middle East, but his English had a faintly British accent. He spoke rapidly, clipping his words.
"You"ve got to be kidding! You heard Haffner. He"s sure he can get the will set aside. Ten million for that place? That"s crazy."
Jack too was shocked. He"d hauled that asking price out of the air, never dreaming they"d even consider it.
"My people want this matter settled. It has dragged on too long. And after all, what is ten million against what we will gain by keeping it out of the wrong hands? A pittance."
The wrong hands? Jack thought, mentally rubbing his own hands together. He was hot, sweaty, and cramped, but suddenly that no longer mattered. Now we"re getting to the good stuff. Keep going.
"A pittance to you, maybe. But a h.e.l.l of a lot of money for something that might not be there."
"If it is not, it is of no loss to you. It is not your money."
"Yeah, but then Alicia will be a millionaire and I"ll have zilch. Less Less than zilch. I quit my job to help you with this." than zilch. I quit my job to help you with this."
"You are being well compensated. And don"t forget that you will have the house-after all, we are buying it in your name."
"Yeah...the house," Thomas said. "What"s left of it. I mean, we"ve turned the insides upside down-at least as upside down as you can without making it obvious-and we"ve come up empty-handed. We push it much further and we risk getting arrested for trespa.s.sing and vandalism."
"There is something there," Kemel said. "Perhaps not the plans and diagrams themselves, but if not, then I believe it is reasonable to a.s.sume that your father left some clue as to their whereabouts."
"That"s becoming an expensive a.s.sumption."
"The will all but says so. One cannot ignore your father"s message to that ecology group-what is it called?"
"Greenpeace."
"Yes. Greenpeace. Such a strange concept. We have no such groups in my land. But your father, he said, "This house holds the key that points the way to all you wish to achieve. Sell it and you lose everything you"ve worked for." That to me is proof enough that the house is hiding something something."
"Fine. But we"ve got to find it."
"Have no fear. We will find it. As soon as the house is ours, we will begin a most thorough search, breaking down the walls if necessary. And if we still have not found it, we will dismantle the house brick by brick, beam by beam, until we succeed."
"And if we don"t?"
"At least we will have prevented others from finding it it and using it." and using it."
"Yeah, but then I don"t get my payday."
"Well, certainly you would not expect us to buy something that you do not have. Would you?"
Thomas shrugged. "What"s our next step?"
"I contact my superiors to approve the purchase price-a mere formality, I a.s.sure you-and then we let Mr. Haffner arrange the details."
"Ten million bucks," Thomas said, shaking his head as he"d done when this little tete-a-tete started. "Well, I guess I should be thankful my dear sister has no inkling what we"re after. If she did, she"d be asking ten million per brick brick."
"Yes," Kemel said. "And that would still be a bargain."
He"s got got to be exaggerating, Jack thought. But somehow he doubted it. to be exaggerating, Jack thought. But somehow he doubted it.
As he lay there wondering what the h.e.l.l could be worth so d.a.m.n much and be small enough to hide in a house, he noticed Thomas and Kemel heading for the door.
Jack felt like singing that old Peggy Lee song, "Is That All There Is?"
What had he learned here?
Well, he"d seen Kemel. That was something. And he"d learned that whatever was in the Clayton house was d.a.m.n near priceless to some very rich folks from the Middle East. And he"d learned that Thomas"s people weren"t the only ones interested in it. They were concerned about it falling into "the wrong hands." Whose hands were the "wrong" hands? He didn"t think they meant Alicia"s. Another Middle East power? Israel? Or someone else?
But he"d hoped for more, especially after risking his b.u.t.t in an elevator shaft, sweating and crawling through filthy heating ducts, and wedging himself into s.p.a.ces where he could barely breathe.
He cursed them for being so d.a.m.n oblique. What was this mysterious it it? Why couldn"t they just come out and say what was in the house? He grinned-h.e.l.l, it wasn"t as if anybody was listening in on them.
But maybe the it it they were after was so important, so valuable, that they instinctively avoided referring to it by name. they were after was so important, so valuable, that they instinctively avoided referring to it by name.
As Jack wiped some sweat from his eyes, his overall sleeve caught the lens on his headlamp and knocked it off. He s.n.a.t.c.hed at it but it slipped from his fingers and landed with a clunk clunk on the floor of the duct. on the floor of the duct.
Jack froze as Kemel stopped at the threshold and whirled.