They sat in silence for a few minutes, until Render called and Jon answered.
“What do you want, detective?” the Gotham Security boss said, obviously irritated. “I’m having dinner with my family.”
“Your company not only built the Water Wall,” Jon said, “but secured the subway tunnel system after the flooding started, right?”
“Yeah,” the older man responded. “Why?”
“Are your people able to move around down there, under the city, conduct operations?”
“Yeah, we did some engineering to prevent more flooding, and to travel underground if we needed to. We also built some rooms down there—we call ’em ‘Belows’—to use as posts just in case. We haven’t needed them much so far. This isn’t some big secret, though we don’t broadcast it. Why are you asking?”
“We want you to unlock a GS door for us along the Water Wall, below the High Line, and send us a map of the underground.”
“Why?”
“Because we have a suspect, and we think he might be hiding down there.”
“Why didn’t you ask Gant when you talked to him? He could have taken care of that.”
“Because I wanted you to be the only one who knows. And I wanted to see what you would say.”
“What the hell?” Render said, even more irritated now, but Jon just let the question hang in the air.
“Is the suspect a Gotham employee?” Render asked.
“Not officially. But he could be using your tunnels to move around and hide.”
“If he’s not our employee, then he would’ve had to steal a key, or find one that was lost, which isn’t likely.”
“Unless you hired him unofficially.”
“What?” Render asked. Jon couldn’t tell for sure over the phone, but the GS boss seemed to be genuinely perplexed. “Oh, right, your theory about me being involved in these crimes. I don’t know what else I can do but tell you I would never in a million years do something like that.”
“You can come down here yourself and open this door for us, and give us a map.”
“What would that prove?”
“It wouldn’t prove anything,” Jon said, “but it would help us to believe that you’re not involved.”
“How’s that?”
“If you make us get in some other way, and we can’t find the guy, then we’ll think maybe you warned him so he could get away. But if you come here yourself—”
“I hate to tell ya,” Render interrupted, “but that doesn’t prove anything. I could warn him on my way there. Look, I told you I want to cooperate in any way I can, and I want to know myself if someone is doing this, Gotham employee or not. It’s just that there are other good reasons for me not to drive over there right now, like I’m having dinner with my family. So let’s do this…. I’ll personally call one of my agents who’s in the area, tell him not to talk to anyone else, and have him open the door for you and search with you. I won’t even tell Gant, though he’ll be pissed when he finds out I didn’t.”
“Okay,” Jon said. “I guess that’s the best we can do right now. What about a map of the underground?”
“I’m sure the MPD already has one.”
“Would it have all of your modifications and additions?”
“Probably not,” Render admitted. “So I’ll send you a link to ours, right to your phone. And if you find your guy, you’ll know I’m not involved in these murders.”
I already know you are, Jon thought.
17
The link to the map arrived almost immediately, and the agent Render had promised not long after. When Jon forwarded the map to Amira, she said that it would take a little while to adapt it for use on their phones, but Jon figured they could do without it right now because the man who arrived from GS would presumably know his way around down there.
Or woman. Jon couldn’t tell which it was until she introduced herself and said her name was Natalie, and was still a bit confused because the voice definitely seemed male. The shapes under her higher-level “Builder” uniform seemed rather ambiguous as well, and John had heard stories of how many ex-military men (especially Special Forces, for some reason) were transitioning after they completed their service. He had even read an article online about some controversial psychological theories suggesting why this was happening so often—one was that they had reached the pinnacle of masculinity and found it unsatisfying, and another was that they carried guilt from all the killing they did in their macho job and tried to escape it by creating an entirely different identity for themselves. But all that really mattered to Jon right now was that Natalie had the much-needed key, which turned out to be a thumb-sized cylinder attached to a flat square.
“It’s a magnetic code locking system,” she explained as she opened the door, when she saw Jon looking at the key. “No electronics were allowed because of the water threat, so the locks can’t be controlled remotely. You need one of these keys to get through any of the entrances to the underground, and to move around once you’re down there. And they are very carefully guarded, impossible to copy by anyone but us. That’s why it’s very unlikely that the person you’re looking for went in here.” She led Jon and Halladay inside. “But we’ll look anyway.”
On the wall inside the door there were some industrial flashlights sitting on shelves. One of the shelves was empty, but Natalie didn’t seem to notice that when she pulled one down for each of them.
“We didn’t hook up any lighting in the halls or tunnels,” she said as she turned her flashlight on and locked the door behind them. “The cost would’ve been prohibitive, and we don’t use them that much.”
“What about the rooms you built down here?” Jon said. “What are they called again?”
“‘Belows.’ Yes, they have light and power. And cell phone signal boosters and Wi-Fi routers that are left on for when we do come down.” She shook her phone at Jon and thumbed its screen as she led them down a hallway, which Jon figured was built into the Water Wall.
“So there’s a Below near here,” Jon said.
“Uh-huh,” she said. “We’ll check it out.”
“We should be quiet,” Halladay whispered, “in case he’s in there.”
“If you insist,” Natalie whispered back.
They continued in silence down the dark hallway, which was more like a narrow tunnel, and then turned left away from the Wall into another passage that sloped downward. That one, apparently excavated by the Builders, led to a wide stairway that even an outsider like Jon recognized as part of the subway system. When they reached the bottom of the stairs, they turned right onto an abandoned train platform. As Jon swung his flashlight around, it revealed that the tracks in the tunnel below the platform were covered in water. He also noticed a bad smell and heard Halladay make a disgusted noise.
“We weren’t able to close up all the tunnels before they flooded,” Natalie whispered as she also shined her light on the small river over the edge of the platform, where the trains used to run.
At the end of the platform there was another narrow passage, obviously created by GS engineers to run parallel to the flooded subway and to provide access along it. Jon wondered why it had been less trouble to dig this tunnel rather than clear the water out of the already existing one, but he didn’t have much of a chance to think more about it, because they soon arrived in front of a closed door set into the side of the passageway. Natalie abruptly shut off her flashlight and motioned for the two cops to do the same. They could see a very thin line of yellow around the edges of the door—indicating that there was a light on inside.
Jon caught a whiff of strong perfume when Natalie moved close to him and whispered in his ear that she would go in first, in case there was a GS employee in there. Then she moved quietly over to Halladay and did the same thing. Both cops drew their sidearms, but Natalie didn’t, apparently still confident that there would be no one dangerous in the room. Instead she pulled out the underground key, opened the lock with it, stuck it back in her pocket, and pushed open the door.