And then I woke in a sweat and Tauber was creaking back and forth with a cup of evil-smelling coffee, singing some classic rock song I knew I’d heard but didn’t really recognize. And Max was seated on the edge of my bed, worried face taking me in. And I knew he’d shaken me awake. He was dressed pretty neatly and had even brushed his hair, for all the good it did.
“You’ll want a shower after the day you had,” he said. “And the night.” My dreams were already fading. He probably remembered a whole lot more of them than I did. “You should start getting ready,” he urged softly.
When I came out of the shower, they were both staring at the TV, rapt. “…Matthews, the chairman of Mainline Technologies, a security contractor-”
“I know Mainline,” I said. “They were everywhere in Iraq,” and all at once they were both staring at me like I had pox.
“-had just walked out of merger negotiations with the L Corporation of Herndon, Virginia-”
“Also spooks, I’ll bet,” Tauber said. “It’s the right neighborhood,” and Max nodded.
“Authorities at the two companies were unable to explain why the helicopter pilot turned into a water tower instead of following his flight plan.”
Video flickered on the screen. “It’s bullshit,” Max said immediately. “Look at his face,” he said. “He’s looking where he’s going. He went on purpose.”
“Which doesn’t mean he meant to,” Tauber said drily.
Max nodded. “He was ‘persuaded’.”
“By who?” I asked.
“Let’s see,” Tauber considered, “what country would want to knock off our security contractors? Name the top six.”
“No,” Max shook his head. “The question is, who’d be interested in knocking off the head of Mainline, sabotaging the Mayor of Copenhagen and a nuclear powerplant in New York State? When you’ve figured that out, then you’ve got something.”
“Controversy grew today over the proposal for nuclear disarmament raised by Aryana Singh, the new Indian Premier. An attempted no-confidence vote in the Indian Parliament was disrupted by several dozen demonstrators inside the chambers and an estimated group of more than 10,000 outside. Sizeable demonstrations took place in London, Berlin, Frankfurt, Paris and Tokyo.”
“What did Mainline do in Iraq?” Max asked.
“Everything,” I answered. “Bodyguards for the VIP’s, they ran the food concessions at the bases, they brought fuel in from Kuwait.”
“Fuel?” Tauber growled. “Iraq’s got oil.”
“They’re not producing it fast enough-at least that’s what they told us. What they produced went to paying for the government.”
“Paying off the government, more likely,” Tauber said.
“We should get going,” Max said and I stuffed my things into my bag.
We approached Durham just before 9, joining the morning rush past a skyline that waffled between glass tower and impregnable cliff dwelling. Miriam Fine lived in a suburban town on the outskirts. “I’m unsatisfied with your instructions,” Max complained. “Technically, she doesn’t even live in Durham.”
“Complain to Dave next time you see him,” I told him. “I’m just a vessel.”
“Why don’t you find her?” he remarked, looking at Tauber. “This should be perfect for remote viewing.”
“I need pen and paper,” Tauber said and I knew where it was in the glovebox. He closed his eyes and took several long breaths. His breathing got lighter and lighter after that, to the point that I thought he was either asleep or expiring. But, just at the point that I got concerned, his hand started moving on the page, sketching a very loose oval with a bulge on one side and a couple cross-hatch markings, first towards the top, then leaving a space and continuing the lines below. Beneath the oval, he began sketching a series of small rectangles and then abandoned them, ending with several stacked boxes. His eyes opened and he smiled at what was probably my skeptical expression. “Your subconscious,” he said, “is a whole lot more powerful than yer conscious-it’s in touch with stuff your conscious mind wouldn’t fraternize with to save yer life.”
“The conscious mind wants control,” Max interjected. “It wants everything in a neat box. If you just let the hand move however it wants to-don’t try to control, don’t second-guess-you can draw directly from the subconscious.”
“You get a bit at a time,” Tauber continued, “first a feeling, then a little more detail and a little more and if you’re lucky, wham! You get the big picture.” He pointed at the glovebox. “Let’s see that map,” he said and I handed it to him.
“Okay,” he said, pointing, “here’s the hump in the highway-see it there?” and I did. Where his oval wasn’t perfect-where it bulged out in one direction-the highway did the same on the map. He pointed out a spot on the map near the bulge where a bunch of criss-crossing streets were grouped around a long narrow empty space: “Here’s all the streets criss-crossing in that neighborhood-well, they aren’t quite as straight as I drew ‘em. The empty spot’s a hilltop.” He stared at the stacked boxes as though they were somebody else’s work. “She lives at the top of the hill-two-story brick with double-chimneys. It might not be a big hill,” he added. “You’re boosting the signal, aren’t ya?” he asked Max suspiciously. “I wouldn’t’a got it this fast on my own. It’s been a long time.”
“You’re still doing the work,” Max said.
“But…how does it work?” I stammered. “How do you explain it?”
Tauber shrugged. “That’s a conscious mind thing,” he said, tapping his forehead. “Having to explain everything. I don’t have to know how sex works, son, long as I know how to do it…”
He turned to Max. “But how do you know what you know?” He had that same squinty-eyed skeptical look on his face that I’d seen the night before when we started talking about Florida. Smiling, pleasant but there was an edge to it. “I’m not the man I was, but my memory’s okay. I don’t remember you in the program.”
“I was sort of on the edges,” Max said, smiling back-two of the worst smiles I’d ever seen.
“What edges? Weren’t no edges. You were in or out. Which program? Center Lane? Grill Flame? Stargate?”
“None of them,” Max answered. Then he went red, taking both of us by surprise. “I never made it through training. I was drummed out-for insubordination.”
After a second, Tauber answered with his own laughter. “That would explain you getting along with Dave.”
Max nodded, adding, “Dave was the one who fired me,” and that triggered another round of laughter. Throughout it all, though, Tauber’s eyes stayed tight on him.
“You’re blocking me,” he said finally.
“Force of habit,” Max answered first and then shrugged. “We all have our secrets. You’re blocking me too.”
“But you know who I am-Dave sent you to me.”
“Uh-huh,” Max sighed, “and he sent me to you, didn’t he?”
Tauber didn’t seem thrilled with this answer, but it silenced him for the moment. And then we were down the offramp into the suburbs. “This is right, isn’t it?” Max asked Tauber and he nodded, gruff.
The offramp dumped us into a development, streets of neat well-kept houses on a hilly incline. Max started his driving-with-the-eyes-closed thing and I was stupidly thrilled to see Tauber was just as petrified by this as I was. But this time, we circled the neighborhood several times before Max could get a heading. “Lots of interference,” he muttered. He closed his eyes again, made a few quick turns and Tauber pointed at a brick house just where the road curved. “That’s it,” he said immediately.
Miriam Fine’s house stood at the apex, the highest completed point of the development. Streets of blocky brick houses stretched out downhill in several directions. A wide patch of woods filled the crest of the hilltop just behind her, a few construction cranes visible farther back, in a clearing between two developments. This looked like the spot the developer had reached when the construction economy got the hiccups.