Anti mobile phones, I thought. That’s okay, so am I.
Geoff came back carrying something not very heavy in a not very big case. He deposited it on the back seat carefully and got behind the wheel.
‘What did you tell your housemate about me?’ I asked. ‘She came out to get an eyeful.’
‘Oh, Jules. Yeah. I told her you were my uncle.’
‘Well, I am one. I’m an anti-godfather, too.’
He started the car and I was pleased to see that he didn’t rev it unnecessarily. ‘What’s that?’
‘A godfather who doesn’t believe in God. How long’s this going to take?’
‘All depends.’
Ask an ignorant question, get a non-informative answer.
Back at my place I left him in the spare room plugged in to the phone line I had installed upstairs when I’d toyed with the idea of getting on the e-mail and Internet myself. So far, I hadn’t done anything about it, but the day was coming. Down below I phoned Cyn, got her machine, and told her that Geoff and I were getting along okay but there were no further developments. It’s easier to lie to a machine than face-to-face with a person dying of cancer.
I itched to know how the police were doing in their hunt for Talbot, but since Glen Withers left me and Frank Parker retired, I’ve lost my access to information the police don’t necessarily want citizens to know about. It was time for me to set about cultivating another contact but it’s got harder to do. Friendship was always the best method and money came next. These days, both avenues have more or less closed down except in peripheral areas like motor registration and such because cops have become paranoid and suspicious. Understandably. The funny thing is that the ‘cop culture’ all the reformers wanted to crack open has just hardened under the pressure.
It’s much the same with the journalists. Back when they worked for owners, not corporations, and could smoke and drink in the office, they were willing to tell you things off the record in exchange for off-the-record information from you. Not any more; now the news is so processed and sanitised almost nothing gets out that could ruffle corporate feathers. The politicians take some heat occasionally, but the money men are safe. A journalist these days would rather find out that Princess Diana had had an ingrowing toenail than that the head of a multinational had embezzled a hundred million.
Well, with my computer expert working upstairs at least I was moving with the times. I took him a cup of coffee and inhaled a little of the marijuana smoke.
‘How’s it going?’
‘Getting there. The security’s not as good as it should be. She left the server software in a desk drawer, so that was easy. Now I have to get the user to get into the data base.’
‘How will you do that?’
‘It’ll be something they can all remember – the name of the receptionist or one of the doctors, the street they’re in – something like that. I collected a up a few cards while I was there.’
‘You’re a natural’
He took a sip of his coffee and a drag on his joint. ‘Leave me with it, unless you can help.’
‘Just be as quick as you can. I’ve got another job for you when you finish that.’
‘Okay. What’s my rate of pay?’
‘Room and board, son, room and board. D’you know the paperwork involved in actually employing someone these days?’
‘Yeah, the country’s fucked.’
‘Not quite. But they’re trying.’
I left him to it and discovered, when I got downstairs, that my erection had subsided. It was the first time I’d ever been relieved about that. Out of curiosity I opened the box Mrs Merryweather had given me and removed several packets of fine needles designated for injecting insulin; the plastic injection kit and a leaflet on how to use it, another leaflet on priapism (a possible and very unwelcome side effect of the treatment), and a small bottle of the magic elixir. I studied the leaflets. ‘STORE IN REFRIGERATOR’ the sticker on the bottle read, so I did.
‘Hey, Cliff!’
I raced up the stairs, glad to have that freedom of movement back.
‘Got it?’
‘Yep. I’m in and they haven’t password-protected the files.’ Geoff pointed to the screen where Damien Talbot’s file was set out in large type. The doctor had been more thorough with him than Dr Pradesh had been with me. Talbot’s height and weight were recorded along with his pulse rate and blood pressure. He had described himself as a social drinker and admitted to smoking twenty cigarettes a day. The injury to his foot (“damage to ligaments in ankle and foot’) was noted. Talbot had claimed to be in a permanent relationship and to have been impotent for the past year.
The doctor’s notes indicated his scepticism: ‘Patient’s fingers heavily nicotine-stained; evidence of drug injection; blood pressure high, pulse fast, lung capacity poor.’ No medication had been prescribed pending a report from Talbot’s own doctor. The final note wasn’t comforting: ‘Patient violent and abusive’. I copied down the address Talbot had given and the name and address of his doctor, Dr Bruce Macleod.
‘Good work, Geoff. The address’s likely to be phoney but the doctor’s probably genuine.’
‘How do you figure that? And why’s the doctor so important?’
‘I’ve been told Talbot lives mainly in the van and anyone dodging fines the way he’s been doing wouldn’t give out his address easily. But my guess is he wanted the impotence treatment badly enough to stick to the track where he could. At least up until it looked as if he wasn’t going to get his way.’
‘Okay.’
‘The doctor’s the only bit of hard information we’ve got on him, and he’s got plenty of health problems – a crook leg, a broken thumb, drugs, sex. There’s a chance the doctor’ll be able to tell me what he might do next, how dangerous he is. Stuff like that.’
‘I get it. If he’ll talk to you.’
‘There’s that.’
Geoff made a series of moves with the mouse. The slimline printer kicked on and he handed me a printout of the file. I expected a cheeky remark but he wasn’t looking amused. ‘Sounds like a real shit, this bloke.’
I shrugged. ‘He’s said to be charming when he wants to be.’
He turned the computer off and pushed his chair back. ‘So, do we go and see the doctor?’
‘I do, you don’t. Doctors can be difficult. They’re litigious and I’ve already violated the conditions of my licence by getting you to do what you’ve done. If I show up with you in tow…’
‘Well, we’re in the same boat. It’s illegal to hack into medical records.’
‘All the more reason for you to stay out of it. No, I’ve got something else for you to do. Something you can do better than me.’
‘You don’t often hear people your age saying that. What is it?’
‘I want you to go to Tadpole Creek and see if you can get yourself in somehow. As you pointed out yourself, you’re an environmental engineer. You must know the lingo. You could be doing a thesis or something. You’ll have to watch yourself. They’re not dumb. Particularly a woman named Tess Hewitt. She’s the sister of one of the leaders of the protest, Ramsay.’
‘Okay. What am I trying to find out?’
‘This Ramsay Hewitt got himself arrested in connection with the death of the security guard. I’d like to know how that stands. But the most important thing is to find out who’s backing the protest. Putting up the money and supplying equipment and so on.’
‘I thought the most important thing was to find Talbot.’
‘It is, but I’ve got a feeling there’s a connection. There’s something not quite right about this protest.’
‘Like what?’
‘I don’t know. I’ll show you the stuff I’ve got on the history of the site and you can make up your own mind. Are you all right to drive after smoking dope?’
‘One joint? Sure.’
‘Watch yourself with that when you’re out there. I’m not sure of their attitude to it.’
He stood up and stretched and his fingers almost reached the ceiling. ‘How long’ve they been there?’
‘A couple of months I think.’
He laughed. ‘They’re probably growing it.’