So I stopped at Gold's for an hour and a half, to poop myself out good, then buried my nose in Hirschman's massive Twenty Case Histories of the Post-Reform Era—about my fifth reading of it—and around midnight went to sleep without any trouble. By that time I'd decided Tuuli wouldn't have found anyone at Long Valley, Arizona, who was stronger or smarter than me. Not that she could talk Finnish with.
27
NEW BREAKTHROUGH
I was finishing off an omelette in Morey's the next morning when Indian came in. Usually when he comes in, he's there earlier, and I could tell by his expression that something was seriously wrong. I waved to him and he came over without even stopping to order.
"Jesus Christ!" he said as he flopped down.
"What is it?"
"Cloud Man's dead! Killed! This morning!"
It turned out they'd been riding in together on Indian's big bike—an Indian Buffalo, appropriately enough—with Cloud Man on behind. They'd turned onto Hollywood from Gower and just passed the intersection with Cahuenga when a sniper had shot Cloud Man right off the bike. Indian had almost lost it; it took him forty or fifty meters to stop. By the time he'd run back to Cloud Man, cars had stopped and people were gathering. A couple of them were on their knees, trying to help. Crowding them aside, Indian knelt. Cloud Man's eyes were open, and when he saw Indian, he tried to talk to him. Indian had to get his ear down close to hear.
"My real name," Cloud Man whispered, "is Leo McCarver." He repeated it. "Leo McCarver. The guy, who shot me— Card in my wallet. Ensenada. Mexico. Warn Martti. They'll kill him too."
As Indian finished telling me, his eyes opened wide, as if only the words, not the meaning, had registered before. As if his attention had been so totally on the incomprehensible—someone shooting Cloud Man—that he hadn't really connected the words with reality. "Go on," I said. "Then what?"
That was all Cloud Man had told him; then he'd closed his eyes. Indian hadn't tried to frisk him for his wallet, because about that time two beat cops came running up. Three or four minutes later an ambulance was there, and the paramedics had gotten Leo McCarver—Cloud Man—onto a litter. Indian heard one of them say he was dead. By that time a patrol floater was there too, and Indian told the sergeant Cloud Man's name—names—and where he'd lived, and what his own name was. The sergeant had asked a few more questions, then let him go.
He hadn't mentioned Ensenada or me. Indian had driven on to Yitzhak's then, even though he'd arrive too late for muster, to tell them what happened. The jobs had already been assigned, so he'd come to Morey's.
Warn Martti. They'll kill him too! Unless Indian had left something out, those were McCarver's last words, said with almost his last breath! Why, unless he thought it was true? And where did I fit in?
* * *
I passed Steinhorn and Rossi in the lobby, going out as I went in. Rossi said hi; Steinhorn only nodded. I suppose I said something back.
Carlos' office was still clean, and I sat down next to him so we could both watch his computer screen. I told him about Cloud Man. Leo McCarver: the name meant nothing to him either. He called Algotsson-Scherker, and as you'd expect of a construction outfit, their headquarters' office was open. They opened at eight instead of nine, and they were on Mountain Time. The guy who answered connected him with their personnel office, where a Francine answered. After Carlos had identified himself and the firm, he told Francine he needed to see their personnel file on David Steinhorn.
She asked why he needed to know. When he'd satisfied her, she said, "Just a moment, Mr. Katagawa." Her attention went to her computer; presumably her fingers were giving it instructions. Then, frowning, she looked back at her vidcam. "I'm sorry, Mr. Katagawa, but we have no record of a David Steinhorn."
"You did when I checked with you a little over a week ago," Carlos said. "You may have a record of my call. We hired him on the basis of it."
Her gaze returned to her computer screen, her brows drawn down in concentration. Again her fingers wrote. She shook her head slightly, still frowning, and tried something else, then something else again, finally staring thoughtfully with her lower lip between her teeth. Then she looked out at us from the phone screen. "I'm sorry, sir. I have nothing on a David Steinhorn; on any Steinhorn; or any other name beginning with S-T-E-I-N or S-T-I-E-N or S-T-E-N."
"But you do remember my call."
"I remember your face, yes."
"Do you remember finding a file on Steinhorn?"
"I remember finding a file for you, yes sir, but I don't recall its identity."
"Okay. There's something strange here. May I speak with whoever's in charge of personnel files?"
"I'm in charge of personnel files," she said. She was still frowning. I got the notion that actually she remembered seeing the file and was wondering what the hell had happened to it. "Would you like to speak with Ms. Hawks, the personnel director?"
"If I may, please."
Ms. Hawks was a trim and handsome woman, black but with an Oriental look. Her father'd probably been a GI in Asia somewhere. When Carlos had explained our problem to her, she shook her head. "I'm sure we've had no salaried employee named Steinhorn since I came here in oh-four. And our personnel files haven't been culled since they were computerized; probably in the seventies or eighties."
"Who has access to them?"
"Various people, in read-only. Only Francine and I have access to them in edit mode. Except of course Mr. Scherker, and Ms. Lopez, his administrative assistant. And— We employ standard precautionary systems to ensure the integrity of our personnel files. To meet the legal requirements for personal privacy. Entering them illegally would require someone skilled and resourceful. And reckless."
She left it at that. The rest was understood: Such people were available for hire, operating out of homes and offices everywhere. There was a constant attrition of them, of course. Some made their stake and quit. Others got located by monitor programs and arrested; sent to work camps to chop cotton in the desert sun, or plant trees on old cutovers and burns. Hard manual labor, hot and sweaty or wet and cold. But the payoffs could be big. There were always recruits to the ranks of computer criminals. Or perhaps Lopez or even Scherker could have done it, maybe as a favor to a friend. Or it could have been Hawks or Francine, though Francine especially had seemed too convincing to be acting. Carlos decided to let be; he thanked Hawks and disconnected. Then we talked. Conceivably Steinhorn might have hacked into A-S' personnel files himself, and inserted the erroneous file. Then erased it after he was hired, to avoid someone like Hawks running across it and perhaps informing us, if they logged the personnel reference requests they received.
But if Steinhorn had the skills for that, what was he doing working for Prudential as an investigative assistant?
To both of us, it seemed a lot more likely that someone else had arranged the false file, for the purpose of inserting Steinhorn in our office. Someone interested in the Christman case. Which could be any of our active suspects, or someone else, unsuspected and maybe unknown.
"So," I said, "assume his military record is genuine. It probably is. If he hasn't been working for Algotsson-Scherker since he took his discharge, what has he been doing?
"And Cloud Man, Leo McCarver—was he connected with Steinhorn in any way? They both arrived on the scene about the same time. When I first met McCarver, he didn't seem like a Loonie to me. I thought he might be undercover for the LAPD, or maybe the DEA—something like that. Whose card did McCarver have in his wallet? Apparently someone in Ensenada who might be interested in killing me.
"Why would someone, or some business entity, in Ensenada want me dead? Is there a connection with Steinhorn? And why would McCarver want to warn me, when we'd barely met? Was there a faction that wanted me dead, and another that wanted me alive and on the job? Specifically the Christman job? Because that's the only job I'm handling."