It was Tuesday morning. There was nobody else in the house. Kevin was at Just Blow Me, and the others were out doing whatever it was they did. Monica mightve been in her place in the garage, but you never saw too much of her anyway.
Rydell got his bag of cornflakes out of the cupboard and carefully unrolled it. About enough for a bowl. He opened the fridge and took out a plastic, snap-top, liter container with a strip of masking-tape across the side. Hed written MILK EXPERIMENT on the masking-tape with a heavy marker.
Whats that? Hernandez asked.
Milk.
Whys it say experiment?
So nobodyll drink it. I figured it out in the dorm at the Academy. He dumped the cornflakes in a bowl, covered them with milk, found a spoon, and carried his breakfast to the kitchen table. The table had a trick leg, so you had to eat without putting your elbows down.
Hows the arm?
Fine. Rydell forgot about not putting his elbow down. Milk and cornflakes slopped across the scarred white plastic of the tabletop.
Here. Hernandez went to the counter and tore off a fat wad of beige paper towels.
Those are whatsisnames Rydell said, and he seriously doesnt like us to use them.
Towel experiment Hernandez said, tossing Rydell the wad.
Rydell blotted up the milk and most of the flakes. He couldnt imagine what Hernandez was doing here, but then hed never have imagined that Hernandez drove a white Daihatsu Sneaker with an animated hologram of a waterfall on the hood.
Thats a nice car out there Rydell said, nodding in the direction of the carport and spooning cornflakes into his mouth.
My daughter. Rosas car. Been in the shop, man.
Rydell chewed, swallowed. Brakes or something?
The fucking waterfall. Supposed to be these little animals, they come out of the bushes and sort of look at it, the waterfall, you know? Hernandez leaned back against the counter, flexing his toes into the nubby sandals. Some kind of, like, Costa Rican animals, you know? Ecology theme. Shes real green. Made us take out what was left of the lawn, put in all these ground-cover things look like gray spiders. But the shop cant get those fucking animals to show, man. We got a warranty and everything, but its, you know, been a pain in the ass. He shook his head.
Rydell finished his cornflakes.
You ever been to Costa Rica, Rydell?
No.
Its fucking beautiful, man. Like Switzerland.
Never been there.
No, I mean what they do with data. Like the Swiss, what they did with money.
You mean the kvens?
You got it. Those people smart. No army, navy, air force, just neutral. And they take care of everybodys data.
Regardless whatit is.
Hey, fucking A. Smart people. And spend that money on ecology, man.
Rydell carried the bowl, the spoon, the damp wad of towels, to the sink. He rinsed the bowl and spoon, wiped them with the towels, then stuck the towels as far down as possible behind the rest of the garbage in the bag under the sink. Straightening up, he looked at Hernandez. Something I can do for you, super?
Other way around. Hernandez smiled. Somehow it wasnt reassuring. I been thinking about you. Your situation. Not good. Not good, man. You never get to be a cop now. Now you resign, I cant even hire you back on IntenSecure to work gated residential. Maybe you get on with a regular square-badge outfit, sit it that little pillbox in a liquor store. You wanna do that?
No.
Thats good, cause you get your ass killed, doing that. Somebody come in there, take your little pillbox out, man.
Right now Im looking at something in retail sales.
No shit? Sales? What you sell?
Bedsteads made out of cast-iron jockey-boys. These pictures made out of hundred-year-old human hair.
Hernandez narrowed his eyes and shoved off the counter, headed for the bung room. Rydell thought he might be leaving, but he was only starting to pace. Rydell had seen him do this a couple of times in his office at IntenSecure. Now he turned, just as he was about to enter the living room, and paced back to Rydell.
You got this bad-assed attitude sometimes, man, I dunno. You oughta stop and think maybe Im trying to help you a little, right? Back toward the living room again.
Just tell me what you want, okay?
Hernandez stopped, turned, sighed. Never been up to NoCal, right? San Francisco? Anybody know you up there?
No.
IntenSecures licensed in NoCal, too, right? Different state, different laws, whole different attitude, they might as well be a different fucking country, but weve got our shit up there. More office buildings, lot of hotels. Gated residentials not so big up there, not til you get out to the edge-cities. Concord, Hacienda Business Center, like that. We got a good piece of that, too.
But its the same company. They wont hire me here, they wont hire me there.
Fucking A. Nobody talking about hiring you. What this is, theres maybe something there for you with a guy. Works freelance. Company has certain kinds of problems, sometime they bring in somebody. But the guy, hes not IntenSecure. Freelance. Office up there, they got that kind of situation now.
Wait a second. What are we talking about here? Were talking about freelance armed-response?
Guys a skip-tracer. You know what that is?
Finds people when they try to get out from under debt, blow off the rent, like that?
Or take off with your kid in a custody case, whatever. But, you know, those kinds of skips, they can mostly be handled through the net, these days. Just keep plugging their stats into DatAmerica, eventually you gonna find em. Or even he shrugged, you can go to the cops.
So what a skip-tracer mostly does Rydell suggested, remembering one particular episode of Cops in Trouble hed seen with his father.
Is keep you from having to go to the cops.
Or to a licensed private detective agency.
You got it. Hernandez was watching him.
Rydell walked past him, into the living room, hearing the German shower-sandals come squishing after him across the kitchens dull tile floor. Someone had been smoking tobacco in there the night before. He could smell it. It was in violation of the lease. The landlord would give them hell about it. The landlord was a Serb immigrant who drove a fifteen-year-old BMW, wore these weird furry Tyrolean hats, and insisted on being called Wally. Because Wally knew that Rydell worked for IntenSecure, hed wanted to show him the flashlight he kept clipped under the dash in his BMW. It was about a foot long and had a button that triggered a big shot of capsicum gas. Hed asked Rydell if Rydell thought it was enough.
Rydell had lied. Had told him that people who did, for instance, a whole lot of dancer, they actually liked a blast or two of good capsicum. Like it cleared their sinuses. Got their juices flowing. They got off on it.
Now Rydell looked down and saw for the first time that the living room carpet in the house in Mar Vista was exactly the same stuff hed crawled across in Turveys girlfriends apartment in Knoxville. Maybe a little cleaner, but the same stuff. Hed never noticed that before.
Listen, Rydell, you dont want to take this, fine. My day off, I drive over here, you appreciate that? You get tweaked by some hackers, you fall for it, you push the response too hard, I can understand. But it happened, man, its on your file, and this is the best I can do. But listen up. You do right by the company, maybe that gets back to Singapore.
Hernandez
My day off
Man, I dont know anything about finding people
You can drive. All they want. Just drive. You drive the tracer, see? Hes got his leg hassled, he cant drive. And this is, like, delicate, this thing. Requires some smarts. I told them I thought you could do it, man. I did that. I told them.