The House on Cold Hill

45

An hour and a half later Chris Webb was seated in Ollie’s office, in front of his computer. Ollie hovered anxiously behind him, peering over his shoulder at the screen. It was filled with a maze of rows and columns of numbers and letters that were meaningless to Ollie, but Webb was studying them with fierce concentration, emitting a string of comments out loud as he did so.

‘What the—? Oh, I see... But how the hell did you get there? What? What’s this?’

‘What’s what?’ Ollie asked.

‘I mean, that just shouldn’t be there!’

‘What shouldn’t be?’

‘Have you been in here changing any settings?’

‘No, why would I?’

‘Someone has,’ Webb said.

‘Someone? That’s not possible, Chris — I’m the only person who would ever touch this computer.’

Webb grimaced. ‘Could just be a Mac glitch — I’ve got a few clients where something similar’s happened recently on the latest operating system — settings changing of their own accord.’

‘Or could this be evidence of the hacker?’

Webb lifted the large mug of coffee Ollie had brought him, and drank some. ‘Well, this wouldn’t give anyone a pathway in. I think it’s more of an operating system glitch. Jade wouldn’t have been on this?’

‘Absolutely not. I’m certain.’

‘You see, I can’t find any footprints at all. I can see the tracks I left earlier, when I connected through TeamViewer, but there’s no sign at all of any unauthorized user having been here.’

Distracted by movement through the window to his right, Ollie saw Caro coming up the drive in her Golf, with Jade beside her and a figure, presumably Phoebe, on the back seat.

‘It’s a mystery,’ Webb said. ‘I’m sorry, I’m baffled. I don’t know what to suggest. We could put in an extra firewall and see if that stops it.’

‘Chris, I’ve got to do something to salvage the situation. I can’t afford to lose these clients.’

‘Of course.’

‘OK, I’ve had an idea,’ Ollie said, suddenly brightening up a little. ‘Cholmondley and Bhattacharya aren’t aware of each other. So, how about you write an email to each of them, explaining that you are my IT manager and that these emails have been sent from some malicious hacker who must have a grudge against them?’

Webb looked dubious.

‘I’ll compose it and give you the wording. All you have to do is just sign as yourself, as my IT manager. Then I can follow it up by phoning them, when hopefully they’ve calmed down.’

‘OK, sure. But—’

‘But?’

‘I’ll write it, sign it, whatever, but I’m not sure it’s going to be the end of it.’

‘What do you mean?’ Ollie asked.

‘What I mean is I don’t think you’ve been hacked, mate.’ He stared at Ollie.

‘So who do you think wrote these?’

‘Someone in this house.’ Webb raised his arms. ‘Look, I know that sounds crazy to you, but I really don’t think you’ve been hacked. Unless it’s by someone a lot cleverer than me — and that, of course, is always a possibility!’

‘Chris,’ said Ollie, becoming impatient with the man’s intransigence about hacking, ‘those last two were sent while I was sitting here at my desk. Jade was out at a riding lesson and Caro sure as hell didn’t come in and start typing under my nose without my seeing her.’

‘All right, email scan be programmed to be sent at a scheduled time. Perhaps someone typed these during the night, when you were asleep, scheduling them to go at a specific time. Either by accessing this computer or by hacking it.’

Ollie shook his head. ‘Who the hell would do that, Chris?’

‘I don’t know. Have you made any enemies?’

‘No.’

Could it possibly be Jade, Ollie wondered, lapsing into thought? Sleepwalking and now sleep-typing? She was pretty computer savvy, it wasn’t impossible. Yet the language in those emails, the technical information about the Ferrari, the information about the restaurants, she couldn’t possibly have known all that. But who had? And equally importantly, why had these emails been sent? By someone out to destroy him, that was evident. But who, he thought again? Who the hell could it be — and why?

‘I honestly can’t think of anyone I’ve upset. This is just a complete mystery.’

Webb gave him a sideways look. ‘Maybe it’s that pesky ghost of yours again!’

Ollie did not smile.