Simple Simon

Chapter Twenty Price of Admission

Kimura…

Nothing made any sense now, Lomax thought.

The week sucked, the day sucked, everything sucked. That was Bob Lomax’s estimation of life at the moment as he gazed uselessly out his window to the traffic below. And the real bitch of the matter was he saw no way to make it any better, no way to understand it even.

Sure, he could peck away at the incriminating cloud that surrounded his number two, he could seek answers from the low life scum he endeavored to put away. And he could swear at Breem under his breath every chance he got.

But for what? Art was still out there, running, and Lomax hadn’t the foggiest idea what was really going on.

And then the newest hole to fill: Kimura.

“Damn,” the SAC said, tapping the cool glass with the edge of his fist, leaving fat, muddled smudges on the window.

“Sir?”

Lomax turned, surprised to see Van Horn wheeling in.

“I knocked, but there was no answer.”

“Come on in,” Lomax said. He rolled his shoulders once and assumed the position behind his desk. After several years piloting the damn thing he still hadn’t gotten used to the feel. “What’s on your mind?”

Van Horn steadied himself with a breath. “Sir, Art Jefferson came to my house on Saturday night.”

After a moment’s absorption of the admission, Lomax sniffed a brief laugh. Son of a bitch, Art. “And why was that?”

He’d expected maybe a dressing down first, at least, or maybe a question as to where the fugitive was now. Not a Why? “He wanted something.”

“Money, what?”

“A trace of a phone number,” Van Horn answered.

Lomax looked off and shook his head. “He’s still investigating. That’s a strange thing for a guilty man to be doing.”

“You don’t think he did it…” Van Horn quizzed the SAC.

“Hell, no, Nels. I just wish I knew what—” A number? What number? “What number?”

“That’s what I was coming in here to tell you. I promised Art I wouldn’t, but after that shootout, well, sir, I’m worried.”

Shootout. It wasn’t much of that, Lomax knew. Only two slugs matched Art’s duty weapon. The remaining thirty came from someone else, someone shooting at Art, and at Simon Lynch.

And then there were the fingerprints, matched to Art, Simon, Pooks Underhill, an unknown, and, low and behold, Keiko Kimura.

What in God’s name is she doing gunning for my number two?

“I’m worried, too, Nels.”

“Anyway, he came to me and gave me this number to trace.” Van Horn passed the slip to the SAC. “It’s an eight hundred number, only it doesn’t exist.”

“Excuse me?”

“No listing, sir. I ran it up and down.”

“So, it was a mistake,” Lomax observed.

“I don’t think so,” Van Horn said.

“Why is that?”

“Because he got that number out of a page of KIWI ciphertext. From a magazine.”

From a what? Pieces began to fly in Lomax’s head. Kimura. Vince Chappell. Betrayal by MAYFLY. And now KIWI. “Nels, from the top, tell me everything you know. Everything.”

Rothchild was at lunch, away from his office, when Kudrow stopped by and let himself in. The monitors glowed weak, and the darkness they could not defeat surrounded him like a shroud. At this moment he found comfort in the din.

He had come for that and to be reminded of his position.

Kudrow eased into Rothchild’s chair and felt the warmth it retained. He scanned the numerous controls associated with the systems, finding with little trouble the series of switches that Rothchild had once explained to him. The left switch first, and a picture window appeared on the large monitor before him, then the switch next to it, and an image flooded the window.

I can do this, Kudrow told himself. Things could go wrong and still he could do this, could, with the flip of a switch, watch the President of the United States sit at his desk in the oval office and go about his business as if nobody was the wiser. If you pick your nose, I have it on tape. If you call the Russian President, I have it. If you speak unkindly of a friend, I have it.

Art Jefferson might still elude him. Simon Lynch might still be out of his grasp. But not this.

I have this. And I will have them.

“So you decoded these two pages of KIWI for him,” Lomax said. “You don’t remember what they said?”

Van Horn shook his head. “Just the number when Art gave it to me Saturday. That stuck in my mind. And…”

“And what?” Lomax pressed. It was no time for reticence.

“Well, I remembered something from the Academy. A lecture I attended about a year ago, just before I took over Com. The guy giving this one talk went heavy on the anecdotes, and he was telling us how some of the people who develop codes put pieces of them in puzzles, and then put those puzzles in magazines, or textbooks even, with messages in them. It’s a test to see if anyone might see something they missed. He said that kind of thing has been going on since the sixties.”

“And…”

“Well, I remembered one thing from the pages of KIWI Art showed me. One was a photocopy, and down at the bottom was a page number, and, it looked like to me, the name of a magazine. Something called The Tinkery.”

“And being the diligent agent that you are, you checked that out,” Lomax theorized.

“This morning. When I heard about the shootout I decided to do some checking. In case Art needed help.”

“Of course he needs help. So?”

“The page of KIWI ciphertext was placed as a puzzle over two years ago in this Tinkery thing. It’s one of those egghead magazines.”

If Lomax had been an egghead he might have been offended. As it was, he was far from offended. “Who placed it?”

“They have no record of it being placed,” Van Horn answered.

Okay, a phone number that didn’t exist, pulled from a puzzle that wasn’t placed, made up of the code now in use by every arm of the United States government. The day didn’t suck anymore, Lomax decided. It simply made no sense.

“Is any of this going to help?” Van Horn asked.

“Who the hell knows.” Lomax fiddled with the slip of paper Van Horn had given him. “Have you tried it?”

“No.”

Lomax picked up his phone. “What can it hurt to call a number that doesn’t exist?”

He pressed the eleven digits and, after a second, heard the first ring.

The buzz of the phone would never bring anything close to joy again, Pedanski thought as he waited through three rings. Just before the fourth, with the recorders and trace gear up and running, he picked up the receiver.

“Hi, you’ve reached the puzzle center,” he said, not even an attempt at enthusiasm punching his words.

“I’m calling about Art Jefferson,” the voice said before Pedanski could go on.

Oh, shit.

“Who is this and where are you?” the voice asked as though an answer were expected, part school teacher, part drill sergeant.

Pedanski froze.

“Hello…”

An indicator on the trace gear flashed, and Pedanski hung up. His breaths came in small eruptions, feeling like more air leaving than coming. A losing battle.

Telling himself that he wasn’t hyperventilating, that he was just scared, that he should breathe slower, Pedanski very precisely maneuvered his fingers over the keyboard hooked to the trace system and pulled up the information on the number that had just called them.

It said it belonged to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

“Sh-i-it.”

Chicago Field Office.

Pedanski managed a swallow between the rushes of air ebbing in and out of his lungs.

Office of the Special Agent in Charge.

“Oh, God…” Deep, deep, slow breaths. But telling wouldn’t do. Pedanski grabbed a bag that still held the remnants of day old donuts and dumped it onto the floor, then put it over his mouth and breathed in and out, doing so for more than a minute before the rise and fall of his chest edged toward normalcy.

Oh, man, this is out of control. Mr. Folger was right.

But for Folger to be right, it would mean that someone else had to be wrong. Dead wrong.

Art had made one stop at a discount electronic store before choosing a motel near O’Hare International, and once in the small second floor room with its two twin beds he plugged in the tape player and set it next to a chair by the window.

“Simon,” Art said, patting his lap. “Come here.”

“Daddy’s gonna sing.”

“Yes he is,” Art affirmed, and helped Simon into a comfortable position, cradled in his arms. The shades were partly open, and he could see downtown in the distance, the buildings dotted by lights that shaped them against the black sky.

“Daddy’s gonna sing,” Simon said expectantly as he nuzzled his head close under Art’s chin.

Art reached over and pressed the play button.

“Wander boy, wander far, wander to the farthest star…”

Simon’s thumb crept into his mouth. His eyes closed as the song continued.

The words, though, were lost on Art. His attention was elsewhere. On the events of the day before. And on what he was beginning to see in the near future.

At first he had thought Pritchard simply one piece of an attempt to wrest Simon from him at Pooks’ apartment, but that possibility he soon decided made little sense. Too much show was involved. The story, good and evil players, walking the man downstairs only to have him warn of someone in the apartment.

If anything the confluence was chance. That was what Art believed. It was what he had to believe.

“Wander boy, wander far, dreams are what you’re made of…”

And the woman who had nearly killed him, or who he’d nearly killed. Which, he didn’t know. He did recognize her, though, from supporting information in the Chappell file. Keiko Kimura. In the States, as Lomax had told him. Closer than that, he had learned first hand.

She wanted Simon.

So did someone else.

Or were they all one?

The tape droned on, to simple humming now, and Simon’s breathing took on the rhythm of sleep, slow and deep.

Art could not sleep yet. Staring out the window, eyes fixed on the speckled skyline, he thought of what Pritchard had said. They’ll never stop looking.

Pritchard, discounted as an enemy, now only a cryptic unknown, albeit one Art was having less trouble believing than before Keiko Kimura nearly killed him and Simon. His fanciful declarations now seemed not just possible, but plausible, and the only part of that that troubled Art was that he wondered if it was the case that he wanted to believe so much that his better judgment was being ignored.

Or could it be as Pritchard said. Good existing with evil. It was a given in dogma. Why not in the institutions that governed everyday life?

Faith in man. Art thought it an odd concept in this situation, different than faith in himself. Different, yes, but he believed. He had to.

He could not let Simon exist as a pawn his entire life, always running. Whatever his life was, it should not be that.

And as the night wore on, and the constant of Simon’s breathing soothed him, Art looked down upon the quiet, innocent face that lay against his chest, and he understood what was at stake, and he knew what he would do when the new day dawned.