Cole Perriman's Terminal Games (19 page)

Lieutenant Grobowski put the cup of coffee in front of her and sat down across the table. She picked up her sandwich and was about to take a bite when the detective’s face caught her attention—not exactly smiling or cordial, but certainly kind and thoughtful.

How strange.

Here was real consideration from a man who had every reason to be suspicious of her every move.

How very, very strange.

“Go ahead,” Grobowski said. “Eat up.”

Marianne felt her eyes sting a little. For the second time today, she was near tears. The first time, it had been out of despair. This time, it was out of gratitude. But she was still determined not to cry until it was out of pure, unvarnished grief. Besides, the lieutenant probably wouldn’t like it if she got all weepy.

“Thank you,” she said simply, and began to eat.

*

The television screen was the only illumination in the room. There were no explosions or gunshots or car chases taking place at the moment, just anomalously beautiful people in exotic settings talking to one another and saying nothing, because the sound was off.

Marianne couldn’t deal with any noise.

She sat in bed, propped up against several pillows, staring at the glimmering screen, feeling an eerie identification with the nameless, voiceless apparitions. She had returned to the hotel late in the afternoon, bought a toothbrush and other necessaries in the hotel shop, returned to her room, showered, climbed into bed, and fallen into a deep sleep. When she had awakened, it was night. Marianne always found it disorienting to fall asleep during the day and wake up after dark, but never more so than now.

Marianne looked at the gown and robe she was wearing, remembering that they did not belong to her. Through the faint, quivering light, she could see other unfamiliar clothing hanging on a clothes rod near the bathroom. Her eyes scanned the room and could not locate a single object that did belong to her. Without her computer, without her work, she felt bland and featureless—much like the room itself.

If a tree fell in this room, would anybody hear it? Not me, surely—because there’s no “me” at all.

She thought about what Pritchard had said back at Insomnimania.

“I could write you down,” he had said. “I could take a pencil and write down everything you are. I could do it with just two symbols—a one and a zero. And when you died, I could pour all those ones and zeroes into a machine and start them up again.”

Marianne almost wondered if she had already been the subject of such an experiment. Perhaps it had failed, and her ones and zeroes were now hopelessly scrambled into an anonymous mess. Or perhaps she was a cipher, a blank tablet, a non-sentient machine awaiting the downloading of Pritchard’s precious information.

She shuddered as a deep sense of nothingness washed over her. She felt a desperate craving for human contact. She had to talk with someone.

I’ll call Renee.

She actually reached for her phone before she stopped herself. The gesture’s bitter irony overwhelmed her. Renee’s death had exposed the void in her life, had shown Marianne a mirror with no reflection in it—and now Marianne wanted nothing more than to hear Renee’s friendly voice on the phone.

She couldn’t shake off the impulse.

I know her number. All I have to do is pick up and dial …

She had to think it through. If she picked up the phone and called Renee’s number, she would probably get Renee’s answering machine, left running by the police in order to collect names and telephone numbers. Renee’s friendly voice would deliver her playful outgoing message ...

“If you’ve got the right number, you know who I am. If you don’t, you don’t. Leave a message, and we’ll see what we’ll see.”

Renee wasn’t going to be getting back to her anymore. So why was Marianne still eyeing the telephone with half a mind to pick it up and dial Renee’s number?

It’s called denial, Marianne. Remember denial?

And indeed, she could remember going through plenty of denial after her parents’ deaths. A year or more after each of them died, it had been painfully difficult to remember
not
to send cards and presents for birthdays and holidays.

My God. Is it going to take that long this time?

She continued to stare at the phone.

She almost jumped out of her skin when it rang.

She fumblingly lifted the receiver to her ear.

“Hello?” she asked.

“Is this Marianne Hedison?” a vaguely familiar male voice asked. Marianne felt a warm surge of relief at the sound of her name—as if her identity, her very selfhood had been magically returned.

“Yes,” Marianne said, sitting up slightly.

“This is Roland McKeever.”

Marianne couldn’t recall the name for a moment. But then she remembered. He was the taller of the two kind men she had met at Renee’s condominium.

“Of course,” she said warmly. “It’s good to hear from you.”

“Have you settled in okay?”

“As well as can be expected.”

“We got a call from Renee’s aunt and found out more about the funeral. We thought you might want to know.”

“Oh, yes. Thank you.”

Marianne fumbled through the drawer in the side table for a pencil and a piece of hotel stationery. Roland told her that the funeral would be held Saturday in Lakin, Iowa—a little town near Des Moines.

“Do you think you’ll go?” Roland asked.

“Yes,” Marianne said decisively.

“Then please give our best wishes.”

“I will.”

“Let’s get together sometime soon—under happier circumstances.”

“Oh, yes. Let’s do that.”

She hung up the phone and found herself pondering the last words of the conversation.

How could they both have been so sincere when they both knew they wouldn’t see each other again?

*

The Troubadour Club was something of a labyrinth, and you could get lost in it easily. Whenever Marianne came to the club in Stephen Madison’s company, she found it easy to spot newcomers, who often got separated from their club-member dates or friends and wandered around looking stranded and perplexed.

Here comes one now.

And at that moment, a shy, well-dressed woman poked her head through the doorway of the dark-paneled candlelit room Marianne and Stephen were sharing by themselves. She looked absolutely panic-stricken. Marianne guessed she had gotten lost on the way back to her table from the ladies’ room.

“I’m very sorry,” she sputtered, “but could you tell me how to get back to the Provençal room?”

Marianne spoke up. “Take one right and two lefts,” she said.

“Oh, thank you,” said the woman humbly. “Sorry to intrude.”

The woman disappeared.

“I’m glad
you
remembered where it was,” Stephen said.

“Come on. It’s your club.”

“Don’t talk about it like I own it.”

Marianne had returned to Santa Barbara the day before yesterday, after a night’s stay at the Pacific Surf in Santa Monica. She was at least marginally refreshed and ready for tomorrow’s trip to Iowa. But she still felt strained and nervous. Stephen had been kind enough not to comment when she ordered a double bourbon and water in place of her customary white wine.

Stephen was of medium build, trim, with bland good looks—soft smile, solid jaw, low hairline, thick eyebrows. As a lover he was proper—neither imaginative nor passionate, but attentive to necessary considerations. He worked out regularly at an expensive gym.

For nearly six months, she and Stephen had treated each other like well-worn clothes—not the least bit obsessively, but not carelessly, either. It was common for them not to see each other for two or three weeks at a time. Then they might spend three or four successive days and nights together, almost always at Stephen’s house, acting like an old married couple. They were neither profound friends nor amorous lovers, but enjoyed each other’s company now and again.

Marianne finished telling him about the whole ordeal—her witnessing of Auggie’s snuff, her interrogation by the police, her viewing of Renee’s body, and her efforts to help Lieutenant Grobowski.

“It must have been awful,” Stephen said, sipping his martini. Stephen always ordered martinis. He had once confided to Marianne that he didn’t really have any burning attachment to martinis—they were simply what lawyers were supposed to drink.

“It’s been the worst experience of my life,” Marianne said.

“I haven’t gotten a chance to apologize for yelling at you on the phone that night.”

“It’s okay. I was crazy. I admit it.”

“But it’s over now, isn’t it? I mean, they’ve got a real live suspect, right?”

“Right,” Marianne said.

But she had no idea if that was true. Before leaving L.A., she had called the police division switchboard and had tried to reach Lieutenant Grobowski, but the detective wasn’t at his desk. This bothered her. She wanted to know if Donald Hampstead of Malibu had, indeed, turned out to be a plausible suspect. Now she supposed she would have to wait until she came back from Iowa to find out. But for the time being, it was best not to disturb Stephen with uncertainties. He had been worried about her enough already.

“I’m glad you’re clear of it,” Stephen said. “I wasn’t looking forward to defending you against a murder charge. I handle business cases, not homicides.”

“You would have done fine.”

“I’d have found someone else for you. I know you’re innocent. A lawyer is never at his best when defending someone he knows is innocent.”

“Cramps his style, huh?”

“Something like that,” Stephen said. “I’m sorry about your friend,” he added sympathetically.

“Thank you. She was a wonderful person.”

“I met her once. Remember? It was about a year or so back. You introduced me. She was a real wild woman.”

Marianne felt herself smile. Yes, Stephen
would
find Renee pretty wild.

“She remembered you, too,” Marianne said.

“Did she think
I
was wild?” Stephen asked facetiously.

Marianne’s smile widened. “Let me put it this way. She called you ‘Stephen Smooth.’”

Stephen chuckled. “Is that smooth as in sly, cunning, and roguish—or smooth as in processed cheese?”

“I’m not going to answer that,” Marianne said.

They both laughed. Marianne still found it strange to be able to laugh at all, let alone about memories of Renee. Even so, she was grateful to have some sense of humor left.

But she had been talking ever since they had arrived at the club, and she was tired. She felt relieved when Stephen started talking about himself—his caseload, his exercise program, his racquetball game, the new gourmet dish he had learned to make.

Small things.

But small as they were, they absolutely entranced her tonight—perhaps by contrast with the brutal realities she had so recently faced.

In the midst of the big things, we are in the small things.

The realization gave her solace. As Stephen talked on and on, she hoped he would never stop.

“… and Mike got married last week,” Stephen was saying as dinner arrived. Mike was Stephen’s younger brother. Both Stephen and Mike belonged to their father’s law firm.

“You’d mentioned the wedding was coming up,” remarked Marianne. “How was the ceremony?”

“Pretty.”

“Is she a nice woman?”

“I guess. To tell the truth, I can’t see any real difference between Kimberly and any of the other women he’s dated. But he seems to be happy.”

“How’s he doing at the firm?”

“Fine. He’ll probably be its president someday.”

Marianne was a bit surprised. “What about you?” she asked. “You’re the older brother. You’ve been with the firm longer. What about seniority?”

“What about it?” Stephen said with a shrug. “He’s the one with the drive, the passion, the ambition. Me, I’m just a good, competent lawyer.”

“Would you rather be doing something else?”

“Not at all. I like having a job that’s assured as long as I don’t screw up badly. I like having a good income and a certain amount of prestige in the community where I grew up. It’s not like it’s a
calling
or something.”

Stephen had never kept it any secret that he was not an ambitious man. Even so, Marianne felt oddly affected by his words tonight. She had recently been faced with a hollowness in her own life. It had seemed to her a dramatic revelation. But it was different for Stephen. He looked into his own personal void every day with undeceived, self-deprecating eyes. He didn’t undergo any angst about it. He was comfortable and able to joke about it. Marianne had never really understood this about Stephen before—had never really grasped his languid brand of self-awareness. Now that she did, she couldn’t help thinking him rather brave.

They left the club after brandy and desserts and a couple of hours of stale but comfortable conversation. They drove in Stephen’s Mercedes through the curving, darkened, prosperous streets of Santa Barbara. The city seemed awfully serene by contrast with L.A.

During the drive, Marianne found herself thinking about Insomnimania. She knew that Stephen was a member, as were at least four or five other friends and acquaintances. It seemed strange for all of them to be part of it—to be connected in some mysterious, electronic way to a murderer. And it seemed strange that she had no idea who any of them were when they logged on. What were their names? Did they have electronic bodies? Did they meet and talk and even have virtual sex without recognizing each other?

“Would you tell me something, Stephen?” she asked.

“Sure.”

“Who’s your alter?”

“My what?”

“You know what I mean. Your role in Insomnimania.”

“Why do you want to know?”

“I was just curious.”

Stephen grinned. “I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.”

Marianne laughed a little. “Spoken like a true lawyer,” she said.

He had called her bluff. She had never told anybody except Renee that her own alter, Elfie, was nothing but a bodiless pair of eyes, incapable of action or even conversation. She didn’t particularly want to say so now—despite her longstanding guess that Stephen’s alter might be just as nonphysical. How often had their eyes passed each other while wandering voyeuristically through Insomnimania’s desktop maze? Perhaps they had even blinked at each other without realizing it.

They reached a turn off where they could go to either Marianne’s house or Stephen’s.

“Do you want to spend the night at my place?” Stephen asked.

She considered it for a moment. But there was too much turmoil boiling in the back of her mind for her to feel comfortable going home with him.

“Not tonight,” she said. “Maybe when I get back from Iowa.”

“Okay,” said Stephen, without the slightest trace of disappointment.

Stephen dropped Marianne off and waited in the drive until she got into her front door. Moonlight poured into her living room windows, giving her enough light to see, to move about. She didn’t turn on the lights. She wondered why she didn’t want to. After all she had been through, why wasn’t she like a frightened child, afraid to go to bed with the lights off?

She noticed that her answering machine was blinking, and she ran the tape. The message was from Lieutenant Grobowski. He wanted to talk with her and had left his home phone number. He said not to worry about calling too late.

Marianne called him immediately. She explained about the funeral.

“I just want you to know I’m not leaving the country or anything,” she assured him.

“Thanks for letting me know,” he replied, not unpleasantly.

“I’ve still got those clothes. I’ll bring them back.”

“No hurry.”

“How did things work out in Malibu?”

She could hear the detective sigh. His voice sounded scratchy and tired.

“Not good,” he said. “The guy’s some sort of rich eccentric—a low-tech type. He’s hardly got an electrical appliance to his name. Credit cards are his one concession to the twenty-first century. Claims he doesn’t know the first thing about computers, much less about Insomnimania. And he’s got an airtight alibi. The odd thing is, nothing from Insomnimania has actually been billed to his credit card, even though Auggie’s been using his number. The guy showed us the statements.”

Marianne felt her heart sink. This could only mean that Auggie was an excellent hacker. Nothing had been solved after all.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Yeah, me, too. Look, could you come back to Los Angeles after you get back from Iowa? I could really use your help.”

Marianne was surprised by the lieutenant’s sincere tone. He didn’t sound like he was playing games with her now. But why? Didn’t this new development put her back on the top of the lieutenant’s list of potential suspects?

“Of course,” she said. “I’ll call when I get back.”

“Thanks, Ms. Hedison.”

“Marianne. Please.”