Rule 34 (29 page)
Authors: Charles Stross
The Gnome drains his glass then waggles it at you. “Will you stay for a refill? I think it’s about time we had a heart-to-heart talk about how to buy and sell derivatives . . .”
When you finally go back to the house, you fail to work up the nerve to tell Bibi about your house guest. She’s home late from work, tired and silent from too many hours in the pharmacy, and lavishes all her warmth on Naseem and Farida, who’ve been staying round at Mrs. Uni’s house after school. The cone of silence she traps you in is poisonous and chilly; you know from bitter past experience that she will make you wait on the threshold for three days and nights before she relents.
Three days is her usual sentence for drunkenness and foolery: not one minute more and not a second less. She has the measure of a judge and the restraint of a probation officer. You’ve been on the receiving end of this sanction before. Bibi can be a harsh woman, when she wishes to teach you a lesson. And so you take the spare key wordlessly when you leave for work the following morning. Let John Christie—no, Peter Manuel—explain himself to her when he arrives,
if
he arrives. After all, it might never happen.
if
he arrives. After all, it might never happen.
You sit behind your desk in a haze of mild dread for a couple of hours, a cup of tea cooling by your hand as you try to distract yourself by chasing naughty pictures on the Internet. But your heart isn’t in it, and in the end you give up and stand, meaning to go in search of water to pour on the endlessly dying rubber plant, when your mobile rings.
Your heart sinks as you recognize Bibi’s face: It’s most unlike her to phone you from work. “Hello? What is it?”
“Anwar? Praise Allah, it’s you! Please, can you go at once and look after my mother? She just called. I think she’s having another of her funny turns—”
Sameena lives with her husband Taleb and Cousin Tariq and assorted grown-up children, their spouses and descendants in a stillslightly-ramshackle town house Ali bought back in the nineties. You weigh Bibi’s plea momentarily. It’s an imposition, and it means closing the office, but on the other hand, it means early release from the cone of silence. “All right, my love. Just for you I’ll close the office early and—”
“Please, Anwar! Just go, right now. You might need to call in help—I can’t leave the shop, but—”
Five minutes later, you’re on your way, heart singing and feet light. Bibi has not only forgiven but, in the urgency of her call, has forgotten to be angry at you.
It doesn’t last. The hairs on the back of your neck begin to rise as you turn the corner on their cobbled side-street on the wrong side of Bruntsfield Place and see two—no, three—police cars sprawled across the parking bays.
Coincidence,
you tell yourself, and anyway, even if Tariq’s got himself into trouble, you’re here with the best of intentions, to give aid and comfort to his mother, who is doubtless—
Coincidence,
you tell yourself, and anyway, even if Tariq’s got himself into trouble, you’re here with the best of intentions, to give aid and comfort to his mother, who is doubtless—
Their front door is ajar. As you approach it a fourth police car turns the corner, lights flashing, and double-parks a couple of doors along from you, and as you reach up and ring the doorbell, you hear sobbing from inside, the sound of your mother-in-law losing it wholesale in the kitchen.
The cop who opens the door is instantly suspicious. “Who are you and what are you doing here?” he demands, scanning you with a small forest of cameras. His free hand twitches in the direction of a beltful of handcuffs. “You can’t come in.”
Your shoulders slump. “My wife got a call from my mother-in-law,” you say. “Is she alright? Has there been an accident?”
“What’s your name? What’s your mother-in-law’s name?” He looms over you, overbearing.
“I, uh, I’m Anwar Hussein. My wife’s mother, Sameena Begum, is she alright?” You blink at him, trying not to cringe away. Your stomach is churning again. The rozzer’s eyes twitch behind his head-up shades, fingers twitching on some kind of air keyboard, then his shoulders relax slightly.
“Who else lives here?” he demands. “Do you know them?”
You blink rapidly. “My mother-in-law. And my wife’s brother and sisters. My father-in-law, Uncle Taleb—”
He shakes his head. “Are you next of kin?”
Ah.
“Yes. What’s happened—”
“Yes. What’s happened—”
“I’m sorry, sir.” Now that he’s pigeon-holed you he switches to the next-of-kin script; unfortunately it’s not the good-tidings one. He’s got that
oh shit do I have to tell the family
look on his face. Your knees go weak. “I’ll have to ask you to wait here for a few minutes while we finish securing the, the scene. Your mother-in-law is unhurt, but I’m sure she’ll be happy to see you.”
So who . . .
“My colleagues may need to ask you some questions.”
oh shit do I have to tell the family
look on his face. Your knees go weak. “I’ll have to ask you to wait here for a few minutes while we finish securing the, the scene. Your mother-in-law is unhurt, but I’m sure she’ll be happy to see you.”
So who . . .
“My colleagues may need to ask you some questions.”
Footsteps behind you. You look round and see a man and a woman, both in suits, with something about them that screams “cop.” And now it takes all your will-power to keep your knees from collapsing completely because you recognize the woman; you last saw her face over a video link to the sheriff’s court, laying a comprehensive smack-down on your sins in front of the beak.
“Good morning, Mr. Hussein. What brings you here?”
Her smile is bloodlessly professional.
You have to fight your own tongue to avoid blurting out
It wasn’t me, I didn’t do nothing
. “My mother-in-law—is she okay? What’s happening?”
It wasn’t me, I didn’t do nothing
. “My mother-in-law—is she okay? What’s happening?”
She loses the smile, looks past you at the bastard in black who opened the door. He obviously kens she’s with the filth: funny handshake, raised eyebrows, that kind of thing. “Mr. Hussein.” It’s the cop. “Please come in, no, into the living room, my friend.” It’s all
my friend
and
come in
now. He backs up a step to give you room. Looking past you: “Confirmed next of kin.”
my friend
and
come in
now. He backs up a step to give you room. Looking past you: “Confirmed next of kin.”
“Oh sh—dear. Where’s Sergeant MacBride? I’m here for his signoff, this is Inspector Aslan, on secondment from Europol—”
You back into the cluttered living room, managing not to knock over a precariously positioned occasional table, and drop into the overstuffed sofa. You can hear muffled sobbing from the kitchen. The cop is swithering—head twitching from side to side like a hungry pigeon—between you, the bitch in the corridor, and the greetin’ from the kitchen, which is now rising into a high, keening noise not unlike a broken smoke alarm but maybe two or three times as annoying. After a minute, he gives up and stands in the doorway like a human roadblock, relying on his shouldercam to keep an eye on you while he burps heavily acronymic police-speak back and forth with Inspector Butthurt. The other cop, the Easterner from Europol, is clearly kibitzing. You pull out your mobie, discreetly rolling its protective sock back into your jacket pocket, and IM Bibi.
AT TALEB’S. COPS HERE. WON’T LET ME SEE SAM. WHATʹS UP?
AT TALEB’S. COPS HERE. WON’T LET ME SEE SAM. WHATʹS UP?
The plod pile-up in the hall disintegrates: Inspector Butthurt and her trailer head for the kitchen, while Constable Bouncer stays on door duty. He glances in at you as the doorbell rings. “I’ll explain in a minute, sir. If you don’t mind staying right where you are.”
The door opens. The pair of snowmen on the front step—that’s your first impression—resolve into cops in white crime-scene overalls, humping battered flight cases full of gear. You’ve seen this shit on telly enough times to know what it means, but seeing it in Uncle Taleb’s house lends it an air of unreality. The wailing continues until you’re digging your fingernails into the frayed fabric of the armrests. You can barely hold yourself down in the seat. It’s as bad as the other day, when she had that funny turn, finding that customer—
Sweat like ice trickles down your back. “Who’s dead?” you demand, standing up.
“Sit down, my friend. Take it easy.” PC Bouncer lays a meaty hand on your shoulder. You tense, but you know better than to struggle. They’re trained like guard dogs, to react instinctively to challenges.
“I want to help,” you say. “That’s my wife’s mother in there.”
He shoves you back towards the armchair, gently but forcefully. “Who else might be here?” he asks, glancing over his shoulder to confirm that the bods in the bunny suits haven’t left the front door open.
“Her husband Taleb, Tariq, Parveen, and Fara—they’re my cousins—grandma, and if they’re visiting, there’s Uncle Akbar and his family—”
PC Bouncer is beginning to go as glassy-eyed as his portable panopticon of cameras and data specs. (White, Scottish: He probably counts his relatives on the fingers of one hand.) “Who would be at home during the day, my friend?”
He’s getting on your nerves. “You’re not my friend,” you say before you can stop yourself. “I’m sorry,” you add sullenly. “She needs help, listen to her . . .”
He began winding up when you snapped at him but makes a visible effort to keep his lid on. “Let’s try and keep this polite, shall we, sir. Deep breath, now. I’m going to ask you again: Who should we expect to find here during the daytime?”
Your mobie vibrates. It’s Bibi’s signature waggle. You keep a tight grip on it as you answer: “Sameena, sure. Taleb if it’s a Friday.” (Today is not a Friday.) “Tariq, he works from his lappie, so he’s home a lot—”
What emotional defences you managed to reassemble in the wake of the Toymaker’s visit collapse around you.
No point hiding: He saw your face. “Is it Tariq?” you ask, your voice going all wobbly. “Is he alright?”
You see at once from his face that your brother-in-law isn’t alright.
Nor will he be alright ever again.
Nor can all the king’s horses and all the king’s men put Tariq together again.
It’s very strange to be sitting side by side with Inspector Butthurt in your father-in-law’s chintz-infested living room, chatting over cups of knee-cap-balanced tea (brought for you, incongruously, by a crime-scene cop dressed from head to foot in white plastic).
“I’m sorry we keep running into each other under such unfortunate circumstances, Mr. Hussein. By the way, is that your official registered phone?”
“Yes—” You watch nervelessly as she touches it, blinks a virtual fly away from the corner of her eye, and nods confirmation of some arcane suspicion to herself. Her movements are swift and precise. She’s a tall woman; if she were a man, built to proportion, she’d be about the same height as Constable Bouncer (who is waiting outside)—a terrifying tower of muscular poise. Far scarier than the weedy Eurocop she came with, who is presumably in the kitchen right now, trying to get some sense out of Auntie.
“Well, that’s a relief. You came here directly from the East End, I see. I’m going to have to image your phone and follow up your cellproximity record to confirm what it says, but unless you’ve turned into some kind of criminal hacker master-mind in the last year it looks like you’ve got a watertight alibi.” The dryness of her tone gets your hackles halfway up before you manage to remind yourself what she is.
“Alibi for
what
?”
what
?”
“For—” For the first time she looks discommoded. Blinks again, evidently looking something up. “Sorry. Nobody told you?”
“Told me—”
“It’s your cousin, Tariq Shaikh Mohammed. He’s dead, I’m afraid.” She’s watching you. You nod, still not quite believing it. “We received a call from Sameena Begum—”
“My mother-in-law. His mother.”
“Oh dear.” She glances away. The wailing has gone, replaced by occasional sobbing. And tea, probably.
They’ll have her in another room,
you realize.
To get her story, and mine. Before we talk.
They’ll have her in another room,
you realize.
To get her story, and mine. Before we talk.
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