Queen of Angels (9 page)

Citizen Oversight occupied the first seven floors of an early twenty first commercial tower rising from Wilshire in old Beverly Hills. The waiting rooms on the second floor made no pretense at decor; they were minimal uncomfortable white and harshly lighted. Mary waited patiently as the minutes advanced past her appointment. Three other pd from Long Beach and the Torrance Towers waited with equal patience across from her. They said little to each other. They were not in their element. Oversight controlled information pd could not get through a court order. Getting such information was an art not unlike politics. Individual pd or pd districts who asked too often were marked as greedy. Throughout the USA vid monitors and other sensors tracked citizen activity in private cars buses trains aircraft even walkways, wherever citizens used public concourses or buildings. Private service company records financial records medical records and therapy records all went into Oversight and new officials were publicly elected every year in each state to administer the information so gathered. Oversight had proven its worth a hundred times over in giving social statisticians the raw data necessary to make plans track trends understand and serve a nation of half a billion people. When first proposed and created Oversight had been absolutely forbidden from releasing any data involving individual citizens or even specific groups of citizens whatever their activities to the judiciary or pd. But even before Raphkind the wall between Oversight and the courts and pd had thinned. During Raphkinds seven years in office the walls had thinned even more, been breached, and information had flowed freely to the pd and federals. Now in pendulum swing Oversight offered scant pickings to pd on a strictly regulated basis. There were now stiff financial penalties and even incarceration awaiting Oversight officials who made errors in releasing data. Consequently each query by pd was a battle of wills. Wills against wonts Mary thought of it; she had never been granted information in her four attempts at making queries. She did not expect to get information now, despite the severity of the crime she was investigating. The arbeiter in charge of the front desk called her name. She passed her ticket through the slot and took a short flight of stairs into a small office cubicle with two doors on opposite walls and an empty desk acting as barricade between. There were no chairs. The relationships here were adversarial not comfortable. Mary stood and waited for her contact to enter through the other door. A middle aged man dressed in casual blue midsuit, hair thinning, entire attitude proclaiming physical lack of pretension and weariness, entered and looked at her resentfully. Hello, he said. She nodded and stood her ground, arms folded before her parade rest. Lieutenant Mary Choy, investigating the murder of eight people in the third foot of East Comb One, the contact said. Yes. Ive looked over your request. This is an unusual case in a comb or anywhere for that matter. You wish to know if citizen Emanuel Goldsmith has been oversighted anywhere within the USA during the last seventy two hours. You would use this information to narrow your search to some locale or to travel outside the USA to continue your search. Yes. The man looked her over impartially not judging just looking. Your request is not out of line. Unfortunately, I cannot release full information due to conflicting assessments in three of our districts. There is insufficient public need. In our judgment, you will capture the murderer without it. However, I have been authorized to tell you that we do not have a record of Emanuel Goldsmith conducting any financial or other personal transactions outside of the city of Los Angeles, within the United States of America, within the last seventy two hours. You may appeal again after twenty four days on this same subject. Appeal before that time will be rejected. Mary did not react for several seconds. The oracle had told all that it would. She relaxed slightly dropped her arms and turned to leave. Good luck, Lieutenant Choy, the weary man said. Thank you.

Old dark men with gray Beards. Execute tribal justice Teeth rotten. Eyes yellow Fingers stiff Minds. Dreaming Man steals others Wife. Land Cattle Finger gone or scar on. Forehead mark of thief or. Shariya forfeit right Hand. Gray wigs black robes sonorous sleepy. Rooms with wood same old. Dark men with gray Beards. Yellow Eyes. Better Teeth.

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Paul Lascals Martin Burke inserted the card into his phone. face appeared saying, Yes. Hello. Burke here. Good to hear from you, Mr. Burke. Any decision? Martins lips were numb and dry. Tell Albigoni Ill do it. Very good. Are you free this afternoon? Ill never be free again, Mr. Lascal. Assuming irony, Lascal laughed. Yes, Im free this afternoon, Martin said. Ill have a car at your door at one oclock. Where will I be going? Lascal coughed. Sorry. Please allow us this much discretion. This much and more, Martin said cheerily, the voice of hired help. Oh, and Mr. Lascal. . . Ill need every scrap of information you can give me about our subject. Its all right to inform him about the procedure Hes given his permission. Martin was surprised into silence. Ill arrange to have all bio and related material available on your arrival, Lascal said. Martin stared at the blank screen for a time, empty of thoughts, rubbing his hands on his knees. He stood and walked to the window to look out at shabby genteel La Jolla, still dreaming of a glory fled to the north to the monuments or west across the broad sea. He had come to love La Jolla. He had no ambition to regain the monuments or God forbid the LA combs. Yet if all went as planned as conspired he would soon be very far from here, back in a place if such it could be called that he loved even more than this, in the Country and with Carol as well. I can look on all this as an adventure, he said aloud, or I can be afraid. Martin perused his shelves and gathered up the necessary disks and cubes, instructed the home manager and as afterthought called his attorney to let him know where he might be found if after a week he was not back at his apartment. The last edge of suspicion. A long midnight blue private car the size of a minibus arrived curbside on time and opened its door to receive him into soft gray and red lounge comfort. The car hummed through La Jolla streets crowded by gaily dressed lunch throngs. It quickly found the Fed 5 slaveway entrance, speeding north. Ten minutes to Carlsbad between late twentieth checkerboard condos crowding the slaveway like cliff houses, now tenements for those living below Carlsbads kilometer high inverted pyramid. A turn east at the pyramid and off the slaveway onto smooth concrete county road twisting through the hills and across fields spotted with stacked coin haciendas, villas, mosques, glass domes, blue ocean tile far from the sea, miniature lakes, golf courses, half timber brick tudor estates: havens of the eccentric old rich who preferred to be away from the ostentation of the monuments and the bourgeois haunts of the littoral minded. Viewed from the sea Californias southern coastline resembled the wall of a vast prison or some careless gaily colored wrinkle of basalt cast up by the Earth, cooling into cubes and tubes and hexagons and towers filled with lemmings gathered from around the world: Russian colonies of expatriate exploiters of the natural wealth of the Siberian masses from the decades of Openness with their shoreside bistros; Chinese and Korean colonies come too late to buy extravagant land; old rich Japanese and the last Levantine families of the oil century that had sold their land for yet more fortunes to the builders of monuments, all clutching their allotted rectangular boxes. These competed with a few discouraged outnumbered old Californios, their dassibbon-wall habitat now overshadowed by these same monuments and newer larger combs. It made sense that Albigoni had his estate away from all of this, yet the publisher had not followed the reverse tide of those westerners who had moved thousands of miles east to reclaim the central states and the old catastrophe of New York. Is that it? Martin asked the car. They had turned onto a private road through the shade of canyon live oaks and now approached a sprawling five floor complex apparently made of wood, with white walls and a brick colored roof and a great broad central tower. The building looked familiar to Martin though he had surely never seen it before. The controller, a dedicated low level thinker, said. This is our destination, sir. Why does it look familiar? he asked. Mr. Albigonis father had it built to resemble the old Hotel Del Coronado, sir. Oh. He was very fond of that hotel. Mr. Albigonis father duplicated much of it here. Pulling into a high broad entryway Martin leaned forward gazing at brick steps and brass rails leading up to a broad glass and wood door, stained woodwork or white painted woodwork. visualizing the raw materials dragged with heavy equipment screaming from forests decades ago; here perhaps Brazil or Honduras. there Thailand or Luzon, woodflesh felled by great mechanical jaws, denuded by wirebrush maws, sawed on the spot into timber, dried and banded, graded, severed ends painted, packed and shipped. Martin did not enjoy wood furniture. It was his peculiarity to feel in plants and especially trees a higher consciousness uncomplicated and profound; no minds no self no Country but the simplest response to life imaginable: growth and sex without ecstasy or guilt, death without pain. He did not express these beliefs to anyone; they were part of his secret midden of private thoughts. Paul Lascal came down the steps and stood beside the car as the door opened with a sigh. He extended his hand and Martin shook it while still surveying the woodwork, lips parted like a childs in heads up wonder. Glad to have you aboard. Dr. Burke. Martin nodded politely. He pocketed the released hand and asked softly, Where to? This way. Mr. Albigoni is in the study. Hes been reading all of your papers. Good, Martin said, though it was really neutral information; Albigonis understanding was not required. He would not be going up Country. I met with Carol, he told Lascal in a wide dark hail dark granite flooring wood vaults corbels columns exotic woods mahogany birdseye maple teak walnut others he could not identify as disgraceful in their way as the skins of extinct animals, though of course the trees were not extinct. The time in which they had been cut down and carpentered had been a bad time, a sinful time, but the trees had survived and now flourished. New farmgrown genetically altered wood was cheap and therefore little used by the wealthy, who now preferred artificial materials made rare by the cost and energy of their creation. Albigonis was a house caught between the age of gluttony and the age of proletarian plenty. Lascal had said something he had not heard. Pardon? Shes a fine researcher, Lascal repeated. Mr. Albigoni is very pleased to have the services of both of you. Yes; well. Lascal preceded him into the study: more wood, dark and bookrich with perhaps twenty or thirty thousand volumes, the thick sweet dust smell of old paper, wood again, age and rot in suspension. Albigoni sat in a heavy oak chair before a slate. Rotating diagrams of human brain, in cross section, rostral, caudal, ventral, crossed the slate. He raised his bead slowly, blinking like a lizard, face pale and old with grief. He might not have slept since they last met. Hello, Albigoni said flatly. Thank you for agreeing and coming. There isnt much time. Beginning the day after tomorrow the IPR will be open to us and all of your facilities will be available. There are some points Id like to have explained before then. Lascal dragged a chair forward and Martin sat. Lascal remained standing. Albigoni swiveled elbows on chair arms and leaned forward like an old man, broad Roman patrician face, lips that once smiled naturally, friendly eyes now empty. Im reading about your triple focus receptor. It picks up signals from circuitry established in the skin by special neurological nano. Its designed to track activity at twenty-three different points around the hippocampus and corpus callosum. Yes. If were going up Country. Its versatile and can do other jobs in other areas of the brain. It doesnt disturb the subject? Albigoni asked. No long-term effects. The nano withdraws to skin surface and is retrieved; if it somehow doesnt withdraw, it simply breaks down, inaccessible metals and proteins. But the feedback probe.. Excites neurochemical activity through selected pathways, neural gates; creates transmitters and ions which the brain interprets as signals. Albigoni nodded. Thats intrusive. Intrusive but not destructive. All these stimuli are naturally reversible. But you dont actually explore the subjects mind directly, one to one. No. Not in first-level exploration. We use a computer buffer. My program in a computer interprets the signals received from the subject and recreates the deep structure imagery. The researcher explores this deep structure in computer simulation and if necessary engages the feedback stimulus for a queried response. The subjects mind reacts and that reaction is reflected in the simulation. Could you explore the mind directly? Only in level two exploration, Martin said. Ive only done that once. My engineers tell me level one exploration is not going to be possible. Your equipment was tampered with by investigators six months ago. Your simulation or buffer computer is in Washington DC right now. Lawyers have impounded it comparison with imported torture devices used by Selectors. Are you willing to engage our subject mind to mind? Martin looked around the room, working his chin back and forth. Smiled and leaned back in the chair. This is a new game, gentlemen, he said. I didnt know about the impounding. The federals are completely off track; my equipment is nothing like a hellcrown. Now I have no idea what I can do or not do. The computer cannot be retrieved. We can find another I built that computer myself, Martin said. Grew it from a nano pup. Its not a thinker, but its almost as complicated as the brains it simulates. Then the project is impossible, Albigoni said almost hopefully. Martin clenched his jaw muscles and stared out the window. Blue and electric green winter roses blossomed in a neat hedge; green lawn dusty green oaks golden brown hills beyond. The final push of the sword. To make the decision and then have it all taken away. Too much. Its probably still possible. Whether its advisable or not... Dangers? Direct mind to mind is more strenuous on the subject and the researcher. Less time in the Country is allowed. Probably no more than an hour or two. An older, smaller computer I designed could partially interface and boost comprehensibility; it acts as an interpreter so to speak but not as a buffer. I hope that equipment is still available. Albigoni looked to Lascal, who nodded. If our inventory is correct, it is. How did you reopen the IPR? Martin asked. Lascal said that did not really concern him. He was right; it was idle curiosity. It did not matter so long as it was true. What were the limits to the power of a man with wealth? They might all be found out, the result of a rich mans fapup or the folly of an unknown subordinate. Why does the Country of the Mind exist, Mr. Burke? Albigoni asked. Ive read your papers and books but theyre quite technical. Martin gathered his thoughts though he had explained this a hundred times to colleagues and even the general public. This time he would not allow any artistic embellishments. The Country was fabulous enough in plain. Its the ground of all human thought, of all our big and little selves. Its different in each of us. There is no such thing as a unified human consciousness. There are primary routines which we call personalities, one of which usually makes up the conscious self, and they are partially integrated with other routines which I call subpersonalities, talents, or agents. These are actually limited versions of personalities, not complete; to be expressed, or put in control of the overall mind, they need to be brought forward and smoothly meshed with the primary personality, that is, what used to be called the consciousness, our foremost self. Talents are complexes of skills and instincts, learned and prepatterned behavior. Sex is the most obvious and numerous twenty talents in full grown adults. Anger is another; there are usually five talents devoted to anger response. In an integrated, socially adapted adult older than thirty, only two such anger talents usually remainsocial anger and personal anger. Ours is an age of social anger. Albigoni listened without nodding. For example, the Selectors are dominated by social anger. They have confused it with personal anger. Social anger talents control their primary routines. Talents are personalities, Lascal said uncertainly. Not fully developed. They are not autonomous in balanced and healthy individuals. All right, Albigoni said. That much is clear. What other kinds of talents are there? Hundreds, most rudimentary, nearly all borrowing or in parallel with the primary routines, all smoothly integrating, meshinghe knitted his knuckles gearwise and twisted his handsto make up the healthy individual. You say nearly all. What about those routines and subroutines that dont borrow, that are most likely to be He referred to his notes. What you call subpersonalities or close secondaries. Very complex diagram, Martin said. Its in my second book. He nodded at the slates screen. Subpersonalities or close secondaries include male/female modeling routines, what Jung called animus and anima... Major occupation routines, that is, the personality one assumes when carrying out ones business or a major role in society ... Any routine that could conceivably inform or replace the primary personality for a substantial length of time. Being an artist or a poet, perhaps? Or a husband/wife or a father/mother. Albigoni nodded, eyes closed and almost lost in his broad face. From what little research Ive managed to do in the last thirty six hours, Ive learned that therapy is more often than not a stimulus of discarded or suppressed routines and subroutines to achieve a closer balance. Martin nodded. Or the suppression of an unwanted or defective subpersonality. That can sometimes be done through exterior therapytalking it outor through interior stimulus, such as direct simulation of fantasized growth experiences. Or it can be done through physical remodeling of the brain, chemical expression and repression, or more radically, microsurgery to close off the loci of undesired dominant routines. In a sexual offender, for example.. Typical therapy for a sex offender is to destroy the loci of an undesired dominant sexual routine. Very carefully. Indeed, Martin said. Dominant routines can subsume large sectors of primary personality. Separating them out is a delicate art. And a primitive art, until you came along with your work at IPR. Martin agreed modestly. Radical therapy was only fifty percent effective until you made the procedures more precise. Albigoni raised his dull eyes to Martins and smiled faindy. Thereby putting the final touches on a transformation of law and society in the