The Scarab (17 page)

Antonio nudged me. “Egyptian motif.
What else? You’ve got to play it up; you’re going to be in the top ten.
Everybody expects it. What does your promoter have to say?” I had visions of
pro-wrestling get-ups and rivalries staged for the benefit of the cameras.

“I do it as long as my costume has
a mask; I really don’t want anyone to see my face. But I don’t want you to go
to any trouble. I have some great clips from Japanese monster movies that I was
going to show with Ghedra blasting away at some dinosaur,” I explained. The
others seemed less than impressed by my plan. I would have stayed to discuss
more of their views on the charity banquet, but just then I felt a little
woozy, probably the pain medication.

I thanked everybody for their help,
but told them, “The Bach beer was too much for me, and I have to get some rest.”
I stepped downstairs to get some peace and quiet. My FBI tail followed me at a
discrete distance. In the elevator, I asked Whitaker if he knew anything about
Andiron Enterprises, and he said he’d get back to me on it.

At the front desk, I grabbed a
paper and checked with Mr. Niven for any messages. Mare was still tied up
giving testimony and coordinating the sting, but one of her brothers had called
to congratulate her for being on TV. It seems she told them at Thanksgiving to
watch for me, but hadn’t mentioned her own contribution. Steve was the California paramedic, ex-military. The other two were Boston police officers.

While at the main desk, I arranged
for another suite for the rest of the convention because our current
accommodations were swarming with fingerprint teams and roped off with crime
tape. The hotel provided rooms on the same floor for free, as well as
complimentary overnight kits. I also grabbed a new pullover shirt from the gift
shop because my current one smelled of smoke and sweat. Then, I started
thinking about what Mare would need when she got finished.

I arranged for some Epsom Salts and
a silk robe to be sent to the new room for Mare. I sent a bellhop to give her
the new key and take her order for a temporary wardrobe. It would be nice if we
had a team doctor. She might need help and I was hampered by the sling. On the
spur of the moment, I dialed up her brother Steve, using Information, and
invited him to the last day. He almost hung up on me to tell the rest of Mare’s
sizable extended family she was still in the race. I gave him my corporate
commuter card number and told him I’d pay if he wanted to fly in. “Wow. Not that
I’m complaining, but why the freebie?” he asked. Did everyone in her family
think like cops?

I didn’t want to discuss the
kidnapping. “She’ll want to tell you herself. We had a bit of excitement here
and it looks like she may swing a promotion out of it. That’s what I hear
through the grapevine, anyway.”

Steve went back into gosh-gee-whiz
excitement mode and started planning how he could get someone to work his shift
so he could make it here by morning. He did mention just before he hung up how
eager he was to meet me. That phrase always makes a guy uneasy when he’s
sharing a hotel room with the man’s sister. I went back to making deals for the
game, where I had at least a little experience.

I visited the Porsche suite, and
they had been looking for me to do them a favor. They wanted to produce a
limited run of cycles just like mine for next year and needed my permission to
make it official. I agreed to a 10 percent cut of the take for essentially no
work. We shook hands on the deal. Our lawyers would be contacting each other
soon so the product announcement could go out by the end of the race tomorrow.
Almost as an afterthought, I had them sign my petition. With the easiest three
down, I only needed two more signers.

At almost 6:00, I remembered how
hungry I was. While eating dinner with my shadow, he gave me the scoop on
Andiron Enterprises. There had been some organized crime influence in the
company’s labor union in the recent past. A word in the right ear, and they
were more than happy to cooperate with an ongoing Federal investigation. They
signed by 7:00 with my promise that no member of our team would attack their
vehicle, and that we would speak to their sales representatives first when
selecting heavy equipment for our new production plant. Only one signature
remained to be garnered before midnight.

I could barely walk, I was so
tired. So I headed to the new suite to freshen up while I had a little
breathing space. In the main lobby, a six-and-a-half-foot man in a trench coat
caught me by surprise when he shoved something toward my ribs. “Mr. Hayes, I’m
with the Palmeri Syndicate,” he began. We drew stares when my shadow landed
atop him, pressing him into the cold marble floor.

“He’s clean, no weapons,” announced
Whitaker.

“We’re just here to offer Mr. Hayes
a lucrative deal,” said the man in the trench coat when he could breathe again.

Helping him up, I said, “I’ve
already given my testimony to the FBI, sir. You can keep your bribe.”

The man blanched. “I wasn’t trying
to... Oh, my.”

My FBI guard read the business card
the man had been trying to put into my pocket when we over-reacted. “He’s with
an entertainment syndicate. He (cough) probably wants the rights to you race
footage, and maybe a deal for your story.”

The man nodded.

I helped brush his coat off and
straighten his gear as we stepped into the elevator. My shadow, eager to avoid
a lawsuit, explained, “We apologize for the welcome, sir, but Mr. Hayes has had
several attempts made on his life by terrorist elements.”

“They weren’t terrorists,” I began,
trying to dampen the rumors.

“How else do you explain the
grenades they used, Mr. Hayes?” said Whitaker.

“But the surveillance equipment
indicates industrial espionage, not assassination as the primary goal of this
group,” I countered.

Our guest was mute with shock. I
tried to turn him down gently. “I am under advice from counsel not to discuss
my role in these proceedings. The recordings we still have are under a seal of
evidence. I’m sorry, but I don’t want to have my personal life sensationalized
either. I’m a very private man. Thank you for your interest, however.” I shook
his hand as we left him overwhelmed in the elevator. I needed a press agent
before things got out of hand.

In the suite, I found all of our
requested amenities, plus four jumpsuits with the team logo embossed on the
arms and Snap-On Tools displayed across the back. Mare would have something to
wear tomorrow after all. The gifts were accompanied by a brief letter of thanks
from the company and a solution to my time problems in recovering a pilot from
the border. The fans at this company knew about a little-used “mission of mercy”
rule wherein contestants engaged on a humanitarian mission could earn back
penalty time at the rate of 30 seconds per minute spent on the mission. They
had spent hours with contacts in Europe until they found an organ transplant
organization based out of Switzerland that could help. The Swiss organization
could meet me at the border with an ambulance containing a human heart, which
they would normally send by high-priority courier. I could then transport the
heart to the far side of Munich and make up my lost time.

Frantically, I phoned the judges
for clarification. The man on duty allowed that I could use this clause, but
that all benefits would be nullified if I fired a single shot from my guns or
physically assaulted another vehicle during the mission. I also had to provide
a suitable environment for the organ. If it decayed or were damaged in any way,
I would also lose the mercy time. I could live with both restrictions. No one
else was this far back to shoot at, and the heart should fit nicely in the
Duratech vault. The casual comment the judge made in closing, however, threw me
for a loop. “Your deadline has been moved ahead two hours at the request of several
other players. They need time to read it so they can make their own petitions.”

“So that makes it ten o’clock local
time?” I said, not happy, but not wanting to argue. I could make the last deal
in three hours if I hurried.

“Eight local. Eastern Time is the
standard for all of our deadlines, Mr. Hayes.”

I slammed the phone down and had to
vent for a few minutes before I was fit to speak diplomatically again. My
shadow ducked his head in briefly while I ranted. I had less than two hours
remaining when the phone rang again.

“What do you want this time? My
firstborn?” I shouted.

“I hope you were referring to Miss
Anselm, sir. Lawyers are no longer allowed to take infants or souls in payment
since the Faust accords of 1623.”

“Nigel!”

“Good Evening, Mr. Hayes. My wife
told me you’ve been trying to reach me, but you’ve been unavailable. Did I miss
anything important?”

“I’d give my right arm to have you
here,” I sighed.

“Careful what you say, sir. I’m
down in the lobby for the last day’s event, as I promised. What is so important
that you’d part with a limb?”

I saw the clock, and skipped the
good stuff. “North Ameri-Car needs something to keep open their helicopter
plant, and I need a petition signed. I’ll authorize them to mass-produce the
main body of Ghedra as a bargaining chip. I want you to head to their suite and
begin negotiations. We don’t need a contract, just a fair gentleman’s
agreement.”

“No problem,” he said, a little
puzzled and travel-weary. “Anything else?”

“We need it by eight. Meet you
there in ten minutes,” I said, straightening my clothing and hanging up.

Foxworthy was amazing. He kept
saying that he wasn’t that sort of attorney, but he did a fantastic job helping
us reach a business understanding. Everybody left the bargaining table happy,
and Nigel was still cautioning me. He was wearing his usual sort of casual
attire—dress pants, a pullover shirt his wife got him for his birthday, and
leather deck shoes. He spoiled the leisure effect by wearing argyle socks and
carrying a briefcase large enough to transport a house cat. His other four bags
were waiting for him in the lobby.

“They’ve only contracted to build a
small number of your design, more for novelty than anything. It’s admittedly
impractical, but it gives them a chance to retool and retrain their plant. You’re
not getting a percentage either. North Ameri-Car is merely licensing thirteen
of your patents for the spin mechanism, suspension, and coupling systems. All
this is subject to FCC approval, of course. You can offer your services to help
make the design street legal, but that would be a separate contract.”

I phoned my allies to let them know
the good news. I would live another day, and the Scarab was still undefeated!
As we headed to the judges’ suites, something Nigel said earlier finally sank
in. “How did I get so many patents so fast?”

Foxworthy smiled. “My whole office
has been busy. Gertrude warned me that we had to make the applications by the
end of the race or what’s left would be considered common domain. We couldn’t
have that, now could we?”

I was once again stunned. When this
was over, I owed Gertie more than a box of chocolates. “How many patents do I
have?”

He shrugged. “We applied for
twenty-three. It will take a few months, but I expect over half to come through
approved. By the way, you swindled me on the arm. You knew it was defective
when you offered it.”

I smiled. “You were so eager that
you didn’t ask. Maybe you’ll learn next time. But if you want to, I’ll trade
you this bum arm for a glass of the house’s best champagne with a beautiful
lady.”

“Where is she?” Nigel asked, not
wanting to be swindled again.

“Mr. Whitaker?” I asked my shadow
when we left the elevator on the judges’ floor.

His eyes focused for a moment and
he said, “Your old room, sir.”

“Looks like we’ll have to rescue
her from a room full of FBI agents.” Both men raised an eyebrow at that
statement. I gave Nigel the short form of what happened since we spoke to him
last.

We made it to the judges’ lounge
and turned in the petition with ten minutes to spare. The DeClerk negotiating
team went down to the front desk to order champagne and get Nigel his own room.

“How’s the stock?” I asked Niven
while Foxworthy signed for his key.

“The market is closed, sir. But the
buy orders are waiting.”

Whitaker knocked on the door to our old suite and gave the
guard some kind of secret handshake. Soon, we were ushered into an
investigation in progress. It wasn’t the nerve center, but there were hotel
maps, communication head sets, and manila folders strewn about on a card table
and the kitchen countertop. The photographers were gone, as were large sections
of my Sansui interface and half the portable items in the room. I saw four
suits drinking coffee in the kitchen, and asked, “Where’s Officer Anselm?”

The closest one answered. “That’s
Special Investigator Second Class Anselm. At least after she gets back from her
mandatory, three-week medical leave, it is. I put in for her citation right
after I got here. I’m field supervisor Reynolds. You must be...”

One of the other suits whispered my
name in his ear. This Reynolds had a unique aura of competence about him. Many
local cops I know leave the impression that their first career choice had been
that of gym teacher, but they didn’t want to go through all that work to get a
degree. This cop looked like he could have been a great salesman, but quit
because it wasn’t a challenge. Although they all had on the same outfit, I
could tell the others were all just imitating the style of their boss. Cloning
is the sincerest form of flattery. Reynolds had the beefy appeal of an aging
hometown hero who could some day run for office. He had a head full of hair,
tinged with gray at the temples. The southern-accented officers to each side,
who I dubbed Billy Bob and Joe Bob, gazed at him with that loyal dog look that
said they’d take a bullet for him. Maybe he deserved their devotion, but I took
an instant dislike to the man. I don’t know what got my hackles up, but I
smelled snake oil. I tried to hide my mistrust for Mare’s sake.

“Ahh... Yes. I wanted to talk to
you, Mr. Hayes. I’m the new agent in charge here, and there are some questions
I’d like to ask you.” The camera crews must love him. I was right; he could
sell ice to an Eskimo. Fortunately, I wasn’t an Eskimo.

I shrugged. “You already know more
than I do. I just came to get Mare. Our team needs to assemble in two hours,
and I want to spend some time with her before then. She’s had a pretty rough
day already. I thought I’d talk to the principal and get her out early.”

Supervisor Reynolds nodded. “She’s
in that bedroom talking to our colleague from the FCC. You’re right, though.
She deserves a break, we’ll both go in. Your friend...” he said, indicating
Foxworthy.

“His lawyer. Flew in from Pittsburgh,” explained Whitaker.

“Interesting,” said Reynolds,
chewing on a thought. “In that case, he can come in, too. Whitaker, you can
wait out here. It’s going to be crowded enough in there already.”

On our way in, Nigel whispered a
frantic, “I’m not that type of lawyer either.”

“Do they know that?” I asked,
impishly.

In what had been Mare’s bedroom,
she and my old pal Larry from the FCC were having a long and tedious chat. Mare
looked both relieved and a little distressed to see me. Officer Lawrence had
the same thin ring of frizzy hair ringing his bald crown and the same nasal
voice that only he seemed to love the sound of. I have a theory that balding
government functionaries compensate for their own sufferings by making life
hell for whomever wanders into their petty little kingdoms. I sat on the bedside
dresser while Nigel stood against the back wall, concealing the bottle of
champagne behind him.

Larry saw Reynolds and asked, “Where
did that Holstein fellow lead you?” When he saw me and Foxworthy, Larry
frowned.

“He found a pay phone and made a
local call to an Indian Reservation just north of here,” said Reynolds.

“You’ll have to be specific. There
must be a dozen of them,” complained Larry.

“The Sandia Reservation.”

“Iran-Contra all over again,”
murmured Foxworthy.

“Drugs? Guns?” I asked. They all
cut me a break because it had happened before I was born.

Reynolds explained. “Sandia is a
sovereign nation by treaty. They are very sensitive about us searching. It’ll
take almost a week to go through proper channels. By then any evidence will be
sterilized.”

Larry seemed annoyed by my
presence. “Holstein was the only lead we had, thanks to Hurricane Hayes over
here.”

“Hey, I got you all those mouse
pads and keyboards for fingerprinting,” I said, defending myself.

Larry was working up steam toward
full indignation. “Yes, we needed the fingerprints to identify those guys from
the computer room. Hayes tried to eliminate as much of their dental and facial
record as he could. Lord knows we can’t question the guys he brutalized.”

Mare chewed on her lower lip and
looked away from me. Foxworthy stepped in. “What are you implying?”

“I’ll put it in terms you can
understand, fancy pants. Hayes should be up on charges of assault and
obstructing justice! He’s a loose cannon,” complained Larry.

“Actually, those pants are quite
plain,” I said to rub him the wrong way. “He normally wears the Armani.”

Mare looked like she wanted to
elbow me in the gut.

Nigel grinned. “You see, Mr. Hayes
does most of his fighting with words. I doubt you’ll be able to find one person
who has seen him raise a hand in anger.”

“The Scarab is certainly violent.
Maybe the Scarab did it for him,” Larry argued. As childish as he sounded, that
theory scared me a little. I do tend to save up my violent impulses to vent
during the game.

“Scarab hasn’t killed anyone this
race,” I said.

“Maybe he wanted to. Hayes
fractured one guys jaw and shoulder in at least three places. He beat the other
guy into unconsciousness, and then kept kicking him hard enough to cause
internal bleeding and break more than twelve bones.” It seemed that Larry
wanted me locked up in the worst way.

Everybody in the room stared at me.
Mouth dry, I said, “The first guy had a gun. It was hard not to fracture his
skull with that fire extinguisher. The second guy, the one who hurt Mare, had a
knife. I don’t remember anything about kicking him. In fact, I didn’t remember
much of anything except what people told me afterward. The report said ...”

“Mr. Waters refused to tell us the
whole story because you saved his life. You’re a sick and dangerous man. When
the public finds out about what we know, you’re going to jail.”

Nigel’s voice got lower and
quieter. Not that most people would notice, but I believe he was angry now. He’d
be a great poker player, even though he prefers Bridge. “You’re implying that
an unarmed, unskilled fighter picked on two poor armed terrorists, foreign
nationals who were known murderers and kidnappers? You’re complaining because
he defended himself, his teammates, and country against those thugs? I’m not a
criminal attorney, sir, but even I know no jury would ever convict Mr. Hayes,
even if you had a witness to this alleged abuse. He’d walk out of there with a
medal. If you state these vindictive theories of yours outside this room, I
know a colleague who is very good at slander suits.”

Larry wasn’t put off that easily. “Oh,
we’ll try him. We’ll bring up the fact that his father’s brother was an
alcoholic who drank himself to death. He did leave behind a battered wife,
though. I hear that these sorts of things run in the family. We have witnesses
that will testify that Ethan Hayes himself indulges too frequently for his own
health. We can make a case that his unstable personality and fits of rage make
him an untrustworthy ally for the United States government.” That was close
enough to the truth to hurt. I surprised everyone, though, and kept calm.

Nigel continued to defend me. “Try
to make that claim stick without a medical exam. The guilty-by-relation attack
didn’t work for insurance companies who wanted to deny coverage, why should it
work for you. Mr. Reynolds, I’m sure you don’t feel this way. Mr. Hayes has put
every resource that his company possesses at your disposal, risking his own
life for your investigation.”

“You had to find something out from
the workstation,” I added, gesturing to pieces strewn about the floor.

Reynolds shrugged. “Someone did
more than clean and floss when they were done on that machine. They resurfaced.
This Kali either has a real tidiness fetish, or someone is not telling us the
complete story.”

Something smelled fishy. “You’re
telling me that the FBI has questioned everyone and can’t find a single clue?”

“Not everyone. GEDM has over twenty
racing crew members and twenty more executives present, and we have to leap
frog two levels of lawyers to get ‘no comment’ from each of them. Any attempt
to force the issue will be met with restraint-of-trade lawsuits. We don’t know
if they’re stonewalling on principle or they really have something to hide.
Most of the remaining TSM members have diplomatic visas. All the guards you
caught would tell us is that they heard she was Indian,” said Reynolds.

“Makes sense with a name like Kali.”

Reynolds shook his head. “Wrong
kind of Indian. She’s a local, probably mestizo, but nobody we can talk to has
ever seen or heard her, including you. Why do you suppose she chose the name of
a Death goddess?”

“Goddess of Destruction,” I
corrected. “Yama is Death.”

Reynolds nodded. “Comparative
religion class?”

“Roger Zelazny,
Lord of Light
,”
I explained. “What about the supercomputer net and the hotel phone switch? You
didn’t get anything from those? The Minos login alone should have been a dead
give-away.”

Reynolds shrugged his shoulders. “The
Minos login is shared by all the active judges—each of them has a copy of the
security key. The only one unaccounted for was the duplicate from the hotel
vault. As you know, that one is no longer functional.”

“That’s one threat out of the way,”
said Larry. He truly annoys me.

I had to reply. “No. Once any competent
programmer has superuser authority, they can gain access to your system any
time they want. Hell, I could do it.” Larry seemed gratified by this admission.
“Can you tell me what you do know? I’m tired of being a mushroom.”

Reynolds used his best press
conference tone, soothing but unrevealing. “We know what you told us. One or
more anonymous people are stealing files from dying contestants. They are
determined enough to kill to cover their tracks. We know enough about their
technique that if we have a few minutes warning, we can trace the robbery and
gather enough evidence for warrants. But right now we don’t have squat.”

“What about the Cuban real-estate
lead?”

Larry took over. “That sort of
investigation takes months to complete. By the time we do, Kali will be long
gone. This is, of course, assuming there is a Kali. I personally believe that
she’s a total fabrication meant to misdirect us.” Mare knew otherwise, but she
wasn’t speaking. The way she was avoiding me, maybe she wasn’t allowed to say
anything. Someone had ordered her silence.

Nigel interceded for me. He
remembered my feud with this man from our last encounter. “Agent Lawrence, your baseless juvenile implications have now crossed from petty unprofessionalism
to downright lies.”

“Maybe we should just let him go,”
pleaded Reynolds. I suspected a game of good cop/bad cop going on.

“Show him the file,” ordered Larry.
A new dossier on E. Hayes appeared, only a few pages thicker than the last one.

Reynolds apologized. “We
investigate everyone involved in these cases, and Mr. Hayes has several
unanswered questions in his past.”

“Gentlemen, if you have a question
you want to ask me, by all means do so. We’re on the same side here,” I
offered. Foxworthy put a cautionary hand on my shoulder.

“To begin with, Mr. Hayes has no
history with the IRS,” said Larry.

Foxworthy explained that I had
never in my life made a profit, and had an indenturement exemption filed with
the credit bureau. Since the company had not been selling stock for three
months yet, DeClerk Enterprises had filed no return either.

“He never registered with selective
service, a Federal offense.”

“I’m exempt.”

“Why, were you in prison at the
time?”

I took Mr. Reynolds aside and
explained my hemophilia. I told him quietly that I didn’t want Lawrence knowing. He nodded, and declared that issued settled.

“What, is he gay or something?”
Larry whined.

Reynolds winced and Mare cracked a
smile.

Larry caught himself on that one. “Oh,
yeah. I forgot. Next item, he has no birth certificate.”

“But I had a passport from the ages
of eight through eighteen. My birth certificate should be on file at the hall
of records in Rio de Janeiro. Is this almost everything? We really do have work
to do.” I stood behind Mare and began relieving the knots in her shoulders.

“How do we know you are not Kali?”
demanded Larry.

“How do we know you aren’t Bozo the
Clown? We’re never seen you in the same room together. Look at my hair, pal.
People don’t normally go around lighting themselves on fire. But if you wanted
to try, I wouldn’t stop you.”

Nigel apologized, wishing he could
stuff the pillow into my mouth. “Answer only what they ask and as briefly as
possible.”

Without warning, Reynolds took off
the gloves. “I asked a friend at the State Department about your family. What
do you know about the Committee for Social Justice?”

Again, all eyes in the room were on
me. I deflated under the force of the memory. “You tacky bastards, always
blaming the victim. For even insinuating we were involved with those hoodlums,
you’ve lost my cooperation. Find another stalking horse.”

“She wasn’t going to go after you
anyway. According to all the long distance calls we’ve traced, and all the
people we’ve interviewed, there are in all likelihood no Swiss Bank accounts.
We have nothing left for bait. Now answer the question,” said Reynolds sternly.