The Mandel Files, Volume 1: Mindstar Rising & a Quantum Murder

  Her arm tightened instinctively around Adrian. He didn’t know how much of a comfort he was.

  Don’t be so sarcastic, Grandpa, it’s very unbecoming. Have Walshaw’s security programmers managed to backtrack?

  Not yet.

  Total surprise.

  Give them some credit, Juliet, that melt was hard to spot.

  If they’d written a decent guardian program in the first place there wouldn’t have been a melt through.

  Her grandfather answered with a reproachful silence. Surprising what could be read from emptiness.

  Greg climbed out of the Duo. Julia let out an involuntary gasp. His left eye was swollen and black, heavily bruised; a moulded white surgical dressing covered his nose; his hands seemed to be all blue dermal membrane; he was limping.

  Christ!

  ‘What happened?!’ she demanded anxiously.

  He smiled heavily. ‘I had a little chat with your friend, Kendric di Girolamo.’

  ‘My God! He did this to you?’

  ‘His bodyguards.’

  ‘Oh, Greg. You shouldn’t even be out of bed. Come along with you, out of this hot sun.’

  Greg shrugged. ‘Not as bad as it looks.’ His eyes were fixed on Adrian. Accusing, Julia thought, certainly not indifferent. My God, could he be jealous?

  Adrian stirred uncomfortably under the stare, gripping her hand that little bit tighter.

  ‘Adrian, isn’t it?’ Greg asked.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  They reminded her of two stags, scraping hoofs before they locked antlers. Disturbing to think she might be the cause, but then again it didn’t exactly hurt her ego.

  Greg’s cut lips quirked slightly, breaking the spell. ‘The name’s Greg. Nice to see you again.’

  Adrian relaxed a little at her side.

  She gave him a huge sunny smile. ‘This conference won’t take long, darling. Would you see to Tobias, I’ve been neglecting him shockingly.’

  ‘Sure thing.’ He pecked her cheek and gave Greg a quick curious glance before heading off towards the stables.

  Another thing about him, he understood the way Event Horizon business dominated her life, and made allowance, never making unreasonable demands. There weren’t many who’d do that. He was going to make a smashing doctor with that kind of sympathy.

  ‘Nice lad,’ Greg offered as they reached the shade of the portico. There was sweat on his forehead.

  She slipped her arm into his, steadying his walk; glad to have someone trustworthy to confide in. ‘Nice? Greg, he’s gorgeous. And you should see him with his shirt off. Totally hunky!’

  ‘Lucky Adrian.’

  Doncaster is squirting, now!

  Julia nearly groaned aloud. How could she have forgotten about Grandpa? He would’ve heard every word. That bloody OtherEyes was going to have to be rewritten again.

  Greg was looking at her speculatively. A blush was rising up her cheeks.

  Morgan Walshaw was waiting for them in the study. He did a double take at Greg’s injuries, frowning, then signalled them to sit.

  Julia pulled out her chair at the head of the table. The dark polished surface in front of her was cluttered with gear modules and cubes. Morgan Walshaw was devouring information from three cubes fed by an elaborate-looking customized terminal. Next to her grandfather’s NN core was a Commodore bioware number cruncher, a maroon hexagonal block fifty centimetres across and twelve high. A thick bundle of fibre-optic cables linked it to the study’s communication consoles. Her grandfather called it junior; he’d unplugged his NN core from Event Horizon’s datanet, plugging in the Commodore as a replacement. It’d been loaded with a Turing personality responses program; and he’d spent the last three days reformatting it to shuffle Event Horizon’s data squirts in a routine fashion.

  ‘Will you look at that.’ Her grandfather’s gruff voice rumbled around the study.

  The biggest cube on the table was displaying a schematic of the Commodore’s databuses, a nightmare Mobius topology of fine turquoise lines binding together a miniature globular cluster of sparkling jade stars.

  A cadaverous pink stain had begun to wash through the image, spreading down the lines and branching at every star, tainting everything in its path.

  ‘Christ, the bugger’s expansion rate is phenomenal. About fifth power,’ the directionless voice exclaimed.

  The cube showed an unhealthy homogenous pink blob.

  ‘Six seconds from reception to total domination. Incredible. Whoever they are, they’re serious. I would never have been able to stop it if it’d got into the NN core. That’s all down to Gabriel. Where is she, Greg?’

  ‘Her psi-function takes a lot out of her. She’s at home recuperating.’

  ‘Well, try and get her back here. I want to thank her personally.’

  If Greg was aware of the irony he didn’t show it. ‘I’ll tell her.’

  ‘So. Kendric had you roughed up, did he, boy?’

  ‘My fault. I confronted him.’

  ‘Why?’ Julia asked.

  ‘Taking a short cut. I wanted to establish that Kendric was the one who paid Wolf.’

  ‘Well, of course he is,’ she exclaimed.

  Greg shook his head gingerly. ‘No. That’s the problem. Kendric isn’t directly behind the blitz. Not that I could prove, anyway. My intuition says he’s involved in some way, though.’

  ‘Well, there you are then,’ she said.

  ‘I wanted something a little more concrete.’

  ‘What for?’

  She saw Greg and Walshaw exchange an edgy glance. It was so bloody annoying. Why couldn’t they speak in front of her?

  ‘Concrete proof for concrete action,’ Walshaw said quietly.

  ‘Oh.’ She put her hands flat on the table, studying the nails intently.

  ‘It wasn’t a complete waste of time,’ Greg said. ‘I think I can prove Kendric does know about the NN core.’

  ‘Ah!’ Philip said triumphantly.

  Julia suddenly realized Greg was staring right at her.

  ‘Katerina Cawthorp is living with Kendric on his yacht,’ Greg said.

  ‘Still?’ Julia blurted.

  ‘You knew about it?’

  ‘I knew she’d gone off with him, I was there when it happened. I thought Kendric was another of her one-night stands. Kats is like that, you see. Bit of a bed-hopper.’

  ‘What I’d like to know is whether or not she’s bright enough to work out that your grandfather was planning to translocate his memories into the NN core,’ Greg said. ‘She was here for a few days. The opportunity exists.’

  ‘A week.’ Julia stared pensively at the leather-bound books on the wall shelving, not bothering to cut in the processor node. Remembering all those years she and Kats had spent together at school. Only time’s perspective gave them a totally different slant, like an old play whose plot she’d forgotten. They’d seemed like great days while they were happening, insufferably tedious now. ‘Kats never paid any attention to classes, too busy with boys,’ she said slowly, reluctant to condemn. ‘But no, she’s not stupid. It’s just that I find it hard to believe Kats would bother listening to idle business chatter, let alone interpret it.’

  ‘She wouldn’t have to interpret it, Kendric would do that for himself,’ Greg said.

  ‘I’m sure I never mentioned the NN core project in front of her. I wouldn’t have, there’d be no point, science and finance simply don’t fit into her world view. And Grandpa and I certainly never discussed it at meals.’

  ‘She may have overheard it being mentioned. There’s a certain thrill in eavesdropping on the conversations of someone as powerful as your grandfather. Even if she couldn’t make sense of it at the time she might remember what was said.’

  ‘True enough,’ said Walshaw. ‘Though the Kendric connection is still circumstantial.’

  ‘Don’t be obtuse, Morgan,’ Julia said. After all Greg had gone through he didn’t deserve disparaging observations. ‘Of course Kendric’s guil
ty, he reeks of it.’

  ‘I wasn’t disagreeing,’ the security chief said mildly. ‘It is the degree of Kendric’s involvement which seems to be unresolved.’

  ‘Not the exact degree, no,’ Greg said. ‘But he’s in deep, no messing. And I think we can rule out a mole now we know about Katerina.’ He glanced at Walshaw for confirmation.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘OK, that just leaves the question of why Kendric allowed Julia to buy him out. I still don’t understand that, and it bothers me. We know he’s in trouble with the family over the money he withdrew from Event Horizon’s backing consortium, and he’s working on some deals to try and fill the gap, provide the house with an equal return. That’s got to be the key, these deals of his. And they’re tied up with you somewhere.’ He shot Julia a fast glance.

  She knew he meant his intuition again. It gave her a creepy feeling, the way his suspicions about the spoiler had turned out to be true. Now Kendric was making unknown deals.

  ‘Raw materials?’ Walshaw suggested. ‘Is he buying up the options on the compounds that go into the giga-conductor?’

  ‘No,’ said Philip. ‘There aren’t any really rare minerals involved in any case. And I’ve made quite sure we have a safeguarded stockpile of the chemicals we use. That’s an elementary precaution, I did that even before we filed the patent.’

  Greg rubbed the dressing on his nose with a forefinger. ‘Tell you, my own impression is that Kendric has made some sort of alliance.’

  ‘With who?’ Julia asked.

  He gave her a wan smile. ‘Don’t know. Someone, some organization, who would benefit from having your grandfather wiped. Kendric is an influence peddler, you see. Once he established that Philip Evans’s memories were stored in the NN core, he could barter the information in exchange for an investment opportunity that’d give the family house money a return equal to the Event Horizon backing consortium. Get someone else to do his dirty work for him, and make a profit at the same time. That’s his style.’

  ‘A kombinate?’

  ‘No, I never believed it was a kombinate behind the blitz, a month-long delay in introducing the giga-conductor would be a nonsense when you consider their cyber-factories would have to be totally rebuilt to produce the stuff.’

  ‘What, then?’

  ‘Sorry, I can’t tell you. That’s just the feeling I get out of all this.’ He shrugged. ‘Kendric definitely has some sort of scheme in mind, the buyout is proof of that, as well as his hatred for you.’

  ‘Mutual,’ Julia said automatically.

  ‘I know.’

  And the way he said it made her glance at him, he’d sounded disapproving.

  ‘What about this Wolf bloke?’ Philip said. ‘He’s had two goes at me now. Seems to me, you ought to be concentrating on him, boy.’

  ‘I was coming to that. My contact has backtracked O’Donal’s payments; he squirted Wolf’s identity to me this morning.’

  ‘May we know the name?’ Walshaw asked.

  ‘Charles Ellis. Currently residing at the Castlewood condominium, New Eastfield, Peterborough.’

  She couldn’t help the little start of interest. ‘I know that place. Uncle Horace lives there, it’s not far from the marina. That proves Ellis is connected to Kendric, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Not necessarily. It’s a perfectly logical place for someone that rich to gravitate to. Although I admit it’s pushing coincidence a long way.’

  ‘Rich?’ Walshaw enquired. ‘What is he, a tekmerc?’

  ‘Apparently not,’ said Greg. ‘According to my contact Ellis is a data fence. He normally goes under the handle Medeor. Wolf is a totally new venture for him.’

  ‘What do you propose as your next step?’ Walshaw asked. His grey eyes had narrowed, contemplating Greg with reserved, vaguely threatening preoccupation.

  ‘Pay Charles Ellis a visit. He’s the last link, the connection between the team of hotrods who ran the blitz and whoever paid for it.’

  ‘Seeing as how you’re so close I’d like to send one of my operatives along with you,’ Walshaw said. ‘I know you prefer to work independently, and I respect that. But the stakes are mounting.’

  ‘I wasn’t going to object,’ Greg said. ‘Just make sure he’s briefed not to interrupt.’

  ‘He won’t.’

  ‘One more thing, have you had any luck with the analysis of Tentimes’ burns?’ Greg asked.

  ‘If you mean is there a single beneficiary, then the answer is no.’ Walshaw paused, looking concerned. ‘But seven manufacturing companies have gone under because of O’Donal; and some of the financials are on a sticky wicket, although they’ll never admit a thing. And now we know what to look for, the researchers have spotted several similar victims outside O’Donal’s list. It looks like all eight of Wolf’s hotrods are very active; they’ve caused a lot of damage in the last year. It prompts the question why?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Philip. ‘If that kind of disturbance is being repeated by others like him I’d hate to think of the long-term consequences.’

  ‘Perhaps that’s Wolf’s goal,’ Greg said. ‘Trying to sabotage Event Horizon’s long-term prospects.’

  ‘I don’t mean just us, boy. I’ve run my own analysis on the burns and their fallout. They’re totally indiscriminate. If that sort of thing isn’t halted soon it’ll add at least another couple of points to inflation, and that’s already running too high as it is. A further rise would blow the Chancellor’s budget to pieces.’

  ‘You mean even Kendric would suffer?’

  ‘Everybody suffers,’ Walshaw said bluntly.

  ‘Could it be another government? If England’s industrial output goes down, who’d step in to make up the shortfall?’

  ‘Just about everybody,’ Philip concluded miserably. ‘Bloody Pacific Rim would be the biggest beneficiaries, of course.’

  Julia saw the connection without having to kick in her processor nodes. ‘A finance house,’ she said firmly. Both men looked at her. ‘A finance house would benefit from a change of interest rates, if they knew for sure it would happen.’

  ‘That’s right, they would. Good girl, Juliet.’

  ‘The di Girolamo house?’ Walshaw mused.

  ‘Why worry?’ she said brightly. ‘Greg can do his word-association thing with Ellis to find out the details. You’ll have it all solved for us by tonight, Greg, won’t you?’

  Greg sat back in his chair, a tired smile playing over his battered face. ‘How much do you want to bet on that?’

  29

  Greg kept a cautionary eye on Julia as she walked out to the car with him. There was a confidence about her which had been absent before; she’d always had poise, but it’d been stilted and formal. This was a natural grace. No doubt Adrian had a lot to do with it. The kind of stability he offered putting her at ease with other people.

  Adrian hadn’t changed all her habits, though. He thought her emerald broderie anglaise dress was something Maid Marion would’ve been perfectly at home in; it had puffball cap sleeves, a lace-up bodice and a skirt hem riding several centimetres above her knees. Nice legs. The girl’s clothes sense was the weirdest, nobody else her age wore anything remotely similar. But, of course, she wasn’t like anybody else her own age. Just wanted to be.

  She lifted the front door’s iron latch for him, eager to please. Sparrows, goldfinches, and a couple of hoopoes squabbled underneath the sprinklers’ cascade, pecking at the grass for worms that’d risen in the artificial rain. The direct sunlight set off an uncomfortable itch on Greg’s face and hands.

  ‘Hop in,’ he said, as he blipped the Duo doors, ‘I’ve got something to say to you.’

  Her face lit up with mischief. ‘Greg, really! And Adrian so close by.’

  He sensed that ghostly extraneous thought current leave her mind with lightning swiftness. Her own thoughts were a fast-paced mixture of excitement and contentment. Julia was one happy girl. He flicked the jammer on, screening the Duo’s interior from the manor’s securit
y surveillance sensors. ‘Julia.’

  Her expression dropped at his tone. ‘What?’

  ‘Katerina.’

  ‘Oh, her. What about her?’

  ‘I’m going to be very nice to you, and I’m not going to put you over my knee and give you a damn good wallop. Although God knows you deserve it, or worse, after what you’ve done.’

  ‘What?’ She was spluttering, hauteur and outrage gathering within her mind.

  ‘Your grandfather was quite right about you. You’re a sciolistic; you know the moves, but not the governing laws.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Oh, you worked it out very nicely on a surface level, I’ll grant you that. What you failed to appreciate were the undercurrents.’

  ‘Stop talking in euphemisms, it’s bloody annoying.’

  ‘I’ve seen inside Kendric’s mind,’ Greg said. ‘He dreams of you, Julia.’

  ‘He does?’ She was suddenly very uncertain.

  ‘He hates you, and fears you. He wants to destroy you. No. He’s obsessed with destroying you. Not merely Event Horizon, but you personally, physically. He wants you beneath him, Julia, spread-eagled and screaming. He’s sick in a way you’ll never know.’

  ‘I do know,’ she insisted quietly.

  ‘No, not really; you still haven’t twigged, have you? Loathing is an abstract to you, a word whose meaning you’ve looked up in a dictionary. Kendric is its physical embodiment, lethal, and scatological to boot. You will never understand the sheer intensity of his revenge psychosis. It’s a monstrous personality dysfunction.

  ‘Tell you, Kendric sets up targets to knock down, fixates on them, devoting himself singlemindedly to their downfall. For the kind of left-hand business he’s involved with it’s a commendable trait. He’d been pretty successful, too; built up a good reputation for reliability, top man in the field. He’d never really known failure. Then I come along, hired by your grandfather, and we thwart him in what was probably his most ambitious scheme ever: asset-stripping Event Horizon. His first true débâcle. Then you followed it up by humiliating him with blackmail. Anyone flying that high is going to be hurt bad by the fall. Small wonder you dominate his thoughts; any normal person would be bitter, but with a wacko like that it was probably the push over the edge. You misjudged him completely, and now Katerina is suffering because of that.’