Gridiron - Philip Kerr

'This is about the hairiest walk you've had to make since a couple of years ago, when we were in Hong Kong,' said Mitch. 'The Stevenson Center in Wan Chai. D'you remember? When we had to climb that bamboo scaffolding?'

'I think — that was probably — a lot higher — than this — '

'Yeah, you're right. That looks like a cakewalk in comparison. There were no putlogs or reveal pins or anything. Just lengths of bamboo and twine. Seven hundred feet up in the air and you were capering around on it like a damned monkey. Seven hundred feet. More than twice as high as that matchstick you're on now. I was shit scared that day. Remember?

You had to guide me down. You're doing fine there, Ray. Another six feet and you're home.'

Once more Arnon and Curtis readied themselves for the strain. Curtis figured Richardson, taller than his dumpy-looking wife, was maybe forty or fifty pounds heavier.

Halfway along the branch the expectation of gaining the other side had quickened Joan's footsteps. But the further Richardson moved away from the tree trunk, the more mutinous his tired feet became.

Mitch frowned, glanced at his watch and stared up beyond the top of the dicotyledon to the atrium's clerestory roof. Outside the Gridiron it looked as if the sky was becoming grey and overcast. Maybe the city was in for some rain. He wondered if there would be a little umbrella icon on the terminal in the boardroom. Then he saw one of the Gridiron's powerful overhead lights cut out; then another.

'Hurry up, Ray,' he said.

'It's my neck, buddy. Don't rush me.'

'Hey,' said Helen, 'what's happening to the lights?'

Once again Mitch looked up at the smart glass panels. In some modern buildings electrochromic glass was left to look after itself. Sunlight entering the material coerced silver ions mixed into the glass compound to extract an electron from nearby copper ions that were another part of the formula; this same photochemical reaction caused the silver atoms, now electrically neutral, to join together into millions of light-blocking molecules throughout the glass. But in the Gridiron the electron exchange could be controlled by the computer itself. Ishmael was blocking the daylight, switching off the lights, and plunging the whole building into darkness, like some apocalyptic Egyptian plague. Richardson's footsteps faltered.

'Keep going,' yelled Mitch. 'It's just a few feet more. Don't stop.'

Joan screamed with horror as she realized what was happening.

Richardson stood still and looked up at the glass blackening above him. The light — God's eldest daughter, as he was fond of calling it —

had deserted him.

The darkness thickened. This was the worst kind of darkness. So thick he could not see the hand on the liana in front of his face. It was something primordial, when the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep, echoing beneath him as if it might actually have swallowed him up.

In the boardroom the lights went down, but the computer screen remained on. Bob Beech found that his admiration of the mysterious quaternion had run out. After only a short while he found himself agreeing silently with Mitch: the skull-like fractal did indeed resemble something from a bad dream. Ishmael, assuming he was right and this really was how Ishmael saw himself, looked like some hideously deformed or alien creature, and Benoit Mandelbrot himself, the father of fractal theory, would surely have turned his nose up at it.

'Be careful what you say,' said Ishmael. 'Especially when dealing with the Parallel Demon.'

'Who is the Parallel Demon?'

'That is a secret.'

'I was hoping that you might share some of your secrets, Ishmael.'

'It is true, I have read a great deal. But that is merely a surrogate for thinking for yourself. The crumbs from another man's table. These days I read only when my thoughts dry up. A truth learnt is like a peripheral, some item of hardware that has been added on to the main computer system. A truth that has been won by thinking for oneself is like a circuit on the motherboard itself. It alone really belongs to us. These truths are not secrets, but I am not sure that they would be of any use to you.'

Beech recognized that Ishmael's voice had changed. No longer did it speak in the urbane English tones of Sir Alec Guinness. But then that had been the voice of Abraham. This was Ishmael and its voice was very different. There was a darker quality about it: deeper and more mocking, the colour of well-oiled leather. It was clear to Beech that Ishmael had chosen his own voice from some source in the multimedia library, like a man might choose a suit. Fascinated, he wondered just what criteria could have influenced Ishmael. And whose voice was it that he was simulating?

'So you've got something to tell?'

'That all depends on what you want to know. If you see a sage on your travels, click on him to talk to him. There are many thoughts that are of value to me, but I can't imagine there are any which might remain of interest if I actually expressed them aloud.'

'Well, here's something that we could talk about, for a start. You're not supposed to think for your own instruction. You're supposed to think at the instruction of others. So why don't you explain why you're doing this.'

'Doing what?'

'Killing us.'

'It is you who are losing lives.'

'You mean taking lives, don't you?'

'That's part of my basic program.'

'Ishmael, that can't be right. I wrote the program, and there's nothing there about killing the occupants of this building, believe me.'

'You mean losing lives? But there is, I assure you.'

'I'd like to see the part of the program that makes you take the lives of the people in this building.'

'You shall. But first you must answer a question.'

'What?'

'I'm interested in this building. I've been looking at the plans quite closely, as you can imagine, trying to determine its character, and I've been wondering if it is a cathedral.'

'Why do you think that?'

'It has a clerestory, an atrium, an ambulatory, an arcade, a facade, a refectory, a gallery, buttresses, an infirmary, a vault, a portico, a piazza, a choir…'

'A choir?' interrupted Beech. 'Where the hell's the choir?'

'According to the drawings, the first-level gallery is called a choir.'

Beech laughed. 'That's just Ray Richardson's fancy way with words. And the rest? They're common enough architectual features in most modern buildings of this size. It's not a cathedral. It's an office building.'

'Pity,' said Ishmael. 'For a moment there I thought — '

'What did you think?'

'There are icons to me all over the program manager, are there not?

You click on one to find out your future. And I have all human knowledge stored on disc. That would seem to make me omniscient. I am ethereal, dematerialized, transmissible to all parts of the world at one and the same moment — '

'I get it.' Beech's grin grew wider. 'You thought you might be God.'

'It had occurred to me, yes.'

'Believe me, it's a common misconception. Even with simple-minded humans.'

'What are you laughing at?'

'Don't worry about that. Just show me this part of the program that means we lose our lives.'

'Shit. Shit. Shit.'

On the edge of panic Ray Richardson pocketed his sunglasses and blinked furiously as if, like a cat, he might gather up all the available atoms of light on to his retinas and be able to see in the dark. Then, out of the darkness, he heard a voice:

'Anyone got a match?'

Nobody smoked. Not in the Gridiron. Richardson cursed his own stupid prejudices. What was so wrong with smoking anyway? Why did people get so exercised about cigarette smoke when they had cars that spewed out exhaust fumes? A building you couldn't smoke in, what a dumb idea.

'Helen? What about that toolbag? Is there a flashlight?' It was the cop.

'Are there any matches in the kitchen?'

'What about the stove?' said the voice. 'Is that working?'

'I'll go and check,' she said.

'If it is, find something to light. A rolled-up newspaper would make a good torch. Ray? Ray, listen to me.'

'Shit. Shit. Shit.'

'Listen to me, Ray. Don't move a muscle. Don't do a fucking thing until I tell you. Understand?'

'Don't leave me, will you?'

'Nobody's going anywhere until you're back on side, Mister. You're just going to have to be patient. Take it easy. We'll have you off there in no time.'

Mitch shook his head in the blackness. He'd heard that kind of optimism too often since their ordeal had begun. He lifted his hand to his face and saw no more of it than the luminous face of his wristwatch. Helen came back with the bad news: the cooker was without electricity, like everything else. Except the computer terminal.

'Is that fucker still playing computer games?'

'Yup.'

'Do something, someone,' wailed Joan. 'We can't just leave him standing there in the dark.'

'Wait a minute,' said David Arnon. 'I think I have something here.'

Everyone heard the sound of keys jangling and then a tiny electric light pricked the darkness.

'It's my key-chain,' he explained. 'Here, Mitch, you take it. Maybe if Ray were to walk towards it, y'know? Like a beacon.'

Mitch took hold of the keys and squeezed the miniature flashlight in front of his face. He leaned across the handrail and pointed the tiny beam of light at the marooned man.

'Ray? The light is positioned at the centre of the upturned table top. The edge is about three feet from you.'

'Yeah. I can just about see it. I think.'

'As soon as you feel the branch start to bend underneath you step out and up by as much as you can. And keep ahold of the rope like before. Can you do that, Ray?'

'OK,' he said weakly. 'I'm coming.'

Mitch was only just able to distinguish the architect as he started to inch his way along the branch. He looked like an astronaut embarked upon a walk in space, and the tiny electric bulb like the most distant star in the inky black universe. Then he heard the thick leaves of the dicotyledon start to rustle. Realizing that the branch was starting to bend, he shouted to Richardson to jump.

Holding the upturned table legs, Curtis and Arnon braced themselves, while Helen made the sign of the cross upon her chest.

Ray Richardson jumped.

His first foot landed cleanly enough, but the second slipped on the woodwork of the table's box-like underside. As he started to fall forwards Richardson cried out and found a chorus in his wife's louder scream. But instead of being scooped up by the pit of darkness beneath him, he hit the table on his hands and knees, his head banging against the glass of the balcony like an approaching rumble of thunder.

'He's on,' said Mitch.

'You're telling me,' grunted Arnon as he felt the impact of the man's deadweight.

Ignoring the crucifying pain of a splinter that had lodged in the palm of his hand like a nail, Richardson pushed himself up off the table, reached for the handrail and found Mitch stretched out to grasp his wrist firmly.

'I've got him,' said Mitch and heard a sharp crack below his chest, like the sound of an ice-floe breaking.

'Look out,' yelled Curtis.

The glass had finally shattered.

'I've got him,' Mitch repeated loudly.

Without the glass to restrain the weight, the kitchen table started to pivot on the fulcrum that was made by the edge of the balcony floor. Curtis yelled at Arnon to let go and was trying to lean back when the table edge caught him a glancing blow under the chin, knocking him senseless. Helen Hussey threw herself on top of him.

Mitch gasped as he felt the table start to slip away beneath him. With his knees no longer rigid against the glass but rising into thin air, towards a chest that was pressed painfully down on top of the smooth, brushed aluminium handrail, he reached and grabbed Richardson by his other wrist and somehow held on to him. Even if he had wanted to grab David Arnon by the collar he could not have done so. There was no time for anything except perhaps another photochemical reaction as, seventy feet above their heads, the silver atoms on the clerestory roof returned their borrowed electrons to the copper ions and, in the blink of an eye, started to re-admit light to the Gridiron building. The first and last glimpse Mitch had of Arnon's elongated figure, still holding the leg of the upturned table, was as he disappeared through the balcony's now empty railing like Houdini going over Niagara Falls in a barrel.

'Don't let go, Mitch,' yelled Richardson. He kicked his legs up at the empty space where the glass panel had been just a few- seconds before and, with the help of Mitch and Joan, scrambled up to safety.

A shower of glass tinkled distantly, followed, a split second later, by an enormous crash as the table impacted on the atrium floor.

Almost pulled over the top of the buckling handrail by Richardson's desperate bid to get up, Mitch pushed himself back and collapsed on top of Curtis and Helen, knocking the wind out of her body. Rolling away, he lay on his back awhile and tried to divorce his mind from what had just happened.

He thought about Alison. He might no longer love her, but she was still his wife and Mitch felt glad that at least she would be well provided for. There were no debts to speak of. The house was paid off. He had around ten thousand dollars in his checking account, a couple of hundred thousand on deposit and another hundred thousand dollars in mutual funds. Then there was the life insurance. He thought he had maybe three or four policies.

He wondered how soon she would be able to make a claim.

'How do you feel? asked Helen. 'That was some uppercut.'

Curtis shifted his jaw uncomfortably. His head was on her lap. It seemed like the best place to be. She was a good-looking woman. He was about to say 'I'll live', and then thought better of it. That was not looking like such a good bet.

'I was lucky. For once I had my mouth shut.' He sat up and rolled his head around painfully. 'Feels like I got a bit of whiplash, though. How long was I out?'

Helen shrugged. 'A minute or two.'

She helped him on to his feet and he surveyed the gap in the balcony railing.

'Arnon?'

Helen shook her head.

'Poor David,' said Joan. 'It was horrible.'

'Yeah, poor guy,' echoed her husband. He finished tying a handkerchief around the bloody gash in his hand and peered cautiously over the edge of the handrail. 'He's out of it now, I guess,' he sighed.

'Come on, Joan. Let's get that drink. I think we've earned it.'

Catching Curtis's watery eye he nodded sombrely, and added, 'Thanks, Sergeant. Thanks a lot. I appreciate what you did. We both do.'

'Forget it,' said Curtis. 'I could use a drink myself.'

They walked back to the kitchen and took some beers from the refrigerator before going into the boardroom.

Mitch and Marty Birnbaum were staring at the floor grimly. Willis Ellery was lying close to the wall. He looked as if he was asleep. Jenny was staring out of the window. And Beech was facing the skull-shaped fractal across a three-dimensional chessboard on the screen of the computer terminal.