All Cry Chaos

by Leonard Rosen

  >I can usually get to a computer in the library by 3.

  >Good. 3 PM two days from now. I'll be sure to be online.

  Poincaré checked his watch.

  >It's only 7 o'clock. You're sleepy?? >Long day, Antoine.

  >OK. Thanks. You're not in Cambridge, I

  guess.

  >Good night.

  For her, Poincaré thought. But the sun had yet to set in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He logged off the Math League Web site and e-mailed a colleague in Lyon, Hubert Levenger, who headed a recently commissioned office responsible for tracking cybercrime. In an earlier conversation, Levenger offered to infiltrate the Math League Web site and track the IP address of the person chatting with Poincaré—provided she did not use any of several tricks to mask the address. "If we can get her IP," said Levenger, "we can identify the service she used to connect to the Internet. That will give us a country of origin, at least. Depending on the service, we can get a location to within fifty miles, possibly closer."

  Poincaré waited for a return e-mail. When it arrived, the answer was not what he hoped for. "The person chatting with you used a proxy server positioned between her computer and the Math League to log onto that server as an authenticated user. She could be anywhere, Henri. Give me another shot when you chat next. I'm tired. See you later."

  Levenger had done him the favor of staying up until 1 AM in Lyon. It occurred to Poincaré that if Chambi was tired, too, she was not in the Americas. Seven PM in Boston was only 8 PM in Brasilia and Buenos Aires. Taking her at her word, it was late wherever she sat. At thirteen hours later than Boston, Hong Kong was not likely. He ruled out the Far East. It was Europe, he concluded, or Africa—chatting with him between midnight, Lisbon time, and 1 AM in Johannesburg.

  He logged into his Interpol account to confirm that a Blue Notice had been issued for Chambi. Immediately before leaving for the States, he had mastered his rage sufficiently to tie Interpol into his search. Monforte had poisoned everything he touched in Poincaré's life. Still, if Interpol could not guarantee personal safety, what it did well was track and arrest fugitives who crossed international borders. Because Chambi was not yet indicted and could not be held against her will, Poincaré issued an Interpol Blue Notice that, without detaining her, would yield information on her whereabouts and activities. Rainier's Red Notice listing, by contrast, would lead to her arrest. But with both women well out of sight, the system of Notices had yielded nothing. Eventually, he expected, one or both would make a mistake and when that happened the chase would be on. Monforte had seen to the details, and Poincaré updated Chambi's profile regarding her likely location. Before walking into Harvard Square for dinner, he sent a text message to Gisele De Vries:

  Dana Chambi. Ecuadorian national. Was she on hotel list compiled in Amsterdam?

  He pushed send, confident that De Vries would answer him within the hour.

  "YOU MISSED the worst of the storm," said Eric Hurley, standing at the door of the Cambridge Police Station and surveying the sky. "Can you stand American coffee? Just up the street. Come on."

  He didn't wait for an answer, and Poincaré followed him to a shop called the Busy Bee, where the detective greeted the woman behind the counter and wedged his stevedore frame into a booth. "The Fenster case got more interesting," he said. "Annie—coffee and a corn muffin. Grilled. Same for my friend."

  "What is it with Americans and muffins?" asked Poincaré.

  "Look, Inspector. It's been a couple of months since you were here. You must have been out of touch because Agent . . . what's his name—the kid . . . Johnson—contacted me. Said you dropped off the radar. I never knew Fenster had his apartment cleaned three times before he left for Amsterdam."

  "Did you speak with the custodian?"

  "No." Hurley adjusted the knot of a hideous paisley tie, his neck bulging over a yellowed collar. "If the place was cleaned, the last time by a crew that wiped everything down, then how did our forensics people find anything? My report shows dozens of fingerprints matching the ones you pulled off the body in Amsterdam. Also a direct DNA match from two samples—urine on the toilet rim and hair with some intact follicles from a brush. No way, not with the place wiped."

  "Is that the report?" said Poincaré.

  Hurley slid an envelope across the table. "Your copy. Johnson turned out to be better than I figured. He pulled one set of prints from the computer keyboard, the kitchen glasses, the picture frames, and the covers of Fenster's books. Those matched the prints we found. So far, no surprises. He even pulled prints off the goddamned light bulbs. All perfect matches. But then there was this." Hurley opened his own copy of the report. "We missed a second set of prints that he pulled from the sticky side of a piece of tape on Fenster's computer. These matched the prints Johnson pulled off the inside of Fenster's books. There were some glossy pages that yielded perfect prints. So we have two coherent sets of prints in that apartment. Tell me, Inspector. What cleaning crew that you ever heard of would wipe down the individual pages of every book on a shelf?"

  "None," said Poincaré.

  "Correct. I called them, the companies, and they said they did wipe the covers. But not the inside. Why would they?"

  "What about the teeth—in the cigar box," said Poincaré. "I asked Johnson to run those."

  Hurley made room for their coffee and muffins. "The DNA from the baby teeth matched DNA from the urine and hair samples—which matched your results in Amsterdam. So we're to conclude what," said Hurley. "That Fenster handled the covers of his books but didn't read a page of any? Or that someone else read his books but didn't touch the covers? And that same someone wrote all those notes in the margins, in five languages, in the same hand, and attached a piece of tape with a few words to Fenster's computer? Inspector, I assume you examined an actual body in Amsterdam."

  Poincaré tried rescuing his coffee with sugar. "I did," he said. "What was left of it."

  "Then we've got a puzzle. And there's this." He produced a second set of envelopes and handed one to Poincaré. "Copies of complaints in Middlesex County Superior Court filed several weeks ago to establish ownership of Fenster's hard drive, which is now being held as evidence by the state. Harvard and a man named Charles Bell have retained downtown law firms that bill at $600 an hour."

  "What's on the drives?"

  "Wouldn't everyone like to know. I put our best people on this, but they couldn't access a damn thing after months of trying. Apparently, Fenster created a password that mere mortals can't touch. They've gotten this far: the password consists of sixty-seven characters. Inspector, there's not a word in the dictionary for the number of combinations in a sixty-seven character password. I've run out of resources. Officially, this case is closed on our end. We did our work, our results confirmed yours, and we're not the agency of record investigating the murder. Which means I won't be getting any more money for data analysis. The State budget's too tight, and we've got an eight-month backlog as it is at the forensics lab. Officially, we're done. But from where I sit, this case is not nearly closed—for you, anyway. The FBI report complicates things. And then there's the hard drive."

  "What will you do with it?" Poincaré asked.

  "That depends."

  Poincaré sipped his coffee.

  Hurley leaned close enough for him to count the pores on his nose. Too close. "Everyone knows the crime lab in this state has its problems. We've got a habit of losing things. In fact, at the moment this is sitting on an evidence shelf at the lab in Sudbury, Mass." From the side pocket of his sport coat, Hurley produced a sealed Tyvek envelope. It was smaller than the other envelopes, with their documents. This one looked to have some weight to it. "To think the Commonwealth is closing this case down just when it's gotten interesting. . . . I've seen too much," said Hurley. "My work is all about budgets now, not like the old days when the boss said Just go find me the bastards. Next February will be thirty years, and I'm outta here. Probably time, anyway—with how forgetful I've been getting. Every
now and then I'll go out for coffee and actually leave things—keys, cell phone. So I've decided to retire with dignity before they wheel me out. You be in touch, OK . . . and pay that check, as long as you're sitting here."

  Hurley slid from the booth and exited the Busy Bee without a backwards glance. When Poincaré stood, he saw that the detective had left the Tyvek envelope on his seat. Poincaré sat once more. He did not know Hurley, who had shown him nothing but contempt ten weeks earlier. If the man, playing nice, now wore a wire and was setting him up to receive stolen evidence, then his career was over, stained for good. But that hardly mattered anymore. He lifted the envelope, feeling its heft, and slipped it into his briefcase.

  Outside the coffee shop, Poincaré could almost hear Ludovici laughing about the virtues of tainted evidence; and when his phone rang he half expected it to be Paolo with a hearty It took you long enough. Welcome to the world, Henri! But the screen blinked with an incoming text message from the ever-efficient De Vries:

  Chambi stayed at pension 2 blks from Ambassade. Checked in 1 week b4 bombing, left day of. GDV

  Chambi was in Amsterdam and in Paris with no apparent reason to kill either Fenster or Chloe. Yet there she was and they were dead— with Poincaré, Poincaré alone, the link. If he found her, he would kill her. His heart lurched and he took another pill.

  CHAPTER 23

  The view had not changed from the twenty-ninth floor of the State Street office tower, nor had Poincaré's fleeting but intense vertigo as he stepped from the elevator into the glass-walled offices of Charles Bell. A receptionist showed him to the same conference room where, months earlier, Bell had made such a lasting, unpleasant impression. Poincaré was sweating, though the ventilated air of the conference room was a pleasant seventy degrees. He felt ill and asked for water.

  "Inspector! It's been months—terrific to see you again!"

  Like the view of Boston harbor from these offices, the man striding into the conference room was unchanged: his smile as broad as a continent and not a millimeter deep. Poincaré had met less polished versions of Charles Bell in markets from New York to Marrakech. The smile was the thing. If the rug happened to have fewer knots per square unit than advertised, where's the harm? A wink and a special discount reserved for our very best customers.

  "Mr. Bell," he said. "Thank you for seeing me on short notice."

  "Charles, remember? Why are Europeans always so formal? I'm hoping you've brought news of progress, Inspector."

  "We're working . . . Charles. That's all I can say for the moment. But while I was in town this time investigating the murder, a few questions occurred to me. Do you mind?" He produced his photos of Chambi and Rainier and watched for cracks in the mask.

  "Ah, Dana! Very talented. I tried hiring her—giving her a stipend until she completed her degree. I would have paid her whole overpriced ticket to Harvard, but she said someone was already doing that—and that she was returning to Ecuador once she completed her degree. Fenster and his altruists. She couldn't be involved in any of this."

  "The other one?" asked Poincaré.

  "Never seen her, Inspector."

  "When did you last see Ms. Chambi?"

  "Two months ago, at least. After James died, I contacted her. She said no again—pleasantly, as always, then left Boston without a forwarding address. Up to that point, for perhaps a year, I kept her on a retainer. You know, a few hundred dollars a month to come down every so often and talk with my people."

  "In order to—"

  "To entice her to stay. What else? One of my personal marketing schemes that failed."

  "She and your staff would talk?"

  "That was the point. We'd catch up on new trends in mathematical modeling. There's nothing like a grad student to keep you connected to what's hot in a field. She'd learn about our operations, but as I say she didn't bite. I've tried a half-dozen ways to find her, starting with the Ecuadoran Embassy. Let me know if she turns up, OK?"

  Poincaré worked himself into a chair and unbuttoned his collar. In his briefcase was the hard drive, in Hurley's envelope, which Bell would have ripped open with his teeth if he only knew. "Dr. Fenster had a laptop computer, Charles. Apparently, you and the university can't agree on who owns it."

  "You might call it a difference of opinion. That's right."

  "More like a war is what I heard."

  Poincaré loosened his tie.

  "I hate a bully, Inspector. Harvard has no right to the hardware I bought for Fenster. It wasn't enough I paid the university close to $8 million for the computers they linked into a massive array somewhere in the Science Center basement? It's madness. Those machines cost at most $5 million and the university pocketed the other $3 million for overhead. A total scam—James knew it and I knew it. So I also paid him on the side, for incidentals. He used that money to buy the laptop—he told me so directly. I only want what's mine. The only thing a bully understands is a punch in the nose."

  "So you filed suit."

  "Which is how people with money fight in America. I've spent $20,000 on lawyers already, and I'm prepared to spend ten times that. It's galling, the way the university grabs whatever it wants. Not this time." His face flushed, and he looked and sounded just like a man driven by principle.

  Poincaré did not believe a word of it. "You know, I was talking with Peter Roy the other day, Fenster's attorney, and I learned that in his will Fenster left everything to the Math League of Cambridge. If he didn't leave you his laptop specifically, wouldn't the Math League have the strongest claim? But I see they're not involved in this suit just yet. I've read the filings."

  "This is your idea of entertainment—to read court filings?"

  Poincaré felt too sick to parry.

  "Not to worry, Inspector. I've already reached an understanding with the faculty advisor at the high school. If my suit fails, I'll back the Math League's claim to the hard drive. They will prevail, and for a consideration I've already paid they'll give me the drive. Or, rather, loan it to me for a time. It's a win-win: Harvard gets spanked and the Math League won't have to worry about funding for the next 200 years. And I get to support a cause dear to James's heart."

  "Excellent," said Poincaré. "I heard you were generous. Now I know you're clever and generous."

  Bell caught his reflection in the glass and aligned his cuffs.

  "It's admirable," Poincaré continued, "that you would help the Math League this way. But it's difficult to imagine that the contents of Fenster's hard drive have nothing to do with your generosity. What do you suppose is on the drive?"

  Bell watched an Aer Lingus flight land at Logan. "Let's settle this," he said. "I've told you about Fenster's relation to the work we do, about our occasional chats. What we've accomplished with our modeling of the markets goes well beyond anything he and I discussed over stale biscuits and coffee. I want the hard drive because I want it. Because Harvard pisses me off. They own his mainframes, which I paid for, and everything on them. And now they want a $400 hard drive as some sort of cherry to crown their $25 billion endowment—which has sunk like a stone because they didn't invest in my funds? Like hell! I'm going to bloody their nose, and I don't care what it costs. And I hope you came with another question because this one's exhausted. What's the French word for that—exhaustion?" Bell turned back to the room. "Inspector?"

  Poincaré heard the question but could not answer. He had slumped sideways across the table, clutching his chest.

  PART III

  •

  Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain,

  and a path for the thunderstorm?

  — JOB 38:25

  CHAPTER 24

  He woke with no tags on his toes or coins in his eyes. He could see monitors blinking and hear the squeak of rubber-soled shoes along a corridor. If Poincaré needed further proof he was alive, every part of him ached as though he'd been pistol-whipped. Alive, then; but hardly well: a tube ran from under the sheets to a bag he chose not to examine too clos
ely; IV lines ran into veins at both arms and at the back of each hand; a sensor clamped on his finger monitored levels of oxygen in his blood; wires ran from leads on his chest; and at his bicep a cuff inflated every ten minutes, waking him each time he managed to doze. A bona fide hospital had got hold of him.

  "I imagine you've had better days," said a doctor, stepping around a curtain. He flipped through the pages of a chart and checked the monitors. "The first thing to do is change your medications. Your heart responded well to intravenous dosing with an anti-arrhythmic, so we'll continue that approach in pill form. Your heart's now in normal sinus rhythm, Mr. . . ." He consulted the chart. "Inspector . . . Poincaré. That's the good news."

  The embroidery on the man's jacket read Maxwell Beck, Director of Clinical Cardiology. Poincaré had been rushed to the emergency room of one of Boston's teaching hospitals; later, as he drifted in a medicated sleep, he was transferred to the Cardiac Care Unit, where he now lay tethered to his bed like a dog to a fence post. Aside from the births of his son and grandchildren, he had not a single positive memory of hospitals. He fought a strong impulse to pull out the tubing and run.