Thankfully, inside the costume, he was carrying all that he needed: the digital video camera, the computer card, and McClaren’s explosive. But the duffel, now at risk, was also his escape. That damn headlamp had made him change things—and now, like dominoes, those changes were forcing others. If they find that duffel …he thought, already searching for an alternate way off the train.
Time now was everything.
The crash-test dummy slowly turned its head until the man inside it confirmed car eight was empty. Then he pushed a child dummy off his lap, sat that child in the seat he’d occupied, and hurried down the aisle to seven.
These moments of movement, dressed as a test dummy, were the riskiest. He had a few pat answers down, if confronted: “part of the show—don’t tell anyone!” “undercover security, and it’s important it remain undercover.” But if real security or maintenance stopped him, it would get ugly.
He hurried to the lavatory, shedding the costume in favor of the black pants, white shirt, and tie he wore underneath. To this he clipped the all-important NUS identity tag that from a distance at least looked a decent replica. Under scrutiny it might not hold, and this thought caused him to flush with unwanted heat.
He used his set of keys—the shapes and dimensions stolen from NUR corporate—to unlock the lavatory’s trash disposal bin, and he hid the uniform along with the two halves of its plastic head. If needed, he might resort to this costume again. With this change in clothes he could move freely through the train. With each new step in his plan, he felt closer to the end. He stretched for it now, knowing these next few minutes represented a lifetime. Maybe many lifetimes, if things went poorly.
As a security man, Alvarez crossed into car seven and walked its empty aisle, the eerie mannequins staring at his back. He headed straight for the mechanical closet. He opened it, unlatched and opened the divider, and quickly stepped inside, pulling the unlocked door closed.
Here was where the headlamp was to have assisted him. Without it, he worked now in the gray haze seeping under the door and the limited light cast off by a few amber and green LED indicators from the guidance computer. He connected his video camera to the train’s audio/video feed without trouble. The timing of his showing that video would depend on Goheen staying on schedule; the tape contained ten blank minutes. Goheen—a man obsessed with staying on schedule—was supposed to greet his guests as the F-A-S-T Track crossed the Delaware, making reference to George Washington and to American ingenuity and glory.
Next, as he’d rehearsed, he used a Leatherman pocket tool to unscrew and remove the face plate from the GPS guidance device, a metal box about the size of a book. He faced a circuit board, a cream-colored resin epoxy board containing dozens of gray chips and other smaller, piggybacked boards, all connected by razor-thin silver lines.
For him, the beauty of the NUR design was the redundancy factor. There was not one GPS board but three, all in sockets next to one another and in the center of the circuit board. If one board failed, the next took over for it in nanoseconds. Had the system contained only one board, Alvarez could not have hot-swapped his replacement. The system would have crashed. But with three, he merely removed the second and replaced it with his own, a board programmed both to misdirect the car’s stabilizer and to trick the locomotive’s computer into believing all three cards were functioning normally. The replaced board functioned exactly as did the others and therefore would not pass the handling of the car’s guidance to the third, and final, backup card. More important, someone looking at this replacement would see no difference when compared to the others. If inspected, it would go undetected. The actual differences between the boards were several: the NUR board was programmed to this train route, designed to anticipate and adjust the stabilizers as the car approached a particular bend in the track. Alvarez’s replacement was blank—its GPS memory erased—and yet it would send out a signal to the locomotive’s server that all was well. Without the route programmed in, this board would not signal the stabilizers of an impending curve. It would also displace the stabilizers if the train slowed more than ten miles an hour, removing the center of gravity and causing the car to derail. But the crowning achievement for Alvarez was his computer virus. This virus sent itself out over the diagnostics data port and corrupted each GPS board in succession, all of which would then report to the server that they were in perfect order. With the installation of this single board, he’d corrupted the entire guidance system in every car but the locomotive.
If on the outside chance Goheen met his demands, then this card could be identified and removed, the guidance system re-booted from the locomotive’s server, allowing the train to slow to a stop without incident.
In less than thirty seconds, it was in place. Alvarez withdrew the portable GPS device that showed him the train’s exact location, speed, and time to destination. In forty seconds, the southbound train would reach a straightaway that would be maintained for over ten minutes. Alvarez waited out those seconds in stomach-knotting tension and then ran the metal tip of his screwdriver to the base of the processing chip on the first guidance board, shorting it out. A tiny spark flashed, and the air smelled metallic. Handling of the car’s stabilizers passed instantaneously to the replacement board, where an LED continued to glow green, just like the others. At that same instant, the virus began to spread to the other cars.
Alvarez held his breath, waiting, his legs tensing. If the train suddenly began to slow—if his ruse had been detected by the server—then the train would likely automatically shut down. But the vibration remained steady. The purr beneath his feet warmed him.
In the end, it was Northern Union’s quest for total safety that made this system vulnerable.
He marked his watch, pushed PLAY on the video, and then peered out of the closet. His ten-minute grace period began to tick off. Seeing the car still empty, he stepped out, replaced and latched the divider, and shut and locked the closet’s door. His final move was to fill the lock mechanism with an instant-dry epoxy that would set fully in less than five minutes.
He still had a lot to get done, including his own escape.
Umberto Alvarez prepared to crash William Goheen’s party. He grinned at the irony of that expression.
Alvarez gathered his strength as he advanced toward the backs of the two maintenance men, the gear heads, who occupied the two right front row seats of car six. He could approach this one of two ways, but he opted for the bold.
As he came up behind them he intentionally startled them by speaking loudly. “Okay, guys, I got the wonderful job of checking the coupler.” He walked right past them, reached the door, and popped the red panic bar that opened it automatically. He offered them only a piece of his profile, but enough to show them that he had a tag clipped to his shirt. “If you hear me yell, come looking.”
He stepped out into the vestibule, where casually dressed reporters sucked on cigarettes and shared vodka on the rocks and war stories. A woman looked up and checked him out. He felt her study of him clear down to his toes.
He said loudly, “Sorry, folks, but I’ve got to ask you to take the party forward for a few minutes. We’re getting ready for the press conference. You can smoke in the vestibule between the next two cars.”
To his surprise, even the spoiled-looking guy with wet eyes didn’t object. They snubbed out their smokes and reentered the dining car. As the door shut behind them, Alvarez unlocked and opened the right-hand section of accordion wall that connected the two vestibules, and he reached outside. He tripped a release lever that allowed a flange of corrugated flooring to be lifted. This flange could move with the turning of the car through curves, but it connected cleanly, one vestibule to the other.
With this short piece of flooring lifted, Alvarez could see down past the massive coupler. Part rush, part terror, he kneeled just four feet above a railbed hurtling maniacally past at 180 miles per hour. For a brief moment he felt in awe of the technology that generated such speeds. For a moment he
felt empathy for William Goheen’s dream.
Unlike the freight cars, and most passenger trains in the United States, the couplings on the French-built high-speed trains were controlled electrohydraulically. A keyed switch on each car—both of which had to be operated nearly simultaneously—allowed coupling and uncoupling. For safety, the tension between two moving cars prevented uncoupling. In theory, only while the cars were at rest, in a yard or a station, and pushed against each other with a tug or locomotive to remove that pressure, could uncoupling take place.
For this reason, Alvarez reached down and placed the McClaren explosive onto the coupler alongside the main pin. It adhered to the forged steel magnetically. Checking his portable GPS one last time, he threw the two switches, starting the timer and triggering a tamperproof detonation device: if the magnetic bond with the coupler was disturbed, the bomb would explode prematurely.
Life is made of moments, and had Alvarez finished doing this at a different moment, his plans might have ticked along as scheduled. But after replacing the floor flange, as he was locking up the accordion wall, he felt an urgency to look over his left shoulder and through the tempered glass window into the dining car. It was a wholly inexplicable urge. His plans had called for him to hurry back to car nine and the waiting duffel bag. Escape!
He caught sight of the back of a woman’s head. A chill swept through him, and now he was drawn to trip open the door and go into the dining car. It smelled some of perfume, with a dash of locker room. His nerves were jangling. Something cut to his gut. He feared his plans had been uncovered. He took another step into the car, his heart beating wildly. He saw sport jackets hanging on coat clips, white shirts and ties and small orbs of sweat; he smelled beer and pretzels, Scotch and traces of cigars; he heard loud voices and laughter. Part high school, part summer camp, part press room. A few of the men appeared to have already reached a sloppy drunk.
Out the dining car windows, he caught sight of a faintly rust-red skyline. Trenton, New Jersey, he thought, realizing Goheen would start his press conference any minute.
The people suddenly seemed to be talking louder, their laughter directed at him. He knew he’d made a mistake entering this car. He wanted to turn around but felt himself resisting. What had drawn him in here? Who? A guest? A security guard? Goheen himself? That feeling burned in him—something was terribly wrong. He checked his watch. His video would start playing in less than three minutes.
A waiter bearing a tray of champagne held high was barely able to pass. He squeezed by Alvarez, excusing himself. Alvarez turned to move out of the man’s way, and as he did so, he couldn’t resist looking up ahead into the crowded car.
He made the move nonchalantly, a polite gesture to allow the waiter through.
There was that same woman, not ten feet from him. She turned her head away, just as Alvarez rotated, as if avoiding him. She wore a dark blue, crushed velvet cocktail dress. She had skin the color of pearls, her face framed in dark hair. Now she turned toward him. It was Jillian.
CHAPTER 35
“You’re telling me we’ve been walking right by this guy?” Coopersmith asked.
“I think so, yes,” Tyler answered quietly. They stood in the vestibule between cars eight and nine, tucked around the edge of the accordion connector alongside three carpeted shelves for luggage. “That dummy hidden in the maintenance closet was no practical joke, it was an extra. Extra because Alvarez is now occupying a seat.”
Coopersmith, distracted by the gun in Tyler’s right hand, didn’t seem to hear.
“And I think he’s probably monitoring our radios—both maintenance and security frequencies. We can’t use the radios.”
“You don’t know for sure he’s even aboard this train.”
“I bet we’re about to confirm that,” Tyler said. “We should be finding a black duffel bag, possibly with clothes inside, possibly with explosives, hidden behind the panel in one of the mechanical closets. That is, if we’re lucky. Otherwise he’s already moved that duffel to an overhead rack, where it’s blending in with the other carry-ons. In that case, whether he’s on board or not, this train could already be rigged to derail.”
“That’s bullshit. Besides, why the mechanical closets?”
“Because he hid the dummy there. We know he has access. A key. Whatever. And that means he has access to anywhere on this train—a full set of keys. I’d count on that.”
“But that’s just not possible.”
Tyler had no time to argue. “Normally, I’d try to get word to security. But now without using the radios we can’t trust security,” he said, returning to the ruse he had invented to protect himself. “That means I personally check every crashtest dummy on this train. And I’ll need your guys, the two guys in car six, to clear these four rear cars and block that door at six. We can’t let him slip by and reach the forward cars. Too many people there.”
“Yeah, okay,” Coopersmith said reluctantly. “I can do that.”
“We do the mechanical closets both for that duffel bag and for any tampering,” Tyler reminded him. “I’d pay special attention to the guidance systems.”
“You’re way off base on this.”
Tyler barreled ahead. “I’ll take car nine. You and I already did the closet in eight. But seven, six, and all cars forward have to be thoroughly rechecked.”
“No problem.”
“For now we’ll focus on these rear cars. If we have to move forward, if we start pushing guests around, it’s going to get sticky.” He asked, “What about under the cars?”
“At these speeds?”
“Can he access the electronics down there?”
Coopersmith considered. His face soured. “If he knew what he was doing, if he had the wiring schematics, it’s possible he could interrupt the data cables. But trust me, he doesn’t have the schematics.”
Tyler wasn’t so sure, but he held his tongue.
“And a hundred-and-fifty-mile-an-hour windchill? A man wouldn’t last ten minutes down there.”
For Tyler, it was still a possibility he needed to follow up. He didn’t put anything past Alvarez. He knew the man. “If you find that duffel, go on the radio and announce that you found the missing wrench. You got that?”
“Missing wrench,” Coopersmith echoed. For such a big man, he looked a little frightened, his face florid, eyes bulging.
Tyler again felt relief that Nell had left the train with Gretchen Goheen. He had a feeling Alvarez was hiding in car nine. If so, perhaps the train was already rigged to roll. The last car—nine—was the farthest from the action and, as such, presented the best hiding place. Tyler moved quickly.
Coopersmith went forward to empty the rear cars of any stray passengers and to block egress from six into the dining car.
Tyler entered car nine, at once excited and terrified. He walked to the far end of the car, to a locked door with a tempered glass window. It was dark out. Tyler couldn’t see a thing out there. He walked the car then, taking hold of each of the half dozen life-sized dummies that had been randomly placed about. He shook each of the dummies, ensuring they weren’t concealing a person. The mannequins were too small and skinny to hide anyone. If Alvarez was in here, he had to be costumed as a dummy.
Tyler marveled at the number of mannequins, the elaborate masquerade to impress the media, the expense to which Northern Union had gone.
By the time he reached the front of the last car, Tyler felt nauseous, disappointed, and in the throes of self-doubt. Through process of elimination, he’d convinced himself that he’d find Alvarez hiding here. Now, his thoughts strayed back to the undercarriage where they had found his original hiding place. Had he somehow eluded them during their exhaustive search? What if Alvarez had intended to remain outside for the whole trip? Tyler glanced at his watch. He didn’t have much time. The train was up to speed. There was no reason for Alvarez to wait. The longer he waited, the greater the chance of being caught.
It took Tyler three tries with the
keys to find the one that opened the mechanical closet. He stared into the empty space, more discouraged, and then worked on the latch to the interior panel. It came open. Lying on the floor in front of him, crumpled and standing on one end, was a black duffel bag.
“Oh, shit,” Tyler gasped aloud, not a soul within earshot.
The duffel’s zippers were not locked together, though a tiny padlock did hang there. This told him that Alvarez had been rushed, had left the duffel perhaps half expecting it might be found. A tad of encouragement buoyed him. He unzipped the bag and searched it. The largest of the items came out first, a stuff sack the size and shape of a sleeping bag. To keep him warm under that train, Tyler decided. Does this mean he’s still on the train, not under it? he wondered. The only other fairly large item was a cardboard shipping box, of a size to contain a crash test dummy, since the only bulky part of the costume would be the plastic head. He found duct tape, nylon webbing, a wire cable ratcheted winch called a come-along, flares, superglue, matches, spare batteries, and a laptop computer. But no explosives, no corrosive acid, no GPS devices.
Tyler focused on the computer. He tried to turn it on, but no surprise, it was password-protected. Maybe some lab tech at the FBI could some day access it, but for the time being, it was useless as evidence. His momentary encouragement lost ground to increasing panic: Alvarez was on board, and he meant business.
He got on the radio and announced he’d found the missing wrench. Coopersmith called back, “Yeah? Well we need you in seven.”
Parallel Lies Page 30
