It wasn’t all work for either Dexter or the two men on the boat. During their period of separation, they sought out new pleasures wherever they could be found. For Dexter, those pleasures were as diverse as rod and line fishing, photography, hill-walking and church architecture. The latter, leading to a growing passion for English history. For Carrington and Gregory, they were less sophisticated but perfectly acceptable. They found their pleasure in walking off the beaten track and finding far-flung pubs. They also worked together on the boat and somehow managed to teach themselves the rudiments of carpentry, boat electrics and diesel engine maintenance. Having serviced the engine themselves, they’d burst into laughter as they stared at each other, covered in oil, hands blackened and faces smeared. It wasn’t the look that made them chuckle though. What bought them both to fits of giggles and tears of joy was the shared realisation that, somehow, a drunken ex-convict and a posh city trader had reached a point where they were playing with engines. They were different people now and the thumping of that engine as it burst into life, told them the change hadn’t all been for the worst.
The alcohol-ravaged years hadn’t been kind to Carrington. Whilst his brain had pretty much recovered most of its brilliant gifting, his body was that of a much older man. They worked to repair it as much as possible along the way. Treatable wounds and sores had all but disappeared and dentists had made his teeth respectable again. Off-the-shelf medicines did their best with his insides and were helped along by the healthy diet that Philian Gregory insisted they stick to. Still, he would never run a marathon nor would he be able to assist his friend in some of the tasks they needed to carry out. He had no regrets about that. In fact, he woke every morning with a huge sense of gratitude that his mental faculties had not been destroyed by the lost years.
Gregory, on the other hand, had set himself a goal of becoming fitter than he’d ever been. That fitness had already paid off as he’d scaled impossible walls and run unimaginable distances to evade capture. Aware of the need for one of them to be able to perform such feats, he stuck at the intense regime and was now lean, sculpted and powerful enough to take on all-comers. To compliment this physical improvement, he taught himself martial arts, Marine fighting techniques and a number of other defensive skills. They were skills that he hoped that he’d never need to use, but the reality was that they were as necessary a tool to the team as Carrington’s computing ability.
When it came to the use of the limited numbers of weapons that they had been able to procure, they shared the training and pushed each other to new limits. The pistols that they’d retrieved from Hendrick’s and Powell were still in excellent shape and the rounds they used were readily available once you’d established initial contacts in the grey markets that surrounded most large towns. They practised with these as often as possible. At first, they’d used paper targets, but now they tended to go for live ones. Hitting rats and rabbits and an assortment of birds had two advantages. Firstly, they were harder to hit than set targets. Secondly, and most importantly, they desensitised the shooter to taking a life.
It had been hard for Gregory at first, even after his foray into murder with the two hitmen. Carrington had done all the other kills that followed. Prior to this change in lifestyle, Gregory had been the sort of person who was reluctant to stand on a spider. Now, he was comfortable with not only killing a rabbit, but also skinning it and cooking it. Carrington had long overcome such squeamishness and regaled his friend with tales of being on starvation’s brink and waking to the half-chewed, raw carcasses of various creatures during his oblivion years, including pigeons and even a cat.
Aside from the pistols, they had Tasers, crossbows, a souped-up air rifle and a vast assortment of knives. They rotated practise between these weapons and had become highly proficient in their use. The knives were always the weapon of choice, but they were ready to use whatever they had to if needs must.
When Dexter had informed them of his decision to join them, they’d asked him to do his best to get as fit as possible and to think about the necessity of building some sort of weapons base. What they didn’t know was that Dexter had many years of experience with guns, stretching back to his days in High School where he was a prize-winning shot. You didn’t live in America and not get to make the choice to arm yourself or not. He’d always chosen not to, but had taken enough time out at the range to ensure that, should he ever have to, he would be prepared. Dave had gifted him something of an armoury as part of the identity swap, delivering it covertly to the motorhome at some point in his first week on the road. Along with the weapons, blanks and live rounds aplenty had been stacked into the luggage bay of the camper. Sights, silencers and cleaning materials had completed the delivery.
Only when he was sure he was in a remote spot, did Dexter brush up on his shooting. At other times, taking Gregory’s advice, he chose instead to exercise and tone up the body he’d let go a little to seed. The long walks in the hills helped, but these had to be supplemented by lifting heavy rocks for a set time and the usual array of other aerobic exercises.
When the three got together in March, they each saw the change in the other. It was the sort of change that made them feel confident that they’d made the right decision and that they could never be instantly identifiable as the people they were. That meeting took place in a popular tourist location on the Trent and Mersey canal; the sort of place where the numbers of people were cover themselves and where local facilities suited. There was mooring for the boat, a holiday park that allowed motorhomes and, most importantly, a superb canal-side pub serving a vast range of real ales.
“Looking good.”, Gregory told Dexter as they shook hands, “A few weeks in the country and you’ve shaken off the London flab. Good stuff.”
“And you.”, Dexter replied, “Not quite the going-to-seed city trader image I first set eyes on. More the Hollywood mercenary. Although the beard needs work!”
Carrington joined them outside the boat and took a moment to blink in the daylight, as though he’d been tucked away inside for days on end.
“You’re both beautiful.”, he told them with a smile, “But, the question is, can you use that fitness to deliver?”
They both nodded in agreement, wondering where this was heading.
“Good.”, Carrington replied, locking the boat and heading towards the pub, assuming they would follow, “Because we need to down a few pints and talk about a few things, not least of which is what we propose to do aboutour first target. Just pulled it off the computer now. In other words, we’re going live again.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
“The important thing to remember,”, Carrington began explaining his findings to Dexter, “is that, from this stage on, we can’t be certain of anything. Every step we take has to assume the innocence of the party we are investigating. That is, until we find something concrete. Make sense?”
Dexter nodded his agreement.
“Good. Now, a brief summary of the system I’ve put in place. And to start, let me use an analogy that you might be familiar with. You have life insurance, I take it?”
“Plenty.”, Dexter’s reply was wary given the implication of what had been said.
“No, don’t worry, I’m not planning on your cashing it in anytime soon. I’m only using it as an example.”, Carrington sought to reassure him, “An example of the way that seemingly abstract circumstances can be quantified and used to predict outcomes. Your insurers use actuarial statistics. Every year, those statistics become more complex and more complete, but the aim has always been the same. They’re used to predict your life expectancy. From that, they calculate your premiums. Think of it as using the best of the best of past experience to make the best guess about the future. Not perfect, but the most reliable system nonetheless.”
“Now,”, he continued after a long draw on his pint, “I’ve used the same principles and applied them to the field of child abuse victims.
As you know, I have something of a background in mathematics. That background is complemented by the strange ability I possess to be able to see some patterns of order in what appears to be a very disordered world. Philian, on the other hand, is a little more nuanced in his thinking. He’s been studying the theory behind agreed practice in understanding those victims. Not my cup of tea at all, but it’s helped me refine my models.
Aside from numerous other factors, the theory tells us that there are standard patterns to the life-course of an abuse victim. For example, some use therapy to bring them healing, some display patterns of carrying on abuse into adulthood, some live on anti-depressants, and some kill themselves. And there are numerous other outcomes. All of which gives me a basis for building a model that can fit an identified victim into an expected future. We can’t necessarily predict which course they’ll take, but we can say that they will take one or the other. Which means that, if our speculations are correct, those that do not fit into the pattern are the ones we need to look at. They are the invisible players that have chosen another path. A path that we believe will lead to The Circle. Those invisible anomalies are the names my system generates. You still with me?”
“I am,”, Dexter took his time to reply, “although there’s one thing missing. How do you identify the victims in the first place?”
“Absolutely the right question.”, Carrington smiled as he replied, “And the next part of my explanation. In short, it’s the easiest part of the process. It shouldn’t be, but it is. And it’s all about the use of computers by those whose speciality is in other areas. The police believe their systems are secure. As do the social workers and medics who form the support circle around the victim. That’s a false belief. There are holes in the security that allow me in and which allow me to harvest names. Those holes are so obvious that the users assume they can’t exist. For example, the police mainframes are pretty tightly locked down, but, they allow data out into a less secure world. Prior to a court case, e-mails will be sent to victims. Those victims have less secure systems and most of the time, those e-mails are sent from laptops carried by assorted people out in the field. One constant, is the Victim Statement. You search for that and who’s been sent one from a specialist in the abuse area and you start to get names. Sure, they’ll be a lot missed, but it yields sufficient substance to give us a start.”
“But that can’t give you enough data, surely?”, Dexter asked.
“No, no, it doesn’t. We leave it to the victim to do that for us. Once we know their IP and e-mail address, it’s a short hop into the world of social media and the vast resources that we can gain from there. The delay in us getting that first name is because it takes time for the system to harvest the personal details that are posted out to the world, and then sort these into patterns of behaviour. It probably sounds more complicated than it is, but it seems to work. People think they’re unique, when in reality they follow certain standard pathways. Quantify those pathways, compare lifestyles that are on open display and then, you can slot people into pigeonholes. It’s not a new theory. The spies and the web monitors have been deploying this approach for decades. So too, the banks and credit card companies. I’ve just applied it to a different field.”
“Don’t worry if you still don’t get it all.”, Philian Gregory put a reassuring hand on Dexter’s arm, “I certainly don’t. But I do trust this man to deliver. So, if he says he has a name, then we should give it a whirl. Always remembering the start of this conversation. No action until we’re certain.”
“Come on.”, Carrington finished his pint and rose, “Let’s head back to the boat and I’ll fill you in.”
Still out of peak season, there were only a few boats moored up along the canal, and they passed only one old man walking a dog as they made their way to the boat. It was a good fifteen-minute walk away, tucked at the back of the visitor moorings in the Coventry Canal, even though there was space nearer to the junction. Even that spot was a little too public for Gregory and Carrington, but Dexter had convinced them that there was more anonymity in being in an expected place than in trying to hide in an illogical remote location. Besides, he had to walk back to his own home later and he didn’t fancy too long a trek along unlit towpaths. They walked in silence, each processing their own thoughts as they considered the next steps in their journey. Steps that would take them from many of the certainties of what had gone before and into much less definitive territory where every move was based on nothing more tangible than a best-guess system and their belief that they would find the centre of The Circle by tracking those who didn’t fit the normal pattern of behaviour. In this world, did anybody? It was all a very long shot, but then again, it was all they had to go on. Had they known where it would lead them, maybe they’d have called it a day. Then again, what they were headed towards was a place where the human mind was incapable of conceiving of.
“This is what I have.”, Dexter opened up a folder and lay copies of the contents across the boat’s small dinette table, “Our first mission, as it were. This could take some time, so I’ll brew up while you bring yourselves up to speed on it.”
The only sound in the cabin was of the kettle gently boiling and of the slight rustle of papers as pages were turned. Carrington loaded their largest coffee pot with grounds and let the caffeine seep into the brew for longer than usual before bringing a tray to the table.
“Okay?”, he asked.
“I think so.”, Dexter replied, “Although it’s an odd one.”
“I agree.”, Gregory poured the coffee for them all, “Not what we’d expect, but then, isn’t that the point?”
Walt Farnham was twenty-seven years old. Having graduated from one of the smaller Oxbridge Colleges with a First in Political Science, his entire academic career seemed exemplary in both behaviour and achievements. It was the sort of early history that seemed worthy of envy and which carried no threats into his future. Following graduation, he’d rejected several offers from the Civil Service and opted for the higher pay of the political lobbyist. That position had ended with his being head-hunted to an even higher salary as a researcher for a small, but expanding new economic think-tank. It all fitted with his background and with the sort of career path that the right contacts created for you.
“Seems normal enough to me.”, Dexter said, “Why has your system thrown him up?”
“He was admitted to hospital for an appendectomy at aged nine.”, Carrington explained, “All routine, except that he tried to touch a nurse up. Under the guise of a routine follow-up procedure, they put him under again, at the request of the hospital’s psychology team, and found signs of his having been abused. When they questioned him, he laughed it all off and explained it all away as self-indulgence. He was discharged, but the system kept an eye on him.”
“His parents were nothing special.”, he continued, “The mother worked in the school canteen and the father was a jobbing builder. Decent people, by all accounts, but never flush with money. When the mother died of breast cancer, Farnham was fourteen. Seems a hefty insurance premium paid out, as the family then moved to a very nice neighbourhood. The father retired early, enjoyed something of the high-life, with Walt knuckling down and putting all his energy into his school work.”
“I’m still not getting it.”, Dexter sighed.
“It’s fairly simple really.”, Carrington explained, “There was no insurance policy and there’s nothing to explain the change in financial circumstances. Except for one thing. When Walt was eighteen, his father died in unusual circumstances. Officially, it was attributed to suicide, but there was no note, no indication of his dwelling on the death of his wife and nothing in place to support his only son after his death. He was found hanging from a beam in his garage by Walt who, shortly after, set himself up in a small apartment close to his University. The apartment was bought outright in his name and he graduated without a penny of debt. Seems unusual, I’m sure you’
d agree. No overt abuse, but almost certainly a background theme to his growing up, probably with support from the father and very likely as a willing participant in his later years. The money came from somewhere, and my bet is that it was from supportive patrons.”
“It’s not enough.”, Philian Gregory couldn’t hide his disappointment at the sparsity of substance they were being presented with, “We don’t even know he was a victim of abuse. Aside from that hospital report, there’s nothing. You sure your system’s up to this?”
“What you have there,”, Carrington was on the defensive, “isn’t everything. It’s a summary. I’ve looked at some of the program’s thinking and done my own checks, and I’m happy it’s delivering a sound result. The hospital found traces of semen around his anus, for goodness sake! You attribute that to self-abuse? This was before routine DNA testing so they had to let it ride, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t a victim. And the monitoring from Social Services continued. They didn’t act, but there are multiple exchanges between different departments, still archived in old computer records that flag him as being at-risk.”
“Look,”, he continued after a pause, “I know you’re sceptical, but can we at least have a look? Remember, we’re not looking at dead-certs now, we’re in new territory. If it comes to nothing, I’ll make changes to the system.”
“But what are we picking up on his current status?”, Dexter asked, “I thought that social media was our goldmine here. Is there anything there?”
“Yes and no.”, Carrington replied, “And that’s my other reason for wanting to pursue this one. Putting it simply, Walt Farnham doesn’t really exist in the cyber-world. Given his age, work profile, contact circle and social status, that’s enough of an anomaly in itself. Yes, he’s there when connected to Walt Farnham the employee. But there’s nothing out there to give any indication of Walt Farnham the individual. No Facebook, no Twitter, no connection to any web-related groups at all. You think that absence doesn’t say more than any large presence he might have? Because I do.”
Philian Gregory Page 31
