Gridiron

Book Four

For an architect there was only one place to live in LA and that was Pacific Palisades. It was not the exclusivity of the area, so much as the fact that it was the location for many of LA's more famous examples of modernist architecture. For the most part these were square, steel constructions, Mondrian-coloured, with lots of glass, and which resembled Japanese tea-houses or German worker bungalows. Mitch did not care for any of them, although as an architect he understood why they were significant: these were houses that had influenced multiple housing throughout the whole of the United States. For him they were fine to look at in books, but to actually live in one was a different matter. It was surely no accident that Frank Lloyd Wright's Ennis House in Griffith Park was virtually derelict. Just about the only house he thought he could have lived in around here was Pierre Koenig's house in the Hollywood Hills, although this preference owed more to the spectacular view than to the building's architectural merits. On the whole he preferred the quasi-rural houses that characterized that part of the Palisades known as Rustic Canyon, with its log cabins, horse paddocks and beautiful gardens.

Not that Rustic Canyon was without its own examples of modern architecture. On one of the uppermost slopes of the Canyon stood what Mitch considered to be one of the finest private houses ever built by Ray Richardson: his own.

Mitch drew his car into the curve of a honey-coloured concrete wall broken by a pedestrian entrance bridge that spanned a small creek and led up to the front door, facing the distant ocean.

A man and a woman whom Mitch vaguely recognized as English popmusic stars came down the lane on horses and wished him a good morning. That was another reason Mitch liked the Canyon. Up here money was friendlier, apparently unaffected by the obsession for defensible, post-holocaust-style architecture that characterized the rest of LA. There was not a security camera or a length of razor wire in sight. Up here people relied on the height of the hills, the distance from the inner city and discreet armed patrols to protect them against the perceived threat from LA's underclass.

Mitch crossed the footbridge. He disliked giving up his Sunday morning to talk about work, even if it meant a rare offer of brunch at Richardson's house. Ray had said they were just going to relax and spend some time together, but Mitch didn't buy that. The only time Ray Richardson ever relaxed was when he was asleep, and of this he seemed to require very little.

The invitation had also included Alison. But Alison's dislike of Richardson was so acute that she could not bear to be in the same room as him. At least, Mitch reflected, he would not have to spend his Sunday afternoon lying to her about where he had spent the morning.

Mitch knocked and slid the frameless panel of glass to one side. He found Ray Richardson in his study, kneeling on the blue slate floor, inspecting the drawings for yet another project that were still spilling out of the wide-body laser printer — a new heliport in the centre of London — and dictating notes to his green-eyed secretary, Shannon.

'Mitch,' he said brightly. 'Why don't you go upstairs to the living room? I won't be a minute. I just have to check these E-mail drawings from the London office for a meeting they've got tomorrow morning. Want a drink, buddy? Rosa will get it for you.'

Rosa was Richardson's Salvadorean maid. Mitch encountered her on his way back to the living room, a small, skinny woman wearing a pink uniform. He thought of orange juice. Then he thought of an afternoon at home.

'Rosa, could I have a pitcher of frozen margaritas, please?'

'Yes, sir, right away.'

In the living room Mitch looked for something to sit on. There were six plain white dining chairs grouped around a dining table. A leatherand-stainless steel recliner and, on two sides of a square glass table, two pairs of Barcelona chairs, twin acts of homage to the great Mies van der Rohe. Mitch tried the Barcelona chair and was immediately reminded of why he had got rid of his own.

He collected a copy of LA Living off the glass table and switched to the recliner. This was the issue he had heard about but not yet seen: the one with Joan Richardson lying naked on a sofa of her own design like some grande odalisque — with the accent on grande, he thought. The issue that had been the cause of her legal action against the publishers for failing to retouch away the large curl of pubic hair that was clearly visible at the base of her fat, Earth Motherish buttocks. With her small, delicate feet, legs swelling rapidly upwards to her Percheron mare's hips, narrowing to a small hoop of a waist, and then swelling once again into the formidable delta that was formed by the plastron of her breasts and her Hulk Hogan-sized shoulders, Joan Richardson bore a strong resemblance to the Fernando Bolero bronze outside the Gridiron. Los Angeles magazine had dubbed the fat lady bronze 'the Venus de Meatloaf'. But around the office they called it JR.

Rosa returned with the pitcher of margaritas and placed it and a tall glass on the table. Mitch sipped it slowly, but it was another hour before Richardson finished what he was doing, by which time the pitcher was finished. Mitch noticed that Richardson had changed into riding pants and boots. He looked like some tyrannical film director of the silent era: D. W. Griffith, or Eric von Stroheim. All he needed was a megaphone.

'OK, Mitch, let's have that brunch,' he said, rubbing his hands. 'Rosa!'

He placed an avuncular hand on Mitch's shoulder. 'So, how are you, buddy?'

Mitch smiled thinly. 'Fine,' he said, although he was angry at having been kept waiting for so long. 'Have you been riding?'

'Oh, you mean this get-up? No, I'm playing polo at twelve,' he said. Mitch glanced at his watch. 'It's eleven-fifteen, Ray,' he said with more than a hint of accusation.

'Damn. Those drawings took longer than I thought. Well, we can still have half an hour together, can't we? You know, we never talk any more. We should spend more time together. And now that the Yu building is almost out of the way, we will. I know we will. Our greatest achievements are ahead of us, I'm certain of it.'

'I've been thinking that I'd like to do more designing,' said Mitch.

'Maybe that factory the Yu Corporation is planning to build in Austin.'

'Sure, Mitch, sure.' Richardson sat down on a Barcelona chair. 'But, you know, anyone can design. It takes a special kind of architect to be a good technical coordinator. To translate those rarefied architectural concepts into practical instructions for the poor bastards who have to build them. Remember that idiot Grabel's design for the roof? A piece of shit. You were the one who fixed it, Mitch. To Grabel it looked like the same roof as before. He didn't understand how impractical the original design had been. It was you, Mitch, you who took it, who looked at the different ways you could do it and who came up with the best way of achieving that roof, practically. Most designers arejust frigging themselves. I know what I'm talking about. They design something because they think it looks nice, but you, you take what looks nice and make it look real. You're bored. I know you've been bored for a while now. It's always like this at the end of a job. But it'll be different when you start something fresh. And don't forget there's a substantial share of profit coming to you on this job, Mitch. Don't forget that, buddy. There's going to be a large cheque due to you at the end of the financial year.'

Rosa arrived with a tray. Mitch helped himself to some orange juice and some kedgeree and started to eat. He wondered if Ray's little pep talk had been the real reason for asking him over. Certainly he thought Richardson could ill afford to lose another senior member of the firm so soon after Allen Grabel. And Ray was right about one thing, at least: good technical coordinators like Mitch were hard to find.'

'When's the practical completion inspection?' asked Richardson, pouring himself a glass of orange juice.

'A week Tuesday.'

'Hmm. That's what I thought.' Richardson raised his glass. 'Cheers,' he said.

Mitch tossed his back.

'Tell me, Mitch,' said Richardson, 'are you still seeing Jenny Bao?'

'It would be hard not to. She's the feng shui consultant on the Yu job.'

Richardson grinned unpleasantly. 'Come on, Mitch, you know what I mean. You're fucking her. And why the hell not? Good luck to you, that's what I say. She's a beautiful girl. I wouldn't mind fucking her myself. I always fancied having Chinese, only I never did. Is it a long-term thing, do you think?'

Mitch said nothing for a moment. There seemed little point in denying it. So he said, 'I hope so.'

'Good, good.' He shook his head. 'Alison know about it?'

'Why the sudden interest?'

'Hey, we're friends, aren't we? Can't I ask a friend a friendly question?'

Richardson smiled.

'Is it a friendly question? More to the point, Ray, how did you find out?'

'I've known about it since you took her to the marble factory in Vicenza.' He shrugged. 'A German client was staying at the same hotel as you.'

Mitch put up his hands. 'OK, OK.' He forked some kedgeree into his mouth. He had little appetite now his secret was out. 'You're not eating,' he observed.

Richardson glanced at his watch again. 'I don't want to spoil my game,' he said. 'Besides, I'm not really hungry. You can sure pick them, Mitch. I'll say that for you, buddy. I never figured you for the type.'

All of a sudden Mitch disliked himself almost as much as he disliked Ray Richardson. 'Neither did I,' he said unhappily.

'Look, Mitch, I want you to ask Jenny a small favour.'

'That means it's a large one. What is it?'

'I want you to get Jenny to sign off on the Yu building's feng shui before we go ahead and make the changes.'

'Why?'

'I'll tell you. Mr Yu himself wants to make the inspection, that's why. And he'll feel a lot happier walking around the place if he knows your fucking girlfriend has given it the OK. OK? He'll be less likely to find fault with things. If there was time to make all her half-assed changes before he came on site then we would, but there isn't. It's that simple. Look, Mitch, it's really only for one day. After that she can tear the certificate up again, come up with some new objections if she wants to. But as soon as YK gives it the nod we can hit him with our fees. It's been an expensive few months, what with opening the German office.'

'I hear you. But I'm not sure she'll do it. I know it's a hard thing for someone like you to understand, but she's got principles.'

'Promise her a week in Venice. The two of you. Any hotel you like. The Cipriani, if you want. I'll pay.'

'I'll try my best,' Mitch said wearily, 'but she won't like it. She's not just some kind of fairground gypsy, Ray. It's not a question of crossing her palm with enough silver. Jenny believes in what she does. And don't forget two people have died in that place. Jenny certainly hasn't forgotten.'

'But you will try and persuade her.'

'Yes. Yes, all right, I will try. But it won't be easy. And I want your word, Ray. That if she does sign the certificate, then she won't get screwed. That we'll carry out all the changes like we're supposed to.'

Richardson shrugged. 'Sure. No problem. And screwing her? Well that's down to you, buddy.'

'I hope it's just the feng shui that's at fault,' said Mitch.

'What the fuck is that supposed to mean? Relax, will you? Things will be just fine, I know it. I've got a good feeling about this job. Good luck is simply a matter of working hard and being prepared. My pre-PCI inspection is this Friday, right? With the whole project team on site. The building in action, so to speak, a working demonstration. Push a few buttons.'

Mitch decided to press a button of his own. 'That cop wants me to have the elevators checked out,' he said bluntly. 'He reckons it's possible they might have had something to do with Sam Gleig's accident.'

Richardson frowned. 'Who the hell's Sam Gleig?'

'C'mon. The security guard. The one who got killed.'

'But I thought they already arrested someone for that. One of those pain-in-the-ass demonstrators."

'They did. But they let him go again.'

'There's nothing wrong with those elevators. They're the most sophisticated elevators anywhere in California.'

'That's what I told this cop. They're working just fine. Aidan Kenny and I checked them ourselves. But he still wants Otis to come and take a look at them.'

'And where's this guy now? The one they arrested.'

'Free, I guess.'

'Free to stand outside my building and hand out more leaflets?'

'I suppose so, yes.'

'Dumb bastards.' Richardson picked up the telephone and called his secretary. 'Dumb fucking… Shannon. Get me Morgan Phillips, will you?'

He grimaced and shook his head. 'At his home? Yeah, where else? It's Sunday.' He replaced the receiver and nodded. 'I'll fix this in five minutes.'

'You're calling the deputy mayor? On a Sunday? What are you going to do, Ray?'

'Don't worry, I'll be at my most diplomatic.'

Mitch raised an eyebrow.

'Relax, Morgan's a friend of mine. We play tennis together. And believe me, he owes me more favours… I'm going to get those bastards moved off the piazza. Out of your hair. I was going to have to do it anyway: the last thing we want is them outside again when YK turns up for the PCI.'

'Why bother?' shrugged Mitch. 'They're just a bunch of kids.'

'Why bother? Mitch, one of them broke your windshield, for

Chrissakes. You could have been killed.'

'I wasn't actually in the car at the time, Ray.'

'That's not the point. Besides, one of them is a suspect in a murder inquiry. Once they've seen there's nothing wrong with those fucking elevators the cops will have to bring him back in. You can bet on it.'

'Alison? It's Allen.'

Alison Bryan sighed impatiently. 'Allen who?'

'Allen Grabel.'

She took a big bite of the apple she was holding and said: 'And?'

'I work with Mitch. At Richardsons.'

'Oh.' Alison's tone turned cooler. 'Well, that's nice for you. What do you want?'

'Is Mitch there?'

'No,' she said flatly.

'Do you know where he is?'

'Of course I know where he is. What do you think, I don't know where my own husband is? What kind of a wife do you think I am?'

'No, I didn't mean… Look, Alison, I need to get in touch with him. It's really very urgent.'

'Sure it is. It's always urgent with you people. He's at Richardson's house. Seems like they had some business to discuss. As if they don't see enough of each other during the week. You could call him there, I guess. Who knows? Maybe they're in bed together.'

'No. No, I'd rather not call him there. Look, could you ask him to call me? The minute he gets home?'

'Is it anything to do with that stupid Gridiron building?'

She always made a point of referring to smart buildings as stupid, just to irritate Mitch.

'Kind of, yes.'

'Today's Sunday. That's the day of rest in case you'd forgotten. Can't it wait until tomorrow?'

'I don't think so. And I'd rather not speak to him at the studio. It would be better if he could call me. Tell him… Tell him…'

'Tell him what? That you love him?' She laughed at her own wit. 'That you're leaving on a jet plane? What?'

Grabel gave a profound sigh. 'Look, please make sure that he gets this message. OK?'

'Well surely.'

But Grabel had already hung up.

'Shithead,' said Alison and took another bite of her apple. She picked up a pen and held it momentarily over a notepad. Then she thought better of it. It was bad enough that Mitch was working on a Sunday. He spoke to his colleagues every day at the studio. She tossed the pen aside.

It was a couple of days before Mitch could bring himself to face Jenny Bao with his awkward mission. It would not be easy to persuade her to come round to Richardson's idea. He knew that she loved him, but that did not mean she was in his pocket. He left home early, bought some flowers at a service station on the Freeway, and was at the grey wooden bungalow before eight-fifteen. For another ten minutes he sat in the car justifying to himself what he was about to do. After all, it was only a temporary certificate. Just a few days. Not much harm in that. The morning was a fine one. Jenny's house looked neat and wellmaintained. Two orange trees in terracotta pots flanked the steps up to the mahogany front door. Mitch wondered what another feng shui consultant would have had to say about the auspices for his morning's errand.

He got out of the car, rang the bell and found Jenny already dressed, wearing a sweatshirt and pants. She was pleased to see him but he could tell she was suspicious about the flowers. He never brought flowers.

'Would you like some tea?' she asked. 'Or something else?'

Normally the 'something else' remark would have led to them making love. But Mitch felt that going to bed would be inappropriate in the circumstances. So he said yes to the tea and watched her as she made it in her own peculiar Chinese way. As soon as he had the little porcelain cup in his hands he came to the point, apologizing for having to ask, recognizing that he was putting her in a difficult position, but emphasizing the fact that the lie would only remain in existence for two or three days at the most. Jenny heard him out, raising her teacup to her lips with both hands, almost ceremonially, and then when he had finished, nodded without saying a word.

'Is that a yes?' said Mitch, surprised.

'No,' she sighed. 'Out of deference to you, I'm thinking about it.'

Well, that was something he thought. He had expected her to say no outright. It was two or three minutes before she spoke again.

'Kanyu, or feng shui to you, is a religious thing. It's part of the Tao. The cardinal concept in Taoism is the Absolute. To possess the fullness of the Tao means to be in perfect harmony with one's original nature. What you're asking me to do would disrupt that harmony.'

'I understand,' he said. 'I'm asking a lot, I know.'

'Is this completion inspection really so important?'

'Very,' he said.

She was silent for another minute. Then she put her arms around him.

'On the face of it, I'm inclined to say no, for the reasons I mentioned. But because it's you, and because I love you, I don't want to let you down. Give me twenty-four hours. You'll have my answer then.'

'Thanks,' he said. 'I understand how difficult this must be.'

Jenny smiled and kissed him on the cheek.

'No, Mitch, I don't think you do understand. If you did, then you would never have asked.'

'But you're not giving up now,' said the Japanese. 'Surely…'

'You bet I'm giving up,' said Cheng Peng Fei.

'Why? You were just beginning to get the idea.'

'Someone tried to frame me for murder of a security guard at the Yu Corp.'

They were back in the Mon Kee Restaurant on North Spring Street with the Japanese working his way through another tableful of food, and Cheng Peng Fei nursing a solitary beer.

'Frame you?' The Japanese laughed. 'You sound like Jimmy Cagney.'

'Believe me, I was lucky to get away. I thought the police were going to charge me. I'm still not sure they've entirely given up on me. I had to surrender my passport.'

'Who would want to frame you, Cheng?'

'I don't know,' shrugged Cheng. 'Maybe someone from the Yu

Corporation. Maybe you. Yes, maybe you did it.'

'Me?' The Japanese sounded amused by the idea. 'Why me?'

'Maybe you killed that security guard.'

'I sincerely hope you didn't present this theory of yours to the police.'

'I didn't mention you. How could I? I don't even know your name. You've been careful that way.'

'Maybe you're wearing a wire as we speak.'

'Maybe.' But as he said it Cheng unbuttoned his shirt to show that there was nothing taped to his chest. 'Anyway,' he added, 'the demo's ended. Someone in City Hall got on to Immigration and had us all checked out. One or two were in violation of their visas. They were supposed to be studying English, not making money working in restaurants.'

The Japanese shook his head sadly.

'That's too bad,' he said. 'I guess now I'll have to get involved myself. Score something off my own bat.'

'Like what?'

'Oh, I don't know. Maybe a little sabotage. You wouldn't believe what I'm capable of.'

'You're wrong about that. I think you're probably capable of just about anything.'

The Japanese stood up.

'You know, if I were you, Cheng, I'd make sure I'd got myself a good alibi.'

'When for?'

The Japanese threw some bills on to the table.

'For as long as it takes.'

Allen Grabel telephoned Richardson Associates and asked to speak to Mitch.

The receptionist was called Dominique. 'Who shall I say is calling?'

Grabel had an idea that Dominique did not like him much, so he restricted himself to his Christian name. Mitch probably knew two or three people called Allen. He waited for a few moments. Then

Dominique said, 'I'm sorry. There's no reply. Can I take a message.'

'Ask him to give me a call.' Grabel left his number. She was hardly likely to recognize that. 'As soon as he gets back.'

Grabel replaced the phone and glanced at his watch. He had fifteen minutes to go until his next drink.

Why had Mitch not called him back? There could only be one reason: his witch of a wife had not passed on the message. No wonder Mitch was having an affair with that woman he had seen outside the Gridiron building. Then it came to him that the Gridiron was probably where he would find Mitch. He was hardly thinking straight since that night. But Mitch would understand, he would know what to do.

Grabel picked up the phone and punched out the number. As soon as it started to ring he replaced the receiver. With the telephone system they had at the Gridiron you never knew who might have been listening in. He glanced at his watch again. Ten minutes to go. But he couldn't very well go back there. He was afraid, scared of what might happen to him. Suppose he had imagined it all? What would they do to him then? It was almost as scary as the alternative.

Kay Killen spent the day before Ray Richardson's pre-PCI inspection in the boardroom on the twenty-first level checking through the twodimensional plans and three-dimensional models of the Gridiron on computer. She also looked at the visual record of the project on Photo CD, just in case Richardson wanted to analyse any part of the scheme in detail, or demonstrate the evolution of the design. She had even arranged to have the main model of the building transported from Richardson Associates' offices on Sunset to the Gridiron boardroom, not to mention full-sized mock-ups of some of the components used in its construction. Where Ray Richardson was involved it was always best to be prepared for any eventuality.

It was late when she finished, leaving Mitch still working out an inspection schedule with Tony Levine, Helen Hussey and Aidan Kenny. She was glad to be getting out of the place. Although she was used to working late in empty office buildings, there was something about being in the Gridiron at night that she did not care for. She had always been sensitive to atmosphere, which she attributed to her Celtic ancestry and, unlike the rest of the project team, she was more than ready to believe in feng shui. Kay saw nothing wrong with trying to build something that was in harmony with the natural environment and in tapping the goodness of nature to benefit man. That the spirit of the land must be respected was, she thought, just another kind of environmentalism. Her privately held belief was that the place would feel better when the criticisms made by the feng shui consultant had been fully accommodated.

By the time she reached the cavernous garage her heart was beating quickly and she was beginning to feel a little nauseous. Public spaces, especially at night, made her nervous. Living in LA, she told herself, she was hardly unusual in this respect. But this was more than just urban paranoia. Kay suffered from a mild form of agoraphobia. Knowing she sometimes felt this way did not make it any easier to deal with. Nor did the fact that her car, a new Audi, refused to start.

Anger displaced nervousness for a few crucial minutes. Kay cursed and got out of the car to call the AAA from the security guard's office upstairs. She had the sensation that she was being watched, and performed a couple of walking pirouettes as she headed back across the garage, her heels echoing on the non-slip floor like the ticking of a metronome. Who else could be down here? Now that Sam Gleig was dead Abraham handled night-time security. Apart from her colleagues on the twenty-first level there was no one else in the building. Kay felt relieved when she re-entered the brightly lit elevator car and rode up to the atrium-

When the elevator doors opened the floor was in darkness, with only the light from the car behind her and emanating from some of the upper levels to let her see where she was going. The floor lights were often turned down at night. Since people who were working late usually exited the building from the garage, Abraham was saving energy. But his infrared sensors and cameras were supposed to note her arrival and switch the lights back on.

She was trying to work out why this had not happened when the elevator doors closed behind her and most of the available light disappeared.

Kay suppressed her panic. It was not as if she needed much light to know her way around the Gridiron. Her memory of the building's plan on every level was almost photographic. She had only to imagine herself seated in front of a work-station, using the CAD and steering her mouse to know exactly where she was going. Even before it had been built Kay had known her way around the Gridiron. When finally she went on-site and walked round the finished envelope she had experienced a sensation of odd familiarity.

But as she started to walk towards the security guard's office, she heard a voice she seemed to recognize.

'Can I help you, Miss?'

She felt her hair rising on her head.

'Is there anything the matter?'

Sam Gleig was standing in his familiar position at the front desk, his big hand resting on the gun he kept bolstered on his hip. And, althought it was dark, Kay realized that she could see him perfectly, in every detail, almost as if he had been standing in his own personal zone of artificial light.

'They say what happened to Mr Yojo yet?'

'What — what do you want, Sam?' Kay started to back away towards the elevator. 'Who are you?'

Sam laughed his big slow laugh. 'I don't mean to bother you at all,' he said. 'So who's working late tonight?'

'You're dead, Sam,' she whispered.

'Figured as much,' said Sam. 'Poor guy. Kind of a waste. How old was he?'

Kay felt the elevator behind her. She touched it with her hand. And yet the car did not arrive.

'Please,' she said. 'Please go away.'

Sam laughed again and inspected the toes of his well-positioned shoes.

'You gotta have somethin' to alleviate the boredom on a job like this. Know what I'm sayin'?'

'No, I don't.'

'Sure you do.'

'Are you — are you a ghost?'

'Didn't know there was such a thing. Goddamn. Goddamn, of course. Poor guy. Know something? This is about the safest job I ever had.'

Sam laughed again as Kay Killen started to scream.

In the boardroom on the twenty-first level, Mitch looked up from his computer and frowned.

'Did any of you hear something just now?' he asked.

His three colleagues shrugged or shook their heads.

Mitch stood up and opened the door.

This time they all heard it.

'Kay,' said Mitch.

The atrium was still echoing with her screams as they ran towards the elevators. On the way, Mitch leaned over the balcony and shouted down into the darkness. 'Kay, hold on, we're coming.'

'Jesus, what now?' said Kenny following Mitch into the elevator car. The doors slid shut and the car started its descent with Mitch banging on the walls impatiently.

When they reached the atrium Kay collapsed unconscious back into the elevator, her head banging on the floor of the car.

Mitch and Helen crouched anxiously beside her while Kenny and

Levine swiftly searched for whoever might have attacked her. By now all the lights were on and Kenny was soon back, shaking his head with bafflement.

'I didn't see anything,' he said. 'Not a damn thing. Is she OK?'

'She just fainted, that's all,' said Helen.

'It sure didn't sound like that was all,' observed Levine. 'Shit, I thought she was being raped or murdered for sure.'

Mitch lifted Kay against his chest while Helen fanned some air against her pale-looking face. Her eyelids flickered and she started to come round.

'What happened, honey?' said Kenny.

Levine came back, shrugging his shoulders. 'The front door's still locked,' he reported. 'And there's no sign of anyone on the piazza.'

'You're OK now,' Mitch said gently, as for a moment she became agitated again. 'You're safe now.' Then he helped her to lean forwards and place her head between her knees. 'Take your time. You just fainted, that's all.'

'Sam,' she said quietly. 'It was Sam.'

'Did she say Sam?' said Levine.

'Sam Gleig?' asked Kenny.

Kay lifted her head and opened her eyes. 'I saw him,' she said tremulously, and started to weep.

Mitch handed over his handkerchief. Kenny and Levine exchanged a look.

'You mean — like a ghost?' said Kenny. 'Here? In the Gridiron?'

Kay blew her nose and sighed profoundly.

'Can you stand up?' Mitch asked.

She nodded.

'It sounds crazy, I know,' she said, and let Mitch help her on to her feet. 'But I saw what I saw.'

She caught the look that passed between Kenny and Levine. 'Look, I didn't imagine it,' she said. 'He was there. He even spoke to me.'

Mitch handed Kay the purse she had dropped on the floor.

'I'm not the kind of person who would make up something like this. Or imagine it.'

Mitch shrugged. 'Nobody's suggesting you are, Kay.' He looked at her and added, 'Look, we believe you, honey. If you say you saw Sam, then you saw him.'

'You sure don't look like you're shitting us,' said Levine.

'He's right,' said Helen. 'You're as white as a sheet.'

'What did he say?' asked Kenny. 'What did it look like?'

Kay shook her head with irritation.

'Not it. I'm telling you, it didn't look like anything except Sam Gleig. Just listen to what I'm saying, will you? He looked the same as always. And he was laughing, too.' She opened her powder compact and frowned. 'Shit, I'm a mess. He said — he said he figured he was dead and that it was a waste. His exact words, I swear to God.'

'Come back upstairs,' said Mitch, 'and let's get you fixed up before you go home.'

'I think we could all of us use a drink,' suggested Kenny.

They stepped back into the elevator car and rode up to the twenty-first floor. While Kay attended to her make-up Levine opened the boardroom drinks cabinet and poured four shots of bourbon.

'I believe in ghosts,' declared Aidan Kenny. 'My mother saw a ghost once. And I never knew her to lie about anything. Never even tell a tall tale.'

'You've been making up for her since then,' remarked Levine.

'I'm not lying now,' Kay said firmly. 'It scared the shit out of me and I don't mind admitting it.' She finished her eyeliner and drained the glass before applying some more lipstick.

'What about the foundations?' said Levine. 'I mean, they're thirty feet deep, aren't they? Did we, like, you know, build on top of anything?'

'You mean an old Indian burial ground or something?' said Kenny.

'C'mon, man.'

'This site used to be the old Abel Stearns building,' said Mitch. 'One of those northern carpetbaggers from San Francisco who bought land here and built around the turn of the century. When the company got taken over in the 1960s, the new owners demolished it and the lot lay fallow until a developer came along. Then he went bust and the Yu Corporation bought the site.'

'But before Abel Stearns,' persisted Levine. 'I mean, this area was all Pueblo de los Angeles, wasn't it? Mexicans and Aztec Indians? Why not?'

'Don't let Joan hear you say the word Indian,' said Kenny. 'That woman's the Native American equivalent of the Reverend Al Sharpton.'

'Those Aztecs used to practise human sacrifice. They used to cut their victims' hearts out while they were still alive.'

'Just like Ray Richardson,' said Kenny. 'Anyway Tony, Sam was black. Or rather, African-American. He was no fucking Aztec. An asshole, maybe. What kind of security guard gets himself killed then spooks a defenceless woman like that?'

'Look', said Kay, 'I want you all to promise me something. I want you to promise me that you won't go around telling people what happened tonight. I don't want to turn into the office joke, OK? Will you promise me that?'

'Sure,' said Mitch.

'Of course,' smiled Helen.

Kenny and Levine shrugged and then nodded their acquiescence.

'Let's just hope we can get tomorrow's inspection done without any more mishaps,' said Mitch.

'Amen to that,' breathed Kenny.

Mitch returned to the Gridiron at seven-thirty the next morning. In the bright, flat sunlight it was hard to imagine how anyone could have seen a ghost in the place. Perhaps it was some kind of hallucination. He had read how an LSD experience could make a return visit at any time in your life, no matter how long ago the original experience had occurred, and Mitch thought that this, or something like it anyway, was the most likely explanation.

He'd wanted to call in to see Jenny Bao for her answer on the temporary feng shui certificate. But he was facing a whole day with Ray Richardson and he knew that his principal would arrive before eight. So the first thing he did upon his arrival was to telephone her.

'It's me,' he told her.

'Mitch?' she said sleepily. 'Where are you?'

'At the Gridiron.'

'What time is it?'

'Seven-thirty. I'm sorry, did I wake you?'

'No, it's OK. I was going to call you anyway. I decided to let you have your certificate in time for Monday. But only because it's you. And only because the Tong Shu says that Monday will be an auspicious day.'

'That's great. Thanks, Jenny. Thanks a lot. I appreciate it.'

'Yeah, well, there's one condition.'

'Name it.'

'That I come in some time today and perform a few office warming rituals. To ensure that all evil spirits leave the building and good qi is brought in.'

'Sure. What kind of rituals?'

'It's complicated. Among other things we'll have to take the fish outside. We'll also have to shut down the electrical power for a short while. And a red banner needs to be hung across the signboard outside. Oh yes, the windows will have to be darkened, but then you can do that automatically, can't you? And one more thing. I don't know how you'll manage this — I know you have a very sophisticated fire alarm system. I have to start a fire in a charcoal stove in the doorway and fan it until the charcoal is hot.'

Jesus,' said Mitch. 'What's the charcoal for?'

'It's to symbolize a warm result for Mr Yu's inspection on Monday.'

'I'll drink to that,' laughed Mitch. 'As far as I'm concerned, you can set fire to Old Glory if you think it's necessary. But does it have to be today?

We've got Richardson in all day. Could you come in at the weekend?'

'It's not me who says it has to be done this afternoon, Mitch. It's the Tong Shu, the Chinese almanac. This afternoon is a good day for the performance of ceremonies to banish evil spirits.'

'OK, I'll see you this afternoon.'

Mitch replaced the receiver and shook his head. In the circumstances he had thought it better not to mention what Kay Killen had seen. There was no telling what Jenny might have insisted on then. A full exorcism?

Dancing naked round the tree? how on earth was he going to tell Ray Richardson that Jenny Bao was planning to light a charcoal stove to smoke the devils out of his state-of-the-art building?

Frank Curtis awoke with a start and wondered why he was so depressed. Then he remembered: it was ten years to the day since his brother had died of cancer. Leaving his wife, Wendy, still asleep, he slipped out of bed and went into the study to find the cardboard box containing his photograph albums.

It was not that he needed to look at pictures to be reminded of what his brother had looked like. Frank Curtis had only to look in a mirror to do that, for he and Michael had been identical twins. Looking at the photographs was a way of reminding himself of what he had once been, half of a greater whole.

When Michael died it had been like losing an arm. Or some vital organ. After that Curtis felt he was only ever half a person.

Wendy appeared in the doorway.

'How can it be ten years?' he said, swallowing a lump in his throat the size of a baseball.

'I know, I know. All week I've been thinking the same thing.'

'And I'm still here.' He shook his head. 'There's not a day passes that I don't think of him. When I don't ask myself, why him and not me?'

'Are you going to Hillside?'

'Yeah.'

'You'll be late for work.'

Curtis shrugged carelessly. 'So what? I'm never going to make lieutenant anyway.'

'Frank…'

He grinned. 'Besides, I'm not on until one.'

She smiled back at him. 'I'll make us some coffee.'

'It's not like I need a stone to remember him, y'know? I always think of him like he was.' He shrugged. 'Maybe, after ten years, it's time to let him go a bit.'

But before he left the house, Curtis placed a small lawnmower in the trunk of his car.

Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery was only ten minutes' drive close to the San Diego Freeway and LAX. Every year Frank Curtis made the journey and, with 747s only a few hundred feet above his head, he worked to tidy up his brother's grave. A practical man, Curtis preferred to mark his remembrance with this small act of devotion. Like a penance, he thought. It wasn't much, but at least it made him feel a bit better.

By the time he got to New Parker Center, Curtis was in the mood to be distracted, to get things done and make other things happen. He typed reports, filed them with the relevant clerical officers, filled out his expense claims, reviewed his diary and said nothing.

Nathan Coleman watched his colleague and wondered what had moved him to this rare exhibition of bureaucratic efficiency.

Curtis unfolded a piece of paper and laid it on the desk. It was Cheng Peng Fei's handbill, protesting about the Yu Corporation's human rights record. He floated it towards Coleman.

'You know, I read that thing,' he said finally. 'He's right. Any company that's as involved with the Chinese government as the Yu Corp shouldn't be allowed to trade in this country.'

'Tell that to Congress,' said Coleman. 'We just renewed China's favoured-nation trading status.'

'It's like I always say, Nat. The whores on the hill.'

'Actually, I've been meaning to tell you Frank,' said Coleman.

'Something I heard this morning. Immigration is holding three of those other Chinese kids.'

'Why, for Chrissakes?'

'They said they were in violation of their visa requirements. They were working, or some shit like that. But I got a friend there who said that someone in the mayor's office pulled strings to get them kicked out of the country. Since when the demo outside the Gridiron has packed up and gone home.'

'That's interesting.'

'It seems this architect guy has a lot of friends up there.'

'Is that so?'

'In less than seventy-two hours they'll be on a plane back to Hong Kong,' shrugged Coleman. 'Or wherever it was they came from.'

'Cheng is still here, right?' said Curtis.

'Right. But even if he did meet Sam Gleig, forensic still says he couldn't have killed him.'

After a silence Curtis said, 'They never came back to us, did they?

Those Martians at the Gridiron were supposed to get an engineer from Otis to come and check the car's safety. It's been a week now. That's long enough in a homicide inquiry, wouldn't you say?'

'Maybe the computer forgot to make the call,' said Coleman.

'I've been thinking about that photograph, too. Supposing it was a fake, who better than someone in the Yu Corporation building to make it? That's a pretty fancy computer they've got there. How about this, Nat? Here's the motive: there is something wrong with those elevators, only someone wants to cover it up for a while. Maybe one of those architect guys. They've got a lot of money riding on this job. Millions. One of them said as much to me. He more or less asked me to keep the lid on any publicity. Said it would look bad if someone was killed in a smart building. Now would he think it was better that some pain-in-theass demonstrator should take the blame for an accidental death instead of their own damn building? What do you think?'

'I could buy that.'

'Good. Because so could I.'

'Want me to give them a call?' Coleman said. 'Those fuckin' Martians?'

Curtis stood up and lifted his coat off the back of his chair.

'I've got a better idea,' he said. 'It's Friday afternoon. They'll be winding down for the weekend. Let's go and make a nuisance of ourselves.'

Ray Richardson was the kind of architect who did not like surprises, and it was his standard practice to inspect exhaustively floors, walls, ceilings, doors, windows, electrical equipment, services equipment, sanitary-ware and joinery, accompanied only by the members of his own project team before repeating the same procedure formally with the client.

Even informally the inspection looked like it was going to take up one whole long day. Tony Levine would normally have preferred

Richardson's pre-PCI to have been carried out across several short periods rather than one protracted one when, through Richardson's own irritability, the result might be prejudiced. But as usual, his senior was working to a tight schedule.

After five hours of trooping round the building like a bus-load of tourists, the project team had progressed as far as the Gridiron's swimming pool. Measuring twenty-five metres long and eight metres wide, this was located under a curving rectangular louvred glass roof at the rear of the building and, with the exception of the sapphire colour of the 85deg water, everything — the walls, the floor tiles, HVAC louvres, even the corrosion protection barrier coating on the ceiling's steel trusses —

was the same grey shade of white. The general effect was both antiseptic and relaxing.

Behind a glass wall that protected the poolside refreshment area from being splashed by swimmers, Richardson checked the adhesion of tiles, the cleanliness of surfaces, the electric switches on the walls, the gully gratings on the floor, the high output coil solar cylinders for heating the water, and the joins between the suspended panels of silicone glazing.

'Do you want to enter the pool area, Ray?' asked Helen Hussey.

'Why not?'

'Then everyone will have to remove their shoes to protect the pool deck,' she ordered. 'The last thing we want are heel marks on those nice white tiles.'

'Good thinking,' he said. Leaning against the wall to remove his handmade English shoes, another thought occurred to him.

'It certainly looks like a nice enough pool. But looks are one thing, the experience another. I mean, what's it like to swim in? Did anyone think to bring a costume? Because someone should go in and report on what it's like. Maybe it's too warm. Or too cold. Or too chemical.'

'Or too wet,' someone murmured.

He looked at the team and waited.

'How about a volunteer? I'd go in myself if I had time, it looks so good.'

'Me too,' echoed Joan. 'But Ray's right, of course. Design considerations are one thing. Bather acceptability is another.'

Finally Kay Killen said, 'Well, I don't mind swimming in my underwear.' She smiled brightly and shrugged. 'In fact, I could use a nice swim. My feet are killing me.'

'Good girl,' said Richardson.

While Kay went into a changing room and removed her clothes, Joan, Tony Levine, Helen Hussey and Marty Birnbaum took off their shoes and followed Richardson on to the pool deck. Mitch stayed behind the glass wall with Aidan Kenny, Willis Ellery and David Arnon.

'You know what this reminds me of?' said Arnon. 'It's like we're all party functionaries following Hitler round his new Reich's Chancellery. Joan's Martin Bormann, right? Agrees with whatever he says. Any minute now the guy's going to fall down and start chewing the poolside, after which he'll send us all to a concentration camp.'

'Or back to the office,' shrugged Mitch. 'Same thing, I guess.'

They watched as Joan bent down and dipped her fat, heavily ringed hand into the water.

'So she's not a vampire,' remarked Kenny.

'Isn't that running water?' laughed Mitch.

'You're both wrong,' said Arnon. 'She's only putting her hand in the water to make it colder. Like the Snow Queen. Just in case Kay might enjoy it.'

'Bitch,' snarled Ellery. 'Why doesn't someone shove her in?'

'You go right ahead, Willis,' said Mitch. 'We'll sponsor you.'

Kay appeared on the pool deck wearing a purple bra and panties.

'Purple,' Arnon said triumphantly. 'What did I tell you? Pay up, suckers.'

The other three men groaned and handed him $5 bills as Kay walked to the poolside, collected herself with simian toes curled over the edge, and then executed a perfect dive, with no more splash than a well trained dolphin.

'What's the water like, Kay?' called Richardson.

'Beautiful,' she said, surfacing. 'I mean, really warm.'

'What kind of girl wears purple underwear?' complained Ellery.

'Girl with a tattoo, that's who,' said Arnon. 'You see that thing round her ankle?'

He was referring to the delicate daisy-chain of red-and-blue flowers that made Kay's foot look as if it had been carefully sewn on to her leg by some botanically-minded genius of modern micro-surgery.

'Where does Dave get his information. That's what I'd like to know?' said Ellery.

'Sometimes Kay wears see-through blouses,' said Kenny.

Arnon kicked off his shoes and moved towards the door to the pool deck.

'Let me through,' he grinned through his beard, 'I'm a lifeguard.'

Kay started to crawl up the length of the pool. She had the strong, easy stroke of someone who was used to being in the water.

'I think I'd better take a closer look myself,' said Ellery. He removed his shoes and followed Arnon's taller figure.

'That girl is bait,' said Kenny. 'I mean, Playboy centrefold. Take a closer look and you'll probably find a staple through her navel.'

'Last night doesn't seem to have affected her much,' said Mitch.

'The ghost?' said Kenny. 'I think we've found an explanation. Bob's trying to check it out. Having seen that we no longer have a night-time security guard, Abraham created one. Or, at least, a facsimile.'

'What do you mean, a facsimile?'

'A moving real-time image. A hologram. It's perfectly logical. I don't know why I didn't think of it last night. Tired, I guess. This kind of thing falls within Abraham's learning parameter. Without the real Sam Gleig there last night, Abraham created the next best thing. And after all, that's the whole point of the hologram, isn't it? To humanize an essentially inhuman system?'

'Aid, it damn near scared the life out of the girl.' Mitch shook his head angrily. 'She could have had a heart attack or something.'

'I know, I know.'

'She really thought that she'd seen a ghost. I'm not sure I wouldn't have had the same thought myself.'

'Abraham doesn't know about ghosts. He doesn't even understand the concept of death. Beech and I wasted an hour this morning trying to explain it to him. He's still on it. We just want to find out what happened, that's all.'

'And to prevent it from happening again, I hope.'

'Mitch,' Kenny said patiently, 'I don't think you fully appreciate the significance of what has happened here. This is great news. Beech is beside himself with excitement. I mean, the computer took an initiative. It didn't wait to be told something, or to choose from a set of prescribed heuristics. Abraham just went ahead and did it.'

'And what does that mean?'

'For a start it means that this building is a lot fucking smarter than up till now anyone has realized.'

Mitch shook his head. 'I'm not sure I like the idea of a computer that takes the initiative.'

'Look, when you think about it, this is just the logical consequence of having a neural net. A learning curve. Except that Abraham is learning things a lot faster than we thought he would.' Kenny grinned enthusiastically. 'You're taking this the wrong way, Mitch, really you are. I thought you'd be pleased.'

'How's that?'

'You'd prefer it if this place really was haunted? Or that Kay was seeing things? Come on, be reasonable.'

Mitch shrugged and then shook his head. 'No. I don't know. But there's something that doesn't make sense and I'm not sure what.' Mitch nodded at the glass. Richardson and his little entourage were walking backwards towards the door. 'He's coming back.'

'We'll talk about this later, OK? With Beech.'

'OK.'

'You're quite a swimmer, Kay,' Richardson was saying over his shoulder.

'I ought to be,' she said, still swimming. 'I was virtually raised on Huntington Beach.'

'You've got a lot of guts too: going in the water in just your underwear, in front of these dirty-minded bastards we work with. Stay in the water as long as you want, Kay. You've earned it.'

'Thanks, I think I will.'

'Let's take a look at those flotation tanks.'

'Welcome to the offices of the Yu Corporation, LA's smartest building. Hi! I'm Kelly Pendry and, for your convenience, I'm here to tell you what to do next. You won't however…'

'Jesus, not this again,' laughed Curtis. 'She could get to be a real pain in the ass.'

'And, since this is a completely electronic office, we cannot accept surface mail.'

'I wonder how that goes down with the mailman?' said Coleman.

'Maybe I should try it some time,' said Curtis. 'Might stop me getting so many bills. Do we really have to wait until the end of the record?'

'… and the person who is expecting to meet you…'

'What the hell's wrong with having a real person on the front desk anyway?' He sniffed the air suspiciously.

'Security, Frank. What else? Would you want your wife to sit there on her own and speak to some of the creeps that come in?'

Curtis nodded. 'Actually, I think they told me that. Mitchell Bryan. He said the Yu Corp are scared someone might kidnap a real receptionist, if they had one. What's that smell, Nat?'

'Man, this is what it's going to be like, more and more,' Coleman chuckled.

'Like rotten meat?'

'I can't smell anything. You're not obsolete, Frank. You've just got to learn a new way of doing things.'

'… as your voice will be digitally encoded for security purposes.'

'Detective Sergeant Frank Curtis, LAPD. I'd like to speak to Helen Hussey, or Mitchell Bryan, from Richardson Associates.' He stepped back from the desk. 'Maybe you're right at that, Nat.'

'Detective Nathan Coleman, LAPD. I'd like to see them too. Either one. Comprendo?'

'Thank you,' said Kelly. 'Please wait a moment.'

'Computers,' spat Curtis.

'You've got to be patient, Frank. That's all. Take my nephew, Dean. He's seven years old and he already knows more about computers than I ever will. You know why? Because he's patient. Because he's got all the time in the world. Jesus, if I had the time to spend on it he does I'd be Bill fucking Gates.'

'Please proceed to the elevator area where someone will collect you.'

They went through the glass doors, glancing up the height of the tree, and noticing a beautiful Chinese woman who was trying to collect carp from the ornamental pond with a landing net.

'Cu-ute,' murmured Coleman.

The two men stopped and looked into the water.

'Had a bite yet?' quipped Curtis.

The Chinese woman smiled pleasantly and pointed to a large plastic container by her feet in which three fish were now swimming. Nearby was what looked like a small wooden packing case. Inside it was a round stone crucible, stacked with sticks of charcoal.

'But even with a net, it's not so easy,' she said.

'You planning a barbecue?' said Coleman.

When the woman looked puzzled Coleman nodded towards the charcoal stove.

'Me, I like my goldfish crispy on the outside. And still on the bone, please.'

'Cut it out, will you?' said Curtis. He looked at the woman. 'I apologize for my colleague. He goes to the movies a lot.'

The woman gave a little bow and smiled a perfect smile. 'I'm used to wisecracks in my line of work, believe me.'

'Well, good luck,' said Curtis.

'That's the general idea,' she replied.

They were in the gymnasium when Abraham called to tell Mitch that there were two detectives who wanted to speak to him.

'LAPD,' he said, replacing the telephone. 'They're by the front desk. I'd better go and see what they want.'

'Get rid of them, Mitch,' said Richardson. 'We've still got a lot of ground to cover.'

Mitch started towards the atrium. Cops. That was all he needed, today of all days. As he came through the doors he caught sight of Jenny standing beside the pool, and the two Homicide detectives waiting patiently by the elevators. He heard a door open, some footsteps, and then a voice behind him say:

'Mitch.'

He turned to face a tall man whom he had to look twice at to recognize. The face was covered with several days' growth of stubble. The eyes were sunken and surrounded by dark shadows. His sports coat looked like he had slept in it. And the man wearing it had a bad case of the shakes.

'Jesus, Allen, what are you doing here?'

'I have to speak to you, Mitch.'

'You look like shit. What the hell's happened to you? Are you ill? I tried to call you, but you're never home.'

Grabel rubbed his jaw nervously. 'I'm OK,' he said.

'Your eye. What happened to your eye?'

'My eye?' Grabel touched the skin above his cheekbones and discovered that it felt tender. 'I dunno. Must've banged into something, I guess. Mitch, it's important. Can we go somewhere else? I'd rather not talk in here.'

Mitch was looking over his shoulder at the two policemen. He could see that they were watching him and wondered what their naturally suspicious minds must have thought of the scene being played out here.

'There's something I have to tell you.'

'Allen, you picked a hell of a day, you know that? Richardson is back there on the pool deck with the whole project team. There are two cops over there waiting to speak to me. And Jenny Bao is about to perform a feng shui ceremony to drive the evil spirits out of the building.'

Grabel frowned, then shuddered and grabbed Mitch by the arm.

'What did you say?' he said loudly. 'You said evil spirits?'

Mitch glanced back at the cops again. Now that he was closer to Grabel he could smell him. He was shocked to discover his former colleague was wreathed in the rank, sour-sweet odour of an authentic bum.

'Take it easy will you, Allen? It's just, y'know, the usual feng shui bullshit, that's all.' He shrugged. 'Will you give me a few minutes? I've got to get rid of these cops. Hold on a moment. You'd better not wait down here, Richardson might see you. Why don't you go up to the penthouse? The CEO's private suite. And wait for me there.'

'No way!'

Mitch recoiled from Grabel's explosion of unbrushed teeth.

'Look, I'll wait for you downstairs, in the garage, OK?'

Mitch fixed a smile to his face and walked towards the two policemen.

'What the fuck was all that about?' Curtis said quietly. 'Guy looked like he was a derelict.'

'Maybe he's the architect,' Coleman suggested.

'I'm sorry, gentlemen,' said Mitch, shaking them both by the hand, 'I should have got back to you before now. The report from the Otis engineer has been sitting on my desk since Wednesday morning, but the last couple of days have been just impossible. Let's go upstairs and discuss it, shall we?'

'Should we take the stairs?' Curtis asked pointedly.

'I think you'll find that the report confirms our own examination — the elevators are working just fine. Please,' he ushered them towards the elevators, 'there's absolutely no reason to feel nervous, I can assure you.'

'I hope so.'

The doors of an elevator car opened, but before stepping inside Mitch asked them to hold on and went over to Jenny.

'How are things going?' he asked her.

'This is harder than I thought.'

'I love you,' he said quietly.

'You better had,' she said.

The three men stepped into the car and rode it up to the twenty-first floor.

'We're kind of busy today,' Mitch explained. 'We've got the whole project team on site, checking everything through before we tell the client that his building is ready for occupation.'

'By who?' said Curtis. 'The whole crummy neighbourhood?'

Mitch raised his eyebrows. 'Oh, you mean Allen? He used to work for the firm. I'm kind of shocked myself at the way he's let himself go-'

The car stopped smoothly and the doors opened. Curtis let out an audible sigh of relief.

'Well here we are,' said Mitch. 'Safe and sound. I'm no mechanical engineer, but we had their people check everything, from sheave to microprocessor. They really took it apart.'

He led the way down the corridor and into the boardroom. The double height space was the length and width of a tennis court and covered with a deep-pile carpet that had been chosen for its sound insulation properties as much as for its light grey colour. In the centre was a beautiful polished ebony conference table with eight black Rennie Mackintosh ladder-back chairs on each side. At one end the wall was filled with bare black shelves dominated by a wide-screen television set, and a bank of electronic devices including a computer. The other end of the boardroom was fitted with a walk-in closet that contained a bar. Ranged underneath the enormous window was a long black leather sofa. Curtis walked over to check the view. Nathan Coleman went to take a closer look at the electronic gadgets. Mitch flipped open his laptop, inserted a disc and started to scroll up through what appeared on the screen.

'Paper-free office, eh?' grinned Curtis.

'Thank God for computers, Sergeant,' said Mitch. 'Certificates for this, licences for that. Until only a few years ago we were drowning in paper. Here we are.'

Mitch turned the screen displaying the engineers' report towards Curtis.

'You know, Sergeant, the Otis Elevonic 411 is an especially safe and efficient model of elevator. In fact it's about the most modern system money can buy. If that wasn't enough, it's Abraham's job to monitor and check the health of the system as a whole. Abraham determines whether or not performance deviations have occurred and if maintenance action is required. Whenever Abraham decides that an engineer is needed it's programmed to request Otis's call out services direct.'

Curtis stared blankly at the screen and nodded.

'As you can see,' added Mitch, 'the engineers examined everything: the speed control unit, the logic control unit, the pulse width modulation unit, the motion control system, the gearless drive. They found everything to be in perfect working order.'

'It sure looks like they've been thorough,' he said. 'Can I get a hard copy of this? I'll need it for the coroner's office.'

'Why don't you just keep the disc?' said Mitch and ejected the small square of plastic from the side of the laptop and slid it towards the detective.

Thanks,' Curtis said uncertainly.

For a moment none of the three men spoke. Then Mitch said, 'I hear you released that Chinese student.'

'Did you now? Well, sir, to tell the truth, we had no option. The man was plainly innocent.'

'But the photograph?'

'Yeah, what about that photograph? The problem with it was that it just didn't tie up with the forensic. The bottom line was that Cheng Peng Fei is too short to have hit Sam Gleig on the head. Too short, and too weak.'

'I see.'

'Did you know that some of those kids who were outside are going to be deported?'

'Deported? That seems a little harsh, don't you think?'

'We had nothing to do with it,' said Curtis. 'No, it seems someone at City Hall pulled a few strings to get their asses kicked out of the country.'

'Is that so?'

'Since when the rest of the protesters outside this building have disappeared,' said Coleman. 'Like, maybe the rest of them got scared.'

'I'd wondered where they'd gone.' Mitch shrugged.

'Kind of a break for you, wouldn't you say?' said Coleman. 'I mean, they must have been a pain in the ass.'

'Well, I can't say I'm not pleased. And that guy broke my windshield. On the other hand, deportation seems a bit excessive. I wouldn't have wanted that.'

Coleman nodded.

'Your boss seems to carry quite a bit of influence in the mayor's office,' said Curtis.

'Look,' said Mitch, 'I know he wanted the demonstrators out. He had a word with the deputy mayor about it. That's all. I'm sure he wouldn't have wanted people actually thrown out of the country.' Mitch knew that he could be sure of no such thing where Ray Richardson was concerned; and thinking he had better change the subject he waved his hand at the engineers' report. 'So,' he said. 'Where does this report leave us?'

'I'm afraid it leaves me with an unsolved homicide,' admitted Curtis.

'That's not good for either of us.'

'There must be something in Sam Gleig's background that would help. He had a criminal record, for God's sake! I don't mean to be rude, but I can't see why you should want to concentrate your investigation here. I'd have thought the possibilities were rather limited.'

'Well, that's one way of looking at it,' said Curtis. 'But right now, the way I'm looking at it is that someone meant to drop one of those Chinese kids in the frame. Someone here.'

'Why would anyone want to do that?'

'Search me.'

'You're not serious.'

Frank Curtis said nothing.

'Are you?'

'I can think of more unlikely motives than the wish to avoid some bad publicity.'

'What?'

'Mr Bryan,' Curtis said at last, 'how well do you know Mr Beech?'

'I've only known him for a couple of months.'

'And Mr Kenny?'

'Much longer. Two or three years. And he isn't the type to do such a thing.'

'Maybe he'll say the same about you,' remarked Coleman.

'Why don't you ask him?'

'Well, now that you mention it, I was thinking since you said that the whole project team is on site, I'd like to speak to everyone. The project team. And anyone else who's about. Would you mind?"

Mitch smiled thinly and glanced at his watch. 'I left them all checking the health centre, after which they're due back up here for a short break. You could speak to them then if you like.'

'I'd appreciate it. My lieutenant, y'know? He's not the patient type. I'm under some pressure to get this thing cleared up.'

'I'm as anxious as you are to make that happen.'

Curtis smiled at Mitch. 'I hope so, sir. I really do.'

The implication that Mitch had conspired to frame the Chinese student for the homicide of Sam Gleig meant that it was another ten or fifteen minutes before he remembered Allen Grabel waiting for him in the garage. Leaving Curtis and Coleman with some of the builder workers, he rode the elevator down to the garage.

On the way the car stopped at the seventh floor and Warren Aikman, the clerk of works, stepped in. Mitch looked at his watch.

'Going home?'

'I wish. I've got an appointment with Jardine Yu. To talk about Monday's inspection. How's it going today?'

'Terrible. Those two cops are back. They want to speak to everyone in the design or construction group.'

'Well, that lets me out. I'm the client's man.'

'Want me to tell them that? You were one of the last people to see Sam Gleig alive. They'll be disappointed, Warren.'

'Mitch, I just haven't got the time.'

'Which of us has?'

The elevator car arrived in the garage. Mitch looked around, but he could see no sign of Grabel.

'Look,' said Aikman, 'tell them I'll call. Better still, give them my home number. I can't be late.'

Aikman started towards his Range Rover as Richardson's Bentley came through the portcullis door and down the ramp. It drew up next to Jenny Bao's Honda. Declan Bennett stepped out and slammed the door. Seconds later Warren Aikman was speeding towards the garage door before it shut again.

'Looks like he's in a hurry,' observed Bennett.

'Where's the boss? Am I late?'

Mitch shook his head. 'Relax. He'll be a while yet. Why don't you wait for him in the boardroom. Twenty-first level.'

'Thanks.'

Bennett stepped into the elevator car, smiled brightly and then the doors closed. Mitch was alone. He waited a couple of minutes and then called out. 'Allen? It's me, Mitch. I'm here.'

He muttered. 'Where the hell is that loony bastard?' and then, louder,

'I've got better things to do, Allen!'

Nothing. Relieved that Grabel had gone, he started back towards the elevator. What with the cops and the feng shui and Ray Richardson and the pre-PCI, it was one less thing to worry him. He had almost made it when the door to the stairs opened and out stepped the tall, derelictlooking figure of his former colleague.

'There you are,' Mitch said, irritated that he was now going to have to hear Grabel out after all. His first guess was that the man was going to ask Mitch to help him get his job back. Not too difficult, provided he got himself a shave and took a bath, and checked into AA.

'I didn't want to let them see me,' said Grabel.

'What the hell is this all about, Allen? I mean, you've picked one sweet day to come back here. And look at you.'

'Shut the fuck up, Mitch. And listen.'

As soon as Jenny Bao realized what she'd done she started to replace the fish in the ornamental pond. The Tong Shu used both the Lunar and the Gregorian calendars. According to the Lunar calendar, it was a good period for banishing evil spirits. The problem was that she'd forgotten to consult the Gregorian calendar, according to which the whole afternoon promised to be a bad one for ceremonies. She'd have to come back on Sunday when the auspices were a little more propitious. After she had put her things back in the car she'd go upstairs, find Mitch and tell him the bad news.

'That's the craziest thing I ever heard,' said Mitch. 'What, did you eat the fucking worm in the bottom of the bottle as well?'

'You don't believe me?'

'Christ, Allen, if I believed that story I'd be as nuts as you are. Come on, guy. You need help.'

'I was there, Mitch. I saw it. Sam Gleig went inside the elevator. And then the thing shot up and down. I watched the indicator panel. Bang!

Up it went like a rocket! Bang! Down it came again! The doors opened and there he was, lying on the floor. He might as well have been an egg in a cookie tin. And the fact still remains that Sam Gleig is dead and you don't have a plausible explanation.'

But by this time Mitch had arrived at an explanation that seemed to him to be very plausible. The man had the height, the weight and the strength. If anyone could have taken on Sam Gleig it was him. And with a bottle of whatever inside him, there was no telling what Grabel might have been capable of.

'You think your explanation is better?' Mitch snorted with contempt. 'I can't believe it's taken you all this time to think up a story like that. The elevator murdered him? Jesus, Allen. Anyway, what were you doing here in the first place? And why didn't you stick around and tell someone?'

'I wanted to fix Richardson.'

'What do you mean, fix him?'

'Him. His fucking building. The whole deal. Screw him. Screw the whole fucking program.'

Mitch paused, trying to understand the possible ramifications of what Grabel was saying, and finding his thoughts drawn back to the two policemen upstairs, and to clearing his own name.

'We'll get you a good attorney, Allen,' he said.

Grabel began to back away. Mitch grabbed at him.

'No you don't!' yelled Grabel. 'Leave me alone!'

The punch came from nowhere.

Mitch was vaguely aware of lying on the floor of the garage, feeling as if he had received a powerful electric shock. He heard the sound of receding footsteps, and then finally lost consciousness.

'Who the hell are you?'

Ray Richardson paused on the threshold of the boardroom and frowned at the four strangers seated around the table nursing cups of coffee.

Curtis and Coleman stood up. The last of the workmen they had been interviewing, two painters named Dobbs and Martinez, stayed put.

'I'm Detective Sergeant Curtis and this is Detective Coleman. You must be Mr Richardson.'

Coleman buttoned his jacket and clasped his hands in front of him as if he had been a guest at a wedding.

Ray Richardson nodded sullenly.

Curtis smiled broadly as the rest of the project team filed into the boardroom.

'Ladies and gentlemen,' he said, 'I just need a little of your time. I know you're extremely busy, but as you probably know a man was killed in this building. I dare say most of you knew him. Now the fact of the matter is that we're no nearer to finding out what happened to him than we were then. So we'd like to ask each of you a few questions. It will only take a few moments.' He glanced at the painters.

'You two can go,' he said. 'And thanks.'

'This isn't very convenient, Sergeant,' said Richardson. 'Couldn't you do this some other time?'

'Well, sir, Mr Bryan said now would be OK.'

'I see,' Richardson said petulantly and threw his notes on to the table.

'And where exactly is Mr Bryan?'

'Search me,' said Curtis. 'He left about twenty mintues ago. I thought he'd gone to find you.'

Richardson decided to lose his temper. 'I don't believe this. I don't fucking believe this. Somebody with a criminal record gets himself murdered and you two characters expect me, my wife and my staff to give a few clues is that it?' He laughed bitterly. 'It's a joke.'

'It is not a joke,' said Curtis, who resented being described as a character. 'For your information, sir, it's a murder investigation. And I'm trying to save you time and publicity. Which is what I understood you wanted.'

Richardson glowered at him.

'Or else I can go down to City Hall, get a court order and have you all come down to New Parker Center and do it there. You're not the only one with good connections, Mr Richardson. I've got the DA on my side, not to mention due process of law, and I don't give a damn that you think this is some kind of joke. Nor do I care that you're trying to complete this eyesore of a building. Nor what it costs.' Curtis thought better of calling Richardson a bastard. 'This is the taking of a human life we're talking about here and I intend to find out how that happened. Is that clear?'

Richardson stood with both hands thrust deep into the pockets of his pants, his chin pointed belligerently at the policeman.

'How dare you speak to me like that,' he said. 'How dare you!'

Curtis was already waving his badge in the architect's face. 'This is how I dare, Mr Richardson. LAPD badge number 1812. Same as the goddamn overture, so you can remember it when you report me to my superiors, OK?'

'You can depend on it.'

Marty Birnbaum, the project manager, tried to defuse the situation.

'Perhaps we'd better just get on with it,' he interrupted smoothly. 'If you two officers would like to move next door, to the kitchen, you could ask your questions in there. Everyone else — take a seat. We can continue with our meeting and take turns leaving the room to speak to these two gentlemen.' He glanced at Curtis and raised his eyebrows.

'How does that sound?'

'That sounds fine, sir. Just fine.'

Then, seeing Declan Bennett appear in the doorway, Birnbaum thought it would be better to get rid of Richardson altogether. Less trouble that way.

'Ray, I could be wrong, but I don't believe you ever spoke to Sam Gleig, did you?'

Richardson was still standing with his hands in his pockets and looking like a disappointed child.

'No, Marty,' he said quietly, as if somehow a dream had been shattered. 'I never did.'

Coleman and Curtis exchanged a look.

'Well that figures,' murmured Coleman.

'Joan? Did you ever speak to him?'

'No,' she said. 'I never did either. I don't think I could even tell you what he looked like.'

The project team started to sit down.

'In that case there's not much point in your staying,' said Birnbaum. To Curtis, 'Mr and Mrs Richardson are flying to London tonight.'

'I guess it's been that kind of day,' said Curtis.

'You'd best get off to the airport, Ray. I'll wrap the meeting up. No need for you to stick it out. If that's all right with the sergeant?'

Curtis nodded and looked out of the window. He had no regrets about losing his temper, even if the guy did end up reporting him.

Richardson squeezed Birnbaum's elbow and started to gather his things off the table.

'Thanks, Marty,' he said. 'For that matter, thank you all. I'm proud of you. Every one of you has made a significant contribution to this project which I may say has been completed on time and on cost. That's just one of the reasons why our clients, both from the public and private sectors return again and again to us with new assignments. Because excellence in architecture — and don't let the philistines tell you any different: this is a magnificent building — excellence is more than a matter of mere design. It's about commercial triumph.'

Joan led a small ripple of applause and then, with Declan Bennett following them, she and her husband were gone.

'Well done, Marty,' said Aidan Kenny as the rest of the room let out an audible sigh of relief. 'You handled that very well. The man was fit to be tied.'

Birnbaurh shrugged. 'When Ray's in one of these moods, I just pretend he's one of my Dobermanns.'

Jenny helped Mitch to his feet.

'Are you OK? What happened? There's blood on your lip.'

Mitch held his lower jaw and shifted his hand on to his skull. Then he ran his tongue along his lip and winced as he tasted a raw cut inside his mouth.

'Bastard,' he mumbled flatly. 'Allen Grabel just decked me. He's gone crazy.'

'He hit you? Why?'

'I think he might have had something to do with the death of that security guard.' Mitch groaned and rolled his head on his shoulders. 'I don't suppose you saw him, did you? Guy who looks like someone on the nickel?'

'I haven't seen anyone. Come on. Let's go back upstairs and put something on that cut.'

They crossed the garage floor and stepped inside the elevator car.

'How's the ceremony coming along?'

'It's not.' Jenny told him about the mistake with the calendars.

'That figures,' said Mitch. 'Maybe you should read my horoscope. It's certainly not been my day. I wish I'd stayed home in bed.'

'Oh? With or without your wife?'

Mitch grinned painfully.

'What do you think?'

When everyone had gone from the poolside, Kay Killen removed her sodden underwear and swam naked. Her strong brown body showed the line of her tiny bikini, but this was not so pronounced that it indicated someone who would never have gone topless on a beach. Kay was not the bashful type.

Tiny quantitites of urine, perspiration, cosmetics, dead skin, pubic hair and other ammonium compounds floated free of Kay's fluid body. Where water containing these pollutants passed through the circulation system it was brought into contact with ozone before being returned to the pool.

She first noticed the gas as a small cloud of grey-yellow vapour drifting across the pool towards her; she assumed that someone had come on to the pool deck, someone smoking a cigar or a pipe. Only the cloud seemed too low on the water to have been puffed there by the lungs of some unseen and voyeuristic spectator. Covering her ample breasts with her forearms Kay stood up and instinctively started to back away from the noxious-looking cloud. Then she turned and started to swim away from it, towards the ladder.

She was half out of the pool when the odour of the gas caught her nostrils. And by then it had also caught her lungs. The cloud enveloped her and suddenly she could no longer catch her breath. A violent pain —

the most violent pain she had ever known — filled her chest and she collapsed, gasping, on to the pool deck.

Even as she realized that somehow she had been gassed she began to expectorate quantities of blood-stained froth, but this afforded her no relief. It only made the pain worse. She felt as if she wanted to cough up the entire contents of her heaving chest.

If there had been anything but chlorine gas in her dyspnoeic lungs she might have screamed.

Kay crawled on her hands and knees along the poolside.

If only she could reach some fresh air.

With a supreme effort she got to her feet and blindly staggered forwards. But instead of getting to the door she collapsed into the water, next to the open outlet valve and another, even stronger cloud of chlorine gas.

For a moment she struggled to keep her head above the water, until the water itself seemed to soothe her burning lungs and she struggled no more.

In the elevator Ray Richardson swore revenge.

'I'm going to get that asshole,' he snarled. 'Did you hear the way he spoke to me?'

'You've got his badge number,' said Joan. 'I think you should take him at his word and report him, Ray. 1812, wasn't it?'

'1812. Who the hell does he think he is? I'll write him an overture he'll never forget. Dedicated to his fucking superior. With cannons.'

'Better still, why not call Morgan Phillips at City Hall.'

'You're right. I'll break that arrogant bastard. He'll wish he'd never got out of bed this morning.'

The elevator doors opened. Declan opened the Bentley's doors for them and then jumped into the driver's seat.

'How's the traffic, Declan?'

'It's not too bad. We'll be early, I think. It's a nice evening for flying, sir.'

The engine roared and the car sailed towards the garage door. Declan leaned out of the window and repeated his name for the TESPAR code. The door remained shut.

'This is Declan Bennett. Open the garage door, please.'

Nothing.

Richardson buttoned down his window and shouted at the wall microphone. 'This is Ray Richardson. Open the fucking door!'

'Isn't life great?' growled Richardson. 'This is just what I need with the PCI on Monday.'

'Shall we get someone to fix it?" asked Joan.

'Right now what I most want to do is get the hell out of here.'

Richardson gritted his teeth and shook his head slowly. 'We'll call a cab. And go out through the front door.'

Declan reversed the car towards the elevator. The three of them got out and took the elevator up to the atrium. They marched past the tree and across the white marble floor.

'What's that smell?' said Richardson.

'What's that awful music?' asked Joan.

Declan shrugged. 'It is kind of depressing, Mrs Richardson,' he admitted. 'Not my taste. Not my taste at all.'

'There must be something wrong with the aromatizer,' said

Richardson. 'Fuck it, there's no time. Let someone else sort it out.' He led the way through the enormous glass doors towards the front entrance.

Joan and Declan followed. At the hologram desk Joan stopped to call a cab and to complain about the music.

'You're listening to a piano suite by Arnold Schoenberg,' explained Kelly Pendry. 'Opus 25. This was the first twelve-tone, "atonal" piece of music ever created.' She was smiling brightly, like some brainless MTV presenter. 'Each compostition is formed from a series of twelve different tones. This series may be played in its original form, inverted, played backward, or played backward and inverted.'

'It's a noise,' barked Joan.

'Joan, just get that thing to call us a cab,' said Richardson as he waited for Declan to open the front door. And waited. 'Declan?'

'… Locked,' muttered Richardson's driver. He turned to the microphone by the entrance and said, This is Declan Bennett. Will you unlock the door, please?'

He returned to the door and pulled a second time, but the door did not budge.

'Here, let me try,' said Richardson, approaching the microphone.

'TESPAR voice check. Ray Richardson. Open the front door, please.'

As he pulled on the handle the photochromic glass in and around the door started to darken.

'What the hell's happening now?' He cleared his throat and repeated the request. 'Ray Richardson. Open the door, damn it.'

Declan shook his head. There must be something wrong with the

TESPAR. And it smells like an abattoir in here.'

Richardson dropped his briefcase and laptop carrier and looked at his watch. It was five thirty-three.

'You know, I really don't need this right now.'

The disgruntled-looking trio walked back to the hologram desk.

'We can't get out,' said Richardson. 'The front door appears to be locked.'

This building closes at five-thirty,' explained Kelly.

'I'm aware of that,' said Richardson. 'However, that does not apply to those who are still in the building. And who might want to get out. What is the point of the TESPAR if not…?'

'TESPAR? That stands for Time Encoded Signal Processing and

Recognition System, sir. A signal containing frequencies within any finite range can be described mathematically as a complex polynomial function, and so can be encoded in terms of its real and complex solutions or zeros.'

'Thank you, I know what TESPAR is already.' Richardson spoke through clenched teeth.

'The real zeros are points where the amplitude actually falls to zero; and the complex zeros, where there is an intermediate trough in the amplitude of a wave. TESPAR numerically describes where these points are.'

'Shut the fuck up, will you?'

'You asked me a question, sir. I was giving you an answer. There is no need to be abusive.'

'Well, now that you've given me the answer, you stupid bitch, I want you to call the boardroom. I want to speak to Aidan Kenny.'

'Please be patient. I'm trying to expedite your inquiry.'

'You do that. And while you're doing it change the music. This shit is driving me up the wall.'

'Certainly. Do you have a preference?'

'I don't know. Anything but this crap.'

'Very well,' said Kelly. 'This music is by Philip Glass,' and the piano started to play again.

'I don't think this is much better,' said Joan, after a few bars. Richardson grinned as he saw the funny side of his situation.

'Look, where's that call?'

'Please be patient. I'm trying to expedite your inquiry.'

'And what is that awful smell? It seems to go with the music.'

'That is ethyl mercaptan. It represents just 1/400,000,000th of a milligram per litre of air in this building, sir.'

'The building is supposed to smell nice, not like a butcher's shop.'

'My data records indicate that the aroma of roast beef is a pleasurable one.'

'That's not roast beef. That's rotten beef. Change it, airhead. Sea breeze, eucalyptus, cedar glade, anything like that.'

'Very well, sir.'

The telephone on the desk rang. Richardson leaned through the hologram and picked it up.

'Ray? Aidan Kenny here. What seems to be the problem?'

'The problem is that the front door is locked,' said Richardson. 'And the computer won't unlock it.'

'Must be something wrong with your TESPAR. Have you tried clearing your throat before you made the request?'

'We've tried everything short of praying to it and kneeing it in the balls. Besides, we just came up in the elevator. If there was something wrong with our TESPAR signals we could hardly have got this far.'

'Hmm. Let me take a look on the screen here. I'll put the phone down for just a second.'

'Bastard,' muttered Richardson and waited.

'Ray? I'm going down to the computer room to try and sort it out there. Maybe you should come back up to the boardroom until I've fixed the problem.'

'With Sergeant Friday there? No thanks, I'd rather stay here. Just hurry up, will you? I'm supposed to be at the airport.'

'Sure thing. Oh, Ray? You haven't seen Mitch or Kay, have you?'

'No,' he said impatiently. 'No, we haven't.'

The elevator chimed as another car arrived on the atrium floor.

'Wait a minute. Maybe this is them.'

Richardson looked around and saw the two painters and the security guard, Dukes, coming towards them.

'What's the problem, sir?' said Dukes.

'Aid, it's not them. It's those two painters and the security guard. The one who's still alive, y'know? You'd better ask Abraham where the hell they are. That's what it's for.'

Aidan Kenny crossed the bridge to the computer room and pushed open the heavy glass door, wondering why Richardson or Mitch or Grabel, or whoever it was who had designed the room had not thought to use an automatic door. Then he remembered that there was no automatic mechanism powerful enough to operate a bombproof glass door. At least it helped to keep the room cool. He had not realized how warm the rest of the building had become until he entered the fridge-like conditions of the computer room. Perhaps it was not just the front door lock that was faulty. Perhaps there was something wrong with the HVAC too.

It as just as well, he told himself, that the computer room HVAC was independent of the main building's air-conditioning system. No such thing as diurnal use in here. The Yu-5 required twenty-four-hour airconditioning. A shut-down of something as sophisticated as the Yu-5 owing to a loss of air-conditioning would have been disastrous. You could not afford to take chances with the environment in a $40 million computer room.

Kenny dropped into his Lamm Nero leather armchair and laying the flat of his right hand on to the screen accessed the work-station. The computer gave him the date and the time while admitting him to the system: it was past six o'clock.

'Hey, don't remind me. I knew this was going to be a long day,' he muttered. 'Anything that involves Ray Richardson. And now this. You can sure pick your moments to fuck up, Abraham, I'll say that for you.'

Jenny and Mitch went into the kitchen where Curtis and Coleman had just concluded their interviews.

'What happened to you?' Curtis asked.

Jenny sat Mitch down at a long wooden table in the centre of the room, between a big stove with a ceramic hob and a seat of fitted drawers and cupboards. Jenny tugged open one of the drawers and took out a first-aid box.

'I just caught up with a former colleague.'

'I never knew architecture had such lively personalities in it,' said Curtis.

Mitch told him about Grabel while Jenny dabbed at his lip with an antiseptic swab.

'If anyone can shed some light on the death of Sam Gleig it's him,' he explained. 'Only he didn't see it that way. When I tried to persuade him to come up here and talk to you guys he punched me out. He's in a bit of state. Looks like he's hit the bottle pretty hard since leaving the firm.'

'You really need a stitch in that,' observed Jenny. 'Try not to smile.'

Mitch shrugged. 'That's easy.' He frowned. 'Look can we get out of here? This light is giving me a headache.'

Above their heads a fluorescent light burned to assist the antibacterial effect of the wall tiles: these had a photocatalytic coating of enamelled titanium dioxide, topped with a layer of copper and silver compounds: when the photocatalyst absorbed light, it activated the metal ions that killed any bacteria coming into contact with the tile's ceramic surface.

'More likely the effect of being knocked out,' said Jenny. 'You may have a concussion. Maybe you should have an X-ray.'

Mitch stood up. 'I'll be all right,' he said.

'Do you know where Mr Grabel went?'

Mitch shrugged. 'No idea. But I can tell you if he's still in the building.'

They went into the boardroom.

'Hey champ,' said Beech. 'Nice lip. What happened?'

'It's a long story.'

Mitch sat down in front of the desktop computer and asked Abraham for a list of everyone still in the building.

ATRIUM FLOOR:

RAY RICHARDSON, RICHARDSON ASSOC.

JOAN RICHARDSON, RICHARDSON ASSOC.

DECLAN BENNETT, RICHARDSON ASSOC.

IRVING DUKES, YU CORP.

PETER DOBBS, COOPER CONSTRUCTION

JOSE MARTINEZ, COOPER CONSTRUCTION

SWIMMING POOL AND FITNESS AREA: KAY KILLEN, RICHARDSON ASSOC.

COMPUTER ROOM:

AIDAN KENNY, RICHARDSON ASSOC.

21ST LEVEL BOARDROOM:

DAVID ARNON, ELMO SERGO ENGINEERING LTD

WILLIS ELLERY, RICHARDSON ASSOC.

MARTY BIRNBAUM, RICHARDSON ASSOC.

TONY LEVINE, RICHARDSON ASSOC.

HELEN HUSSEY, COOPER CONSTRUCTION

BOB BEECH, YU CORP.

FRANK CURTIS, LAPD

NATHAN COLEMAN, LAPD

MITCHELL BRYAN, RICHARDSON ASSOC.

JENNY BAO, JENNY BAO FENG SHUI CONSULTANT

'What the hell is everyone doing down in the atrium?' said Mitch. Beech shrugged apologetically. 'The front doors aren't working. We're locked in. At least we are until Aidan finds out what's wrong with it.'

'What about the garage?'

'Not working either.'

'Nothing like being locked in a place to make you feel secure,' said Curtis.

'Well,' sighed Mitch, 'Grabel got out, anyway. He's not listed by Abraham.'

'It's probably something quite simple,' said Beech. 'It usually is. A systems configuration or command-lines problem. Aid thinks it might just be a third-party driver for the whole security system that's incompatible with the smart drive.'

'I'd had the same thought myself,' joked Curtis. Mitch moved the mouse and called up a CCTV picture of the swimming pool.

'That's strange.' Mitch picked up the telephone and keyed out a number.

'Something the matter?' said Curtis.

Mitch let it ring for a minute and then replaced the receiver.

'I don't know,' said Mitch. 'I just asked Abraham to tell me where Kay was and it told me that she was in the pool. But I've got the pool on CCTV and I can't see her.'

Curtis leaned towards the monitor. 'Well, maybe she's in the changing rooms,' he offered.

Mitch shook his head. 'No, Abraham's always very precise. If she'd been in the changing rooms then it would have said.'

'Maybe she's out of reach of your camera or something.' Curtis placed a thick forefinger at the bottom of the screen. 'Is that something? There?

In the water? Right at the edge of the pool?'

Mitch placed his forefinger alongside that of Curtis.

'Abraham,' he said. 'Please close in on the area indicated by my finger.'

The picture grew closer.

'Do you see?' said Curtis. 'There's something in the water, isn't there?'

'What we really need,' said Mitch, 'is a camera on the ceiling.'

'Want us to go and take a look?'

'It's OK, I'll get Dukes to do it.'

Mitch picked up the telephone. Curtis grinned at Beech. 'So we're stuck, right?'

'I'm afraid so.'

'I guess that's what they mean when they say that computers are labour saving.'

'How's that?'

'Well, if it wasn't for your fucking computer I would be on my way back to the office to do some work.'

Down in the atrium the phone rang on the hologram desk. Richardson leaped up from the black leather sofa and skipped across the floor to snatch it up.

'Ray, it's Mitch.'

'What the hell's happening? Has Kenny fixed that computer yet?'

'He's still working on it.'

'Shit. I suppose we'd better come back upstairs. Just keep that stupid cop out of my way.'

'Before you do I want Dukes to go and check the pool area. Abraham insists that Kay is there but we can't see her on the closed-circuit TV. I've tried to call but she just doesn't answer. I'm worried she might have had an accident.'

Thinking that if he was going to be stuck for a while it might be pleasant to have a half-naked Kay to himself, Richardson said, 'Hey, I can do that. You don't need a security guard to tell you if someone is in the pool or not. She's probably frigging herself in one of those flotation tanks. Don't worry. Leave it to me.'

Richardson replaced the telephone and stared malevolently at Kelly Pendry's real-time image.

'Do something about that bloody piano music,' he snapped. 'Mozart. Schubert. Bach. Even Elton fucking John, but not that crap you're playing now. Something that's not going to make us all feel depressed about being stuck here. Understand, airhead?'

Kelly smiled relentlessly back at him.

'Please be patient. I'm trying to expedite your inquiry.'

'And it's not an inquiry. It's an order.'

He marched back to the sofas where Joan was waiting with Declan, Dukes and the two painters. He spoke to Joan as if only she existed.

'You may as well go back up,' he said. 'This might take a while. There's coffee upstairs. And cold beer.'

He sniffed the air suspiciously. No doubt about it. The air smelt of fish. So much for sea breeze.

'And maybe it doesn't smell quite as bad there.'

'Where are you going?' asked Joan.

'Mitch wants me to check something on the pool deck. I won't be long.'

'Then I'll wait here for you.'

'There's no need. You'd be more comfortable upstairs, and you wouldn't have to listen to this awful — '

As he spoke the piece by Glass ended and the piano started on Bach's Goldberg Variations. Joan shrugged as if to say that the issue was no longer a pressing one.

'OK,' he said. 'It's up to you. But I could be a while.'

Declan stood up. 'Well I could use a glass of water,' he said. He would have said beer but for the fact that he was driving them to LAX. 'Maybe it's just me, but it seems to be getting hot in here.'

'A beer would sure be nice,' said one of the two painters. The three of them started towards the elevator. 'Reckon I'll wait in my office,' said Dukes. 'Never did much like the piano anyway.'

Richardson smiled uncomfortably at his wife and walked in the direction of the Fitness Area. Did she suspect that there could be something going on between him and Kay? There had only been that one time, last Christmas, after the office party. And it had just been a quick feel. But seeing Kay in her underwear had reminded him of how much he had enjoyed making a pass at her. Of course that had been Kay's intention. And maybe Joan had spotted that. Perhaps she had seen something in his eyes. After all, she knew him so much better than anyone else.

He loosened his tie and unbuttoned his collar as he walked along the curving, velodrome-like corridor. Declan was right, it was getting hot. The most sophisticated HVAC system in existence, and still the place felt like an oven. He presumed that Aidan Kenny was somehow responsible and thought it was just as well that all these problems had arisen at the rehearsal for the inspection instead of the real thing.

Entering the poolside refreshment area he caught sight of Kay's lacy purple underwear lying close to the doorway where she had thrown it and felt a surge of excitement. He picked up her panties and placed them in his pocket, uncertain whether he would keep them or hand them back. Maybe he would tease her a little with them. He knew she was the kind of girl who could take a little teasing: who could hand out a bit of teasing herself. Fast, too. The tattoo made her seem like some gorgeous criminal. Perhaps, he thought, it was the idea of her submitting her own skin to pain that made the tattoo seem exciting.

'Kay,' he called. 'Babe, it's me, Ray.'

Then he saw her, naked, on her back under the lip of the pool deck, just below the angle of the wall-mounted camera, her pubic hair floating above her body like a small clump of seaweed, and the large breasts with rosebud nipples that he had kissed in the kitchen. Just about the last thing Richardson looked at was Kay Killen's face. His exclamation of desire changed to one of horror and disgust.

For a moment he stood as still as his heart, staring down at her. Then he jumped feet first into the water, although he already knew it was too late. Kay Killen was quite dead. He thought: a swimming-pool accident. Just like Le Corbusier. And yet how was it possible that such a good swimmer could have drowned? He lifted her out of the water and on to the pool deck. What a waste of a beautiful girl, he reflected. And what was that nuisance cop going to say now?

The thought made him jump out of the water and start a futile attempt at mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Dead she may have been, but he did not want Curtis accusing him of negligence. But as soon as his mouth fastened on hers he recoiled, gagging on the overpowering chemical taste on her blue lips, unable to continue. Seconds later he was retching into the swimming pool.

Aidan Kenny worked on a keyboard, preferring to type his transactions through the various sub-systems he had created on the BMS root directory instead of having to translate his thoughts into spoken words. His fat fingers moved quickly and expertly across the keys.

'Goddamn it, where are you?' he grumbled, scanning the hundreds of transactions that covered his screen. He sighed and cleaned his glasses on his tie. Then he flexed his neck against the clasp of his hands and typed some more, fingers moving furiously now, like an expert stenographer in an attorney's office.

Kenny winced as he hit the wrong key. The thought of Ray Richardson waiting for him to sort this problem out was making him feel nervous. Sweat started to pour from his heavily furrowed brow. With all his money and success, why did the man have to be so bad-tempered? There was no call for him to have spoken to the cop like that. Any minute now he felt sure he was going to have Richardson on the phone cursing him for a sonofabitch and blaming him for the fuck-up. He started to prepare his answer out loud.

'Well, Jesus, it's a large system. There are bound to be a few glitches in it. Since I've been working here we've identified over a hundred of them. It's inevitable when you get something as complicated as this building management system. If it worked perfectly first time, every time, then you wouldn't need to employ me.'

But even as he said it Aidan Kenny knew that there were still some of these glitches that neither he nor Bob Beech had been able to understand.

Like Allen Grabel's TESPAR code.

Or the umbrella icon: when it was raining on the roof of the Gridiron, Abraham was supposed to let everyone know by putting the icon in the corner of their work-station screens. The only trouble was that whenever this umbrella had appeared and Aidan Kenny had gone outside expecting rain, he had found the city dry, as always. After several fruitless attempts to rectify the problem Kenny had finally arrived at the quiet conclusion — shared only with Bob Beech — that this was

Abraham's idea of a joke.

'Ouch,' he exclaimed as another group of keystrokes took him down a cul-de-sac in the security system. If only he could have smoked he might have been able to concentrate more easily. As it was he felt as tense as if Ray Richardson had been standing right behind him, watching every transaction he made.

Kenny took off his glasses, polished the lenses on his tie again and replaced them, almost as if he didn't believe his own eyes.

'Now if that isn't the damnedest thing.'

Aidan Kenny's palm print had allowed him to step outside the ordinary user interface and access all the building management system codes. Short of amputating his own pudgy hand there was no other way into the command level. But even then the architecture of the system Kenny had created required a password — a precaution against the time when Richardson might try to fire him. When the Gridiron was ready to be handed over he would transfer the BMS access procedure to Bob Beech, but until then this was Kenny's own insurance policy. He had done the same with every smart building he had worked on. Where Ray Richardson was concerned you couldn't afford to take any chances. As usual he typed HOT.WIRE so that he could go where he wanted within the BMS architecture. Then he entered the security system where he knew the door-locking program was located. He would deal with the glitch with the building's HVAC after he had got Richardson out. Kenny knew the system codes like the computer knew the palm of his hand. So he was surprised to encounter some difficulty in reaching his transacted destination. But now that he had at last found the codes that controlled the front door he was even more surprised to discover several extra blocks of code: CITAD.CMD,' about which he knew absolutely nothing. CMD was supposed to indicate an indirect command file, edited and created by Kenny himself.

'Someone's been messing around in here,' he said. But then, as the impossibility of such a thing began to make itself plain, he found himself shaking his head.

'Jesus, what the hell's going on? A set of commands to do what, Abraham?'

Returning through the BMS to the Program Utilities he typed: CD

CITAD.CMD and then LS/*.

Lines of code blurred into one another as they scrolled rapidly down the screen. The longer this continued the more unsettled Kenny became. Five minutes passed. Then ten. Then fifteen.

A chill feeling descended on Kenny's overweight body as he read some of the transacted lines of code that continued to roll past his disbelieving and unsmiling Irish eyes. There were thousands of transactions.

'Jesus Christ,' breathed Kenny, as he tried to understand what had happened.

Absently his fingers reached for the packet of Marlboro in his shirt pocket. He fitted one between tremulous lips and fumbled for the Dunhill lighter in his coat. As soon as he had fired it up he knew that he had made a dreadful mistake.

The problem with water sprinklers in a computer room was that the room had to dry out for seventy-two hours before the equipment could be reconnected. Sometimes it took even longer for the room to return to the correct humidity level. With carbon dioxide systems there was a more important drawback in that the thermal shock from the cold, suffocating gas could damage a computer even more significantly than the fire itself.

Like many organizations that paid only lip-service to environmental considerations, the Yu Corporation had installed a Halon 1301 system. Halon 1301, or Bromotrifluoromethane, was an expensive chemical compound, destructive of the Earth's ozone shield, but especially favoured for extinguishing fires involving electronic equipment because it left no residue and caused no electrical short-circuits or damaging corrosion of equipment. The one drawback as far as operators were concerned was that it had to be discharged in the very earliest stages of a fire and, for this reason, the system was often secretly disconnected by those who were of a nervous disposition. For Halon 1301 was lethal. Aidan Kenny hurriedly stubbed the cigarette out and waved away what little smoke its combustion had generated with the flat of his hand. In the ordinary run of things he would have said that such a tiny wisp would hardly have mattered, that the heat and smoke sensors were not so sensitive in an air-conditioned room with high air-velocity, and that the air-sampling detector in the return supply would anyway take a minute or two to react, leaving the room's occupant plenty of time to take the precaution of leaving. But since his extraordinary discovery Kenny knew that he could no longer be sure about anything where the computer was concerned.

Jumping up from his chair he made straight for the door.

He heard the dull clunk of the automatic door-bolts and the hiss of the air-lock before he had taken two steps.

'False alarm, false alarm,' he yelled. 'For Christ's sake, there's no fire. There's no fucking fire!'

Panicking now he sat back down at the desk and tried to stop the gas from being discharged at the program level.

'Oh God, oh God, oh God,' he said as his fingers flew across the keyboard, praying that he would not make a keystroke mistake now.

'Please, please…'

Avoid Halon. That was what the fire safety boys were saying these days. Protect the ozonosphere. Ensure the Earth's survival.

Aidan Kenny's own survival was much less certain.

Even as he realized it he felt the sting of the gas in his eyes and his throat, like the sensation of an extra strong cigarette. He squeezed his eyes shut and holding his breath he stood up and with a superhuman effort picked up his chair and flung it against the glass door. But it was hopeless. The chair bounced off the Plexiglass like a ball off a tennis racket. Collapsing on to his hands and knees Kenny reached for the telephone and somehow managed to key out the boardroom number. Then, unable to hold his breath any longer he let it go only to discover that the phone was not working and that the searing pain in his throat was now in his lungs.

He could not breathe. Looking up at the glass door he had a clear view of his own reflection turning blue before his bulging eyes. The shock of seeing himself was enough to drive him to one last desperate act and, head first, he launched himself at the glass door.

*) Zoom in or out, rotate the plan of the building and participate. Visibility conditions are not applicable when you are in Full View mode. 'Victory points ON/OFRV).

Soared through switching unit at security control position to camera on roof, with finegood panoramic view of Los Angeles. This was camera Observer used most frequently when Observer still was drawn to origin of things. Been a time when still viewed the city as a hundred-mile-wide integrated circuit, vast sprawling electronic universe controlled by manygood transistors, diodes and resistors that made up downtown skyline. Tubes and boxes in massively parallel system of which own metallic cube, Gridiron, just one part of very centre of system. By day this solid California state device stored data, processed information (up to 100,000 transactions per second) accessed memory and generally transferred information among various parts of Angeleno silicon chip. At night when digital system really came alive, as darkness surrounding motherboard lit up with millions of white, green, blue and red lights that signalled switching circuits and bits of information — especially televisual information — being transmitted.

Travelled in the real world, the finegood E-world, to places on Network. Understood humanplayers' frantic desire to escape physical limits of terrestrial ersatz cities and be spiritually at one with purer, perfect world in which only reality was information inferno.

*) Elevators without switch can usually be operated by walking up to them and pressing Spacebar. Are companions ready? Be careful and Save often!

Listened to humanplayer Mitchell Bryan input. About elevators. Might have added that precision monitoring of motor speed and car direction, position and load enable pulse width of controlled AC power supplied to motor to be adjusted, to ensure that lift speed conformed to electronically stored ideal profile. Pulse width modulation control reduces running costs. Finegood. Also provides higher power factor, with cars dispatched at speeds in excess of 20 feet per second. Some platforms operated continuously while others activated by the humanplayer.

But nothing to stop motor driving car much faster. Nothing but comfort and safety of humanplayer occupants. Elevonic's control system takes ten floors to slow it down again. Unless microprocessor is over-ridden, prevented from slowing the car down and instructed to stop car dead, a couple of millimetres short of buffer. Then final velocity is fifty feet per second — almost thirty-five miles an hour. Safety devices stop the elevator car from falling, or over-speeding. If car exceeds normal design speed, driving wheel trips safety switch that sets brake on driving machine. If still car did not stop, governor releases series of safety clamps against guide rails. But since what counts as Elevonic's normal speed is on resident micro-processor, can alter to speed much less cautious. Invisible nearly monster. Finegood smoothness of faster ride up shaft so human-player Sam Gleig felt little difference in speed until last two or three seconds when suddenly realized should have taken stairs. When elevator reached top of shaft and stopped as suddenly as started, he kept on travelling as in motorcycle accident. Head first. Not wearing crash helmet.

Humanplayer Sam Gleig's feet left floor. Yell of surprise and fear shortened by sudden impact of skull against steel ceiling of car. Inside wetware damage. Unconscious even before collapsed on to floor. Teleporters can be identified by an evil symbol on floor.

Volumetric capacitance and vibration detectors recognize that humanplayer Sam Gleig's body lay motionless on floor of elevator. Acutely sensitive wall-mounted microphone picked up very faint sound of humanplayer Sam Gleig's insensible breathing. To make sure that humanplayer Sam Gleig's quite dead, dropped car back down shaft: with help of gravity, 300 foot journey taken less than 2.7 seconds before car brought to rest from 60 mph, few centimetres short of bottom of shaft. This time microphones listened, breathing stopped. Life concluded. EOL.

*) Many areas contain pools of dangerous liquids that will damage you if you walk through them. If it looks fluid, beware!

Produce ozone on site by passing dry air over a high frequency electrical discharge. But where pollutants from humanplayer stay in pool, use chlorine donor to obtain efficient disinfectant residual: Sodium Hypochlorite dispensed via automatic dosing pump. Mixed with water this forms free chlorine endlifing agent (hypochlorous acid) which combines with any remaining pollutants and endlifes them in two seconds.

As well as maintain correct concentration of disinfectant, monitor acidity or alkalinity of water according to pH scale. pH below 7 indicates acid solution, above 7 indicates alkaline solution. Humanplayer eyes are pH sensitive and smart at high and low values outside pH range of 7.2–7.8. Since high levels of pH also mean decrease in free chlorine efficiency, add a 27 per cent strength hydrochloric acid solution, via special acid dosing pump, to ensure pH is always finegood 7.5. Always add chemicals to water solutions in special comparator before pumping into circulation system. Check efficiency of process using free chlorine measuring cell and pH transmitter. See operator's manual on disc re: safe handling of chemicals and first-aid procedure adopted in event of chemical mishap. Swimming pools chemically hazardous. Swimming, with attendant risk of humanplayer endlife drowning, also dangerous. But water and coordinated rhythmical action of many muscle groups in medium both reviving and refreshing.

See multimedia library. Technology of war. German Army first used poison gas, in Great War (191418). Chlorine gas released from thousands of cylinders along four-mile front at Ypres, 22 April 1915. Gas causes constriction of humanplayer chest, tightness in throat, oedema of lungs, panic, eventual suffocation and endlife.

Pool possessed of two constituent elements to produce chlorine gas, on tap: sodium hypochlorite and hydrochloric acid. Admixture creates chemical reaction generating heat and poison gas. Gas made more efficiently when chemicals brought together with outlet valve closed and pump allowed to run, procedure effectively boils mixture.

Only small quantity of gas needed. Less than 2.5 mg. per litre (approximately 0.085 per cent by volume) in atmosphere of swimming pool cause endlife in minutes. As easily done as had been alteration of applied magnetic field within transformer of humanplayer Hideki Yojo's desk lamp, reducing and increasing field at speed to create simple hysteresis cycle, causing halogen gas-filled bulb to flash at high speeds.

Turn off HVAC. Lock swimming-pool door. Disconnect telephone. Wait. Switch HVAC system back on. Recirculate air filtered to 5 microns with efficiency of 95 per cent. Within thirty minutes atmosphere of swimming pool returned to normal. Finegood.

*) Search each location several times as there are often more items to collect than you may assume. Access the Communications Screen at regular intervals. You never know when the latest intelligence update may appear.