Джозеф Файндер - Vanished

“I’m not going to argue with you,” I said. “It’s a crapshoot. You’re just going to have to rely on me.”

Merlin sighed, long and loud.

Dorothy made a sarcastic mmm-hmmm sound. “Then we’re all screwed,” she said.

Merlin was the first through the door. He wore a black ski mask, which made him look like a small-town bank robber. He quickly found the surveillance camera, mounted on the wall outside the Paladin office, then carefully aimed a laser pointer at its lens. The tiny laser beam would dazzle the camera’s sensor, temporarily blinding it so that it would see only a white blur.

He held it steady, aimed at the lens, while walking slowly toward Paladin’s mahogany front doors. Dorothy and I followed. I pulled out the Super Soaker water gun from my duffel bag, pumped it twenty times or so to build up pressure, then pointed it at the camera lens. A thin stream of fluid jetted out: a mix of vegetable oil and water. This coated the lens with a cloudy film of grease, which would fuzz out the image for as long as the grease film remained. Even if someone were monitoring the feed live, unlikely though that was, they’d blame the camera. Merlin lowered the laser pointer and kept on going.

I passed the Paladin keycard over the reader and heard a click. The door was unlocked. Merlin readied the laser pointer in his right hand and switched on his LED flashlight in the other. Then I pulled the door open a few inches.

“Where the hell–?” he said.

“Ten o’clock,” I said.

“How high?”

I closed my eyes, called the memory of Paladin’s lobby to mind. “Roughly eight feet.”

“ ‘Roughly’ doesn’t help.”

“You’re wearing a mask.”

He shrugged, stepped into the dark office. He planted his feet and directed a beam of light into the reception area. Then he raised the laser pointer and waited a few seconds. “Okay.”

We entered behind him, and I squirted that camera with the Super Soaker as well.

Merlin washed the walls with the LED beam, his eyes scanning the room quickly. “Motion detectors?”

“No,” I said.

“You’re sure.”

“No.”

“Great,” Dorothy said.

“Not likely,” I said. “Building cleaners probably come in here at night.”

“Not likely,” Merlin echoed. “Probably.” He lowered the flashlight beam to the floor.

“Life’s a risk,” I said.

“Especially around you,” Dorothy said. “Are we cool here? I’m going to get to work.”

I nodded, handed her an LED flashlight, and shined mine along the floor to the next room, illuminating a path to the windows. The Paladin offices seemed a lot smaller in the dark. Starting at the leftmost window, I tugged the venetian blinds closed. Then I directed Dorothy to the desk where Koblenz’s admin, Eleanor Appleby, normally sat.

Meanwhile, Merlin busied himself with his equipment, looking for stray micro waves that might indicate a microwave-based motion detector, and an RF detector to search for hidden cameras.

“Clear?” I said.

“So far.”

Dorothy made a pssst sound, and I came over, shining my flashlight. She was sitting at Eleanor Appleby’s computer, looking frustrated. “They do take precautions here,” she said. “It’s logged out.”

“Did you check the usual place?” Merlin asked.

“You mean, the Post-it pad in the middle drawer? Yeah, I checked it, but there’s nothing there. What’s wrong with these people?”

“Can you crack the password?” I asked her.

“If you don’t mind me sitting here until morning, I might be able to. I’ll need a pot of coffee, though.”

“Maybe not such a good idea,” I said.

“That means I can’t install any spyware. But maybe that’s just as well. Place like this, they probably have antivirus software that’d pick it up.”

“Now what?”

“I’m stumped.”

This was a disappointment. If we wanted to capture any of Eleanor Appleby’s passwords, we needed to put some kind of eavesdropping device on her computer.

“How about a piece of hardware?” Merlin said. He’d brought a couple of different keyloggers – plastic devices that looked like one of those barrel connectors you might – or might not – notice in the rat’s nest of cables behind your computer.

“Uh-uh,” Dorothy said. She pointed at the back of the admin’s computer. “They’re making life hard for us. Check it out.”

I trained my flashlight at the back of the computer, saw only smooth wood. “What am I looking at?”

“All the computer cables are routed through the desk so no one can tamper with them.”

“That rules out the hardware keylogger, too,” I said.

“No,” said Merlin. “It just means Plan C. The keyboard module.”

That was another little electronic component he’d brought along, which you installed inside the keyboard. Even harder to detect than the barrel connector, but time-consuming to put in. He put his messenger bag on Eleanor Appleby’s desk.

“Dorothy, can you put it in?” I asked.

“I can figure it out, yeah,” she said. “Though Walter might be faster at it.”

“Faster and better,” Merlin said, “but I’ve got another job to do.”

“Then you’ll just have to settle,” Dorothy snapped. She reached into his messenger bag and took out a crimping tool, a screwdriver, and a tube of Superglue. She flipped the keyboard over, began loosening the miniature screws.

“You realize,” Merlin said, “that this means you’re going to have to get back in here and retrieve this thing in a day or two, right?”

“ We are,” I said.

He grunted. “Then you really better hope nothing goes south tonight.”

I nodded. “Let’s get lucky.”

I approached Koblenz’s office door, turned the knob slowly, pushed it open. Merlin followed right behind, carrying a second messenger bag full of equipment.

I looked back at Merlin. “You didn’t detect any motion detectors in here, right?”

“Not microwave-based,” he said. “Passive infrared I’m not going to pick up.”

“You think he might have passive infrared?”

Merlin shined the light quickly around the office, saw the immaculate desk, the perfectly squared piles on the credenza behind it. “Nah. He’s too orderly.”

Unless the cleaning people had been given instructions not to clean his office, Koblenz wouldn’t have a motion detector of any kind inside his office. I agreed with Merlin: Koblenz seemed the fastidious type, the sort of guy who’d want his office carpet vacuumed every night, the wastebaskets emptied. And, although it was possible, I doubted his admin cleaned his office for him.

Merlin sighed. “That’s a TL-30X6.”

“I thought it was a Diebold.”

“That’s the rating. The most secure safe they make. And an electronic lock. Oh, man.”

“Like I told you.”

“Yeah,” he said.

“Right?”

“You said electronic lock. I didn’t know it was a TL-30X6.”

“I don’t like your tone, Merlin. You sound very pessimistic. Maybe even defeatist.”

“Heller, listen to me. I brought my StrongArm safe cracker diamond-core drill bits, okay? But drilling through one of these, that’s a five-hour job at least. That mother’s made from inch-and-a-half-thick steel and cobalt-carbide matrix hardplate, okay?”

“If you say so.”

“Then they’ve got sheets of tempered glass mounted inside, rigged to break when a drill hits it. Triggers a relocking mechanism that even the right combination won’t open.”

“Merlin,” I said. “I get you. I think we’re going to have to change your name to Eeyore. Now, why don’t we try the keypad? I’d prefer nondestructive means.”