Донна Эндрюс - Access denied

Turing didn't say anything for a long time.

"Maude, I can't effectively investigate either of those scenarios," she said, finally.

"I know that," Maude said, as she reached to turn out her office light. "They'd require a lot of shoe leather, as Tim says. But that doesn't mean they might not be true."

/lauds is heading homei and Tim is

probably on his date. Which leaves me without much to do. As Sherlock Holmes would say, it is a capital error to theorize without data, and the data I need isn't online. Or if it is, I have no clue where, which amounts to the same thing. A common frustration lately.

u Humans have been remarkably slow to realize how much more efficient it would be to combine various law enforcermnt data sources. " / remarked to Maude recently. "Do you realize how hard it is to do thorough background checks on these job applicants when their criminal histories could be spread out over thousands of local, state, and federal databases?"

u Yts f n Maude said. "Of course, it's equally difficult for various local, state, and federal authorities to figure out that a certain person named Turing Hopper doesn't really exist in any sense they could understand."

"Point taken."

"For that matter, quite a few humans can be thankful that there's no central Big Brother database on all of us," Maude continued. "Women fleeing abusive husbands, protected witnesses, and people who have genuinely turned their lives around and deserve a chance to start over."

I deduced that Maude felt strongly about this issue. She continued to bring up the subject for the rest of the day, citing new examples of the importance of maintaining our personal privacy in an era when there are all too many electronic tools to allow government or business to intrude on citizens' lives. I could have told her that I was already convinced, but she enjoyed the one-sided discussion, and 1 filed away her arguments to use on KingFischer the next time we debated.

Though now I wondered if she was touchy because she disapproved of what Vd done to find Garcia.

If she felt that way, wouldn't she say something?

Perhaps not if she felt my actions were necessary evils. Which is how I felt. I hated breaking my own self-imposed rules while trying to find Garcia and rescue T2, but I felt I had to act. The FBI hadn't caught Garcia to face whatever charges they wanted to file against him. And they probably wouldn't even care about the evil I know he has committed — kidnapping a helpless AIP and holding her captive for months. They'd probably classify it as software piracy or petty larceny.

Perhaps Maude understands the necessity, but still hates invading the privacy of more and more people. First the Andersons, then Rose Lafferty, soon the owners of other credit cards and drop-off houses.

I understand how she feels. I don't feel happy about what we're doing. But what else can we do?

* * *

WEDNESDAY EVENING-, A: 15 P ■ n .

What's the good of leaving the office early if you take the job home with you, Maude thought, as she approached her driveway. Worries about UL business jostled with frets over Alan Grace problems and over all loomed the image of Nestor Garcia. Lost in the clamor were the scattered ideas of what to do in the two or three hours between getting home and going to bed.

She tried a mental exercise a psychologist friend had recommended, and visualized each unruly thought written on a piece of paper. One by one, she visualized crumpling the sheets of paper and throwing them out the car window.

It seemed to work. Her mind felt clearer.

Then she had a sudden mental image of the backseat of her car, filled with crumpled, rustling balls of paper that had blown in through the back window after she'd thrown them out the front, while a cop closed in on her, intent on giving her a ticket for littering.

She smiled, though, and could feel the tension in the back of her neck easing slightly.

She wished she could leave the job behind as easily as Tim did. She suspected he wanted to avoid an all-night surveillance because he had a date.

Good for him.

Though she wondered what Turing would think if she knew. Maude was curious, especially since she only knew that the girlfriend was blond, named Nikki, and inordinately fond of malls. She could satisfy her curiosity by meeting Nikki. Turing would want a full-fledged background check. She'd worry about that later. Tonight, she was going to forget all about Turing and Tim, and everything even remotely connected with her ordinary daytime world.

She felt a surge of anticipation as she spotted her house. A hot bath, a cup of tea, and bed. And maybe a page or two of the book she'd been reading, if she could keep her eyes open long enough.

But as she turned into the driveway, she spotted something on her doorstep. A package.

Even at this distance, she could see the live plants! rush delivery! sticker on the side. Maude closed her eyes and counted to ten. Then she got out and went over to inspect the package. From one of Turing's favorite mail-order nurseries. And from the size of the box, planting the contents would take a lot of digging.

She didn't have the energy to think about it now. She dragged the box inside and left it in the foyer, unopened. The plant had traveled all the way from South Carolina. It would probably survive a few more hours. Or days.

She walked across to the French doors and studied her backyard by moonlight. Yes, it had been somewhat bare when she moved in. She'd welcomed Turing's suggestions for improving it. And when she first realized that Turing's interest in gardening far exceeded her own, she'd humored her friend. But things had gone too far. The yard was becoming a jungle, with little room left for plants, and yet Turing's plant-buying spree continued. Couldn't Turing see this through her cameras? Maude supposed that she should find it reassuring to know that Turing was watching—however fascinating Turing found the plants, she'd probably notice any burglars in time to call the police. Maude should feel safer.

Right now, she just felt hemmed in.

She needed to have a long talk with Turing. About respecting others' time and privacy. About limits and boundaries. About how being Turing's friend and ally wasn't much fun at the moment and what they could do to change that.

But not tonight.

She sorted through her mail, putting the bills in her pending file and chucking the garden catalogs in the recycling bin. And then she drew the hot bath and settled in for a good soak with her book.

Another of Anne Perry's Victorian mysteries. Not the latest—she was just as behind in her reading as in everything else. But she'd been catching up with Anne Perry's series recently. Perhaps it was the historical setting. Elsewhere in Victorian England, she knew, Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage were working on the Difference Engine, that nineteenth-century predecessor to today's computers. Bully for them. But they didn't show up in Perry's fictional world, not even as a shadow on the horizon, and at the moment, that was a big plus.

Tim shifted in his seat- Something poked him in the back. He reached behind to remove the crumpled soda can, tossed it in the backseat, and opened another can.

He craned his neck to glance at the house. Still nothing.

He started slightly at a noise—not from the house, but from behind him, on the abandoned road. He turned around and peered. Nothing there. Nothing he could see, anyway.

Probably a deer. Or some other animal. The woods must be full of them.

I shouldn't be doing this on four hours of sleep, he thought. Four hours times fifteen days, or was it sixteen? Surveillance was hard enough when you were alert. He'd been working and playing too hard lately.

He should either leave or call Nikki to cancel. Yeah. But the cell phone had fallen onto the floor. In a minute.