The Magdalene Cipher Read Free

to—”
    â€œYou heard the news? I mean, you heard the fucking News at Ten a?!”
    â€œYeah . . . sort of. I mean . . . my Irish friend just called and—Jesse, I have a life! Fahchrissake! I can’t just—”
    â€œYou were supposed to clean up!”
    â€œWe did clean up. I mean , he did—my man did. I told him to go over there—when was it? The day before yesterday.”
    â€œThey found a device.”
    â€œA what a?!”
    â€œI said, the police found a device a.” There was a pause, and Dunphy could tell that Jesse Curry was hyperventilating. “Listen to me, my friend. There are people—policemen—who are trying—even as we speak—to find out whose device a it is. They’re making ‘in- kwy a-ries,’ and I think they have a name. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
    â€œOf course.”
    â€œWell, then, just how long do you think it will take MI5 to find that mick son of a bitch of yours, and then to get from him to you? One day? Two?”
    â€œThey won’t find him. He’s already out of the country.”
    â€œGood. That’s just where I want you to be. Don’t go back to your flat. Just take the first flight out.”
    â€œHow the fuck—I told you, I don’t even have my wallet! I ran to the office.”
    â€œI’ll have a courier in the Arrivals lounge. Terminal 3, just outside the Nothing-to-Declare. He’ll be holding a cardboard sign.” Curry paused, and Dunphy could hear the wheels spinning in his head. “ ‘Mr. Torbitt.’ Look for him.”
    â€œThen what?”
    â€œHe’ll have everything you need: passport—”
    â€œCash—”
    â€œâ€”ticket to the States, and a suitcase full of someone else’s clothes. Probably his own.”
    â€œWhy do I want someone else’s clothes?”
    â€œWhen was the last time you saw someone cross the Atlantic without a suitcase?”
    â€œLook, Jesse—”
    Beep-beep-beep . The pay phone wanted another coin .
    â€œGo home!”
    â€œLook, I don’t think this is such a great idea!”
    Beep-beep . a “Just do it.”
    â€œBut—”
    Beep-beep . a “I’m outa change!”
    There was a clatter on the other end of the line, a strangled curse, a distant harmonic, and that was it. Jesse Curry was gone .
    Dunphy sat back in his chair, dazed. He took in a lungful of smoke, held it for a long while, and exhaled. Leaning forward, he stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray and stared at the wall .
    Don’t go to your flat. I’ve got a housekeeping team—
    A housekeeping team . What about Clementine? Was she still asleep? Would they cart her out with the laundry? Lunging for the phone, he tapped out his own number and waited. The ringing came in extended, noisome bursts punctuated by long intervals of crackling, dead air. After a minute that seemed like an hour, he hung up, figuring she’d gone to her own place. Should he call her there?
    Dunphy shook his head, muttering to himself that Clementine was too important to handle on the fly. And, anyway, the operation was crashing and there were things that had to be done—now and by him. In the end, he would do his own housekeeping. He’d take care of his own “disposals.”
    With a sigh, he touched the trackball next to the keyboard and clicked on Start . Clicked again on Shut down , and a third time on Restart the computer in MS-DOS mode . Then he leaned over the keyboard and began to peck out the cybernetic equivalent of a lobotomy .
    CD/DOS
    It gave him the same sickening thrill that a skydiver feels as he steps, for the first time, into the air. Here goes, here comes—nothing:
    DEBUG
G=C800:5
    The computer began to ask a series of questions, which Dunphy answered in a perfunctory way, tapping at the keyboard. After a while, the hard disk began to grind. An age passed