Slow River

After some thought, she accessed net archives, downloading charity commercials that were two or three years old. She analyzed them for the same trends she had spotted in the later adverts, then brought up the tax records of those organizations that were still alive enough to be filing.

“It will work,” Lore said, but Spanner was putting on her jacket. “It will,” she went on more calmly. “We have a few minutes before we have to be there. Just sit down and listen.” Spanner zipped up the jacket. She was pulling gloves out of the pockets while Lore talked fast. “Look, you’ve seen what I can do. And you’ve seen the commercials. They can’t afford anything more expensive than library shots with maybe one live head. No interactives. Nothing I can’t handle. True?”

“True.”

“Then all we need is a false account, and maybe twenty seconds break-in time.”

Spanner shook her head. “We can’t even replace our own PIDAs in this climate.”

“We can get an account set up by getting Ruth’s help. She works at the morgue, remember.”

“I hadn’t forgotten. But she’s not likely to help us, not after the film.”

Lore swallowed. “Maybe if we explained…” And there was always that film, with the right head attached to the right body: there was always blackmail.

“And what about breaking into the net transmission? Ruth can’t help us there.”

“No.” Lore tried to smile. “Actually, I was hoping you would be able to think of a way to manage that.”

Spanner frowned. “I suppose… No. The equipment would be too expensive. It wouldn’t be cost-effective.”

“How expensive?”

“I don’t know. A lot.”

“Five hundred? Ten thousand?”

“More.” Spanner was still frowning, still thinking. “But maybe not that much more. It would be difficult to get hold of, though Hyn and Zimmer would be able to help…”

“But we don’t know where-”

“I can always find the old foxes. How much do you think we could make?”

Lore thought about lying. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “It depends how good my tape is. If I could count on ten seconds, say, then maybe… thirty thousand?”

Spanner nodded. “We’d more than break even after the second run.”

Assuming we don’t get caught after the first, Lore thought, but said nothing. She was feeling odd, almost excited, a little scared. It might work, it might. This might be a way out. She was finding it hard to breathe.

Spanner pulled on her gloves and tapped her breast pocket where the vial nested. “Meanwhile, we still need money. Even more if we’re to get that equipment.”

Spanner’s eyes were very blue, Lore thought, very beautiful. And there was no choice. They had to get their money from somewhere. For now. She nodded, and the motion spilled the tears that had been gathering in her eyes.

Spanner took off one of her gloves and gently brushed at Lore’s cheek. “Don’t cry. We’ll just do this for a little while longer. Just until we have the money for the equipment. Then I’ll make everything all right. I promise.”

She smiled, but Lore just cried harder. She had seen that half curl of the lip: Spanner was lying.

After Lore had set out the cat’s food, she sat on the damp earth by the rookery she had made of broken bricks and lumps of concrete with the steel still stuck through it. The worst of winter was over. There were two snowdrops poking bravely from the scraggy grass. It had rained earlier; the earth smelled freshly turned. She felt utterly blank. She watched the sky, a beautiful, cold, clear blue that made her ache. It reminded her of the Netherlands, of being six, of being looked after, protected from the world.

A faint mewling brought her back to the present. It came from under the bushes. She moved her head very slowly. Slight movement. Something—several somethings—small. She stayed very still, trying to breathe quietly, evenly. Heard it again, this time two thin squeaks. Kittens.

Lore thought about the thin, pathetic thing she had buried just a few months ago, the kitten that had died of utter starvation. Nothing, probably, had improved for the feral mother, but she did not know the meaning of giving up. Giving up got you nowhere. Nowhere at all. She would keep trying, keep giving birth, until she had a soft, round kitten.

* * *

Meisener came in, talking to Cel, while I was wriggling into my skinny. I watched him covertly while he took off his coat, folded it up and bundled it into his locker, and unhooked his slate.

His slate. It would be so simple. If I dealt with Spanner again. No. Not that. Not again. But you have to do something, Magyar had said, and she was right. Lucas Chen was strapped to a chair in a tent, somewhere, or shivering in a sleeping bag, naked and afraid. I had to do something. I worked through the first half of the shift, thinking, then ate my food at the break while staring unseeingly at the fish loop, still thinking. Near the end of the shift, I found Magyar. “Is there any way you can stay here after the end of the shift Pretend you need to do some office work, or something?”

“I don’t need to pretend. There’s a lot to do.”