Slow River

I stared at the cabinet for nearly two minutes before I had the courage to open it. When I did, the breath hissed between my teeth in a combination of relief and disappointment: no small glass bottle, half full of oily liquid. I closed the door, turned away, and realized the muscles across my belly were tight, my breathing hoarse. Even now, after months, I wanted to feel that oil under my chin, be kissed with its musky scent in my nostrils, surrender to it hungrily. I went into the living room. From the kitchen came the lazy thump and tumble of my clothes in the dryer.

“I’ve made tea.” Spanner was sitting on the rug, near the tin-topped table.

“I don’t want any,” I said brusquely. I was angry, angry that the drug had not been there. That I had wanted it so badly. That I had not been faced, at least, with a choice. I had wanted the drug, I knew that, but now I wouldn’t know whether or not I could also have refused it.

“It’ll warm you up. No? To business, then.” She poured for herself. “I assume you’ve given some thought to how long your clip will have to stand up to scrutiny?”

“A standard thirty-second spot should do it. But most of the money that’s going to be donated will be within the first ten or twelve. I’ve told you about Stella’s friends, the rivalry between them to give as much as they can as fast as they can. Judging by the society and celebrity gossip news, it’s still fashionable to be the first to give to a new charity.”

I remembered Stella at Ratnapida V-handing the screen scanner, laughing at beating out her friends. And the amounts had not been small. “So it all depends on how well the equipment from Hyn and Zimmer will perform-”

“Good for several minutes.”

“-and where and how the money will be moved around.”

That was the sticking point. Now that Ruth would no longer help with false physical ID, the bank accounts would be harder.

But Spanner smiled her narrow-eyed smile. “Since you’ve left I’ve become much more sophisticated. I have this program that will skip credit through the edges of slush funds—the ones no one dares to look at too closely, anyway.”

“Like?”

“Like the accounts the various media use to pay their ‘unofficial sources’ at various levels of government; like the accounts the police use to pay their informants.”

Programs like that were not easy to get. “Where did you get it?”

“A… client. And it’s safe enough.”

If, as I suspected, she had extorted it from a daisy chainer or cajoled it as payment from a sex client, then she was more than likely right. Still… “Have you tested it?”

“Once.”

I could only accept her at her word. “I’ll want my share in debit cards, immediately. The minute we can verify the money in our chosen account.”

“Agreed.”

I decided I wanted some tea, after all. “Hyn and Zimmer still think they can get us the equipment?”

“Any day. They sent me the specs earlier tonight.” She stood, turned on her screen. “Come over here.” I brought my tea. “Take a look. Fabulous stuff. If you could make a clip good enough, I could hold the net for six or seven minutes with these.”

In the glow of the spidery schematics, her face looked softer. I had almost forgotten how appealing she was when she was alight with enthusiasm. I had to fight the urge to touch her cheek. I stepped back a little. “Where are you going to get the money?”

“I’ll get it in time, don’t worry.” She couldn’t take her eyes off the technical specs.

“But I do worry.” She looked so happy, so vulnerable. “Look, Spanner, we could just forget this. I mean, I know I owe you money, but I could pay it gradually. A bit every time I get paid.”

“Are you out of your mind?” The hard lines were back, grooved on each side of her mouth. She stabbed a finger at the screen. “Look at that stuff. It’s hard to get, expensive, and already ordered. We can’t just turn around and say, Oops, sorry boys and girls, we changed our minds! And how much do you earn a month, anyway? Not even enough to pay my expenses for two days! I need money now, not in dribs and drabs over the next few years. No. You heard what Hyn and Zimmer said about these people. There’s no way out now but through.”

I hated her then, for getting herself trapped in such a way that all she could do was dig herself a deeper hole, but then I laughed at myself. Wasn’t that what I was doing? We stared at each other a moment. Whatever she saw seemed to satisfy her.

“Now, we still need information about the net nexuses.”

Spanner might be the soul of impatience when it came to other people, but when she was planning something dangerous and illegal she could wait like a cat by a mousehole. I sighed. “All right. We could both name the locations of half a dozen stations without even thinking hard. And you’re good with locks. So tell me why we can’t just break in and use one of those.”