The World Gives Way: A Novel Page 11

  This world was much more unforgiving than the last when it came to status—half the Bendel collection was liquidated before boarding just to pay for the passage, and the rest had been sold off one at a time over the years to pay for the right domiciles, the right vacation spots, the right friends. Eventually even those faded away, through indulgence and bad money strategy.

  “It’s appalling, the lack of respect,” David would often mutter when no one pledged fealty upon the utterance of his surname. Ingrid would huff in agreement, usually while grasping the neck of a martini glass. The only person he ever hooked with stories of his lineage was Ingrid, who was also the last declension of a so-called great family. She would readjust herself to sit up straighter on whatever velvet cushion in whatever hotel lobby they happened to be occupying and say, “Grandpa Radcliffe was in oil,” as if that meant anything to Tobias. He grasped what they seemed unable to acknowledge, which was that this new world was entirely populated by the wealthy families of the previous one, old and new money, but all varying degrees of rich (aside from the contract workers, but they didn’t count). What use was it to be a giant among a multitude of other giants?

  Regardless, David and Ingrid had clung to whatever legacy and prestige they could, and when the last remnants were wiped away by debt, they stole and conned their way into the lifestyle they thought they were owed.

  Stopped at a crosswalk just past the archway, Tobias picked up pieces of litter that clouded like a low fog around the base of a trash bin. He pictured commuters, men in power suits, women chatting on phones, tossing off crumpled wrappers without a look back to see if they landed on their mark. Tobias disdained that sort of lazy obliviousness, whereby people tunneled through life without seeing a thing around them. There are consequences to actions.

  “Appalling,” he muttered to himself, and realized he sounded just like his father.

  The crowds helped his mood, at least enough for him to rejoin Simpson and keep working. Tobias didn’t want to leave Simpson alone for too long, partially because he didn’t trust Simpson to be thorough, and partially because he didn’t want to be seen as lazy.

  Back at the ferry terminal, boats cycled through. Simpson sipped coffee, occasionally glancing at the surveillance feeds. Tobias was staring at Myrra Dal’s picture on his tablet.

  “I don’t think she killed them,” Tobias admitted to Simpson. He almost wished it would start an argument.

  Simpson sat quietly and didn’t take the bait. Tobias continued, as though he had.

  “Look at her life right before this. She’s making all these long-term plans, conning Jake. Why would she go and kill the Carlyles? Seems way too impetuous for someone thinking that far ahead.”

  Simpson set down his coffee and leaned over the table.

  “It’s very likely she didn’t,” he said calmly. “But she broke contract, kidnapped a baby, and cut off a dead man’s hand, so I think it’s probably fine we’re chasing her.”

  “I just think there’s something we’re missing. She had an out. Why did she leave? Why did she take the baby?”

  “You’re new at this,” Simpson said with a tilt of the head. Tobias resented the patronizing tone. “You haven’t had a chance to see yet, the weird things people will do when they’re in a state of panic. If Myrra Dal came across the Carlyles’ bodies, or, worse, if she actually witnessed the suicides”—Simpson paused for effect—“then yeah, I can absolutely see her doing everything she did. She probably did it without thinking.”

  It wasn’t the worst logic, but Tobias pushed back anyway.

  “It just feels like there’s some large piece of information we’re missing,” he said.

  Simpson shook his head.

  “No, no, you’re overthinking this. You know how many skips we get a year from contract workers? I handled dozens of them in my first couple years on the force. It’s the work we always give to the new recruits.” Simpson made a gesture to Tobias across the table. “Truth is, I was promoted out of doing this crap years ago, but I’m stuck on this case now because a very, very rich family is involved, and also because you’re Barnes’s favorite pet, and he wanted someone good working the case with you.”

  Simpson stopped for a sip of coffee but continued before Tobias could get angry or object. “And all these skip cases are a little funny. People get weird when they snap. It’s actually been better, the last ten years or so. You should hear some of the senior agents talking about how bad it used to be.”

  Tobias had heard the stories. Barnes had explained once that about a generation ago, Security saw a lot more of these cases, contract workers losing their heads. A lot of poisonings and intentional gas leaks. Occasionally more violent and bloody confrontations—kitchen knives if they were domestics, or perhaps a foreman flung into the machinery if they were factory workers. More often than not, the workers killed themselves along with their host employers.

  “It’s easier to get lost when there’s no light at the end of the tunnel, no focused goal to strive for,” Barnes had said. “We’re a few generations in now, in this world… The first generation, they were the ones who signed contracts in the first place. They had ownership over their decision. And now this generation, they know they’ll be freed in their lifetime, they’ve got a fixed point to concentrate on. But those middle generations—boy, I don’t know. Maybe it helped if you had a kid right away, were reminded of what you were working for…”

  But Myrra Dal belonged to that blessed generation—the generation that would see freedom. What was the point in tossing her employer off a roof?

  Whenever Barnes discussed the contract arrangement, he did so with a shake of his head. It never really sat right with him, he often said, but then again, with the economy and the cost, he didn’t know if he could come up with a better solution. Tobias had taken on Barnes’s opinion regarding the politics of this, and, like his mentor, he still did his best to uphold the law. The system was flawed, but it was the system they had, and it would mean complete chaos if anyone were to try to change it at this stage.

  It stung to think that Barnes might have brought Simpson on as a babysitter. The hurt must have shown on Tobias’s face, because Simpson was looking a bit contrite.

  “Look,” he said, “it’s not that you aren’t a good agent. I think you actually have the makings to be a pretty great investigator, once some of the newness wears off of you. And I’m pretty sure Barnes thinks so too. You just mean a lot to him, that’s all. Even someone as gruff as Barnes is bound to be a little protective, you know?”

  Simpson gave Tobias a small conceding smile, and Tobias relaxed. He wished he didn’t need the validation.

  “Toby? What is it?” Barnes’s voice was a little fuzzy on the tablet speaker, but came through all the same. It was evening, and Tobias was back in his hotel room. He wasn’t quite sure why he’d called Barnes in the first place. He wanted to hear his voice, he supposed, and wanted to discern whether Barnes really thought that Tobias was capable at all, or whether this job was just something Barnes was throwing to him as a reward, like a dog treat. He didn’t say any of this. Instead he talked about the case.

  “Hi, Barnes—I was just wondering—is it possible for us to get an IT guy to take a look at Marcus Carlyle’s drives again? It feels like there are some files missing, and I was wondering if we could manage some data retrieval.”

  Barnes coughed, and Tobias could hear him shuffling around on the other side of the speaker. Barnes would be back in his apartment by now. Tobias wondered briefly what Barnes was having for dinner. He didn’t always eat healthy when Tobias wasn’t around to check on him.

  “Don’t worry too much about that,” Barnes said finally. “Marcus Carlyle had a lot of access in the government, so some of the higher-ups came in first thing, went through everything in the office, and pulled anything above our security clearance. Any gaps in the information are to do with that.”

  Tobias was dumbfounded.

  “Why didn’t I know abo
ut this earlier?” he said, not sure if he sounded like a professional agent or a rebellious child.

  “They assured me that none of it was relevant to the case,” Barnes said, “and they asked that I leave it off the report. Simple as that.”

  “But you didn’t see any of what they took?”

  “Toby, security clearance exists for a reason.”

  “Sure, but there’s something here worth questioning—”

  “You suddenly think you’re above the law? You can’t pick and choose the rules, you know better.”

  Tobias backpedaled. “No, no—I know. It just feels like it might be connected to the case, that’s all.”

  While he talked, Tobias adjusted the tablet so that it was exactly parallel to the edge of the table. Then he adjusted his tablet stylus so it was parallel as well, then he arranged the plastic hotel brochures in order of size. It was as though Barnes could see Tobias’s movements through the machine. His voice softened. “What does Simpson think?”

  Tobias’s heart sank.

  “Simpson doesn’t think it matters. He thinks Dal just snapped and left.”

  “Then that’s the lead you ought to follow,” Barnes said. “Don’t get ahead of yourself. All you have to do for now is find her and bring her in. We can get the whys and hows out of her during interrogation.”

  A low, rough whooshing noise overtook the tablet speakers. Barnes was breathing too close to the microphone.

  “You’re doing a good job, Toby,” he said. “You’re just putting too much into this, moving too fast. Just follow your instincts and enjoy the chase.”

  “Yeah, OK,” Tobias replied.

  Barnes disconnected the call. Silence. Tobias stared at the objects arranged on the table. He stared at them long enough that the tablet fell asleep and the screen went dark, and all he was looking at was the shiny black reflective surface. Tobias was good about keeping the glass smudge-free, so when the tablet was shut off, it was as good as a mirror. He appreciated the shine off the glass, with a little curve to the light at the corners. From where Tobias was sitting, the surface reflected the hotel ceiling and the edge of the sconce on the wall. There was a small hairline crack forming in the ceiling’s drywall. Maybe they could get a discount on the hotel bill.

  He was trying not to think too hard. He picked up the tablet, watched the screen light up blue again as his index finger touched the glass, and began a search, also with as little thought as he could muster. He didn’t want to consider what it meant to doubt Barnes.

  He searched for anyone employed by the government: politicians, independent contractors, economists, scientists, security, military, even the janitors. Then he ranked them by security clearance. It was like shuffling and arranging a deck of cards. David had once taught him how to do that, back when he thought (wrongly) that Tobias might be willing to learn to count cards.

  He pored over the files for all people at Marcus Carlyle’s level. There weren’t many such people—maybe sixty—and, predictably, the information kept on each was minimal. Mostly just a name, date of birth, occupation, and maybe a list of previously held positions. These were people with power who knew how to keep their secrets. Even with that scant information, however, Tobias was able to spot one disturbing coincidence: four people on the list had died within the past year, all under unnatural circumstances.

  Four was a small but significant number. Not enough to immediately set off alarm bells, but significant. The deaths had been fairly spaced out over time—one of New London’s top structural engineers had fallen in front of a train last December. The following March, the secretary of security had drowned in the Palmer Sea while on vacation. Tobias remembered that one from the news. Four months later, in July, an environmental lobbyist had died of an overdose. Then, a week ago, Marcus Carlyle had slit his wrists. All but the Carlyle deaths had been ruled accidental.

  Tobias didn’t know what to do with this information, but he knew it was important, and he knew that he was growing afraid. Even as he tried to not think past the present moment, he felt nauseous. Tobias felt the same sensation he’d felt in the crowds of Palmer earlier that day, the feeling of insignificance that at the time had comforted him. Now that feeling turned—instead of a cog in the beautiful machine, he felt like one of a million ants in a colony, all climbing hills of sand, unaware of a thunderstorm about to drown everything. He didn’t know what this meant. He had a feeling Myrra Dal knew.

  He couldn’t tell Barnes about this—Barnes would simply chide him. A foreign voice rang out in his head: There’s following the rules, and then there’s burying your head in the sand. It didn’t sound like something he would think. It sounded like something Myrra Dal would say. After reading her letters over and over, he could hear her voice so clearly. Maybe he could tell Simpson, if he found the right opening. They could follow up once they found Myrra Dal, and ask her for the explanation.

  Tobias’s wants, in the grand scheme, were small. He didn’t want to be a part of something big, didn’t want to be the one to expose corruption, usher in change, make his mark on a worldwide scale. He simply wanted to live a stable life, take satisfaction in a job well done and the steady climb of a career, and reside in a nice apartment in a nice part of town.

  Whatever this was felt beyond his reach, and he was ashamed to find he had the sudden ignoble impulse to ignore the nauseous feeling in his stomach and stop any further investigations altogether. Maybe he could even drop the Myrra Dal case. Even as he thought the thought, he knew he wouldn’t abandon anything. He would continue to do his job and do it well. He didn’t quit halfway through. The entire precinct would balk. He was the dependable one, the one to be counted on. That superseded all bouts of anxiety.

  He turned off his tablet again, undressed, and climbed into bed. He shut off the light and shut his eyes, but didn’t sleep.

  13

  MYRRA

  Myrra quite literally did not know what to do with herself. The first waves of uncertainty had hit her after Sem left her alone in the hotel suite. The suite was massive: multiple rooms, seating areas, and a huge stone balcony worthy of the Carlyle penthouse. She walked around to take it all in but avoided the balcony door.

  Ever since Imogene killed herself, she’d been going and going. Now, in Nabat, well off Security’s radar (she’d been looking and looking and had yet to see a single camera), she could finally stand still for a while. But this, in itself, was unexpectedly daunting. Her entire life had been dictated by the people she worked for. Whether she obeyed or rebelled (and she’d done plenty of both), all her actions had been reactions. She didn’t know how to just choose what to do with her time.

  Then there was Charlotte. Myrra regarded the baby in her arms like a small alien thing, a vestigial limb that she couldn’t separate from herself. The porters had set up a bassinet near the bed. She unwrapped Charlotte and laid her down, watched her freely wriggling her limbs with a grateful look. She stretched her two pudgy arms in opposite directions to occupy as much space as possible. It was the first time Charlotte had looked calm since they’d left the penthouse. This kid expected luxury.

  Whatever freedom Myrra thought she had now, it was hampered by her bringing Charlotte with her. She knew that.

  Myrra crouched beside the bassinet and inspected the bottom of Charlotte’s foot. Babies’ feet were so odd; it was uncanny to see a foot that had yet to walk—no calluses, no worn skin. She brushed a finger along the bottom of Charlotte’s foot; Charlotte giggled and twitched in response.

  She’d stay for a few days here, then leave Charlotte in the hotel with a note for the maids to contact local authorities. She could steal a boat at the bottom of the cliffs, head to some other small town across the Palmer Sea, someplace just as low-tech as Nabat where she could stay off the radar. She could be long gone before they found Charlotte, and then the both of them would be safe. Safe, but separate.

  In just a few days she would do this. But Myrra could have time with her till then.
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br />   It wasn’t just the choices. Every second held too much weight now that time was limited. Myrra felt an overwhelming pressure to pack each moment with meaning, to act and think profoundly. What she did instead was drink.

  She liked all the small bottles that came with the hotel room. Imogene had often chatted about what hotels were good or bad, she’d even gifted Myrra a free robe once, but she’d never explained that everything came in miniature. Tiny bottles of shampoo, small flat cakes of soap. Shot-size bottles of whiskey. She grabbed three from the knee-high fridge and poured them all into a single glass, no ice. She’d never had good whiskey before. At first she sipped it, the way she’d seen Marcus do over cigars with his colleagues. When that didn’t relax her, she knocked the whole thing back in one gulp. That was the way workers drank moonshine in the laundry.

  Time swam.

  That evening, Myrra watched Charlotte roll back and forth in her bassinet, bending her leg up to her face, trying to eat her toes. She seemed unaware of anything past the movement of her own limbs. For Charlotte everything felt new, all the time.

  Did she know her mother was gone? There must be some feeling, even with a mother as distant as Imogene. There are things you get used to, a familiar primal scent, a rhythm of breath and heartbeat, a signature warmth in the skin. Even for a baby, there must be a sense of loss when that goes away.

  When she was a child, Myrra had slept in the same bed as her mother. It used to annoy her: the intrusion of limbs, the heat, the lack of space. After her mother was gone, it felt impossible to sleep in the absence of it. The bed felt terrifyingly empty and sterile to the point where, all these years later, Myrra would often wake up and find her body had unconsciously pushed itself to the edge of the bed, leaving a gaping space on the other side. Sometimes, just before drifting into sleep, reaching out with intangible senses, Myrra still felt a sunken weight next to her on the mattress.