around to face her.
âToo crude,â she said. She dipped into her bag and came out with a tiny computer, a set of datashades already dangling from the side. She put it on the desk and held out the net connection to me.
I plugged her in next to my own connection. The office might be run down, the building might be poorly maintained, but at least it was wired with the latest high bandwidth computer cables and outlets. Wireless or no wireless, no one would do business here at all if that werenât the case.
When I glanced back up at her, I saw that sheâd put on the shades. She poked and wiggled just one finger like a cyberwitch in sunglasses making hocus-pocus gestures in the empty air and a moment later my printer started rattling its ancient teeth.
âWhat is that youâre using on your finger?â I asked.
âLike a dataglove,â she said, âbut just one finger when you donât need so much.â
âSo itâs a datafinger?â
âYes,â she said. âItâs one of Pabloâs innovations.â
âSo Pabloâs a hardware guy, too?â
âPablo has lots of ideas,â she said. Since she was still wearing the shades, I couldnât read anything in her eyes.
âCan you download Randyâs book, too?â I asked.
âNo problem.â
âMaybe mail it to me,â I said. âSo I can look at it later.â
âIâll just route it to your hard drive,â she said.
I opened my mouth to ask her just how the hell she was going to get access to my system, but then I changed my mind. She already had access. Sheâd just routed the BOD list to my printer.
She poked at the air a couple more times with her datafinger. Then she pulled it off and took off her shades and put them on top of her little computer. âAll done,â she said. She glanced at me, and then she looked away.
âWhat?â
âNothing,â she said. âI guess itâs just the strangeness of your voice and the way you look. I mean, they donât go together.â
âThey donât?â Lulu said in Luluâs voice.
âYouâre really pretty good.â
I was pleased, but a little embarrassed, too. I got up and walked over to the printer and got the BOD list. I scanned the list as I walked back to my chair and sat down behind my desk again.
It only took me a moment to find
[email protected]. âSo how come you get these mailings and Pablo doesnât?â
âGerald gets them,â she said. âOr he got them. You know what I mean. Pablo figured one was enough.â
Yes, there was Gerald, and further down the list
[email protected].
âHmm,â I said. Wouldnât Pablo be on this list even if Gerald was on it? Didnât computer guys grab every opportunity to get e-mail?
I half expected to see Dennis on the list. We tried to make him keep his head down on the net; he was, after all, one of my disguises, and while we let him have an Internet account, we didnât let him spend a lot of time there. What Iâm trying to say is, I didnât really think he would be on the list, but if he had been, it wouldnât have totally flabbergasted me. The beauty of my method is just letting go and allowing the process to work. The downside is that sometimes when I get out of my own way, I lose track of where I am.
I didnât see any other familiar addresses, but one thing did catch my eye. There were a bunch of addresses that ended in 4e4.com, the anonymous Russian remailing service. If the killer were on this list, surely heâd be among the anonymous.
Or maybe not. I donât remember who said it (but I think it probably is true)ânaked is the best disguise. The killer could be right out in the open here.
And I hadnât crossed Pablo or even Prudence off my own list of suspects yet. It was way too early to go jumping to conclusions. I gave her a suspicious look over the top of the