Jennifer Government Part 20

38 Discontinuance

From his new office window, Buy Mitsui could see a gun store. It was NRA-affiliated, which was appropriate, or ironic, or something. Buy had decided that at the end of the day, he would visit this gun store, purchase a firearm, and shoot himself.

People were going to say he'd cracked, that he'd been grief-stricken. But that wasn't it. The truth was simpler: nothing Buy could ever do would be as important as saving that girl Hayley's life. He couldn't watch a girl bleed to death and then go make 3 percent off stock trades. The idea was monstrous. So Buy was finished as a productive member of society, unless he managed to lose so much perspective that margin calls began to seem important again. Either way, Buy was prepared to put a gun in his mouth and pull the trigger.

He was debating which was the biggest waste, buying lunch or saving the money, when his phone rang. He was so surprised he picked it up. "Uhh.e.l.lo?"

"Konitchiwa-h.e.l.lo," the phone said. "Stand by please for Kato Mitsui, Liaison."

"For who?" Buy said.

"Buy, h.e.l.lo!" a new voice said. "How are you? I hear the weather is lovely."

"Who is this?"

"It is Kato Mitsui, Liaison. You are working for me, is that right?"

"Oh, right," Buy said. "Yes."

"Excellent! It is most good to speak with you. I hope you are excited about this new position, Buy. Are you excited?"

"Uh," he said. "Well"

"Good!" Kato laughed heartily. Buy had to hold the phone away from his ear. "We have much to do. Our consumer-marketer friends are launching programs of most excellent potential. If we do not wish Mitsui to be relegated to any sidelines, we too must devise some cunning marketing strategies. I am hoping you are well equipped in this department."

"Marketing strategies? I don't know anything about"

"Ah, you are modest," Kato said. "To begin, I shall tell you of a program belonging to our friends at IBM. They are rewarding customers who bring in a compet.i.tive product and submit it to their in-house crus.h.i.+ng machine. It smashes it in-store, you see?"

"Yes, I see"

"A most brilliant strategy, to relegate the compet.i.tion to the status of junk and garbage. You must understand, it is difficult for we j.a.panese to think along these lines of head-to-head compet.i.tion. This is why we are now finding ourselves running behind our energetic American friends. But the times they are a-changing, are they not?"

"They are," Buy said.

"Very good! Now, you try one."

"What?"

"I am needing all your esteemed ideas, Buy, to improve and establish our role in US Alliance."

"Uh..." he said. "Can I think about it and get back to you?"

"Of course! I am trusting on your support, Buy. We will talk again when you have had some thoughts."

"I'm on it," Buy said. He put down the phone. Then he stared at it. I'm on it. I'm on it. That was the sort of thing Buy used to say. That was the sort of thing Buy used to say. I'm on it, I'm all over it, let me find out what the story is and get back to you. I'm on it, I'm all over it, let me find out what the story is and get back to you. Why had he said that? Because what Kato was talking about was interesting? Why had he said that? Because what Kato was talking about was interesting?

I'm on it, he thought. It was happening already. He felt disgusted with himself. he thought. It was happening already. He felt disgusted with himself.

It was almost two. Close enough. Buy packed his briefcase and closed his office door behind him.

There were so many guns, and Buy couldn't be bothered, looking through the racks. "I want a pistol," he told the man behind the desk. "Something suitable for putting in my mouth and pulling the trigger."

The man raised his eyebrows. "You want to cap someone?"

"Myself."

"Right, right," the man said, smiling. It took Buy a moment to catch the insinuation. "Something powerful but disposable. Right?"

"In the sense I only need it once, yes."

He unlocked a cabinet between them and hoisted a pistol. "This is a Vektor Z88, nine millimeter. Powerful at close range, simple to operate, doesn't make a lot of noise, and on the cheap side. This what you're after?"

"I don't care about the cost."

The man made the Vektor disappear. "Then you should take a look at this baby right here." He slapped a gun on the desk. It was sleeker and looked more powerful than the Vektor. Buy picked it up and weighed it in his hand. "A Colt .45, fully automatic. Extremely reliable, American-made, can make a man's head disappear from two hundred feet."

"I don't need"

"I know, you don't need long-range. But if you want power and reliability, this baby has it in spades. The accuracy is a bonus."

"How much?"

"For you, three thousand," the man said. "And I'll throw in a case of bullets and some cleaning solution."

Buy handed over his AmEx. "Keep the solution."

The man wrapped the Colt in white paper, then put it in a box. "And, in case you were wondering, this model has no serial number." He winked.

"Just give me the gun," Buy said.

He parked his Saab in the apartment block's underground area and got out. Without thinking, he locked it; it only occurred to him in the elevator how pointless that was. He should have left it on the street with the motor running.

The apartment was neat and quiet: his cleaning service had been in. Buy dragged a huge leather armchair over to the floor-to-ceiling windows and looked out at the city lights. They stared back at him. He began unwrapping his gun.

He was struck with the thought that the a.s.sa.s.sinwhoever had killed the girl, Hayleymust have done this, must have acquired a gun and loaded it with bullets. It didn't seem right to Buy that it was so easy. He looked at the Colt, feeling disgusted. Then he put the barrel in his mouth.

There was a plane descending from the north, its red and white lights winking at him. Buy watched it until it disappeared behind the AT&T building, then pulled the trigger.

39 Pertinacity

Jennifer's finger was getting sore from holding down V, the key that told Billy NRA's bug to vibrate. The signal went from her keyboard to her modem, through the telephone line to the Government Communications Center in Sydney, to a geosyncronous satellite, to the fake cigarette packet in Billy's pocket. It was a lot of technology the Government was still paying off, and it was all useless thanks to the astounding stupidity of Billy NRA.

She had a plan: Billy would overpower Bill and get him to a Government station. This was clearly the man the NRA had confused Billy for. Why he was only now returning to New Zealand, Jennifer didn't know, but that was just details. The important thing was that she'd been given this opportunity to arrest him and replace him with Billy, who could then gather evidence to link the whole mess back to John Nike. But Billy wasn't picking up, Billy, was en route to the NRA in blissful, moronic ignorance, and if he reported in alongside the man he was pretending to be, it was all over for Jennifer's clever plan and probably all over for Billy, too.

"Mommy?" Kate said, coming into the study. "Can we go to the dog shelter now?"

"In a little while." She picked up the phone, but it hissed and squealed at her. She'd forgotten about the modem. "Can you get my cellphone from the kitchen table, honey?"

"I thought we were going to go go."

"Kate, Mommy's very busy."

"Then when can we"

"After," she said. "When I'm done, all right? Please get my phone. It's very important."

Kate left. Jennifer waited, holding down the V key. Her head hurt.

"Is this it?"

"Thank you. I won't be much longer, sweetie, maybe twenty minutes, okay?"

"That's what you said an hour hour ago." ago."

"It was not an hour," she said, but she looked at her watch and maybe it was. "Kate, please go andfind something to do."

Kate left wordlessly. Jennifer swapped hands on the keyboardshe was about ready to dump this slingand dialed with her free hand.

"Government Comms Center."

"It's Jennifer, Field Agent. I'm using that Marlboro bug and I need to get a message to the user."

"You know that vibrate feature I told you about? If you go into the Transmit screen and press V"

"I'm pressing the V right now. How else can I get a message to him?"

"Um...you could just try transmitting a message anyway."

"He'll hear that?"

"No, not unless he's got the headphones in."

"Why would he have the headphones in?"

"I dunno, I'm just saying"

"f.u.c.k!" she said.

"It's designed to be un.o.btrusive," he said, wounded. "An undercover agent doesn't want his bug to start broadcasting, 'Come back, Agent Grimes.' Maybe your operative has a good reason for not responding."

"My operative's reason for not responding is that he's an idiot. You're telling me there's no way" Her cellphone beeped. She looked at it. It said: INCOMING CALL.

"Apart from vibrate? No, there's not."

"I'm going to put you on hold, and I want you to think of a way for me to contact my operative. All right?"

"I'm sorry, there's no"

She switched lines. "h.e.l.lo?"

"Jen!" Calvin said. "How's home life? I didn't interrupt you in the middle of baking cookies, did I?"

"No," she said. "Did you get John Nike?"

"Ah...no, not exactly."

"No?"

"Before you get upset"

"I'm upset!"

"He jumped a plane for Los Angeles."

"Son of a b.i.t.c.h!"

"I've already contacted the L.A. office. They're going to a.s.sign a couple of agents. They'll take care of it."

"No. They won't. John isn't going to be caught by a couple of agents looking for him in their spare time. Jesus!"

"Well, I guess you'll just have to trust in their abilities," Calvin said. "By the way, the other John is in a coma."

"What?"

"There are two Johns, right? Vice-President John is in L.A. The other one is in a coma. They don't know if he'll ever recover."

"Oh," she said. "Right." That was kind of good news.