Because of its location less than two blocks from busy Interstate Jurgen Voss’s apartment building in North Las Vegas was continuously washed by the hum of highway traffic—a steady drone that was often augmented by the thunder of freight trains on the nearby Union Pacific tracks.
On the agreed day Dan Shiller and Buster Malloy arrived almost simultaneously, each parking his vehicle on the shaded side of Gorman Road. As Shiller set the Beamer’s alarm and locked the doors, he dubiously surveyed the run-down neighborhood and wondered whether his hubcaps would survive this visit to Voss. By contrast, Malloy merely removed the key from the ignition of the crumbling Ford pickup and casually banged the door shut, releasing a cloud of rust particles. He did not bother to lock the vehicle or even roll up the windows. The two men greeted each other, filed silently through the front door, and pushed the bell marked J. voss on the bank of battered brass mailboxes.
A scratchy voice answered, “Ja?”
“It’s us,” said Shiller curtly into the dusty speaker.
Within a second, the inner glass door buzzed and the lock was released. Buster and Dan pushed through the door, both involuntarily wincing as a medley of Dustbane, cooked cabbage, and pee assailed their nostrils. They marched single file up the chipped terrazzo stairs to the second floor.
“Gentlemen, I have been expecting you,” Jurgen announced, releasing the dead bolt and ushering his visitors inside. “Please excuse the mess. I am living alone; my housekeeping is not good.”
“Don’t bother me none,” Malloy muttered.
“We’re not here to admire the decor,” Shiller said as he gazed around with barely concealed distaste. “But if we’re gonna set up shop here, you
might as well show us around,” he added. “I wanna see this awesome computer stuff you keep raving about.”
The grimy two-bedroom apartment was furnished with the barest essentials for the little man’s ascetic lifestyle. Jurgen slept in the smaller bedroom, but it was in the larger one that he spent most of his leisure time and virtually all of his disposable income. This was Jurgen Voss’s computer room—his nexus between reality and fantasy, a plexus of technological treasures that he alone commanded.
“Holy shit!” Shiller gasped in disbelief at the sheer complexity of it all. His overwhelming first impression of the room was that of a millennium-class communications center haphazardly deployed among the dusty relics of a twentieth-century computer graveyard. Malloy merely gawked.
Inside the room it was impossible to tell night from day. Opaque plastic blinds were pulled down past the sills, and thick curtains overlapped in the center, completely obscuring the room’s two large west-facing windows. Years of afternoon sun on the windows had baked layers of dust into the heavy cloth drapes and the yellowed plastic blinds. Were he ever to open the curtains and raise the blinds, Jurgen would doubtlessly be faced with a virtual avalanche of dead houseflies. An ancient through-the-wall air conditioner, necessary to protect the equipment from the heat of the desert day, failed miserably to actually freshen any air, which felt stale and heavy. It was difficult for Jurgen Voss’s visitors to suppress sneezes.
Voss proudly swept his hand around the room.
“Have you ever seen such a place, gentlemen?” he began proudly.
“Not me,” said Shiller.
“Me, neither,” said Malloy.
“I have gathered here much unique equipment,” Voss continued, indicating a large, crowded desktop on the wall opposite the door. Its most prominent occupant was a twenty-one-inch monitor whose flared metal case pointed slightly down, suggesting a jet-black hooded cobra. A single track light suspended over the monitor illuminated the top of the machine and the keyboard, leaving the screen itself in shadow. Two smaller monitors flanked the large one, their screens coated with the dust that permeated the room.
Below the work surface was a bank of tower and mini-tower computers, all humming and emitting occasional sharp clicks as their hard disks were accessed. He pointed to the largest of the beige boxes. “As you see, gentlemen, the server is an IBM Itanium. It contains the most powerful chip
possible, which I can upgrade to the next two generations of CPUs. The latest version of Windows is on it. Also Linux. To my ISP I am running a wi-fi connection; therefore, I have the schnellest—fastest—possible access to the Internet.”
“Here on the shelf you see a magnetic card reader and writer—”
“I suppose you’re gonna tell us you take American Express, too,” Shiller interjected sardonically.
“Nein. It is just another useful tool. Like this plastic lamination machine—”
“Now there’s a handy gizmo,” Shiller remarked. “I suppose you use it to create fake IDs, huh?”
“Jawohl. Also other things.”
Shiller surveyed the bizarre vista, his gaze falling on what appeared to be video-editing equipment. “What’s this, Jurgen?”
“I will explain. To the video tape recorder and DVD player you see on the shelf is connected a video-editing card. With specialized software, I can perform completely digital editing of video and also make an output to VHS or any other format you wish … .”
At this point, unable to grasp much beyond the occasional familiar word, both Buster and Dan began to lose the thread of Jurgen’s lengthy technosoliloquy. As the little man droned on, his associates focused their attention elsewhere.
Behind the door they noted a pile of boxes, stuffed with sheets of bubble wrap, blocks of Styrofoam, and unmailed warranty reply postcards, preventing the door from opening any more than ninety degrees.
The entire right wall was occupied by a shelving unit composed of plastic milk crates stacked on their sides. The topmost shelf was piled with more equipment boxes. The next one down contained a jumble of books, magazines, floppies, and compact discs. The lower two shelves contained a collection of computer peripherals, including a color flatbed scanner, a color inkjet printer, and a DVD burner. Cobwebs of various sizes adorned the corners of the crates.
Against the remaining wall sat a large 1200-dpi laser printer, capable of outputting high-resolution color sheets up to eleven by seventeen inches. Next to it on the floor were three additional plastic crates. One was full of parts: a collection of screws, metal plates removed from expansion card slots, floppy disk drives, electric fans, odd keys from old keyboards, and other unidentifiable components. One was overflowing with disks: CDs,
DVDs, 5¼-inch floppies, and 3½-inch disks of several densities, some missing their metal shutters. The last crate contained tools—two incomplete precision screwdriver sets, variously sized pliers, wrenches, a hammer, and a collection of anti-static wrist straps.
Obsolete hard disks, old PCs, and a broken-down dot-matrix printer occupied most of the remaining floor space.
As Jurgen continued his lecture, Buster Malloy gave up on any attempt to make sense of it and slowly developed a glaze over his one good eye. Dan Shiller was more astute. With a considerable effort, and only because some of this verbal diarrhea might be significant, Shiller forced himself to refocus on what the little pencil-necked Kraut was spouting.
“ … power failures cannot hurt my system,” Jurgen continued, indicating four squat, humming boxes, one in each corner of the room. “These are uninterruptable-power-supply boxes. There is in the batteries enough power stored to keep all of this equipment working for several hours. If the power ever should fail, even if I would be out, a controlled sequence of shutdowns would occur and I would lose no data.”
“How come you have three monitors?” Shiller asked.
“A good question!” replied his host in the manner of an indulgent college instructor. “The large one in the center is my main workstation. The smaller one on the left is connected to the machine that stores my information.”
“Impressive, I guess. How about the one on the right?”
Voss blinked. “Basically a spare. It monitors my security system.”
“Security system?” Shiller asked.
“It is not important,” Jurgen replied. He edged toward the door, indicating that the tour was over. “Perhaps we could continue our meeting in the other room … .”
In fact, Voss’s hardware and software were configured with security as their highest priority. A screen-saver program would black out the display and lock all inputs after only minutes had passed without use, and reaccess would not be granted until the correct time- and date-dependent password was entered. The computer cases themselves were constructed with solid locks and antitampering devices; opening the cases without unlocking the two obvious and the two hidden locks would completely and irrevocably destroy all data … and because of certain deterrents contrived by Jurgen, quite likely cause severe physical injury to any intruder.
Deep inside his system, Jurgen Voss had concealed dark, shameful secrets that must never be revealed, no matter what the cost.
Voss’s small living room was furnished with only a thinly upholstered two-seater couch and a single worn armchair. Most of the available wall space in that room was given over to reading material of all description: bookshelves lined with hardcover volumes, cardboard boxes filled with paperbacks, magazines stacked in corners. The subject matter of all this literature was invariably technical: textbooks on electronics and physics, volumes about advanced programming, software manuals, computer catalogs, and industry trade magazines.
As Buster Malloy settled heavily into the armchair, it creaked in protest at the unfamiliar weight. “Have you actually read all that shit?” inquired Malloy, scanning the book-lined walls with the unabashed awe of the chronically unread. Computers were beyond his comprehension, but at least he could understand the principles of the printed word.
“Never mind that,” Shiller snapped. “Look, we’ve got a lot to cover. Let’s get on with it.”
Malloy fixed the con man with a malevolent glare from his single good eye. “Chill out, Shiller. Who died an’ made you the boss?”
“This is a business meeting, Buster. We’re not here to admire Jurgen’s library.”
“What am I, some kinda dummy that ain’t allowed to talk?”
“When you’ve got something relevant to say, I’ll listen. Until then, please keep quiet.”
The big man half rose menacingly from his chair. “You’re askin’ for it, boyo—”
“Sit down, Malloy,” said the grifter. “Or I guarantee you’ll be sorry.”
Fearful that a physical confrontation between the two men might scuttle the project before it ever got off the ground, and even more fearful that he might get hurt during the course of it, Voss interjected: “Gentlemen, please. Let us not make a fight among ourselves.”
Shiller took a breath, relaxed, and realized that the little card counter was right—a further sharp answer would serve no purpose. He renewed his earlier resolve to remain alert and watchful around Buster Malloy. The fact that the big man was prone to violence and enjoyed inflicting pain were
character traits that would be extremely useful in carrying out the operation, yet were traits that Shiller sensed might be difficult to control. He decided to cool it, at least for now. “Hey, you’re absolutely right, Jurgen,” he said lightly. “Sorry, Buster. Now where were we?”
“I can start if you wish,” said Voss nervously, chewing on the ragged remains of a fingernail.
“Good.” Dan glanced quickly at his associate’s raw fingertips, winced, then averted his gaze, focusing for aesthetic relief upon his own beautifully manicured and polished nails. Unable to resist the natural comparison, he glanced at Buster Malloy’s huge hands, noting the cracked, black-framed fingernails. Shiller returned his attention to the plan. “Have you worked out the technical details?” he asked Voss.
“Ja. It required a good deal of research, but fortunately I was able to find all the materials and techniques we need. Through mainly the Internet.”
“Can you be more specific? How about phase one?”
“The material for phase one was the most difficult to find. However, I have succeeded in identifying the ideal compound for our purposes.” Voss paused for effect, a smug expression on his owlish face.
“Well, spit it out, for Christ’s sake,” growled Malloy, still miffed.
“Jawohl, I would definitely spit out this substance!” said Jurgen, hugely pleased that Buster had unwittingly handed him the perfect straight line. It was not often that the little man received an opportunity to display both his knowledge and his wit, so he decided to make the most of it. “Gentlemen, I have selected cantharidin.” He smiled conspiratorially, revealing a mouthful of crooked, off-white teeth. “You may know it with a different name—especially if sex interests you!”
Malloy looked puzzled. “Do you know what the fuck ‘e’s talkin’ about?” he asked Dan Shiller.
Shiller shrugged.
“Spanish fly!” Voss shouted triumphantly. “It has been for years known as Spanish fly! In minute quantities it is said to possess—how do you say it?—aphrodisiac powers—”
“So what?” said the grifter, irritation in his voice.
“So, in larger doses it becomes a level-six toxin. That is as potent as possible. It is a white powder, virtually tasteless.”
“Will it do the job?” asked Shiller.
“Of course! Or I would not suggest it! Once the … subject has taken the poison, death is inevitable.” Voss related this fact quite casually, as if he
were describing the benefits of a headache pill or the side effects of a cough medicine. Having made the decision to participate in Shiller’s scheme, the little German genius had managed over the intervening weeks to insulate himself from the reality of his involvement in an actual murder. In his mind he had gradually transformed the whole operation into an intellectual challenge, abstract problems in chemistry, electronics, and computer science requiring elegant solutions that only he could provide. “For this substance there is no known antidote.”
“Okay, Jurgen. It sounds like the right stuff. Where do we get it from?” said Dan.
“I have in L.A. located a pharmaceutical supply house that will not ask too many questions. But they will ask for identification. So I have already prepared several sets of papers. All I must do now is to print them out and laminate them.”
“No problem. Mr. Malloy here can pick ’em up when you’re ready.” The grifter shifted uncomfortably on the thin cushions of Voss’s couch. “Okay, Buster, it’s your turn,” he said conversationally, careful not to sound confrontational. “How do we deliver the envelope to Druperman?”
“I go right past the mailroom at least once a day. Easy to drop shit off in Druperman’s box. There usually ain’t nobody in there.”
“Excellent. Just make sure you don’t leave any fingerprints on it. Now what about phase two?”
“Piece a’ cake. I’ve got a master key that’ll open any suite in the hotel with the right code. I can buy the materials in any fuckin’ hardware store. An’ I already got the tools.”
“Phase three?”
“No problem. I bought the backpack and the toy cars.”
“Very good, Buster. And phase four?”
“Stealin’ the vehicle was easy. Nickin’ the uniform was the tough part. But I done it.”
Shiller nodded approval and rubbed his hands together. “Jurgen, you got all the chemicals and shit?”
“Everything is in the garage you rented. Here is what we need to do.” Jurgen spoke earnestly for several minutes, taking pains to emphasize his own brilliance. Shiller wondered briefly why he had saddled himself with a full-blown egomaniac and a borderline psycho as partners but consoled himself with the notion that these very flaws were the foundation of their usefulness to him.
When Voss finished, Malloy said gruffly, “Okay, Shiller, we done our part. Now what about you?”
The con man nodded. “Fair enough. Let’s talk about the presentation of our demands first.”
“You have at our last meeting said that to capture their attention and convince them of the seriousness of our intent, the presentation must be of dramatic nature,” observed Voss.
“And it will, Jurgen, believe me, it will,” promised Shiller. “I’ve given the matter a great deal of thought. And you sure as hell have the technology in that room to make it happen. I believe videotapes are the answer.”
“Videotapes?”
“Right. Tapes of … relevant incidents. Stuff they can see and relate to. I want those fuckers to sit up and take notice. I want them to feel the pain.” He described to the other two men in some detail the proposed content of the videos. Voss offered a couple of suggestions, to which Shiller agreed. As usual, Malloy merely listened.
“What about the money?” asked Jurgen. “How do we carry all the cash? I have made calculations that the mass of so many hundred-dollar bills would be too large to fit into—”
“Whoa,” interrupted Shiller. “There is a way. We don’t need to handle cash. I’ve met with some people from … overseas. They can help us with this thing. Naturally, it’s going to cost us. But there’ll still be plenty left.” He paused to make sure he had their full attention. “Now here’s how it works … .”
While Voss and Malloy listened to Shiller explain the intricacies of international money transfers, both men had the feeling that their con-man partner was not telling them the entire story.