Outside on the street, he undipped the cell phone and speed-dialed Isidore's number. Isidore didn't answer his phone, but that did not mean he wasn't at home.
The answering machine kicked in, and for the next few moments he was forced to listen to Isidore's newest outgoing message. Isidore's idea of humor was to record Bible verses of the muscular kind-painful penance and eternal damnation-before inviting his caller to leave a message. Gabriel waited impatiently for the beep.
"Isidore, pick up. Now."
A click. "Gabriel, my man. Where you hanging?"
Gabriel sighed. Isidore had been to Eton and Cambridge but was hopelessly in love with black street rap, and every so often he would sprinkle his conversation with a highly personalized version of American street slang. As his accent remained stubbornly upper-crust, the effect was startling to say the least.
"I'm still in the City. Guess what? Bluetooth."
Isidore chuckled. "You don't say. Well, we be good boys. We due a break. See you soon?"
"I'm on my way."
He closed the cell phone and found himself smiling. This job was going to be a breeze.
His iPAQ had told him Pittypats was making use of wireless technology. Very cool. Wireless technology certainly made for lovely uncluttered work environments, with computers talking to one another without being connected by a rat's nest of hardwired cables. But there was one problem. Wireless electronic emissions can be picked up if you have the right equipment. And he and Isidore most certainly did have the right equipment.
He unchained his bicycle and took off his black-framed glasses, substituting them with a pair of Ray-Bans. The sting of the sun was easing slightly, but the glare was still considerable. He glanced at his watch: 4:30 p.m. Another twenty minutes at least before he'd get to Isidore's place.
Isidore lived close to Smithfield meat market and he liked it there, something Gabriel did not understand. The sight of bloody rib cages was too reminiscent of a horror painting a la Francis Bacon. Meat had been sold at Smithfield for eight hundred years, and for close to four centuries it had also been the site where witches, heretics and traitors were burned or boiled alive as so many pieces of meat themselves. Probably another reason why Gabriel was immune to the stunning architecture of the marketplace with its ornate ironwork and imposing arches and pillars.
Isidore lived in a narrow up-and-down duplex, squeezed in between two abandoned houses with boarded-up windows. Just as well he didn't have any neighbors: Isidore preferred his music loud. As Gabriel walked up the shallow steps leading to the front door, he could hear music pulsing through the double-glazed windows. It was a good thing he had a key to the house: there was no way Isidore would be able to hear the doorbell over this racket. He turned the key in the lock and braced himself for the onslaught of sound.
It was even worse than he had expected. Rap was Isidore's poison, but it seemed his friend was in a nostalgic mood. Vintage Guns N' Roses was the choice du jour. Welcome to the jungle! screamed Axl Rose with enviable lack of inhibition.
With his hands over his ears, Gabriel mounted the steps two by two and walked rapidly through the wide-open door at the top of the flight of stairs. Without pausing, he continued over to the wall unit and pressed his thumb hard on the power button of the CD player. The sudden silence was a shock.
He turned around. In the swivel chair in front of him, blond hair falling untidily across his forehead and eyebrows raised in pained surprise, was Francis James Cavendish, aka Isidore. Isidore was a nom de guerre, chosen in homage to Jack Isidore, the dysfunctional hero of Philip K. Dick's Confessions of a Crap Artist. The fictional Isidore believed the earth to be hollow and sunlight to have weight. The real-life Isidore was able to come up with theories easily more off-the-wall than that.
He now threw his hands in the air in mock surrender, the long fingers calloused from hours of slamming the keyboard. "Hey, bro. What's your problem?"
"I don't want to go deaf, that's my problem. Shit-" Gabriel paused and looked around him. Every available surface that wasn't taken up by computers, screens, keyboards, tech manuals, wires and other computer detritus was cluttered with empty pizza boxes, chocolate wrappers, soda cans and greasy chip packages. "It stinks in here. You're turning into a cliche, you know that? This is the stereotypical hacker hell. Why not try for a little originality for God's sake."
Isidore managed to look hurt. "Like you? Driving a Jaguar and listening to Chopin. Oh, yeah. That's original. I'm waiting for the day you start smoking cigars. Besides which, five years from now you'll still be paying off the mortgage on that fancy flat of yours and I'll be rocking in the sun sipping mai tais."
Gabriel knew that Isidore's plan was to retire within five years to Hawaii and spend his days surfing the waves off Banzai Beach. Which would be a good plan, except that he had never surf boarded in his life. And the idea that he would actually be able to break his addiction to the computer screen and leave the keyboard for the great outdoors was even more ridiculous. But Point Break was Isidore's favorite movie and the Patrick Swayze character his hero.
Gabriel sighed. Isidore was an ass but he was also a genius. No one could hack together code more robust and elegant.
"OK." Gabriel sat down on the edge of a pumpkin-colored velour chair, pushing two empty beer bottles out of the way. "Here goes. I wasn't able to see inside the offices themselves, but there's no doubt Pittypats are using wireless technology. I think it could be because they're situated in a protected building. Regulations probably prevented them from installing cables and disturbing the structure."
Isidore nodded. "Don't you just love planning permissions. What about WEP?"
"Yes. It looks as though their CTO is doing his job on that front."
Isidore grunted but, as Gabriel expected, didn't look in any way concerned. WEP was a cinch: it could be cracked by anyone with half a brain using freely available software. Isidore had more than his share of gray matter to begin with and seldom used anything but his own custom-designed software anyway.
It was amazing, Gabriel thought, how cavalier companies were when it came to computer security. High-tech companies and the biotech industry were more cautious, but in general very few compa-nies scanned their network regularly or even ran an integrity checker to see if their system files had been altered in any way. And very pf-ten with wireless networks, WEP encryption wasn't even enabled.
The bottom line was that the only way Pittypats could protect itself from electronic penetration would be to install layers of steel inside its offices. And one thing was for sure: that house didn't have any steel walls. So it was only a matter of fishing within the pond of electronic emissions and hooking a password, the name of a file, or a project handle and he and Isidore would be home free.
Gabriel yawned suddenly. For the first time today he was feeling tired. He glanced at his watch. "I have to get home. I wanted us to work out the surveillance schedule today but let's wait until next time."
"Heavy date tonight?" Isidore was watching him sardonically. "Is it still… what's her name… Bethany?"
"Briony. And no, it's not."
"She dumped you, huh."
"You could say that. I'm pretty cut up about it."
"Oh, give me a break. You dated her only so you could get close to her friend, the blonde with the cute lisp."
Gabriel frowned. "Not true. Well," he amended, "maybe at first, but that's all changed. Briony broke my heart."
"Heart? Man, you have no heart."
"So maybe hearts are overrated."
"Essential equipment for most of us, bro."
"Not me. I get by on sex appeal alone."
Isidore scowled. "Get out of here, you smug bastard. I have to get ready for a date myself."