* * *
Wednesday. Up before Cathy, Rem took an early walk to the lake, a habit now in case Nut might be at the shoreline, then returned only to skulk out the house again and head downtown with a half-planned notion, two birds, one stone. He left without explanation. No tall tales about Paul Geezler or shared jokes about the man’s manner or his work. No hint on what he would be doing today. Just a plan to attend the expo, report back as requested (although he still wasn’t sure what the man wanted) and earn in one day what had taken three weeks in the previous month. Plus, if he returned with brochures and information it might be enough to quieten Cathy. Two birds. Prospects for the early summer weren’t looking good. At some point he’d need to speak more formally with Mike and Jay and the others about putting the business on hold. He might have to explain about Matt.
Riding the train, Rem made a decision about Coleman.
* * *
Posters along Grand advertised tickets for the expo at twenty-five dollars. A crisp wind blew from the shore, cold and without aroma. Wagons and trailers for a film production blocked the sheltered roadway under Lake Shore Drive, and Rem picked a route between the idling vehicles, the gathered onlookers, expecting to be challenged. The city stopped at the pier, an abrupt wall of glass towers behind him, ahead a clean rolling blue that stopped the running argument in his head.
His phone trilled in his pocket: Coleman — 1 voice.
Rem found the entrance to the expo through a fixed fairground, a hotdog and souvenir stand right beside the stairway. As soon as he’d mounted the steps he realized that he was out of place. Dressed in jeans and trainers and a hooded top, he cut a scruffy figure, a slouch among men in pressed suits, military uniforms, and military fatigues. Men with heads shorn to express discipline.
The exhibition space, a long glass-topped gallery sectioned by two parallel aisles of open booths, stretched the length of the pier. In each booth the company names and logos were stencilled large across the walls, every one of the small kiosks dressed with carpets, counters, and tables, little sets busy with leaflets and brochures. And why hadn’t he worn his suit?
Rem had a list from Geezler of the HOSCO partners, the subdivisions, and the subsidiaries. The companies he needed to check out.
He took the job seriously, and strolled through the booths as if to satisfy a particular interest. The booths close to the entrance were wonderlands of massed hardware, of all imaginable kinds of armament: machined, bright, mysterious. In the first booth, and the first business on his list, Proteck Inc., he found a display of jackets and helmets, whole body suits opened layer by layer, some with ceramic plates, others reinforced with micro chainmail padded with a webbed lining and a fine downy insulation. The more expensive jackets fitted with sweat-wicking undershirts and optional protection flaps for the neck and crotch (like necks and crotches weren’t essential), easy-release binds and fasteners, and a guarantee that a personalized suit could be fabricated and shipped to any unit, worldwide, within twenty-one days. These suits, wall-mounted dissections, all impressively clean. Grey and black and busy with pockets.
Rem’s phone trilled again and again, another message from Coleman. He deleted both messages then turned the phone to silent.
The more serious equipment came further up the central aisle — handguns and rifles, semi-automatic and fully automatic, hardware monitored by security guards. The guns, presented on Perspex mounts, pointed to a hoarding-sized poster of a desert populated by sneaky blacked-out turbaned figures with targets marked over their chests and heads. Rem knew next to nothing about guns, they simply didn’t figure in his imagination; but being the kind of man who prefers the engine and not the car, the machined parts held a certain fascination. New, clean, oiled. Untouched. He examined the barrels, the sights, the disassembled trigger mechanisms, the hollowed-out carbon stocks, as if he understood the language.
His phone vibrated against his thigh.
Coleman — 1 message, 2 voice.
At Parkway CI Technologies (third on Geezler’s list of subsidiaries) he found a display of landmines and devices — ETPs, IEDs. On the wall ran a client list of diplomats and businesses, recognizable global brands, sports teams, with a small under-scored by-line as suppliers of expertise to entertainment and production companies. As in the first booth, the combinations of hard technology and recognizable detritus (spent shells and casings, gas canisters, detergent boxes, computer monitors packed with dummy explosives) were opened out for display and marked ‘genuine’.
Mike SMS: I’m getting calls from Coleman.
As Rem bent down a rep approached, talking, and Rem slowly straightened up. He hadn’t bargained on talking.
Mike SMS: He’s saying you won’t answer his calls?
Rem held up his hand to stop any discussion, and continued looking. The man stepped back and asked which service Rem was with, and as Rem didn’t understand the question the man flatly added that there was nothing for him here.
Mike SMS: What do you want me to tell him?
Rem headed back to the aisle.
A sign, ‘Employment Services’, hung in the centre of the walkway, and the booths separated out to a border area marked ‘Food Court’.
In this area the reps dipped anxiously into the aisles, a stickiness to their movements, an anxiety that someone might slip by. As he passed a group of men, each with a coffee, he overheard advice: ‘Set an exit strategy.’ ‘They don’t own you.’
Rem checked his phone. Three further voice messages from Cathy. He’d wait till later to explain himself. He could imagine the confusion if he told her he was looking at guns.
When he checked the messages from Mike he had to sit down.
‘I’m getting questions from Coleman about where you are and why you aren’t answering his calls. He’s threatening all kinds of things.’ Mike spoke quickly. ‘He’s called two or three times an hour. If he comes round … I don’t know. I just don’t want any trouble.’
Rem looked up the aisle at the guns and displays of weaponry. Grenades. Rifles. Semi-automatics. A three-quarter model of a heat-seeking missile.
* * *
Rem returned to the Palmer House Hotel to find Paul Geezler waiting. They sat in the main reception, both in high-backed armchairs. For the second time that day he had the notion that he was on stage, that behind the vast lobby walls were banks of seating, an audience eager to witness a humiliation.
Geezler, smooth and smart in a different suit, his hair neatly parted, comb-tracked. A newspaper across his lap with an image Rem couldn’t quite see — was it a hunter on one knee, or something more benign, a man by a road, a farmer? Geezler sat with his elbows on the armrests, hands clasped, ready to listen. He asked Rem about his visit to the fair.
Rem decided to be honest.
‘I’m the wrong man. I don’t know anything about these things — to be honest — it isn’t that I’m not interested, I just don’t have the knowledge. This isn’t what I do. I’m not the man for what you want.’
Geezler gave small considered nods, and appeared to agree. ‘You’re right. I’m using you in the wrong way.’
‘Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate what you’re doing, but I’m not the person you need.’ Rem was beginning to rise, when Geezler held up his hand.