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where the money went. We can't even say we
stole it, unless we can explain why we haven't
got it any more. There's only one way we can
prevent our names becoming the fannish byword
for Stupidity for the next century, now. The only
hope we have in the world of ever being allowed
in a Con Suite again, the rest of our lives, is to
catch that hairless ape, ourselves, personally,
and get back every cent we handed him in time
for the con to go on. That gives us two weeks,
absolute max. And I think fandom is our only
lead."
"Beatles," she said. "Internet Beatles
forums chat groups "
He shook his head. "You don't have to leave
traces anywhere to know all about the Beatles.
The information's in the water supply. I mean,
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there are probably starving hermits in Pakistan
who know what the original title of 'Get Back'
was, for "
Moira's choices were, get up and get the Pepto
Bismol, or come up with an idea. "I got it!"
Wally misunderstood. "Okay, I was just trying
to "
"No, no, I mean I got an idea. Another lead,
besides fandom!"
Wally stopped in his tracks. If he had been the
protagonist of Jack London's "To Build A Fire,"
suddenly confronted with a Zippo, he could not
have become more alert, more hopeful, more
frightened. "... tell me," he whispered.
Moira began to and from nowhere came the
thought that it would be kinder to let him guess
it himself, and that her husband could use some
kindness now. " 'Fool, fool back to the
beginning is the rule,'" she quoted softly from
their favorite bedtime story.
For a moment she could hear his neurons firing .
. . and then his eyes began to glow, as if in
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illustration of the memory behind them. "Yes!"
he cried. "Magnesium . . ."
"How many places could there be in the greater
Vancouver area where a man could buy that
much?"
The question hung in the air for a moment. And
then they chorused together: "I don't know, but I
know somebody who'll know somebody who
will!" and raced for their computers.
***
Wally, having been both standing and nearest
the door at the starting gun, won the race
handily; Moira arrived (looking not unlike the
Bowen Island ferry) just in his wake, to find that
he had already booted both their machines. She
slapped her modem to life and waited for her
Finder to load.
"I'm tryin'a think, but nothin' happens," it
reported truthfully, in the voice of Curly (the
real one), and began rebuilding her virtual
desktop.
As always, it took too much time. By the time
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the desktop appeared on-screen, she had begun
to leak helium. "This may not work out as well
as we hope," she said slowly.
Wally's system had loaded faster; it just took
much longer to do anything. "Why do you say
that?" He moused like Monk taking a solo, off-
rhythm but strong.
"Think about Jude. Or whatever his name is.
That's my point: can you see a con-man that
good buying a kilo of magnesium in this town?
Under his own name? And leaving a valid
address?"
Monk let the bass player have it. "Oh shit."
Wally pushed his chair back from the desk, and
rubbed his eyes. "Any two, possibly, but not all
three." He looked like he was going to cry.
"We should still try, though," she said hastily,
and opened her Net browser. She wished she
had gotten the Pepto Bismol on the way there.
"Yeah, we will," Wally agreed, his voice tired
and defeated. "And we'll check the Beatles
forums, and we'll search the Net for 'con-man'
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and 'grifter' and strings like that, and maybe we
can even get Vicki's brother Jack to hack us into
the cops' network and look for Jude's footprint,
and none of it is "
"Genius," she said. "I married an intuitive
genius."
Wally blinked. "Certainly. What I say?"
"What does Vicki's brother do for the cops?"
Wally was hesitant to let hope return, but this
was good. For the second time, he chorused
along with her: "He draws pictures of people
you didn't think you remembered!"
Jack was a police sketch artist one of the first
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