The Cipher (22 page)

“A single idea—the sudden flash of a thought—may be worth a million dollars.”

—Robert Collier

MONDAY

“Money often costs too much.”

—Ralph Waldo Emerson

179

ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER
absurdly early start. The early wake-ups were getting ridiculous, but Smiles didn't see any way around it. If they had any delays along the way, they were going to have to haul ass to get Ben by four o'clock. First they had to go to Boston to get the money, then backtrack an hour north to York, Maine, where Zach had demanded they meet for the cipher exchange. (“He stays close to home,” Erin had said. “That trip to Fox Creek might as well have been a European vacation.”) Then back downtown to the Prudential Center to meet the agents and Ben. If Smiles managed to pull this off, he was going to sleep for a month.

The number of details Smiles had to keep straight had almost overwhelmed him. First thing after getting up, he'd sat down at the kitchen table and written out a list with phone numbers and meeting times for Zach, the agents, and Mr. Perry (the banker dude); his Swiss bank account details; and whatever other scraps of information might come in handy. The exercise calmed him down enough to close up the cabin pretty well as the sun rose over the lake.

Now they were cruising south on I–93, and thankfully Erin was staying awake for the ride. Smiles never thought it would be possible, but he might have gotten his fill of driving the Infiniti at this point.

“Do you realize what Ben did?” Erin said, cracking her window on a gray stretch of highway past Concord. “To a mathematician, solving the Riemann Hypothesis is like finding the cure for cancer. And Ben's discovery, it's almost more of a breakthrough than that. I'm not exaggerating to make a point. That's the best actual comparison I can think of.”

“You know,” Smiles said, “I don't think I actually
do
realize what Ben did. I mean, I can't really appreciate it. It's like telling someone from Mongolia that somebody broke Joe DiMaggio's hitting streak. They're not going to get it, no matter how hard they try.”

“Who's Joe DiMaggio?”

Smiles turned in disbelief, but she'd made a pistol of her finger and was pointing it at him.

“Anyway,” Smiles said, “not appreciating the brilliant people in my life is something I seem to excel at, so it's par for the course.”

Erin took his hand, and they drove in silence for ten miles before she said, “He's in bad shape, huh?”

“Yeah. Worst he's ever been.”

Erin turned sideways and played her finger along his ear. “Well, you know, I'm incredibly brilliant, and you seem to appreciate me.”

The good feeling lasted all the way to the bank.

The whole procedure lasted only half an hour. They parked in a downtown structure and crossed the street to Third Boston Bank, the exterior of which had round gray columns of a reassuring thickness. It was one of those old banks, with its name actually etched into the stone and a long double row of wooden desks opposite the brass teller windows. The desks were filled with people in business suits who would have been right at home in a library, considering the obvious effort they made to stay quiet. Someone's desk phone went off, and the ringer sounded like a sonar pulse from a submarine movie. Chewing gum probably got you fired on the spot.

The sound of Erin's flip-flops echoed through the tall open space, which didn't have any other customers in it yet. Smiles and Erin had been the first, arriving just as a security guard was unlocking the double doors at the front of the bank. A reed-thin man looked up at the
thwack
ing
sound of Erin's footsteps, and Smiles saw the name
PERRY
on his gold name tag.

“Mr. Perry?”

“Yes. You would be Mr. Smylie, then?”

Smiles almost said no. “Uh, yeah, but everybody calls me Smiles.”

Nicholas Perry found that extremely amusing. “Okay, then,” he said, with a smile still frozen on his face. “Let's have a seat and see what we can do for you,
Smiles
.” The guy couldn't get past the idea that some human beings have nicknames.

They followed him to a desk in the back row, away from the bank entrance. Smiles wondered if they intentionally kept Nicholas Perry as far from the public as possible. “Now, you said you have an amendment of some kind, allowing you access to the full trust?”

“Uh, right.” Smiles panicked for a second, but luckily he was wearing the same pants from yesterday and still had it in his back pocket. He had folded the page into quarters, and it held the curve of his butt cheek as he dropped it on the desk.

Mr. Perry picked it up gingerly, humming as he examined it. “Yes, well, I made some inquires about this after your call yesterday. To Mr. Hunt, of course, and then to your father.” Smiles wondered if that was normal. He tried to imagine Nicholas Perry conducting his high-level financial queries while Junior blew out his three candles and opened his presents. “They seemed to know about this arrangement, and your father verified that he had signed the addendum. Third Boston is very proud to have your father's business, I should add.” Mr. Perry suddenly turned grave. “We're all very sorry about his condition.”

It was nice of him and everything, but what do you say to that? Thanks?

“Thanks,” Smiles said.

Mr. Perry nodded and hid behind the page again. Finally, he slapped it down onto his desk blotter, raised his eyebrows, and said, “So you want the whole amount, then?”

“Uh, that's right.”

“Okay, well since you called yesterday, I came in early to get things moving. Let's see where we are with the check. One moment.”

Mr. Perry got up and scurried to a door that said
SAFE DEPOSITS
. He punched a code in a keypad and darted inside when the door clicked open.

“That's it?” Smiles said to Erin. “I figured they'd, like, want my fingerprints or something.”

“I do believe that's your guilty conscience speaking,” she said. “You're not here on a trespassing charge—you're here to get your own money.” Erin rested her flip-flops on the desk and leaned her head back, taking in the impossibly tall ceiling.

Smiles snuck a glimpse of the tight curves of her body, ill-hidden beneath her T-shirt and jean shorts. He wondered how a girl with legs like that could really be so into math. “So you actually like that math stuff, huh?”

“And that,” Erin said, pointing to him, “is your chauvinist pig speaking.”

She may have had a point. Smiles grabbed a Third Boston pen from Mr. Perry's collection, just for something to do. Erin released her feet and the front legs of her chair dropped to the floor. “It's pretty easy to get excited about math, actually. Especially codes.”

Smiles hummed noncommittally.

“Think about having an idea like Ben had—how exciting it would be. Or your dad,” she said. “He's sitting there one day, and then all of a sudden he's figured out how to do asymmetrical encryption over the Internet. Your dad is a freaking genius, Smiles.”

And Smiles had put that genius at risk. For now, he could only pray that he'd get the cipher back before Zach could bring down Alyce with it.

Mr. Perry returned with a smile three counties wide. “Success,” he said, and flopped a large file folder on his desk. Inside it was a copy of the trust. Mr. Perry fidgeted with the binding for a minute and fixed a copy of the amendment into the back. “Original's already being messengered to Mr. Hunt,” he said, pleased with himself.

He set the folder aside, revealing underneath it a copy of
The Transparent Innovator
. “Now, Mr. Smylie—
Smiles
—I've been asked to make a request,” he said cautiously. “It's from my colleagues, and you should by all means feel free to refuse. But we would be absolutely honored to have your father's signature on our bank copy of his book. Assuming, of course, that he's up to that kind of thing.”

It was going to be less trouble just to take it, so Smiles did. “Sure, I can try,” he said.

“That's wonderful. That's just wonderful. Everyone here has read it.” Mr. Perry shook his head at his own ramblings. “Anyway, the pièce de résistance.”

With great ceremony, Mr. Perry cleared his throat and detached a check from the page it had been printed on. Before handing it to Smiles, he passed him a single form with three marked places to sign. “There, there, and there, please,” Mr. Perry said, indicating the signature lines with his pen and using his church voice.

When Smiles passed it back, Mr. Perry handed him the check. The final tally: $6,950,000.00. “It's an awfully pretty number,” Mr. Perry was saying in the background. Smiles's eyes were feasting on the check, a tingling feeling in his head. It wasn't the full $7,000,000—Smiles had already gotten the first little payment—but Zach would just have to deal with that.

Erin was tapping lightly on his shoulder. “You okay there?”

He was very okay. He had done it.

“An absolute pleasure meeting you,” Mr. Perry said to them. He rose and shook their hands. “You know what they say, right? Don't spend it all in one place.”

181

SMILES WAS GOING
to spend it all in one place. He was going to spend it at a lobster shack called Fran's Fish House on the outskirts of York, Maine. They had left the bank an hour ago, and now Smiles was parking the Infiniti on the street across from Fran's, Zach's meeting place of choice. He liked the clam chowder, Erin said.

They had passed through the city center five minutes ago to find themselves here, where the pretty resort spots gave way to ramshackle buildings failing the test of nature the salt air imposed on them. The red paint on Fran's Fish House had cracked years ago, revealing lifeless wood in a leopard-spot pattern. The overhead sign hung at a fifteen-degree angle that spoke of nor'easters past.

Smiles pulled the check from his back pocket and noted the time. “We've got ten minutes, right?”

“Yeah, he said ten thirty, but he probably got here early. Dude can be anal.”

“All right, one sec.” Smiles consulted the list of phone numbers he'd made back at the cabin, then dialed the agents. If he was going to do this, he wanted to be sure it was set in stone.

Cole answered right away. “Yeah?”

“We're on for four o'clock,” Smiles said. “Right?”

The guy exhaled. “Yeah. Like you said. Prudential Center, four o'clock. The food court. Do you need directions or something? Another confirmation or two? A wake-up call at three thirty?”

“Just have the money. And I want to talk to Ben first.”

Another sigh, then silence.

“Good idea,” Erin whispered, then peered toward Fran's for signs of Zach. Smiles congratulated himself: For once he'd thought of something first.

Eventually, Ben came to the phone. His voice sounded clear, normal.

“Smiles?”

“Hey man, how you holding up?”

“I, uh, okay, actually.” His voice had dropped, and Smiles could sense the presence of the agents. Ben was being careful with his words, but there wasn't any hidden message in them. Maybe they really did have him coddled in five-star luxury.

“Smart of you not to talk,” Smiles said. “Guess I shouldn't be surprised.”

“Yeah, right, thanks.”

Smiles nodded into the phone. He was suddenly nostalgic for all the afternoons he'd spent at Ben's place in the inflatable Budweiser chair, talking about nothing. “Sorry it took us an extra day to get all this together.”

“It's okay,” Ben said, and Smiles was relieved. Getting into the whole Zach situation probably wasn't the smartest thing to do right now.

“Anyway, I just wanted to make sure you're okay. We're going to get you. We're going to get that money for you, too.”

“Yeah, good.”

He sounded pleased, but he was still keeping a tight leash on his comments. It occurred to Smiles that this would be an ideal time to negotiate his split of the cash. Instead he said, “All right, bud. Hang on for five hours and you're going to be rich.”

Smiles ended the call and turned to Erin. “Showtime.”

Zach was polishing off a bowl of clam chowder when they slid into the booth across from him. He was sporting yet another muscle shirt. The guy had made a bad choice for his trademark look; his arms hadn't gotten any bigger since the last time they'd seen him.

Zach dropped his spoon into the bowl with a clatter and pushed it aside. For a suspended moment they all just sat there. Smiles was on the outside, Erin against the window. Underneath the table, she placed her hand reassuringly over his thigh. It must have been weird for her to be facing her ex-boyfriend like this, but she wasn't showing it.

“Beautiful place you've chosen,” Smiles said, turning his eyes to the dirt-streaked windows. The sill was caked with bird crap. He couldn't tell whether the grimy lobster traps lining the walls were decorative or functional. A transistor radio playing the Red Sox pregame from the kitchen was the only other sign of life in the place.

“She never had a problem with it,” Zach said.

“Yeah, well, tastes change.”

“Do you want the cipher,” Zach said, “or do you want to fight about a skirt?”

Erin rolled her eyes. “Please.”

“I've got the girl already,” Smiles said, and felt Erin pinch him lightly. “I came for the cipher.” He held the folded check in front of him.

“A check?” Zach said suspiciously.

“It's written on the bank, clod,” Erin said. “It's as good as cash. What'd you expect, we were going to come in here with duffel bags?”

Zach shrunk into himself for a second, aware that Erin was right. Smiles had to make himself frown to keep from cracking up.

Zach hoisted Erin's messenger bag onto the table. From inside, he produced a page from Ben's notebook and a small green thumb drive. Smiles remembered seeing the green drive sticking out of Ben's netbook—it appeared to be the genuine article. To prove it, Zach produced his own laptop from his side, fired it up, and placed the thumb drive inside. “Go ahead, see for yourself. I haven't touched a thing.”

Erin swiveled the computer around and tapped on the trackpad. Smiles made a show of checking the screen, but he had no clue what he was looking for. He was gladder than ever to have Erin at his side.

“We're good,” she said.

“Make it to cash,” Zach said to Smiles. It didn't hit him what the guy was talking about until Erin pulled a pen from her bag and handed it to him.

“Yeah, right,” Smiles said, wondering if either of them could sense his embarrassment for habitually forgetting to bring pens to occasions like these. He wrote
Pay to the order of CASH
on the back of the check and signed underneath.

After that it all went very fast. Erin grabbed up her bag and the page with the algorithm. Almost before she'd extracted the thumb drive and shut the computer, Zach had taken the laptop back and held his hand out for the check. Smiles gave it to him, and then he and Erin were out of the booth, out the door, not looking back.

They shut themselves inside the Infiniti and looked at each other.

Erin held the thumb drive out. “We got it. We actually got it.”

“I kept waiting for something to go wrong,” Smiles said. A laugh passed through him in a wave. He had just saved Alyce Systems. He was about to save Ben. He was about to get rich. “I can't believe it. You're my good luck charm.”

“Let's get out of here,” Erin said.

“Back to the cabin?”

“Yeah, it's still early—we'll have some time before we have to head back to Boston. I want to show you how lucky you are.”