Accelerando by Charles Stross Page B

days?”
    â€œThe employers.” She slips her coat off her shoulders and hangs it behind the broad wooden door. “They subsidize everything when you reach my grade.” Pamela is wearing a very short, very expensive dress, the kind of weapon in the war between the sexes that ought to come with an end-user certificate: But to his surprise it has no effect on him. He realizes that he’s completely unable to evaluate her gender, almost as if she’s become a member of another species. “As you’d be aware if you’d been paying attention.”
    â€œI always pay attention, Pam. It’s the only currency I carry.”
    â€œVery droll, ha-ha,” interrupts Glashwiecz. “You do realize that you’re paying me while I stand here listening to this fascinating byplay?”
    Manfred stares at him. “You know I don’t have any money.”
    â€œAh.” Glashwiecz smiles. “But you must be mistaken. Certainly the judge will agree with me that you must be mistaken—all a lack of paper documentation means is that you’ve covered your trail. There’s the small matter of the several thousand corporations you own, indirectly. Somewhere at the bottom of that pile there has got to be something, hasn’t there?”
    A hissing, burbling noise like a sackful of large lizards being drowned in mud emanates from the kitchen, suggesting that Annette’s percolator is nearly ready. Manfred’s left hand twitches, playing chords on an air keyboard. Without being at all obvious, he’s releasing a bulletin about his current activities that should soon have an effect on the reputation marketplace. “Your attack was rather elegant,” he comments, sitting down on the sofa as Pam disappears into the kitchen.
    Glashwiecz nods. “The idea was one of my interns’,” he says. “I don’t understand this distributed denial of service stuff, but Lisa grew up on it. Something about it being a legal travesty, but workable all the same.”
    â€œUh-huh.” Manfred’s opinion of the lawyer drops a notch. He notices Pam reappearing from the kitchen, her expression icy. A moment later Annette surfaces carrying a jug and some cups, beaming innocently. Something’s going on, but at that moment, one of his agents nudges him urgently in the left ear, his suitcase keens mournfully and beams a sense of utter despair at him, and the doorbell rings again.
    â€œSo what’s the scam?” Glashwiecz sits down uncomfortably close to Manfred and murmurs out of one side of his mouth. “Where’s the money?”
    Manfred looks at him irritably. “There is no money,” he says. “The idea is to make money obsolete. Hasn’t she explained that?” His eyes wander, taking in the lawyer’s Patek Philippe watch, his Java-enabled signet ring.
    â€œC’mon. Don’t give me that line. Look, all it takes is a couple of million, and you can buy your way free for all I care. All I’m here for is to see that your wife and daughter don’t get left penniless and starving.You know and I know that you’ve got bags of it stuffed away—just look at your reputation! You didn’t get that by standing at the roadside with a begging bowl, did you?”
    Manfred snorts. “You’re talking about an elite IRS auditor here. She isn’t penniless; she gets a commission on every poor bastard she takes to the cleaners, and she was born with a trust fund. Me, I—” The stereo bleeps. Manfred pulls his glasses on. Whispering ghosts of dead artists hum through his earlobes, urgently demanding their freedom. Someone knocks at the door again, and he glances around to see Annette walking toward it.
    â€œYou’re making it hard on yourself,” Glashwiecz warns.
    â€œExpecting company?” Pam asks, one brittle eyebrow raised in Manfred’s direction.
    â€œNot exactly—”
    Annette