In the Company of Ghosts by Stephen A Hunt Page A

just too wide. So instead, Spads had stayed inside the school’s computer lab as much and long as was allowed, avoided the tediously ungifted bulk of humanity, a clockmaker learning how the cogs and gears of the universe fitted together. Learning how the system inside mirrored the system outside. God was canny, to hide himself in mathematics that only the most worthy could comprehend, to anchor that achingly beautiful glory in the ritual and observances of software, burying the large system within the small, each reality running in emulation inside the other, nested realities like Russian babushka dolls. Just like the Christ child that Spads’ mother seemed so obsessed with, she could sense the saviour’s light shimmering inside her son. And Spads too had spent his years in the wilderness, training himself, proving himself; his light keeping everyone else away from him. He was lonely, of course. But that was the way it seemed it had to be. He had never found his Mister Myagai, never come across the Yoda to train his inner Jedi. He was too far ahead of his peers to put the gang together, for the Avengers to ever assemble with him as a member of the team. Spads had always proved himself to God by climbing the mountain alone. When he wanted to understand something, he took it apart and put it back together again. Then he would code it from scratch and make it better, at least twenty per cent more efficient each time. Despite the pain and the solitude, Spads had kept the faith, and just as he knew he would, God had kept him too. When the FBI had appeared, demanding his extradition to the USA for testing himself against their systems, their envious hands clutching an orange hood to make him blind, salivating at the thought of parading him on the Perp Walk towards their vile gladiator pit of a prison, the universe has swiftly stepped in, saving its favourite son. A quick faked-up suicide in a crowded East London prison. Then resurrection in a hidden temple of secrets, his own private Styx where the river carried in not souls, but sub rosa documents that only the pure of heart were allowed to access. Spads had been moved behind the curtain, elevated to the cabal, given access to the tools of the priesthood. What he didn’t know was if Helen Thorson was here as a test for him, part of his terrible hunger of loneliness in the desert, or as a reward for his service to the universe? He was still thinking about that one.
    ‘His ISP logs show a computer somewhere in here,’ said Spads. ‘I’ll find it and see if there are any hidden extras inside the screen.’
    ‘You do that,’ said Helen. She turned around taking in the surroundings of the flat. You could tell she liked what she saw. Even an innocent like Spads could tell that this place was dripping with wealth. Gold, silver and platinum colours everywhere you turned, polished and offset by deep brown wood. Sofas, modern, soft and luxurious. Glass cabinets filled with dark abstract sculptures. One of the walls had an oil painting of James Dean divided like a puzzle across separate squares of canvas. As a display of wealth, Simon Werks’ London office seemed restrained by comparison. His office probably saw more visitors, so who had the entrepreneur been trying to impress here? Women like Helen , something whispered inside him.
    ‘When it comes to accruing expensive art and antiques,’ said Helen, ‘there are two main types of collectors…’
    Spads nodded, indicating he was listening. He enjoyed listening to Helen almost as much as looking at her. All knowledge is useful. To be approached with humility.
    ‘The first use consultants to pick and choose for them,’ she continued. ‘The second make their own selections and personally read the auction books sent out by Christies and Sotheby’s, even if they send agents to bid for them to help keep the prices low. You can tell the difference from how the collection is displayed. If a consultant is responsible for curating