Vortex by Robert Charles Wilson Page B

guys get paid in cash. He put Orrin to work doing the usual lift-and-carry jobs. But Orrin turned out to be an unusual employee by Findley’s standards, which means he came in on time and sober, he was bright enough to follow orders, he never complained and he didn’t care about finding a better job as long his pay was regular. So after a while Findley took him off day work and made him night watchman. Most nights between midnight and dawn Orrin was locked in the warehouse with a phone and a patrol schedule, and all he had to do was conduct an hourly walk-through and call a certain number if he noticed anything unusual.”
    “A certain number? Not the police?”
    “Definitely not the police, because what passes through the warehouse, along with a lot of die-stamped toys and plastic kitchenware, are shipments of precursor chemicals bound for black-market bioreactors.”
    “Orrin knew about this?”
    “That’s unclear. Maybe he had some suspicions. In any case, Findley fired him a couple of months back, possibly because Orrin was getting a little too familiar with the details of the operation. Some of Findley’s black-market material comes in or goes out after hours, so Orrin would have seen a few transfers. The firing was pretty traumatic for Orrin—I guess he thought he was being punished for something.”
    “He talked to you about it?”
    “A little, reluctantly. All he says is that he didn’t do anything wrong and that it wasn’t time for him to leave.”
    Sandra asked Bose for another Corona, which gave her time to think about all this. What he had said seemed to make everything murkier. She decided to focus on the only part of this she really understood or could affect: Orrin’s assessment at State Care.
    Bose came back with a bottle, which she accepted but set down immediately on Bose’s ring-stained coffee table. He needed new furniture, she thought. Or at least a set of coasters.
    “You think Orrin might have information that would be damaging to a criminal smuggling operation.”
    Bose nodded. “None of this would matter if Orrin had been just another one of Findley’s hired drifters. Orrin would have left town or found other work or otherwise disappeared into povertyland, end of story. The trouble is that Orrin surfaced again when we took him into custody. Worse, when we asked him about his employment record, he piped right up about his six months at the warehouse. Mention of the name set off alarms in certain quarters, and I guess word worked its way up.”
    “So what are the smugglers afraid of, that Orrin will reveal some secret?”
    “I said the federal agencies are too busy to take on corruption in HPD, and that’s true. But there are ongoing investigations related to longevity-drug rings. Findley—and the people Findley works for—are nervous about Orrin as a potential witness, now that his name and history are in the database. You see where this is going?”
    She nodded slowly. “His psychological condition.”
    “Exactly. If Orrin’s admitted to State Care, that constitutes a formal declaration of incompetence. Any testimony he might give would be fatally compromised.”
    “Which is where I come in.” She sipped her beer. She seldom drank beer. She thought it tasted the way old socks smell. But it was gratifyingly cold, and she welcomed the slight buzz, that oddly clarifying wisp of intoxication. “Except I’m not on Orrin’s case anymore. I can’t do anything to help him.”
    “I don’t expect you to. I probably shouldn’t have told you what I did, but—like you said, quid pro quo . And I’m still interested in your opinion of Orrin’s writing.”
    “So you think his document is what, some kind of coded confession?”
    “I honestly don’t know what Orrin’s document is. And although it mentions the warehouse—”
    “It does?”
    “In a section you haven’t read. But it’s hardly the kind of evidence you can take to court. I’m just…” He seemed to struggle