"So how did that lead you to her-and us?" Mr. Jewels wanted to know. His gemlike eyes held an ugly glitter as he looked over at Caitlin.

"You guys can still hide behind your masks," Caitlin's voice was bitter as she turned to her fellow vandals. "And we can be just as sure that he couldn't track me through the Net. He's got to be somebody from my school who caught on to me in the real world. So you don't have to worry," she sneered. "We haven't met out in the flesh since we began this stuff!"

Mr. Jewels looked ready to slug the girl, and Matt tensed his muscles, ready for a hopeless defense. But the cartoon cowboy gestured the gleaming t.i.tan back with his oversized six-gun. "Hold on there, ya big galoot. We're workin' from the other end of the rope right now."

Once again, Matt noticed the fractional hesitation between moving lips and Western-holo speech. If that's the Idiom Savant program, it's working even slower than David said it would If that's the Idiom Savant program, it's working even slower than David said it would, Matt thought. Unless...it's not just changing English into that silly lingo, but a completely different language! Unless...it's not just changing English into that silly lingo, but a completely different language!

But there wasn't time to get into that right now. He had to convince this bunch of spoiled rich kids that he could be useful-and amusing.

"My search kicked out all sorts of rumors about people getting their veeyars trashed, and even roughed up. Now, I've I've got a couple of tricks I can pull in virtual-as the lady can tell you." got a couple of tricks I can pull in virtual-as the lady can tell you."

"We've heard," the swordsman said coldly. Matt noticed that he didn't seem to mind that he spoke English with an accent. Unless that accent was some sort of proxy trick...

No, Matt told himself. There's not the same sort of hang-time on this guy's lips as on the cowboy.

"So you know my kind of stuff can annoy people, even scare them. But it doesn't have the same sort of-authority-you can call on."

Matt spread out his stick-figure hands. "With all the rumors I'd collected, I still wasn't sure you guys were for real, or some sort of vapor-tale. So I decided to try and find you. I figured you had to be rich-electronic wilding requires resources." He rubbed his fingers together in the old gesture for money. "I also figured you must live pretty close to where you've been playing. That meant getting a line on all the virtual hangouts for rich kids in the D.C. area."

Matt pinned a smile on his proxy's sketchy face. "Somehow, I just had a feeling you wouldn't turn out to be a bunch of forty-nine-year-old computer geeks."

He shrugged. "And, what do you know, I was right. The first site I tried was Maxim's. And who do I meet there but the lovely CeeCee, who talked a little, then slugged the real Courtney Vance when she turned up to complain. I heard the punch, I saw Courtney react in pain...and I knew I'd found what I was looking for."

Matt held up his proxy hand. "I'm not going to tell you how I connected CeeCee with Caitlin Corrigan. Every relationship needs a little mystery. But I do want you to know that I'm way impressed-and I want in."

"Look here, pilgrim," the cartoon cowboy said, spouting his silly Wild West jargon again. "I don't rightly think you realize who holds the whip hand here. You tracked us down, right enough. But one shot from my trusty forty-five, and you're pushin' up daisies on Boot Hill. Dead men tell no tales."

"I'll say it again," Matt said, hoping his voice was holding steady. "I don't want to turn you in, I don't want to blackmail you. All I want is to join your team-to learn how you do what you do."

"Then you'd know more than any of us," the frog muttered.

Matt was confused, but he couldn't let that show. He had had to win this bunch over. But how? to win this bunch over. But how?

The words burst out almost before he realized he was speaking. "You're worried about me telling tales? If I ran with you, I'd be in for as much trouble as you catch."

"Maybe." Mr. Jewels drawled the word out as if he were tasting it, thinking over Matt's offer. "I daresay you've shown that you know your way around computers, since you got this close to us. But that's not all you need to prove if you want to run with us."

"Meaning what?" Matt asked cautiously.

"You have to be able to pull your weight." The monolithic jewel-monster leaned forward, his words coming faster. "Get us in somewhere we haven't been able to penetrate."

A test, Matt thought. That made a certain sort of sense. At least it would let him get out of this empty white room without getting shot.

"I'm willing to try," Matt promised. "As long as it's not outright impossible, like the Pentagon or the White House."

"Oh, it's more possible than that." Mr. Jewels gave a grating laugh. "We want to get into the veeyar of Sean McArdle. He's the son of the Irish amba.s.sador. I'm sure I don't need to tell you more. You can find out all you want to know with a data search."

"I'll start right away." Matt hesitated before he went on. "You all want to get in there?"

The others laughed. "And walk into a b.l.o.o.d.y trap? I think not," Mr. Jewels sneered. "No, all you need to worry about is yourself-and CeeCee here." He made an ironic bow toward the furious Cat Corrigan.

"Since she's the only one you know out of our little group, you can contact her when you've arranged something." Mr. Jewels turned his gemstone eyes full on Matt. "If we've heard nothing from you in, oh, a week's time, we'll simply take it for granted that you're no longer interested. But if we hear any rumors about our activities-or detect any official interest in Caitlin, then we'll be forced to interest ourselves in you."

He loomed over Matt's insubstantial proxy. "You wouldn't like that, Yank. No, not at all."

Matt was glad to let Caitlin take him out of there. But when he came to leave her veeyar, he didn't go straight home. Instead, he took a complicated, preprogrammed escape route that shunted him with dizzying speed between dozens of different Net sites. He'd done the same thing when he'd bailed out of Lara Fortune's party, ricocheting back and forth across the Net to baffle any possible tracers that might have been planted on him. He'd even taken the precaution of making this route different from the one he'd taken on Friday night.

His last stop brought him to a huge pyramid ablaze with electrical impulses-the virtual representation of an on-line catalogue operation. The restless glitter represented constant calls for pricing information and orders.

Matt hurtled onward without even slowing, blending into the blaze of electronic activity around the construct. If the virtual vandals had managed to keep track of him up to now, the sheer volume of information glaring would confuse their pursuit.

He was aiming for a tiny dark spot on the side of the pyramid-a few gigabytes of computer memory that Matt had diverted from the catalogue business. Now, the little niche held programs to let Matt run a self-check to insure he'd made a clean getaway.

The tiny dark s.p.a.ce suddenly flared into life, blinking brightly as the ant.i.tracking programs gave him a green light, then erased themselves. He took one more whirl around the pyramid, routed himself along with some outgoing calls, and veered off homeward.

Matt's knees felt a little rubbery when he got out of his computer-link chair. Maybe that evasive pattern he'd flown from Vandal Central had a few too too many twists and turns. His only regret was that he hadn't been able to plant a tracing device in the veeyar where Caitlin had taken him. many twists and turns. His only regret was that he hadn't been able to plant a tracing device in the veeyar where Caitlin had taken him.

That problem was, a bug would turn out to be a two-edged sword. It would reveal the node where the virtual vandals had met, but the transmission would let the bad guys pinpoint him him. And right now, the only things he had going for him were the Caitlin Corrigan connection and his hidden ident.i.ty.

Matt walked off his shivers, then headed down the hall to the phone.

Now it's my turn to try and unmask a few proxies, he thought as he punched in Captain Winters's office number. Luckily, the captain was in, spending his Sat.u.r.day clearing away paperwork.

"Captain, it's Matt Hunter," Matt said into the handset. "Could I come down there and talk with you? I may have come across a connection to that Camden Yards thing."

"You don't want to tell me right now? Or e-mail a report?" the officer asked.

Matt coughed. "I'd rather you hear this in person, sir. When you do, I think you might agree." No way was he going to talk on an open phone line-or send a message through the virtual vandals' network playground.

A sigh came over the phone. "I was hoping to leave in a little while-when can you get here?"

"I'm leaving right now," Matt said.

On the autobus ride to the captain's office in the Pentagon government office center, Matt tried to organize his experiences of the past week into a coherent report. But even his best effort didn't sound so coherent when he faced the impatient Captain Winters.

The captain was a lot less impatient and much more worried by the time Matt finished. "You're suggesting that the daughter of the Honorable Senator from Ma.s.sachusetts is linked to a group of wealthy virtual thrill-seekers? And several other members of this bunch are foreign-possibly related to the diplomatic community?"

"I think-" Matt began.

But Captain Winters finished his sentence for him. "I think you'd better have some pretty convincing evidence to back up charges like that. We don't have any official standing in the case-it's still the Baltimore PD's baby." He rolled his eyes. "And they'd just think you'd better have some pretty convincing evidence to back up charges like that. We don't have any official standing in the case-it's still the Baltimore PD's baby." He rolled his eyes. "And they'd just love love hearing this theory." hearing this theory."

"I still think the foreign connection is worth looking into," Matt said quietly.

"As long as you don't go rocking any boats," Winters said. He glanced at his watch. "I'll leave you to it." Turning to his computer console, he said, "Computer, identify for voice commands."

"Voice identified as Captain James Winters," the computer responded.

"Open database search, noncla.s.sified material, Corrigan, Caitlin-known a.s.sociates, specifically foreign nationals."

"Going back to six months ago," Matt suggested. "I don't think they've been meeting recently."

The captain nodded. "Time variable extending to six months before present date. Datascrip copy to be presented to Matthew Hunter, identified now."

"Matthew Hunter," Matt said.

"Execute," Captain Winters ordered. He glanced at Matt. "I'm sure you'll have a bit of a wait. Even for our computer system, this will be a long search." He went to the door. "I'll leave this locked. Just close it on the way out. And tell me if anything interesting kicks out."

Matt didn't know whether to be flattered by the captain's trust or annoyed by his obvious belief that nothing interesting would emerge. Standing alone in the office, he waited impatiently as the Net Force search engines ground through all the public information sites-print news, electronic info, HoloNet, and government public affairs-for any connections between Caitlin and Washington's large foreign community.

But impatience quickly became dismay as the computer announced hundreds of hits.

"Organize by individuals," Matt ordered, "listing by name in decreasing frequency of references."

Even that way, the datascrip Captain Winters had left was quickly filled.

I bet he figured this would happen, Matt thought, and set it up as a lesson for me and set it up as a lesson for me.

He was about to pull the scrip from its reader when he suddenly stopped, struck by a new thought. He hadn't been able to identify the accents of two of the three proxied-up characters he'd met today. But he had a suspicion about Mr. Jewels.

"Separate file," Matt ordered the computer. "First ten individuals on the list-sort by nationality. If there are any British subjects, give them precedence."

The scrip whirred again. "Last thirty-seven names on master list deleted to make room for file," the computer warned.

"Accepted," Matt said. "List nationality file."

A holo-screen appeared in the air over the computer console. Matt examined the glowing letters. "One British subject," he muttered. "Look at all those press references."

Matt decided to try and press his luck. "Computer," he said, "is there a current government file on"-he squinted, then read the name-"Gerald Savage?"

The room was silent for a moment as the computer searched the Net Force files. "Affirmative."

"Is the file cla.s.sified?"

"Negative."

"Call up file on Gerald Savage," Matt ordered.

An eye-blink later, the image of a harsh-faced but handsome enough guy appeared over the console. There was just a little too much nose and chin, and the brown hair was worn defiantly long.

"Hunh," Matt muttered. "It's a State Department file, not Net Force info."

He frowned as he ordered a scroll of the written contents. Gerald Savage, it seemed, was the kind of guy who gave the idea of diplomatic immunity a bad name. He'd gotten into several physical confrontations, which had earned him the nickname "Gerry the Savage."

Matt became more interested as he discovered that Savage's brawling apparently had a political origin. His father was a radical British politician, campaigning on an angrily anti-Irish platform. Matt knew there had always been a lot of anger in the history of England and Ireland. The Irish had fought for hundreds of years to be free from British rule.

But the antagonistic relationship had taken a new turn since the late 1990s, when Ireland began outperforming Britain economically. Where Englishmen had once claimed superiority, they now felt envy. It only became worse when, twenty years later, the British government finally allowed the six counties of Northern Ireland to reunite with the rest of the country. Many Englishmen were humiliated at losing one of their last colonies-and Cliff Savage, Gerald's father, had ridden that wave of old hatred and anger to sudden political prominence.

It looked as though the government had given him a foreign-service post to get him out of the country.

Matt shook his head. But why send him here? They had to know about the huge Irish-American community. Or was that the idea? Maybe the people in London were hoping that the Savages would cause some kind of international incident.

"Close file," Matt ordered. But he was already frowning as a new thought came to him. Caitlin Corrigan. That had to be an Irish name. What was she doing with a guy who liked to dump on Irish people?

Maybe it was just part of Washington society. It was amazing how diplomatic functions were always throwing together people who were supposed to be bitter enemies. Sometimes political points could be made by acting like friends.

Then again, these were two kids whose parents were always in the public eye. Maybe they thought it would be funny to drive their folks crazy by picking the world's most impossible friend.

Matt swallowed. In school, his English cla.s.s had been going over Romeo and Juliet Romeo and Juliet, the famous play where two kids from feuding families had fallen in love.

Any of those scenarios could explain why Caitlin and Gerry the Savage had gotten together. But all they told Matt was that he had a lot more to find out about Cat Corrigan before he'd know what made her tick.

7.

Matt knew he should be working on the "a.s.signment" he'd been given by the virtual vandals-the little job he hadn't mentioned to Captain Winters. His attempt at undercover work would go up in smoke if he couldn't deliver on what he'd been asked to do.

Instead, Matt found himself staring at a holo image over his computer console. It showed Caitlin Corrigan in an evening gown, arriving at some charity event with her escort, Gerald Savage. Cat was giving the paparazzi a mischievous grin. The Savage looked as if he'd just bitten into a chocolate-covered pickle.

How was Matt supposed to compete with these people? They were the innermost in-crowd, invited to every social event. If they couldn't get to Sean McArdle, how could Matt expect to get through?

Unless...Matt suddenly thought, maybe I'm asking the wrong question maybe I'm asking the wrong question. Why can't they get through to Sean McArdle? can't they get through to Sean McArdle?

He erased the image from his computer console, and began a new data search. As Matt read the news reports he called up, a line of type caught his eye. Then a slow smile appeared on his face. Maybe, just maybe, there was was a way.... a way....

A day or so later, Matt ventured out into the Net, carrying his telecommunications icon, Leif Anderson's proxy program, and Caitlin's earring protocol.

He took a roundabout route before heading to Cat's veeyar, just in case she was monitoring where he came from.