Part 12 (2/2)
I didn't know what going further meant, but I did want to ask a few more things.
”What's your official status? You're what? FBI?”
He nodded, and took a long second before answering. ”In a way. When I think we're ready for that level of disclosure, I'll explain all the interdepartmental connections.”
Fine. The reluctance peeved me. But I had another question, and I didn't want to erode my standing before asking it. I was surprised by how much it pained me to voice the words.
”You say Wallace is dirty. How do you know for sure?”
I suppose part of me still didn't want it to be true.
”The house is a bribe,” Ruddik answered. ”I can't prove it, because we haven't secured a warrant to trace the finances, but my belief-based on scrutiny of Wallace's unpromising long-term savings situation-is that the house was funded by a single transfer, a giant payoff for something that recently happened or is about to happen. But Wallace is only part of a larger picture.”
Ruddik unsnapped his briefcase and carefully spread four sheets of paper on the table, arranging them so that a dense schematic of lines and bubbles became connected. It looked like a technical drawing of a nerve cl.u.s.ter or the layout of tunnels on a lunar station.
”Consider this a work in progress. I've been building a network map of Ditmarsh Penitentiary by mining a variety of data points. It's a hodgepodge, but an interesting one. Basically, think of it as a visual display of who spends time with who. I've included inmates, COs, and civilian staff in key positions like the mail room, the purchasing department, the infirmary, and other high-contact or heavy information flow areas. I've tried to a.n.a.lyze where s.h.i.+fts and meetings and work periods overlap, who knows who outside the inst.i.tution and in social settings. Which staff goes on vacations or training courses together. I combine all that with financial information. I look for prisoners who have shown b.u.mps in their inmate account balances. I look for the COs recording the most overtime pay. I follow promotions and watch who gets special-duty opportunities.”
Our food arrived, and Ruddik slid the papers to the side, careful not to sully his map. I thought about URF and my struggle to join. Special duty.
”It's new stuff,” Ruddik said. ”Some people call it mosaic theory or network a.n.a.lysis. In the last few years it's become standard in CIA and Homeland Security work, tracking phone calls, account transfers, flights, hotels, bar bills, mining all that data to draw conclusions about otherwise residual contact between apparent strangers. The goal is to sift through the trash and surface the connections.”
”I never knew that sort of thing was possible,” I said.
”Take a Homeland Security example,” he said, eating as he talked. ”You've got three foreign students who have no apparent relations.h.i.+p with one another. But they pop up in your data because each one has attended a different flight school. Fine. We're all suspicious of Arabs at flight schools. So you start tracking phone calls, bank deposits, vacations, business trips. You look into what each one does in his free time. Since they're Muslim, you're particularly interested in mosques, community groups, and special groceries and bookstores. Maybe you can't see any conspiracy or connection. Just an innocent fascination with learning to fly an airplane. Then you realize that all three went to the same fitness club at least once within the last year. Now the gym becomes your next jump-off point. Does the gym itself arouse any suspicion, or is there anyone attached to the gym who could be a person of interest? Sure enough, you connect the gym to another person you've had your eye on for some time, a courier type. Two more connections, and you're linked to a banker in Switzerland who funnels cash for Al Qaeda. Bingo. There's no proof, and there's no crime, but you know there is a connection between those three students and a terrorist financier. Nothing random about it.”
Ruddik drove his toast into his egg and took a hasty bite leaning over the table.
”It sounds like that Kevin Bacon game,” I said. That's all I could think of: the idea that any person could be linked to Kevin Bacon through a minimum of six other people.
”You're talking about six degrees of separation. That's an old Zimbardo experiment and very fundamental to network theory, but his scope of interest was just about random connections. We're interested in the intensity of connections to show directional flow and draw conclusions about behavior patterns. The example I gave you about the three foreign students is a real one. That was three of the nineteen terrorists from September 11. When intelligence did a retro a.s.sessment of the trails the hijackers left behind before that day, we were able to discover connections between all nineteen hijackers. Rather than the mosques, like everyone expected, the gym was in fact the best nexus point for determining who knew who.” He grimaced. ”That gym was the key, and we never knew it. They were workout pigs. They liked lifting in front of mirrors, and they got to know each other that way. Incidentally, a tendency for narcissistic behavior got upped in terrorist profiles subsequently. When a.s.sessing the motivations of extreme ideologues, we'd seriously overlooked personal aggrandizement as a coping mechanism.”
I stared at the map on the table. Some of the bubbles were densely connected with lines that led to other bubbles.
”So how does it work with Ditmarsh?”
”Basically I'm focused on the shadow hierarchy,” he said.
”Shadow?”
”As opposed to the real or formal hierarchy. You know how it works. The warden is a political figurehead. The deputy wardens are more like functional executives, chief operating officer, chief finance officer, and so on, while the keepers, or lieutenants, are the line managers with supervisory control over the rank-and-file COs, who have the most contact with the customers-or inmates.”
Customers? His corporate language threw me. I thought of the inst.i.tution purely in the terms of a military organization.
”The shadow hierarchy explains what really happens inside-as opposed to the way we pretend things are supposed to happen. Why do some keepers have more clout than others? Why do some worthless COs have such easy s.h.i.+fts and other highly trained COs are always running into trouble? Why are there blocks that run smooth and others that don't? How come when you pull one or two inmates out of a tier that's running fine, you get a sudden surge in chaos and random violence? You know as well as I do there are inmates with more control over the daily routine than any CO. If you want to get something done, you've got to work through them; otherwise the whole system grinds to a halt and the other COs start ignoring you in the staff room because you've poked a stick into the wheel.”
”I'm not blind,” I said, a touch bitter. ”I work there, too.”
”So you look for connections,” he said. ”And sometimes you observe some interesting patterns.” He put his thick finger on one of the nodes. ”I'm looking for my gym, and I've got a couple candidates.”
”Like where?” I asked.
”B-three is a node for sure. But that's Billy Fenton's ground, so no big surprise.”
I nodded. Although I had no evidence to back up my suspicions, I'd sensed power emanating from his surroundings, like waves of heat.
”The infirmary spiked slightly in the last six months, though I can't tell whether that's a distortion in the data or something meaningful.”
”Okay,” I said.
”Another really dense node is the art therapy group.”
In spite of everything, I wouldn't have guessed. ”What's going on there?”
”Maybe it's Crowley,” he said. ”Crowley was in the infirmary. Crowley was on B-three. Crowley was in the art therapy group. Crowley ended up dead. If we can find out why, we'll learn more about what he was involved in and who else was part of it.”
The plates had been cleared away, the coffee refilled.
”I want you to help,” he said.
”What do you mean by help?” I asked, nervous as h.e.l.l.
”I think you have a knack for this stuff. And I want to see what you can come up with when you get your feet wet. Nothing crazy. Just a toe dip. You're able to talk to some people I can't, ask different questions. Let's start with the Ditmarsh Social Club, for example. You want to know more. I want to know more. I want you to ask around about it. There must be some old-timer you can trust. I want you to get a sense of how they react when you bring it up, maybe learn something valuable.”
I didn't answer right away. I kept my face straight despite the misgivings. I suppose there's a point when you join the other side, whether you commit to it or not. Just by listening to Ruddik's overtures, by not walking out on him, I'd cut myself loose from any trust any CO might have owed me. I wasn't sure I wanted that trust anymore. I was sick of the lies.
Ruddik kept working on me.
”I've shown you a lot of stuff here this morning, Kali. I've made myself very vulnerable to you. This is not a game. I'm asking for a little help. Another set of boots on the ground. No one has to know but you and me.”
In a snap I made my decision, my fateful affiliation. ”I can do that.” I nodded. ”I've got some ideas who to try.”
Ruddik nodded and looked pleased. ”I knew you would.”
I try not to get too jacked up emotionally. My great plans have generally been followed by setbacks and downward spirals, so I've developed a philosophy for emotional survival: modulate the lows, suspect the highs. But I was excited driving home. I got stimulated by the idea of exposing connections, uncovering truths. And I liked the way Ruddik talked. I wanted to impress him, perhaps for no more complicated a reason than the attention he was paying to me. He thought I was important. Maybe that's all it took. It helped that he was easier to be around than I ever would have expected.
And then came the low. When I got home, I checked my messages and heard Keeper Wallace's voice. He told me I had to be present for a hearing the next afternoon, on my day off, to deal with the next stage of the Shawn Hadley deal. I would have felt a tinge of bitterness no matter what, but that the news came from Wallace, after what I'd learned that day, just notched up the spite.
23.
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