Day Twenty-three, late afternoon
Israel Museum Library, Jerusalem
Perhaps it had been George's weight or his greediness. Perhaps it was because the huge man had been such a damn good actor. Or all of the above. Whatever the reason, Gil had seriously underestimated him.
“You've had eight days. What did you learn?” Sarkami asked succinctly.
Once on the hunt, Gil had been able to access virtually every one of George's files at CyberNet Forensics, Gil explained. Through CyberNet's system, he had tapped into George's home computers as well. He could have done it at any time in the past but, as George probably knew, Gil would have had no reason to even considering doing so. Throughout those eight days, a single document eluded Gil. It was an e-mail that had been created on the day George sent Gil to Israel and had been encoded with a special password.
“At first, I figured it couldn't be that important,” Gil said, “but there it was, sitting all by itself, in a separate partition of George's hard drive. That bothered me.”
For a while, Gil repeatedly attacked the defiant little document. The more it resisted each of Gil's inventive assaults, the more determined he became. Then, after nearly a dozen attempts, Gil abandoned the futile game. In the past, he would never have walked away from a challenge, especially a chance to prove he was a better cybersleuth than George.
“Now, it just didn't seem to matter that much,” Gil said.
George had left a mountain of electronic jumble behind. Much like the hard copies that littered the big man's desk, the pile seemed endless. Then an odd pattern began to appear, Gil explained.
With each new document he accessed, Gil discovered a pattern to the maze that made up George's secret life. The trail was long and convoluted, a mammoth three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle of illegally intercepted e-mails and Internet searches as well as unauthorized entries into secured hard drives and databases. When the pieces were dissected, then laid in clear view, they told a story of frightening genius.
It took Gil more than a week of fourteen-hour days to work his way backward. The seed that led to the spread of George's influence was a simple program, developed years earlier for Ludlow. It had enabled the Professor's less affluent Museum interns to gain easy access to his communications and texts.
“George was a graduate student back then, freelancing to make money for his tuition. He charged Ludlow half the going rate, then installed a hidden access program in Ludlow's e-mail system.”
“Ingenious,” Sarkami said.
“You ain't heard nothin' yet.”
Nicknamed “Darwin,” the program began to evolve with the first e-mail the Professor received. The initial evolution provided Darwin with the ability to attach itself to every message that the Professor sent or received. The design was flawless.
From that moment on, each piece of e-mail that entered or left Ludlow's computer, carried within it a bit of the Darwin program. Once the bit of program took root in a new computer, it completed its own programming, providing George full and easy access. Once established, the newly established program began to evolve again. Later evolutions added websites, chat rooms, and instant messages to George's sphere of accessibility. Whatever the user saw, George saw. Whenever he desired.
As the final stroke to his masterpiece, George endowed the offspring of his Darwin program with their own powerful ability to replicate. Each bit of program carried orders to reproduce, immediately and often. With his cyber moles in place, George was free to sit back, read sensitive e-mails and peruse the website records of thousands of potential targets.
“How many people are involved?” Sarkami asked.
“
Were
involved,” Gil replied, “but I'll explain that in a minute.”
The cyber trail led from Ludlow's little laptop through DeVris' mainframe to the Museum's most confidential records. From there, Darwin traveled to the computers of all of the Museum's contributors, some of the wealthiest and most influential individuals and foundations in the world.
Gil listed a few household names from the ranks of the rich and famous and waited for Sarkami's shocked response. The old eagle looked unimpressed. Gil continued.
With the world at his fingertips, George could sit at home, feet up, and while munching on his favorite snackâwith a few strokes of his keyboardâcould enter some of the most private recesses of banking, communications, and world politics.
“I could tell he was planning something of gigantic proportions,” Gil said. “George trimmed his access lists daily and kept only the biggest and most powerful names. He seemed to have been biding his time because for a long time he wasn't actually doing anything with the information.
“Then, out of the blue, a couple of months ago, George began to access every e-mail, Internet search, or other communication that came or went through the Museum's computer system. Anything that carried the word âdiary' or âscroll' in it.”
“That must have been an incredible amount of data,” Sarkami said.
Gil laughed. “Yes, at first, it must have kept him hopping. But George knew how to minimize the workload. He simply wrote a subprogram to filter out e-mail that contained certain keywords.”
“Is that how he picked up Hassan's communications to Maluka?” Sarkami asked.
“Yes. How did you know?”
“Go on,” Sarkami said.
George's interest in the diary was first piqued when an early e-mail from Ludlow to DeVris described the dairy as the discovery for which Ludlow “had been waiting all of his life.”
“I never knew George to give a damn about anybody's opinion,” Gil said, “but, apparently he trusted Ludlow's judgment far more than most. From what I can tell, George figured that if the old boy thought it was important, it was well worth George's time to check it out.”
Once he learned about the diary, George was obsessed with collecting and cataloging all correspondence and Internet searches that came from Ludlow, DeVris, Hassan, or Maluka.
“He even kept copies of documents and searches that didn't directly relate to the diary or to the possibility of locating the scroll at Weymouth,” Gil added. “Anything they were interested in, George was interested in.”
“He was quite thorough,” Sarkami said matter-offactly.
Gil stifled his irritation at what appeared to be praise and continued, intent on presenting George's failures for Sarkami's review as well.
McCullum never used e-mail, Gil explained, and so remained invisible. Only when George accessed DeVris' phone records, did he find evidence of frequent phone calls to and from WATSC headquarters.
“That single piece of information, the fact that McCullum was involved, spurred George into action. From that point on, George's collection of e-mails to and from Maluka, DeVris, and McCullum provided me with all I needed to know.”
“I thought McCullum didn't communicate by e-mail,” Sarkami said.
“With George, McCullum broke his rule,” Gil answered. “George offered him a deal he couldn't pass up.”
As a first step, George contacted the three men, individually, and informed each of the activities of the other two. In order to ensure each man's interest, George included e-mails that proved the other two were ahead in the hunt for the scroll. Then, when all three were convinced that only George could help them get to the scroll first, to each in succession, George offered the same deal at the same price.
Each was offered exclusive inside information on all activities, e-mail communications, phone records, and computer documents related to the other two. Each man thought himself to be George's sole partner. In exchange, each agreed that, upon discovery of the scroll, George would be given exclusive access to it for three months. After that time, the owner of the scroll would be free to dispose of it as he saw fit.
“Interesting arrangement,” Sarkami said thoughtfully. “Why only three months?”
“George claimed that three months was all he needed in order to pinpoint the locations of treasure detailed in The Cave 3 Scroll using the new scroll as a guide. George told them that the location of the treasure was all he cared about.”
“And they believed him? Even Maluka?” Sarkami asked skeptically.
“From the little I know of DeVris, George's hunger for money would have made sense to him and McCullum, as well.
“Maluka was a harder nut to crack, so George saved him for last. By that time, George had so much essential information on the other two players, Maluka couldn't turn down the offer. Though, I think he always remained somewhat suspicious.”
“So,” Sarkami concluded, “in the end, each of the three agreed to the deal they thought to be theirs alone.”
“Yes, and George began to deliver each the information as promised.”
“With each man receiving updated information on the other activities of the two, the chase would have grown more frenetic as the distances between their advantages closed,” Sarkami said thoughtfully.
“And each naturally turned to George for more help,” Gil added.
“So, George was the puppet master with no stake in who won because no matter who got the scroll, ultimately, it would be delivered to him, at least temporarily.”
Gil nodded. “And you can be sure that George had no intention of allowing any of them to live once the prize had been secured.”
George had a blind spot, however, Gil added, and it cost him dearly. For all his planning, George had underestimated Sabbie. “That was his biggest mistake,” Gil said.
Even when George realized that she had accessed his computer system, George dismissed her as insignificant. It turned out to be an Achilles Heel for him and, in the end, for her as well.
“Ironic,” Sarkami added. “Years ago, George was the one who suggested that Ludlow pressure DeVris into giving Sabbie a job at the Museum.”
“He probably thought she'd be just another ace-in-the-hole if he ever needed it.”
Sarkami nodded and sighed deeply. “Anything else?”
Gil said that, even with all of the answers in place, he hadn't been willing to call it quits, so he had probed a little deeper. Two questions had still remained. Number one: what lay hidden within the one piece of George's e-mail that he had been unable to open? Number two: in answer to Sarkami's previous question, why was Sabbie so worried about George being killed?
Sarkami looked up in surprise, but motioned Gil to continue.
The answer to the first question, Gil explained, arrived in the form of a message from George as Gil was exiting George's system.
A QuickTime movie appeared in the middle of the screen, complete with George's smiling face.
“I hate those âif-you're-seeing-this-then-I'm-already-dead' messages, don't you?” George began. “In case you haven't figured it out by now andâknowing that your first priority is not necessarily the potential profit in thingsâlet me fill you in. The amazing network you have just discovered constitutes what I refer to as my peach orchard, acres of sweet fruit just ripening on the vine. Each of the Fortune 500 companies, each of the billionaires, each of the obscenely well-financed foundations that you see in my system, share one common fear, a terror of having their most intimate secrets exposed to, shall we say, unsympathetic eyes.
“One by one,” George continued, “I have brought each of them forensic evidence of the less-than-legal actions, secret stashes, and underhanded deals they have perpetrated. I offered them the information freely, with concern, and suggested only that they protect themselves from future exposure by employing CyberNet's services.
“No one ever refused and as you know,” George added with a mocking laugh, “the company has done amazingly well. I have taken, as my commission, what I consider to be my fair share of the profits. It's a greater percentage than my contract stipulates but I think I more than earned it.” George's computer image seemed to look directly into Gil's eyes as if, once again, they were both in his office.
“So, Gil,” George continued, “if you've ever wondered why the company has such high profile customers but still does not seem to be swimming in profit, voilà , now you know that I've been holding a little in reserve for myself.”
George leaned in close to the camera. “Now, I gotta tell you that being found out isn't fun, but two things make it totally unacceptable. The first is knowing that, after uncovering all of my hard work, being the boy scout that you are, you will probably feel obliged to dismantle the most perfect data gathering system ever devised.
“To make matters worse,” George went on, “you did not take the bait I so carefully placed in your path. That little annoying e-mail that you could not access contained an attachment, my own electronic little time bomb actually. It was set to detonate on your twelfth try, I figured you'd go for the even dozen.”
Had Gil activated the e-mail, all record of those infected with the Darwin program would have been erased. While the program itself would continue to evolve, there would have been no way of deactivating it. George was hoping that, with some luck, the living program would have provided access for some very smart fellow in the future, someone who would make good and profitable use of it. And, when he did, George would have emerged as the ultimate winner of his game of wits with Gil.
George's screen image panned a dramatically sad face. “But, if you are hearing this message, you didn't take the bait and you didn't activate the self-destruct. That's not like you, Gil.” George shook an index finger at the camera. “It means that, like my program, you're evolving as well. What's the matter, lost your old will to win, boy?”
George backed away from the camera that had been recording his message and continued without the sarcastic tone. “You beat me, kid, but good. And I concede. But before I go, I have one last surprise. While you've been listening with great interest to my parting thoughts, my last little Darwin has been quite busy. It has created a self-destruct subprogram that will erase all record of my activities and the identities of those infected with my Darwin program. In many ways it is quite similar to the e-mail time bomb that you did not activate, with one important exception.