Mappa Mundi by Justina Robson

Author:Justina Robson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Prometheus Books
Published: 2013-05-29T16:00:00+00:00

White Horse knew of Mary, although they'd never met. Mary seemed pleased to see her, and annoyed when she heard that Jude wouldn't be back until later that evening. White Horse invited her to wait, thinking he wouldn't be long—he'd said by seven. They sat down together in the white room and let the TV play quietly in the background. White Horse drank coffee. Mary had tea, which White Horse couldn't find, but Mary knew the kitchen better and located it first look.

“Huh,” she said, looking at the box. “Run out again. He never remembers to get it at the store.” She was going to leave the empty pack out, but on second thought picked it up and put it back in the cupboard, manicured hands adjusting its position perfectly. White Horse glanced at her own hands, burnt and callused, but she made no effort to hide them. Mary could think what she liked.

At first the conversation was tough going but, White Horse realized, once they'd got onto the only subject they had in common—Jude—it was clear that Mary was closer to him than she was. She tried not to notice the possessive jealousy that grew on her as they spoke; it was her fault the years had gone by in silence. At least this terrible set of circumstances would give her a chance to fix that now.

Mary, relaxing in the couch, began to tell her about their long-term pursuit of this one guy, omitting details she said she couldn't mention because of their secrecy. White Horse could see how much the flippancy of her telling revealed the kick she got out of having access to power and inside information.

“We first came across him when we were trying to convict these Russian mafia thugs for running steroid simulants into their pet basketball players in the Leagues—you know they're big on sports here. These drugs, they'd been altered in some real clever way to fool the body into thinking it needed to produce more of particular chemicals itself. Then, after, there was another set they used to filter them out of the bloodstream, so that whenever testing was carried out there wasn't much chance of them getting caught. You know, after all that nandrolone hoo-ha was finally sorted out the legal ranges for a lot of 'natural' chemicals had to be recalculated and they played on that…so, there they were, trading players and making money and Jude and I finally catch up with them in Detroit where they've got a warehouse full of this stuff and a laboratory set up in one corner churning it out…but the guy who orchestrated it all, Ivanov, is already long gone on to something else.”

She paused and finished her tea and White Horse waited for more. She thought Mary'd assumed she wouldn't understand some of it and was deliberately dumbing it down but she didn't say anything. She wanted to know about Jude.

“No way to get a conviction on him, as none of them would talk and there was no documentation.

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