The City & the City - China Mieville [53]
“Fuck, yes, then,” she said. “If authority’s stiffing you, unauthorised is all you’ve got.”
Chapter Eleven
“YES?” Mikyael Khurusch looked at me more closely from behind the door to his shabby office. “Inspector. It’s you. What… Hello?”
“Mr. Khurusch. Small point.”
“Let us in, please, sir,” Corwi said. He opened the door wider to see her, too, sighed and opened to us.
“How can I help you?” He clasped, unclasped his hands.
“Doing okay without your van?” Corwi said.
“It’s a pain in the arse, but a friend’s helping me out.”
“Good of him.”
“Isn’t it?” Khurusch said.
“When did you get an AQD visa for your van, Mr. Khurusch?” I said.
“I, what, what?” he said. “I don’t, I have no—”
“Interesting that you stall like that,” I said. His response verified the guess. “You’re not so stupid as to out-and-out deny it, because, hey, passes are matters of record. But then what are we asking for? And why aren’t you just answering? What’s the trouble with that question?”
“Can we see your pass, please, Mr. Khurusch?”
He looked at Corwi several seconds.
“It’s not here. It’s at my house. Or—”
“Shall we not?” I said. “You’re lying. That was a little last chance for you, courtesy of us, and oh, you pissed it up a wall. You don’t have your pass. A visa, Any Qualified Driver, for multiple entry-reentry into and out of Ul Qoma. Right? And you don’t have it because it’s been stolen. It was stolen when your van was stolen. It was, in fact, in your van when your van was stolen, along with your antique street map.”
“Look,” he said, “I’ve told you, I wasn’t there, I don’t have a street map, I have GPS on my phone. I don’t know anything—”
“Not true, but true that your alibi checks out. Understand, no one here thinks you committed this murder, or even dumped the body. That’s not why we’re ticked off.”
“Our concern,” Corwi said, “is that you never told us about the pass. The question is who took it, and what you got for it.” Colour left his face.
“Oh God,” he said. His mouth worked several times and he sat down hard. “Oh God, wait. I had nothing to do with anything, I didn’t get anything …”
I had watched the CCTV footage repeatedly. There had been no hesitation in the van’s passage, on that guarded and official route through Copula Hall. Far from breaching, slipping along a crosshatched street, or changing plates to match some counterfeit permission, the driver had had to show the border guards papers that raised no eyebrows. There was one kind of pass in particular that might have expedited so uncomplicated a journey.
“Doing someone a favour?” I said. “An offer you couldn’t refuse? Blackmail? Leave the papers in the glove compartment. Better for them if you don’t know anything.”
“Why else would you not tell us you’d lost your papers?” Corwi said.
“One and only chance,” I said. “So. What’s the score?”
“Oh God, look.” Khurusch looked longingly around. “Please, look. I know I should’ve taken the papers in from the van. I do normally, I swear to you, I swear. I must have forgotten this one time, and that’s the time the van gets stolen.”
“That’s why you never told us about the theft, wasn’t it?” I said. “You never told us the van was stolen because you knew you’d have to tell us eventually about the papers, and so you just hoped the whole situation would sort itself out.”
“Oh God.”
Visiting Ul Qoman cars are generally easy to identify as visitors with rights of passage, with their licence plates, window stickers and modern designs: as are Besź cars in Ul Qoma, from their passes and their, to our neighbours, antiquated lines. Vehicular passes, particularly AQD multiple-entry, are