Thornton glanced around my office, taking in the grimy windows, the fretwork of crisscrossing steel girders outside, and the skulls resting on the wide windowsill. “I’m pleased to meet you, sir. I’ve heard a lot about the Body Farm from the Forensic Recovery Teams who’ve trained there. It’s a great opportunity for them.”
“We’re always glad to help,” I said. “And you don’t have to ‘sir’ me. Hell, you’re the high-wattage guy from FBI headquarters.”
He grinned, a lopsided, aw-shucks kind of grin. “Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate — sounds impressive, doesn’t it? I’m actually pretty low on the food chain, though.”
“Well, Captain Sievers practically saluted Hank’s cell phone when you started talking yesterday,” I said. “What’d you say to make such an impression?”
“Not much,” he said. “Usually the more I say, the less impressive I get.” That drew a laugh from me, weary though I was. “The WMD Directorate is part of the National Security Branch. I just told Captain Sievers this incident could involve terrorism and national security, and that we’d appreciate it if he could help us keep it low-profile till we figured out if there was a bigger threat.”
“Were you just blowing smoke to keep Sievers in line? Or might there really be a bigger threat?”
“In the post-9/11 world,” he said, “we consider any suspicious incident involving radiation to be terrorism, and we assume the threat could be big until we find out otherwise.”
Thornton pulled a small, glossy pamphlet out of a jacket pocket and handed it to me. Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), the title panel read. A Pocket Guide. Inside, one panel described various weapons — explosive, chemical, biological, and radiological — while a second panel listed the federal laws terrorists would be breaking if they used weapons of mass destruction. The pamphlet’s innermost spread outlined how the FBI would assess the danger from an actual or threatened WMD attack.
“Yikes,” I said. “Good to know you guys are prepared, but scary that there’s the need to print this sort of thing in mass quantity. Also scary that you have to assume the worst.”
“We’ll be happy to be proven wrong,” he said. “We’ve sent the source to Savannah River National Laboratory, where we have a forensic rad lab. The lab should be able to tell us where it came from, and when.”
“It’s already there? That was quick.”
He shrugged. “We figured that since we were sending a plane to Knoxville anyhow, we might as well get some more mileage out of it. A couple of my cohorts landed in South Carolina with it about thirty minutes ago. That’s not for public consumption, by the way, but I wanted you to know we’ll be bringing a lot of resources to bear on this.”
“That’s good to know,” I said. “Listen, I was just about to go look in on Dr. Garcia. You want to come with me?”
“Thanks, but I guess I should pass,” he said. “I probably should start seeing what we can dig up in Oak Ridge.”
“I understand,” I said. “Good luck.”
Just then I heard Miranda’s voice in the hallway. “Hey, boss, you ready to go back across the river?”
“Can’t wait,” I said as she reached the doorway. “Miranda, this is Special Agent Charles Thornton. Agent Thornton, this is my graduate assistant, Miranda Lovelady.”
Thornton held out a hand — more eagerly than he’d extended it to me, I thought — and said, “Chip. Call me Chip.”
“Miranda runs the bone lab and works forensic cases with me,” I said. “She was in the autopsy suite yesterday.”
“I’m sorry to meet you under these circumstances,” he said. “Dr. Brockton invited me to head over to the hospital with you guys to meet Dr. Garcia. We can talk on the way.” Miranda looked a question at me; I answered with a slight shrug of the shoulders. Thornton had apparently decided he could wait a bit to start his spadework in Oak Ridge.
Despite the tangle of tubes and wires attached to him, Eddie Garcia looked better than he had in the ER fourteen hours before. His nausea and diarrhea had subsided, and ordinary fatigue had replaced panic as the predominant look on his face.
“You look pretty good,” I said. “You sure it wasn’t just something you ate?” Miranda elbowed me by way of a reprimand, then reached out and gave Garcia’s arm a squeeze. I felt a flash of panic when she did that — could that increase her exposure? — then I remembered the scene with the fearful ER nurse, and I felt ashamed. Garcia wasn’t contaminated or dangerous, I reminded myself; just exposed and endangered. Amazing, I thought, how easily fear trumps logic. I introduced Thornton, who shook hands with Garcia and then whipped out copies of the handy pocket guide for him and Miranda.
“Swell,” said Miranda. “Now I feel better.” Thornton glanced at me, but I just smiled. Apparently most people didn’t react to the pamphlet with the same pessimism Miranda and I had shown. She fluttered her fingers in the general direction of Garcia’s attachments. “What are all these things they’ve fastened to you since we were here a few hours ago?”
“The wires are EKG leads so they can monitor my heart,” he said. “One of the drips is saline and electrolytes, to replace what I’ve been losing from both ends. I have a line they can tap for blood without sticking me every time. So far, I’ve managed to fend off the nurse with the urinary catheter.”
“Pick your battles,” I said. “As good as you look, Eddie, I bet you’ll be out of here by this time tomorrow.”
He shook his head. “Appearances are deceiving with radiation sickness,” he said. “And you heard Dr. Sorensen; once the symptoms disappear, it’s just a matter of time before they come back with a vengeance. Sorensen’s seen a lot of cases of radiation sickness; if he’s worried about me, I’m in trouble.” I winced at his unsparing realism, though I admired the courage it took to face his situation squarely.
Miranda wheeled to face Thornton. “Who would have done this, and for God’s sake, why? It makes no sense. Why not just shoot the old guy, or strangle him? Why not just let him die of old age?” Her voice shook with anger and sorrow.
“Our people in Behavioral Sciences — the profilers — are asking exactly those questions now.” He looked as if he were about to add something, then changed his mind and kept quiet.
Miranda saw the hesitation, and she pounced. “What?”
“Nothing, really,” he said. “It’s just…you know the riddle of the albatross?”
She looked perplexed. “Uh, something to do with a sailor who shoots a bird and brings bad luck down on a whole ship?”
“No, that’s a poem,” said Thornton. “This is a riddle. A man who has returned from a voyage walks into a restaurant, sits down, and orders the albatross. The waiter brings it, the guy takes one bite, then rushes out of the restaurant and goes home and kills himself. Why?”
“Seems a bit of an overreaction,” I said. “It must have been really, really bad albatross.”
“It’s a guessing game,” said Thornton. “You have to guess what happened earlier, before he walked into the restaurant. You can ask me yes-or-no questions.”