‘If going backwards gets us forwards, then let’s try it,’ said Beverley. ‘It’s the only idea in town.’
‘It’ll be a slow process of elimination,’ warned Deke Pulbrow.
‘It was always going to be that,’ Parnell pointed out. ‘But it doesn’t necessarily have to be that slow. Influenza is basically respiratory – that narrows our genetic field.’
‘By a few thousand,’ said Beverley.
‘We’ll need more samples. And a lot more mice,’ said Lapidus.
‘Get as many samples as you need from Tokyo,’ said Parnell.
‘We’ve got enough to start already,’ said Beverley, enthusiastically. ‘Kathy’s the mouse mother.’
‘Then start,’ urged Parnell.
Pulbrow hesitated, as they began filing out, and Parnell said: ‘Beverley told me. Why not close the door?’
Pulbrow did so, but stayed by it. ‘I don’t want to cause trouble.’
‘As far as I’m concerned, it’s entirely down to you whether you undergo the assessment or not. I’m certainly not going to put any pressure on you. I don’t see how I could. Or why I should.’
‘You think I should have it?’
The man wanted someone to make the decision for him, guessed Parnell. He said: ‘I think you should decide yourself what you want to do. And then do it.’
‘I’ve talked around. This seems to be a pretty structured, authoritative organization.’
‘The organization might be. This unit certainly isn’t,’ said Parnell. ‘No one’s holding a gun to your head, Deke.’
‘You took it?’
‘I thought it was a waste of time. Still do, for that matter. I couldn’t then be bothered to refuse.’
‘Then?’ questioned the other man.
‘I think I might tell her to forget it next time, if indeed there is a next time.’
‘Her?’
‘The psychologist is a woman. Kind of an earth mother.’
‘I’ll think some more about it,’ said Pulbrow, uncertainly.
‘You do that,’ encouraged Parnell, looking up at Kathy Richardson’s entry.
‘You’re high on Dwight’s demand list,’ said the secretary. ‘Written confirmation after the telephone call.’
Why the duplication? wondered Parnell.
The truckers’ stop, about ten miles into New Jersey beyond the Hudson tunnel, had been designated by Edward C. Grant, who had been waiting when Harry Johnson arrived, the untasted coffee like a totem before him, the menu pushed to one side. Johnson chose the Big Breakfast, with an extra side order of hash browns and a double orange juice, his necessary and already marked serviette tucked tightly into his collar in a forlorn attempt to protect his shirt.
Johnson said: ‘You should have ordered this. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day – sets you up.’
‘I’m not hungry,’ said the white-haired man. He sat strangely in their window booth, overlooking the interstate car park of dinosaur-sized trucks, as if he feared contamination by contact with the table or the red plastic seat or even the mug.
‘You haven’t touched your coffee, either. It’s good coffee.’
‘I’m not thirsty.’
‘I’m glad we could meet like this,’ said the Dubette security chief, who’d made the demand.
‘So am I.’
‘How’d you know about this place? Know how to dress to fit in, like you belong?’
Grant was wearing jeans and a work shirt, although neither had ever been worked in. Johnson’s better fitted the surroundings, more stains being added by what the inadequate serviette wasn’t catching.
Grant said: ‘That’s not what we’re here to talk about. What do you want?’
‘You’re right about that,’ said Johnson. ‘I’d say there’s a lot for us to talk about, one way and another, wouldn’t you?’
‘What’s your problem, Harry?’
‘That’s exactly what my problem is!’ said Johnson. ‘It’s not knowing what my problem is.’
‘You watch a lot of television, Harry?’
‘Crime stuff, mostly. The old life, before Dubette, I guess. You know how it is?’
‘No,’ denied Grant. ‘I don’t know how it is. I’m waiting for you to tell me.’
‘Which is what I thought the arrangement was between us, you telling me, me telling you. But always direct, not through any intermediary… like Dwight Newton.’
Grant sighed. ‘There was a directors’ meeting in New York. It was easier, more convenient, to pass the message on through him.’
‘It was never easier, more convenient, before. I don’t like the way everything’s falling down. I particularly don’t like the idea of being cut out of the chain of communication. I wouldn’t have thought you would, either.’
‘The problem’s that fucking flight number!’
‘You told me there was a problem: that something had gone wrong and that the girl was dead and Parnell had to be incriminated. I thought the flight number, which the Paris office used a lot in the past, would make it look as if they were stealing secrets. I forgot the earlier terrorist alerts. If Parnell hadn’t dismissed Fletcher, there would have been a plea, imprisonment, and Parnell would have been disgraced, imprisoned and unemployable anywhere else. Which was what you also told me to fix…’ Johnson looked again around the truck stop packed with drivers. ‘And if you’d had me fix the accident, the driver wouldn’t have killed Rebecca, just created the accident in a police district where I could have handled everything.’
‘What can the FBI find out?’
‘Nothing!’ insisted the man. ‘It’ll run into the ground.’
‘Like Dubette’s stock value!’
‘Your problem, largely of your making,’ insisted Johnson. ‘I’m more interested in personal things – you and I, for instance. As I think you should be.’
‘You’re not being cut out of anything!’ insisted Grant. This was wrong, all wrong – his worst nightmare. He wasn’t sure what the feeling was, but didn’t want it to be fear, because Johnson was the sort of man who could smell fear, like the animal he was.
That’s good to hear. That’s very good indeed. I really wouldn’t like that,’ said Johnson. He mopped up the egg and grease with a piece of bread, ate it, and immediately belched. He said: ‘See how good it was.’
‘You got anything else to say?’
‘I got this witness summons.’
‘You’ve been in enough courts.’
‘You see the fucking press conference? Hear the threats?’
‘What can they threaten you with?’
‘I don’t know. The lawyer talked about a lot of evidence.’
‘It’s got to be exchanged. You’ll know what you’re facing, before you’re called to the stand.’
‘I want a good attorney.’
‘You’re going to get the best. You know how Dubette looks after its people.’
‘I think I got particular reason to be looked after.’
‘Don’t worry.’
‘I do worry when I think I’m being cut out of things.’
‘We’ve gone through that.’
‘I’m not sure about the Metro DC guys. I think they’re flaky.’
‘They drop you, they drop too.’
‘I told them I knew where Parnell’s car was. I think I told the FBI I didn’t know.’
‘So what? You forgot, then you remembered. That’s how it happens.’
A saggy-breasted waitress came by with coffee refills, freshened Johnson’s mug and took away the congealed plate. As she left, Johnson ordered toast, peanut butter and jelly.
He said: ‘You didn’t tell me how a guy like you knows about a place like this!’
‘Stop it, Harry. I’m not amused.’
‘What happened to the girl, Ed? What happened to Rebecca?’
It was the first time ever that Johnson had felt bold enough to address Grant like that, and a shudder visibly went through the older man. It was several moments before Grant could reply. ‘I don’t understand your question.’
‘I organized the detective-agency stakeout, like you told me to when we were dealing direct. Alerted you to their Sunday day out to Chesapeake. Called my people off, like you told me. Then…’ He clicked his fingers. ‘… POW, poor kid’s dead at the bottom of a ravine. You know what I think? I think Rebecca Lang might just still be alive if I’d kept agency guys on the job… I wouldn’t be at all surprised if they’re more than a little concerned, the way things happened…’