Mr. Stevens kept staring at me, his dead waxy face immobile. Creepy.
I said to him, "Let me ask you the question we're all here to have answered-Could Tom and Judy Gordon have smuggled microorganisms off this island? Tell us the truth."
Paul Stevens replied, "Theoretically, they could have."
No one in the bus spoke, but I noticed that the driver turned his head and did a double take.
Mr. Stevens asked, "But why would they?"
"Money," I replied.
"They really didn't seem the type," said Mr. Stevens. "They liked animals. Why would they want to wipe out the world's animals?"
"Maybe they wanted to wipe out the world's people so that the animals could have a happy life."
"Ridiculous," said Stevens. "The Gordons took nothing from here that would hurt any living thing. I'll bet my job on that."
"You already have. And your life."
I noticed that Ted Nash and George Foster were mostly quiet, and I knew they'd been briefed much earlier, and they were probably afraid they'd sound sort of like, "Been there, done that, got the T-shirt."
Mr. Stevens turned his attention back to the windshield and said, "We're approaching Fort Terry. We can get out here and look around."
The bus stopped, and we all got out.
CHAPTER 9
It was a nice morning, and the sun was warmer here in the middle of the island. Paul Stevens led us around the fort.
Fort Terry had no walls, and actually resembled a deserted town. It was unexpectedly picturesque with a brick jailhouse, an old mess hall, a rambling, two-story brick barracks with a veranda, the commandant's house, a few other turn-of-the-century buildings, and a white clapboard chapel on a hill.
Mr. Stevens pointed to another brick building and said, "That's the only building still used-the firehouse."
Max commented, "This is a long distance to the lab."
"Yes," Stevens replied, "but the new laboratory is virtually fireproof and has its own internal fire-fighting system." He added, "These fire trucks are used mostly for brush fires and fires in buildings without biocontainment."
Max, who'd lived his whole life upwind or downwind from this island, said to Stevens, "But a fire or a hurricane could destroy the power generators that filter the biocontainment areas. Right?"
"Anything is possible." He added, "Some people live near nuclear reactors. This is the modern world-full of unimaginable horrors-chemical, biological, and nuclear nightmares waiting to clean the slate for the next evolving species."
I looked at Paul Stevens with new interest. It occurred to me that he was nuts.
In front of the barracks was a field of cut grass that swept down to the water some distance away. Flocks of Canada geese were strutting around the field, cackling and honking or whatever the hell they do when they're not crapping. Stevens explained, "That was the parade ground. We keep the grass cut so that aircraft can see the concrete letters that are embedded in the grass. The letters say, ' Plum Island -Restricted.' We don't want small planes landing here." He made a little joke. "The sign keeps airborne terrorists away."
We walked around a bit and Stevens said, "Before we built the main facility, a lot of the administration offices were housed here at Fort Terry. Now almost everything-labs, security, storage, administration, and animals-is under one roof, which is very good from the standpoint of security." He said to me, "So, even if the perimeter security were breached, the main building is virtually unbreachable."
"You're really tempting me," I said.
Mr. Stevens smiled again. I loved it when he smiled at me. He said, "For your information, I have a college degree from Michigan State, and it's hanging on the wall behind my desk, but you'll never see it."
I smiled back. God, I love pissing people off who annoy me. I liked Max, I liked George Foster, I loved Beth, but I didn't like Ted Nash or Paul Stevens. Liking three out of five people was really good for me-four out of six, if I counted myself. Anyway, I'm getting really intolerant of liars, fools, blowhards, and power freaks. I think I had more tolerance before I got shot. I have to ask Dom Fanelli.
The old parade ground ended abruptly in a steep drop to a rocky beach below, and we found ourselves standing at the edge overlooking the sea. It was a breathtaking view, but it highlighted the loneliness of this place, the otherworldly and end-of-the-world feeling associated with islands in general, and this island in particular. This must have been a very isolated duty station, an extremely boring outpost with little to do except watch the sea. Probably the artillerymen here would have welcomed the sight of an enemy armada.
Stevens said, "This beach is where the seals come every year in late autumn."
I asked, "Do you shoot them?"
"Of course not. As long as they stay on the beach."
As we walked back from the beach, Stevens drew our attention to a big boulder at the end of the parade ground. Sitting in a cleft of the boulder was a rusty cannonball. He said, "That's from about the time of the Revolution-British or American. It's one of the things the Gordons dug up."
"Where did they find it?"
"Right around here, I guess. They dug a lot around the seal beach and this parade ground."
"Did they?"
"They seemed to have a knack for knowing where to dig. They turned up enough musket balls to arm a regiment."
"You don't say?" Keep talking, Mr. Stevens.
"They used one of those metal detectors."
"Good idea."
"It's an interesting hobby."
"Indeed it is. My aunt was a big digger. I didn't know the Gordons were into digging. I never saw anything they uncovered."
"Well, they had to leave everything here."
"Because of contamination?"
"No, because it's federal land."
This was interesting, and Nash and Foster were starting to listen, which is not what I wanted, so I changed the subject by saying to Stevens, "I think the bus driver is trying to get your attention."
Stevens looked toward the bus, but the driver was just staring up at a flock of geese. Stevens glanced at his watch and said, "Well, let's see the rest of the island, then we have an appointment with Dr. Zollner."
We boarded the bus and off we went, heading east into the rising sun, out toward the spit of land that was the curved bone of the pork chop. The beach was magnificent, about two miles of unlittered, untrodden sand washed by the blue waters of the Long Island Sound. No one spoke in the presence of this majestic display of nature. Not even me.
Stevens, still standing, glanced at me now and then, and I smiled at him. He smiled back. It was not a really fun kind of smile.
Finally, at the narrow end of the island, the bus stopped, and Mr. Stevens said, "This is as far as we can go with the bus. Now we walk."
We all got out of the bus and found ourselves in the middle of an amazing old ruin. Wherever I looked, I saw massive concrete fortifications overgrown with vines and brush-pillboxes, bunkers, gun emplacements, ammunition magazines, tunnels, brick and concrete roadways, and huge, three-foot-thick walls with rusty iron doors in them.
Stevens said, "One of these underground passages leads to a secret laboratory where captured Nazi scientists are still working to develop the ultimate, indestructible virus that will wipe out the world's population.
He let that sink in a second or two, then continued, "In another underground laboratory is the preserved remains of four aliens that were recovered from the UFO crash in Roswell, New Mexico."
Again, there was a silence. Finally, I said, "Can we see the Nazi scientists first?"
Everyone laughed-sort of.
Mr. Stevens smiled his winning smile and said, "These are two of the absurd myths associated with Plum Island." He added, "People report seeing strange-looking aircraft taking off and landing after midnight on the parade ground. They claim AIDS was originated here and also Lyme disease." He looked around and said, "I guess these old fortifications with all the underground passages and rooms can play on some fertile imaginations. You're welcome to look around. Go anywhere you please. If you find the aliens, let me know." He smiled again. He had a really weird smile, and I thought maybe he was an alien. Mr. Stevens said, "But, of course, we all have to stay together. I need everyone in my sight at all times."