68
Dr. Hannah Clark received them on the wraparound porch of her gingerbread-draped Victorian, where she was carving a pumpkin with crescent-moon-shaped eyes and a sad mouth. She was a tall woman, with her father’s bony frame and haunted brown eyes. Born in the last years of the Second World War, she was in her sixties now, white haired but still slim and vigorous. According to Matt, who had set up their meeting, she had retired from Ford Detrick the previous year.
She listened without interruption, her hand tightening around her small paring knife, while Jax told her of the salvaging of U-114 and the plot by unidentified agents to release the pathogen known as the Sword of Solomon. When he finished, she said, “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because we’re hoping you can help us figure out who’s behind it.”
Laying aside the knife, she went to stand at the railing, her gaze on the canal that ran placidly beside the distant road. Despite the sunshine, the air was crisp and heavy with the scent of burning leaves. “It’s because of my father, isn’t it? You think he’s somehow involved.” When Jax didn’t answer, she said, “Well, you’re wrong.”
“Am I?”
She swung to face him again. “Last December, shortly before I retired, the security guards at Fort Detrick caught one of the lab technicians trying to smuggle a sample of DP3 out of the facility.”
“DP3?”
“The pathogen was never called die Klinge von Solomon in this country. When brought here, after the war, it was given the name Dachau Pathogen III-DP3, for short.”
Jax and Tobie exchanged quick glances. Dachau Pathogen Three? How many of Kline’s other nasty diseases had the U.S. imported?
Jax said, “What happened to this technician? Can we talk to him?”
“Unfortunately, no. He was arrested and turned over to the local authorities for prosecution. Two days later, he was found dead in his cell. It was ruled a suicide.”
Tobie said, “Do you believe it was?”
A faint, ironic smile touched her lips. “After thirty years of working on secret projects for the government? Hardly. I heard they discovered that a hundred thousand dollars had been transferred into his account the week before the incident.”
“Did they trace the source of the funds?” said Jax.
“They tried. It came from a bank in the Cayman Islands.” She looked from one of them to the other. “You need to remember that DP3 has been is this country for sixty years. There are probably dozens of people who know about it.”
“Perhaps. But how many of them would know that when their attempt to bribe someone to steal the pathogen from Fort Detrick failed, there was more available on a U-boat that sank off the coast of Denmark in 1945?”
Dr. Kline’s daughter stood very still. A breeze kicked up, rustling the dying leaves of the beeches along the canal and fluttering the fine white hair that framed her lined face.
Tobie said, “According to what we’ve been told, this DP3 is some sort of respiratory virus that is only lethal to those of Semitic origin. Is that true?”
Dr. Clark put up a hand to push the windblown hair from her face. “It’s a retrovirus, actually, not a virus-which means it replicates itself by using its host’s cells to transcribe its RNA into DNA, which is then incorporated into the host’s own genome. At first we didn’t understand how the pathogen could kill some people so quickly while hardly affecting others. But with the advent of DNA testing, we were able to determine that many Europeans and Asians produce a series of three hormonelike substances called chemokines, which block the DP3 retrovirus from slipping into their T-cells. Those of Middle Eastern descent typically lack those three protective chemokines.”
“What about Africans?” said Jax.
“The results there have been mixed. It seems that those from certain areas frequently share the genetic sequence; others don’t.”
“It’s fatal?”
“For those who lack the necessary protective sequence, yes. Nearly always.”
“So it really is an ethnic bioweapon,” said Tobie softly.
“In a sense. But I’d hardly describe it as a smart bomb.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because the concept of race is a social illusion-not a scientific construction. The truth is, there is far more genetic variation within a group than between groups.”
Jax said, “Meaning?”
“Meaning that if this pathogen were let loose, millions of those who consider themselves ‘white’ would also die. Anyone who sees DP3 as an easy way to rid the world of Jews and Arabs is not just evil; he’s a bigoted fool.”
Tobie said, “Is there a treatment for it?”
Dr. Clark shook her head. “The U.S. never had any plans to pursue DP3 as a weapon, so there was no need to develop a vaccine.” She must have seen the shock in Tobie’s face, because she gave another of her wry smiles and said, “The United States gets around the Biological Weapons Convention by saying our bio programs are purely defensive, which technically makes them legal. Unfortunately, knowledge that is developed for ‘defensive’ purposes can all too easily be used for a different purpose entirely.”
Tobie studied the woman’s even features. She looked like someone’s gentle, white-haired grandmother, not a mad scientist who had devoted her life to devising new and more lethal ways to kill. “That doesn’t bother you?”
Dr. Clark turned to look toward the canal, where a fat brown duck waddled complacently across the lawn, its feathers ruffled by the growing wind. “It bothered my father. He long ago decided that all such work is morally indefensible, since we never know how our discoveries will be used by others. It’s why he left Fort Detrick and went to MIT.”
When neither Tobie nor Jax said anything, she added, “I know you’re remembering what he did at Dachau, during the war. But if you think he’s involved in any of this, now, you’re wrong. He’s not the same man. I’m sorry I can’t help you more.”
It was obvious that as far as she was concerned, the conversation was at an end.
She walked with them to the road beside the canal, where Jax had parked his car. Jax said, “Your father claims he never told anyone about the shipments sent out of Germany under Operation Caesar. But he may have told someone he’s hesitant to betray-someone he trusts and doesn’t want to believe could be involved in this.”
She pressed her lips into a thin line, and after a moment said, “I could try driving out to see him. He may be willing to talk to me.”
Jax handed her a card with his cell number. “Please.”
He started to get in the car, but paused to say, “If I wanted to expose a group of people to this pathogen, how would I do it?”
She thought about it for a moment. “Probably the best way would be to release it into a subway, or the air-conditioning system of a building-a hotel, perhaps, or a large office building. No one would ever know. That’s the terrible beauty of a biological weapon. With a bomb, there’s never any doubt that a deliberate attack has taken place. But if an epidemic suddenly sweeps across an area…who can say that it was the result of a deliberate biological attack?”
Jax’s gaze met Tobie’s, and she saw her own dawning horror reflected in his drawn features as the same thought occurred to them both: they might already be too late. The pathogen could have been released that morning, anywhere in the country.
And they would never know it.
69
“Maybe we’ve been going at this all wrong,” said October. They were walking along the banks of Carroll Creek in the historic district of Frederick, waiting for Hannah Clark to call. “Maybe we should be focusing on the kinds of people most likely to do something like this. Or the sites they’d be likely to select.”
Jax shook his head. “They could have picked any one of a thousand sites-anywhere from the subways of New York or Washington, D.C., to the Sears Tower in Chicago. And as for the kinds of people most likely to do something like this…” He let his voice trail off.