Unacceptable Risk

Chapter 12

The prospects of female companionship in the Arab state of Quatram were abysmal, so Gaudet imported women. He paid them fairly and found replacements readily for those he hurt more than they wanted to be hurt. Killing the biggest complainers was a program that ensured good referrals and easy replacements. None was as good as Benoit Moreau had been, and that wouldn't change. But Gaudet still sought tall and supple women who reminded him of Benoit.

New York City was another matter entirely. But he could not afford to distract himself even for a few minutes now, which was a pity because there were plenty of women.

Trotsky wore some stubble, which was unusual, and kept quiet, which was normal, waiting for Gaudet to speak.

Gaudet sipped an unsweetened double espresso.

"When all this is over, I'll need a new place. Somewhere they will never expect me-a civilized part of the world. I've had my fill of Quatram."

"Maybe a nice neighborhood in Middle America."

"I'm not into potlucks."

The phone rang and Trotsky took it.

"They want to know if they can buy more art in Spain. They are obviously tired of the smuggling business."

"The store makes money?"

"Seems to."

"Let them, but control it. And put that business on the 'keep' list."

Two or three more calls came in during the next twenty minutes.

"You are growing a small empire," Trotsky said.

"I started with nothing but my bare fists, working for shit." Gaudet took his feet off the hotel coffee table. "Let's call them."

In seconds Trotsky had the Quatram office on the line.

"Get me 'Big Mohammed,' " Gaudet said, referring to the chief of the computer men. Big Mohammed was a short, balding man named Wilbur Hogan. With a noticeable paunch, Hogan was the type who liked big silver belt buckles on his blue jeans. He was divorced and couldn't find a girlfriend in Texas, so Gaudet had hired him one. Although the first and second girls didn't take, the third seemed to be sticking around and Big Mohammed seemed content living in Quatram, for the moment.

Gaudet sipped his espresso while the chief went to find Big Mohammed. It took five minutes.

"Our clients are pushing the timetable."

"Everything seems to be pushing the timetable," Big Mohammed drawled in his dreadful Texas accent.

"Do you have the time from release to complete invasion?"

"About two hours-maybe one. Fifty million Windows- based computers and a few million VN-based computers."

"How about the FAA?"

"We will get on the network, but not through the Internet. You know the old slogan: 'Crispy on the outside, but a gooey, soft center on the inside.' Cordyceps will overload the system and bring it to a halt."

"You don't know how long?"

"If it hits the hardware like I think it will, we're talking weeks, maybe months. Weeks for sure."

"Electrical utilities?"

"Some. Rolling blackouts all over the place."

"I'm counting on the phones. Especially long-distance infrastructure."

"Again I'll predict a significant impact. It will not all be down. But Americans will be writing plenty of letters. A crimp in the e-mail."

"Railroads?"

"Down by thirty-five percent. Just a guess."

"Pipelines?"

"Don't know. Not sure how tech-dependent they are. But don't worry. The stock markets are gonna crash, no doubt about it."

"Have we any chance of getting command and control?"

"Nothing's changed there. They'll still have full military capability, except to the extent that domestic chaos cripples it."

Gaudet hung up without another word and turned to Trotsky. "Make sure our investors aren't the only ones with put options. I want plenty, and well disguised."

"I've been buying for weeks." Trotsky seemed offended.

Gaudet didn't respond to that comment. He checked his watch. "How long?"

"They're strolling. How long we don't know."

"I want to watch the bastard die."

"I think that is a bad idea."

"I don't give a shit."

"Remote revenge is underrated." Trotsky smiled again. Twice in a day. "Think of it as a private jubilation of the imagination."

Grady called Sam, determined that she would go alone with Michael to get the journals and equally determined that she would put up a fight as necessary. There was no way Sam would agree and the odds of convincing him had to be near zero. In order to make the call, she walked down the street because she wasn't going to argue with Sam in front of Michael. They weren't far from the middle of Manhattan and there were plenty of people on the street. She supposed the thing that bothered her the most was that if he said no, she wouldn't go. The cabbie didn't seem to mind stopping as long as he had his meter running.

"Sam, we have to talk about something."

"I can always tell when you're loaded for bear." Grady tapped her foot for a moment and didn't say anything. It pissed her off that he had already put her in a neat, little box. It was the rebellious-brat-employee box.

"I want to go very low profile with Michael and pick up his journals. It's either that or he goes alone."

"You think it's a good idea?"

"It's better that I go than nobody goes. He needs a guide in this country. Surely, you've noticed that."

"If you want to, go ahead. Tell Yodo what you want."

"I want to pick them up halfway between Manhattan and Ithaca. Somewhere remote. And then I want Michael to lock the journals away in a vault when we get back."

"Good plan. Jill can arrange for the vault."

"Anything else?" she asked, unable to believe his re sponse.

"Make a copy of the 1998 journal and courier it to the office. Jill can provide the courier. Also make copies of all the journals and have them locked somewhere else, where only Michael can get them. Jill could probably help you with that as well."

"Sam, are you feeling okay?"

"You're grown-up now. And that means I have to be will ing to let you die."

Grady froze up when he said that. "You never said anything like that before."

"I respect you and, I think, to a certain degree you can act like a real contract agent. I'm not always going to be there to yank your butt from the jaws of defeat."

"This is one hell of a cold fatherly talk." Then she laughed because she didn't know what else to do.

" 'Treat every failure as a new beginning.' My mother said that. I believe in you."

Grady walked back down the sidewalk, feeling frightened… and proud.

"If we hurry, we can be back in time for lunch tomorrow," she said to Michael.

"I already called Rebecca and told her the meeting would have to be put off-maybe for a few days. She was very disappointed, but I have to make it up to her by taking her hik ing in the California mountains. That woman is a negotiator."

Yodo came walking toward them. Obviously, he had already talked to Sam.

"Good luck." He held out his hand and Grady shook it.

"What'll you be, a pallbearer?" Grady smiled.

Sam and Anna walked along the edge of Central Park toward the Plaza Hotel. Tonight he had a blond handlebar mustache and blond hair with eyebrows to match and wore a beret. Anna wore a Snoopy hat complete with earflaps. Looking at her, a person would never think celebrity. The driver of a horse-drawn carriage shivered in the autumn cold and snubbed his cigarette under a Red Wing boot. Sam could tell that Anna wanted to take a ride through the city. The horse pawed the pavement, maybe bored, maybe pissed off. Since the horse's ears were forward, Sam banked on bored and ready to go.

"Take us on a thirty-minute round," Sam said.

In the carriage was a heavy blanket. Sam pulled it over them. He wanted to think, and it didn't surprise him that Anna knew his mood. Under the blanket she put her hand on his arm and looked off at the people and shops as they rode down Fifth Avenue. Sam knew he was at a crossroads in his life. There were decisions made at forty-two that could not be made at sixty-two. There were choices a man could re gret, some irreversible, and he didn't want to make one of those.

He thought about his grandfather and a talk they once had. Sam had been trying to decide about a young woman in his neighborhood who wanted to go away to college, but she had become so infatuated with Sam that she was losing her will to leave home. Sam wanted her to stay because he wanted to hang out with her, but at the same time he be lieved that for her own sake she should leave and go to school and get a career. It was a struggle.

"I want to tell you a story," he said to Anna. "A story my grandfather told to me."

"Shoot."

"It may be a little corny." Sam grinned.

"Corny is good when you're pregnant. You have to make your thinking more basic."

"Back before my grandfather's time, the Tiloks had a very old chief. One tooth left in his head just before he died. Black Hawk. Called himself Jones to the whites. Grandfather had a painting of him and talked about how he kept the tribe from violence."

"I suppose the tooth part is apropos of nothing but a lack of dentistry," Anna joked.

Sam loved her sense of humor.

"So, Black Hawk was confronted with a choice of two men to be his successor. One was Charles Curtis, the other Andrew Wiley. Wiley had many enemies. He was arrogant and contentious, but also strong and impressive, and men followed him. Nobody could beat him in wrestling. Curtis was a good planner; he could read and write and he helped the widows. And he understood growing crops. He never talked of gaming revenge on the whites-unlike Wiley, who doted on the fantasy.

"Black Hawk needed to choose one of the two men. If he chose Wiley, the young men would be happy, at least most of them. There were a few young men, those more educated in the white man's ways, who wanted Curtis and would have nothing of Wiley. These men tended to live off the reserva tion. In his heart Black Hawk knew that for the future, living with the white man and abiding by his laws, Curtis was the best choice for the people. But on his deathbed the chief wanted also to please the young men.

"Black Hawk devised a test question to determine the best man for the job: 'Suppose the white man's government came to the village and wanted to buy a piece of the reservation for very little money. Suppose the money was so little and the land was so great that the tribe might not survive, so that the white man was stealing our future. Suppose there were two ideas. One idea was for the chief to starve himself and to tell the white man's newspaper of the injustice. The other was for the strongest braves to take a hostage, a power ful white man in the government who was known to be traveling in the area. What would you do?'

"Wiley was quick to answer: 'The men would sneak out at night and at daybreak, in the gray of the morning, they would take the government man and blindfold him so that he could not recognize them; then they would hide him in the mountains, where no one could find him. They would offer next to negotiate for their land and say nothing of the gov ernment man or his whereabouts. If they could not change the mind of the white men in the negotiation, they would at least kill their hostage and they would take more government men in the night and kill them as well, and they would have some retribution for their loss.'

"This answer pleased the young men.

"Curtis gave his answer 'I would go out alone in the night. I would sneak up to the government man's house. If possible, even on the threshold or even inside. At first light I would show myself. I would ask to speak with the govern ment man in front of the man who writes newspapers. I would tell him that I had come to prevent violence and to stop an injustice. I would tell him that I would take no food until the matter was resolved so that the Tiloks could survive.'

"Wiley scoffed, or so the story goes. He says: 'But they would ignore you and laugh or even put you in chains and then the people would be without a leader.'

"Curtis argued: 'That is where you are wrong. If they put me in chains or even killed me, the people would have a greater leader. Because a leader is a man who shows the way. You cannot kill the white men and go unpunished and it is foolish to try.'

"Wiley figured he had him. Turning to the crowd, he said: 'So you would give up without a fight.'

"And this was Curtis's answer: 'But that is only me,' he said. 'If they killed me, or put me in chains or merely ig nored me and ignored my plea, the village could make a new plan. Perhaps another man could come and another. I would trade my life for a chance to buy peace for the people and I would teach others to do the same.'

"Wiley's view of the world was essentially that the chief must survive because he viewed the tribe as an extension of himself and saw himself as at the center of value. Curtis, on the other hand, saw himself as only one man and saw that there might be good in giving himself for something greater than himself. He saw value in other places. 'Every person has a Wiley and a Curtis inside them,' Grandfather said. 'They are always with us.' Regarding that girlfriend of mine, Grandfather said that my Wiley and my Curtis were in a struggle for my soul.

"I think that's what is happening now. There is something epic about a child-a small person with his whole life in front of him. A mind that a man could nurture and teach. But with the child would come diapers, whining, parent-teacher conferences." He decided he'd said enough and kissed her on the lips.

"What did you do?"

"Told the girl to go to college. She met a man and fell in love. I know I never would have married her."

"There are all those future potential girlfriends of Sam," Anna began, "or Robert, or whoever. Beautiful women. Beaches full of them, malls full of them, on the sidewalk, in the restaurants, tending their gardens, going about life, every one of them an extraordinary adventure and you would be forfeiting all of that. I know, Sam. I know how it is."

"But there is that child. A child that is ours together. And there is you."

He kissed her again, and this time she kissed back. People were watching, so they cooled it and went back to playing under the blanket.

He looked in her eyes and saw a calm certainty. Oddly, he was both pleased and distressed that she looked so wise. Still, he thought he should make things plain and give his lit tle talk.

"I've decided."

"Yes?"

"I want to marry you." He paused. "So, I'm asking if you will be my wife."

"I love you." She began kissing him anew despite the onlookers. "You will marry me in public?"

"In Times Square, if you want."

"I accept. Not the Times Square part. The rest."

"I think we should become a family. I'll drop the anonymous routine."

"Can we do the honeymoon before the marriage?"

"It's a little backward, but sure. Did I surprise you?"

"I'm thrilled. And happy. Happier than I have ever been," Anna confessed.

"When did you know?"

"When you told me, of course."

"Come on. I could see it in your eyes."

"Well…"

"Come on…"

"I was pretty sure when I saw the pink spot on the little tester strip that says 'Sam has one in the oven.'”

Sam nodded.

"You remember when we met?" she asked.

"How could I forget?"

"When I saw that sailboat and a guy in the raffia hat, I knew even then that you were coming for me to haul my ass out of the Devil's Gate. And when I jumped overboard, I knew you would follow. And when I told you that I had to have your help with my brother, I was pretty sure that you would do it. And the first time we made love…"

"You're an incurable romantic."

"Okay, so when do you think I knew?"

"Some things dawn on us a little bit at a time."

When she cried, he told himself that it was going to be like this with all the pregnancy hormones and the lactation and the ligaments turning rubbery and all the other transfor mations that went along with this business of making a baby. Since there were pills for erections and pills for anxiety and pills for depression and pills for sleeping, Sam wondered if there might be a pregnancy pill. Better yet, a relationship pill for nervous Indians.

He waited for Anna's tears to turn to a mere glistening and resumed the conversation about her new movie deal. That worked for a minute. Then she got hungry for a pickle and a peanut butter sandwich.

They pulled up in front of the bed-and-breakfast in a yellow cab with a driver who spoke with his hands, fingers, and a clipboard with preprinted messages. Sam was a bit uneasy, he supposed about leaving Bowden. It seemed these days that he could smell Gaudet, and he now wondered if it was really Gaudet or simply the conclusion that Gaudet would soon figure out Michael Bowden's whereabouts.

There were gates of wrought iron everywhere along the sidewalk and it looked like a haphazard arrangement of barricades, as though made by kids for war games. Nobody seemed to agree on exactly how much of the sidewalk was public. On the street side of the cab Sam got out to go around to open the door for the new queen of his life, but she was already exiting, so he contented himself with taking her arm. His knowledge of her pregnancy had made her seem fragile.

She laughed, obviously understanding her newfound status in the hierarchy of his brain.

There were people on the street and in this part of town, as usual, relatively prosperous people; if there were holes in their blue jeans, they were the designer sorts of holes, raggedy white from machine washing. Some people needed to prove they could have holes and be cool.

A man stood reading his newspaper, no doubt waiting for his wife's nails to dry. He seemed to be having trouble turning the pages with his black leather-no doubt fur-lined- gloves, and his heavy black glasses seemed to match purposely the black shoes and the black poodle dog.

The buildings were many-storied and Sam glanced up and around as he reached out a hand for a gate. On their side of the street, in a window bay on the next building over and several floors up, his eye caught a glint of something, or maybe it was just that he suddenly supposed someone was behind the glass. It was a feeling like bricks falling to the pavement and he felt in himself a sort of startled response. Then the man with the newspaper jerked his head up, seemingly at the very second there was the sound of shooting- multiple shots in fairly quick succession. And then Sam felt himself lifted with a hit to the chest and crumpled to the sidewalk along with Anna. He was aware of the pain and thankful for the body armor, all in the same instant.

He rolled over the top of Anna and covered her, trying to get every inch of his body over hers at exactly the same instant, and once that was done, he stuffed his hand inside his partially unzipped coat, reaching for his 10mm Smith amp; Wesson.

People were rushing toward them, in what he suspected was the line of fire. Soon there were at least five people huddled round and he realized that whoever had fired the shot that had hit him was not likely to get another. And it was odd because it wasn't automatic fire. That struck him even as he lay on the pavement. It should have been automatic fire, but he had heard only a series of single shots and he was hit with only a single bullet. There was a reason for this, and he would work it out, and he hated himself for thinking it be cause he knew he should be thinking about Anna beneath him. And with that, he raised himself and looked down and saw blood oozing from the side of her head.

"Ambulance!" he shouted. "Ambulance!"

From the crowd came a soft voice: "Do you need anything?"

Sam couldn't respond. He thought perhaps he was weeping but wasn't sure.

Sam sat in a waiting area while they did the surgery. There had been flurries of activity around Anna since she ar rived at the hospital, and mostly he couldn't get closer than about ten feet. Anna's mother, Carol, had come, but she had ignored him; obviously, there was an issue with her where he was concerned. Although he had begun explaining to her that he and Anna were to be married, Carol was like a cor nered animal in her determination to hide from the truth. When he saw the pain and the fear in her eyes, he backed off and explained that he had been with Anna and that it was im portant that he stay with her at least until things stabilized. Carol had the durable power of attorney for health care and Sam was not consulted as to Anna's treatment. At the moment that was all right because he had satisfied himself that Dr. Prince, the attending neurosurgeon, was very competent and that Anna's mother truly cared for her.

Sam had made it a point to befriend the nurses-one in particular, named Lydia. He told her briefly that he was Anna's security man, that he and Anna were great friends, and that he had even grown to love her. He did not explain about the engagement or that Anna had returned his affec tion. Given Anna's high-profile life, he explained that he was very vulnerable to the press and that it would be a great kindness if she told no one. Normally, he would have expected the nurse to talk, but this woman was serious, not given to careless gossip when it came to her duties, and he knew she would keep silent. She would be an ally. Even if the woman let it slip, he had to conduct himself as though Anna would live and, therefore in her own time, Anna would announce their love to the world. His anonymity would be gone forever. It would be a great and wonderful new beginning, but if possible, it was something he and Anna should do together.

Exhaustion had set in for Sam, probably from resisting the depression. Sam needed to sit and experience his misery so that he could eventually escape it. But there was no time. It wasn't as if someone else could take over and carry on the work of stopping Gaudet. Anna lay in a coma and it seemed that if he could sit at her bedside, he might help her to get better. It was a torturous conflict whether to devote himself completely to the one, or try to save the many.

He took a moment to call his mother. Sometimes she was more Talth spiritual leader than pyschologist, sometimes more psychologist than Talth, but she was always Mother.

First he explained that Anna was pregnant, then what had happened, and that he was all right save for his weary sor row. Of course he blamed himself. He should have had Anna surrounded with security so that a bullet could not have gotten to her. It was stupid to even be with her while he was fighting Gaudet and protecting Bowden. He should have made her see that. He told his mother all of this.

"I will go to Universe Rock and make prayers."

"I am trying to stop the man I told you about. I believe he has a very dangerous technology that could be used against many people. I don't know what he is doing with it."

"This is the man that you have been hunting?"

"Yes, this is the one."

"And you are sure he will hurt many. Kill many people?"

"I believe that, yes. I am convinced, although I don't have the proof yet."

"Even Anna might suffer if he is not stopped?"

"Yes. Definitely."

"But you have fallen in love and she needs you," Spring reminded him.

"Yes."

"Who else is with her?"

"Her mother. She doesn't much like me, but she is a good woman."

"She doesn't know you. You are uncertain about marriage?" she sincerely asked.

"I… I… don't think…" That one stumped Sam. "I guess I'm not sure if I'm uncertain." He could sense his mother's smile at that one.

"Anna has no Indian in her and I think it worries you that she will not accept you because you are Indian. Perhaps you question whether you will be good for her. You worry that you are not right for her world."

"It's partly what I do for a living. Worry. I compare myself to Grandfather."

"Grandfather's life force was very focused and it was focused on teaching young men and on understanding. Your life force is very focused as well."

"Yes. It's focused on catching assholes being assholes. Perhaps that is why I can never be like him."

"You can't conclude that you will never be like Grandfather. Each man has only so much he can give and he has to decide where he will give it," Spring advised.

"My mother drops the whole load."

"Normally, I would never drop the whole load as you put it, but you are on a cliff's face trying to decide which way to climb. You can't stop to cook a meal or build a house. This man you hunt kills your friends and your family and you are wondering… where has God gone… where is justice… and somehow you wonder if it is all because you haven't done it just right."

"If I felt bad before, it's even worse now. But I don't think I'm a head case."

"Your father killed himself and hid your heritage from you. And yet you are a very good man, a caring man, a strong man." Spring was consoling her child.

"But a strange man."

"You should know what you are up against. It is not just this evil fellow. It is what is inside you. I understand why you have called me. You need someone you respect to give you permission to leave Anna and to devote yourself to hunt ing this nemesis. You tell yourself that you are the only one that can do it. And it might be true. But maybe, you ask yourself, you are leaving her side because you are not strong enough to do the right thing. Many days from now, when Anna is better, and swollen with your child, when you look in her eyes and put your hand on her stomach… will you know that you did the right thing and will she know it too?" Spring counseled.

"That is what I don't know." Sam lost it for a few minutes and then put himself back together.

Jean-Baptiste marveled at Benoit's self-assurance. Although he was on top, her legs were tightly gripping his thighs and her pelvis was perfectly fitted to his and she controlled the friction of their movements and the rhythm of their sex so that her excitation steadily mounted. Sweat from her belly felt good under his, and the strain and tension in her body had a sensuous quality that magnified his lust and it was all he could do not to climax as he observed her passion building. The woman was to sex as the Rolls-Royce was to automobiles. Then her breaths became very deep and her voice high pitched as she began to moan and mutter her incanta tion: "In… in… in… in."

Her back arched and she nearly screamed and it made him feel very much the bull man as he worked his way up to his own orgasm.

They were back in the Hotel International, back in the same room with the same pastries. For a moment he wondered if it was bugged and then dismissed the idea.

When she rolled off, he lay beside her, admiring her body and wondering at his good fortune while he tried to stifle the guilt. His life was becoming ever more confusing. He was a good public servant in the service of a government that was as soft as it was inept. He was a man of talent who had been passed over and now he was making sure that he was not entirely without good fortune. Like rules about monogamy and sex, which he was stretching some, he was also wreaking havoc with the rules of his profession. But it seemed necessary and not unlike the things done by other men who had escaped doormat status-a life spent under the boots of the arrogant and wealthy.

She went to shower, and even when he was spent she fascinated him. He sat on the toilet seat and watched her, still thrilling at the sight of her lithe body. He never had enough of looking. It was possible to watch by pulling back the edge of the shower curtain and he enjoyed the water pouring over her skin and the droplets beading over her.

"So, tell me about Gaudet. What will he do after Cordyceps?"

"Plastic surgery. I'm sure he already has the new identity and no one really knows the old one. I know what he looks like, but that is about it."

"What will it be like when I meet him?"

"You won't really. You won't see him and you won't be close enough to touch him and he will disguise his voice. He will give you nothing of himself."

"I can see why you worked for the company-why you practically ran it."

"You know Thomas Edison, the American inventor? He said that people miss opportunity because it comes dressed in overalls and looks like work. That is the biggest compo nent of success-work. But there is another component. When the Wright Brothers invented the airplane, the world was ready for a flying machine. When Edison invented the electric light, the world was ready to escape the soot. I am telling you the world is ready to master the body. I can see that you are a man with the vision to be part of that."

"You know how to inflate a man's ego."

"I can feel ambition in a man. I feel ambition in you. And you know that France will pay for Chaperone. Likewise, you know there are people who will make a killing when the market falls. You can take a big bite out of both apples. But now you need to ask the admiral to let me go to the United States."

"You think I can just snap my fingers?"

"Ask him or we are through. I will go back to the dun geon."

"Relax. I will ask him. He will say no, but I will ask just the same. Benoit? What made you dream up this whole idea?"

"Prison has a way of focusing your thoughts. Liberation is a powerful incentive."

Baptiste nodded.

"I will have to tell the admiral about Cordyceps and, of course, France will have to appear to try to stop it."

Baptiste opened his mouth to protest.

"Don't worry. The admiral can try all he wants, but he won't be playing with a full deck. I'll see to that."

She stepped out of the shower and onto the tile floor. Moving the towel over her body was like a peep show. When she glanced down and saw his erection, she reached for it and pushed him back a bit; then she settled on him and she hunkered down very tight and began to move. In minutes the tightness of her and the softness of her aroused him near to orgasm. Her back became taut and he could feel the muscles like steel bands above her buttocks as she orchestrated the level of friction with her pubic bone. God, it was as if her body were a suction cup pulled tight to his. Her breathing became strong and he tasted the new sweat between her breasts. When her nipples were hard, and the size of thimbles, he took the right one in his mouth and used his tongue so that she shuddered and moved even harder down on him. The slickness of her made a giant quivering in his thighs and he could feel her perfect rhythm, now like a galloping horse hard onto the finish line, and then she moaned deep and long and he let himself come and he felt strong. So strong.

Baptiste ordered security not to let Benoit contact any one. He would do all the talking to the admiral that needed to be done. It was a dangerous career move, but the relief it provided him made it seem worth the risk. Preventing Ad miral Larive from initiating a meeting with her would be more difficult. As he was thinking through how he would ap proach the admiral, his phone rang. It was Figgy.

"Somebody just tried to kill Sam and got his girlfriend instead."

"Why in the hell are we talking on an open line?"

"Because I don't give a shit, and besides, nobody is listening and it wouldn't matter to me if they were."

"There is actually a Sam?"

"I said cut the shit," Figgy barked.

"Who did it? Gaudet?"

"I was worried it might be you or your boss."

"No way. Get it straight. We want Sam to lead us to Chaperone. If someone is trying to kill him, it's no doubt Gaudet and we don't have a clue to his whereabouts."

"You're sure."

"I'm certain. Keep your eye on the ball. There is a lot of money to be made."

Baptiste hung up. Now was the time to meet Gaudet. He would need an alibi-a way of legitimizing the meeting if someone found out. He went to the admiral.

David Dun

Unacceptable Risk

The man was smoking one of his cigars and that normally meant he was in a good mood. It was rare of the admiral to have a cigar in his office. The room was large, with a desk at one end and a more informal conference area at the other, and the office permitted a great deal of pacing on the admiral's part.

"I have a tip that Gaudet wants to talk," he began.

The chief puffed extra hard on his cigar and Baptiste could see a brightness in the eyes.

"How do you talk with Gaudet in the future?" the admiral questioned.

"I dial a cell phone number."

"Do you have it all down in the file?"

"Oh yes."

"What kind of a deal could the French government make with a man like Gaudet?"

"Offer to buy Chaperone," Baptiste answered.

"Yes, except I thought he doesn't have it."

"But he's a dog in the hunt with a lot of inside information."

"We haven't found Raval?"

"Not yet."

"And Sam?"

"Figgy says not yet."

"Sam brought down Grace Technologies so I know his or ganization is effective. What are they doing, then? That's what I'm getting at."

"Trying to catch Gaudet."

"We all claim to be trying to stop Gaudet. Where is Sam now?" the admiral inquired.

"New York. Michael Bowden is there too, Figgy says."

"We all need Bowden, that's sure. It alone is enough reason to go there. Now, how do you get Bowden on our side? Never mind. I don't need to know. You just need to do it. And get Chaperone. I have been told that France must win this race in the strongest possible terms. Do you understand me?"

"Yes, sir," Baptiste said. "There is one more thing."

"Yes?"

"I don't want you to think I'm crazy, but I believe we should consider temporarily releasing Benoit Moreau to assist us."

"You're right, I think you're crazy. Why?"

Baptiste explained Benoit's plan for getting the technology for France in exchange for a pardon-Bowden's knowl edge of the source of the molecule, Gaudet's knowledge of the vector technology, and Raval's knowledge of the Chaperone immune system process.

"You actually think she could do all that?"

"It doesn't hurt us to let her try. The only risk is that she will escape."

"It'll be your risk, then. If you believe in her, I'll go with a temporary release on your say-so. Submit a memo arguing strongly for her temporary release in the best interest of the Republic and I will take it to the minister."

Benoit Moreau walked out of the government lab that day. Pulling a good travel bag on wheels behind her, she caught a cab for Charles de Gaulle International Airport.

Grady and Michael left the car off campus on the street after having looked for fifteen minutes for a place to park. It had taken them a couple days to recoup from Anna's tragedy and for Grady to become functional. They had remained in New York until the third evening getting ready and making one last somber visit to Anna's bedside.

Dressed like students, they carried backpacks loaded with volumes of an old encyclopedia they'd borrowed from the bed-and-breakfast. Traversing the Eddy Dam footbridge, they wound up past a tennis building to Hoy Road, until they finally found their way to Tower Road and Corson Hall, a bi ological sciences building at Cornell University. Michael wore a stocking cap and Grady an old fur-lined leather cap from the Salvation Army. Unless one knew exactly what he was looking for, it would be tough to spot them. Because the Kevlar under their parkas made their bodies appear some what full, a trained eye would note the possibility of body armor. Now that she was on her own, Grady wasn't as anx ious to argue about the Kevlar. They had traveled in the night then took a hotel room and napped, without incident and without any hormone jokes. Both of them were serious and aware of the risks.

Yodo and the bodyguards were staying completely out of sight, back at the bed-and-breakfast, leaving the impression that the entire group, including their charges, had planned a couple of days indoors.

It was cold and looking like snow. Walking across cam pus, thinking about her aunt, wishing she could be at her side, Grady began to think about her own life, and to fanta size about actually living in a place filled with biology, math, poetry, weighty with thoughts but light on earthly responsibility. For a moment she wondered: was such an idyllic life really that appealing? If she wanted it, she could have it, her aunt would give it to her in a second, and so would Sam, for that matter. It was she who had maneuvered herself out of her classes and into the Amazon and then to New York, and now she was here with a pistol in her purse and no bodyguards.

Looking around with studied casualness, she tried to spot someone that didn't look like a student-maybe a forty- year-old with some flesh on his bones and a mug portraying the cold solitude of a professional criminal. It was a notion from the movies. Sam had explained that some of the deadliest killers were nondescript, never standouts. If Gaudet had any professional killers trailing them, they wouldn't be easy to spot.

Corson Hall was a mostly brick three-story building of nondescript modern architecture. Dr. Lyman's offices were on the second floor. They went in a small side door, feeling safer than if they had charged through one of the main entrances, where she imagined that Gaudet might have someone posted. The faculty offices were typical, modest, with personalized memorabilia according to the tastes of the oc cupant. As they looked from the doorway, they saw two men in bulked-up suits in chairs in the hallway. One read a paper, the other a book, but they both looked up the moment the quiet electronic chime went off-obviously triggered by opening the door. Grady suddenly knew why it had been so effortless to talk Sam into this mission. She felt both mildly pissed and quietly reassured. Sam wasn't really prepared to let her die yet. As they approached the office of Dr. Lyman, they noticed an open door to an office across the way. In it was a third man, no doubt with a Howitzer in his coat.

At the appointed hour of 11:00 a.m. Michael and Grady approached Dr. Lyman's partially opened door and pushed it a little farther to find a rugged-looking, trim man, fiftyish or so, and quite handsome. He sported a mustache that was well trimmed and Grady noticed a wall filled with pictures of this man with various graduate students and natives in a jungle setting. A field biologist, apparently.

"Pretty heady stuff sitting around with my own private army. They go everywhere with me except inside the classroom and the bathroom. My wife gave them milk and cookies last night. Different group, though, on nights. Michael, how are you?"

Michael shook Lyman's hand. "I'm fine. And this is Grady Wade." Lyman shook her hand as well. "You never mentioned your company here."

"Nope. I just do as I'm told. Very well-placed people from the FBI told me I should allow these guys into my life. They're good guys. It's great to see you, but I'll bet you want to see those journals."

"That'd be great. I really appreciate your taking care of them." But Grady could see that Michael was unhappy. Sam's presence loomed large here, even having insinuated itself with an old friend and colleague. She put her hand in the middle of Michael's back.

Dr. Lyman smiled. "Not a problem. The journals are in another building entirely, so we'll have to travel a ways to the other side of campus." He started putting on a heavy wool long coat and, to no one's surprise, the shadows did the same when the fellow from across the hall brought the coats.