Firechild (2 page)

“Just give us time.” Belcraft turned graver. “I think we’ll get you.”

Sorel had chuckled, and Clegg responded with a scowl.

“Remember King Knut?” With an air of lazy innocence, Sorel murmured his query. “The story that he tried to sweep back the tide with a broom? Not quite biblical, but still a lesson you might look at. Whatever devil has got into your soul, I doubt that you can command the ocean. The secrets we look for are contained in every living cell. Genetic research will surely go on, and not just here. What we learn—all of us, everywhere —will be a tide of knowledge old Knut never imagined. God or not, new science will sweep your kind away.”

“Blasphemer!” Clegg’s birthmark showed through his makeup as his face reddened with anger. “We don’t debate Satan’s vile disciples. And we aren’t naive.”

He stopped to frown at each of them in turn, as if to memorize their faces.

“We know genetics enough to foresee the Armageddon your folly is inviting. If you persist in this mad infamy, we can mobilize force enough to stop you. We can pass laws against you. We can rally the media to warn the nation. If you force us into action, we have measures to take that even you will have to understand.”

“Mr. Clegg—” Trembling, Lorain was back on his feet. “Is that a threat?”

“Ignore our warning, exhaust our forgiving grace, and you’ll find out.” Clegg swept up his briefcase and swung to the security officer waiting at the door. “I’m ready to go.”

He returned to his hotel. During the day a number of men in business suits came to his room, most of them grimly grave as he was. When he went out for dinner, a private car stopped at the curb to pick him up. After midnight a different car brought him back. He flew out of Enfield early next morning, his destination Denver.

At the EnGene Labs, genetic research continued.

2

“The

American

Weapon”

T
he long midwinter night had fallen over Moscow. Kutuzovsky Prospekt lay armored in black ice and nearly bare of traffic. The Hotel Ukrania brooded above it, wedding-cake towers dissolving into low-scudding clouds, Stalin’s red star only a rosy nimbus around its high pinnacle.

Sleet rattled on the windows on the fourteenth floor, but the suite inside was stuffily hot. The man in the canopied bed was sensitive to chills. He was overweight and ill. Wrapped in a blanket and propped against a mound of pillows, he lay listening to the woman, pale old eyes watching her fondly.

She sat very straight in a hard chair by the side of his bed, reading aloud from a volume of Shakespeare. Beneath a sheer white nylon robe, her fine skin shone from the heat. She was slender enough, with long platinum hair and a shape that had excited many men.

” ‘Methought I heard a voice cry, ‘Sleep no more!’ ” She had been an actress. She read with lively animation, and her accent had always charmed him. ” ‘Macbeth does murder—’ “

“Pardon, mademoiselle.”
The nurse spoke behind her. “Monsieur Shuvalov has arrived.”

The man in bed wheezed for his breath, blinking indignantly. “Who’s Shuvalov?”

“An official. From the Kremlin.” The woman laid her book on the coffee table, bent to kiss his lax old lips, and reached for a heavier robe. “Sorry, darling. He’s a man I must see. World-Mart business. I won’t be long.”

The nurse had seated the caller in a gilt-columned reception room beside a table where a samovar was steaming. He was a stocky and heavy-bellied man, his blue-jowled face sleekly shaven and odorous with cologne.

“My dear Miss Ostrov!” He came to meet her, scanning her with small shrewd eyes that took no part in his smile. “Fetching! More fetching than ever.” He liked to practice the English he had brought home from embassies and trade missions abroad, but he still had a thick accent. “Apologies, if I’m intruding.”

Her own long eyes a little narrowed, she offered tea.

“Urgent business for you.” He shook his head. “The news you brought requires a quick response. You will return to America at once. The Center has new orders for your special cell.”

“At once?” Her voice sharpened. “We can’t. Mr. Roman has trade negotiations all this week, and he wants to see Dr. Rykov. His emphysema—”

He waved a heavy hand to stop her.

“The trade discussions will be postponed. Dr. Rykov can call tonight. The Roman party is booked for New York on Aeroflot, leaving at noon tomorrow.”

“Listen, Boris!” She was on her feet, her face grown white. “I’m not your slave—”

“Anya, you forget that we made you.” He paused deliberately to pour his tea. “You were a failed actress. Your family was in disgrace. We took pity on you, saved you from Siberia, or worse, to make you what you are.” Gold teeth glinting, he gestured toward the bedroom. “Mistress of a great American industrialist, permitted to wallow in decadent luxury.” He paused to sugar and sip the tea. “Do not forget—you still belong to us.”

“I don’t forget.” Trembling, she sat down. “But Mr. Roman will be unhappy.”

“He must be persuaded.”

“We can’t go till he feels better. His emphysema makes travel very difficult—”

“Anya, dear, that’s enough.” He shook his head as if she had been a stubborn child. “Perhaps you failed to understand the disturbing implications of what you report.”

“Computer printouts. Most of them from something called the engine laboratories.” She shrugged. “I can recruit and organize, but I am neither a chemist nor a computer programmer.”

“You have been competent.” He squinted at her keenly. “But you must understand that this affair is going to require a most extraordinary effort. Frankly, comrade, we discussed replacing you with a more señor officer. I advised against that because you know your agents and they are already in place. However, you must learn more, know more than you seem to be aware of about the crisis—a very grave crisis—implicit in what you report.”

She waited while his passionless eyes weighed her again.

“EnGene!” He spoke the name like a curse. “It has nothing to do with engines. It is a laboratory the Americans have set up for secret military research. This new information from your apparatus indicates that they are very near success.”

“Success with what?”

“The
Glavni Vragl!
He burst into explosive Russian. “The
Amerikanski!
They are about to grasp a deadlier secret than anything atomic. One of our own genetic engineers has called it the final weapon.”

She sat staring, her eyes grown violet.

“You will be more fully briefed by our own master biologists before you leave.” He returned to sober-toned English. “But here, in outline, is your task. Your special cell must act at once to secure complete technical information on the research at EnGene Labs. When that has been accomplished, the laboratory must be sabotaged. The top researchers must be identified. So far as possible, they must be eliminated.”

“Comrade!” She shivered. “That’s too much!”

“As I said, it will require extraordinary efforts, but you must understand that Mother Russia is facing a new and deadly danger. The Americans must be checkmated. Now, comrade! At any cost! Before they possess this weapon. That is your assignment. The nation depends on you. And I must warn you, comrade.” His tone turned bleak. “You must act with the utmost secrecy, without delay!”

“There—there’ll have to be delay.” She had half risen, but now she sank back into her chair. “We are not prepared—not for this. I do have informers in EnGene, but nobody—no experts in genetics. No fit staff to sabotage the plant and dispose of the researchers. Even in America, foolish as their leaders are, some things are impossible.”

“Make them possible! You’ll find means.” He lifted his teacup as if to drink to her success. His gaze grew thoughtful. “I regret Mr. Roman’s illness, because he has been so generous to you. Certainly, the association with him has given you an excellent cover, and I believe the trade ministry has found him a valuable partner. Even now—” The gold teeth lent a glint of malice to his grin. “Sick as you say he is, I think he will serve us one more time.”

Jules Roman died in his bed that night. The cause, as reported by Dr. Vladimir Rykov, was a pulmonary embolism. His trusted private secretary, Anya Ostrov, carried his ashes back to his widow in Palm Beach, that island haven where so many senescent capitalists retired to die in luxury.

Exit permission denied, the nurse stayed behind.

3

The Limits of

Life

S
ummer had come early and hot. On that breathless Monday night in Fort Madison, Dr. Saxon Belcraft stayed at the hospital with a recovering cardiac patient longer than he was really needed. He stayed for a second Bud with his sirloin at Stan’s Steak Place, and finally killed an hour at the office, frowning over his bank statement and the file of past-due bills. Since Midge left, he hated going home.

Tara Two—that was her fond name for the old house on the river bluffs. Timbers decaying and foundations settling, it had cost too much, certainly more than a beginning physician should have mortgaged himself to pay, but the white-columned entrance was still impressive, and it overlooked a magnificent sweep of the Mississippi. Midge had loved it. Without her now, it had become an empty hell.

The phone was ringing when he let himself in, too loud against the silence. He rushed to answer, spurred by the crazy hope that she might be coming back.

“Hiya, Wulf.” His brother’s voice, so unexpected that he didn’t recognize it until he recalled how Vic used to cull him Beowulf. “Happy birthday!”

The greeting surprised him again, because the years had let them drift so far apart. Even when he married Midge, there had been only that short note on the En-Gene letterhead.
Sorry, Sax, but I can’t be there. We’ve just broken into something new here at the labs. Something too big to be neglected.

“Thanks, Vic.” He paused, remembering. “It’s been a long time. What’s new at EnGene?”

“Nothing I can say much about.” Vic seemed gently hesitant, no longer the brash kid brother. “How’s the young riverboat doctor? And the beautiful bride?”

For a moment he couldn’t speak. The empty house got to him again. Midge had walked out just last week. Still crying for herself, blaming herself for wanting too much. There would never be anybody else. It was just that the hospital and the office and the night calls took too much of him. The grand old house was too lonely for her now, no longer enough.

“So-so.” He didn’t try explaining anything to Vic. “I’m on the .hospital staff. Financial sunlight maybe in sight.” And he asked, “Is anything wrong?”

“There has been, Wulf.” A rueful voice, older and graver, than he recalled. “But I’m on top of it now.”

He waited, wondering about EnGene.

“Listen, Wulf.” A sober-toned appeal. “I don’t think I’ve ever thanked you. Till now, I guess I never really wanted to, because I don’t think you ever forgave me for being brighter than you were. When you used to look after me, I always thought it was just because you had to, because I was your baby brother.”

“Maybe.” He had to agree. “Maybe so.”

“Not that I ever blamed you. I guess I didn’t care, not that much. I must have been pretty obnoxious, and I’ve been thinking lately that I do owe you something for wiping my nose and beating up the bullies that beat me up. Remember, Wulf? You taught me how to tie my shoes, and you signed for library books everybody said I was too young for. You even played chess, so long as I let you win now and then. I guess I loved you, Wulf, even if I never wanted to admit it.

“I had to tell you that.”

“You didn’t need to.” He felt a throb in his throat. “Though now and then you were hard to take.”

“Anyhow, Wulf, I’ve just mailed you a letter. Marked personal. Make sure you open it yourself. When you’re alone. It will tell you why I called. And, well—” An odd little pause. “Thanks again for a lot of things. And so long, Sax.”

The phone clicked.

He slept fitfully that night, thinking and dreaming of the scrawny, myopic, loud-mouthed kid Vic had been. Seven years younger. A lot brighter in fact than he was, but too much given to letting it show. Getting into playground battles with kids who resented his brains and his arrogance. Kids big enough to maul him.

Was Vic in need of help again?

Before the night was gone, he knew he had to find out. Up at five in the creaky house, he made instant coffee in the microwave, gulped it with a slab of cold pizza, and dialed information for an Enfield number for Victor Belcraft.

The phone rang a dozen times before a young woman answered, pounding sleepy and annoyed. She hadn’t seen Vic since yesterday morning. She didn’t know where he was, and she didn’t like being blasted out of bed in the middle of the night.

Her voice warmed when he gave his name.

“Wulf? The doctor-brother? He spoke about you just the other day. Seemed fond of you. Sorry if I sounded nasty.”

She was Jeri—the way she said it told him how she spelled it. A commercial artist, she’d met Vic when she was doing PR for EnGene “back when EnGene wanted PR.” They had lived together the last two years. Planning to marry if his job ever left him time for a honeymoon.

He asked her, “Is Vic okay?”

“I don’t—don’t really know.” Her voice had slowed. “He never talks much about the lab, but I know something has disturbed him terribly. Some project he calls Alphamega. Keeps him there night and day. Something he won’t talk about. When I kept asking, he tried to get me out of town. Wanted to ship me off to a graphics exhibit in Memphis, and then to see my folks in Indiana. Of course I wouldn’t go. All I can do is sit here and fret.

“Do you—do you know anything?”

“Nothing. Except that Vic called me last night. What he said troubles me. It sounded too much like a final farewell. Could he be sick?”

“Obsessed. With this Alphamega project. That’s sickness enough.”

“Something dangerous?”

“I wish I knew. It’s terribly important to him. He’s high when it’s going well, in the dumps when it isn’t. Yesterday morning he—” She paused uncertainly. “He frightened me. He’d set the alarm to rush off early the way he always does, but then he came back into the bedroom and took me in his arms. That terrified me, because he never liked to show that sort of emotion. I asked him if anything was wrong.