Grave Apparel (38 page)

“GOG,”
Wendy
said. “Garrison of Gaia.
We’re
the
new
pro
environmental
lobbying group in
Washington.
I’m sure
you’ve

heard of us. Earth:
Love
It or
Leave
It.”
Hence the logo on her
canvas
bag. “I’m a
lawyer
and
coordinator,
and
Alex
is our lob byist and chief
counsel.”

“Yes,
I’ve
heard of
it.”
Garrison of Gaia
was
relatively
new
on the
Washington
scene and trying to
flex
its muscles.
Like
Greenpeace on steroids,
Lacey
recalled, or
PETA,
only not so subtle. She
couldn’t
remember much more about it.

“Cassandra
used
to
volunteer
there,”
Wendy
offered,
“and
we
all
lived
for
a
summer
in
the
Gaia
Project,
in
the
hills
of
West
Virginia,
a
zeroenergysucking
selfsufficient
ecocommunity
designed
to
prove
a
sustainable
human
society
can
be
carbon
neutral.”

“Cassie’s
writing
a
book
about
it,”
Markham
said.
“We
would
have
stayed on, it
was
idyllic,
but
we
have
a mission here in D.C. Our lobbying
mission.”

“And
someone is trying to stop the
mission,”
Wendy
said.
“Look
at
what
happened
to
Cassie.
It’s
clearly
a
political
vendetta.
It could happen to
any
of
us.”

Lacey
turned to Henderson
Wilcox.
“And
you,
how
do you
know
Cassandra?”

“Oh, I missed the
halcyon
days in the mud at the Gaia Proj
ect.”
His tone
was
dry,
speaking not to her
but
to Markham and
Townsend.
“The
summer
of
love
and
muck.
I’m
just
the
legal
mind who
kept
it all going behind the scenes. Someone had
to.”

Three
angry
ecolawyers,
Lacey
thought.
How
fun.
Can
I
leave
now?

“He
worked
in D.C. at the GOG
offices.”
Wendy
loved
to speak for others.

“Until the bastards from K Street came calling with brief cases full of
cash,”
Markham continued.
“You
know
the kind? The lying
lawyerlobbyists?
The kind who
would
sell his repu tation, and his soul, for a
window
office
on K Street?
Well,
meet the
newest
sellout.”

Lacey
wasn’t
one to sell a
window
office
short. Her
own
desk
was
near a
window.
But
windows
were
obviously
a stick ing point for these people. Sounded
like
simple jealousy to
her.
“You
have
something
against
windows?”

“Only when it means you stop supporting
environmental
is sues! Only when you switch sides to defend the Earth rapers for a
fat
paycheck and a
few
lousy
perks,”
Markham said.
“How
many
pipelines are going to rot out in Alaska on your
watch,

Henderson?
How
many
millions of barrels of crude oil soaking into Gaia, Mother Earth, will you be apologizing for?” He
was
face
to
face
with Henderson
Wilcox,
his
voice
loud enough to raise the comatose.

“Knock it
off,
Alex.”
Wilcox
turned back to
Lacey
and nar
rowed
his
eyes.
“What my
friend
here is trying so clumsily to
say
is that
I
used to
be Garrison of
Gaia’s
chief
legal
counsel.
I recently
moved
to a
law
firm
that will actually
allow
me to eat
food
and
pay
my
mortgage,
for
a
change.
I’m
still
on
the
same
side.
You
tell me, Smithsonian, am I raping Mother Earth if I
want
to
live
under a roof, not freeze, and not
starve
to death?”
Lacey
wasn’t
up for trick questions. This
lively
conversation
was
interrupted when the
elevator
doors opened and
Eye
Street
reporter
Peter
Johnson
emerged,
trench
coat
flapping.
He
gazed
around the hall to get his bearings and spotted
Lacey.
“You!

What the hell are you doing here, Smithsonian?”

It
was
the Cassandra
trio’s
turn to
observe
the moment. The
mophaired
nurse
strode
by
again
with
a
tray
of
meds
in
her
hands, death rays in her
eyes.

Johnson
looked
scruffier
than usual. His collar
was
rumpled around a loose and
crooked
tie. His trench coat
was
shabby and
threadbare
and
seemed
to
have
acquired
permanent
brown
stains.
Lacey
wondered
if he were really that careless, or if his
fellow
commuters simply felt compelled to pour their morning
java
all
over
him. It
was
an amusing thought.

“Hello,
Johnson,”
Lacey
said. “Imagine meeting you here.

We
could
have
a
staff
meeting.”

“You’re
from
The
Eye
too?”
Wendy
Townsend
and
the
amazing toxic
gardenia smog
closed in
on the
new
arrival.

“Peter
Johnson,”
he said in clipped tones without looking at
her.
“Capitol Hill
reporter,
Eye
Street
Observer
.”

Lacey
wasn’t
sure,
but
she sensed a throb of female attrac tion
toward
Johnson from
Wendy.
Of course, this
woman
also seemed interested in both
Alex
and Henderson.
What was with
these
people?
Lacey
thought.
What
kind
of
jungle
pheromone
does
Garrison
of
Gaia
put
in
their
coffee?
But still, this
was
Washington,
D.C., she reflected, and the standards of attraction were
different
here.

“Well,
Smithsonian?” Johnson jarred her back to the mo ment and stood there
expecting
an
answer.
“You’re
not here out of
friendship.”

“A
command from the queen herself,
delivered
to me via Mac
Jones.”

“I
don’t
believe
it!
You?!”
Cassandra’s
friends stood by ab sorbing the scene, blocking the hall. “Cassandra
asked
to see you?”

“Ask
her
yourself,”
Lacey
muttered,
watching
for the nurse to
reappear.
“I’m sure
you’ll
have
this wrapped up in no
time.”

“Wrap what up?”
Wendy
asked.

“Nothing.”
Lacey
and Johnson both said it at the same time.
“All
I
want
to do is see
Cassandra,”
Johnson said.

“Take
a
number
and
get
in
line!”
Markham
squared
his
shoulders.
“We
were here
first!”
The decibels were rising.

“You
can
take
my
place.”
Lacey
hit
the
elevator
button.
“Time
flies when
you’re
having
fun.”
The nurse with the
evil
eye
was
storming
down
the hall
toward
them on silent clogs, her stethoscope swinging.

“Wait
a
minute.”
Peter put his hand on
Lacey’s
shoulder.
She brushed it
off.
“Hey,
I’m talking to you,
Smithsonian.”

“And
I’m talking to you!” Nurse
Grumpy poked
Johnson in the
shoulder.
“There are patients here, sick patients, patients who need their rest. All of you, out of here.
Now!
You
will not
enjoy
being under my
intensive
care. Out!” She herded them all onto the
elevator
together and
waited
until the doors shut.

The
five
of them rode
down
in an uncomfortable silence.

And
a
cloud
of gardenia perfume.

Freedom
was
a heady feeling,
Lacey
reflected on her
walk
back to the
office.
The air on the street
was
considerably less
stuffy
without
the
gardenia
cloud
and
the
bombast.
She’d
left
the
Wentworth
Four
in
the
dust
while
Johnson
was
attempting
some
manly
strutting
before
Alex
Markham
and
Henderson
Wilcox,
each
apparently
in
fear
that
the
alluring
Cassandra
Wentworth
had
every
ecolawyer
in
Washington
pining for
her.
Wendy
Townsend
had stood at the edge of this little tableau, perhaps
waiting
to claim the
victor.
As
Lacey
had breezed out through the
George
Washington
University
Hospital
door,
she heard the
woman
plead for them all to stop squabbling and get
coffee
at
Starbucks.
But
Lacey didn’t
stick around to
find
out.