Darwin's Children Part 24

"I beg your pardon?" Kaye asked.

"There are better places to seek, and better texts to find," the man said.

"Thanks, I'm fine," Kaye said. She looked away and reached for another book, hoping they would leave her alone.

"What are are you seeking?" the woman asked. you seeking?" the woman asked.

"I was just browsing. Nothing specific," Kaye said, avoiding their eyes.

"You won't find answers here," the man said.

The driver was not in sight. Kaye was on her own, and this probably wasn't serious anyway. She tried to appear friendly and unconcerned.

"There's only one valid translation of the Lord's words," the man said. "We find them in the King James Bible. G.o.d watched over King James like a holy flame."

"I've heard that," Kaye said.

"Which church do you attend?"

"No church," she said. She had come to the end of the aisle and the pair had not moved. "Excuse me. I have an appointment." Kaye clutched her purse to her side.

"Have you made peace with G.o.d?" the woman asked.

The man lifted his hand as if in benediction. "We lose our families, the families of G.o.d. In our sin, in h.o.m.os.e.xuality and promiscuity and following the ways of the Arab and the Jew, the pagan G.o.ds of the Web and TV, we stray from the path of G.o.d and G.o.d's punishment is swift." He swept his hand with a scowl at the whispering books on the shelves. "It is useless to seek His truth in the voices of the devil's machines."

Kaye's eyes crinkled. She suddenly felt angry and perversely in control, even predatory, as if she were the hawk and they they were the pigeons. The woman noticed the change. The man did not. "Terence," the woman said and touched the man's elbow. He looked down from the ceiling, meeting Kaye's steady glare and reeling in his spiel with a surprised galumph and a bobble of his Adam's apple. were the pigeons. The woman noticed the change. The man did not. "Terence," the woman said and touched the man's elbow. He looked down from the ceiling, meeting Kaye's steady glare and reeling in his spiel with a surprised galumph and a bobble of his Adam's apple.

"I'm alone," Kaye said. She offered this like bait, hoping they would bite and she would have them. "My husband just got out of prison. My daughter is in a school."

"I'm so sorry. Are you all right?" the woman asked Kaye with an equal mix of suspicion and solicitude.

"What kind kind of daughter?" the man asked. "A daughter of sin and disease?" The woman tugged hard on his sleeve. His Adam's apple bobbled again, and their eyes darted over her clothes as if looking for suspicious bulges. of daughter?" the man asked. "A daughter of sin and disease?" The woman tugged hard on his sleeve. His Adam's apple bobbled again, and their eyes darted over her clothes as if looking for suspicious bulges.

Kaye squared her shoulders and shoved out her hand to get through.

"I know you," the man continued, despite his wife's tugging. "I recognize you now. You're the scientist. You discovered the sick children."

Confined by the aisle, Kaye's throat closed in. She coughed. "I have to go."

The man made one last attempt, brave enough, to get through to her. "Even a scientist in self-centered love with her own mind, suffocating in the fame of television exposure, can learn to know G.o.d."

"You've spoken to Him?" Kaye demanded. "You've talked to G.o.d?" She grabbed his arm and dug into the fabric and the flesh beneath with her fingernails.

"I pray all the time," the man said, drawing back. "G.o.d is my Father in Heaven. He is always listening."

Kaye tightened her grip. "Has G.o.d ever answered you?" she asked.

"His answers are many."

"Do you ever feel G.o.d in your head?"

"Please," the man said, wincing.

"Let him go go," the woman insisted, trying to push her arm between them.

"G.o.d doesn't talk to you? How weird weird." Kaye advanced, pus.h.i.+ng both back. "Why wouldn't G.o.d talk to you you?"

"We fear G.o.d, we pray, and He answers in many ways."

"G.o.d doesn't stick around when things get ugly. What kind of G.o.d is that? He's like a recorded message, some sort of G.o.d service that puts you on hold when you're screaming. Explain it to me. G.o.d says he loves me but dumps me into a world of pain. You, so full of hate, so ignorant, he leaves alone. Self-righteous bigots he doesn't even touch. Explain that to me! Explain that to me!"

She let go of the man's arm.

The couple turned with stricken looks and fled.

Kaye stood with the murmuring books lapsing into silence behind her. Her chest heaved and her cheeks were flushed and moist.

"All right," she said to the empty aisle.

After a decent interval, to avoid meeting the couple outside, she left the store. She ignored the guard's irritated glower.

She stood under the eaves breathing in the heat and the humidity and listening to real thunder, far off over Virginia. The government car came around the corner and stopped at the black-striped yellow curb in front of the store. "Sorry," the driver said. Kaye looked through the limo's window and saw for the first time how young the driver was, and how worried. "Store security ignored my license. No place to park. G.o.dd.a.m.ned guard fingered his holster at me. Jesus Christ, Mrs. Rafelson, I'm sorry. Is everything okay?"

2.

Hart Senate Office Building Plenary Session of the Senate Emergency Action Oversight Committee, Closed Hearing WAs.h.i.+NGTON, D.C.

Mark Augustine waited patiently in the antechambers until called to take his seat. It was duly noted that he was the former director of Emergency Action. The nine senators a.s.sembled for this unusual evening session-five Republicans and four Democrats-exchanged edgy pleasantries for a few minutes. Two of the Democrats observed, for the record, that the current director was late. As well, Senator Gianelli was not present.

The chair, Senator Julia Thomasen of Maryland, expressed her aggravation and wondered who had called the meeting. No one was clear on that.

The meeting began without the director and Gianelli, and lacking any obvious point or focus, soon devolved into a testy debate about the events that had led to Mark Augustine's dismissal three years earlier.

Augustine sat back in his chair, folded his hands in his lap, and let the senators argue. He had come to the Hill to testify fifty-three times in his career. Power did not impress him. Lack of power impressed him. Everyone in this room, as far as he was concerned, was almost completely powerless.

And-if the rumors were true-what they did not know was about to bite them right on the a.s.s.

The minority Democrats held sway for a few minutes, deftly entering their comments into the record. Senator Charles Chase of Arizona began the questioning of Augustine as a matter of senatorial courtesy. His questions soon led to the role of the state of Ohio in the death of SHEVA children.

"Madam Chair," bellowed Senator Percy from Ohio, "I resent the implication that the state of Ohio was in any way responsible for this debacle."

"Senator Percy, Senator Chase has the floor," Senator Thomasen reminded him.

"I resent the entire subject area," Percy bellowed.

"Noted. Please continue, Senator Chase."

"Madam Chair, I am only following the line of questioning begun last week by Senator Gianelli, who is not, I hope, indisposed today, not with a virus, at least."

No laughter in the Senate chamber. Chase continued without missing a beat. "I mean no disrespect to the honorable senator from Ohio."

Senator Percy flipped his hand out over the chamber as if he would have gladly tossed them all through a window. "Personal corruption should not reflect ill on such a fine state."

"Nor am I impugning the reputation of Ohio, which is where I was born, Madam Chair. May I continue my questions?"

"What in h.e.l.l made you move, Charlie?" Percy asked. "We could use your eagle eye." He grinned to the nearly empty room. Only a grandstanding senator-or an aging vaudevillian-could imagine an audience where there was none, Augustine mused. He unfolded his hands to tap his finger lightly on the table.

"Chair asks for a minimum of unchecked camaraderie."

"I'm done, Madam Chair," Percy announced, sitting back and wrapping his hands behind his neck.

Augustine sipped slowly from a gla.s.s of water.

"Perhaps our questions should be more pointed, dealing more with responsibility and less with geography," Thomasen suggested.

"Hear, hear," Percy said.

"When you were in charge of the school system for Emergency Action, did you supply all schools-even state-controlled schools-with the federally mandated allotments for medical supplies?" Chase continued.

"We did, Senator," Augustine said.

"These supplies included the very antivirals that might have saved these unfortunate children?"

"They did."

"In how many states was there sufficient supply of these antivirals to treat sick children?"

"Five; six, if we include the territory of Puerto Rico."

"My state, doctor, was one of those five?"

"It was, Senator," Augustine said.

The senator paused to let that sink in. "The supply of antivirals was sufficient to take care of the children in our custody-our care. Arizona did not lose nearly as many children as most. And that supply was insured because Arizona did not seek to control and divert the federal allotments and allocations for Emergency Action schools, a hijacking sponsored by the Republican majority, if I remember correctly?"

"Yes, Senator." Augustine tapped his finger again on the table. Now was not the time to bring up Arizona's current record. There were rumors that the children of dissidents were being warehoused in schools there. He no longer had access to the lists, of course.

"Is it fair to say that you lost your job because of this fiasco?" Chase asked.

"It was part of the larger picture," Augustine said.

"A large part, I presume."

Augustine gave the merest nod.

"Do you continue to consult for the Emergency Action Authority?"

"I serve as adviser on viral affairs to the director of the National Inst.i.tutes of Health. I still have an office in Bethesda."

Chase searched his papers for more material, then added, "Your star is not completely out of the firmament in this matter?"

"I suppose not, Senator."

"And what is the authority's budget this year?" Chase looked up innocently.

"You of all people should know that, Charlie," Senator Percy grumbled.

"Emergency Action's budget is not subject to yearly congressional review, nor is it available for direct public scrutiny," Augustine said. "I don't have exact figures myself, but I would estimate the present budget at over eighty billion dollars-double what it was when I served as director. That includes research and development in the private and public sector."

Thomasen looked around the room with a frown. "The director is tardy."

"She is not here to defend herself," Percy observed with amus.e.m.e.nt. Thomasen nodded for Chase to continue, and then conferred with an intern.

Chase closed in on his favorite topic. "Emergency Action has become one of the biggest government programs in this nation, successfully fighting off all attempts to limit its scope and investigate its const.i.tutionality in a time of drastic fiscal cutbacks, has it not?"

"All true," Augustine said.

"And with this budget, approved by both Republican and Democratic administrations year after year, EMAC has spent tens of millions of dollars on lawyers to defend its questionable legality, has it not?"

"The very best, Senator."

"And does it pay any attention to the wishes of Congress, or of this oversight committee? Even to the extent that the director arrives on time when summoned?"

Senator Percy from Ohio exhaled over his microphone, creating the sensation of a great wind in the chamber. "Where are we going, Madam Chair? Haven't we enough black eyes to go around?"

"We lost seventy-five thousand children, Senator Percy!" Chase roared.

Percy riposted immediately. "They were killed by a disease disease, Senator Chase, not by my const.i.tuents, nor indeed by any of the normal citizens-the true citizens-of my great state, or this fine country." Percy avoided the hawklike gaze of the senator from Arizona.

"Dr. Augustine, is it not the scientific conclusion that this new variety of virus-hand, foot, and mouth disease-arose within the so-called normal adult population, in part through recombination of ancient viral genes not found within SHEVA children?" Chase asked.

"It is," Augustine said.

"Many prominent scientists disagree," Percy said, and lifted his hand as if to fend off the sudden rap of the gavel.

"And did you predict that just the reverse would happen, fourteen years ago, a statement that practically led to the creation of Emergency Action?"

"The reverse being . . ." Augustine said, lifting his brows.

"That the children would create new viruses that would kill us us, Doctor."

Augustine nodded. "I did."