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windburn totally gone. She had swept Follett with one quick glance, and now was looking at Lasater
steadily.
I think the lady wants to talk to me in private, he said to Follett.
Raining too hard, Follett said, not shifting his gaze from Lyle Taney.
What can I do? Lasater asked helplessly. He's bigger than both of us. You want a cup of coffee?
Let's get that jacket off, dry out a little. He made no motion, but continued to study her, the changes in
her. Always before she had kept herself way back where she thought she was safe, but now she was
right out front, not hiding at all. Her eyes blazed at him, straight on. Then he thought, she was sleeping
with the kid! He was fascinated and disgusted by the idea.
Why are you still here? she asked. What else do you want? You drove Saul Werther to his death.
What more can you do?
He isn't dead, Lyle. Let's not pretend. Werther, the kid, you, me, we're all in this together. We've come
too far to try to kid each other.
I'm warning you, she said, if you don't get out of here and leave Carmen alone, and leave me alone,
I'm going to call the sheriff's office and the nearest FBI office and anyone else I can think of and make a
loud noise about an ex-agent and an ex-football player who keep threatening and harassing me.
Baby, I'm on their side. National security takes precedence over local affairs every time.
You're a liar, Mr. Lasater. I intend to make those calls if you don't get out of here and leave us alone.
Lasater laughed and reached past her to lean against the door. Honey, what makes you think you'll be
going anywhere to do any complaining?
She did not move. I asked everyone in the park which camper you and the football player were in, she
said evenly. Two tents, a motor home, two campers, and a trailer. Some of the boys thought it was neat
to be camping out next to Milton Follett. They might even ask for an autograph.
Follett made a sound deep in his chest, a grunt, or a groan.
Lyle continued to watch Lasater. Just so there wouldn't be any excuse to delay, she said, I brought
you this. She took her hand from her pocket and tossed the bug onto the bunk bed.
She's lying, Lasater said to Follett then. She doesn't want cops asking that kid questions any more
than we do.
Let her go, Follett said. He had stopped watching her and now was looking at Lasater murderously.
She's been using my name around here. Let her go.
He was infuriated because the plum had been yanked out of reach, Lasater knew. There would be no
way of getting him to cooperate again soon if she walked out the door. Let's take off, go down the
beach a ways and decide how to handle this.
You'll have to move my car, Lyle said. It's blocking you. One of you will have to go out and move it,
and some of the people I talked to will be curious enough to be watching Now she looked at Follett,
as if she knew he was the one to work on. I left a note for Carmen, telling him I was coming here. If he
comes down, and he will, and finds all of us gone, he'll call the police fast.
He put you up to this, didn't he? Lasater demanded.
You win because no one really opposes you, she said, and there was a new intensity in her voice. I
tried to close my eyes to what you were, what you were doing, trying to make me do. But I'm not afraid
anymore, Mr. Lasater.
She was telling the truth; she was not afraid. He knew it, and he realized that Milton Follett knew it. For a
moment the tableau held. Then, as if from a great distance, Lasater heard himself mutter, Oh, my God!
and suddenly he knew what it was the old man had found. It wasn't a cancer cure, was it? he
whispered. Wildly he turned from her toward Follett. I know what it was! Look at her!
Follett was moving the few steps that separated him from the other two. Savagely he jerked Lasater
away from the door. Get the hell out of here, he said to Lyle.
She left. She had not yet reached her car when the camper shook as if a heavy weight had been slammed
against the side of it. She did not look back, but got inside her car and put the key in the ignition.
She started the car, left the camping area, climbed the steep gravel driveway.
He used it on me, she thought clearly, and it seemed as if the rain had come inside the car, was blurring
her vision. She saw Carmen on the road and stopped for him. He examined her face quickly.
You could have been hurt!
But not killed?
For a moment he was silent. She started the car again and drove south, toward the beach where they had
walked with Saul.
You could be killed, he said then. But you could be hurt and hurt and hurt for a long time first.
She nodded. Why did you do it to me?
We need help. We have to stay together in case one of us gets hurt. The other has to take care of him.
No hospitals. No doctors. There are a few others, but they all have work to do, and some of us have to
be able to travel here and there.
To attend conferences, see who is getting too close.
Yes. Lyle, who would you hand it over to? Our government? A church leader? Who should be given it?
Eight hundred million Chinese? Two and a half billion Asians? Four and a half billion of all of us? A
scientific elite? The military? Who, Lyle?
She shook her head. You're as bad as Lasater. Judge, jury, executioner.
We know we are, he said very quietly. She thought of the immensity of the sadness she had detected in
Saul. Four people so far have followed that line of research, he said. One of them was already
spending his Nobel Prize money. I killed him and buried him. His voice was very flat now; she did not
want to look at his face. One of them died following the injection. Two of them are back at work,
helping us keep it undiscovered.
They had reached the wide beach. Today the water was almost black under the low clouds and
pounding rain. It was low tide, the waves were feeble. Lyle parked and they sat staring out at the endless
sea. She thought of the story of the fisherman and his three wishes. This was her third trip to this winter
beach. I wish ... I wish ... There was nothing to follow the words. Golden wings, she thought. She could
wish for golden wings. Why me? she had wanted to demand of Lasater.
Why me?
I don't want it, she said. I didn't ask for it. You didn't ask me if I agreed.
I know. If you had wanted it, we wouldn't have chosen you.
You can't make that decision for the rest of humanity. No one can make such a decision for everyone.
I know. We can't, but we have to, because if we don't someone else will. Who? You know the fears
about an escaped genetic experiment? If a mutated virus got loose, there wouldn't be any way to stop it.
There wouldn't be any way to stop this either. We're carriers. You're a carrier now. It's in the blood, in
every cell of your body. A transfusion, sexual contact, that's all it takes. Think of the malnutrition here
now with our four-and-a-half-billion population, and then start multiplying it endlessly. Parents, children,
their children, all living forever until their metabolism stops because there's no food for them. They would
hurt for an awfully long time before that happened, Lyle, and they would hurt very bad.
She thought of the look on Follett's face back in the camper. She had recognized that look: cruelly
possessive, hungry. Sexual contact. And the Folletts and the Lasaters would be the ones to get it. The
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Dobre pomysły nie mają przeszłości, mają tylko przyszłość. Robert Mallet
De minimis - o najmniejszych rzeczach.
Dobroć jest ważniejsza niż mądrość, a uznanie tej prawdy to pierwszy krok do mądrości. Theodore Isaac Rubin
Dobro to tylko to, co szlachetne, zło to tylko to, co haniebne.
Dla człowieka nie tylko świat otaczający jest zagadką; jest on nią sam dla siebie. I z obu tajemnic bardziej dręczącą wydaje się ta druga. Antoni Kępiński (1918-1972)
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