'Get a good night's sleep. Meditate on rising and pray for a successful termination. I won't see you again before you leave, so I'll wish you good luck. I have a hundred-and-one-percent confidence in you, Mara. A- OK?'
'A-OK,' Mara confirmed.
Chase was searched three times even before he got to the reception hall at the UN. When he finally made it, his ID was scrutinized by a surveillance operative behind a bulletproof glass shield while a red-capped guard stood nearby cradling a snub-nosed automatic pistol in the crook of his arm.
The operative fed the serial index into the terminal and read off the instant dossier that flashed onto the screen. Carefully he compared the two mug shots--the one on the ID with the one on the screen--then punched a button and in seconds a facsimilie photograph was spat through the slot. This he affixed to a green-bordered security pass, ran it through a magnetized coder, and handed the pass and the ID over, waving Chase through the electronic barrier.
There must have been several hundred people milling about in the hall with its gigantic mosaic murals and marble columns and the spotlit fountain as its centerpiece. The continual movement of feet on the marble floor slurred into a sibilant sound that scraped at the nerves. Chase had never understood why the sight of crowds of people hurrying about should unsettle him. Each one had a purpose, presumably, a reason for being here, yet in places like this he felt uneasy because there were so many people on secret errands--not like at airports where everyone's reason for being there was obvious.
'Are you lost, Dr. Chase?'
He swung around and looked down into the brown eyes of a woman with dark curly hair. He frowned and snapped his fingers. 'Ruth . . .' He remembered. 'Patton.' They shook hands and Chase said, 'You recognized me after all this time?'
'Even with the beard,' Ruth smiled. 'You're not exactly unknown, are you? Best-selling author and TV celebrity. The cover of
Foolishly he almost blushed. He couldn't get used to fame. The Gavin Chase in the media wasn't him--some other guy. 'What are you doing in New York?' he asked her.
'I actually live and work here,' Ruth said. 'Somebody has to.' She told him about Manhattan Emergency on Sixty-eighth Street and her research there. 'I have just spent a frustrating and totally fruitless two hours with the medical attache of the Chinese delegation. I heard that they'd introduced a new respiratory drug in China and I've been trying to get hold of a sample to test.' Her lips tightened. 'Oh, they're exceedingly polite--yes, madam, of course, madam, leave it to us, madam. That makes the third positive assurance in three months.'
'And still nothing?'
Ruth shook her head. 'You know, we send them our new stuff
It was Chase's turn to shake his head. 'If only I knew,' he said. 'I've been summoned by the executive office of the secretary-general. Beyond that--' He shrugged.
'Madam Van Dorn herself?' Ruth's mouth formed a silent O. 'I wish I had that kind of clout. Put in a good word for me.'
Chase promised he would.
'If you're staying in New York for a few days why don't we have dinner one evening?' Ruth proposed.
'I'd like that. You can meet my son, Dan. Suppose I give you a call at the hospital and we can fix a date?'
'I'll look forward to it. Don't keep the lady waiting!' Ruth called out and was gone with a wave in the surging tide of people.
It transpired that Chase, and not the lady, was kept waiting.
He sat in an outer office on the twenty-second floor browsing through a stack of glossy UN pamphlets that ranged from famine relief in Indochina to the annual report of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics.
Through the high narrow windows the sun was a drab orangy smear, seen diffusely through the murky haze that lay upon the city to a height of two thousand feet. Even at this hour there was hardly any natural daylight: The lights in the offices were kept burning all day long. It was eerily like being underwater, submerged in a viscous ocean.
When the secretary-general did appear, emerging from her office to greet him, she was far more striking in the flesh than as purveyed by the media. She wore a royal-blue silk blouse cut diagonally at the throat and a long pale-cream skirt with a scalloped hem. Her silvery-blond hair was parted at the side and brushed back in a burnished curve that effectively gave prominence to her strong bone structure and widely spaced blue eyes. With spiky high-heeled shoes and an erect bearing, Ingrid Van Dorn was only fractionally shorter than Chase; a stunningly impressive female.
She led him through into a large softly, lit room that was more like a luxury apartment than an office--except there were no windows. 'In case of rocket attacks,' Ingrid Van Dorn explained casually. 'And there isn't anything to see, is there? One might as well stare at a blank wall.'
Carpeted steps led down to a circular depression in which fat armchairs and two squat sofas were grouped around a low chrome-and-glass table. In the center of the table a large ceramic sculpture posed in frozen animation. It might have been a surrealist horse or man's soul yearning toward a loftier plane. Chase ran out of inspiration after those two stabs.
Ingrid Van Dorn introduced Senator Prothero, who uncoiled from an armchair, dwarfing Chase by five or six inches. Deeply tanned and beautifully dressed, Prothero had a full head of hair streaked with gray that might have been trimmed and razored not five minutes ago. Thick horn-rimmed glasses lent him an air of thoughtful academic or earnest newscaster.
A secretary appeared, poured fragrant coffee from a silver pot, and silently glided away. Whatever this was all about, it had better be worth it, Chase thought. Worth breaking an itinerary planned months in advance, not to mention a three-thousand-mile flight. He sipped the delicious coffee and waited.
Prothero took time adjusting the crease in his trousers before crossing his long legs. He remarked pleasantly, as if discussing some tidbit of gossip that had reached his ears, 'The president, the entire administration, and the Pentagon are, right this minute, making arrangements to leave Washington and set up the seat of government elsewhere. Does that alarm you, Dr. Chase?'
'My alarm threshold is pretty high. It has been for the past twenty years. I'm surprised it's taken them so long to wake up to what's happening.'
The glance between Prothero and Ingrid Van Dorn was laden with coded information. Chase didn't bother trying to decipher it; he was curious, intrigued, and restive all at once.
Prothero said, 'It's our belief that the government is abandoning its federal responsibility. Instead of facing the situation and tackling it-- and being open and honest about what's really happening--they're moving their fat hides as quickly as possible to a place of safety. All they've done up to now is to declare six states Official Devastated Areas and send in the National Guard to shoot looters. As a member of the Senate I find that reprehensible and pathetic beyond words. Both of us --Madam Van Dorn and myself--believe it is time for independent action. Above all else we need practical solutions and not empty rhetoric.' Prothero clasped his long brown hands and rested his chin on his extended index fingers; this was the musing academic. 'You'll be familiar, Dr. Chase, with the legislation we've tried to push through in recent years--and, I hardly need add, failed on nearly every count. Too many vested interests. Commerce and industry closing ranks and screaming 'regressive' at the tops of their voices. Anything we've managed to push through--and precious damn little it's been--is merely a sop to the environmentalists. And anyway doesn't make one iota of difference because the government turns a blind eye to breaches of federal law and point-blank refuses to enforce it.'
Chase had been slow. Kenneth J. Prothero was for years chief administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency until it became moribund. He remembered Prothero had been highly active: speeches, articles, campaigning for radical change in government attitudes.
'So what happens?' Prothero said, spreading his hands. 'Everybody sees the problem as being somebody else's, and so it ends up being nobody's.'
