year, until it came to a cataclysmic end in fire and ice in the Arctic, the Valhalla affair had threatened forever to alter not only the Fredericksons, but our entire species.
It had been a real bummer-not least because the basic premise Loge had gleaned from his Triage Parabola and acted upon, that we were inevitably doomed to extinction within a relatively brief time, remained unrefuted. I was convinced that Garth, who had suffered the most, had never fully recovered from the horrors of Valhalla, and the thought persisted that Valhalla-perhaps residual effects from the serum combined with the poison he had ingested-could very well have something to do with his present condition.
'Jesus Christ,' Veil said in a hollow voice when I finished.
'Aside from the people who were involved, you're the first person who knows anything about this. Lippitt feels there are serious national security considerations, and I agree with him. It's hard to know how people would react.'
'It won't go beyond me.'
'You see my point? Garth remained under a great deal of stress, and the signs that he was ready to come apart were there all the time we were tracking you. I should have seen them, and then done something about it.'
'Like what? Take time off? Madison and his men, not to mention this Henry Kitten, were breathing as hard on your ass as they were on mine-harder, since they usually knew where to find you. Kitten had threatened to kill Garth if you stopped looking for me, remember?'
My response was to shrug, and then resume poling away dirt in the deepening trench in which I stood.
'Run the present situation by me again, Mongo,' Veil said quietly. 'That is, if it doesn't bother you to talk about it. What was Garth poisoned with?'
'A chemical called nitrophenylpentadienal, also known as NPPD or 'spy dust,' ' I replied in a flat voice. 'Because it bonds very strongly to flesh and clothing, and can be seen under ultraviolet light, it's used by a lot of intelligence services to track people. Most information on the stuff is classified, and they're not even sure what the long-term effects may be for people whose flesh has been exposed to it. It sure as hell isn't meant to be eaten.
'Garth was working undercover on an industrial espionage case in a place called Prolix Pharmaceuticals; it's one of a handful of plants in the United States authorized by the government to manufacture NPPD and conduct classified research projects. The D.I.A. suspected a security leak at Prolix, and Lippitt arranged with the NYPD for Garth to be put on the case. There must have been a leak at the NYPD, or Garth made a mistake, because the spy or spies at Prolix got on to him. They began poisoning him with NPPD.'
'How?'
'Lippitt thinks it was done slowly, over an extended period of time. Maybe they dosed his coffee a few times, or sprinkled small amounts on his food.'
'Do you suppose whoever did it to him knew what the final effects would be?'
'There's no way of knowing that until they catch the guys. Garth may strongly suspect who did it to him, but we won't know unless-until-he comes around.
'Anyway, I'd just begun pondering the problem of where you'd disappeared to. As you know, Madison sent his men to find out what you might have told me over the years, and then burn me to death. When they succeeded in burning out a whole floor of my apartment and killing five people, that made it a case of arson and murder, and Garth was assigned to tag along with me to try to find you, since you were considered a material witness. The transfer put a stop to the slow poisoning, but he'd already absorbed a lot of shit into his system-his brain. You saw him snap; he killed Madison, and tried to kill you, and then sank into the catatonic trance he's in now.'
'What's the prognosis?'
'There is no prognosis-not yet. Nobody's ever been poisoned with NPPD before, so Garth's the test case. Since there is no standard treatment, everything now is a wait-and-see show.'
Veil shook his head, then reached down, gripped my shoulder, and pulled me out of the trench. 'That's deep enough, Mongo. Let's put him under.'
Veil grabbed hold of one of the corpse's splayed arms. I took hold of the other, and we dragged Henry Kitten down off the mound of junk, into the shallow grave. Together, we poled and kicked dirt over the body, then piled up refuse over the site.
'I'm ready for my Scotch,' I said when we had finished.
* * *
Our clothes and bodies reeked of death and garbage. Fortunately, because Veil and I often worked out together in his loft, I kept a spare set of sweats there. I stripped off my clothes and threw them away; then, while Veil showered, I soaked in a hot bath, taking care to keep my bandage dry. Afterward, I toweled off, dressed in my clean sweats, and joined Veil at the kitchen table, where he had a tumbler of Scotch over ice waiting for me.
Veil said, 'Since you've quit teaching, I assume you'll be spending as much time with Garth as possible?'
I sipped at my drink, nodded. 'Yeah. The hospital's a little more than an hour's drive from lower Manhattan, depending on the traffic.'
'Oh, I know where it is, all right,' Veil said softly. 'I spent time there, as a kid. Didn't you find that out?'
'I wasn't sure it was a subject you'd appreciate me bringing up.'
'Thanks, but it doesn't bother me to talk about it. The staff in the children's division saved my life and mind in a dozen different ways.'
'I could commute from Garth's apartment, but I don't want to. Lippitt arranged for me to get a small apartment in a staff dorm they've got there, and he gave me keys and a pass that will get me into the clinic any time I want; I intend to take full advantage of the privileges. I want to be at Garth's side until this thing is resolved. . one way or another. Until they tell me Garth is going to stay a vegetable, I want to stick close in case he needs me.'
Veil nodded, then studied me as he sipped the tea he had brewed for himself. 'Any other plans at all?' he asked. 'Will you do any work? What about your P.I. practice?'
'Shut down, at least for now. I don't have any cases pending, and anything that comes along I'll refer to some of my colleagues. I've got enough money put away so that I don't have to do anything if I don't want to, at least for a while. I've been giving some thought to working at the Children's Hospital there. There's a whole separate facility, which they didn't have when you were there.'
'Teaching?'
'Yeah. The school's right there in the hospital. I'm not certified for teaching emotionally disturbed children, but you don't need certification to substitute, and I've been told they have a hell of a time getting substitutes. If they want me, they've got me.'
'You'd be great teaching those kids, Mongo,' Veil said, his voice low and serious. 'Forget certification; with disturbed kids, it's the singer, not the song. You've got a great voice.'
'Thanks. We'll see.'
Veil smiled thinly. 'Then again, teaching at Rockland Children's Psychiatric Center won't exactly be like teaching at the university, Mongo.'
'You don't say?'
'You don't get admitted into RCPC unless you're either homicidal or suicidal-sometimes both, which was my case. It's bottom-line work. You'll be dealing with some very sick puppies there-and not a few of them will be dangerous.'
'So I've been told.'
'I think it's a great idea for you to teach there while you're looking after Garth-but I want you to know what you're getting into.'
'Thanks. I appreciate it.'
'What about Prolix, Mongo?'
'What about it?'
'Who's continuing that investigation-the D.I.A. or the police?'
'I really don't know. I didn't think to ask Lippitt, and I'm not sure the NYPD would welcome inquiries from me.'
'I thought your problems with the city cops had all been smoothed over.'
'Maybe,' I said with a shrug. 'Maybe not.'
