"I guess in that case it doesn't matter," Bryant said with a slight hesitancy. "Do you happen to know whether he's making a direct connection at New York or staying overnight? Maybe I could get a message to him there."
"I think he's transferring directly." Cheryl frowned, trying to recall Gavin's schedule. She remembered. "Yes, he complained about having a three-hour wait at JFK, which wouldn't give him enough time to go into Manhattan, so he'd have to wait at the airport."
Bryant boomed a chuckle. "I don't envy him."
"No," Cheryl agreed.
"Thanks for your help, Dr. Detrick."
"You're welcome, Mr. Bryant. Good-bye."
She was about to hang up when he said, "Was it the eight o'clock flight out of Los Angeles, would you happen to know?"
"The nine-fifteen."
"Thanks again. I appreciate it. 'Bye."
Cheryl hung up and walked across the lab and stood unseeingly at the bench, conflicting emotions rising inside her, struggling to keep them quiet and dormant. Of course he had to leave, what was she thinking of? He had professional commitments and personal ties back home. But acknowledging this didn't make her feel any better.
In the office suite in San Francisco Sturges put the receiver down with his right hand while with his left he leafed through the United Airlines timetable. His finger traced a line and stopped. He looked up at Gelstrom behind the desk in the contoured velvet chair and nodded his blond crew cut.
"Take one of our aircraft," Gelstrom said.
"No, I can make it." Sturges smiled coldly. "Plenty of time."
12
Rumor swept the plane, but it wasn't until they landed at JFK that Chase saw it confirmed in the headlines:
athletes die in finals
Sitting in the crowded transit lounge, Chase read the rest of the story, which added little to the banner headline. Competitors had suffered from dizziness, nausea, and hallucinations for the past ten days. First the food and water had been blamed, then the drugs that many athletes took to improve their performance, and now the climate. The official explanation was ludicrous, Chase thought. Sixty-six degrees F. was in no way excessive, especially for top-class athletes.
There could be another cause, though, one that they wouldn't dream of looking for in a city that was practically at sea level. Cerebral anoxia. It was an insufficient supply of oxygen to the brain, and if the percentage was low enough and the person was exerting himself, he would eventually die. But who would ever think of testing for altitude sickness in a place like Stockholm?
Chase folded the newspaper and tossed it aside. He had filled three fat notebooks and taped over forty interviews. In the past seven weeks he'd talked with scientists, state officials, industrial workers, forestry wardens, city engineers, ecologists, and environmentalists right across the country. It was all there, in the bulging briefcase between his feet. He had enough material--more than enough--for the series he had to write, and he knew that John Ware would be happy with the result. But he didn't have the clincher. Several times he had come close, had sensed it was almost within his grasp: when Binch had spoken guardedly about DELFI's predictions (and the interest shown by ASP); when Ruth Patton had told him about the cloracne victims and that there were military installations in the area; at the Bakersfield plant where he knew damn well that JEG Chemicals were up to something and he couldn't pin down precisely what.
If only he could piece it together, make some sort of sense of it all. All he had was a string of apparently unconnected facts supported by hunch, suspicion, and not very satisfactory circumstantial evidence.
So air pollution is increasing by 15 percent a year. So what else is new? Chemical wastes, pesticides, and herbicides are pouring into rivers and lakes at an unprecedented rate. But who says the environment can't cope? Wildlife is being wiped out, entire species decimated. But isn't that the price we have to pay for a modern technological society? World population is up to 5.7 billion and putting a heavy strain on the biosphere; but don't forget that it's leveling off a lot faster than anyone predicted, due to the famines in Africa and Asia.
No, he decided regretfully, to a skeptic the case was still not proved. Three dead athletes wouldn't prove it either. What was needed was specific, documented, incontrovertible proof, and he had failed to get it.
A moving electronic display caught his eye announcing the arrival of a flight from San Francisco. Another two hours and ten minutes to wait. Chase yawned and rubbed his eyes. Why not get something to eat? He wasn't really hungry, but it would help pass the time.
