a lab? He was director of sales. He had meetings and business trips all over the country and... Why would he have a lab? He isn't... He wasn't..."
"Sales?" Sharon asked. "That's what he told you? You never knew?"
"What?"
"He's a molecular biologist."
"A molecular...No. He was director of sales. He told me." But what had he told her? And what, from his behavior and allusions, had she merely assumed?
Chapter 18
"He's a biologist, Mrs. Lawton. I mean, he was. I ought to know since I worked with him. And he... listen, I have to ask this. I'm sorry, but I don't know how else to make sure ... Did he die the way they said he died? He wasn't... ? I wouldn't put it past Cabot to have him snuffed out. He's a secrecy freak. And even if he weren't, this stuff's so nasty that if Cabot knew Eric was taking it to CBS, believe me, he'd do something to stop him."
"To stop him from what?"
"Contributing to the expose. Eric was blowing the whistle on Biosyn. He was scared shitless to do it - we both were scared shitless - but he'd made up his mind. I smuggled out a sample of Exantrum one night - and I can't even tell you how freaked out I was to get close to the stuff without a safety suit on - and I gave it to Eric. He was set to meet with the journalists, to hand it over so they could get it tested for themselves in Atlanta, and then... This was three weeks ago. I guess he might've met with them but he didn't say and then he was dead. There hasn't been even a sign at Biosyn that anything's the least bit wrong, so I started to think Eric never made contact and I wanted to get the name of the journalist myself to find out. That's what I was looking for at your house. The name of the journalist. Either that or the Exantrum. Because if he didn't make contact, I've got to get that stuff back into a controlled environment. Fast."
Charlie stared at the woman. She couldn't digest the information she was being given quickly enough to make a coherent reply.
"I can see he didn't tell you any of this. He must've wanted to protect you. I admire that. It was decent of him. Typical, too. He was a great guy. But I wish he'd confided in you because then at least we'd know what we were dealing with here. We could set our minds at rest. As it is... Either that stuff's out there waiting to wreak havoc on the state of California or it's safe at the Centers for Disease Control. But in either case, I need to know."
The Centers for Disease Control. "What is it?" Charlie asked, and the words sounded hollow to her ears and dry in her throat. "I thought Biosyn made pharmaceuticals. Cancer drugs. Medication for asthma and arthritis. Maybe sleeping pills and antide-pressants."
"Sure. That's part of it. That's Division I. But Division II is where the real money is, where Eric and I worked, where Ex-antrum is."
"What is it?" Charlie repeated, dread rising up in her throat like bile.
Sharon looked around. She said, "We need to order something. If we don't and if someone sees us here, it's going to look suspicious. We've got to get a waitress's attention."
They managed to do so, each of them asking for scones and tea which both of them knew they would not touch. When their order came, Sharon poured from the pot and said, "Exantrum is Cabot's key to immortality. It's a virus. It was discovered in standing water in a cave... this was about two years ago. A hiker went inside a cave in the Blue Ridge Mountains. A hot day. He finds a pool of water. He splashes himself on the face with it. He's dead in twenty-one days. Hemorrhagic fever. The doctors in North Carolina don't know where the virus came from but it looks enough like Ebola to make people freak. Atlanta gets onto it and everyone starts tracing where this guy has been, who he's seen, what he's been up to. They're looking at his associates through a microscope, they're looking at his passport to see if he's been out of the country, they're looking at his family to see which of them might've passed something on from someone else. They can't figure it out. Cabot follows all this but does