The Green Progression

by L. E. Modesitt Jr

  “They only work for Fortune 500 companies. Even if they know, who’s about to let them rock the boat?”

  “And you think Heidlinger will?”

  “He doesn’t know what you’re doing—”

  “—we’re doing,” corrected McDarvid.

  “He only wants us to solve the client’s problems.”

  The small office remained silent as clouds on the western horizon parted and the reddish light of the setting sun reflected onto the off-white walls.

  “Christ,” mumbled McDarvid. “Jesus fucking Christ.” He stood up. “Can you get me something on that by tomorrow morning?”

  “It shouldn’t take long. Are you going to be here for a while?”

  “No. It’s Thursday, remember.”

  “Right. Then I’ll have it for you first thing in the morning.” Jonnie paused. “Speaking of nasty ideas, are you done with the telephoto lens? My sister asked about it yesterday. There’s no hurry, but…”

  “That’s another thing I haven’t gotten around to yet. Another week or so be a problem?”

  “No. Just so I know. She mentioned that she’d need it by the end of March.”

  “I’ll finish up and get it back.” McDarvid opened the door and headed back toward his own large closet, wondering about telephoto lenses and creative financials and the integrity of men who employed either. He was still shaking his head, even after he had begun to pack up his briefcase.

  65

  McDARVID TAPPED ON THE WALL NEXT TO THE OPEN DOOR. The nameplate on the wall read “Eleanor DiForio.”

  “Hello there.”

  “Jack! Come on in. I’ve just got a few minutes before I have to go off to a work group meeting.”

  McDarvid plopped into the white armchair. “Anything new?”

  “Since we talked yesterday?”

  McDarvid grinned at the heavyset woman with the cheerful voice and pleasant smile. “All right. How’s Jerry?”

  “He’s still spending a lot of time on the metals initiative, but he’s getting into figuring out the policy implications of the big study on pesticide contamination of groundwater.”

  “The one that was supposed to be finished two years ago, and wasn’t?”

  “The same one.”

  “So what’s Jerry’s concern? That there are trace contaminants hazardous to health, but that the current economics won’t justify controls?”

  “Pretty much. How did you know?”

  McDarvid shook his head. “Sometimes I amaze myself.”

  Ellie laughed. “You haven’t gotten any more modest since you left here. That’s for certain.”

  “What can I say?” McDarvid gave Ellie an exaggerated shrug. “But it figures. Wasn’t Jerry the one who worried about electric blankets giving Americans cancer?” McDarvid held up his hand. “I know. There’s a possibility that extremely low frequency electric current may have a harmful effect on some unborn children. But not the one in a hundred Americans that Jerry cited.”

  “Jerry was partly right on that, Jack. We’ve got reports on more than a dozen children with a very rare brain tumor, and the only thing they had in common was that their mothers used an electric blanket while pregnant.”

  “Fine. A dozen children over how many years and how many million women? Everything is dangerous to someone. Jerry still doesn’t understand that.”

  “You’re down on Jerry this month, I take it.”

  “I’m probably down on everyone this month.”

  “Then tell me about Elizabeth while I pack this folder.”

  “I finally broke down and got a computer around Thanksgiving. She treats me like an interloper if I want to use it in the evenings. ‘Really, Father, this is most inconvenient. My homework looks so much more professional on the computer. Even Mrs. Hoppes is pleased, and nothing pleases Mrs. Hoppes.’

  “Then she smiles, and I think maybe I should buy one just for her use.” McDarvid pursed his lips. “But she can be such a pain in the ass sometimes.”

  “Jack … sometimes I think you feel all women can be a pain in the ass.” Ellie stood up, folder in hand.

  McDarvid stood and stepped outside the small office. “They said Jerry should be back before long.”

  “He’s headed down the hall now.”

  “So he is.” McDarvid looked toward the center of the building, down the long straight corridor. “Better wait for him to get into his office.”

  “I’ve got to run, Jack.”

  “Thanks, Ellie.”

  McDarvid walked into the office bay adjacent to the one containing Killorin’s office and up to the secretary.

  “Yes?”

  “Has the permanent replacement for Fran Berkey been named?” McDarvid knew the answer already.

  “No.”

  “Thank you so very much.” McDarvid nodded and turned to leave, following Jerry Killorin into the main reception/secretarial area. He hung back, waiting until Killorin was inside his office. Then he crossed the bay and stuck his head inside. “Hello, Jerry.”

  “Hello, Jack.” Killorin’s voice was neutral. He replaced the telephone handset, but continued holding the stack of papers, not bothering to set them down.

  “Got a minute?”

  “Just about that. There’s never enough time.”

  McDarvid smiled but waited.

  “What do you have in mind?” Killorin finally asked.

  “Couple of things. First is the pesticides in groundwater study. Any idea when your shop will finish your input to Hank?”

  Killorin frowned. “We just got the preliminary reports on the data from Pesticides. Zenobalia’s still crunching the numbers. Then…” The division chief shrugged.

  “Same old schedule—from the economists to the analysts” McDarvid nodded sympathetically. “What about the timetable for the metals initiative?”

  “Jack … that one’s about to go to Red Border. I really can’t say much.”

  “When is it likely to go to OMB?”

  “Who knows? That depends on what the other shops have to say.” Killorin lifted the papers slightly, as if to signify he were running out of time.

  McDarvid ignored the gesture, instead smiled brightly. “You know, Jerry, I’ve been working on another study. This one’s about government employees. I don’t recall when you came to Washington, but when we came fifteen years ago, we still had the chance to afford a house that wasn’t halfway to Richmond, and it was possible to survive on a single income.” McDarvid shook his head sadly. “That’s all changed now. I mean, my wife’s a doctor, and I don’t do badly with the consulting, and we still live in the same house, and the kids still go to public schools, and I bought the cheapest car I could find. I just don’t know how people can make it.

  “Anyway, we’ve done an analysis of government salaries. Compared the salaries for various positions with the income needed for, say, housing, food, children’s education, entertainment. Then we’ve made some adjustments using not just government officials’ salaries, but their spouses’ incomes and any other income they may have reported. For senior level people, we did that by using the ethics forms. We requested a number of them. Some were pretty interesting.” McDarvid shrugged. “The results should be out one of these days.”

  “Who did you say you were doing this for?”

  “I didn’t. Until we make the results known to the right people, I wouldn’t want to have the conclusions or the sponsor known.” McDarvid smiled and straightened. “Anyhow, I’ve taken far too much of your time, but I do appreciate your comments on the groundwater thing. We’ll have to see how the metals initiative comes out—assuming it does.” He nodded, then turned, walking quickly toward the elevators.

  He still needed to tell George Rendhaas about the as yet unwritten ethics study. He’d actually done a couple of tables. They showed that a number of civil servants were either getting impossibly deep in debt or not reporting all income.

  George would spread the word, and a few others might get nervou
s.

  McDarvid’s stomach twisted, but he smiled as he neared the two women and the man standing by the elevator.

  66

  “VOLONINOV LEAVES YOU ALONE NOW?”

  “He still wants whatever hard intelligence I may have picked up. He frowns if I have nothing interesting to say. But my budget and my people have not been touched.” Kaprushkin looked at his wife.

  The clear eyes and unlined face did nothing to betray her fifty years, nor did the few strands of gray in the black hair framing her angular face.

  She wrapped her arm around his still-lean waist as they walked through the small park. “Your protector?” Her sardonic tone came with a smile. “How could anyone with the brains to understand your work have risen so high?”

  “It is difficult to believe that anyone who could understand my little program could fail to understand its full extent.” He laughed softly in the sunlight. “And since I’m still alive and with a new budget, more than I expected, no one has questioned my accounting.”

  “American parliamentarians are expensive,” Irenia said with a slight chuckle.

  “They would understand that. They would not appreciate not knowing one works for me.” Kaprushkin shrugged. “Unfortunately, he is getting more expensive every year. I had to invent a new recruit to account for the Congressman’s increased cost.”

  “It’s better than letting your superiors know.”

  “There has not been a choice. Recruiting a congressional candidate over twenty years ago was not a problem, even when he won. But had I reported that victory, my control of him would have been taken. He is far too important for my program. If they had known then that I had bought a minor idealistic candidate, I would be a hero. If it were known now that I control a senior Congressman…”

  Irenia tightened her hold on his waist.

  “Let’s not worry now. It is not often we have such a warm day so early in the year. We must enjoy this one.” Kaprushkin placed his right hand in the rear pocket of his wife’s tight jeans. Her giggling made him smile again. They continued through the park with its strollers, lovers, children, and parents. “When I was accepted at the academy all those years ago, the last thing anyone would have suspected was a true revolutionary. I would have been shot on sight. How could a country founded on revolution, guided by revolutionary principles, have been run for so long by such reactionaries?”

  “Why don’t you ask the Americans? They have the same problem.”

  The Colonel chuckled. “Our American friends? I wonder what would scare them more? Knowing how much we are shortsighted materialists like them, or finding out how they are like their feared communist enemies—noble revolutionaries gone bad?” Kaprushkin took his hand out of the pocket of his wife’s black Levis and entwined his long arm around her waist. She leaned her head against his cheek as they walked.

  “This new group—they are, in their own way, revolutionaries. They have made some serious changes,” she observed.

  “Many things appear to change,” the gray-haired man conceded. “I suppose we had no choice. Empires are too expensive. But I think the Republics’ leaders are just nationalist versions of Splotchhead. They see political freedom as just another economic lever. Let people mouth unapproved slogans, and they will work harder. Let them earn some worthless rubles from semiprivate enterprise, and the economy will be transformed. Meanwhile, one man has more power, the pollution increases, and most people still can’t find a decent chicken or a roll of toilet paper.”

  “Still, they are important changes.”

  Kaprushkin snorted. “Like the capitalists, we will sow the seeds of our own self-destruction.”

  Irenia closed her eyes briefly but did not reply.

  “I dreamed of Misha last night.”

  Irenia stopped walking but said nothing.

  “I saw his body. I saw the growths. He was filled with pain.” His arms left his wife.

  “He is free now. He has no pain.”

  “How many children are filled with pain? How many fathers have nightmares of pain?”

  “We can’t stop the world’s pain, not yet.” Irenia placed her hands on his shoulders.

  “We can’t stop it all. Just some, just a little tiny bit. I must settle for that. There was no reason for Misha to die.” Tears filled the corners of his eyes. “Why was so much pesticide used? Misha was drinking poison so some apparatchik could come closer to meeting his five-year plan.”

  When he continued, his voice was harder. “My protector, whoever he is, thinks that my plan will just weaken the capitalists’ industrial and military structure. But it will also allow a few less fathers to have nightmares of pain. Russian children deserve the same health as the Americans. They don’t understand that the green revolution is meant more for us than for them.”

  “Pyotr, they don’t need to understand.”

  “I know.” The gray-haired Colonel sighed. “I know.”

  “You feel so deeply. That’s why I love you so much. But we made the hard decisions so many years ago. You cannot relive the past. Not over and over.”

  Kaprushkin nodded. He wrapped his arms around her body and held her close. Irenia returned the tight embrace.

  Around them, in the park, no one looked at the familiar Colonel or his slender wife as the sunshine cascaded around them.

  67

  McDARVID ADJUSTED THE SQUASHED THROW PILLOW that cushioned the old oak kitchen chair which served as his study desk chair. He peered absently through the flurries of wet flakes barely visible under the streetlight, ignoring the hum of the computer which beckoned for him to finish the revised Amalgamated Electric PCB update and recommended regulatory strategy.

  He moistened his lips, not looking at the telephoto lens on the shelf. What if the I.G. issued the normal mealymouthed report on Killorin, something along the line of “apparent income discrepancy … recommend a more complete filing by employee”? That still wouldn’t focus enough attention on the metals issue.

  As for his old boss, the good Chairman of the Public Works Committee—there was no way Sam would touch something that obviously environmental, unless he was forced to.

  McDarvid glanced at the pile of papers in the folder on the corner of the desk. Why didn’t he recognize them? Was he already losing it? He picked up the folder, flipped open the cover, then grinned as he read the title page: “Princess Elizabeth and the Red Dragon.” His daughter was clearly well along with her latest play. He closed the folder and replaced it on the corner of the desk, trying to position it exactly where Elizabeth had left it.

  The morning’s Post had included another article on high-technology multinationals relocating production facilities offshore—this time focusing on computer-controlled machine tools. Just one line mentioned environmental regulations, a cryptic reference to the impossibility of compliance with air toxics rules that made the executive quoted sound like a robber baron.

  In the meantime, Devenant had called for an update, wanting to know about even delaying the final rule, and Heidlinger had sent a memo reminding him of the need for a legal strategy on the metals initiative.

  The pieces were all there—the impact of the regulations, the subtle but direct influence on the standard through setting risk levels at impossibly conservative levels, Lao Systems and its Foundation, the unwillingness of the Congress to face reality …

  He wondered what Jonnie really thought of the whole mess. Then again, beyond the day-to-day, what did he really know about Jonnie?

  The younger consultant had a flair for financial analysis, had contacts worldwide, knew far too much about secure computer systems, and dated attractive young women. He was bright, and he loved terrible puns. And he had worked somewhere in OMB, but had avoided explaining much beyond the technical details. McDarvid shook his head angrily.

  “You know more about Jonnie than anyone else in the firm. Now all you need to lose it all is to swallow Jonnie’s half-assed suggestion that the Russkies control the U.S. environmental m
ovement.”

  McDarvid’s eyes strayed back to the telephoto lens. Still … what was he going to do if the pressure on Killorin didn’t produce results? How could he get enough hard evidence, create enough pressure to break something loose?

  He looked again at the telephoto lens.

  “Jack?”

  He reached over and turned off the computer.

  “I’ll be up in just a minute.”

  After turning off the study lights, he stood in the dimness for a time, watching the snow flurries, now fading into nothingness, leaving not even a thin white dusting on the browned grass of the lawn.

  68

  “MR. CORELLIAN? Esther Saliers is on the line.”

  “Oh … please put her through.” Andrew Corellian flicked off the microphone on the speakerphone and grasped the handset.

  “Esther, I was thinking about calling you, but somehow things have been rather rushed.”

  “I’m sorry to bother you, then. Am I interrupting anything? Would it be better if I called later?”

  “No, no, not at all. I was just jotting down some notes for one of those reports I have to file with the head office now and then. They like to know what I’m doing to make them seem more responsible.” The sandy-haired man glanced down at the yellow legal tablet and clipboard on his lap. The number 3 pencil had rolled against his belt. He reclaimed it, juggling the receiver between his shoulder and ear.

  “Jotting? On paper? I can’t believe you don’t use your own products.”

  “Oh, I do. Lao makes sure that we all have the latest models. They even sent me for a week’s training. But the truth is I prefer old-fashioned writing—don’t tell anyone I said that. I still compose on paper and then transfer it to the machine. Editing is easier on the computer. Once the document is final, I just zap it down to headquarters. We have a WAN—a wide area network—that links all of our offices.”

  “That certainly beats the post office. Or government messenger service.”

  “That’s for sure. Tell me—how does Keri like the idea of going to Emory?”