Last Gasp

by Trevor Hoyle

  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.”

  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

  Mystery Deaths in 5,000- and 10,000-meter Finals

  in Stockholm — Officials Blame “Heat Stroke”

  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.

  Russ Trambo wiped the folds of his neck with a handkerchief soaked in ice water and gazed wearily up at the young reporter. Outside the newsroom window of WNRB-TV the hotels and casinos of Las Vegas were baking nicely in a midafternoon temperature of 107 degrees. Across the street a faulty flickering neon sign (WEDD NGS WHILE-U-WA T) was trying wanly to compete with the hard desert sunlight.

  “What are they, Jesus freaks?”

  “No idea. Some of them have shaved heads and black robes and beads and bells and stuff. They’re coming in old cars, trucks, buses and heading up highway ninety-three.” Jack Chang rested his knuckles on the desk, his lean sallow face alight. “Give me a crew, Russ. We can sell this to the networks for sure.”

  “What the hell is up ninety-three except a lot of nothing?” Russ Trambo asked with a grimace. “Where are they going?”

  “I asked a couple of them and they didn’t seem to know.” Jack Chang flipped open his notepad. “They kept on about ‘Boomy Bap’ or something that sounded like it. There’s nothing like that on the map.” Russ Trambo propped his double chin in the palm of his hand, mechanically wiping the back of his neck with the now-lukewarm handkerchief. “‘Boomy Bap.’ What the fuck is that? Is it the heat or am I going crazy?”

  “Maybe it’s the end of the world,” the young reporter suggested with a grin. “You know, these religious nuts? Keep gathering year after year, waiting for the end, prophesying doomsday or whatever. Nothing ever happens, so they put it off till next year.”

  “Hey now,” the editor said, a light bulb flashing on in his brain. “The Atomic Energy Commission’s nuke test site is up there—and so is the Nellis Air Force Missile Range. Maybe it’s a protest demo. Did any of them mention something like that?”

  Jack Chang shook his head. “Like I say, they told me it was a pilgrimage and just kept on repeating ‘Boomy Bap, Boomy Bap’ like it was some kind of incantation.”

  “Wait a second. ‘Boomy.’ Could that be a religious reference to an explosion, a nuclear blast?” Russ Trambo wadded the handkerchief into a damp ball and tossed it on the desk. “Okay, why not, nothing else is going down except a couple of routine homicides.” Jack Chang picked up the phone to get his crew together, grumbled to himself, “if it is the fucking end of the world, why can’t we have a goddam ice age instead?”

  From long experience Sturges knew that it wasn’t the act itself that presented problems but what happened afterward. If the act could be accomplished quickly, quietly, and without fuss (depending on method, as yet undetermined), he would simply walk away and vanish in the crowd. Though he didn’t like working in crowds, too many unpredictable factors. His preferred modus operandi was one-to-one, just him and his victim, in a fixed situation that closed the options down to zero. The Detrick case, for example. Just himself and Detrick and the automobile as a murder weapon. Crunch, bump, and it was all over with only a dented fender to show for it.

  He was soberly dressed in a dark gray business suit with a fine pink stripe outlining the lapels and cuffs. Similarly conservative was the soft black vinyl hat, which he wore to hide his spiky blond crew cut. Nothing he could do to disguise his six feet four or his 210-pound frame or his fifty-four-inch chest; but there were plenty of big men around and he didn’t feel conspicuous. Anyway, nobody ever remembered faces at airports, and his would be one among thousands.

  He carried two items of hand luggage: a slim flat black attaché case and a matching camera case slung around his neck. The attaché case contained what he termed his “close” methods. Hypodermic. Capsules. Cigarettes.

  If he could get close to his victim, say next to him in a line of people or behind him on an escalator, the hypo shot was easily delivered through the fake index finger of the black glove, his own hand clenched inside working the plunger.

  The tiny beadlike capsules dissolved instantly in hot or cold liquids, so again this depended on whether he could get near enough to slip one into the victim’s drink.

  The cigarettes, a popular low-tar brand, were a favorite method because the victim could smoke one all the way down without suspecting a thing and ten minutes later would be stone-cold dead of an embolism—by which time Sturges would be clear of the vicinity and going blamelessly about his business.

  Concealed in the camera case a gas-powered ejector dart, effective at up to twenty-five feet, could penetrate the thickest clothing and kill in under two minutes. He’d used it twice before and it was absolutely dependable. No
need even to pretend to be taking a photograph: There were two viewing and aiming positions, one from above, which meant he could be fiddling with the camera, pretending to adjust it, and line up his victim through the target viewfinder.

  Two vital elements remained unresolved: location and recognition. Sturges had to find his man and know for certain it was Chase. Having seen him once before, in Geneva eight years ago, was a bonus; most times he had to work from photographs. And according to Madden, Chase had altered very little—a slight thickening of the waist perhaps, but still the straight black sweep of hair across his forehead, the thick dark eyebrows.

  A moving walkway took him around the rim of a large transparent dome and through a maze of plastic tunnels. Below him the main concourse was thronged with people, among them the usual drug cases, mugging trios, and beggars. No one carried hand luggage or a shoulder bag that wasn’t chained to his person. Sturges didn’t trouble because his size was an adequate deterrent.

  As he stepped off into the transit lounge he checked out the suspended circular display that flashed up the arrivals and departures.

  FLIGHT D-049 : LONDON : 1915

  It was listed on schedule. Sturges allowed himself a fleeting smile, and a glint of gold shone faintly in the broad heavy features. His preparation and timing were perfect. He had two full hours. As he’d assured Gelstrom, plenty of time.

  He strolled past the rows of crowded seats, just another passenger waiting for his flight, eyes flicking left and right, comparing each male face with the picture in his head. Down the left-hand aisle past the rest rooms and back up the center aisle. A number of men with black hair, about the right age, mid-thirties, but none fitted the picture. Down the right-hand aisle this time, eyes never still, returning up the center aisle again.

  Sturges paused at his starting point. It had taken him less than ten minutes to check out the transit lounge and he had not seen his man.

  Okay—shops, newsstand, restaurant, coffee shop. He walked around the perimeter of the lounge, spending a few moments to glance into each of the little shops and booths selling perfume, souvenirs, leather goods, flowers. This took seven minutes and still nothing.

  At the glass door to the coffee shop he peeked in and then moved closer to the tiled wall. From here he had a clear view through the window except for those tables next to the near wall. There was a man with black hair in one of the rear booths, his back to the door so that Sturges couldn’t see his face. The man wore glasses and was reading what looked from here to be a typed report. Did Chase wear glasses? Madden hadn’t said so, though maybe he did for reading.

  Sturges watched him steadily for two minutes and then went in. He moved past the counter and chose a table near the front, facing away from the man in the booth'. The coffee shop was busy, too busy, people coming and going all the time. He didn’t like the setup.

  Placing the attaché case under the table he picked up the plastic menu card and was in the act of taking a casual look over his right shoulder when the waitress came along and stood, one hip thrust out, and asked for his order. Sturges told her coffee, black, and went back to studying the menu.

  Again he looked around, affecting that vacant scrutiny that people have in public places, and this time got a good look at the man. He turned back and slid the menu between the relish and the ketchup. Fucking Japanese.

  Where the hell was he?

  Sturges breathed out slowly and looked at his gold Rolex. Nineteen minutes gone and he hadn’t located his man. Had Chase altered his plans? Decided to stay overnight in Manhattan? Clearly he wasn’t—

  “Keep the change,” he heard someone say through the hubbub, and the English accent shrieked in his head like a fire alarm. The man was at the cash register tucking a wallet into his inside pocket. He must have been at one of the tables next to the wall. Black sweeping hair over his eyes. Right age. And what’s more, Sturges remembered him.

  Chase stood aside to let someone enter and went out.

  Sturges stood up and held out a dollar bill to the waitress bringing his coffee and pushed past her, camera swinging against his chest, attaché case in his dark hairy fist, and reached the glass door before it had swung shut on its chrome-plated hinges.

  Getting to see the president at such short notice wasn’t easy, as Lucas had known all along.

  At first he’d tried the proper channels, following protocol, and been told it would take three weeks minimum. When he insisted that it was a matter of extreme urgency he was asked to submit the reason for requesting a personal interview in writing, which was of course out of the question.

  In the end he had pleaded, cajoled, and finally persuaded two senior White House officials and the president’s appointments secretary that it was imperative he speak to the president at once, if only for ten minutes.

  “Is that all?” one of the officials remarked dryly over the phone. “Think yourself damn lucky if you get five!”

  He was granted an appointment sandwiched between a delegation from the Free Palestinian Trades Council and an awards ceremony in honor of an army ordnance team that had defused a one-thousand-pound bomb at Grand Central Station. Instead of being shown to the Oval Office, however, as he’d expected, Lucas was stationed between an aide and a secret service agent on the steps leading down to the lawn at the rear of the White House.

  Then came another surprise—or rather, shock. He was crisply informed that he had however long it would take the president to walk from the steps to the welcoming committee of military brass in the middle of the lawn to state his case. Dumbfounded, Lucas gazed with sick dismay at the short stretch of trimmed grass. He reckoned he had about a minute; perhaps a few seconds more if the president slowed to a dawdle.

  One minute in which to explain the technical complexities, the scientific fallacies, and the ecological implications of DEPARTMENT STORE.

  One minute to warn of global catastrophe.

  Trying to get his thoughts in order, and already sweating at the prospect, Lucas was totally unprepared for what happened—which happened so fast he didn’t know it was happening. The tap and scrape of shoe leather on marble, a pack of people bearing down on him, and he was grasped firmly by the elbows and all five feet four of him lifted off his feet and thrust forward, before he knew it walking—trotting— alongside the president, completely surrounded by large hulking men wearing sunglasses and blocking out the light. He was in a forest of bodies.

  “Gene, good to see you. How’s everything?”

  Automatically Lucas extended his hand and it was lightly taken by the slender black one. The president released his hand and said over his shoulder out of the side of his mouth, “What is he, colonel, general, or what?” A low hard voice from the crush answered at once, “Colonel, sir. Cathermore. Purple Heart in El Salvador. Prosthetic hip joint, right side.”

  “Mr. President,” Lucas said breathlessly, running alongside, “I have to speak with you. It’s vitally important, a matter of national security. It’s difficult to explain right now, in these circumstances.”

  Munro smiled, incredibly handsome, perfect white teeth in a strong, acceptably negroid face. Virile, sensual, powerful, full of character. “I appreciate the problem, Gene, but that’s how it is. Sorry. These people tie me up in so many fucking knots I can’t move.”

  The smile came back, dazzling. No wonder television audiences went wild over him. He was better looking than any movie star.

  Lucas gritted his teeth and launched in. “Shortly before he died, Mr. President, Secretary of Defense Lebasse gave me a dossier concerning a top-secret project that had been submitted to him for approval. He wanted my opinion—as a scientist—on the advisability of proceeding with this project”—they had covered half the distance already; this was impossible, ludicrous—“and I know that he himself had grave doubts. In view of his death—what I mean is, Mr. President, is that I feel it’s my responsibility as your scientific adviser to urge you most strongly not to grant approval ...”

&
nbsp; He was babbling. Did any of this make sense? Physically shaking, trying to keep his voice under control, he said with as much firmness and authority as he could muster, “This project must not be allowed to go ahead, sir. The consequences are truly horrendous.”

  They were ten yards away from the flags and the bunting and the group of officers and the squad of soldiers beyond. President Munro halted and the phalanx of aides and secret service agents stopped with him, forming a solid mass enclosing the two men, the tall handsome black one and the small gray-haired white one.

  Lucas drew in a quivering breath: He felt dwarfed and lost, yet somehow defiant, a man fighting desperately for a cause in which he believed.

  President Munro was looking down at him, two thin creases on either side of his nose, momentarily spoiling those dark beautifully proportioned features.

  “What project are you speaking of, Gene?”

  Lucas let go a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. Gaining confidence by the second, he said rapidly, “It’s code-named DEPARTMENT STORE, sir. It was submitted to the Defense Department by Advanced Strategic Projects of the Pentagon.” At last he was being listened to, and by someone who mattered, who had the power to do something. By God, the evil could be stopped and would be!

  “That one. Yep.” The president was nodding. “Nothing to worry about, Gene, it’s all taken care of. Approval has been granted on the advice of Mr. Zadikov.”

  “Who?” Lucas mumbled, too dazed to be astounded.

  “Ralf Zadikov, the newly appointed secretary of defense.” President Munro patted Lucas on the shoulder. “Great to see you again, Gene. Drop by again sometime. Give my best regards to your wife—” somebody muttered in his ear—“Elizabeth.”

  He smiled brilliantly and everyone went with him except Gene Lucas, suddenly all alone on the lawn in the mellow evening sunshine, staring emptily after them.

  Chase wandered across to the newsstand and looked idly over the racks of magazines and paperbacks. Would the series for Sentinel make a book? John Ware had hinted that there was the possibility of a spin-off, though naturally everything depended on how the pieces turned out. What was really needed was precisely what he lacked— that nugget of pure gold that had eluded him. What the hell. Pointless to fret about it now.