The Tomorrow File

by Lawrence Sanders

  “What a cock-bucket!” one of them marveled.

  “You going cruising for cush, Dr. Flair?” one of them asked.

  “No,” I said, “Fm taking my dear old grandmother for a spin in the country.”

  I don’t think they believed me. I signed for the car, handed the chauffeur a pat, slid behind the wheel. If I smelled of elegance, the car smelled of love. Natural glove-leather upholstery; natural burled-walnut dash. If burial had been legal, I would have opted for that car as my casket.

  I pulled up in front of the Cafe Massenet. Directly in front. I had an instantaneous audience: passersby pausing to goggle at the car’s sensuous lines. When I alighted, carrying my plaid cloak, I attracted almost as much attention.

  “Big porn star,” someone said knowingly.

  The doorman awaited me under the canopy. I had his pat ready.

  “I’m Dr. Flair,” I said. “With Mrs. Wingate’s party.”

  “Of course, Dr. Flair.”

  “I’d like to leave the car right there.”

  He glanced down at the folded bill before slipping it inside his white glove.

  “Of course, Dr. Flair!”

  “I’m Dr. Flair,” I said to the headwaiter. “With Mrs. Wingate’s party.”

  “But of course, Dr. Flair! An honor, doctor!”

  He snapped his fingers. Someone took my coat.

  “I am Henri,” he murmured. “Allow me.”

  He removed a minuscule bit of lint from my shoulder.

  “This way, if you please, doctor,” he said. “Mrs. Wingate’s special table.”

  Heads turned to watch our passage. The trappings of power. The only objects who scoff are the powerless.

  It was unquestionably the best table in the room. Secluded, but with a fine view of everything. I was the first to arrive. As I had planned. I bent my knee. A chair was gently nudged under me. The pale pink napery was so stiff it was difficult to bend.

  “While the doctor is waiting?” Henri suggested diffidently. “A something?”

  “A something would be nice.” I nodded. “Perhaps champagne as an aperitif?”

  "Oh, excellent," he chortled. "May I suggest a ’91 Piper? It was a very good year.”

  “The Piper will be fine,” I said.

  “And just in time!” he cried. “For here are the ladies!”

  If my entrance had occasioned glances, theirs attracted stares. The preceding black zipsuit marched past me, hand in pocket, into the restaurant’s kitchen. And stayed there. Presumably guarding a back entrance. A second sentinel, an ef, took up a position behind and to one side of our table. Impassive. The third remained near the entrance. I relished every minute of it. The panoply!

  “Mrs. Wingate,” I said. Having risen. “How nice to see you again. And you must be Louise Rawlins Tucker. A profit.” When we were all seated:

  Grace: “Nick! Did you see that antique car parked out front? What a beauty! It’s all red, and so lovely!”

  I (negligently): “The Jaguar? Oh, yes. It’s mine.”

  I knew, instinctively, that Louise Rawlins Tucker, personal aide and social secretary to the Chief Director’s wife, would be important to our scenario. During lunch I paid court. Not neglecting Grace Wingate, but trying to make the duenna feel she was guest and partner more than server and chaperone.

  It was not difficult. Though her physical appearance was offputting—-she was more yeoman than dragoon—she had an easy manner and a pretty wit. More significantly, she had an obviously deep affection for her young charge. That made us co-conspirators, did it not?

  The luncheon ritual went swimmingly. Louise was wearing a dove gray flannel suit, not too unlike my own in cut. That was good for a laugh. Grace was wearing—I could not have been conscious of it since I did not remember it.

  Once, while I was speaking, she reached up, listening, looking into my eyes, and twirled a vagrant strand about her finger. Slowly twisting and stroking. Ems have gone to war for less.

  About Louise Rawlins Tucker:

  She was an obso, quite large, with enough lumps and blotches to remind me of leonine facies. But she was obviously not a victim of Mycobacterium leprae; simply an unfortunate, unprepossessing ef. With a wry, self-deprecating charm that included amusement at her own officiousness.

  I wondered—parti-wondered—if she sensed my interest in Grace Wingate and might not be a closet romantic. Because, under my gentle prying, she revealed that she had devoted most of her adult life to the care of her widowed father. A professor of Romantic Literature at Georgetown University.

  “Isn’t all literature romantic?” I asked.

  “Ah,” she said.

  Then, upon her father’s stopping, she had created a whole new life for herself.

  “I don’t know what I’d do without Louise,” Grace Wingate said fondly. Putting her soft, tanned hand on the other ef’s claw. “Just perish, I suppose.”

  “Ah, I’d do anything for you, angel,” Louise Rawlins Tucker vowed. Fiercely. “Anything. ”

  I had the oddest notion that she was speaking to me. A promise. And a warning.

  When we went outside, preceded and followed by black zipsuits, there was an admiring audience circling the red Jaguar. The doorman looked on benignly.

  “Nick,” Grace Wingate said, “is it really yours?”

  “For the day,” I said. “A ride?”

  “Oh! What a profit!”

  She looked to Louise Rawlins Tucker.

  “Grace, you can’t,” her aide said. “We’re running so late.” “A half-hour,” I pleaded. “Around town. Through Central Park. You and the guards can trail us.”

  “Louise?” Grace said. “Please? May I?”

  “Ah,” the yeoman said. Looking at me. “Well. . . . Twenty minutes. No more. We’ll be right behind you.

  So they were: two black limousines following my every turn. I didn’t care. I was alone with Grace. I laughed. She laughed. “You area scamp!” she said. “Do you ever run out of ideas?” “Never,” I said. “But this is a one-shot. We can’t do it again.” “No,” she said. Regretfully. “I suppose not. Oh, Nick, it’s such a car.”

  It was. It handled like a muscled ef. I turned smoothly into Central Park, heading north, making the grand circuit. Children were sledding. Booting a soccer ball through the snow. Chasing. There were dogs. Objects were sauntering. Couples. Users, I supposed.

  “Grace,” I said.

  “What?” she said.

  “Nothing,” I said. “Just Grace.”

  She put her hand lightly on my arm. A few months previously she had told me of her love for her husband. How she would do anything to preserve her marriage. And now she was. . . . But I didn’t think less of her for that. It made her infinitely more precious. Idealism was for scoundrels. I wasn't that. Quite. Nor was she.

  “Grace,” I said again.

  “Yes?”

  “What are you wearing?”

  “Didn’t you notice? Brute! I wore it just for you.”

  “All I could see was you.”

  She could not snuggle; the limousine was close behind. But her arm moved sideways. Hand probed. I moved up casually in my bucket seat so she could clasp my waist.

  I took a deep breath.

  “I love you,” I said.

  It didn’t hurt.

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Will you say it?” I asked her.

  “No,” she said. Quite low. “Not yet.”

  “But you shall?”

  “I think so. Please, Nick. Time.”

  “Oh, yes.” I nodded. “As much as you want. And then I shall have your ears.”

  “My ears?” She was astounded.

  I told her how I worshiped her ears. She was amused. And touched. I thought.

  “I’ll cut them off and mail them to you,” she said. “Dear, sweet Nick.” She touched my beard. Quickly.

  “What are we to do?” I asked.

  She thought a long moment. But I knew she had already co
mputed it.

  “Do you like Louise?” she asked.

  “Yes. Very much.” “She lives alone in this big house in Chevy Chase. Not too far from where you and Paul live. Since her father stopped, she has become very social. Her parties are famous. Very tooty. Mike is away a lot. Out of the mainland. It would be all right if I went to Louise’s parties. Mike would approve.”

  “Would Louise? I mean, would she invite me?”

  “Yes. If I asked.”

  “You trust her?”

  “With my life.”

  “Exactly,” I said. “It may come to that.”

  “I’m willing. Are you?”

  “There’s asharpcurveupahead,” I said. “To the left. I’m going to speed up suddenly. We’ll be around the turn before the limousines catch up. They won’t see us. I can bend to you. You can bend to me. Briefly.”

  “Yes,” she said.

  So we did. We kissed. Oh

  The next day I took the air shuttle to Washington. I had flashed ahead to set up a facial with the Chief Director. Penelope Mapes came on screen. .

  “I’ve got to see him,” I said.

  “No, Nick,” she said. “He’s got a full plate.”

  “It’s about GPA-11,” I said.

  “Oh,” she said. “Take a beat.”

  She went off screen. Then came on a moment later.

  “Should Bigelow be there?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Take two beats,” she said. And disappeared again. Finally she came back on.

  “Got you in,” she said. “At 2030 tonight. Here, at the EOB.”

  The shuttle got me to Washington an hour before my meet. I took the Metro to the Lafayette Square stop. I was carrying no luggage. I intended to stay overnight, but I had clothes and toilet gear in the Chevy Chase place. As I did in Grosse Pointe. It would, I thought, be nice, some day, to settle. Put down roots. Obso thinking. To settle was to stop.

  I was still early for my meeting with the CD. I walked in, unannounced, to the office of the gestating Department of Creative Science. After all, it was my office. In the basement of the EOB. A suite of three rooms, in the disarray of enlargement. No one about. Machines shrouded. But in the inner office, Paul’s sanctum, lights and the sound of voices. I pushed open the door. Paul, Mary, Maya Leighton, Seth Lucas, Art Roach.

  “Ah-ha,” I said. “Gotcha.”

  “Hey, Nick.” Paul said. Genially. Uncoiling from his swivel chair behind the desk.

  “Dr. Flair,” Roach said. Solemnly. “I haven’t had a chance to thank yawl for what you did.”

  “Sure,” I said. “We stroke you, you stroke us. Keeping an eye on the stamps and petty cash around here?”

  Then they were all silent. Suddenly.

  “Art just took over,” Paul said. “A few days ago. Doing good service. Some creative ideas. What gives, Nick?”

  I thought the mass was stressed. But when you lived in a paranoiac world, you learned to breathe suspicion.

  “Got a meet with the CD, Paul,” I said. “Can you make it?” “About the DCS?” he asked anxiously.

  “No. Something else.”

  “Nick, I have a meeting of the Beists’ finance committee.” “Go,” I said. “By all means.” I turned to Seth Lucas. “How’s your patient, Seth?”

  “Just stopped by to say hello,” he said.

  “Lewisohn did?”

  “No, no,” he said hurriedly. “No change in Lewisohn. Maya and I came over for a seminar.”

  “Oh?” I said. “What seminar?”

  “Not a seminar,” Paul said testily. “How many times do I have to tell you, Seth? It’s not a seminar, it’s a hearing. House Committee on Science and Astronautics, Nick. I wanted to condition Seth and Maya to the drill. They may be called upon to testify.” “They may indeed.” I nodded.

  “See you later, Nick?” Maya smiled at me. “After your meeting?”

  It was pulling in all directions. Stretched and disturbing.

  “I may be a while,” I said.

  “Seth is going back to the Hospice,” she said. “I’m staying over with Mary out in Chevy Chase.”

  “Fine,” I said. “Maybe I’ll see you there. Paul, can I talk to you for a minute?”

  It had been a curious exchange. No structure. I could not compute it. It was my fault, I supposed, for barging in suddenly.

  Paul followed me out into the corridor.

  “That business in GPA-11,” I said. Low voice. “It’s a manipulated strain of Clostridium botulinum. Aerobic.”

  He looked at me. Startled.

  “My God,” he breathed. “How did you get onto that?”

  “Heavy analysis of specimens from the National Epidemiology Center. The strain was developed during chemwar research in 1988.”

  “Never heard of it.”

  “You wouldn’t. Not the original research. Before your time. But it was listed in the restricted drug code book. I’d have thought you’d remember. Didn’t you scan it when you were AssDepDirRad?”

  “Well, sure,” he said. “But Nick, there must be a hundred stews in that book."

  A serpent began to stir.

  “Close to it,” I said.

  “Well, there you are,” he said. '‘How is it administered?”

  “No idea,” I said. “I’m telling Wingate right now. Then it’s Bigelow’s migraine.”

  “Oh? He’ll be there?”

  “Of course.”

  “Well, don’t take any kaka from him, Nick. I happen to know his status is fragile.”

  “My son, the pol,” I said.

  Chief Director Michael Wingate and Chief of the Bureau of Public Security R. Sam Bigelow were seated in the dining area of the CD’s office when Penelope Mapes ushered me in. The remains of a meal littered the table. Both ems appeared frayed.

  “Well, Nick?” the Chief Director demanded. “What have you got for us?”

  “Sir," I said, “I had heavy analysis done on specimens sent from the National Epidemiology Center. That outbreak in GPA-11 is caused by a manipulated strain of the botulism bacterium. It’s aerobic. Meaning it can exist in the presence of oxygen.”

  “I don’t believe it,” R. Sam Bigelow said angrily. Frog face going in and out.

  “It’s not important what you believe,” I said. I was, I admit, relieving my growing hostility on him. “It’s operative.”

  “Now see here, you—” he began.

  Wingate raised a hand. Bigelow’s mouth snapped shut. The CD stared at him.

  “Why didn’t Heath know about this?” he said coldly. “More to the point, Sam, why didn’t you know about it?”

  “Listen, Chief,” Bigelow said hotly, “you can’t expect the Bureau’s labs to know about every poison developed by the Department of Bliss.”

  “It wasn’t developed by the Department of Bliss,” I said. “This particular poison was developed by the Department of Peace. In a Phase II alert, ten years ago.”

  “Shit,” Bigelow said disgustedly. “All right. Write it down. We’ll check it out.”

  I looked around for something to write on. Penelope Mapes was at my elbow instantly with pencil and scratchpad. I jotted the name of the bacterium and the code number and slid it across the table to Bigelow.

  “Any cure, Nick?” the Chief Director asked.

  “An antidote? No, sir. Not to my knowledge. The alert was canceled before we went that far.”

  “Shit,” Bigelow repeated. And glowered at me as if I had personally stopped every one of those victims in GPA-11.

  “Then the outbreak is programmed,” Wingate said. No idiot he. “Yes, sir.” I nodded. “No doubt about it.”

  “Any idea how they’re doing it?” the Chief Director asked. “No, sir. Not really. You might have the field investigators check out fiddled cigarettes and cigars. But it’s a very long shot, considering the age-victim numbers. It’s something else. Got to be.”

  “Don’t worry, we’ll find it,” Bigelow grumbled.

&nb
sp; “I’m sure you will,” I said equably. The toadish em bored me. Suddenly the whole fracture bored me. Not half so significant as a soft kiss, in a closed car, on a swift turn, in Central Park.

  “Grace told me you entertained her at lunch in New York,” Michael Wingate said. Walking me to the door. “That was kind of you, Nick.”

  “My profit, sir.”

  “Yes. And thank you for your service on this business. We’ll take it from here.”

  It was late, but I was able to draw wheels from the EOB motor pool. I drove to Chevy Chase slowly. Much had happened in the

  past hour that I wanted to compute. But all I could reckon was my own obsession.

  I estimated her weight at about fifty kilos. All stuff. Wind it up and set it ticking. No different. It was operative that she was comely, but so were millions of other efs and ems. Why she? No great beauty. No great wit. She was simply who she was.

  I drove in a glaze. What bemused me was my chilly sombreness in computing all this. And my total disregard of the possible consequences. Dreaming of her, even doom seemed a profit.

  Z-4

  From an address to a cadre of fourteen-year-old neurophysiologists under accelerated conditioning at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, February fourth, 1999:

  “There was a time when a conditioned obso, expert in his discipline, might spend a lifetime studying Sumerian script. I suggest to you that this was less discipline than self-indulgence! (Laughter)

  “I will not insult your intelligence by calling you the ‘wave of the future.’ I will say only that today, and tomorrow,' your brains are needed. There is vital service to be done, a world to remake, and it is to enlist your aid in remaking that world that I am here tonight.

  “When you leave this hall, you will be given Instox copies of HR-316, a bill to establish a Department of Creative Science in the Public Service, as submitted by the Chief Director to the House of Representatives for debate and approval. We hope!

  “I would like to call your attention to Division III, Section 8 of that bill. It deals with staff organization of the proposed Department. You will find frequent mention of the term ‘omnists. ’ I would like to take a few moments, if I may, to analyze for you what our computing was on this subject, and why we created the term ‘omnist’ to describe the scientist of tomorrow.”