Doug felt a little foolish, pouring quarters into a pay phone beside a back road Shell gasoline station. How much the world had changed in only a few years. The digital revolution a dead before was still stumbling, pulling the world into an addiction to technology. Like any technology it came with its good and it’s bad. The Stone Age gave man the flint and the arrow to hunt with, but also the first weapons of war. The wheel helped carry man across the planet, while giving rise to the chariot. The pay phone felt like a throwback to another age, and yet it allowed him to evade the ever-tightening matrix by which anyone could be watched or monitored at any time and in any place.
The air was cool, but not cold. A brisk wind chases fat gray clods through a mostly blue sky. Molly was inside getting them coffee and something for breakfast. Doug dialed the one number of the only man he could trust to help them. Arnie Hamlin picked up almost immediately. Doug looked around to be sure no one else was near.
Interested in talking with the most wanted man in America?” he said.
“Jesus, Doug! What the hell is going on?”
“The less you know right now the better.”
“The whole damn world is looking for you.”
“Still golf with the Attorney general?”
“What are you into?”
“Tell him that I contacted you, and I’m prepared to discuss terms of my surrender in the next forty-eight hours, but I need protection for me and a friend.”
“Doug, I…”
Molly came out of the station with coffee and rolls. She wore a pair of cheap sunglasses she’d purchased as well. They did little to hide the dark bruise covering the side of her pretty face. Doug took a coffee. He felt enlivened almost by the bitter-warm scent steaming up from the Styrofoam cup.
Arnie, listen to me. Put someone on Shosa Industries and First Thrust.”
“What am I looking for?”
Anything. Everything.” His eyes found Molly’s behind the sunglasses. She touched his arm, stroking it reassuringly. “Check background on the company, political connections, and any details about their Nano-weapons research.”
“Give me a hint?”
“I think we’re going to war over a lie.”
“Doug, I can’t be a party to any crimes. I won’t do anything to jeopardize this paper. Just so we’re clear on that.”
“Arnie, I swear that I haven’t broken any laws, except where I had to protect my family. Let me ask you this. Ever known me to beg?”
“Never,” said Hamlin.
“Well, I’m begging.”
There was a long pause, as wide as a canyon, and every bit as deadly if Doug took a wrong step along a cliff’s edge.
“”I’ll give you twenty-four hours,” Hamlin said gravely. “The president is addressing the nation tomorrow night. The Iranians have broken off all contact. The word is he’s giving them an ultimatum. “
The news hit Doug like a sledgehammer. Could he stop a war in time? It seemed all but certain now. So what was there to fight for now, but the girls? Doug pressed his forehead to the polished steel cover around the telephone and leaned heavily against it. He kicked at some stones and pursed his lips.
Doug stood straight, suddenly filled with a greater determination. Later he would recall that it seemed holy, as if something pure and perfect had seized him and urged him on, like sunlight washing over a darkened field of grass, like a pure rush of wind or a cool drink in the desert. At once Doug knew what he must do.
“I want a Press Conference tomorrow on the steps of First Thrust. I need some heavy weights there, but I need this kept a secret until then. Can you do it?”
“I’ll do what I can,” said Hamlin. “My sister-in-law’s son teaches at Northwestern. Purvich, is his name. He’ll be expecting you. One shot here, Doug.”
Doug took a deep breath and felt the full weight of all this. He looked to Molly and found inspiration there. “Hopefully, that’s all I’ll need.”
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment