Last Gasp (9 page)

“It isn’t dull at all,” Jill said reprovingly. “Why do you pretend it is?”

“Do I?” Chase shrugged. He swirled his whiskey, making the ice cubes clink. “I suppose it’s because most people never give a second thought to the way the biosphere works. They just take it for granted. They don’t understand that the whole bag of tricks depends on microscopic plant life, so when you start talking about it they just turn glassy-eyed and drop into a doze. You have to be a genius like David Attenborough to make them see and understand.”

“What about Sir Frederick Cole?”

“What about him?”

“You’ve heard of him, I take it?”

There was a gleam in her brown eyes and an underlying hint of mockery in her tone, as if it were his turn to be patronized. He chided himself for taking Jill at his own estimation—a shallow media person, all mouth and trousers—when clearly she had more up top.

“He was one of my lecturers at Cambridge. We used to call him ’Firebrand Fred.’ ”

“You actually know him then? He’s coming into the studio next week to give a talk for a schools program. We’re taping it next Wednesday afternoon and I’m the gofer.”

“I should think he’d be rather good on the telly,” Chase said, thinking about it. “Blunt northern humor, straight from the shoulder. An instant TV guru.”

Jill laughed. “We’ve made him buy a new suit. He turned up at the office wearing a pullover with holes in it and the crotch of his trousers somewhere level with his kneecaps. If I hadn’t met him at the station I don’t think the doorman would have let him into the building. ‘Firebrand Fred,’ ” she said, giggling. “That suits him. I’ll call him that next time I see him.”

“Feel free,” Chase said darkly, “but don’t mention my name. What’s he going to be talking about?”

“It’s one of a series of programs dealing with different aspects of aquatic life in English lakes and rivers. How plants and animals adapt to their particular environments. I wasn’t involved in the filming, just the linking sequences in the studio.”

It occurred to Chase that if he wanted to pick someone’s brains about C0
₂
absorption in seawater, he couldn’t do better than Sir Fred. He’d earned his knighthood for impressive research work in the sixties and early seventies and was still regarded as one of the top three people in the field, even though he’d given up the lab bench for the lecture platform.

“Would it be possible to meet him while he’s here?”

“Yes, I don’t see why not.” Jill gave a slow, lingering wink. “You could meet me at the same time. Why not come to the studio on Wednesday? I’m sure Firebrand would be delighted to meet one of his old students.”

“What time?”

“He’ll be arriving about one and will probably have lunch in the canteen. We’re in the studio at two-thirty and we’ll be through by four or soon after. After would be better, I think. He’ll be fidgeting with notes and things before the recording.”

“Late afternoon suits me better too,” Chase said.

“What is it, something to do with your work? Or a reunion?”

“More of a general problem really.” Chase stroked his jaw. “A small matter of marine chemistry.”

Jill pointed at his empty glass. “That looks like a small matter of alcohol deficiency. Can I get you another?”

Chase thanked her in advance and gave up his glass. Angie strolled up, her long hollow cheeks flushed, arms linked with Archie Grieve. He wondered again about her fidelity, or lack of it. Or was he being provincial and boorish? He suspected that Jill had been making gentle fun of him and was surprised to find that he rather enjoyed it.

“I’m just about to get Gavin some more of our excellent Scotch,” Jill said, kissing Archie on the cheek. “Won’t be a minute.” She gave Chase an amused glance over her shoulder and went off.

Chase smiled ruefully. Had she got the dig about Glaswegian spot-welders? He looked at Angie, still hanging on Archie’s arm, rather unsteadily, and at the drink in her hand, which fuzzed and sparkled.

“What’s that?”

“Champers, darling!” Angie exclaimed. “Like some?”

Chase shook his head, feeling a little woozy himself. Noticing how the reflected sparkle made tiny dancing highlights on the underside of her chin. Remembering too that what gave champagne its fizz were bubbles of carbon dioxide suddenly released into the atmosphere.

The blond secretary with the silver claws reacted visibly when he appeared in front of her desk. Most of the men who passed through her office on their way to see the deputy director of the World Oceanographic Data Center were conservatively dressed in dark business suits, crisp shirts, and polished shoes. A few of the younger ones, it was true, wore open-necked shirts, sports jackets, and slacks, but here was somebody in his sixties who looked for all the world like a beachcomber down on his luck.

She half-rose in alarm, appraising with distaste the dingy crumpled T-shirt under the cord jacket with torn pockets whose peculiar shade of green might almost be mildew (she looked closely and saw that it was mildew), the creased, dirty-white twill trousers with ragged bottoms, the sneakers without laces, which might have been, many moons ago, white. And no socks!

Quite stunned by this apparition in the sanctity of her Washington office on an otherwise unremarkable Tuesday morning, Ms. Weston could only stare speechlessly, and it was left to Theo Detrick to introduce himself. In his soft guttural accent, a remnant of his German ancestry, he reminded her of his appointment with Dr. Parris Winthrop, the deputy director.

“You—you are Dr. Detrick?”

“That is correct,” he said patiently.

Parris Winthrop was less taken aback than amused. “Theo, marvelous to see you!” he enthused, striding around his huge walnut desk to greet him. He towered over Theo, clad in a dark-gray suit with a matching tie flecked with pale yellow. “You look wonderful! But what the hell are you wearing?”

“What I always wear.” Theo swapped his bulging briefcase with the broken clasp from right to left in order to shake hands. “Macy’s haven’t got around to opening a store on Canton Island as yet.”

Winthrop patted his shoulder, genuine pleasure on his broad, ruddy, well-fed face, and indicated a leather armchair. “Like something to drink?”

“Coffee, black, will be fine.”

“I was thinking of something with a bit more bite. Don’t tell me you’ve become Spartan in everything,” Winthrop said jovially.

“I like to keep a clear head during the day. ” Theo sat back holding the briefcase flat on his knees with both hands. It was worn and scratched and some of the stitching had come adrift.

“Coffee it is then.” Winthrop smiled and leaned across the desk to press the intercom tab. A gold signet ring flashed on his little finger. Having given the order he offered cigarettes from an ornate silver casket, which Theo declined, and then lit one himself with the onyx desk lighter.

The white-haired scientist let his eyes roam around the spacious office. Slats of sunlight from the Venetian blinds imprinted gold bars on the thick carpet. Parris had every reason to be expansive and highly pleased both
with
the world and himself. He had climbed high on the ladder since their student days at McGill. Both had come from poor homes and nonintellectual backgrounds, both had finished top in their respective subjects. Then Parris had had the good fortune to receive a Traveling Fellowship, which he chose to spend at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institut in Dresden. While Theo had doggedly embarked on the long hard slog of—in those days—underpaid research in small laboratories up and down the country, Parris had been given the luxury of several prestigious options, including the post of director of the Pacific Fisheries Experimental Station, then based in Hawaii.

After that it was plain sailing. Or maybe it wasn’t, Theo considered, knowing how the outward show of a person’s life was often misleading.

Perhaps Parris had struggled and fought as much as the next man, the difference being that he had taken his chances, had had the good sense to stay near the center of influence. A string of administrative appointments had eventually led to this post and this office: deputy director of a world-renowned and respected scientific establishment. And next year, or sometime soon, the director, top of the heap.

From Theo Detrick’s point of view, however, the prestige was of less importance than the fact that Parris was on PSAC. The President’s Scientific Advisory Committee.

“When was it, three, four years ago?” Winthrop said. He snapped his lean fingers. “Dedication ceremony at Scripps for the physical oceanography annex. Right?”

Theo nodded. “You’d just been appointed deputy director here.”

“And I met your daughter there. She was at Scripps, taking her Ph.D. Where is she now?”

“Still there, doing postgraduate work. According to her last letter.”

“Haven’t you seen her recently?”

“Not for over a year.” Theo examined his brown grizzled hands. “I don’t get to the States very often. On this trip I shipped into San Francisco and flew directly here.”

Winthrop waited a moment. Whatever had brought his old friend seven thousand miles, it wasn’t merely to pay a social call. “I guess it must be pretty important then.”

“I think so.” Theo cleared his throat and opened the one remaining clasp on his briefcase. He carefully extracted a thick stack of papers loosely contained between stiff covers and tied together with black tape. It was bulky enough to require both hands as he placed it on the gleaming expanse of desk. “My research,” he said quietly.

Winthrop looked at it and then at Theo. “Over how long?”

Theo stared beyond him to the Venetian blinds, lost in speculation. He blinked slowly and said, “Altogether, twenty years. Most of it is over the last ten years, as regards actual conclusions. But the records are complete since 1970.” There was no smugness or boasting; it was a statement of fact. “I’d like you to study it, if you would, and then we can see the president together.”

A corrugation of V-shaped lines appeared below the deputy director’s silvery widow’s peak. He looked at the heap of soiled documentation in its dog-eared covers despoiling his beautiful desk and then regarded Theo blankly.

“I don’t understand. The president?”

“You’re still a member of the advisory committee?”

Winthrop nodded, a little more warily now.

Ms. Weston tapped and entered discreetly, leaving a tray with coffee. Theo waited until she had gone.

“That’s the reason I came to see you. I don’t know of any other way, except through you, Parris, with your help.”

“Now you don’t understand me. What I meant was,
why
do you have to see him? About what?”

Theo’s expression was calm, stoical. His clear blue eyes, the color of a washed sky, showed no emotion as he said, “We are in danger of running out of oxygen. The amount in the atmosphere will decline by the year 2000—possibly after that, I’m not certain when exactly—but it will certainly fall below the level capable of supporting life on this planet. All animal life, that is, including man.” His square brown hand made a delicate gesture toward the heap of paper. “The evidence is all there. Records over twenty years of the decline in the phytoplankton index, which is continuing at a steadily increasing rate.”

“Theo, old man,” Winthrop said faintly. “Do you seriously expect me to tell the president that the world is about to perish through asphyxiation?”

“No,” Theo corrected him at once. “I want you to arrange a meeting so that I can tell him. That is why I’m here, why I came in person. This is my task, my responsibility, Parris, not yours.”

Winthrop’s healthy, urbane face had frozen into a mask of pained unease. He’d read what isolation could do to the mind. Was he seeing it at first hand in the ragged figure who sat before him? With an effort he tried to clear his mind and concentrate on what Theo was saying.

“I’m not asking you to take my word alone. If I were, I’d be as mad as you’re beginning to think I am. What I ask is that you consider this information objectively, as a scientist, and draw your own conclusions.”

“Which you believe will be the same as yours.”

“If you’re honest and consider the data without prejudice, yes,” Theo told him frankly. “It’s all there in the records. I don’t have to convince you; study them and you’ll see.”

“The evidence is completely incontrovertible?”

“Yes.”

“Then why not publish it?”

Theo smiled, his head craggy and solid as a carving in the filtered light. “I intend to, but I know it will be seen by many people as yet another doomsday prophecy. Another fanciful way for the world to end.” He clenched his fist and leaned forward. “What I need—must have—is the support of an organization such as yours and, ultimately, the support of the president. Only then will people begin to listen and take the threat seriously.”

“But is it as serious as you make out, Theo?” Winthrop asked bluntly. “You’ve taken readings from a specific fixed location, remember. I’ve seen a number of recent reports on phytoplankton growth in the Atlantic, and while it’s true that there
has
been a decline north of fifty-nine degrees north, there’s actually been an increase in southern latitudes. As you know better than anyone, Theo, the phytoplankton population is subject to cyclical change and seasonal variation. How do you know that what you’ve been observing isn’t simply a local phenomenon, confined to the equatorial Pacific?”

“Fair point,” Theo said, helping himself to coffee. He stirred in a spoonful of sugar, sipped, and nodded appreciatively. “I’ve been used to instant.” He took another sip and said, “I chose Canton Island as my base because it lies in the ten-degree belt where cold-water upwelling takes place for most of the year. This provides the ideal conditions for abundant growth of microorganisms—in the first place because the water rising from two- to three-hundred-meter depths is rich in nutrients; and, second, because phytoplankton thrives in cooler water. Also, phytoplankton cannot grow at extreme depths because of insufficient light, which blocks photosynthesis. But given all these conditions—ample sunlight, cooler water, and plenty of nutrients—it should bloom copiously. And that’s precisely what isn’t happening.” Winthrop twisted the signet ring, working it around and around, his face somber. “What you’re saying is that if the phytoplankton is declining in the ocean around Canton Island, where conditions are the most favorable, then the situation must be the same if not worse elsewhere in the world.”