The Black Silent (15 page)

She looked away. "What happened to you?"

Sam didn't answer.

Silent, she looked as though she wanted to hug him but didn't dare.

Removing a pair of black tights from the bag, Sam pulled them on, then reclaimed his jeans. He worked fast, knowing they still had to get to Lattimer's.

She looked at the overall effect of the disguise. "Well, you look almost like a 'she,'"

Haley said. "It's close. Especially with the blond wig. It's your size that's the problem.

Can't disguise that."

Next he shuffled through the bag and found heavy boxing tape and a couple towels.

Taking the towels and putting them on his back all bunched up, he had her apply the tape liberally to hold them in place. Then he once again put on the trench coat and stooped way over drawing his shoulders in.

"You look like a bag lady."

Next he pulled out the dress for Haley that he had borrowed from Rachael and had her put on the dress over her jeans. It fit well and she rolled up her jeans just as Sam had done.

"I hope Ben is at Lattimer's," Haley said.

"Me too."

They exited the rest room and walked away around the back.

As they emerged, a patrol car came around the corner.

Sam was hunched and deliberately turned his face to the car. It was a half hour or so after sunset and nearly pitch black. He could imagine the squint of concentration on the officer's face, the car passing slowly as if making an appearance in a lonely parade. The street was quiet and the buildings without life. The dark clouds had begun wringing themselves out. Misty rain fell along with the big drops and everything was wet, water beading on Sam's stocking cap and running down his face. It poured off the rooftop eaves and gushed out of down spouts. Few cops would get out of their patrol car without cause. There was certainly no point in stopping for a stooped old woman with her daughter.

Sam's leg hurt, but it helped him feign an old woman's walk. In the officer's spotlight and with no other foot traffic, Sam hoped the cop would have little perspective to measure the scale of his bulk. The humped back and the tights and the womanly face hidden behind too much makeup all looked pretty normal. He knew the officer's own expectations would slant the man's perception. After all, they were walking along the street in plain view, moving slowly. What fugitive would do that?

"You're good," Haley whispered. "You're really good."

Lattimer Gibbons lived on the hill on Harrison in the south part of Friday Harbor, only a few minutes' walk. Gibbons's house stood at the far side of a small, circular, concrete drive. The place looked old but in good condition.

They looked up and down the street for any sign of a parked police car. The rain had gone as fast as it came leaving only a dark night and swirling clouds that made the weather uncertain like everything else. Perhaps the clouds would open and allow the islands a little reflected light from the moon.

Haley called Lattimer Gibbons on Sam's cell.

"Are you alone?" she said.

Sam hoped Gibbons would recognize her voice. After a moment she hung up.

"We're on."

"All right. I guess we take a chance."

The driveway was steep; they felt exposed even inside the hedges and so they hurried to the front door, hoping the police were not inside. Quickly Sam removed the towels, the stocking cap, the wig, and dropped his pant legs. After putting the discarded part of the disguise in his duffel bag, he tossed it in the corner on the porch.

Haley knocked while he wiped off as much makeup as he could. A bespectacled man with a neat white mustache opened the door. He appeared fit for his age. Perhaps fifty-five, he had a flat stomach under his starched dress shirt and gray slacks. He wore dress shoes that were carefully shined but well-worn, with deep creases in the leather. Sam supposed the guy would drive a ten-year-old Caddy in mint condition.

Gibbons gave Haley a kiss, while keeping his distance from the drenched clothing, and ushered them inside. "I've been watching the television. They're looking for you."

Sam decided that if Gibbons were Ben's friend, then he was acting strangely serene under the circumstances.

Gibbons's house was meticulously appointed and arranged. Small brass light and coat-hanging fixtures gleamed, as did an antique brass ship's compass on a stand next to a stub wall that partially separated the living room from the entry. It was apparent that Gibbons paid attention to every detail of his life. They hung their coats.

The entryway led to an ornately furnished living room on the left and to a kitchen straight ahead, where Sam glimpsed a large wood-burning stove that was definitely an antique.

"Gibbons, you look really good," Haley said.

"Thank you. Come on in. Get warm." Gibbons led them toward the kitchen.

"We'd love to stay, but we're afraid Frick's trying to steal Ben's work," she said. "It's only a matter of time before he comes here—for Ben or his work. Do you have any idea where Ben is?"

Gibbons just kept walking. "Do I have any idea where he is?" he repeated over his shoulder.

Sam always mistrusted people who repeated a question rather than answering.

As if pondering an answer, Gibbons turned and asked, "You're sure no time for coffee?"

"We are really in a hurry," Haley said. "We don't have time. Do you know where Ben is?"

Sam saw something in his eyes. They glanced quickly and looked especially alert for a man acting so casually. Despite his demeanor, Gibbons was nervous.

"If I talk to you, I won't be charged with helping fugitives?"

"We've committed no crime," Sam said. "You're an accessory to nothing."

"Well," Gibbons said, "I also know nothing—"

"Tell me this," Haley cut in. "What do you know about Ben's research on aging?"

"As far as I know, that was strictly confidential stuff."

"This is Ben's life," she said. "I need you to tell me."

"I would, but he didn't tell me. Look, I know you wouldn't hurt Ben," he said as if rethinking his conclusion. "I'm not trying to make this harder. Really."

"What do you know about the microbe Archaea?" Haley said.

Lattimer's physical response told Sam that he knew plenty.

"Well, let's see. I actually went on a trip with Ben that involved Archaea. Arcs, he calls them for short. Ben wanted to look at mud from the bottom of the Black Sea. He wanted to measure the quantity of Archaea microbes."

"What did you find?" she asked.

"We didn't find mud—it was solid microbes. Solid living mass on the bottom of the ocean."

"What did he do with the microbes?"

"Studied their DNA." Gibbons responded so quickly it sounded rehearsed.

"How did they help Ben understand aging?" Haley tried again.

"I haven't the faintest idea."

"Does he use Arc DNA in any way?"

"I can't imagine that he does," Gibbons said. "But he studied Arc DNA from all over the world."

Sam signaled to Haley by pointing at the papers tucked in his pants.

"Do you have any of Ben's research papers or lab records?" Haley asked.

Lattimer shook his head no, as if he didn't want to actually say the words.

"But, Lattimer, I know you and Ben talked about this kind of stuff. I think you even helped him in his work." Haley tried to soften her voice. "Please tell us."

"You'll have to be more specific." Gibbons wouldn't give up his maddening act.

"Okay," Haley said. "What about long-lived people? Didn't you help Ben study long-lived people?"

"We found a French family. Ben used them."

"Any relation to the family of Madame Jeanne Clement?"

Gibbons smiled. "Very good. You must have been following the subject."

"Let me in on this," Sam said.

"She was the longest-lived person in the world. Died at one hundred twenty-two. She's well-documented. Others are not," Gibbons said. "We didn't use her family. In another family, same region but seemingly no near-term genetic ties, the average age was actually higher, although the eldest was only one hundred eight."

"What exactly did Ben do?" Haley asked. "Did he take DNA from these people?"

"He grew skin fibroblasts."

"So he got their genome. Did he isolate genes?"

"I don't know, and even if I did, I would feel uncomfortable telling. I was sworn to secrecy."

"About what?"

"About everything!"

It seemed to Sam that Gibbons was close to losing his cool.

"He was dead serious about it," Gibbons said. "And excited. I was excited too. Who wouldn't be? Gout, low-back pain, can't pee right, have to do it two times a night, arteries going to hell, moles all over the place, hair growing out my ears." He paused again as if the weight of the world were on his shoulders. He looked at Sam, then at Haley.

"Death lies in the weeds. It's always there when you pass by. As the years overtake you, it creeps ever closer to the path. You start to sense it at first, hiding there, but you brush it off, banish it from your mind; then you start to smell it; eventually you begin to see it; at first just snatches of it as it follows you along. It's a demon. It's the universal truth and the great equalizer. I think of it as black as the blackest silk, and with eyes that shine. As you grow old, it slithers beside you and makes only the slightest rustle like a stalking cat. Death is everywhere, it's in everything, it comes too soon, and it is relentless." He looked up at them as if he'd been having a dream.

Sam looked at Haley. Much passed between them in that glance.

"Lattimer," she said, "you don't look old at all."

"As if it cares."

Haley sighed audibly, frustrated at Gibbons's evasiveness, annoyed that the frustration was getting the better of her. Ben had been at peace with death as much as anyone she knew. He understood the order of things and he had always told her that she could find peace in the inevitable. Death did not slither for Ben. It was ordinary, Mother Nature's tax collector.

Gibbons was a different story entirely. Something was happening that Haley didn't understand, something she did not recognize from her earlier encounters with the man.

Something was happening inside Gibbons.

"Tell me this, then," she began. "You remember your arguments with Ben about the ocean being the lungs of the earth? You thought it would be great to attack the greenhouse effect by fertilizing the plankton in the ocean with iron particles in order to increase photosynthesis."

"Mm-hmm. I've been following that. It's not working very well. Seems that not enough sequestered carbons actually make it into the bottom sediments to be stored, which is the whole idea."

"Do you still have the articles?"

"They're over here."

Gibbons walked into the living room and pulled a binder off a shelf. He paused for a moment.

"I thought you didn't have anything," Sam said.

"I forgot about these."

Another three-ring volume stood beside it.

"What's this binder?" Sam asked.

"Things I was involved with for Ben," said Gibbons. "I wouldn't call them research papers."

"I see the word
ARCLES,"
Sam said. "What does that mean? I assume it has to do with Archaea."

"I have no idea." Gibbons stiffened at Sam's questioning.

Haley gave it a try. "These are in your house, all bound up, you've obviously looked at them, and you really have no idea?"

"None."

"These are all the materials you have?" she asked.

"Please understand," Gibbons said. "I can't betray Ben's confidence."

"Oh baloney!" Haley cried. "His life is in danger. Stop screwing around!"

Gibbons set down the binder and sat on a window seat. "All right. Ben deliberately spread his research materials around. He didn't want them all in one place. For safety, you see."

Sam and Haley nodded.

"So I got this binder. It's part genetic work and part microbe work. It's all related."

"Related how, exactly?" she asked.

"Ben never told anybody, so how could I tell you?"

Sam stepped forward. "We want to take the volumes."

"I'm not big enough to stop you." Gibbons handed them over.

"You have more," Haley said. "Ben said you did."

"I don't understand."

"What don't you understand?" she said, her voice rising again. "We want the other binders. He said you have them hidden and that you'd give them to me."

"He didn't tell you that," Gibbons snapped.

"You can level with us," Sam said, "or you can tell your story to Frick. We've seen him in action. He doesn't take no for an answer."

Gibbons shrugged like a petulant child.

Sam picked up Gibbons's telephone and dialed a longdistance number, then put it to Gibbons's ear.

"Federal Bureau of Investigation."

"Agent Chase, for Ernie Sanders, please," Sam said into the mouthpiece.

"Hang up," Gibbons said. "I want nothing to do with this. It was all Ben's doing."

A
s tough as she was, Haley had looked worried when he placed a call to Ernie. Sam made a mental note to ask her why.

"What
was
Ben doing? The experiments. Aging."

Gibbons pursed his lips, as if holding them together would keep him safe. "I'm not telling you a thing, and really I don't know much, anyway."

"Just give us the rest of the documents," Haley said, "and I promise we'll leave."

"Ben really told you that I had other documents?" asked Gibbons. "Because I don't know what he's talking about."

Sam picked up the phone again.

"Wait. There were some . . . irrelevant things."

"Get them," Sam said. "We all need to leave this place."

"I'll get the papers." Gibbons started up the stairs.

As he did, the doorbell rang. Sam saw a large figure through the curtains. Loud knocking followed.

"Go out the back door and hide," Sam told Haley as he moved to the stairs. With his bad leg he had to avoid the temptation to try to climb them too quickly. At the top of the stairs came the second-floor landing; then the stairs continued. Gibbons was moving more rapidly than Sam.