Текст книги "Gideon's Corpse"

Автор книги: Lincoln Child

Соавторы: Douglas Preston
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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 24 страниц)

9

During what promised to be a long crosstown ride to Little West 12th Street, in gridlock traffic, Garza said nothing, his eyes straight ahead, concentrating on driving. The nighttime streets of New York were their usual blaze of light, action, noise, and bustle. Gideon could feel the man’s dislike of him radiating from his face and body language. Gideon didn’t care. The silence let him prepare for what he was sure was going to be an unpleasant confrontation. He had a pretty good idea of what Glinn would want now.

When Gideon was twelve, he had witnessed his father gunned down by FBI snipers. His father had been a civilian cryptologist working for INSCOM, the United States Army Intelligence and Security Command, and had been involved with the group that developed codes. The Soviets broke one of those codes only four months after it was introduced, and twenty-six operatives and double agents had been rolled up in a single night, all tortured and killed. It was one of the worst intelligence disasters of the Cold War. They had said it was his father’s fault. His father had always suffered from depression, and under the pressure of the accusations and investigations he broke down, took a hostage, and was shot and killed in the doorway of Arlington Hall Station—after he had surrendered.

Gideon had witnessed the entire thing.

In the years following, Gideon’s life had gone off the rails. His mother began drinking. A succession of men came and went from the house. They moved from town to town, following one broken relationship or school expulsion after another. As his father’s money had dwindled, they lived in houses, then apartments, trailers, motel rooms, and boardinghouses. His strongest memory of his mother during those years was of her sitting at the kitchen table, glass of Chardonnay in her hand, cigarette smoke curling about her raddled face with its thousand-yard stare, Chopin’s Nocturnes playing in the background.

Gideon was an outsider and he developed a loner’s interests: math, music, art, and reading. One of their moves—he was seventeen at the time—had brought them to Laramie, Wyoming. One day, he’d gone into the local historical society and spent the day, killing time instead of going to school. Nobody would find him—who’d think of looking there? Occupying an old Victorian house, the historical society was a dusty warren of rooms with dark corners, packed with memorabilia and Western bric-a-brac—six-shooters that killed famous outlaws nobody had ever heard of; Indian artifacts; pioneer curios; rusty spurs; bowie knives; and a miscellany of paintings and drawings.

He found refuge in a room in the back where he could read. After a while his attention was attracted by a small woodblock print, one of many badly hung prints wedged uncomfortably along a wall. It was by an artist he had never heard of, Gustave Baumann, and it was called Three Pines. A simple composition, with three small, straggly trees, growing on a barren ridge. But somehow, the more he stared at the print, the more it drew him in; the more remarkable, even miraculous, it became. The artist had managed to imbue those three pines with a sense of dignity, of worth, of essential treeness.

The back room at the historical society became his refuge. They never figured out where he was. He could even strum his guitar and the deaf old lady who dozed at the admissions desk never noticed. He didn’t know how or why, but over time Gideon fell in love with those snaggle-toothed trees.

And then his mother lost her job and they were going to have to move again. Gideon hated to say good-bye to the print. He couldn’t imagine never seeing it again.

And so he stole it.

It turned out to be one of the most thrilling things he’d ever done. And it had been so easy. A few casual questions revealed that the historical society had virtually no security, and its set of dusty accession catalogs was never checked. So one bitterly cold winter’s day he walked in with a small screwdriver in his back pocket, removed the print from the wall, and put it under his coat. Then, before leaving, he wiped down the wall the print had been hung on to get rid of the dust mark, shifted two other prints to cover up the screw holes and obscure the gap. The entire process took five minutes, and when he was done nobody would even know a print was missing. It was, truly, a perfect crime. And Gideon told himself it was justified—nobody loved the print, nobody saw the print, nobody even looked at it, and the historical society was letting it rot in a dark corner. He felt virtuous, like a father adopting an unloved, orphaned child.

But what a delicious thrill it had been. A physical sensation. For the first time in years he felt alive, his heart pounding, his senses razor-keen. Colors seemed brighter; the world looked different—at least for a while.

He hung the print above the bed in his new room in Stockport, Ohio, and his mother never noticed it, never remarked on it.

He was sure the print was almost worthless. A few months later, browsing through various auction catalogs, he discovered it had a value of six to seven thousand dollars. At the time his mother was in desperate need of rent, and he considered selling it. But he couldn’t imagine parting with it.

But by that time he needed another thrill. Another fix.

So he began to haunt the nearby Muskingum Historical Site, where they had a small collection of etchings, engravings, and watercolors. He picked out one of his favorites, a lithograph by John Steuart Curry called The Plainsman, and stole it.

Piece of cake.

It came from an edition of two hundred fifty, and so was untraceable and thus easy to sell on the legitimate market. The World Wide Web was just coming into being, which made it all so much easier and anonymous. He got eight hundred dollars for the print—and his career as a small-time historical society and art museum thief was launched. His mother never had to worry about rent again. Gideon made up vague stories about odd jobs and helping after school, and she was too addled and desperate to question where the money was really coming from.

He stole for money. He stole because he loved certain specific pictures. But most of all, he stole for the thrill. It created a high like nothing else, a feeling of self-worth, of floating above the hidebound, mindless, and blinkered masses.

He knew these were not worthy feelings, but the world was a messed-up place, so why not step outside the rules? He hurt nobody. He was like Robin Hood, lifting unappreciated works of art and putting them in the hands of people who truly loved them. He went on to college, soon dropped out, moved to California, and ultimately devoted himself full-time to visiting small museums, libraries, and historical societies, selling what he had to and keeping the rest.

And then he got the call. His mother was dying in a DC hospital. He went to her side. And on her deathbed she told him the story: of how his father hadn’t been responsible for the cryptological security breakdown, after all. Just the opposite: he had pointed out the flaws and been ignored. And then, when it went bad, they’d made him the fall guy, framed by the general in charge of the project—the same general who ordered that he be shot in the act of surrendering.

His father had been scapegoated. And then murdered.

When he learned this, Gideon’s life was transformed. For the first time he had a real goal, a worthwhile goal. He cleaned up his act, went back to college, got a doctorate in physics, and went to work at Los Alamos. But all the time, in the background, like the drone note of a bagpipe, he’d carried on a search: a search for the evidence he needed to clear his father’s name and wreak vengeance on the general who had murdered him.

It had taken years, but in the end he’d found what he’d needed—and he had taken his revenge. The general was now dead, his own father vindicated.

Yet it was no good: revenge didn’t bring people back to life, or retrieve ruined and wasted years. Still, he had his life ahead of him, and was determined to make the most of it.

Then, shortly afterward—little more than a month back—the supreme catastrophe had occurred. Gideon had been told he had a condition known by the picturesque name of a vein of Galen aneurysmal malformation. It was an abnormal tangle of arteries and veins deep in the brain. It was inoperable, there was no treatment, and it would kill him within a year.

Or at least, that’s what he’d been told. By Eli Glinn—the man who had given him his first assignment as an operative.

He allegedly had one year to live. And now, as Garza and he crawled through New York gridlock toward the Effective Engineering Solutions headquarters, Gideon had no doubt that Glinn, once again, wanted to take a chunk of that year away from him: convince him to take on another operation for EES. He wasn’t sure how Glinn would do it, but he was pretty sure it was connected to what had just happened with Chalker.

As the car turned onto Little West 12th Street, Gideon steeled himself for the confrontation. He would be cool, but firm. He would keep his dignity. He would not engage. And if all that failed, he’d simply tell Glinn to go fuck himself and walk out.

10

It was midnight as they entered EES headquarters. The hushed confines seemed to swallow Gideon in cool white spaces. Even at the late hour, technicians moved about among the strange models, layouts, and tables covered with shrouded and mysterious equipment. He followed Garza to the elevator, which delivered them at a glacial pace to the top floor. A moment later he was standing in the same Zen-like conference room, Glinn seated in his wheelchair at the head of the vast bubinga wood table. The window he had stood by earlier that day now had its blinds drawn.

Gideon felt exhausted, gutted and cleaned like a fish. He was surprised and a little irritated to find Glinn uncharacteristically animated.

“Coffee?” Glinn asked. His good eye was fairly sparkling.

“Yes.” Gideon collapsed into a chair.

Garza left with a frown, and returned with a mug. Gideon dumped in cream and sugar and drank it down like a glass of water.

“I have good news and bad news,” said Glinn.

Gideon waited.

“The good news is that your exposure to radiation was exceedingly minor. According to the tables, it will increase your chances of dying from cancer by less than one percent over the next twenty years.”

Gideon had to laugh at the irony of this. His voice echoed in the empty room. No one else joined in.

“The bad news is that we suddenly face a national emergency of the highest order. Reed Chalker was irradiated in what seems to have been a criticality event involving a mass of fissile material. He was affected by a combination of alpha particles and gamma rays from a source that appears to be highly enriched, bomb-grade U-235. The dose was in the range of eighty grays, or eight thousand rads. A massive, massivedose.”

Gideon sat up. That was astonishing.

“Yes. The amount of fissile material capable of causing such an event would be at least ten kilograms. Which just happens to be more than enough uranium for a substantial nuclear weapon.”

Gideon took this in. It was worse than he had imagined.

Glinn paused, then went on. “It seems clear that Chalker was involved in preparing a terrorist attack with a nuclear device. During these preparations, something went wrong and the uranium went critical. Chalker was irradiated. It also appears likely to our experts that the remaining terrorists spirited off the bomb, leaving Chalker to die. But he didn’t die right away—radiation poisoning doesn’t work like that. He went insane and in his confusion took hostages. And here we are.”

“Have you found wherehe was preparing the bomb?”

“That’s the highest priority now. It can’t be too far from his apartment in Sunnyside, because it seems he returned there on foot. We’re flying radiation monitors over the city and any moment we’ll have a hit, since a criticality event like this would leave a minor plume of radiation—with a characteristic signature.”

Glinn almost rubbed his hands together. “We’re in on the ground floor, Gideon. You were there. You knew Chalker—”

“No,” said Gideon. Now it was time to get up. He rose.

“Hear me out. You’re the man for this job, no doubt about it. This isn’t undercover. You’ll go in as yourself—”

“I said no.”

“You’ll partner with Fordyce. It is an unavoidable requirement of the assignment, imposed by the National Nuclear Security Administration. But you’ll be given a broad investigative mandate.”

“Absolutely not.”

“You only need to pretend to work with Fordyce. In reality you’ll be a lone operator, beholden to no one, working outside the normal rules of law enforcement.”

“I already did what you wanted,” said Gideon. “In case you didn’t notice, I fucked it up and three people were shot. And now I’m going home.”

“You didn’t make a mistake and you can’t go home. We’ve got days, maybe hours. Gideon– millions of lives are at stake. Here’s the address you need to go to first.” He shoved a piece of paper at Gideon. “Now get going, Fordyce is expecting you.”

“Fuck you. I really mean that. Fuck you.”

“You’ve got to hurry. There’s no time.” Glinn paused. “Don’t you think you should do something more worthwhile with the months you have left than just go fishing?”

“I’ve been thinking about that. All that talk of my dying, of my terminal disease. You’re the biggest bullshit artist I’ve ever met—for all I know, this could just be another patented Eli Glinn lie. How do I know those X-rays were mine, anyway? The name was cut out.”

Glinn shook his head. “In your heart you know I’m telling the truth.”

Gideon flushed with anger. “Look. What could I possibly do to help? They’ve got the NYPD, FBI, this NEST group, ATF, CIA, and I’m sure any number of black agencies in on this. I’m telling you, I’m going home.”

“That is preciselythe problem.” Glinn raised his voice, angry himself. His crippled claw smacked the tabletop. “The response is over the top. It’s so unwieldy that our psychoengineering calculations show they’ll never stop the attack. It’ll be investigative gridlock.”

“Psychoengineering calculations,” Gideon repeated sarcastically. “What a crock.” He finally started for the door. Garza blocked his path with a faint curl of contempt on his lips.

“Get out of my way.”

There was a brief standoff, then Glinn said, “Manuel, let him go.”

Garza stepped aside with insolent slowness.

“When you go out on the street,” said Glinn, “do me one favor: look at the faces of the people around you and think about how their lives are going to change. Forever.”

Gideon didn’t even wait to hear the rest. He rushed out the door, crushed his finger against the elevator button, and took it down to the first floor, cursing its slowness. When the doors opened he ran across the vast workroom, through the sets of doors, and down the hall; the front door opened electronically as he approached.

Once outside, he jogged down the street to a boutique hotel, where a line of cabs were standing. Screw his luggage. He would go to the airport, get back to New Mexico, hole up in his cabin until this whole thing was over. He had done enough damage. He grasped the handle of the cab and opened the door, hesitating a moment as he looked at the crowds of trendy people going in and out of the hotel. He recalled Glinn’s advice. He found the people he saw repulsive. He didn’t care how their lives might change. Let them all die. He might well be living with death; why not them, too?

That was his answer to Glinn.

Suddenly he felt himself shoved aside and a drunk man in a tuxedo barged past him, stealing his cab. The man slammed the door, leaned out the window with a grin of triumph, exhaling martini fumes. “Sorry, pal, he who hesitates… Have a nice trip back to Des Moines.”

With a raucous laugh from its passenger, the cab pulled away and Gideon stood there, shocked.

How their lives are going to change.Glinn’s words echoed again in his mind. Was this world, those people, that man, worth saving? Somehow, the very loutishness of the man hit home in a way no random kindness from a stranger would have. The man would wake up the next morning and no doubt regale his friends on the trading floor about the out-of-town dickhead who didn’t know how to commandeer a New York City cab. Good. Fuck him. More proof they were not worth saving. Gideon would retreat to his cabin in the Jemez Mountains and let these assholes fend for themselves…

But as this thought ran through his mind, he faltered. Who was he to judge? The world was made up of all kinds of people. If he fled to his cabin and New York was taken out by a nuke, where would that leave him? Was it his responsibility? No. But by running away, he would have still put himself lower than that tuxedoed scumbag by orders of magnitude.

Whether he had eleven months or fifty years, it would be a long and lonely space of time in which he would never, ever forgive himself.

For a long, furious moment he hesitated. And then, boiling with rage and frustration, he turned and retraced his steps down Little West 12th Street to the anonymous door of Effective Engineering Solutions, Inc. It opened as he approached, as if Glinn were expecting him.

11

Chalker’s body lay on a porcelain gurney encased in a large glass cube, like an offering to some high-tech god. The corpse had been autopsied and was splayed open, a riot of red among gray steel, glass, and chrome, various organs arrayed around it—the heart, liver, stomach, and other body parts Gideon did not recognize and didn’t want to recognize. There was something uniquely unsettling about seeing the guts of someone you’d known personally—it wasn’t just another image on the evening news.

Chalker’s personal effects were arranged on a table next to the body: his clothes, wallet, keys, belt, credit cards, papers, change, ticket stubs, Kleenex, and various other items—all tagged. All, evidently, radioactive.

At a console, medical personnel and technicians were operating a set of eight robotic arms inside the glass cube, each one of which terminated in a different set of grisly-looking dissecting instruments—bone chisels, shears, mallets, forceps, knives, skullbreakers, spreaders, and other tools of cadaveritude. Despite the highly dissected condition of the body, the work was still progressing.

“Lucky thing,” said Fordyce, removing his notebook. “We didn’t miss the autopsy completely.”

“Funny, I was thinking just the opposite,” said Gideon.

Fordyce glanced at him and rolled his eyes.

Gideon heard a whirring sound. One of the robotic arms, which terminated in a circular saw, began to move, the blade spinning up to a high-pitched whine. As the technicians murmured into headsets, the blade lowered toward Chalker’s skull. “Torquemada would have loved this stuff,” Gideon said.

“Looks like we’re just in time for the removal of the brain,” Fordyce said, licking his finger and turning the pages of his notebook to find a blank one.

The whine became muffled as the saw sank into Chalker’s forehead. A dark liquid began running into the drain along the edge of the gurney. Gideon turned away, pretending to examine some papers in his briefcase. At least, he thought, there was no smell.

“Agent Fordyce? Dr. Crew?”

Gideon glanced over to see a technician with big glasses, a ponytail, and a clipboard, standing beside them expectantly.

“Dr. Dart will see you in his office now.”

With a feeling of relief, Gideon followed the technician toward a cubicle at the far end of the high-tech area. Fordyce went along, grumbling about being taken away from the autopsy. They entered a spartan space no more than nine by twelve feet. Dart himself was sitting behind a small desk covered with heavy, squared stacks of folders. He rose and offered his hand, first to Fordyce, then to Gideon.

“Please sit down.”

They took seats in folding chairs set up in front of the desk. Dart spent a moment organizing some already-organized papers. He had a face that did little to conceal the bones of the skull underneath; his eyes, full of vitality, were so deeply set that they gleamed out of two pools of darkness. At Los Alamos he had been a bit of a legend, a rather humorless geek physicist with a doctorate from CalTech who was unexpectedly a decorated soldier—a most unusual combination—having won two Silver Stars and a Purple Heart in action in Desert Storm.

Dart finished organizing the papers and looked up. “This is a pretty unusual portfolio they’ve given you two.”

Fordyce nodded.

“As commander of NEST,” Dart went on, “I’ve already thoroughly briefed the FBI. But I see they want you to have a little extra.”

Gideon said nothing. He had no intention of taking the lead. That’s what Fordyce was there for: to run interference, take the heat, and, if necessary, present his ass for kicking. Gideon intended to lie low.

“We’re an independent team,” said Fordyce. “We appreciate you giving us this private briefing, sir.” His voice was mild, nonconfrontational. Here was a man who knew how the game was played.

Dart’s eyes swiveled to Gideon. “And I’ve been told you’ve been hired by a private contractor whose identity is classified.”

Gideon nodded.

“I thought I recognized you. We worked together at Los Alamos. How did you happen to get from there to here?”

“It’s a long story. I’m on an extended vacation from the lab.”

“You were on the Stockpile Stewardship Team, as I recollect. Same as Chalker.” This little fact hung in the air. It was hard for Gideon to gauge how much Dart knew or what he thought about it.

“You were in on the incident,” Dart continued.

“They brought me in to try to talk him down…but it didn’t work out.” Gideon felt his face flush.

Dart seemed to sense the awkwardness. He waved his hand. “I’m sorry about that. It must have been tough. They tell me you saved the two kids.”

Gideon didn’t answer. He felt the flush deepen.

“All right, moving on.” Dart opened a file and shuffled more papers. Fordyce had his notebook out and ready. Gideon chose to take no notes; he had discovered in graduate school that note taking interfered with his ability to assemble the big picture in his mind.

Dart spoke rapidly while looking at the papers in front of him. “The autopsy and analysis of the personal effects of Chalker are not finished, but we have preliminary results.”

Fordyce began scribbling.

“Nuclear spectroscopy from swipes of Chalker’s hands and neutron activation tests showed conclusively that there were traces of highly enriched uranium 235 on his palms and fingers. He’d handled it in the past twenty-four hours. Chalker’s clothes were contaminated with absorbed and adsorbed radioactive isotopes, including cerium 144, barium 140, iodine 131, and cesium 137. These are the classic fission products of a U-235 criticality event. The iodine 131 has a half-life of eight days, and we found a high level of it, so we know the accident took place no more than twenty-four hours ago.”

Dart glanced at Fordyce. “If some of this is confusing to you, Agent Fordyce, Dr. Crew will explain it later.”

He examined other sheets of paper. “The contents of his pockets have been inventoried. There was an admission ticket stub in his pocket, dated Friday last week, to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.”

Fordyce scribbled faster.

“Slow down before you burn out a tendon,” Gideon said, nudging Fordyce.

“There was a train ticket receipt, one way, Washington Union Station to New York Grand Central, dated yesterday afternoon. There was a piece of paper with a website address written on it and several phone numbers. The phone numbers are being analyzed.”

Fordyce glanced up. “The website address?”

“I’m afraid I’m not authorized to release that information.”

There was a silence. “Excuse me,” said Fordyce, “but I thought we were authorized to receive all information.”

Dart looked at him with his brightly gleaming eyes. “In an investigation like this,” he said, “there has to be a certain level of compartmentalization. Each investigator is given what he needs to know, and not more. We all have to work within parameters.” His glance shifted to Gideon. “For example, I’ve been denied information about the private contractor you’re working for.” He smiled, then went on in his dry voice. “An analysis of Chalker’s vomitus indicated his last meal took place at around midnight. It was crab soup, bread, ham, lettuce, tomatoes, Russian dressing, and french fries.”

“Whew,” Gideon said. “No wonder he’s radioactive.”

Another shuffle. “We recovered two credit cards, a driver’s license, a Los Alamos ID card, and various other items from his wallet. Those are being analyzed now.”

“What about the autopsy?” Fordyce asked.

“The preliminary results indicate damage to his thyroid gland, consistent with exposure to iodine 131. This—” He glanced at Fordyce—“is a major fission product of U-235 and indicates Chalker was exposed for some time to a low level of radioactivity before the criticality incident.”

“Do you have a sense of how long?” Gideon asked.

“Cell necrosis indicates more than eleven days.” Shuffle. “There were also classic indications of a massive exposure to ionizing radiation in the criticality incident, with exposure on the order of eight thousand rads. The skin and the internal organs all showed evidence of acute radiation syndrome, beta as well as gamma burns. The exposure was from the front, with the greatest exposure on the hands. The traces of highly enriched uranium on his hands suggest he was actually handling the material when it went critical.”

“Without gloves?” Gideon asked.

Dart looked at him. “Yes. And that’s something we’re wondering about, too, why he didn’t wear protective gear. Unless of course he…did not expect to live much longer.” A short silence followed this statement, and then Dart shut the file. “That’s all we have so far.”

Gideon said, “If that’s true, we don’t have a lot of time.”

“Why’s that?”

“It seems to me he was assembling the bomb.”

“How do you know?” asked Fordyce, turning to him.

“The simplest nuke—the one terrorists would build—is a gun-type bomb. Two pieces of U-235 are fired together in a tube to achieve critical mass. With a bomb like that, you keep those two halves shielded and you don’t bring the pieces anywhere near each other until it’s time to actually assemble the bomb. Because those two pieces, if they get too close without proper shielding, will exchange neutrons, go critical, and let loose with a burst of gamma radiation exactly like what hit Chalker.”

“So you’re saying Chalker was assembling the weapon and botched it?” asked Fordyce.

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“So was the weapon ruined?”

“Not at all,” said Gideon. “It might be a little hot, but nothing a suicide bomber would need to worry about. The fact that the uranium went critical would have caused physical changes in the core that will, unfortunately, enhancethe yield. It’ll make the bomb more powerful.”

“Son of a bitch,” muttered Fordyce.

“Very good, Dr. Crew,” said Dart. “Our own internal evaluation team has come to much the same conclusions.”

Fordyce asked, “What about his laptop computer? I heard they recovered one from his apartment.”

“The contents are encrypted. We haven’t been able to extract any information yet.”

“Then you should let me look at it. I recently finished a six-month tenure in the FBI’s Cryptology Unit.”

“Thank you, Agent Fordyce, but we’ve got a crack team on it and I personally feel your talents would be better used in other areas.”

There was a brief silence before Fordyce spoke again. “Any indication of the target?”

Dart looked at him steadily. “Not yet.”

Fordyce took a deep breath. “We need access to Chalker’s apartment.”

“Naturally you’ll have access. But NEST is first in the queue.” Dart consulted a calendar. “It’s going to be a couple of weeks, I’m afraid. We’ve got a long line of government agencies ahead of you.”

Gideon waited for Fordyce to react, but to his disappointment the agent didn’t respond. They rose to leave.

“May I have a private word with you, Special Agent Fordyce?” Dart said.

Gideon looked at Dart in surprise.

“I’m sorry, Dr. Crew, this is between us.”

Fordyce watched as Crew left. He wasn’t sure what Dart’s game was—he seemed like a straight shooter, but then everyone, even the best, had a game. Fordyce’s strategy had always been to hide his own game while figuring out the game of everyone around him. It had gotten him through FBI minefields for years.

After the door shut, Dart folded his hands and stared at Fordyce. “I’d like this to remain between us. I’m a little concerned, because, frankly, I find this assignment of yours to be rather odd.”

Fordyce nodded.

“I knew Dr. Crew briefly at Los Alamos. He’s more than bright. I have a high opinion of his abilities. But up on the Hill he had a reputation as a freelancer, someone who felt the rules were for others, not him. The qualities that make him a brilliant and creative scientist may not translate well into a criminal investigation like this. I’m asking you to keep an eye on him and make sure he doesn’t go off…half-cocked. That’s all.”

Fordyce kept his facial expression strictly neutral. It was true Gideon had a reckless, wiseass air about him that Fordyce didn’t like. He understood why Dart thought he had an attitude—because he did. But Crew was his partner, and although he wasn’t sure he trusted or even liked him, partnership loyalty trumped that. “Very well, Dr. Dart.”

Dart rose, extended his hand. “Thank you and best of luck.”

Fordyce rose and shook the hand.