“Hey, even chemists have concern for the human condition. You guys must care about people too. Better living through chemistry, and all that.”
“Or dying,” Karen said softly.
“What?”
“Nothing,” she said, smiling and shaking her head at him. “Let’s change the subject.”
“Okay. Right now I’m wondering what a police car is doing in front of the president’s house this time of night?”
“Probably the trouble on the hill this morning. The rumors have been flying all day. Do you know Doctor Bauer?”
“I had physical chemistry from him. Decent guy, but his lectures would put a hungry shark to sleep. Catatonic.”
“A guard found him dead in his hush-hush lab this morning, and one of his graduate students is missing. The more imaginative rumor is that the student killed him.”
Jack looked at her incredulously. “I can’t see anyone doing in old Bauer. He wouldn’t hurt a bug.”
“Maybe so,” said Karen, “but from what I’ve heard, he’s done some really terrible things to rats.”
CHAPTER TWO
When Curtis Lundeman stepped out upon the front porch of his home he was in an expansive mood, and the world was good. For a moment, the president of Simenson University was totally at peace with himself; the fight with his wife the previous night was forgotten, along with the previous day’s stress of a faculty senate meeting and other nonsense. He breathed in cool air and surveyed his command in the orange light of an early morning sun filtering through trees and awakening the birds. Below him, in a green hollow watched over by the vast research complex he had personally negotiated funding for, the polished marble campus glowed like an ancient seat of learning reborn.
Lundeman was proud of what he had accomplished here, even though he had been necessarily harsh at times, so much so that certain faculty members still walked softly around him. Only the goal was important, the goal of creating an educational institution of high quality that would have a positive impact on a shaky world. The thought of it made him tremble, giving him true meaning and sense of purpose in what he otherwise considered to be a drab life. There it was before him, growing, and glowing in the morning sun.
He looked forward to the day: a little work in the office, lunch with two representatives from the National Science Foundation who were looking at his plans for an institutional grant, and then the trip south for the football game and what he hoped would be another big victory for the Cougars. Why was it, he wondered, that universities were so often measured by the greatness of their football teams? A sad fact, but one he accepted and made use of in his talks to business groups. Football made money.
The campus was quiet, the sound of his footsteps coming back to him from granite walls. At a distance, he saw someone mount a bicycle in front of the physics building and ride away. Lights were on in the chemistry complex; it seemed the chemists were always there, cooking a new brew. Lundeman was happy with them. Chemistry made money, lots of it.
He walked past beds of flowers surrounding the cylindrical hub of campus which was his office building, known among various faculty factions as the galactic core, the seat of power, the phallus of academe, or simply the palace. His office was on the first floor, and he used a key to let himself in, made a pot of coffee in the little kitchen that had once been a closet, and settled himself at his desk. He inserted a disk of Mozart’s Requiem in a player, turned the volume down low and began to work as the aroma of brewing coffee filled the office air. The work flowed smoothly, the coffee was hot and tasty, and the music lulled him into a state of peaceful detachment. Such a fragile state, so easily shattered by the sound of a ringing telephone.
The telephone rang three times before he answered it. He listened for a moment, then leaned back in his chair, putting one hand to his forehead to dab at beads of sweat that had suddenly formed there.
“When did you find him?” he asked, then listened.
“Didn’t the guard know anything at all?”
Pause to listen.
“Keep him under wraps, Max. I don’t want him talking to anyone until I’ve cleared it, do you understand? Good. No, you did well, Max. I’ll remember that. Hold tight, and I’ll be over with someone. No, not the police. We can’t allow them in a restricted area. Don’t let anyone in until I get there. Tell them there’s contamination. Right. You’ve got it, Max. I knew I could count on you.”
Lundeman hung up the phone quickly and stared at a wood-paneled wall, drumming the fingers of his left hand on a polished desk. He picked up the phone, punched four numbers, continued drumming until there was an answer. His voice was low, sharp and accusing.
“So you’re in already,” he said quickly. “Let’s see if this is news to you; I just got a call from the hill. They found Jacob Bauer dead in lab four an hour ago. I don’t suppose you’d know anything about that? You know exactly what I mean; don’t give me that shit. You answer to me, don’t forget it. If I find out you’re bypassing me I’ll have your ass. Understand? All right. All right! Is your car here? Go home right now. I don’t want you seen around here. I’ll see you Monday, but I’ve got to call the Langley people now and get a crew out here. Yes. Goodbye.”
He hung up the phone gently this time, breathing deeply as self-control returned, then from memory punched a long sequence of numbers and waited again before speaking carefully and succinctly.
“Curtis Lundeman for room five-two-four. Curtis Lundeman. That’s C-U-R-T-I-S.”
There was a moment of waiting for voiceprint identification before he spoke again.
“We have a red contamination problem in four. I need a crew out here stat. Medical treatment is not necessary.”
When he put down the phone, his forehead was dry again. Moving slowly, he returned two files to a cabinet, locked his desk, rinsed out a cup and unplugged the coffee-maker before leaving his office. He tried the front door of the building after locking it, walked casually across campus and up the hill to the entrance of Gordon Science Center. The walk took only five minutes, but a white Dodge van with U.S. GOVERNMENT stenciled in blue on the front doors was waiting for him when he arrived. No football game for me tonight, he thought.
The revolving glass doors at the entrance yielded to his touch. Three men, one of whom he recognized, looked at him from the reception desk. Max Schuler, head of security, was obviously relieved to see him, smiling as his reinforcements arrived. Unlike Max, who was in slacks and a flannel shirt, the other two men were gloved, dressed in white, each carrying a transparent helmet under one arm. The men, both blond and in their late twenties or early thirties, turned to examine Lundeman with exceptionally blue eyes. One extended a gloved hand, and the university president held it lightly in his for only an instant.
“I’m Sanderson, and this is Harris,” said the man, nodding towards the other who stood beside him silently and without expression. “You called in a problem?”
“We’ll take the elevator up,” said Lundeman. “Max, you wait here, and keep everyone out. Tell them we’ve had a bad chemical spill.”
“Yes, sir,” said Max, looking relieved.
When the elevator doors closed behind them, Sanderson
