Greg Bear - Quantico

Jeremiah lifted his eyes. ‘Your father’s dead, that’s fine. One more bug.’ He looked at William with slit-eyed curiosity. ‘Don’t you want to put your hands around my neck and chicken-choke me? What kind of family-’

‘Why did Chambers make you leave? Why didn’t he let you stay on the farm?’ Rebecca asked.

‘My father never really trusted me with anything important,’ William said.

Rebecca folded her hands, interested in the developing tension.

‘Well, that’s sad,’ Jeremiah said, with a remarkably believable tone of wisdom and pity. ‘My father was a fair man. His rules was hard but we got praise when we did good.’

‘Who came to see your father at the farm?’

‘Sheep seeking fodder,’ Jeremiah said. ‘Pilgrims.’

Rebecca opened her small folder and pulled out a picture of an inkjet printer. ‘Who brought these to the farm?’

Jeremiah looked at the picture. His eyes cleared and his lips thinned.

‘Someone came to the farm and gave some of these to your father,’ Rebecca prodded.

‘We was printing up flyers. I was learning to set up a print shop.’

‘Good job skills, great for getting work in the outside world,’ Rebecca said. ‘But you don’t care about the outside. How often did these people visit?’

Jeremiah chuckled. ‘They stood in line. We shooed them like flies. You don’t know nothing.’

‘There was only one,’ Rebecca said.

Jeremiah stared into a corner.

‘He brought bags of yeast,’ Rebecca said. ‘And the stuff to make fireworks.’

‘We packed fireworks. We sold them like Indians.’

‘Why put yeast in the fireworks?’ Rebecca asked.

Jeremiah cocked his head and winked at William. ‘She’s doing all the talking.’

William folded his arms. ‘She does the hard work. I listen.’

Rebecca passed William a quick smirk. ‘Jeremiah, why did you spread yeast all over the farm?’

‘Alleged yeast,’ the virtual counsel said.

‘We did a lot of baking,’ Jeremiah said.

‘Did you bake with the yeast that the visitor brought?’

Jeremiah shook his head and leaned forward, shackles singing against the table. ‘I’m glad your daddy’s dead. I hope your brothers and sisters are all sobbin’ their guts out.’

‘I’m an only child. Your father didn’t trust you, did he?’ William shot back. ‘He didn’t trust you to defend the farm, so he sent you away. Why was that?’

‘He loved us. He loved his children. God told him he had been discovered, and that soon all the minions of Federales Satanus would be on us. We didn’t want to leave, but we obeyed his plan.’

‘Well, it’s over now and I thought you should know,’ Rebecca said. ‘Your visitor-the man who brought the printers-was an undercover FBI agent. We sent him to the farm and he sold your father a bill of goods. You are such rubes. The FBI convinced you to do useless work and then got you on a terrorism rap. Sweet.’ Rebecca leaned forward. ‘Do you know what a sting is, Jeremiah? Your father fell for it. And now, all of you are heading deep into the Federal Internal Security System-and none of us are ever going to hear about you again. No headlines, no trials, no appeals. You’re goddamned for sure.’

For a second, naked fear played over Jeremiah’s face. William almost felt sorry for him. ‘The yeast was just a test,’ Jeremiah said, struggling to keep control. ‘We did not pack yeast. The sheep died, didn’t they?’

‘Would you like me to bring our agent into this room? I can make a phone call and have him here tomorrow. Right now, he’s in Florida, on a well-deserved vacation. Would you even recognize him? I don’t believe you ever met him.’

‘I won’t be here,’ Jeremiah said, eyes going to the barred door.

‘Did your father let you in on those discussions?’ William piled on. ‘Did he trust you?’

‘We all was there, for different meetings,’ Jeremiah insisted.

‘Convince me. Tell us what he looked like. Maybe then we’ll believe you,’ William said. Rebecca pinched his knee, hard: he had gone too far, too fast. But it worked.

‘He was a tall guy. Taller than you.’ He pointed at William.

‘A tall guy, Jeremiah? That’s it?’ Rebecca asked, contemptuous.

‘Blond hair. Dirty blond, sun streaks, not like this freak. ’ He rattled his shackles at the guard. ‘He wore jeans and boots. I…I don’t remember any more, but I was there!’

‘Tell us if there was something distinctive about him, Jeremiah,’ Rebecca ventured. ‘If you can’t tell us what he looked like, we know your daddy didn’t trust you.’

The young man’s face worked into a frown of concentration, then anguish, as if a fish were about to slip from his hands. ‘One eye blue, one eye green,’ he cried out. ‘I was there. ’

Rebecca did not let up. She hammered. ‘What did you think you could accomplish-something big, something that would change the world? What in hell kind of story is that? You’re just a bunch of rubes, raised like farm animals-how in hell could you hope to hurt us?’

‘We was being trained! I was learning networks, to set up the printers when they came, and some of us was learning how to pack explosives and make fireworks. We packed boxes and boxes of them. We been packing them for a year now. Enough bugs to kill all the Jews in a big city. Where are all those boxes now, huh? You tell me that!’

‘Packing them with anthrax , Jeremiah?’ Rebecca asked, eyes wide, mouth open in disbelief.

Jeremiah sat back smiling.

‘Is that what you were told?’ Rebecca asked.

He put on a nasty, sly look. ‘The sheep died. You’ll learn.’

‘Jeremiah, if you used real anthrax, why aren’t you dead?’

William felt his stomach tighten.

‘You don’t know nothing,’ Jeremiah said. ‘We wore masks.’

Rebecca pushed back her chair. ‘What kind of masks, Jeremiah? Red bandannas? What about your skin? Were you all vaccinated?’

‘We don’t believe in that,’ Jeremiah said. ‘God protects those who do his work.’

‘Oh, really? If you had actually been packing anthrax, you’d all be dead by now.’

Jeremiah shook his head violently. ‘We cleaned it up. We burned it. You’ll never find anything.’

‘We haven’t found a trace of anthrax. You’re the one who’s ignorant.’

Rebecca touched William’s arm: tag team. He moved in, though he felt lost in the story by now. What was fiction, what was horrible fact?

‘We set you up, Jeremiah, all of you. There was never any anthrax. What other whoppers did your father swallow?’ William asked.

‘You just wait and see,’ Jeremiah said. ‘I ain’t talking any more.’ His face twisted in doubt and confusion. ‘I don’t believe anything you say.’ Then he started to wail, ‘I’m telling you, some of it I just don’t remember! They’re putting stuff in my food. This place is making me crazy. Maybe I am sick. Would they get me help if I was sick? I think I need a doctor. I need a lawyer.’

‘We’re done here,’ the virtual counsel said. The background on the screen began flashing red. ‘Questioning of my assignee must stop, and human counsel must be physically present for any further interviews.’

The guard had put some distance, as much as he could, between himself and the table.

Rebecca stood. ‘Get our boy a doctor, then a lawyer,’ she suggested. Then, acid, ‘Check him for anthrax .’

Rebecca was on her phone as soon as they had left the detention center. In the parking lot she made three calls: one to Hiram Newsome in Virginia, one to John Keller, and one to a doctor name Bobby Keel. She slipped the slate into her pocket and took out a handkerchief to wipe her face.