Робин Кук - Mutation

“Sorry to make you wait,” Victor said as he fumbled with his keys.

“No problem,” Louis said cheerfully. “You certainly have a beautiful house,” he added. He stomped the moisture off his shoes.

“Thank you.” Victor led Louis upstairs to his Wang PC. “Here it is,” he said. He reached behind the electronics unit and switched the system on.

Louis gave the computer a quick look, then lifted his narrow briefcase onto the counter top, snapping open the latches. Inside, encased in styrofoam, was an impressive array of electronic tools.

Louis sat down in front of the unit and waited for the menu to come up. He quickly went through the same sequence that Victor had early that morning, getting the same result.

“You were right,” Louis said. “There’s not much space left on this Winchester.” He reached over to his briefcase and unsnapped the accordion-like file area built under the lid, pulled out a floppy disk, and loaded it.

“Luckily, I happen to have a special utility for locating hidden files,” Louis said.

“What do you mean by hidden files?” Victor asked.

Louis was busy with manipulating information on the screen. He spoke without looking. “It is possible to store files so that they don’t appear on any directory,” he said.

Miraculously, data started to appear on the computer. “Here we are,” Louis said. He leaned aside so Victor could have a better view of the screen. “Any of this make sense to you?”

Victor studied the information. “Yeah,” he said. “These are contractions for the nucleotide bases of the DNA molecule.” The screen was completely filled with vertical columns of the letters AT, TA, GC, and CG. “The A is the adenine, the T is for pyrimidine, the G is for guanine, and the C is for cytosine,” Victor explained.

Louis advanced to the next page. The lists continued. He advanced a number of pages. The lists were interminable. “What do you make of this?” Louis asked, flipping through page after page.

“Must be a DNA molecule or gene sequence,” Victor said, his eyes following the flashing lists as if he were watching a Ping-Pong game.

“Well, have you seen enough of this file?” Louis asked.

Victor nodded.

Louis punched some information into the keyboard. Another file appeared, but it was similar to the first. “The whole hard disk could be taken up with this stuff,” Louis suggested. “You don’t remember putting this material in here?”

“I didn’t put it in,” Victor said without elaborating. He knew that Louis was probably dying to ask where it could have come from and who was the person logging onto the Chimera mainframe last night. Victor was grateful that the man held his curiosity in check.

For the next half hour, Louis rapidly went from file to file. All looked essentially like the first. It was like a library of DNA molecules. Then suddenly it changed.

“Uh oh,” Louis said. He had to hold up hitting the sequence of keys that scrolled through the hidden files. What appeared on the screen was a personnel file. Louis flipped through a couple of pages. “I recognize this because I formatted it. This is a personnel file from Chimera.”

Louis looked up at Victor, who didn’t say a word. Louis turned back to the computer and went to the next file. It was George Gephardt’s. “This stuff was pulled directly out of the mainframe,” Louis said. When Victor still did not respond, he went to the next file, then the next. There were eighteen personal files. Then came a series of accounting files with spread sheets. “I don’t recognize these,” Louis said. He looked up at Victor again. “Do you?”

Victor shook his head in disbelief.

Louis redirected his attention to the computer screen. “Wherever it came from, it represents a lot of money. It is a clever way to present it, though. I wonder what kind of program was used. I wouldn’t mind getting a copy of it.”

After going through a number of pages of the accounting data, Louis went on to the next file. It was a stock portfolio of a number of small companies, all of which held Chimera stock. All in all, it represented a large portion of the Chimera stock not held by the three founders and their families.

“What do you think this is?” Louis asked.

“I haven’t the slightest idea,” Victor said. But there was one thing that he had a good idea about. He was going to have another talk with VJ about using the computer. If the information before him represented actual truths and wasn’t part of some elaborate fantasy computer game, the ramifications were very grave. And on top of that was the question of the deleted Hobbs and Murray files.

“Now we’re back to more of the DNA stuff,” Louis said as the screen filled again with the lists of the nucleotide sequences. “Do you want me to go on?”

“I don’t think that’s necessary,” said Victor. “I think I’ve seen enough. Would you mind leaving that floppy disk you’ve used to bring these files up? I’ll bring it to Chimera on Monday.”

“Not at all,” Louis said. “In fact, this is just a copy. You can keep it if you want. I have the original at home.”

Victor saw Louis off, holding the front door ajar until the man got in his van and drove off. Victor waved and then shut the door. Going upstairs, he made sure that VJ was not around. Back in the study, he called Marsha’s office but got the service. They didn’t know where she was, although she’d been at the hospital earlier.

Victor put the phone down. Then he got the idea of contacting Able Protection. Maybe they could get in touch with their operative. If so, then Victor could find out where VJ was.

But a call to Able Protection only yielded the recording. Victor was forced to leave his name and number with the request that he be called as soon as possible.

For the next half hour, Victor paced back and forth in the upstairs study. For the life of him, he could not understand what it was all about.

The phone rang and Victor grabbed it. It was the grating voice of the man from Able Protection. Victor asked if it were possible to contact the man accompanying VJ.

“All our people carry pagers,” the man told him.

“I want to know where my son is,” Victor said.

“I’ll call you right back.” With that, the man hung up. Five minutes later, the phone rang again. “Your son is at Chimera, Inc.,” the man said. “Pedro is at the security gate this minute if you want to talk to him.”

Victor thanked the man. He hung up the phone and went downstairs for his coat. A few minutes later he was cutting his wheels sharply to do a U-turn in front of the house.

After a quick drive, Victor made an acute turn into the entrance to the Chimera compound and came to an abrupt halt inches from the gatehouse barrier. He drummed his fingers expectantly on the steering wheel, waiting for the guard to raise the black and white striped gate. Instead, the man came out of the office in spite of the rain and bent down next to Victor’s window. Without hiding his irritation at being detained, Victor lowered his window.

“Afternoon, Dr. Frank!” the guard said. He touched the brim of his hat in some kind of salute. “If you’re looking for that special security man, he’s here in the guardhouse.”

“You mean the man from Able Protection?” Victor asked.

“That I don’t know,” the guard said. He straightened up. “Hey, Pedro, you from Able Protection?”

A handsome young man came to the door of the guardhouse. His hair was coal black and he sported a narrow mustache. He looked about twenty.

“Who wants to know?” he asked.

“Your boss here, Dr. Frank.”

Pedro came out of the guardhouse and over to Victor’s car. He stuck out his hand. “Nice to meet you, Dr. Frank. I’m Pedro Gonzales from Able Protection.”