Warren Murphy: Death Sentence

" 'Homo Erectus' is Latin for 'Man the Erect,' " Naomi told him reprovingly. "He was the first of our primate ancestors to walk upright. I can't believe people don't know these fundamental things. This is your species."

"Are you calling me a homo, lady? Because if you are, I'll be glad to demonstrate that I can get it up."

"No, no, don't," Naomi said, shielding her eyes. "Can we simply get on with this?"

"Hold on a minute, will you?" Mearle fumbled through his coat pockets, seemingly having trouble getting those intelligent-looking fingers past his lapels.

Definitely a slow sugar burner, Naomi decided. It was unusual. Statistically, most slow sugar burners had stubby, blunt fingers. She made a mental note of the discrepancy, and decided to pay closer attention to the man's mannerisms. Perhaps an unusual phenotypical pattern might emerge.

Finally Mearle located his mini cassette tape recorder and placed in on the corner of Naomi's desk. Its spools turned silently.

"I rather imagined you'd use a pad and paper."

"Don't know shorthand," Mearle told her.

"Were you considered slow as a child, Mr.... ?" Mearle didn't pick up on the lead.

Instead he said, "I don't remember. My editor says you've made an important discovery."

"Yes, I have. But before I start, it's important that you know my background. So you know I'm not some wild-eyed theoretician. I'm a professor of anthropology. Harvard, class of seventy-nine. I've done extensive fieldwork in Asia, Africa, and South America. "

"How do you spell that?"

"Spell what?"

"Anthology."

"Anthropology. It's from the Greek. It means the study of man. I study men."

Mearle's eyebrows shot up. "No women?"

"I study women too. By man, we anthropologists refer to man the species. It's not supposed to be a gender-specific term."

"Think you can use smaller words, Professor Vanderkloot? Our readers are not exactly swift in the brain department."

"Slow sugar burners, you mean?" This time it was Naomi's brows that lifted.

"Say again?"

"It's been discovered that the human brain processes glucose--natural sugar-at greatly different speeds. Some people process their brain sugar very rapidly. Consequently, these people are very quick thinkers. Others, whose brains are less efficient, seem to be slower-witted. "

Mearle the reporter perked up, interest lighting his dull face.

"Great! That's exactly the kind of angle our readers love."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I can see a great headline: ANTHOLOGY PROFESSOR MAKES STARTLING ANNOUNCEMENT: ALL-SUGAR DIET INCREASES BRAINPOWER"

Naomi's brows fell sharply. "That's not what I meant," she said.

"I eat a lot of sugar," Mearle went on as if he hadn't heard. "I guess that explains why I'm so smart."

"Do your friends and family consider you very intelligent?"

"Sure. I'm a writer. I make a lot of money."

"Journalist, you mean."

"Lady," Mearie said sternly, "I've been with the National Enquirer since eighty-three, and in all that time I never once saw a journalist darken my editor's door. Any unimaginative fool can copy down quotes and string them into a newspaper article. We're writers. We make the dull facts jump up and grab you by the throat. That's what sells newspapers."

"And used cars," Naomi said dryly.

"I used to write confession stories before this," Mearle said, not understanding. "It's the same technique. This is easier. I don't have to make everything up from scratch. So okay, let's get back to this sugar thing. What would it do to the average person's IQ if he doubled his sugar intake? If you don't know, try to guess on the high side, okay?"

"Oh, the average American would probably burn out the adrenal glands," Naomi said airily.

"Is that good or bad?"

"In your case, it would probably be an improvement," she said sarcastically. She regretted the lapse almost as soon as she uttered it. Fortunately Mearle No-last-name, Boston stringer for the National Enquirer, took it as a compliment.

"Really?" he said with ill-disguised interest. He was fascinated. "Maybe I'll triple my sugar intake."

"Let me know how it turns out." And this time Naomi smiled. Her lips resembled a rubber band stretching, right to the dull red color. No hint of teeth showed.

"I love sugar. Always have."

Naomi went on doggedly, "It's important that the world understand my credentials. I was the first white person to see a member of the Xitli tribe. I, and I alone, have been initiated into the Moomba secret ceremony."

"Great! We'll do a sidebar. Let's hear all the gory details. "

"I'd rather not get into that," Naomi said quickly, a flicker of embarrassment flooding her ordinarily bloodless features. "What I'm trying to tell you is that before I returned to academe ... er, teaching full-time, I was a highly respected field anthropologist. Not a crackpot."

"Can I quote that last statement?"

Naomi made a prim face. "Please don't." She cleared her throat and went on. "For the last five years I've taught courses in political anthropology, imperialism and ethnocentrism, and ecological anthropology. I also consult for IHPA, the Institute for Human Potential Awareness. It was while compiling data for that organization that I first discovered that he exists." Mearle, catching the portentous tone of the pronoun, jumped to the slow-sugar conclusion.

"He? Do you mean God?"

"I definitely do not mean God. I'm an atheist."

"Can you spell that?"

"Look it up. You'll find a definition that goes with it."

"Good thinking." Mearle grabbed the tape recorder and spoke loudly into it, "Look up 'atheist' for spelling and definition. Okay, go ahead," he told Naomi, replacing the machine.

Naomi plowed ahead. "It began when I took on the task of sorting newspaper clippings and other accounts of extraordinary human physical achievement."

"I can wriggle my ears," Mearle piped up. "One of them, anyway. The left. No, it's the right."

Seeing Naomi's expression, he subsided, one ear quivering.

"In these instances we were dealing with incidents of heightened strength or reflexes," Naomi went on in her best lecturer's voice. "Perhaps you've heard stories of ordinary people who become empowered with near-superhuman strength in times of stress. Like the mother who discovers her child trapped under a car. In her anxiousness, she upends the vehicle to rescue the child."

"I once did a story along those lines. ENRAGED GRANDMOTHER LOSES CAN OPENER, BITES BOTTLE TOP OFF WITH FALSE TEETH. Like that?"

"Not quite. And could you please stop interrupting? This is very important to me."

"If it were that important, you'd be talking to Scientific American, not me."

Naomi made a face. "They declined to publish my findings," she admitted in a morose tone. "So I went down the list of national magazines, then local newspapers. The Boston Globe actually sent out a reporter, but after twenty minutes he pretended he was late to an interview with a local television anchor. I went to the Herald next, and even they weren't interested. I thought I had hit bottom; then I remembered you people."

"Actually, we lead our field. You should see our competition. Some of them don't bother getting quotes. They make 'em up."

"I want my story to get out, Mr. . . ."

"Call me Mearle. 'Mister' makes me think I'm being lectured."

"As I was saying, I want my story to get out. It's important. For if my data are correct, mankind may be on the threshold of an important new era in its evolution." Her tone darkened. "Or, conversely, we may face the extinction of the human race."

"Oh, my God," Mearle said in genuine horror. "Are we facing a global sugar shortage? Will our brains shrivel?"

"Forget sugar!" Naomi snapped. "We're talking about superman."