Грэм Мастертон - Famine

She heard someone talking in a loud, harsh voice, and she turned around. With relief, but with apprehension, too, she saw Peter hurrying along the carpeted corridor. He had to hurry because he was trying to keep up with one of the airline’s electric carts, on which in huge and weighty splendour sat Senator Shearson Jones, in a white suit as large as a circus marquee.

Peter gave Karen a quick half-smile when he saw her, and said, ‘Hi. You made it, then?’

Karen said, ‘Yes,’ but she was more interested in the spectacle of Shearson Jones easing his bulky body from the cart and waddling sweatily towards the gate. She felt as if she were in the presence of a political and physical phenomenon; a being who defied gravity and governments, both.

She didn’t think at first that Shearson had noticed her, but as they followed him down the walkway to the aeroplane, the senator said loudly, without turning around, ‘Who’s the girl, Peter?’

‘Karen Fortunoff,’ said Peter. ‘My head girl. Very efficient.’

‘Good,’ rumbled Shearson. ‘I like to have pretty girls around me. I congratulate your taste.’

Peter took Karen’s elbow as they boarded the plane. ‘See?’ he whispered. ‘He likes you.’

Karen gave him an uneasy grin. ‘As long as he doesn’t want me, I don’t mind.’

Dr Benson yawned as he walked along the corridor to his office in the Kansas Agricultural Research building. He could hear his telephone ringing but he wasn’t going to hurry. He was too tired after driving all the way back from the experimental agricultural station near Hays, and all he wanted now was a cup of hot coffee, a bath, and six hours’ sleep.

The phone was still ringing as he pushed open the door of his untidy office and threw his dogeared briefcase into a corner. He took off his car-coat, hung it up on the back of the door, and then shuffled through the heap of papers on his desk to see if the telephone was anywhere within easy reach. He found it at last, sniffed, and picked it up.

‘Yes?’ he asked, non-committally.

‘Is that Dr Nils Benson?’ asked an intent voice.

‘Who wants him?’

‘Professor Protter, from the Federal Agricultural Research laboratory in Washington.’

‘Oh, I see. Then this is he. How do you do, Professor. I’m glad you called.’

Professor Protter sounded anxious. ‘I’m glad you answered,’ he said. ‘I was just about to hang up.’

Dr Benson lifted his eyeglasses with his left hand and pinched the bridge of his nose to relieve the pressure of tiredness. ‘I went out to the state experimental farm at Garden City, and then over to the experimental agricultural station at Hays. It’s been a pretty exhausting couple of days. I only just walked into the office.’

‘Have your state research people found anything out?’

‘Not a lot,’ said Dr Benson. ‘But they confirmed the blight is a virus of some kind – which is what I originally guessed it to be. They’re running more tests over the weekend.’

‘Listen,’ said Professor Protter, ‘they’re absolutely right when they say it’s a virus. We took it to the chemical warfare people, and they identified it almost straight away as a new strain of Vorar D.’

‘Vorar D? I read about that. So, I wasn’t so far off target after all. I told one of our farmers here that the blight was probably started deliberately.’

‘I’m not hazarding any guesses about how it was started,’ said Professor Protter. ‘That’s up to the FBI. But I am worried about the lack of concrete help I’m getting from the Agriculture Committee in general and Senator Shearson Jones in particular.’

‘You’ve told Jones about Vorar D?’

‘Of course. I told him that the Pentagon have a suitable sterilising compound, too.’

‘And he didn’t seem interested?’

‘He wanted written reports, and tests on the sterilising compound, and God knows what. There’s no question at all that he’s trying to slow this whole thing down.’

‘Can you think of any reason why he should?’

‘Only one,’ said Professor Protter. ‘He’s opened this Blight Crisis Appeal for Kansas wheat farmers, as you obviously know. So far I think it’s brought in three or four million dollars, although the news tonight said he was aiming for a target of twenty-five million dollars or more. Now – I may be unjust in thinking this – but it occurs to me that if the government announces they’ve found a way to arrest the blight, then interest in compensating the poor unfortunate farmers is going to take a downward curve. It’s the same with the way that Jones keeps telling the media that the blights in other states apart from Kansas aren’t very serious. In my opinion, he’s trying to maintain a completely distorted impression of what’s going on, simply to rake in as much contribution money as he possibly can.’

Dr Benson threw a copy of the Kansas paper off his chair, and sat down. ‘That’s a pretty heavy accusation,’ he said. ‘Do you think you can substantiate it?’

‘I’m not interested in substantiating it right now,’ said Professor Protter. ‘All I’m interested in is getting through to the president, and making sure that production starts on sterilising compounds right away.’

‘Why don’t you make an announcement to the press? That’s what I always do when I want to tug a few executive earlobes.’

‘I’m not in a position to do that,’ said Professor Protter.

‘Why not? If you’re right, what can they do to you?’

‘Senator Jones can do a lot to me, and to my family. That’s why I’m sharing this information with you. I was wondering if you could leak the story for me – get things moving. You could always say that it was your own people in Kansas who had identified the virus.’

Dr Benson cleared his throat. ‘You want me to be the fall guy?’

‘You can call your research people – have them check on the virus. I can assure you that everything I’m telling you is true. Six CW experts can’t be wrong.’

‘Well…’ said Dr Benson.

‘It’s not just important,’ Professor Protter told him. ‘It’s crucial to the survival of this whole nation. I wouldn’t have asked you otherwise.’

‘All right, then,’ said Dr Benson. ‘I’ll call Mike Smith at the local radio station. He’s good on handling this kind of thing.’

‘I’m sure you won’t regret it,’ said Professor Protter.

‘No, Professor, I don’t think I will,’ Dr Benson told him. ‘If I’m going to go down, I might as well go down with all guns blazing.’

Dr Benson put the phone down, and rummaged around his room for his telephone directory. He was searching for the number of the Wichita news station when there was a light rapping sound at his door. He looked up, and there was a pretty red-headed woman in a grey raincoat, with a pocketbook under her arm. She smiled at him, and said, ‘Hi. Am I disturbing you?’

‘I, er – well, no, I don’t think so,’ said Dr Benson.

The woman stepped confidently into the office. ‘I was waiting for you to come back from Hays. I saw the light go on in your office so I came up. My name’s Della McIntosh, by the way. I’m the new projects manager for Shearson Jones’s Blight Crisis Appeal.’

Dr Benson shook her hand hesitantly. ‘That’s quite a coincidence,’ he said. ‘I’ve just been talking about the Blight Crisis Appeal to a colleague of mine.’

‘That’s nice,’ said Della, perching herself on the edge of Dr Benson’s desk, and giving him more of her warmest grin. ‘Was it anybody I know?’

‘Oh, I shouldn’t think so. You’re not an agronomist, are you?’

‘No, but I’m over the age of consent.’