Free The Methuselah Gene by Jonathan Lowe Page B

independent of Tactar .   Next, I thought about Dad again.   It had been years.   I wondered what he would make of my asking his advice now.   It seemed ludicrous.   Since Mother died of the stroke that came like a bolt of lightning from God, he’d deliberately cut the cord to his old life, and retired to Florida on the life insurance.   Let me reinvent my life now, please, was the unspoken message there.
    I settled on dialing Madison, Wisconsin instead.   My watch read nine thirty-four p.m., the same time there.   The same zone.   Nonetheless, it was a sleepy voice which greeted me.
    â€œAlan?” Rachel said, with uncertainty.
    â€œYeah, it’s me, Sis,” I confirmed.   “Sorry to call you this way.   I need advice, and I haven’t anyone I can trust anymore.”
    There was a pause, and I knew why.   Rachel had always been the one to ask my advice in the past, if only to hear her own suspicions validated.   Six years younger than I—and as pretty as Mom had been—she had occasional men problems.   She wanted a baby, but could never quite find a man she could put up with for it.   And I wondered on occasion if perhaps I was among the same class of men she usually talked about, just less experienced at being an ass.
    â€œAre you in trouble, Alan?   Where are you calling from?”
    â€œI’m in Iowa,” I told her.   “A small town southwest of Des Moines.   And I don’t know how much trouble I’m in.”
    â€œWhat?   What do you mean?   What kind of trouble?”
    I paused at the edge of it, wondering how deep the hole before me fell, and if it was fair to pull her into it with me.   I vacillated, opting at last to offer her the Reader’s Digest version.   “It’s a long story,” I said, “but the short of it is I’m here tracking down a man who may have helped steal a drug we were hoping to develop.   I’m not sure if I should go to the police here with what I know, though.”
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œBecause my boss will find out I was taking classified files home, to work on them.   And talking about it, too.   That may have resulted in the theft.”
    Rachel took to her new advisory role with surprising confidence, playing devil’s advocate.   “You’re not in the nuclear weapons program, Alan, so what’s the big deal?”
    I sighed.   “Maybe you’re right.   What more can they do but fire me?”
    A brief silence, with the new consideration.   “They’d do that?”
    â€œWhy not?   It’s the next logical step.   Guess I’ve been hoping to uncover some big conspiracy that will get me back my old office.   And of course my . . . drug.”
    â€œWhat kind of drug is it, exactly?”
    â€œNot a drug, exactly.   But I can’t talk about it.   I’ve talked enough.   That’s what got me into this mess.”
    Rachel uuuumed to herself, then broached the hypothetical.   “So . . . what if you don’t go to the police . . .”
    â€œYeah?” I said, hoping for a new insight I hadn’t yet considered.
    â€œWell, what would you do then?   You know what this guy you’re looking for looks like?”
    â€œThink I do now.   But I don’t know what I’d do.   Take photos of him, follow him.   Maybe confront him.”
    â€œThat sounds dangerous, Alan.   Confronting him, I mean.”
    â€œMaybe you’re right,” I agreed, now suspecting that I’d called her only to validate my own decision, much like she’d done with me in the past.
    Another pause.   “But you’ll be fired if you tell them?”
    â€œProbably,” I confirmed.   Then I laughed as a word reverberated in my mind.
    â€œWhat is it?”
    â€œNothing,” I said.   “It’s just ‘them.’   Who