Free The Delta Factor by Thomas Locke

these small-time losers behind for good.

4
    On Saturday morning, Deborah drove at a slow, steady pace through peaceful Edenton streets. She did not speak much, but allowed Cliff to take in the town bit by bit. Occasionally she would draw his attention to special sights: a pre-Revolutionary home with double balconies large enough to accommodate the entire family on hot nights. A blooming magnolia more than two hundred years old, its branches encompassing almost a quarter of an acre. An entire street of crepe myrtle trees frothing with pink blossoms. A Victorian house whose ground floor boasted seven great windows, each framed in a stained-glass pattern of flowering vines. An old stone house so overgrown with creeping wisteria vines that it looked from a distance to be painted green. Earlier in the spring, Deborah informed him, the whole house bloomed lavender.
    Everything moved slower here. Even the car’s blinkers ticked more deliberately in this small, hot town. There were so few automobiles that drivers greeted each other as they passed. The dogs saluted cars with their waving tails, lapping up the heat with lolling tongues.
    The trees had long since grown high and broad enough to create living canopies over all of Edenton’s streets. Deborah took him down the bayside road under a veil of sun-dappled green. The points of land jutting into the bay were anchored by houses older than the nation that claimed them.
    Deborah drove back inland several blocks and stopped before a solid, red-brick church building. She turned off the engine, sat back in her seat, and sighed softly.
    â€œWhat’s wrong?”
    â€œI had so hoped this weekend would be okay,” she murmured.
    â€œYou’re not feeling well?”
    â€œI don’t know yet.” She gave her head a tired shake. “Stress can set off attacks, and there’s been a lot of that recently. Plus I was looking forward to your coming and sort of staying up nights thinking of everything I wanted to tell you.”
    â€œDo you need to rest?”
    â€œMaybe in a little while. First I need to wait and see what’s happening.” She turned to him. “I’m sorry, Cliff.”
    â€œDon’t be.”
    â€œBut there was so much I still wanted to show you. The lab, my house, these latest trial results.”
    â€œThis won’t be my only trip down, Debs.”
    â€œPromise?”
    â€œAbsolutely.”
    She let out a breath. “Okay, then we’ll just take this one step at a time. I want to show you around here a little more. I know that may sound silly, but it’s important to me. This little town is sort of becoming the center of my world.”
    â€œIt doesn’t sound silly at all,” Cliff said. “I think the place is beautiful.”
    â€œYou’re not just saying that?”
    â€œThis is a great place, Debs. I could learn to love it here. I know it already.” He looked around. “I just can’t help but think, though, that it’s a strange place to be making scientific history.”
    â€œWe may actually be doing that, you know.” She slid from the car with visible effort. “Come on, let me show you the church.”
    She led him across the street at a slow but steady pace. “Scientific revolutions occur when paradigms, the framework we use to study the universe, are overthrown. The discovery of penicillin did this in medicine. A spiritual revolution occurs the same way, but one person at a time.”
    â€œThat’s what has happened to you?” Cliff asked. “A spiritual revolution?”
    She was silent a moment. “It’s interesting to realize that we scientists tend to deal in mass and multitudes. The larger the group, the surer our findings. And yet the all-powerful Being deals with the world one person at a time. That should tell us something, shouldn’t it?”
    â€œI don’t know, Debs. I’m not even sure what you’re