“Yes, yes,” said Bowman. “I know—we were talking with François Minart this morning, and he said you had a marvelous biotechnology-research project going here, and we thought it would be a good idea to come visit while we were in Beijing.”

“You talked with Minart?”

“My friend Mr. Truell did.” He nodded in my direction.

“That is very nice, but Monsieur Minart doesn’t have authority to send people here. This facility is not under his control.”

“Yes, I know,” said Bowman. He was running out of cards to play, but he still had one on the table, facedown. “I’m familiar with the situation here. I work with Michel Bézy.”

The Frenchman took a step back. “You know Michel Bézy?” That name was obviously powerful magic.

“Bézy and I work together. We were at the ambassador’s residence last night, with Alain Peyron. If you have any problems, just call Bézy. He should be at the French embassy. He’ll explain.”

Seraut retreated back into the building, apologizing as he did so. It was a magnificent bluff. Bowman whispered to me that he knew Bézy wasn’t at the embassy that morning.

The Frenchman returned, looking uncomfortable. “I could not reach Monsieur Bézy. But Alain Peyron’s office said it’s true—you are a special friend of Unetat—so I suppose I can give you a brief tour. A few minutes, only. Is that all right?”

He opened the front door and led us down a long hall. A bulletin board displayed biohazard signs like the ones I had seen at Dr. Ginsburg’s lab on I-270. I stopped at the first door and peered through a glass window. I saw a gel box; beyond it was an array of fermentation vessels, which were like the ones Ginsburg had shown me but much smaller.

“We do some of our cell cultures here,” the Frenchman said brusquely. He wanted to get us in and out, as quickly as he could.

We continued down the corridor. I peered through another window. Inside was a cluster of computer equipment like the system Ginsburg had said could be used to design the molecular structure of new biological agents. I searched until I saw the brand name: Bio-Ordinateur.

“What do you use this for?” I asked.

“Design work,” he answered.

“Design of what?”