Even when Ed and Willard had turned on the television for the early-morning news, the stories about the wheat blight had been dismissive and superficial. ‘Not a good year for the wheat farmers of Kansas and North Dakota,’ ABC had reported. ‘They’re bothered by a mystery disease which is turning hundreds of acres of harvest-ready crops into black, stinking decay. But federal scientists are said to have the problem in hand, and there’s also news that Kansas Senator Shearson Jones, known for years as the “Farmers’ Friend”, is planning on setting up an appeal fund to help those farmers who might face financial hardship because of the blight.’

Willard, helping himself to a cup of coffee, had shaken his head and whistled. ‘Financial hardship? The way things are going, we’re all going to be wiped out.’

As he drove over the Wichita Valley Flood Control gully, and along Douglas Avenue to the civic centre, Ed tuned into the news on his car radio. But there was nothing at all about the blight – just some long-winded story about a teacher from Wellington who was trying to bring back compulsory prayers. ‘We’ve been without God for nigh on thirty years,’ she was saying. ‘It’s time we turned our faces back in his direction.’

Ed parked the stationwagon in the civic centre parking lot, and took his brown-tinted sunglasses out of the glove-box. Then he walked across the wide, glaring pedestrian precinct, until he reached the shiny office building which announced itself as the Kansas State Agricultural Laboratory – not only with a plaque of brushed stainless-steel, but with a bronze statue of a smiling family growing out of a giant ear of wheat.

Inside, it was cold, echoing, and smelled of polish. A girl receptionist with bright red lipstick and a Titian-tinted beehive hairstyle directed Ed to the ninth floor. He stood in the elevator next to a man in a white lab-coat who was carrying a cardboard box marked ‘Infected Rodents’ and humming Peace In The Valley. There were times when he agreed with Season about Kansas. If you came from New York, or any city larger than Cleveland, you could quite readily believe that the Kansas state mentality was solid cereal from ear to ear.

He walked along the ninth-floor corridor until he reached a half-open office door marked Dr Nils Benson, Head of Disease Control. He knocked.

Dr Benson was standing by the window, peering at a 35mm colour slide. He shouted, ‘Come in!’ very loudly, and then swung around on his heels to see who his visitor was. ‘Ah!’ he said. ‘It’s Mr Hardesty, isn’t it? Mr Hardesty of South Burlington Farm.’

‘You came around at Christmas when I was having that seedling problem,’ said Ed. ‘How are you doing?’