The containment strategy was necessary to subvert the panic that would follow should news of the germ, and more specifically the plans of the terrorist group calling itself One Hundred Neighbors, spread to the public. Not surprisingly, there were some leaks, but mostly the media chose to act responsibly, reporting the story as an emerging strain of streptococcus pyogenes and nothing more.

For now, the extent and deadly potential of the Doomsday Germ was a well-guarded secret. But with their deadline growing ever closer, the One Hundred Neighbors would not keep it a secret much longer. And when word got out, and the mutilation and death rates began to soar, confidence in our hospital system and health care in general would quickly collapse under the strain.

Vaill had studied the files on Alexander Burke and sensed the man’s wife knew more than she had shared with the agents who had questioned her. He wanted a crack at her himself.

“She’s already been interviewed by three other agents more experienced at interrogation than you,” Snyder said. “She doesn’t know anything. She and Alexander have been on the outs, and she hasn’t heard from him in months. What makes you think you’re going to find out anything different?”

“Because she hasn’t spoken to the man whose wife her husband murdered,” Vaill had replied.

The next day he had a plane ticket and a new partner.

The flagstone walkway was bordered by neatly tended shrubs. Vaill led the way up three steps to the front door. He brushed a hand across the breast of his suit coat for reassurance the envelope was still there, and rang the doorbell. Lola Burke checked them out through her sidelight window. Her expression went from curious to saturnine in the time it took her to open the door. She did not bother asking who these latest suits were, or what they wanted. According to her file, well before her husband became first an agent, then a fugitive, she knew what a G-man looked like, and also that they seldom brought anything but trouble.

“I guess there’s no shortage of Feds,” she said. “You people just keep rolling in like Old Man River. I haven’t heard from him if that’s what you’re here to ask.”

Vaill and McCall flashed their badges—protocol. Lola sighed and made a face as if they were her least favorite vegetable. She kept her arm against the door frame, as a barrier.

“Mrs. Burke, I’m Special Agent Tim Vaill and this is my partner, Special Agent Charles McCall. I know we’re not the first agents to come here to speak with you, but it’s very important that we find your husband. We were wondering if we could try again.”

Lola rolled her eyes and lowered her arm.