After almost three hours, Dower is flagging, but his work is nearly done. The woman is checking her watch now, with increasing concern. Eventually, finally, he replaces the bow in its recess and folds the lid of the case shut, snapping the latches closed. He steps back and fastidiously peels off his gloves, then drops them in a rubbish bin, being careful not to touch their contaminated outer surface with his bare skin. Finally he clicks off the dictaphone. "I'm done," he says flatly.

The woman stands, smooths the wrinkles out of her skirt, and nods. "Your written report," she says.

"I'll write it up after I've had some lunch. You can collect it after four, this afternoon . . ."

She shakes her head. "I won't be back." Reaching into her bag she pulls out another envelope. "Print out one copy of your report—and no more—and place it in this envelope. Then seal it and post it." There is no address on the envelope. "After you have done that, you should destroy your records. Erase your word processor files, burn the tapes, whatever it takes. You will be held responsible if your report leaks."

"But there's no—" He takes the envelope. "You're sure?"

"If you post that envelope I will have the contents on my desk by morning," she tells him, staring at him with pale green eyes as unquiet as a storm surge.

"I don't want to see that thing ever again," he tells her.

"You won't."

"But you want to know how to make more—"

"No." Her face is as smooth as plaster, as if any hint of human emotion might crack the surface of her glaze: "I want to prove to my superiors that the cost is too high."

"Isn't that obvious?"

"Not given the magnitude of the threat we face. Desperate measures are called for; I merely believe this one to be too desperate. Good-bye, Mr. Dower. I trust we shall never meet again."

BACK IN THE OFFICE:

Photograph One:

A large slate, resting on a table beside a wooden measuring rod. According to the rod it is twenty inches high and (inferred using a ruler) eighteen inches wide. Cleaved along a plane, it reveals a well-preserved fossil of what appears to be a starfish of class Asteroidea.

On closer inspection, there is something wrong with the fossil. Although it possesses the characteristic five-fold symmetry, each tentacle tip appears to be blunt, as if truncated. Moreover, the body doesn't show signs of radial segmentation—it's an integral whole, giving an effect more like a cross section through an okra fruiting body, or perhaps an oversized echinoderm—a sea cucumber.

Photograph Two:

Is another large slab of broken rock, this time revealing the partially dissected and fossilized arm of a juvenile BLUE HADES . . .

Photograph Three:

Is in the pile Bob has just dumped on the floor.