The meeting took place at one P.M. in the FBI’s field office off Staples Mill Road. State and federal flags fought from tall poles out front as a sharp wind tore brown leaves off trees and made the afternoon seem much colder than it was. The brick building was new, and had a secure conference room equipped with audio-visual capabilities, so we could see remote people while we talked to them. A young female agent sat at the head of the table, at a console. Wesley and I pulled out chairs and moved microphones close. Above us on walls were video monitors.

“Who else are we expecting?” Wesley asked as the special agent in charge, or S.A.C., walked in with an armload of paperwork.

“Miles,” said the S.A.C., referring to the Health Commissioner, my immediate boss. “And the Coast Guard.” He glanced at his paperwork. “Regional chief out of Crisfield, Maryland. A chopper’s bringing him in. Shouldn’t take him more than thirty minutes in one of those big birds.”

He had no sooner said this than we could hear blades thudding faintly in the distance. Minutes later, the Jay-hawk was thundering overhead and settling in the helipad behind the building. I could not remember a Coast Guard recovery helicopter ever landing in our city or even flying over it low, and the sight of it must have been awesome to people on the road. Chief Martinez was slipping off his coat as he joined us. I noted his dark blue commando sweater and uniform pants, and maps rolled up in tubes, and the situation only got grimmer.

The agent at the console was working controls as Commissioner Miles strode in and took a chair next to mine. He was an older man with abundant gray hair that was more contentious than most of the people he managed. Today, tufts were sticking out in all directions, his brow heavy and stern as he put on thick black glasses.

“You look a little under the weather,” he said to me as he made notes to himself.

“The usual stuff going around,” I said.

“Had I known that, I wouldn’t have sat next to you.” He meant it.

“I’m beyond the contagious stage,” I said, but he wasn’t listening.

Monitors were coming on around the room, and I recognized the face of Colonel Fujitsubo on one of them. Then Bret Martin blinked on, staring straight at us.

The agent at the console said, “Camera on. Mikes on. Someone want to count for me.”

“Five-four-three-two-one,” the S.A.C. said into his mike.

“How’s that level?”

“Fine here,” Fujitsubo said from Frederick, Maryland.

“Fine,” said Martin from Atlanta.

“We’re ready anytime.” The agent at the console glanced around the table.

“Just to make sure all of us are up to speed,” I began. “We have an outbreak of what appears to be a smallpox-like virus that so far seems to be restricted to the island of Tangier, eighteen miles off the coast of Virginia. Two deaths reported so far, with another person ill. It is also likely that a recent homicide victim was infected with this virus. The mode of transmission is suspected to be the deliberate contamination of samples of Vita aromatherapy facial spray.”