Marcus opened the door. Emanating from the interior was a loud babble of voices coming from a milling confusion of Department of Health officials, police, FBI agents, firemen, and Department of Defense officers. The Department of Defense personnel were from the army’s USAMRIID, the Marines’CBIRF, and an interservice unit designated as CBQRF. Laurie knew that USAMRIID stood for the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Disease, but she had no idea what the other two abbreviations stood for.

“Please,” Marcus yelled over the noise. “If you wouldn’t mind.” He pointed through the throng and led Jack and Laurie to an interior door. He knocked, stuck his head in, then gestured for Jack and Laurie to enter.

As the door closed behind the two medical examiners, relative peace descended. They were in an office about eight by twelve with three other men. Dozens of temporary phone lines had been brought in. Phones littered the desk running the length of the right side of the room. In contrast to the confusion in the outer office and the pandemonium outside in the streets, the three men were seemingly calm. All were sitting down. Jack recognized only one. It was Stan Thornton, the director of the Mayor’s Office of Emergency Management.

“Sit down,” Stan suggested. He pointed to two empty desk chairs. Jack and Laurie sat down as requested.

Stan’s height was apparent even while sitting. The tall man was dressed casually in a tweedy jacket. With his tousled hair, rumpled clothes, and intellectual mien, he looked more like a college professor than a high-level civil servant.

Stan introduced Jack and Laurie to the other two men: Robert Sorenson, an FBI Supervisory Special Agent, and Kenneth Alden, an officer of FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

“Would you like some coffee?” Stan asked. “You must be famished after your ordeal.”

Jack and Laurie declined but were surprised to be offered coffee so casually during such a crisis.

“Can I ask how things are going?” Jack questioned.

“Certainly,” Stan said. “With as critical a role you two have played in this event, you are more than entitled to know. As you can see from outside, we’ve done a poor job maintaining any semblance of order. There was widespread panic that frankly overwhelmed us and proved beyond a shadow of doubt that a real event is far different from an exercise. We couldn’t keep the people in the building. And because a plume developed from the building’s vent, the whole section of Manhattan west of here became contaminated with the powder.”

Stan paused. Jack and Laurie looked from one face to another. What Stan had just related was terrible news, yet the men seemed curiously unconcerned.

“But there has been one significant development that is undoubtedly in our favor,” Stan said. “Would either of you have any idea of what that might be?”

Jack and Laurie looked at each other quizzically, then shook their heads.