“I think I can answer that,” Paul said.
Sam said, “So can I. One thing they teach budding pharmacologists is that no drug affects everyone the same way. On some people, for instance, penicillin has little or no effect. Some people don’t respond well at all to sulfa drugs. I suspect that, for whatever reasons of genes and metabolisms and body chemistries, we’re among the tiny percentage of those who aren’t touched by Salsbury’s drug.”
“And thank God for that,” Jenny said. She hugged herself and shivered.
“There ought to be more adults unaffected,” Paul said. “It’s summertime. People take vacations. Wasn’t anyone out of town during the week when the reservoir was contaminated and the subliminal messages broadcast?”
“When the heavy snows come,” Sam said, “logging operations have to stop. So in the warm months everyone connected with the mill works his butt off to make sure there will be a stockpile of logs to keep the saws going all winter. No one at the mill takes a vacation in the summer, And everyone in town who serves the mill takes his time off in the winter too.”
Paul felt as if he were on a turntable, whirling around and around. His mind spun with the implications of the article that Sam had read. “Mark and Rya and I weren’t affected because we got to town after the contaminant had passed out of the reservoir-and because we didn’t watch whatever television programs or commercials contained the subliminal messages. But virtually everyone else in Black River is now under Salsbury’s control.”
They stared at one another.
The storm moaned at the window.
Finally Sam said, “We enjoy the benefits and luxuries provided by modern science-all the while forgetting that the technological revolution, just like the industrial revolution before it, has its dark side.” For several long seconds, with the mantel clock ticking behind him, he studied the cover of the book in his hand. “The more complex a society becomes, the more dependent each part of it becomes on every other part of it, the easier it is for one man, one lunatic or true believer, to destroy it all on a whim. One man working alone can assassinate a chief of state and precipitate major changes in his country’s foreign and domestic policies. They tell us that one man with a degree in biology and a lot of determination can culture more than enough plague bacillus to destroy the world. One man working alone can even build a nuclear bomb. All he needs is a college degree in physics. And the ability to get his hands on a few Pounds of plutonium. Which isn’t so damned hard to do either. He can build a bomb inside a suitcase and wipe out New York
City because. . . Well, hell, why not because he was mugged there, or because he once got a traffic ticket in Manhattan and he doesn’t think he deserved it.
“But Salsbury can’t be working alone,” Jenny said.
“I agree with you.”
“The resources needed to perfect and implement the program that he described in his article. . . Why, they would be enormous.”
“A private industry might be able to finance it,” Paul said. “A company as large as AT&T.”
“No,” Sam said. “Too many executives and research people would have to know about it. There would be a leak. It would never get this far without a leak to the press and a major scandal.”
“A single wealthy man could provide what Salsbury needed,” Jenny said. “Someone as rich as Onassis was. Or Hughes.”
Tugging gently on his beard, Sam said, “It’s possible, I suppose. But we’re all avoiding the most logical explanation.”
“That Salsbury is working for the United States government,” Paul said worriedly.
“Exactly,” Sam said. “And if he is working for the government or the CIA or any branch of the military-then we’re finished. Not just the three of us and Rya, but the whole damned country.”
Paul went to the window, wiped away some of the dew, and stared at wind-lashed trees and billowing gray sheets of rain. “Do you think that what’s happening here is happening all over the country?”