“Will you sit down, Mr. Fowler?” she finally shouted.
Smiling, Fowler sat.
“Now, then,” the lady senator began firmly, attempting to regain control of the meeting, “you may, of course, say whatever you like in support of your proposal, Mr. Fowler. It is so stated in the rules. But we are apparently now dealing with private lives and personal experiences of absurdly emotional overtones, which should not casually be aired in public. I therefore declare that the committee should recess for private consu—”
“Never mind, Dee,” interrupted Senator Kaiser. He jerked his head toward the back of the room. “They’ve already left.”
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WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE . . .
Wheeling looked down to the seats vacated by the departed reporters.
Petterson sighed slightly, then directed an unhappy glare at Fowler. He looked back innocently, for all the world a balding cherub in a sharkskin suit. A similarity, Wheeling reflected approvingly, that clearly went deeper than the weave.
“I confess I fail to understand your insertion of high school melodramatics into what is, by your own admission, a matter of science, Mr. Fowler. Your statements do not reflect credit on your department.”
“Your pardon again, Madam Senator, but may I remind you that the department had nothing to do with fixing a location for the sardine catch, and therefore it bears no responsibility for this elderly gentleman’s sad existence. As a matter of fact, it was your committee—I beg your pardon, its ancestor—that settled on the U.S.-Mexican border. A decision which should have been made on the basis of solid scientific evidence, but which in actuality was decided by the insertion of melodramatics hi the form of political maneuvering.”