"Believe me, I'm worried," Evans said.
The detective frowned at him. "Okay," he said finally. "You have a client privilege you're invoking. I have to tell you that I've gotten calls from UCLA and from the CDC on this paralysis thing. Now that there's a second case, there are going to be more calls." He flipped his notebook shut. "I'm going to need you to come by the station and give us a signed statement. Can you do that later today?"
"I think so."
"Four o'clock?"
"Yes. Fine."
"The address is on the card. Just ask for me at the desk. Parking is under the building."
"Okay," Evans said.
"See you then," the detective said, and turned to leave.
Evans shut the door behind him and leaned against it. He was glad to finally be alone. He walked around the apartment slowly, trying to focus his thoughts. The television was still on, but the sound was turned off. He looked at the couch where the private investigator had been sitting. The indentation of his body was still visible.
He still had half an hour before he was supposed to meet with Drake. But he wanted to know what the PI had brought to him. Where was it? Evans had moved in every direction of the compass, and each time the man had indicated with his fingertips that it was the wrong direction.
Which meant what? He hadn't brought the thing? It was somewhere else? Or that whoever paralyzed him had taken it, so it was no longer there?
Evans sighed. The critical question--is it here?--was one he hadn't asked the detective. Evans just assumed it was there.
And suppose it was? Where would it be?
North, south, east, west. All wrong.
Which meant...
What?
He shook his head. He was having trouble concentrating. The truth was, the private investigator's paralysis had unnerved him more than he wanted to admit. He looked at the couch, and the indentation. The guy couldn't move. It must have been terrifying. And the paramedics had lifted him up bodily, like a sack of potatoes, and put him on the stretcher. The cushions on the couch were in disarray, a reminder of their efforts.
Idly, Evans straightened up the couch, putting the cushions in place, fluffing them...
He felt something. Inside a slit in one cushion. He stuck his hand deeper into the padding.
"Damn," he said.
Of course it was obvious in retrospect. Moving away in every direction was wrong, because the investigator wanted Evans to movetoward him. The guy was sitting on the thing, which he had slipped inside the couch cushion.
It turned out to be a shiny DVD.
Evans dropped it in the DVD player, and watched as a menu came up, a list of dates. They were all in the last few weeks.
Evans clicked on the first date.
He saw a view of the NERF conference room. It was a side angle, from the corner of the room, waist high. It must have been from a camera hidden in the speaker's podium or something, Evans thought. Undoubtedly the investigator had installed the camera the day Evans had seen him in the NERF conference room.
At the bottom of the screen was a running time code, numbers flickering. But Evans stared at the image itself, which showed Nicholas Drake talking to John Henley, the PR guy. Drake was upset, throwing up his hands.
"Ihate global warming," Drake said, almost shouting. "I fuckinghate it. It's a goddamn disaster."
"It's been established," Henley said calmly. "Over many years. It's what we have to work with."
"To work with? Butit doesn't work, " Drake said. "That's my point. You can't raise a dime with it, especially in winter. Every time it snows people forget all about global warming. Or else they decide some warming might be a good thing after all. They're trudging through the snow,hoping for a little global warming. It's not like pollution, John. Pollutionworked. It still works. Pollution scares the shit out of people. You tell 'em they'll get cancer, and the money rolls in. But nobody is scared of a little warming. Especially if it won't happen for a hundred years."
"You have ways to play it," Henley said.
"Not anymore," Drake said. "We've tried them all. Species extinction from global warming--nobody gives a shit. They've heard that most of the species that will become extinct are insects. You can't raise money on insect extinctions, John. Exotic diseases from global warming--nobody cares. Hasn't happened. We ran that huge campaign last year connecting global warming to the Ebola and Hanta viruses. Nobody went for it. Sea-level rise from global warming--we all know where that'll end up. The Vanutu lawsuit is a fucking disaster. Everybody'll assume the sea level isn't rising anywhere. And that Scandinavian guy, that sea level expert. He's becoming a pest. He's even attacking the IPCC for incompetence."