The Ethical Assassin_ A Novel Part 24

I fidgeted with an empty plastic ca.s.sette holder I'd found on the floor. "I'm not sure you're his type. Being female and all."

"You don't think he's gay, do you?"

"Well, I did kind of a.s.sume it. But look, that's not important. Who are you, anyhow?"

"Why do you think he's gay? Because he's a vegetarian?"

"Of course not," I said. "I don't care if he's gay or he isn't. I was just letting you know that you may not be his type. But we can discuss that once you tell me why you're following us around. Melford might not care, but I do."

"It's so wrong," Desiree said, "to just a.s.sume things about people, to label them based on appearances. I've worked so hard at trying to understand my real self. I've been reading about auras and reincarnation and using the I Ching. I Ching. And you? Boom. You decide he's gay." And you? Boom. You decide he's gay."

"Look, it's not a big deal to me. I was just saying."

"Have you even asked him?"

"No, I haven't asked him, because I don't care." My tone was growing increasingly shrill. "I haven't asked him what his favorite color is, either."

"Why are you getting so worked up about this?" Desiree asked.

Melford came out of the store, a bottle of water in one hand, his keys in the other.

"Lem thinks you're gay," she told him when he opened the door.

Melford settled behind the wheel and pivoted around to me. He grinned broadly. "A lot of people think that, Lemuel. I wouldn't sweat it. But you don't have anything against gay people, do you?"

"No," I blurted. "That's not the point. I want to know who Desiree is and what she's doing following us around." I blurted. "That's not the point. I want to know who Desiree is and what she's doing following us around."

"What does that have to do with my s.e.xual orientation?" Melford asked. "I don't get it."

"Neither do I." My voice came out high-pitched.

Melford glanced over at Desiree. "Lem has a valid question. Who are you, and why are you following us around?"

"Me?" she said. "Some very bad people asked me to keep an eye on you, Lem, find out if you were up to anything improper."

"And is he?" Melford asked.

"Not as near as I can tell. But I'll have to keep following him to be sure. Unless"-she glanced at Melford-"someone distracts me."

Information came out slowly over a leisurely drive up and down the highway. Desiree worked, as I'd already suspected, for B. B. Gunn, who was centered near Miami and who used both the hog trade and the encyclopedia business as some sort of front for selling drugs. Desiree seemed eager to avoid getting too specific. She made it clear that she wanted to leave B.B., but while she didn't want to betray him, she'd reached the conclusion-thanks, in part, to the I Ching I Ching and in part to Melford-that she needed to make amends for her involvement in such an enterprise. For some time now she'd been looking for something, she said, some kind of meaning, and at the Chinese restaurant she'd become increasingly convinced that Melford's interest in kindness to animals might be what she sought. I had no idea if her conviction would strengthen or waver when she discovered the project involved killing people. and in part to Melford-that she needed to make amends for her involvement in such an enterprise. For some time now she'd been looking for something, she said, some kind of meaning, and at the Chinese restaurant she'd become increasingly convinced that Melford's interest in kindness to animals might be what she sought. I had no idea if her conviction would strengthen or waver when she discovered the project involved killing people.

"So, what do animal rights people do?" she asked. "Blow up slaughterhouses and things?"

Melford shook his head. "For the most part, no. The princ.i.p.al arm of the movement is a loose affiliation of activists collectively known as the Animal Liberation Front. The thing that makes it work so well is that to be a member of this group, all you have to do is espouse its values, take action, and attribute that action to the ALF. No training camp, no indoctrination, no oath of loyalty. On a small scale, they generally vandalize fast-food restaurants or hunting shops, anything to throw a monkey wrench, even a tiny one, into the machinery of animal misery. But more sophisticated operations involve things like rescuing lab animals or breaking into research or farming facilities to take pictures and expose their cruelty."

"I don't know," Desiree said. "It sounds sort of weak. Do you really want to dedicate your life to pestering people to stop doing what they're never going to stop doing anyway? Maybe you should take stronger action. Beat up some fast-food executives or something."

"The ALF believes that its people must never harm anyone, not even the cruelest of animal tormentors, since their core belief is that human beings can live their lives without harming any creatures."

I tried not to react when I heard this.

"They can't take down someone really nasty?" Desiree asked.

Melford shook his head. "Anyone who would do that, who would even be suspected of thinking about that sort of thing, would be shunned by the organization and the entire animal rights movement. They're all about saving lives, even human lives. Though property is always a legitimate target."

"I respect that," she said.

"There are those, however," Melford went on, "who take action when the ALF won't, who believe that violence is, under extreme circ.u.mstances, a necessary evil. The core of the animal rights movement never condone this sort of thing, not even in private, I suspect."

"That sounds about right to me," Desiree said. "It doesn't make any sense to support the idea of protecting the rights of all beings if you then start picking and choosing. Otherwise, we're all like people in a restaurant, picking from the tank which fish we want to eat."

Melford smiled. "That's right."

Desiree smiled at this lie, as if she were so happy to have Melford's approval. The crazy thing was, I knew how she felt. And I knew he was lying to her. So what did that say about the ease with which I'd come to value his opinion? If I didn't know from personal experience, the personal experience of seeing him kill two people, I would never suspect he was lying. I suddenly felt distinctly uneasy, like I wanted to get out of the car. Like I wanted to get away.

"Can I ask a question?" Desiree said.

"Of course."

"What about medical research? I mean, it may be unpleasant to use animals as test subjects, but we get results. And isn't it important to find cures for diseases?"

"Absolutely it's important to find cures for diseases," Melford agreed, "but using animals to do so is another matter. Look, there are two aspects to the answer-one ethical and the other practical. The ethical issue is that it may be expedient to torment and kill animals for our needs, but is it the right thing to do? If we could get better results by using prisoners or unwanted children or unlucky b.a.s.t.a.r.ds picked by lottery, would that be okay? In other words, do the ends justify the means? Either the lives of animals are to be valued or they're not, and if they are, then making exceptions because something is really, really important doesn't make sense."

"I'm not sure I buy it," she said. "They're animals, not people. Shouldn't we have the right to take advantage of our position on the food chain? We don't judge lions for eating zebras."

"Lions can't choose not to eat zebras," Melford said. "It's not ethics for them. It's what they're designed to do. We can choose whether or not to harm animals, so we can be judged by that choice."

"Okay, I accept that," she told him. "But I don't know that I accept that we should die of diseases rather than use animals to help us overcome them."

"That's a tough one. It may be the toughest one for people to get past. The ethical person can sacrifice hot dogs and hamburgers, but the question of animal testing seems to provide a real dilemma. So here's something to keep in mind: Most animal testing is utterly worthless."

"Come on," I chimed in. "Why would they do it if it was worthless?"

"Don't fool yourself. Medical labs may be full of well-meaning researchers, but they need funding to do their work. Researchers have to apply for grants, and grant proposals have to be written so that they are successful. And to get grants, researchers have to use animal research-it's just that simple. Grant providers have come to believe in the efficacy of animal research, and no amount of scientific fact is going to sway them."

"Maybe they believe in it because it works," Desiree suggested.

"Most of the animals they use for research are mammals and are closely related to us, but that doesn't mean they respond to diseases or to drugs the same way we do. Chimps are our closest relatives. They're more closely related to us than they are to gorillas, but you know what happens if you give a chimp PCP-angel dust? It goes to sleep. PCP makes a great chimp tranquilizer. Think about that. A drug that turns us into monsters makes them sleepy, and they're the nearest thing to humans out there. So if a drug works or doesn't work on a chimp or a rat or a dog, what does that tell us about how it will go on humans? Ultimately, it tells us nothing."

"Haven't there been lots of breakthroughs that have come through animal research?"

"And there will probably be many more. That doesn't mean it's the best way to go. Advocates of medical research ask if we'd rather live without the polio vaccine, since the polio vaccine would never have come about if there had been no animal research. It's a false argument. Sure, we're better off with a polio vaccine than without one, but human beings are clever and resourceful. There are alternatives, including using volunteers and lab tests. Some scientists are even beginning to work with models built entirely from computer software. To say that we would never be where we are without animal research is to a.s.sume that research would close down without animals. Of course it wouldn't. We'd find new ways. Necessity is the mother of invention, so if we outlawed animal testing, we might have more advanced computers now because we'd need more sophisticated computer models to save lives. And because animal research is so unreliable, the better question to ask would be what we might have discovered if we didn't rely on it. The defenders of vivisection like to suggest that it's a choice between animals and disease or testing and cures, but what if just the opposite is true, and using unreliable biological models has set back medical science? Maybe without animal testing we'd have a cure for cancer by now."

"I don't know," Desiree said absently. "You make a good case, but if I'm sick, I want them to do everything possible to cure me."

"You want them to do everything possible, but not anything conceivable, whether it benefits you or not."

"True."

"And, as an ethical person, even if you want to allow for animal testing, don't you think there should be some sort of standard of need? Maybe a tester should have to make a case for why it is necessary to sacrifice a monkey or a dog or a rat for a particular cause. Right now they are free to slaughter and torture however many thousands they like without oversight.

"And you know there's a whole lot of animal testing that has nothing to do with health. Cosmetic companies subject millions of animals a year to torture to see if this new and improved nail polish remover does as much damage to a rabbit's eyes as the old version. You'd think it would be enough to know that putting corrosive material in your eyes is a bad move, but these guys need to test it out."

"Why?" I asked.

"Who knows why? Insurance liability or some nonsense like that. They just do it."

"Come on," Desiree said. "You're telling me that big corporations pay who knows how much just to torture animals unnecessarily? I don't believe it."

"Really?" A strange sort of smile came over Melford's face. "You don't believe it? Lemuel, you don't have to be at the pickup until what? Ten-thirty or eleven, right?"

"Right," I said slowly.

"And you have nowhere you need to be before then?"

"Well," I ventured, "it would be nice to go to a movie."

"Nice try."

"I don't know what you're thinking," I told him, "but I really don't like it."

"No," he said, "you won't like it. You won't like anything about it."

I guess we were already heading in the right direction because Melford hit the gas harder.

"Where are we going?" Desiree asked.

"Well, I wasn't planning on doing this so soon, but I've already done the logistical work, so why not." He grinned at her. "We're going to visit a research lab."

Chapter 28.

WE DROVE FOR ABOUT AN HOUR, farther away from Jacksonville, until Melford pulled off and took us through a bleak landscape of fast-food restaurants, topless bars, and p.a.w.nshops. Finally, he turned again and we went about another ten miles through wooded roads until he stopped and parked in a little strip mall with a jewelry store and a dry cleaner. We got out and he walked to the back, where he proceeded to take out a black garbage bag full of black sweat clothes. farther away from Jacksonville, until Melford pulled off and took us through a bleak landscape of fast-food restaurants, topless bars, and p.a.w.nshops. Finally, he turned again and we went about another ten miles through wooded roads until he stopped and parked in a little strip mall with a jewelry store and a dry cleaner. We got out and he walked to the back, where he proceeded to take out a black garbage bag full of black sweat clothes.

"Dig around," he said. "Find something that fits, but don't put it on yet, or you'll be hot as h.e.l.l." He picked up a black gym bag and slung it over his shoulder, and then he reached into a cardboard box and handed us each a lump of cloth. "You'll need these, too."

They were ski masks.

I already had as many legal problems as I needed, so I had no desire to break into an animal-testing facility, but I knew better than to bring that up or to suggest that maybe I should wait in the car. I was in, and I wasn't getting out.

Melford opened up his gym bag and pa.s.sed around a bottle of bug spray, and once we'd applied that we began the trek through a fairly thick copse of pines. It was still light out, but the mosquitoes were buzzing around my ear, moderately deterred by the repellent. The cl.u.s.ter of trees smelled of rotted leaves and the sourness of an occasional decomposing opossum.

Desiree didn't say anything. She had a look of amused determination on her face. But why should she care? She clearly did illegal things all the time. One more wasn't going to bother her.

Finally we began to emerge and Melford held up his hand, the platoon commander ordering us to stop.

"This is as far as we go for now," he said. "It's Sat.u.r.day, and there won't be anyone there, but we're going to wait for dark all the same. Shouldn't be more than an hour and a half or so. In the meantime, I'll go over with you the reconnaissance I've already done." He reached into his pocket and pulled out several pieces of paper, which he proceeded to unfold on the ground. They were hand-drawn maps of the interior of a building.

"What exactly are you planning?" Desiree asked.

"Nothing fancy," he said. "This is a simple hit-and-run. You wanted to know what animal rights activists do-well, this is it. We're going in, we're going to take pictures and collect evidence, and we're going to get out. Simple as that. Then I'm going to pa.s.s along the swag to an animal rights organization, and they'll make the images public and try to stir up controversy. Pretty basic, yes?"

"Sure," Desiree said. "Piece of cake."

Piece of cake. I looked through the woods at the building beyond. About a hundred feet of well-manicured gra.s.s spread out between the edge of the woods and a squat white building without windows. A thin layer of shrubs outlined the structure, but that was all as far as gardening went. It looked bland, harmless, except for its menacing blankness. At the far end, just before an oceanic expanse of parking lot, I saw a concrete slab sticking out of the gra.s.s with the company's name chiseled deep.

Oldham Health Services.

Like the coffee mugs and boxes in Karen and b.a.s.t.a.r.d's trailer. Melford had claimed to have no idea what it was. And now we were about to break in.

It wasn't nearly dark enough to move until almost nine o'clock. Melford smiled at me. "Don't worry," he said. "We'll get you back in time to keep you from getting fired."

The three of us sat there, listening to the chirping cicadas and frogs and night birds, watching the poorly lit grounds of Oldham Health Services grow dark. "These guys are so behind the times," Melford explained. "Up north, they'd never leave a lab like this so vulnerable. But animal rights activists haven't really made themselves known in Florida, so the bad guys feel safe." He took a look around. "Okay, put on your sweats."

Desiree began to unb.u.t.ton her jeans, but Melford shook his head. "Over your clothes, my dear," he said. "We want to be invisible going in, but we want to look normal once we're inside." He glanced at her bikini top. "You'll want to leave the sweatshirt on, I think."

Once we were clad in black and had our masks on, he gave the forward gesture, and we charged onto the lawn like a trio of commandos, heads down, bulleting into the unknown.

I was already starting to sweat, but I felt the rush. For an instant I understood why Melford was Melford, I understood the thrill of doing something illegal, of breaking boundaries, rejecting the mundane and the stable. And it wasn't as if we were burglars, motivated by base greed. We were defying authority for a moral cause. Whether it was my cause, whether I believed in the cause, seemed irrelevant. Just being there made me feel alive.

The yard was poorly lit, and Melford led us around the side and up a set of concrete steps that led to a metal side door. He opened his bag and removed his pick gun, the one he had used on Karen's trailer, and within two minutes the door had clicked open. We slipped inside.

It was pitch black in there, no lights on and no windows. Melford took out a flashlight and instructed us to remove our masks and sweats-all but Desiree's top.

"Security is light," he said in a whisper. "Some guards, almost no cameras. If guards do show up, leave the talking to me."

Once we'd stuffed the clothes into his bag, he hoisted it up and we began to talk again. We were in some sort of storeroom-metal shelves full of boxes, most marked MEDICAL SUPPLIES MEDICAL SUPPLIES. There were gla.s.s jars of dangerous-looking liquids, bags of dog food, cat food, rabbit, rat, and monkey food. All of these emitted their own pet store smell, but from farther beyond I smelled odors far more clinical, things chemical and antiseptic.

Melford found the doors out of the storeroom and we came out into a long corridor of plain cinder-block walls, adorned only with an inexplicable teal racing stripe, and dingy beige linoleum floors. The main lights were off, but enough fluorescent bulbs were illuminated that Melford could turn off his flashlight. The place looked like a hospital after hours.

We made a right, and then another right, and then we went up a set of stairs to a floor that looked remarkably like the one from which we'd come. We followed Melford down a corridor to a door marked "Lab Six," which was locked, so the pick gun came out again. Desiree stood nervous watch while I tried to peer inside through the dark gla.s.s square and Melford worked the lock. In less than a minute we were inside.

When the door came open, I knew I had crossed something more metaphorical, but also more tangible, than a door's threshold. Yes, I'd seen the hog farm, seen how terrible it was, the misery and-if such a term can be applied to hogs-the degradation, but this was different. The hog farm was, after all, owned by a crooked cop, and it was a place whose purpose was the raising of hogs so they could die. It was a way station between nothingness and death, and it wasn't meant to be anything more. The pigs were pre-bacon, pre-pork, pre-ham, their slaughter was ordained and inevitable. It was a place of horror and misery, perhaps unnecessary horror and misery, but that it should be miserable and horrible made a sort of functional sense.

This was something else. Three of the walls were lined with small cages, each of which contained some kind of brownish gray monkey about the size of a child's doll, thin, with expressive faces. The room stank, not like the hog lot-which was the smell of fear and feces-but of living putrefaction. It smelled of fresh s.h.i.t and of vomit and p.i.s.s and rot. At first I thought the monkeys were asleep, but when Melford turned on the light, I saw that their eyes were opened. They lay on their sides, most of them panting, their eyes wide, following our movements with unmistakable terror. Many of them were letting out whimpering noises. One bit its lip and gripped the wires of its cage in its fingers with a repeating, desperate pulse.

Across the room, one of the animals rose, dragged itself upright, and hissed at us-a weak but defiant hiss. It bared its teeth. Then its legs appeared to buckle under its weight, and the monkey fell back into a brown pile that might have been its own feces or maybe monkey chow.

Melford reached into his bag and found a camera, which he handed to Desiree. "Start taking pictures," he told her. He, meanwhile, began to search the lab and quickly found a clipboard, which he held up to us. "Okay, here it is. You know what these monkeys are being tested for? Cure for cancer? Brain regeneration for stroke victims? Heart surgery to help babies with birth defects? Guess again. They're part of an LD50-that's 'lethal dose fifty percent.' These are routine studies done on standard household products to find out what quant.i.ty causes death in fifty percent of the test subjects. They do it with drain cleaner, dish soap, motor oil, you name it. You know what's being tested here? Photocopier paper. How much paper these monkeys can be force-fed before fifty percent of them die."

Desiree stopped taking pictures. Her gaze fell on one monkey, lying on its side, one arm straight back, the other resting limply on its face. Its chest heaved up and down in pained respiration. "But why? What does that tell them?"

"Exactly what you think-how much copier paper will kill fifty percent of the test subjects," Melford said. "Look, you have to understand that these experiments aren't goal directed anymore. Maybe there was a time when LD50 tests were designed to discover something useful. It didn't make it right, but it made it practical, at least. Now it's just something that's done. It's a standard test because insurance companies want data to help them determine liability and flesh out their actuarial tables. They do it because not doing it might help some lawyer down the road argue that the company didn't perform all necessary safety tests. They do it because it is what they do. Millions upon millions of animals are tortured and killed each year just because."