Bug Man Suspense 3-in-1 Bundle

by Tim Downs

  Someone in the back called out, “Can you go over the tomato part again?”

  “Google it. As Manduca sexta develops it passes through five instars. Who can tell me what an ‘instar’ is?”

  No one raised their hand.

  Nick looked around the group. “Who has been conscious for more than five minutes at a time in my class?”

  Again, no one.

  “That explains a lot,” Nick said. “You should all be ashamed of yourselves. There’s a woman right here who has never taken an entomology course in her entire life, and I’ll bet even she knows what an instar is.” He turned to Kathryn. “Ma’am?”

  Kathryn cleared her throat. “An instar is a stage of development an insect passes through on its way to becoming an adult. Blowflies have three.”

  Nick bowed. “Thank you, ma’am. You may stop showing off now.”

  Kathryn made a polite curtsy in return.

  Alena watched the scene and groaned. “I think I’m going to puke.”

  “The tobacco hornworm is a defoliator,” Nick continued. “It has three sets of forelegs to grip the plant and a mandible that acts like a pair of shears. Manduca prefers leaves, but it will also eat blossoms and even green fruit. They will eat everything in sight and they’ll do it in a matter of days. The field behind you is infested with tobacco hornworms. The owner refuses to use pesticides because her farm is certified organic—but if the hornworms are left unchecked, a week from now she will have a field of empty vines. We are here to help her with her problem.”

  The students applauded.

  “I appreciate your willingness to help,” Nick said, “not that I’m giving you a choice. Now, I have good news and I have bad news. The good news is: Manduca does 90 percent of its damage during its final instar, and the ones in this field are still in their first instar—that means we’re catching them early. The bad news is, they’re very small and they’ll be harder to pick.”

  There was a pause. “Did you say, ‘Pick’?”

  “That’s right. We have to pick them off the plants.”

  A timid voice in the back asked, “With our hands?”

  “No, with your teeth. Of course with your hands—what did you think? The hornworm can’t harm you—it doesn’t bite and it doesn’t sting. The little horn on the dorsal end is only for decoration and serves no practical purpose—much like your undergraduate degree. The photograph I’m holding up is an L5 Manduca—a hornworm in its fifth and final instar. Notice that the larva is very large and green in color, and it has seven diagonal white lines on its sides—that’s Manduca’s distinguishing mark. The ones you’re looking for, however, will be small and white and they have no marks—they will not look like this photo.”

  “Then why are you holding it up?”

  “Because I don’t want you to be morons for the rest of your lives. Now, I want you to break into groups of two or three. Start at the end of one of the rows and work your way across the field. Be sure to check the undersides of the leaves—that’s where you’ll find most of them. Make sure each of you has a bucket, or a cup, or a plastic bag—something to collect the hornworms in.”

  “How do you want us to divide into groups?” someone asked.

  “I don’t care. Do it the way your species usually does it: by social dominance or physical attraction. Come on, people—if Manduca can find tomatoes with a brain the size of a pin, you can figure out how to form groups.”

  The students began to break up, but Nick gave a shrill whistle and called them back. “There’s one more thing,” he said, “and this is very important. I’m passing out a simple diagram of this tomato field. I want each of you to take one and keep it with you. When you finish picking the hornworms from a plant, I want you to indicate on the diagram where the plant was located and how many hornworms you found on it.”

  “We have to count them?”

  “Unless you have another method of arriving at their number. We only have a few hours of daylight, people, so let’s get going. Please work as quickly as you can, be thorough, and do not eat the tomatoes unless you pay for them.”

  “And thank you!” Kathryn shouted as the students grabbed diagrams and plastic containers and scattered.

  She turned to Nick. “This is really sweet of you, Nick.”

  He shrugged. “You didn’t give me much choice. Personally, I would have doused the whole place with insecticide.”

  “No, you wouldn’t. You’re a bug man.”

  “There are an estimated ten quintillion insects on earth. The entomologist’s motto is: ‘There’s more where those came from.’”

  “I thought you loved bugs.”

  “Bugs are like people,” Nick said. “It’s easy to love them as a group, but it’s hard to get attached to individuals.”

  “You just haven’t met the right individual yet.”

  Alena approached from behind. “Great lecture, Professor. Is the class closed or can I still sign up?”

  “We can use all the help we can get,” Nick said, handing her one of the diagrams. “Grab a bucket and take one of these—we should all pitch in.”

  Six hours later the skies were black and the students were gathered around a group of folding tables Kathryn had retrieved from her roadside produce stand. Pizza had been ordered from the Papa John’s in Newton Grove, accompanied by bowls of tossed salad made from Kathryn’s own fields. Torchlights flickered all around, encircled by moths and beetles entranced by the flames, and every few minutes a bat would appear in a silent flurry of wings and another insect would suddenly disappear. The torches filled the entire yard with a cheery orange light and cast flickering shadows in every direction. The students were laughing and joking about afternoon classes they had willingly missed and maggots they had fearlessly confronted.

  Nick sat with Kathryn and Alena at a table by themselves. They sat three-in-a-row on a single bench to keep the tabletop in full light. The checkered vinyl tablecloth was scattered with the diagrams the students had completed that afternoon. On a single sheet of paper Nick had compiled all their numbers and locations onto one master diagram.

  “Just what I thought,” he said.

  Kathryn leaned closer. “What?”

  Nick slid the diagram to the center of the table where both women could see. “Look at the numbers. They’re large here, but they gradually get smaller until they disappear about here. See? They fan out from this point, sort of like a rock dropped into a pond—the ripples get smaller as they go out.” He put his finger on the spot where the largest numbers converged. “That’s where we found the original marijuana.”

  “What does that tell us?” Alena asked. “Don’t we already know that the bugs came from the eggs that were in the drugs?”

  “Yes, but we don’t know why.”

  “I’m not following you.”

  “Look—the eggs of Manduca sexta take three or four days to hatch at eighty degrees Fahrenheit. We found our eggs about two days ago and they’ve already hatched—that means the eggs were placed in the marijuana a day or two before that.”

  “Placed? You mean on purpose?”

  “There’s no other way to account for their presence. Manduca lays its eggs on tobacco and tomatoes—never on marijuana. And even if it did, marijuana is always dried and processed before it’s shipped—that would kill any eggs that were present. There’s no way to explain why this insect’s eggs would be present in these numbers—unless somebody purposely put them there.”

  “But why would anyone do that?”

  “I can’t say for certain—but there’s an obvious possibility.”

  “What?”

  “Somebody wanted to destroy your tomato field.”

  Kathryn looked doubtful. “There must be a dozen ways to destroy a tomato field—why would anybody do it like this? It seems like way too much trouble.”

  “I’m not saying that’s the answer,” Nick said. “I just think it’s something to consider. I find it just a little too coincidental that
an insect that devours tomato fields would just randomly appear in yours.”

  “But why the marijuana? And why would Michael be involved?”

  “I can’t answer any of that. So far all we know is that the hornworms seem to be confined to this one area. They’re just larvae—they can’t crawl very far from where they hatch. I wanted the students to chart their distribution so we could see if they were released anyplace else in your field. Fortunately, they weren’t—so far.”

  “So far?”

  “Insect development is all about temperature; the warmer the temperature, the faster the eggs hatch. These eggs hatched today, but they were on the edge of the field in the full sun. It’s cooler under the tomato plants; if there are other eggs out there, they could take another day to hatch.” Nick turned to Alena. “That’s why you need to keep searching the fields for any more marijuana. If you can find it before the eggs hatch it would be a big help.”

  “You got it,” Alena said. “I’ll get on it first thing in the morning.”

  “What can I do?” Kathryn asked.

  “Keep checking your tomato plants for hornworms,” he said. “The kids were bound to miss some. In another week you won’t be able to miss them—they’ll be three inches long and as thick as your little finger. After that they’ll pupate. We have to catch them before they do, because once they pupate we won’t be able to find them, and if the moths mature and start laying eggs, we’ve really got a problem.”

  Kathryn looked at her little finger and shuddered.

  “You don’t have to pick them off yourself,” Nick said. “Just show them to Alena—she can pick them off for you.”

  Alena rolled her eyes. “Sure, Alena’s got nothing better to do.”

  “And one more thing,” Nick said to Kathryn. “You might want to think about who would want to destroy you.”

  Pasha unlocked the door to Nick’s lab and let himself in, then quietly closed and locked the door behind him. He left the lights off and made his way across the room, using only the moonlight pouring through the window to navigate by. When he reached the rearing chamber he took the textbook from under his arm and opened it on the table. He held the flashlight like a dagger and illuminated the pages; the two-page chart was titled “Forensic Fly Species: Development Times for Egg-to-Adult Emergence.” He ran his finger down the chart until he found the number he was looking for.

  He raised the flashlight and pointed it at the row of dials across the top of the rearing unit. He reached for the one marked “Temperature” and lowered it by twelve degrees.

  18

  Habib Almasi ran his hand over the glossy hood of the new Ford Focus. A car for women and children, he thought—nothing like the Mercedes and BMWs that lined the streets of the Financial Centre in Doha. He circled around to the driver’s-side window and cupped his hand over his eyes; the interior looked boring and cheap. It was the car that Ford was currently pushing overseas, and it might do well in Eastern Europe where they were still greedy for second-rate Western goods—but it would never sell in Qatar.

  Habib checked the sticker in the rear window. The bottom line read, “EPA estimated mpg 24 city/35 hwy with manual transmission.” He shook his head—no wonder they put it at the bottom. He checked the tank capacity: 13 gallons. He quickly did the math: gasoline at four dollars per gallon, fifty-two dollars to fill the tank, crude oil on the New York Mercantile Exchange at roughly $110 per barrel . . .

  “Welcome to Crossroads Ford,” a cheerful voice said behind him. “How can I help you today?”

  Habib turned. “Show me something larger.”

  “Glad to. Let me ask you a couple of questions just to get started. Are you married? Any kids?”

  “No.”

  “Then you probably won’t be interested in an SUV. Have you seen the new Mustang GT? It has a 4.6 liter V-8, 300 horses under the hood—very sweet. You need to hear this audio system. Ten speakers and four subwoofers—two on the doors and a dual thumper in the trunk—”

  “What gas mileage does it get?”

  The salesman paused. “To tell you the truth, I’ve never been asked.”

  Habib smiled.

  “You’re interested in fuel economy, aren’t you? Then let me show you—”

  “Are any of your vehicles equipped to burn E85?”

  “You mean ethanol? There’s a flex-fuel version of the Crown Vic. The F-150 pickup too—best-selling pickup in the U.S. for over thirty years.”

  “Where is the truck, please? Just point—I can find it.”

  The salesman directed him to a hulking midnight-blue truck with gleaming chrome trim. Habib stood staring at the vehicle. He didn’t need to consult the sticker; he knew the numbers by heart. The standard F-150 had a 5.4 liter, 8 cylinder engine capable of a pathetic fourteen miles per gallon in the city at an estimated annual fuel cost of just over four thousand dollars—four thousand dollars’ worth of gasoline. But the flex-fuel version of the vehicle was capable of burning E85 instead—a mixture of 85 percent ethanol and only 15 percent gasoline—and for an oil-producing nation, that was not good news.

  Ironically, the truck got even poorer mileage burning ethanol—but the Americans were not concerned about that. The goal of using ethanol wasn’t better fuel economy—not at first, anyway. The goal of developing biofuels like ethanol was to wean America from its dependence on foreign oil. The growth of ethanol could mean stability and independence for the American economy—and disaster for the economy of Qatar.

  In most of America ethanol was still unheard of—but not in the Midwest. Ethanol was made from corn, and Midwestern farmers were growing rich from the increased demand. Twenty percent of America’s corn crop had already been diverted into fuel tanks, and the demand was increasing every year. Numbers continued to run through Habib’s mind: U.S. ethanol production will reach seven billion gallons this year—more than double what it was just five years ago. One bushel of corn will produce 2.7 gallons of ethanol. Ethanol production will require 2.6 billion bushels of corn this year . . .

  Habib tried to imagine his country as it used to be, when Qatar was just a way station for British ships on their way to India. Then Qatar was nothing but a string of fishing and pearling villages, where descendants of the Al Khalifa and Al Saud clans squabbled endlessly over water rights and the true ancestral borders of useless stretches of sand. Then came the discovery of oil in the 1940s—and then came the British oil companies with their pipelines and refineries. Money poured into Qatar, and money poured out again—and in just six decades Qatar became the wealthiest nation per capita on earth. It all happened in just sixty years—and it could all change just as fast.

  Eighty-five percent ethanol, and only fifteen percent gasoline . . .

  The little dancers flitted across the stage like doves, spinning and leaping and pirouetting as they went. No one kept in step; they barely kept time to the music, but no one in the audience cared. They were only children, after all, and they deserved their chance to dance for the sheer enjoyment of it. The world would force them to get in step soon enough.

  Jengo Muluneh and his wife, Mena, sat in the darkened auditorium at Meredith College and watched their daughter dance. Ayanna was so beautiful—like the African flower she was named after. She was dressed in white tights and a matching tutu that rode high on her waist and made her slender legs look even longer. The dancers scurried into line now and began to do demi-pliés, dipping at the knees and allowing their arms to rise up at their sides. On some of the children the move looked awkward—like clumsy seagulls trying to leave the ground. But Ayanna had long, graceful limbs that flowed like wind and water, and her arms seemed to float like feathers in the air. Jengo looked at his daughter’s face. Her ebony skin made her features difficult to see against the dark stage scrim—but not her smile. Ayanna beamed from ear to ear as she danced, and her smile glistened like the little plastic tiara on top of her head.

  Jengo glanced at the girl beside Ayanna. She was shorter and stockier i
n build and she had a little round belly that protruded above her tutu. Jengo tried not to look, but he couldn’t stop himself. His eyes kept returning to that belly, and his mind kept returning to a memory that he could never forget.

  Jengo cut another two ears of corn from the stalks and dropped one of them into the reed basket. He took the second ear and stripped back the husk to expose the grain; the kernels were small and irregular. He shook his head sadly. Corn needed water—a lot of it—even a boy his age knew that, but the drought that had begun in the Horn of Africa and spread westward was slowly decimating his family’s two-hectare farm. Less than a week ago Jengo had passed a dead goat on his way to school. He recognized the goat—it belonged to a neighbor—and now it was nothing but a heap of bleached bones under a papery hide. Jengo saw it as an omen, a warning of things to come.

  His father had told him that if the rains did not increase, their region would become like Somalia, where less than five inches of rain had fallen in the last year and a half. Jengo listened when his father spoke with the other men of their woreda. One man reported that Gambela’s Water and Mines Resources Development Bureau had announced plans to drill fifty-four more deepwater wells, but those were only for drinking water—there would not be enough water for the corn. All the men hoped for more help from the West, but some of the men said that food aid to Central Africa was decreasing. The cost of food was going up everywhere, all over the world—and to make matters worse, the violence and instability of the region were causing the United Nations and private aid organizations to pull back. In Somalia, they said, eleven aid workers had been murdered in just the last year.