Crime Zero by Michael Cordy Page B

went dead. Perhaps Madeline was right; she usually was. Gaining FDA approval to begin Conscience Phase 2 trials was vital for Pamela Weiss to go ahead with her preelection announcement. And it was looking as if it would be increasingly crucial to the election itself, given the latest opinion polls, which showed a strong Republican lead. As for the FDA approval to embark on efficacy trials, that was academic. Under the auspices of Project Conscience, Alice Prince and Madeline Naylor had been secretly testing behavior-modifying gene therapy on unsuspecting convicts for more than eight years now.

    Chapter 5.
    Cartamena Orphanage for Young Boys, Mexico. Wednesday, October 29, 5:23 P.M.
    Dr. Victoria Valdez looked down at the small boy lying on the gurney and released a sigh. Fernando, only thirteen, was one of her favorites. Brave and cocky with a skinny body and huge dark eyes, he had a gift for soccer and making her laugh. He was far too young to have suffered a brain hemorrhage. She looked around the small, spotless clinic attached to the orphanage. His death was especially poignant because it was so rare for a child to die here.
    The Cartamena Orphanage for Young Boys, thirty miles south of Mexico City, was fortunate. A large proportion of its costs and all its medical expenses were funded by a little-known charitable trust in the United States called Fresh Start. The funding and resources had been provided for some nine years on the understanding that there would be no publicity. Valdez knew Fresh Start was a front for ViroVector Solutions in California, but if a large company wanted to help young children without claiming the credit, she wasn't complaining.
    The great Dr. Alice Prince even visited from time to time and selected certain children for her personal attention. And if the children ever had any serious problems outside Dr. Valdez's experience and training, then Dr. Prince and her company provided more specialist care. No, Valdez thought that she and the orphanage had much to be grateful for. The boys here were better cared for than in any institution she knew. In the last nine years she knew of only seven fatalities, remarkable here in Mexico. And those had been just as sudden and unexplained as Fernando's death had been. Some of his hair had fallen out recently, but that could have been vitamin deficiency. And the acne on his face was normal for a boy of his age. When he had gone to sleep last night, he had been fine, but today he was dead.
    As a matter of procedure she had immediately called Fresh Start. It had asked to be notified of all deaths. She was put through eventually to Dr. Prince herself. Victoria told her that the boy had died of a suspected brain hemorrhage. At first Victoria was touched by Alice's apparent genuine concern but then was surprised to be asked only one question: Had Fernando reached puberty?
    Nonplussed, Victoria already guessed the answer but said she would check after hanging up the phone. The orphanage cared for boys only until the age of puberty and then either sent them to other homes or found them jobs. The rules were strict, and Fresh Start insisted on them, but Victoria still thought Dr. Prince's question was strange. The boy was dead. What did it matter whether he could still stay at the orphanage or not?
    Looking down at the naked corpse, she shook her head again. She walked to the wall, picked up the handset, and dialed the number Dr. Prince had given her. "Yes," she said in reply to the American's first question, "but only just."
    Valdez frowned when she heard the sigh of relief. The response hardly seemed appropriate.
    The Marina District, San Francisco, California.
    6:47 P.M.
    Luke Decker felt calmer when he pulled up outside his grandfather's tall Victorian house in the Marina in San Francisco. He had spent the last few hours driving aimlessly around the city. He almost called in on one of his old buddies from Berkeley, a journalist called Hank Butcher, who lived in