Crossing Savage by Dave Edlund Page B

remember. Hello, Jim. You are right on time; 11:00 A.M.” Professor Ian Savage was full of energy and very sharp at an age when many other men would be retired. He stood straight and was just under six feet tall. His physique was best described as tough and wiry—not an ounce of excess fat, yet not thin. With his gray hair and a short, gray beard, he looked very much like a distinguished gentleman, the stereotypical professor.
    â€œPleased to see you again, Professor. It’s been a long time. I drove into Bend yesterday and stopped by to see Peter and ended up staying at his place so we could tell stories and catch up. I asked Peter to join me for this meeting with you. I hope you don’t mind?”
    â€œOh? Why is that?”
    â€œWell, sir, as I mentioned on the phone, I work for the government—military intelligence—and we’ve been tracking several global incidents that suggest to us that your life may be in danger.”
    â€œYou could have simply told me that over the phone and saved yourself a lot of time.”
    â€œSir, I believe I did.”
    Professor Ian Savage smiled ever so slightly at Jim’s reply. He remembered the boy who had been his son’s best friend so many years ago. But now the boy was a man. And he wasn’t easily intimidated or pushed around. The professor respected that, but he would never admit it to Jim. He motioned for them to have a seat at the round conference table tucked into a corner of his office.
    As Jim moved toward the table, he quickly scanned the room, taking note of small details as was his practice. The office was large enough to hold the Professor’s desk and the conference table comfortably. A small table just to the side of the door supported an old-style percolator coffee pot and three cups, none of them matching. There was a modest sofa along one wall, and the opposite wall was covered, floor to ceiling, with books and journals tucked haphazardly on shelving supported by black metal brackets clipped into tracks placed every couple of feet on the wall. It wasn’t very neat, and Jim wondered how Professor Savage could ever find anything on those shelves.
    A large, antique mahogany desk with carved details on the drawer fronts was placed at a right angle to the window, affording the professor a view of the campus common area below without having his back to the door. The top of the desk was littered with papers, including one stack that must have been just shy of a foot tall. Protruding above this chaotic sea of notes and papers was a large flat-panel monitor. At the moment, it was filled with a piping and instrumentation diagram.
    Peter voiced his concern; he knew very well how stubborn his father could be. “Dad, Jim outlined his reasoning last night, and it seems there is a connection to your research. It sounds plausible to me, and I’d like for you to hear him out. What if he’s right?”
    â€œOh, come now. I’m a Professor Emeritus of Chemical Engineering at a state university. My work is hardly that well known. I seldom even publish now that I’m not under pressure to do so. I have a few colleagues that I collaborate with, but again, that work is not well known at all. Who would possibly want to kill me? And what does my work have to do with any of this?”
    â€œSir,” Jim replied, “the team I work with has been following a string of killings of prominent researchers in the field of petroleum science—more specifically, the field of abiogenic oil formation.”
    The professor stared at Jim, silent.
    Jim continued, “Thirteen months ago, a Ukrainian by the name of Dimitri Raznitsyn was poisoned by a lethal dose of dioxin in Paris. About eleven months ago, Professor Stephen Spangler and his post-doctoral student Marissa Kerry died under suspicious circumstances in an explosion and fire that also destroyed his lab at the University of Texas. All his research results were