"Where are we going?"

"Partly we're just getting off the road so people won't see us," Mel said. "Partly I want to show you something." Mel let the Mercedes coast to a stop, set the hand brake, and popped his door open.

A short distance away from the lane was a tree, one of the magnificent, solitary oaks that sprouted from the cornfields every few miles and that was allowed to remain there by the farmers, just because it was beautiful.

"Now I'm totally lost," Mary Catherine said, getting out of the car. She faced Mel over the hood. "You're acting kind of paranoid, Mel, if I can offer a professional opinion."

"I'm fully aware of that," Mel said. "Now, check this out. You might be surprised to know that I have become quite the observer of nature on my little drives down here."

"Nature? I didn't know there was any nature left in downstate."

"Well, you have to look for it, but it's there. Watch the tree." Mel turned toward the oak, cupped his hands around his face like a megaphone, and then did something incredibly un-Mel-like: he made a high-pitched screeching sound, three sharp falsetto cries.

The tree rose into the sky. That's what it looked like, for a moment. A thousand black birds rose from its branches in unison and soared across the cornfield, holding for a moment the shape of the tree, then forming into a tightly organized cloud that twisted around itself, turned inside out, changing directions and leaders but always staying together.

Mel was grinning at her. "You didn't know those birds were there, did you?"

Mary Catherine shook her head no.

"Look at 'em," Mel said. "I've been watching them from my car. Watch how the flock can vanish."

Every bird in the flock snapped into exactly the same banking turn. At a certain point they were all coming directly toward Mel and Mary Catherine, and the flock became nearly invisible as each bird was viewed edge-on. Then Mel made his screeching noise again and they all turned sideways, the hidden flock snapping back into existence, much closer to them, almost merging into a solid wall.

"You know, Mary Catherine, that I have spent my career as an integral part of the military-industrial complex. Whatever the hell that is." Mel waved his arm toward a patch of mist at about three o'clock. "Right over there is Willy's nylon factory, where they made parachutes for the Army. You can't get much more military, or industrial, than that. So I have always scoffed at people who blamed all the world's troubles on the military-industrial complex. But I can't escape the idea that something very big is going on involving our Willy. Something that involves spending an ungodly amount of money."

"The biochip implant is definitely a big deal," Mary Catherine said. She was still mystified by the business with Mel's little black box, and the bird thing made no sense at all, but she decided to play along for now. "The Radhakrishnan Institute definitely has a lot of money behind it. We knew that from the beginning. And we've always been realistic enough to understand that there's an economic dimension to this therapy. If it goes well, the institute and its backers will have a gold mine on their hands."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Mel said, waving his hand dimissively, "that is all a given. That's the Invisible Hand argument - that we're seeing free enterprise in action here. I've been thinking about that argument ever since you came back from your inspection trip. It doesn't hold up under scrutiny."

"Why not?"

"Sure, a lot of people have brain damage. But there are a million diseases. Cancer, muscular dystrophy, car crashes. Now, there's a good example - car crashes. For decades, a ridiculous number of people died in car crashes. Still do. But even simple things like seat belts took a long time to develop. The car makers had to be dragged kicking and screaming into air bags. The Invisible Hand didn't work then."

"What other possible reason could there be?"

"That this therapy was developed specifically for one patient - William A. Cozzano."

But you're talking about a vast expenditure," Mary Catherine said. "Billions of dollars."

"Right," Mel said, "which means two things: first of all, the people who did this are loaded. In fact, it can't be a single entity. It has to be a group of separate entities working in tight formation - like that flock of birds. And secondly, they expect to get a huge return on their investment."

"What could possibly be worth that much money?"

"Only one thing I can think of. The presidency of the United States," Mel said.

At the intellectual level, Mary Catherine thought this whole conversation was ridiculous. But at some deeper level she was coming down with a severe case of the creeps. She had cooled off from her running now and the sweat on her limbs was suddenly replaced by goosebumps. She said, "And you think that this explanation is actually more believable than the Invisible Hand theory?"

"I have insufficient data to answer that," Mel said, "but as long as it's a possibility, I have to consider it. Maybe you can help gather more information for me, so that I can rule out this ridiculous theory and buy into a more respectable explanation."

"What should I do?" Mary Catherine said.

"First of all, assume it could be true," Mel said. "Assume that you might be enmeshed in a very large conspiracy. Assume that you are being listened to and watched, all the time. I already found a bug in my car, and I just found one on you," Mel said.

Mary Catherine was stunned. "Are you sure?"

Mel clenched his jaw and actually looked a little peeved. "Don't ask me if I'm sure when I say something like this. Of course I'm fucking sure. I have connections you don't know about, kid. My whole life is not this fucking corncob business."

"Sorry."

"I went out of town for a couple of days. Came back. Got in my car. Pushed the button for WGN and got some Jesus station from DeKalb. All my station presets were screwed up. So I took it to a friend of a friend who used to work in the Agency, and he found a bug. Then we did a full sweep and found bugs in my house too."

"My god," Mary Catherine said. If Mel was telling the truth, then there really was some heavy shit going on. If he wasn't, he was demented. Either way, this was starting to get serious.

"They weren't Radio Shack special either," Mel said, "they were very good bugs. KGB-level technology."

"Okay, I'll assume I'm bugged. Then what?"

Mel sighed. "Hell, I don't know. The problem with you down-staters is that everything has to be spelled out."

"Sorry."

"Just keep your eyes open. Is that too general? You want a specific question from me? I can't provide you with a specific question."

"I'll keep my eyes peeled for signs of the military-industrial complex," Mary Catherine said.

"It's not that. It's something else," Mel said. He turned to look at the flock of birds, which was still careening across the fields, turning this way and that according to some plan that Mel and Mary Catherine couldn't puzzle out, vanished and then snapping back into full view, each bird somehow knowing what all the other birds were doing. "Let's call it the Network."

This discussion was crystallizing a number of vague ideas and perceptions that had been floating around in Mary Catherine's mind for a few months. The outlines of an idea were beginning to emerge, much as Mel and his car had materialized from the fog.

"There is something going on, now that you mention it," she said.

"What can you tell me about it?" Mel asked. He had suddenly relaxed and softened.

"I don't know. It's just that the same few names keep coming up. Gale Aerospace, Pacific Netware, GODS, Genomics, Ogle Data Research, MacIntyre Engineering. They're independent, yet they act in a coordinated fashion."