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campus.
    “Do you understand what we do here?” asked Reid.
    “Well, I… uh…”
    “Let me start at the beginning. The thing we splice into bacterial DNA is a human gene. The new organism can then make a protein that may become a drug. That’s what it’s all about.”
    I nodded. I hadn’t a clue that was the way it worked. But Reid had a way of explaining everything so simply that I almost caught on to a lot of it.
    First he showed me the organic synthesis lab, where the gene machine was making synthetic DNA. “Linkers” made this way can be used to hook a gene to a plasmid, which can then be put into bacteria. Once you’ve got your new bug, you “grow it up” in vast fermenters in other labs. After you grow it up, you have to harvest it, or “take it down.” That means getting rid of the growing medium so that what you have left is “cell paste,” which you have to keep refrigerated at -80 Celsius.
    Somewhere in your cell paste is your product, but the problem is, it’s still in the cells. So next you have your “purification” step, in which you must break open the cells and separate the protein of interest from all the others in the cell, and there could be a couple of thousand of them.
    I think that’s the gist of what Reid said. He was very patient.
    I saw the labs where all those things were done, but nowhere did I see Jacob Koehler. “Nobody goes in his lab,” said Reid. He pointed to a closed door. “Just Jacob and his wife. And sometimes his kid.”
    “His kid?”
    “Yeah. Terry. She’s supposed to be super-smart or something.”
    “You mean she works in that lab?”
    Reid shrugged. “That’s what her dad says. Maybe he’s putting the rest of us on.”
    That sounded right to me.
    When the tour was over, my head hurt. I needed a new super-absorbency brain— the one I had just wasn’t getting the job done. Reid took me, limping— mentally, anyway— back to Steve Koehler.
    I donned my coat and sat down for a post-tour chat. It seemed to be what Koehler had in mind, too. “How long,” he asked, “have you been at the Journal , Mr. Haas?”
    “I’m not actually at the Journal. I just freelance for them occasionally. Which brings me to something else I meant to ask you. I was thinking of doing a piece on your brother and Lindsay Hearne for People. Fun couple sort of yarn. You’ve probably noticed those things are pretty short and sweet. Think he’d agree to that kind of interview?”
    “Hardly. They’ve been divorced for two years. Jacob’s married to Marilyn Markham now— our second most distinguished biochemist.”
    “Oh. I didn’t realize. But that might even be better— two scientists working side by side, creating life forms together. Sort of romantic, don’t you think? We could get a picture of both of them in their white coats, recombining away.”
    “I’m sure Jacob would never agree to it.” He extended his hand. “If there’s anything else I can do for you, let me know.”
    I said I would. Then I stopped in the lobby for a moment and spoke to the receptionist, casual-like. “Could you tell me something? I’m just curious. That lady who came out when I came in— wasn’t that Nancy Allen? You know, the actress in Dressed to Kill ?”
    She smiled— a real smile, not a fourth cousin. “Sort of looks like her, doesn’t she?”
    I did what I hoped was a fair imitation of a man whose face has fallen. “You mean it wasn’t?”
    “Nope. That was Miss Kincannon of Pandorf Associates. Some sort of artist, I think.”
    “Sardis Kincannon?”
    “Why, yes, I believe so.” She checked in appointment calendar. “That’s right.”
    It wasn’t the kind of name you forget, and I’d heard it before.
    Jacob Koehler had given Birnbaum a list of Lindsay’s friends to check out. He’d gotten to all of them except one. Sardis Kincannon.

CHAPTER 6
    This was great. Here was a lady I wanted to meet and now I had an excuse. Maybe my luck was changing.
    If she worked