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been through this already," he said. "It was a him-or-us situation. We're lucky we got him when we did. They worked him over in the hospital for almost a week, probably gave him every test known to medical science." |
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"You should know," McDermott added, "that he was already far gone. There's no telling where his condition would have led. Chances are, it would have been a slow, miserable demiselike your lab animals. So it's better for everybody in the long run. Now we just do what we have to do." |
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Julius looked at him, then turned back to the window. "'The best lack all conviction, while the worst/Are full of passionate intensity.'" |
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"Come again?" Frank said. |
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Claire shook her head. "It's a line of poetry." |
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"William Butler Yeats," McDermott said. "But it ends, 'And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,/Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?' Do we really want that?" |
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"Of course not." McDermott took a sip of his Pepsi. "Tomorrow we pass papers which, of course, we'll take care of," he said to them. ''According to the agreement we've drawn, they and their belongings will be out by Sunday. The agent reports that the wife is planning to leave town and that the husband has already taken a hotel room. That means we can move our people in to begin neutralizing the water." |
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"Yes," McDermott said with a brightness that paled Julius's sarcasm. He put his hands together in a silent applause. "You might be interested to know that our man in the Boston EPA quashed a report of contaminated water at number 12 Jason Road." McDermott looked through his half-glasses at the memo. "A Dr. Mitchell Tojian had filed a 714-C toxic-substance complaint, specifying an artificial hormonelike compound." McDermott looked up and smiled. "The report, as they say, was cut off at the pass." |
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"Then they know it's in the water." |
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"Calm down," DeVoe said. "In four, five days we'll have it neutralized. There'll be nothing to substantiate the claim even if it's issued again. Next week at this time, you can put that water in Evian bottles." |
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