Chapter 1

Louise Berker was one of those rarest of young women. She was a beautiful, brilliant nerd, socially isolated, but unconsciously charismatic at the same time. Her back story was a teeming tangle of family dysfunction, energies, impulses and influences; a psychological crèche where idealism, mood swings, episodes of brooding resentment and happy expectation each fought for a dominant place on the stage of her mind. Berker’s mind was a nursery from which something magnificently malignant or startlingly generous was sure to emerge.

The only constant was her hunger for consequence. Hers was the sort of background that a good biographer could mine long after the fact for intimations of her great accomplishments. After the story was told, the result of her potential for doing great good or great evil would seem inevitable. The course of history often turns on such pivot moments. The difference in Louise Berker’s case was the power of a singular set of ideas falling into a hungry and vulnerable mind at just the right moment.

As it happened, Louise Berker’s fall began during her frustrating, protracted work on a doctoral dissertation: an exploration of the toxic effects of modern technology. The pivot event was the collapse of a long distance romance with a revered icon of the environmental cause, a famous American professor and her dissertation advisor. When Louise discovered her lover’s shameful secret, the professor was in flagrante delicto. He had wired his brain into a cloud-based virtual reality – choosing his techno-addiction over her. It was a double betrayal of Berker personally, and of her ideals. Her fury quickly gave way to calculated revenge. Knowing that a quick disconnect from the apparatus would be fatal, Louise simply unplugged her lover from his game, killing him instantly. She covered her tracks at the murder scene, and left the country. A coroner would later rule the death as accidental. Campus rumors that the environmentalist icon had died of a techno-addiction would be squelched by a university spokesperson.

In the calmer, more deliberate aftermath of the killing, Berker’s revenge sought a grander canvas, something less personal and more revolutionary. Berker’s transformation took place under the psychological camouflage of a new environmental religion: the most potent toxin of the post technological age. Her first glimpse of a life engulfing purpose evolved from her desire to save humanity from their machines mutated into something much more malevolent: she would save the earth from humanity. The notion that humans were, in effect, a pathogen to be reduced and even exterminated became a quasi-religious fever with her, something carefully shared only among a small, like-minded cult of wealthy and powerful people.

Several years later, Louise—still an arrestingly attractive woman with short black hair and intense blue eyes—was sitting in an abandoned tavern in Hamburg, Germany. She sat quietly in a dark room facing an old man. A single candle lit the room. This was to be her final in-person briefing for a major operation in the United States.

“I understand that we will be killing some US Senators?” Louise sat calmly and waited for the confirmation. The old man she referred to only as the Baron smiled at her. He was dressed in pressed trousers and a rumpled white shirt, and slouched in his chair across from her. A formerly prominent public man, the Baron now worked in the shadowy world of the European Green Underground, using an assumed name like many others who had crossed over into eco-terrorism.

This evening was Berker’s sendoff, her graduation. There were just the two of them, the guards stayed near the entrance, well outside hearing range. This would be her last formal contact with any of her European handlers. The parent terror organization, the G-A-N, would soon have a robust North American presence and enough power to carry out their mission, and any formal links to the European network would be severed. Berker’s G-A-N team was ready. The assignation lists had been prepared and discussed; the passports and identity papers—some legal—had all been cleared.

“Why are we targeting U.S. Senators, exactly?” Berker asked.

“It’s only a few Senators,” the Baron said, “and certainly not right away. It all depends on the political situation.”

“Meaning what, exactly?”

“Louise, this is all part of the Longworthy plan. We have a Trojan Horse. A seemingly innocuous environmental protection treaty is to be signed by the American President and submitted to the U.S. Senate for ratification. It will exploit a loophole in the American constitution. Through this means, and with your help, we will be able to stage a coup d’état. The stupid American politicians will never realize the takeover has even occurred until everything is well past a point of no return. When you leave here, you will take a detailed briefing paper. Study it carefully in private; then burn it. Longworthy and some other legal scholars believe that this ratified treaty will override any conflicting provisions in the US constitution. But in America, a treaty ratification vote takes place only in their Senate and only by a two thirds vote.”

“I think I now understand quite clearly,” Louise said. “The Trojan Horse must get inside the Senate’s gate.”

“Exactly. No one will be allowed to get in the way of the ratification process. No. One.” The Baron spoke with quiet emphasis. “No senator, no public official, no citizen will be permitted to get in the way.”

The Baron was a calm, aristocratic presence. He sat across from Berker at the rough-hewn table, a bland, civilized presence that concealed the utter cruelty of his character. The air was stale. The flickering yellow light exaggerated the lines in the Baron’s face.

Outside, a town clock struck four. As the Baron spoke, his pale eyes gleamed in the candlelight. Each word was as measured and dry as a teaspoon of cold ash.

“You are to leave tomorrow afternoon.”

“We are packed. The identity papers and passports are ready. We can go to the airport at a moment’s notice,” Berker said.

The Baron regarded her carefully. “I see that you have a question about one of the profiles?”

“Yes. Why is Senator Gabriel Standing Bear Lindstrom on your list?”

“You wonder perhaps because he is a Native American?”

“Partly. But more so because he is an ally to the environmental cause.”

“But that may turn out to be a problem. Gabriel Standing Bear is a charismatic leader on the rise. Even though he is only a Senator from a small state, he has attracted a national following.”

Louise still looked puzzled. “Forgive me, but why target a leader sympathetic to our cause?”

The Baron looked at her as he would a small child. “He is a target for two reasons, Louise. Some environmentalists will object to our ultimate aims and he could be one of them. And, more to the point, we prefer followers to leaders.”

“So—”

“He has a bad case of integrity, Louise. His growing prominence and popularity will make him dangerous.”

“But only if he turns on us…”

“When he turns on us, Louise, when. We cannot conceal our real objectives forever.”

Berker thought it through for a second and sat up straighter in her chair. “Then better to kill him while he still is an asset. Frame the enemies of the environment. Make this Indian a martyr.”

The Baron smiled. “Too clever by half, my dear. Why prematurely discard our assets? We’ll just take out some insurance. Virtuous men like Gabriel can likely be controlled through their children. He has a daughter, a student in Seattle, Helen Snowfeather Lindstrom. She is vulnerable to recruitment.”

“Then we will try to exploit her. Thank you for the guidance and your patience.” Berker attempted to hide her embarrassment.

“Very well, then.” The Baron got to his feet. “We are done here. At the end of the day, remember that not all of the targets will be obstacles, particularly as we begin to succeed in shaping public opinion. But some will eventually need to be removed with prejudice. Like your example, that Indian Senator. The trick is always to kill them in compromising locations, places that have the smell of scandal about them. And to take out one or two unrelated victims in the same area. It is possible to create such a bizarre crime signature that it overshadows even a celebrity’s death.” His thin smile appeared briefly. “There is an art to this.”

“Political killing must never seem political, unless and until that is the whole point of the exercise.”

“Louise Berker, you were always my very best student. I will miss you.”

Chapter 10

When Helen Snowfeather Lindstrom began her last year at the University of Washington, she felt that she had finally moved out of her father’s giant shadow. Snowfeather had earned her own—admittedly smaller—place as a mover and shaker.

With her mid-length black hair, high cheekbones and luminous gray eyes, she carried her beauty with the innocence of a young colt. Still cherishing her taproots in the tribal/family compound in Northern Idaho, she had been released from her years of confinement as a politician’s brat in Washington. She had dropped her first name and, as Snowfeather, she was taking on life on her own terms.

Of course, Snowfeather loved her parents. But to her, Gabriel and Alice were hopelessly out of touch. Their unreasonable insistence on micromanaging her life even after her recent twentieth birthday was exasperating even if it was delivered with love. She understood their need for involvement, the attack on both of them and Rachael Owen’s death had made them all too aware of their mortality. But Mom and Dad were finally coming around and letting her find her own way—apart from them. After a few years of aggressive student activism for green causes, Snowfeather had become a public figure. Today’s invitation was among her rewards. Snowfeather was a featured guest at the next luncheon meeting of the University Club, with a place on the podium.

She picked up her phone. Mom and Dad will be proud…

——

At the same time that Snowfeather placed the call from her dorm room, Louise Berker was entering the service elevator in the subterranean parking lot in the Fowler Building in downtown Seattle. It was the same structure that housed Rex Longworthy’s law firm. Dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt, and wearing a red bandanna over her hair, Berker turned a key and headed to a secure work area below. It would the first American meeting of her G-A-N support team. For public consumption, the G-A-N was a small-bore international alliance of NGOs dedicated to protecting the environment. To the public, the letters stood for Geo-Alliance-North.

Deep inside, the G-A-N was a lunatic fringe cult, the Gaia Antibodies Network, based on the notion that humanity was a pathogen and Gaia, the Earth, was a living organism to be protected by any means necessary.

The Gaia Antibodies Network consisted of three working divisions, but today’s meeting would be brief, and attended only by Berker’s personal team. These were the four loyalists who had followed her from Germany. They reported to—and were known by—Louise Berker alone.

The four were waiting for her in a windowless cement-lined box. It was many times the size of the jail cell it resembled, furnished with hardwood tables, comfortable chairs, and two bathrooms. The new communications console was still in its shipping crate at the end of the room.

Berker took the seat at the end of the large table. Her team consisted of three fit, hard-faced males and one equally buff female. Their given names had long ago been replaced by pseudonyms; the latter were supported by elaborately constructed identities; the former were never committed to writing.

Gaul opened with the question the team had all agreed on. His American accent was flawless: “Will you need our help with the Senator’s daughter?”

“No,” Berker said, looking at each of the four in turn. “Stay in your cover identities until you are called. It may take me several months to recruit her.” Berker paused as if thinking something through. “I do have one vacancy among the Earth’s Sisters. Gaul and the other two males glanced at K. She was an attractive woman in her early thirties with very short, very blond hair. She specialized in killing. K smiled.

“K, I want you to stop by the Earth Planet Book Store in Pioneer Square next week and apply for a job,” Berker told her. “All of you will find new training schedules in your lockers. Everyone: stay alert. Be discreet. Don’t ever call me on a cell or land line. I will contact you every few days in the usual way.”

——

When Snowfeather arrived at the University Club for her special guest appearance, she found herself feeling surprisingly serene. She was escorted to the head table and seated next to the University President. The featured talk was being given by Vernon T. Farthwell, the first Director of the Gaia Foundation. Farthwell was a law partner of Rex Longworthy and the outgoing Vice-President of the Greenspike Coalition. His topic was: “The Coming Gaia Era.”

Snowfeather smiled politely when Mr. Farthwell took the podium. He was a mousy, aristocratic man with a penetrating, reedy voice, who had earned a reputation as a formidable environmental lawyer in spite of his charismatic deficit. This was a speech he had given many times recently.

“As many of you know,” he said, “more and more people have begun to talk about the earth as a living organism named Gaia for the Greek earth goddess. As we destroy the earth’s ecology, Gaia consciousness has awakened as a powerful political force…and not one second too soon. Many farsighted leaders have joined forces to save the earth, to rescue Gaia…among them Native American leaders like your own Helen Snowfeather Lindstrom.”

The room erupted in spontaneous applause. Snowfeather beamed.

“I’d like to get to know this remarkable young woman. I suspect our movement will be seeing a lot more of her. I was told that Helen Snowfeather Lindstrom may well be the most important figure in student politics in a generation. You know what? I think I agree.” More applause followed.

“Gaia now stands for the idea that the earth is an actual living being. Suppose, just for a moment, that we take that idea seriously. Think about the implications! How deeply we have injured Gaia. How Ms. Lindstrom’s aboriginal ancestors would weep at what we have done to her.

“I see a revolution in the making here. Gaia, the Mother Earth of myth and legend, asks us to save her. This is a call we should all be proud to heed. Causes like this come our way only once in a few generations. Why not get on board? I say, why not?” The room erupted into sustained applause.

Snowfeather listened while Farthwell speculated about world disease and catastrophic global climate change as Gaia’s revenge for extreme overpopulation. No one laughed at these ruminations. Before this audience, this man, proponent of a notion that would have been widely ridiculed in an earlier time, was hailed as one of the heroes of his generation.

Wow, Snowfeather thought. There is more energy here than at any of Dad’s political meetings. This is energy that can be harnessed for the cause. This Gaia movement goes way beyond Dad’s small-bore environmentalism, the traditional more trees, and fewer smokestacks. Maybe it takes something really extreme to get people out of their complacency…

Could I ride this horse?

Farthwell finished his remarks early and gave Snowfeather another generous introduction. Snowfeather smiled and moved smoothly to the rostrum as easily as if she were in her own living room in Idaho.

“Thank you, Mr. Farthwell. And my thanks to the University Club and the Gaia Foundation for inviting me,” she said. “Our Texan friends still talk about the Alamo. How many of us still remember that sickening ecological catastrophe on the Australian coast?” A number of hands went up. “The Tong shipping company lives forever in infamy! Now, may I say a word about the ecological catastrophe if we don’t stop S&S Shipping from poisoning the Pacific Ocean?” She paused, as the room erupted in enthusiastic applause. “Okay,” she said over the din, “I will.” More applause and cheers followed. Snowfeather grinned in acknowledgment; then her face became solemn. Snowfeather’s sense of audience was pitch-perfect.

“Legend tells us that Chief Seattle gave a remarkable speech 200 years ago. Some say he had a ghost writer. I can’t believe that. I know these words were in his heart. This is what Seattle said to the ages:

“‘This we know: The earth does not belong to man; man belongs to the earth. This we know. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of the earth. Man did not weave the web of life; he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web he does to himself. Even the white man cannot be exempt from the common destiny. One thing we know, which the white man may one day discover, our god is the same god. You may think that you own him as you wish to own the land but you cannot. This earth is precious to the Great Spirit, and to harm the earth is to heap contempt on its creator. The whites, too, shall pass; perhaps sooner than all other tribes. Continue to contaminate your bed, and one night you will suffocate in your own waste.’”

——

Snowfeather was late for class. A few minutes after leaving the University Club, Snowfeather paused, immediately irritated by the small, intense, self-important woman who was standing in her path.

“I’m Louise Berker,” the woman said. “And this is Cynthia Thomas,” she added, pointing to a taller, more severe looking woman with tangled, brown hair.

Like I’m supposed to care? Snowfeather thought. “That’s nice,” Snowfeather said aloud, trying to step around Berker. The Thomas woman moved in her way. Give me a break! Snowfeather scowled and slipped past this even more irritating woman only to face Berker again, who was trying on a smile.

“I’m really sorry if this isn’t a good time,” Berker said with the insincere charm of a spoiled diva who has just been annoyed by a waiter.

“I’m so sorry,” Snowfeather said, matching Berker’s insincerity, “but it is not a good time. I am running late.”

The other woman stepped aside but Berker held her ground. “Just a moment of your time, please,” Berker said. Snowfeather slid past the annoying woman and continued walking. “I promise that you won’t regret it,” Berker said, while striding to keep up. “Our organization is very impressed with how you are handling yourself at these demonstrations.”

Snowfeather slowed, turning to give Berker the penetrating appraisal her father would have. Her flash assessment: Berker was a borderline case. The first impression, the one the woman projected was cordial and responsible, but there was a darker shadow. Helen suspected that Louise Berker was one of those beauties whose cold heart had subtly robbed her of normal human appeal. Dad would say that her feathers were clipped but not her talons. That this woman is charged up with…what? She reminds me of an obsessive compulsive runner between races…or…someone possessed.

“Thank you,” Berker said. She was probably in her mid thirties, and Snowfeather heard the faintest trace of a German accent. Great, she thought, another condescending European wanting to recruit a nice Injun.

“I have just a minute,” Snowfeather said. “What is your organization?”

“Environmental Opinion Associates.”

Berker was trying to be personable, but it was a doomed effort. Like a sociopath pretending to cry at a funeral, Snowfeather thought. And she isn’t used to this, she is used to giving orders.

“We’re a bit on the environmental fringe, some say.” Cynthia Thomas offered.

No doubt! Snowfeather thought. This one is a radical nerd, a self-important subordinate, a minor player with delusions.

“I’m also head of a group dedicated to the protection and restoration of Mother Earth,” Berker added, resuming control of the conversation. “We plan to succeed no matter the cost.” Berker’s implied ruthlessness was thinly concealed by her pleasant, conversational tone.

Snowfeather had stopped walking. Oh crap! Not another true believer! Ruthless as they come, I’ll bet. Snowfeather could hear her father’s warning voice: Watch out for the nutters who self-medicate with anger.

“We are the Women’s League for Earth’s Restoration.”

“It does sound fringe,” Snowfeather said out loud. But she had become curious about this woman, Berker. There was a distinct smell of ruthless energy seeping through her charm veneer. As Snowfeather had reluctantly decided to engage, she pointed to a path near the Club that led to the Jackson Building. “We can chat while I walk, if you don’t mind. I really am late for class.”

“We have excellent funding sources,” Thomas said, walking behind them, head down as if she was talking to herself. Berker waited for Thomas to catch up, and Snowfeather slowed.

Berker sensed the opening. “Cynthia is right about funding. And we are a very well-disciplined organization. Actually, we are two organizations.”

Snowfeather’s curiosity was piqued by the prospect of excellent funding sources; she stopped on the path next to an outdoor bench. “We are Environmental Opinion Associates, which I run, and our newer political action committee, the Women’s League for Earth’s Restoration is where the real action takes place.”

An impish smile crossed Snowfeather’s face. “WOLF-EAR?”

Berker looked puzzled then she actually smiled. “You have a gift.”

“For acronyms or humor?”

“Both, it seems.”

“We could use that,” Thomas added.

No kidding! Snowfeather thought. Then she remembered what Dad had said, Watch the white eyes who have no humor, Little Princess. Those are the dangerous ones. “You just mentioned funding sources,” Snowfeather said out loud. “Are we talking about local money or what?”

“We have some very generous contributors…world class, as a matter of fact. Would you like to join us for a meeting with one of them?” Berker was now playing with Snowfeather like a trout.

“Maybe,” Snowfeather answered. She knew she was being played, but her own ambition was now fully aroused.

“Mr. Rex Longworthy will be there and one of his backers.”

Snowfeather knew the Longworthy name well. “I’d be happy to come,” Snowfeather said.

“Then we should stay in touch. Here,” Berker said, producing a business card bearing a logo consisting of a line drawing of the earth, holding a green eye centered under the words: “Earth’s Sisters.”

Snowfeather glanced at it. “Not the Women’s League?”

“Same address. The ‘Sisters’ are the governing committee, in effect.”

Snowfeather nodded, “And you are the Big Sister, I assume.” Then she slipped the card into her jeans. Snowfeather did not offer one in return. She waved as she turned to head down the path. “Nice to meet you.”

“Will you have any time to meet this week?” Berker asked.

Snowfeather slowed, calling out, “Day after tomorrow? In the afternoon?”

“Excellent. You are staying at Gates Hall, I believe.”

Snowfeather stopped walking. “You seem to know a lot about me. I really am running late.”

“We’d like you to know more about us. Five o’clock?”

“Okay.” She took out the card. “I see you are in Pioneer Square.”

“Yes. Can we pick you up?”

“I’ll manage to find you, thanks anyway.”

Snowfeather stepped up her pace. After a moment, she glanced back at Berker’s purposeful, retreating form, followed by her slightly uncoordinated companion. Both disappeared into a parking structure. Snowfeather trotted on her way, lost in speculation.

Chapter 11

It was a dark Seattle winter afternoon, and the streetlights dimly glowed in the damp air. The office of the Women’s League was an unmarked walk-up behind the Earth Planet bookstore. The store occupied a poorly illuminated niche between an office supply and a vacant business.

Snowfeather nodded to the bored clerk in the bookstore and opened a rear door that revealed a dim, musty stairway. As she approached the top of the stairs, she could see Cynthia Thomas and Louise Berker standing near the doorway of the Women’s League office.

“Come in, Snowfeather,” Louise Berker said, holding the door to the small office. “It isn’t exactly downtown, but it’s ours.” Snowfeather entered a spartan reception area, and was escorted to a large, book-lined room. A simple relief globe of the earth, in true color without political markings, hung from the ceiling over a battered oak conference table. “Let’s talk,” Berker said, pointing to a chair.

“You have a very interesting library,” Snowfeather said as she looked around the room. “And where is Mr. Longworthy?”

“Oh, that wasn’t for today,” Berker said. “We need to get to know you a little better.”

“Every important environmental text and ecological book…they’re all here,” Cynthia Thomas said proudly. “As good or better than the University library.”

“I am impressed. You should have these online.”

“Computers,” Berker dismissed. “They can be a dangerous addiction. And we don’t trust the cloud. High technology is not allowed here at all. Let me ask you a question.”

“Go for it.”

“What was the single most serious ecological problem of the last fifty years?”

Snowfeather paused, frowning. “There have been a whole series of calamities, of course. Global warming seemed to have stalled, restarted, even while the greenhouse gas situation was improving, then sudden cooling ensued with sudden out-of-season blizzards in temperate zones, followed by intermittent warming. In a word—weather chaos. Precipitation is either too much or too little. For several years running, there were major drought zones blighting forty-five percent of world crop acreage. I think food production in many regions fell during that period almost fifty percent worldwide before it began to recover. The overall picture is one of utter unpredictability and increased stress on the various ecosystems. The single problem is eco-stress, possibly without a single cause.”

“Good enough. And you might have added the food price inflation, riots everywhere, the rich countries buying up most of the food while millions starve.”

“That was ten years ago but, yes, we are still working our way out of that one,” Snowfeather said.

“Icebergs are again breaking away from the Antarctic ice mass in large numbers and masses,” Cynthia said.

“Yes, at least for a couple of years that was the case. I was getting to that,” Snowfeather said. “For a ten year period, ocean water levels at all coastal cities rose rapidly, in spite of the Fossil Fuel Technology Treaty. The current pause may be over.”

“What was most important about that treaty?”

“Well, the two-tier pricing system for basic crops seemed like a great idea, giving poor countries a subsidized low price for food imports in exchange for their retirement of fossil fuels, and restrictions on deforestation. But the unintended consequence was a reckless shift by the same countries to old style nuclear power generation. Worse still, companies like S&S shipping are plying the high seas with the resulting unprocessed nuclear waste. Plus, their expanding industrial base created new environmental problems, in effect repeating the China disaster.”

“Excellent,” Berker said. “You obviously know your stuff. Some computer models of global warming predicted a decline in warming, others an increase. None seem to have got it exactly right. What does this mean?”

“I thought you didn’t do computers.” Snowfeather smiled.

“You got me there. There is actually an excellent answer in what you’ve said: Gaia will do what Gaia will do. But is that really your best answer to my question?” Berker asked.

“I don’t follow you.”

“Over the last fifty years, at least one million species of living things have become extinct. The percentage of wild areas, outside the polluted ocean—just the wild land areas—have shrunk to forty percent of what they were at the beginning of the period. Wouldn’t you say that is the single most serious ecological problem of the last century?”

“I suspect you are counting extinct microbes, but the larger animal extinction figures are pretty disturbing. Most of my Native American brothers and sisters would probably agree that the shrinking percentage of wild areas is a very bad thing.”

“The earth, you see, is injured. That is unacceptable.”

“Damage to humans is collateral,” Cynthia added.

What did she say? Snowfeather shot Thomas a questioning glance; then she looked back at Berker, whose expression remained impassive. Did she really mean that?

“So,” Berker continued, “what would you call the prospect of massive spills of radioactive waste products transported in North Atlantic by Ukrainian vessels, and in the Pacific by Brazilian, Indonesian, Ukrainian, and Chinese carriers?”

Snowfeather’s answer came without hesitation: “Sounds like another S&S Shipping screw-up. It would be a huge disaster, of course,” she said.

“You know what we would call it?” Berker asked.

“What?”

“An opportunity,” Thomas said.

“To do what?” Snowfeather asked.

“To move opinion to the next level,” Cynthia mumbled.

“We are going to change the world,” Berker said flatly. “And you can be part of this. Can you meet Mr. Longworthy and a couple of special friends later this week?”

——

Two days later, Snowfeather was called to a noon meeting in a downtown Seattle boardroom. The room was on the top floor of the Fowler building, fifty-five stories of faceted green marble, oxidized copper and mirrored glass. The meeting was just one floor above the environmental law firm of Price, Farthwell and Longworthy.

As the elevator opened into a quiet carpeted hallway with rows of unmarked doors all the way to the end, Snowfeather hesitated, looking again at her hand-written directions. The boardroom was identified by a brass sign over the last door on the right: FOWLER. Snowfeather took a deep breath, walked over and opened the door.

At first, no one seemed to notice her arrival. Louise and Cynthia were almost unrecognizable in their tailored suits, seated at the end of a massive table of inlaid woods. The heavily curtained room was filled with plants and a large globe in natural color. Three men in beautifully tailored business suits sat in a row. No one rose.

Snowfeather hesitated; then Berker turned toward her and smiled. “Helen Snowfeather Lindstrom, this is Mr. Fowler.” She pointed to a slender man with snow-white hair, sitting to her immediate right. Knight smiled and nodded.

“Knight Fowler?” Snowfeather asked. The name belonged to a huge contributor to green causes, although the Fowler family fortune had been made in coal mining. “The Knight Fowler?”

“Yes,” the patrician man said graciously. “You have heard of me, then?”

“No. I just read the sign on the building,” Snowfeather cracked. Fowler chuckled. A least the old guy has a sense of humor, she thought.

“His support has been invaluable,” Cynthia said.

No kidding, Snowfeather thought. “You have been one of my Dad’s heroes,” Snowfeather said. At least my Dad’s biggest contributor.

“Have you met Rex Longworthy?”

“I’m familiar with your work for the Greenspike Coalition, especially in the China spill case. That was amazing work!” Snowfeather took the man’s offered hand. Whoa. A hand like a dead trout!

“I see you have done your homework,” Longworthy said. He was impeccably dressed in a tweed coat.

“And this is Jim Funk.” The last man was in his early thirties, a shaved head and bright, intense eyes.

“Of Coffin and Funk?” Snowfeather said. The man nodded. “Mr. Funk, you have one of the hottest advertising agencies in the country.”

“If you think so, it must be true,” Funk said, also shaking Snowfeather’s hand. “Please sit down.” Snowfeather took the seat nearest the door.

“This is a lot of clout in one room,” Snowfeather said. “I hope you all didn’t travel on the same plane.”

Fowler laughed and winked at Berker. “Louise, you have outdone yourself. I already can tell that Ms. Lindstrom here has every bit the charisma and talent you advertised.”

“Is it Helen or Snowfeather?” Berker asked.

“I prefer Snowfeather.”

“Snowfeather, you may be wondering why this group is getting together,” Fowler said.

“Let me guess,” Snowfeather answered. “You are preparing for some demonstrations?”

“Not just that,” Berker said.

“This is a campaign. It will be national in scope,” Fowler said. “We want you to coordinate coast-to-coast protests.”

“Wow! Has something happened recently that I missed?” Snowfeather asked.

“Not yet,” Fowler said. “But it will. And you’re right to see the need for a triggering event. This is just our readiness strategy, if you will. Something terrible will happen. Something always does. In fact, we want you to seize on every disaster,” Fowler said. “There are sure to be several.”

“National media will cover you in Seattle,” Jim Funk said. “And we are designing an ad campaign, the scope and impact of which the environmental movement has never seen before.”

“Snowfeather,” Berker said solemnly, “we need you. With your help, and the people in this room, in the next few weeks we are going to change the face of politics in this country for good.”

Snowfeather left her first power meeting buoyant to the point of giddiness. As the door closed behind her, her fleeting misgivings about Cynthia’s collateral damage remark were forgotten. Snowfeather was going to be a player. She could make a difference. She would make a difference.

As soon as Snowfeather left the room, Fowler turned to Louise Berker with a solemn expression. “She is every bit as charismatic in person as on television. Can you control her?”

“Of course.”

“Good. Jim, I want you to show Ms. Berker a sample of your campaign.”

“Certainly,” Funk said. “This one will run in all markets in prime time on the eve of the Treaty ratification vote.” He pointed to the screen at the end of the table. “I have it on good authority that Rex Longworthy will be the regional Commissioner.” Fowler chuckled. Longworthy beamed as Jim Funk played the recording on a large drop down screen.

The scene opened to a 1920’s neighborhood in Vermont, as a milkman is carried bottles to a doorstep, a young girl rode a bicycle along a tree-lined sidewalk. The music swelled and the camera zoomed out taking in whole neighborhood.

A voice-over proclaimed, “If the Earth Restoration Treaty is ratified, this can be your future: No television. No computers. No cell phones. No traffic. This was life as it was. As it can be again. Think about it.”

Text scrolled by:

Saving the Earth through Healing Retirement Confiscation.

Your Technology Licensing Commission.

Fighting the special interests. For Gaia.

An image of the earth, small and fragile as if from space, appeared on screen before it faded to green.

“Very good work, Jim,” Fowler said. “But we need something more pointed before the ratification vote.”

“An impressive sample, though,” Berker said.

“This is just an early draft,” Funk said. “I just wanted you to see the approach.”

“You might save the word ‘confiscation’ for a bit later in the campaign,” Fowler said.

“Good,” Funk said, making a note.

“Very well then,” Fowler concluded. “Louise, you and I need to meet separately for just a minute. Thank you, Jim and Rex. Call me tomorrow.”

When the two had left, Fowler placed his hands together and faced Louise Berker. “You have to be very careful who you let in the circle and how far.”

“You refer to Snowfeather?”

“To everyone. Need-to-know basis only. Especially at the beginning.”

“Knight, you are aware that I’ve been in a covert mode for years.”

“Of course,” he said thoughtfully. “The G-A-N.”

“We are very aware of the need for secrecy,” she said. More than you know.

“This kind of revolutionary social movement. It is structured a bit like a bull’s eye,” Fowler said. “Concentric circles of people. At the outside, we present as soft, acceptable, reasonable. In each layer closer to the core, where the real message is harder, perhaps less acceptable to the common people, the trust level must be higher.”

And at the very center, some wealthy, foolish men will die, Berker thought. “Very apt,” she said aloud.

“The treaty clause of the U.S. Constitution is our Trojan Horse,” Fowler said, smiling.

“I’m well briefed on Rex Longworthy’s legal strategy for America. We can’t wait to roll over the petty nationalism of this country,” Berker said.

Chapter 12

Alice Canyon Hawke was working at her desk in the bedroom when her daughter called. It was a quiet Sunday afternoon in Georgetown, and Gabriel was struggling with a clogged garbage disposal in the kitchen wondering whether any of the other ninety-nine US Senators were still willing to crawl under a sink. “Alice, could you get that?” His shout was a muffled cry.

“Here, big guy,” Alice said, as she tapped the phone against her husband’s protuberant elbow. “You talk her out of it.”

Gabriel pulled his head out and took the phone. “Hi, Princess.”

“You talked to Mom?”

“I have.” Gabriel was still sitting on the floor.

“The Senate is in recess for a week. I’d like to come for a visit, okay?”

“Mom’s in a twit?”

“Let’s just say I’m coming on the Boss’s orders…”

——

Two days later, Gabriel and Snowfeather had lunch together in a Seattle cafe near campus. As the plates were cleared and Gabriel laid his credit card on the bill, he looked across at his daughter; he was looking at an adult. She had become a beautiful woman, with Alice’s skin and hair, a noble bone structure and arresting gray eyes. Those eyes are from my father, Swen Tall Bear, the half-Swede, Gabriel thought. He had adored his father, a towering man, whose Swedish-American father had died in combat, leaving his Nez Perce mother a young widow. Tall Bear was raised in northern Idaho by a single Nez Perce mother until she married Fat Bear, who had adopted Gabriel’s father as his own.

“What?” Snowfeather said.

“What do you mean?’”

“You were staring and smiling.”

“Just thinkin’…that you have my father’s eyes,” Gabriel said, “and your mother’s stubbornness.”

“And my father’s charm?”

“Let’s take a walk through the campus,” Gabriel said, his eyes twinkling.

“Well, did I pass inspection?” Snowfeather said outside. It was a rare, sunny afternoon.

“I’ll tell Mom that you are doing fine. And that you pick up your room better than I did at your age. She wanted to be here but the firm was gearing up for a big trial. Paralegals keep the worst hours.”

“You knew that already, didn’t you, Dad? That I was doing just fine?” She poked him in the ribs.

“Oh yeah,” Gabriel said, slipping on his leather jacket. “But I’ll use any excuse for a trip out of the nation’s cesspool, I mean capital. Let’s see if I can still find my way around this old campus.”

After a few minutes of walking into the main campus area, Snowfeather stopped and they sat side-by-side on a moss-covered stone bench hidden in a copse of giant conifers. The air was soft and smelled of cedar.

“Dad, I just heard that President Chandler has agreed to force the senate to vote on the Earth Restoration Treaty, the one that old President Baxter signed but couldn’t get ratified before he died.”

“I’m afraid you heard right, Princess.”

“Afraid? President Chandler said that this will be a legacy for the ages. When I heard the news, I thought, ‘Great! Dad will be in the Senate when the ratification vote comes up.’”

“True.”

“Then I heard this horrible rumor that you will be opposing it?”

“That was no rumor, Princess.” Gabriel was staring at a cloud that was sliding over the treetops.

“Why would you ever do that?”

“Oh, I took the trouble to actually study the issue. Just look at the language…” When Gabriel turned to examine his beautiful daughter, he was startled. A seriously angry young woman was looking back. “All the work I did to get the Habitat established, Gabriel said. “It would be flushed down the toilet.”

“How could that be?”

“Check this out.” Gabriel pulled out a draft summary of the Treaty Protocol from his jacket and handed it to her. “They’re proposing to close the Habitat to people.”

Snowfeather stared at the dense text. “Where does it say that?”

Gabriel read aloud. “As necessary for the preservation or restoration and preservation of endangered ecosystems, to create and establish special ecological protected zones, hereafter ‘Eco-protectorates,’ which shall include all existing parks and protected zones established by any government, but shall not be limited to those areas; to promulgate and establish the geographical boundaries thereof; to control, restrict, or forbid traffic, travel, use of forbidden technologies and recreational access to such zones or any portion thereof by all persons and machines as appropriate.” He handed the document to Snowfeather. Gabriel had underlined the offending passages in red ink.

“What does all that really mean?” she asked.

“This Treaty sets up a very, very powerful international Commission—powerful enough to close the Habitat against the opposition of the Congress and the people. We already have the word on the Hill: They really are going to close it up…if we give them the chance. Longworthy himself said much the same thing in a speech last week—humans can no longer be trusted to take care of it.”

“Maybe that’s just temporary.”

“Right, like Indians on the Rez. Little Princess, I made personal guarantees to every tribe in seven states that our people will have special access to the old streams, the mountains, and the plains. You have no idea how hard getting them on board was. They trusted me. My honor is on the line. And now the tribes are going to be locked out along with everyone else. Our tribes. All tribes.”

“That’s too bad about your honor,” Snowfeather said cynically. “But at least the plants and animals are safe.”

So grown up and yet knows so littleAnd so stubborn. Just like Alice.Just like me.

“You can stop calling me Little Princess!”

Gabriel stared at his daughter, fighting the hot tears welling up. He just stood in place, like a tree, waiting for an apology until it was embarrassing. Then Gabriel turned, and began walking slowly away. His throat tightened and his pace quickened.

Snowfeather stood alone in the path, watching her father’s lumbering form retreat into the distance, watching until he disappeared from sight.

Gabriel’s flight would leave in two hours. Snowfeather felt a single tear run down her cheek. After a time she wiped her face and began the long walk to her dorm.

——

Snowfeather’s phone rang ninety minutes later.

“Hi, Princess.” Her father’s voice was gruff and a little tight, like it was when he learned Alice could come home from the hospital.

“Princess?”

“I dropped the ‘Little.’”

She smiled a bit. “Hi, Dad.” She could hear the sound of jet engines in the background.

Gabriel could hear her smile in the tone. “Here’s the deal, I get to be a Senator on my own terms and you get to be Snowfeather-in-the-world on yours. You graduated today. You are a player and I promise always to respect your independence, even when I think—”

“That I’m full of crap?”

They both laughed a long time.

“I love you,” he said.

“I love you, too, Dad. We have a deal?”

“We have a deal.”