Systemic Shock

Начало книги

In early August of 1996 the Atlantic states baked like some vast piecrust under a paralyzing heat wave. It moved scoutmaster Purvis Little, in Raleigh, to plan the Smoky Mountain pack trip that would save a few lives. It also moved the President of the United States to his retreat in the Shenandoah hills.

The weather relented on the evening of Friday, the ninth. Young Ted Quantrill hardly noticed, racing home after his troop meeting in Raleigh, because he knew he'd have to politick for that pack trip. The President noticed it still less; despite the air conditioning in his hoverchopper, a tiara of sweat beaded his balding head. The bulletin that had drawn him back to Washington suggested complications in the sharp new rise of foreign oil prices; a rise that in itself further impeded his race for reelection against Utah's Senator Yale Collier. The President considered Yale Collier a charismatic fool. Ted Quantrill's parents thought the same of scoutmaster Little. In any event, a modest proportion of fools would survive the next week, while some of their critics would die.

Читать дальше →