“How would I have a chance to say anything to him? I’ve only seen him twice during my entire Ph.D. travail-when I defended my dissertation and when he handed me my diploma.”

“He must have some idea about our plans,” Daniel surmised. “I suppose it’s not too surprising, considering all the people I’ve approached to be on our scientific advisory board.”

“Are you going to go?”

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

It was only a short walk from the lab to the building that housed the departmental administrative offices. Daniel knew he was facing a confrontation of sorts, but it didn’t matter. In fact, he was looking forward to it.

The moment Daniel appeared, the departmental secretary motioned him to go directly into Wortheim’s inner sanctum. He found the aging Nobel laureate behind his antique desk. With his white hair and thin face, Wortheim appeared older than his purported seventy-two years. But his appearance did not diminish his commanding personality, which radiated from him like a magnetic field.

“Please sit down, Dr. Lowell,” Wortheim said, regarding his visitor over the top of his wire-rimmed reading glasses. He had had a trace German accent despite his having lived in the United States most of his life.

Daniel did as he was told. He knew a faint, insouciant smile, which he was certain would not be missed by the department head, lingered on his face. Despite Wortheim’s age, his faculties were as sharp as ever and attuned to any slight. And the fact that Daniel was supposed to kowtow to this dinosaur was part of the reason he was so certain of his decision to leave academia. Wortheim was brilliant, and he’d won a Nobel Prize, but he was still mired in last century’s inorganic synthetic chemistry. Organic chemistry in the form of proteins and their respective genes was the present and future of the field.

It was Wortheim who broke the silence after the two men had eyed each other. “I gather from your expression that the rumors are true.”