The Naked Jaybird
This is a story about a foreign power’s attempt to secretly attack America through disruption of the environment. Would such a plan be feasible? Perhaps as the super powers acquire weapons of such devastating power as to annihilate one another, more subtle means of destruction could be surreptitiously employed that would be immeasurably less costly and perhaps even more debilitating. (Rated PG13)
Rolland Royce is an eager young criminal investigator with an inflated ego inculcated by an impassioned father who wants his only son to follow his footsteps as a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer despite Rolland's natural artistic capability. The story takes place at an undefined time over twelve years. Rolland Royce and Bud Rosenauer, a boorish student more intent on seduction than education, attend a lecture by a Chinese expert who asserts the downfall of America will be because of environmental catastrophe. They go their separate ways, Royce hoping he will never encounter Rosenauer again.
Royce completes his studies in England, returning to Canada to open an office in Toronto as an independent white-collar crime investigator. After two years with little success, the Universal World Bank of Canada hires him as a personal bodyguard to the CEO, Malcolm Stanley, a collector of Chinese artifacts. Stanley owns an exquisite inlaid ivory table, a unique priceless relic that becomes the symbol of the search.
Stanley sends Royce on a mission to Taipei where he learns the Chinese brainwashed an insurgent, sending him and his wife to Canada on an unknown mission with new names, making them impossible to identify. Stanley is strangely enthralled by Royce’s report about the impossibility of stripping away the feathers to find the jaybirds concealed in Canada on an unknown mission.
A political issue about Canadian hockey suggests a strained relationship between the Canadian Prime Minister and Malcolm Stanley. Rosenauer, a Chinese lawyer named Birdsong, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police steer Royce towards the answer. After being accused of murder and political subversion, Royce stumbles on the solution, exposing a Chinese plot to destroy America, discovers a surprising relationship between Stanley and Young and recognizes the truth about himself.
While countering our adversary's belligerency with military prowess, the unintended consequence may be our disregard for the ever-increasing environmental threat. One had merely to scan our newspapers in 1997 for reminders of the dangers we face:
“At least five million people in the world die each year as a result of filthy drinking water.”
“In walrus country, unhappy Eskimo hunters say the frozen sea is breaking up early.”
“Water quality in Eastern Oklahoma is being threatened by an influx of poultry farms.”
And the arrogance of our response suggesting we have more important considerations.
“A House panel voted to restrict the implementation of the Kyoto global warming accord.”
“Business, labor and agriculture all worry the treaty will raise domestic energy costs.”
“Auto makers voice opposition to the warming treaty, saying it would be bad for jobs.”
Fifteen years later in 2012, nothing has changed; our lifestyle, even our existence, continues to be threatened by environmental catastrophe. Perhaps, somewhere behind the scene and far away from the rhetoric, foreign forces may be silently at work so blithely disregarded by us that one day America may awake to an uncontrollable catastrophe.
