9
Kate was waiting outside on the front step as Jack neared the Arsley. She wasn't alone. In the fading light he could make out a tall, thin, stoop-shouldered man in a suit.
Who's this? he wondered.
He'd figured the easiest way to get to Pelham Parkway and back was to drive, so he'd offered his services. But he'd expected only Kate as a passenger.
Felt a smile start at the sight of her, and was struck again by what a good-looking woman she was. Dressed simply and casually in a fitted white shirt and black slacks, she still managed to project taste and style. Guy with her looked to be about her age, but on the homely side. Jack hoped this wasn't the "someone special" she'd mentioned last night. She could do a lot better.
He pulled his two-year-old black Crown Victoria into the curb before the pair. Kate leaned in the passenger window.
"Jack, this is Dr. Fielding, Jeanette's oncologist. He wants to come along."
Swell, Jack thought sourly.
Didn't know what Kate was getting him into, and a third party might tie his hands. She'd told him about Jeanette Vega, a dear friend from college recovering from brain tumor therapy with no one to care for her. And she'd told him about this Holdstock guy popping into Jeanette's unannounced with a key; that plus his apparent influence over Jeanette earned him a high creep quotient. Hopefully tonight's excursion would run smoothly, but Jack found cults generally creepy. Too unpredictable. Jonestown and those Hale-Bopp weirdos were prime examples.
But he smiled and said, "Sure. Why not?"
The doc slipped into the back seat and Jack noticed his dark hair, over-gelled and frozen into long shiny black rows left by his comb. He stretched a bony, long-fingered hand toward Jack. "Jim Fielding."
"Jack," he said, shaking Fielding's hand. "An oncologist who makes house calls. Am I witnessing an historic event?" He turned to Kate who was belting herself in next to him. "Hope you didn't use any illegal means of coercion."
"As opposed to legal means of coercion?" Kate said. "No, Dr. Fielding insisted on coming along."
"Really."
"I'm concerned about Jeanette's bizarre behavior," Fielding said, "particularly the possibility that she might be developing a seizure disorder. She's fortunate a trained observer like Dr. Iverson was there as a witness."
Dr. Iverson? Jack wondered, then realized he was talking about Kate.
"I'd like to do a little first-hand observation myself. And if Jeanette won't come to me, then I'll go to her."
Sounds like a good guy, Jack thought.
Kate patted the seat between them. "Big car. Reminds me of Dad's."
"He's got a Marquis, same car but sold by Mercury. It's the state car of Florida."
"I wouldn't have thought you were a big-car type, Jack."
"I'm not."
"You rented this just for tonight? Jack, you should have told—"
"No, it's mine. Sort of."
"Sort of how?"
"Just… sort of." Should he explain how he'd paid for the car but it was registered under someone else's name? Nah. "Don't worry about it."
"I'm not worried about it—just you."
"It's okay."
Cars were an ongoing problem for Jack. With no officially recognized identity, he couldn't own one in the conventional manner. At least as a city dweller he had little call for one, but on those rare occasions when the need arose he wanted immediate access. Used to keep an old Buick registered under Gia's name but that arrangement had led to a dicey situation where Jack had been linked to the car and the car had been traced back to Gia.
Wasn't about to let that to happen again. He made a point of learning from his mistakes and so he'd hunted around for another way to have access to wheels that couldn't be traced to him. Came up with a beaut: find a guy equipped to field whatever a disgruntled target of Jack's work might toss his way, then clone his car.
After weeks of careful searching, Ernie, his documents guru, found just the man: Vinny the Donut Donate
Vinny D supplied muscle for a Bed Stuy shy; lived in Brooklyn Heights and drove a recent model Crown Vic—black, of course. Jack would have figured Vinny as more a Cadillac kind of guy, but when he looked in the Crown Vic's trunk he understood: big enough to hold three, maybe four bodies.
So Jack had Ernie make him up a set of tags and a registration identical to Vinny's; and a driver's license which, except for its photo, was a perfect match of Vinny D's. Then Jack went out and bought a Crown Vic like Vinny's—a banged-up version that he never washed, but the same make and model.
The thing Jack liked most about Vinny D was his perfect driving record. Ernie's probe of the DMV computer showed no points. Whether this was due to diligence and skill behind the wheel, or a liberal application of grease in official places, Jack neither knew nor cared. The important thing was that if Jack ever got stopped he wouldn't be hauled in as a scofflaw.
It wasn't perfect. Always the possibility of Jack and Vinny D winding up on the same street at the same time and Vinny just happening to notice that their tags were identical. But since Vinny kept his car in Brooklyn and Jack garaged his in Manhattan, and hardly used it, he figured the chance of that happening was practically nil.
"Do we have a plan?" Jack said. "Do we even know she's at this address?"
"It's the only place I can think of to start," Kate said. "She left with that man this morning and hasn't been back since."
Jack said, "I'm feeling a little left out here. You both know this woman and I've never met her. What's she like?"
Kate cleared her throat. "The Jeanette you'll meet tonight—if you do meet her—is not the same woman she was before her treatment."
"And just what was this treatment?"
"For a brain tumor—an inoperable malignant glioma."
Fielding added from the rear: "By far the most common primary tumor developing in the human brain and too often refractory to current therapeutic approaches."
Kate went on. "So when the diagnosis was made I did some research and found Dr. Fielding and his clinical trial. Jeanette qualified for his study and—" She turned in her seat toward Fielding. "Perhaps you can tell it best."
"Of course." Fielding leaned forward. "Jeanette's tumor was treated with a stereotactically administered recombinant adenovirus vector carrying the herpes simplex thymidine kinase gene, followed by intravenous ganciclovir."
"Oh," Jack said. "That clears that up." He glanced at Kate. "Anyone care to translate?"
Kate smiled. "I watched the whole operation. Under x-ray guidance, Dr. Fielding threaded a tiny catheter into the tumor in Jeanette's brain. He then injected the tumor with a special virus, a recombinant strain of adenovirus that's had a specific gene from a herpes virus spliced into it."
"Wait. Doc, you injected herpes into this woman's brain?"
"Not the herpes vims per se," Fielding said. "Just a piece of it. You see, the altered adenovirus is called a vector virus. I'm oversimplifying, but let's just say it's attracted to dividing cells, and wild cell division is what makes a tumor a tumor. When the vector virus meets the tumor cells it does what all viruses do: it adds its own genetic material to the tumor's."
Kate said, "Think of the vector virus as a Trojan horse, but instead of Greeks it's carrying this tiny piece of a herpes virus—"
"Thymidine kinase gene H5010RSVTK, to be specific," Fielding added.
"—which gets incorporated into the tumor cells along with the virus's own genes. Now, there's no specific drug that will kill malignant glioma cells, but we do have medications that will kill viruses. And one of them, ganciclovir, kills by destroying a virus's thymidine kinase gene."
"Exactly," Fielding said. "And so, after injecting Jeanette's tumor with the virus and giving it time to combine with the tumor cells, we flooded Jeanette with high intravenous doses of ganciclovir."
"Which made a beeline for the tumor," Jack said, getting the picture now. "The herpes gene acts as a homing device for the gan-whatever guided missile."
Fielding laughed. "Homing device and guided missile—I like that. I'll have to remember it next time I'm explaining the protocol to a patient."
Kate said, "The ganciclovir not only kills the tagged virus, it kills any cell carrying the thymidine kinase gene. And since the tumor cells now carry that gene…"
"Blammo," Jack said, filled with wonder. "No more tumor. Sounds like science fiction. Or maybe horror fiction. What kind of mind dreams up something like this?"
"I wish mine had," Fielding said. "But I'm merely following in others' footsteps."
"But who volunteered to be the first patient to have a virus injected into his brain?"
"Someone with nothing to lose. But lots of lab animals paved the way."
"So Jeanette is cured."
"Not completely," Fielding said. "At least not yet. Malignant gliomas are tough, resilient tumors. Her last MRI showed a marked reduction in the tumor's size but she'll probably have to undergo another course of therapy to finish it off once and for all."
Kate turned in her seat and looked at Fielding. "And you still don't see any possible link between the protocol and Jeanette's personality changes?"
Fielding paused before answering. "Getting a reprieve from what is in a very real sense a death sentence has been known to cause enormous psychological turmoil."
Which isn't exactly answering the question, Jack thought, but maybe he's worried about a malpractice suit.
Kate had given him Holdstock's address but Jack hadn't had the faintest idea how to get there. He'd checked out a map before leaving tonight and had the route pictured in his head.
Night had settled in by the time he reached Astor Avenue. He slowed to a crawl, watching for a number.
"There it is," Kate said, pointing to a brick house ahead. "The lights are on. I know Jeanette's in there."
"Okay," Jack said, pulling into an empty spot half a block down. "Now that we're here, what do we do? How do we confirm she's there?"
He was mildly uncomfortable with the situation. Too ad lib. Normally he'd have checked out the house in advance and have a plan in place. And he never would have brought anyone else along. But this was Kate's gig. He was along for the ride and to provide some backup if necessary.
Kate said, "I looked through the living room window last time."
"That's a little risky, don't you think? A neighbor could report us as peepers."
"That would be catastrophic," Fielding said. "My entire career would be in jeopardy if I were even charged as a Peeping Tom."
Your career? Jack thought. If Jack got hauled in for anything—from shooting a crazy on a subway to littering—he could kiss his freedom bye-bye.
"Just a quick look," Kate said, opening her door. "I'll go myself. I've never heard of a woman being charged as a Peeping Tom."
No way Jack was letting Kate do it on her own. He got out on his side, and Fielding did the same. Career or not, curiosity must have got the better of him.
"Let's make this quick, people," Jack said as he caught up to Kate on the sidewalk. "One look, then back to the car to discuss our next move."
"I'll bet they're having that ceremony or seance or whatever it was I saw last night," Kate said.
When they reached the house Kate didn't break stride. She trucked right across the lawn toward the lighted window on the side. Jack slowed, letting Fielding go ahead of him. He brought up the rear, doing a three-sixty scan of the area. A few neighboring windows facing this way but no sign of anybody at them. All probably watching TV. Okay.
Kate reached the window, went up on tiptoe, and stared inside.
Jack heard her excited whisper: "There she is."
As Jack approached, Fielding came up behind Kate and peered over her shoulder. Jack saw him lean closer, then jerk back as if he'd received a shock.
"Oh, no!" he cried. Jack winced at the volume. "Oh, dear God, this is worse than I thought!"
He lurched away from the window just as Jack got there. Through the glass—thankfully it was down—Jack saw eight people sitting in a circle holding hands. And that was it. No one appeared to be speaking. The eight of them just sitting there with these goofy smiles on their faces. He was about to ask Kate which one was Jeanette but she'd slipped away.
"Dr. Fielding!" he heard her say. "Where are you going?"
Jack looked and spotted Fielding heading around the front of the house.
"Inside! I'm not leaving here until I find out what this is about!"
Kate followed Fielding and Jack followed Kate and the three of them wound up on the front steps. Jack went to grab Fielding to try to calm him down and find out what had set him off, but too late; he began pounding on the front door.
Kate looked at Jack and he jerked a thumb toward Fielding with a questioning look. She shrugged her shoulders, obviously as baffled as he.
"Take it easy, Doc," Jack said. "We don't need to wake up the whole borough."
Fielding looked as if he was about to speak when the door opened. A heavyset man with thinning blond hair and eyes too little for his face—his looks fit Kate's description of Terrence Holdstock—stood gaping at his three visitors.
"Why, Dr. Fielding. What a surprise!"
"What's going on here, Terrence?" Fielding said.
"Just a meeting. A support group, you might say."
"Support for what?"
"For the ordeal we've been through, and for the wonderful future that awaits us. All thanks to you, Dr. Fielding."
"Yes, well, I'm glad you feel that way, but how did you all meet? I have strict confidentiality procedures. If someone in my office—"
"Nothing like that, I assure you. We met quite by accident."
''''All of you?" Fielding took a step forward. "Look, may I come in? I'd like to—"
Holdstock didn't budge. "I'm afraid not, doctor. We're right in the middle of our meeting. Perhaps some other time."
"No, please, I must talk to you, all of you."
Holdstock shook his head. "We're fine, doctor. And getting better every day, thanks to you."
"I want to see Jeanette!" Kate said.
"She will be home later. As for now, please let us be."
So saying, Holdstock stepped back and closed the door.
"No!" Fielding cried.
He raised his hand to hammer the door again but Jack caught his wrist before he could land the first blow.
"I don't think that's going to get us anywhere."
Fielding resisted for a second, then dropped his arm. "I guess you're right."
"That's it?" Kate said. "We're giving up? Just like that?"
"We're regrouping," Jack said. "Holdstock has the law on his side at the moment. This is his house and he's invited a bunch of guests over to hold hands. He can have the local boys in blue haul us off for disturbing the peace here. So I say we go back to the car and settle down and let Dr. Fielding here tell us why he hasn't been straight with us."
Fielding stiffened.
Kate looked at Jack as if he were crazy.
"Look at him," Jack told her. "Look at his expression. And that conversation with Holdstock. Could you make sense of that?"
She turned back to Fielding and her eyes narrowed. "What aren't you telling us?"
Fielding's eyes were haunted. "I know those people in there. They're all my patients. Every single one of them!"