Out Cold (25 page)

“The eggs,” said Harrigan, “they have to be fertilized, right?”

She nodded. “It's kind of technical. The nucleus is removed from the egg. Without its own genetic materials, it's called an ovacyte. Then cells from somebody else—they could be regular body cells, like skin or hair, or they could be stem cells, and they could be from a man or a woman, it wouldn't matter—they're inserted into the ovacyte. The ovacyte is kept alive for no more than fourteen days, and then its stem cells are harvested.”

Harrigan was frowning. “Women volunteer to donate their eggs, is that right? That's all you need them for?”

“To do therapeutic cloning, yes.”

“So why did you have these young women living here?”

Jeanette blew out a breath. “Because,” she said, “it turned out that Dr. McKibben wasn't really interested in therapeutic cloning.”

“He wasn't?”

She shook her head. “It's what he told me he wanted to do. It's how he described his work. It's what convinced me to come here to work with him. It's what I was interested in.” She looked at Harrigan, then at me. “But it's not what he's doing.”

“Reproductive cloning,” I said. “Cloned human babies. All those Ursulas in their miniature caskets.”

She nodded. “Yes. It turned out, that's all Dr. McKibben was interested in from the beginning. He wanted to create another Ursula.”

“Clone his daughter?” said Harrigan.

Jeanette shrugged. “Yes.”

“That's nuts.”

“Of course it is,” she said. “It's crazy and it's evil. But, if you think only about the science of it, it's very exciting. It hasn't been accomplished yet. But Dr. McKibben has pretty much proved it could be done.”

“Except people die,” said Harrigan.

She nodded. “Yes.”

“Those graves out back,” he said.

Jeanette nodded. “It's the embryos he cares about. We experimented with various drugs and therapies to keep the embryo healthy in utero until it could survive independently.”

“Clomiphene,” I said.

Both Harrigan and Jeanette turned and looked at me.

“That was one of the drugs, right?”

Jeanette nodded. “It's a common fertility drug. It's one of many that Dr. McKibben experimented with, in various combinations.”

“They all didn't work, then,” said Harrigan.

Jeanette shrugged. “Let me explain how he thinks, okay? Jud McKibben is a scientist. The human part of him died with his daughter. All that's left is the scientist. So as a scientist, he'll tell you, he sets up controlled situations, tries different things, and observes and measures the results. That's what science is. Testing hypotheses in a laboratory. You experiment, and keep records, and process the data. As long as you are faithful to your protocols, there's no such thing as a failure. Whatever happens gives you information. When a subject dies? That's interesting, he says. He wants to know why. He'd study it and try to learn from it.” She looked at Harrigan. “Do you understand?”

“Understand?” He shook his head. “I understand what you're saying. I guess I don't understand how anybody could take science to this extreme.”

She shrugged. “He does. We found, for example, that cloned embryos tend to grow faster than natural embryos, and sometimes the surrogate's system—the girl's, I mean—it can't keep up with that rate of growth.”

“Then,” I said, “she dies.”

“Yes,” said Jeanette. “Sometimes they die.”

Harrigan cleared his throat. “Did any of the, um, surrogates…those that didn't die, I mean…were they allowed to leave?”

“You mean,” she said, “just leave us, go back to where they came from?”

He nodded.

“Oh, no,” she said. “Dr. McKibben couldn't allow that.”

Harrigan glanced at me. Then he said to Jeanette, “These girls—your surrogates—where did they come from?”

“As far as I know,” she said, “Albert Cranston recruited them. They were lost children, homeless girls, girls who were wasting their lives. They came here. We cleaned them up, fed them, made them healthy. The doctor said we were giving purpose and meaning to their lives.”

“You gave them drugs to keep them in line,” said Harrigan.

She nodded.

“Can I ask a couple questions?” I said to Harrigan.

“About what?”

“About Dana Wetherbee.”

He nodded. “Go ahead.” For the benefit of the tape, he said, “Brady Coyne is going to ask some questions.”

I turned to Jeanette. “Was a girl by the name of Dana Wetherbee here?”

“Yes.” She smiled. “Dana got away.”

“How did she manage that?”

“I helped her,” said Jeanette. “It's the one decent thing I've done since I've been here.”

“You helped her?” I said.

“She was pregnant.” Jeanette smiled. “She was starting to think of herself as a mother. She was becoming emotionally involved with her—her embryo. She wanted to have her baby. I—it was risky. If the doctor finds out I helped her…”

“It won't matter,” said Harrigan. “He can't do anything to you.”

She shook her head. “I'm not sure I'll ever believe that. That he has no control over me.”

“Tell us about how Dana escaped.”

“She kept talking about having her baby. She was a very sweet girl. So I sneaked her into the truck one day when I was going out for groceries. I drove her to the bus stop in Hardwick—that's the next town south of here—and gave her some money. She said she knew somebody in Boston who could help her.”

“That was Evie,” I said to Harrigan. “My girlfriend.”

He nodded.

“Dana found her way to my house one snowy night a couple weeks ago,” I said said to Jeanette. “She bled to death in the snow in my backyard.”

Her eyes brimmed with tears. “I was hoping…”

“Did you mail a Christmas card for Dana?”

She nodded.

“McKibben doesn't know about this?” I said.

“If he knew,” she said, “he'd kill me.”

“So you don't approve of what he was doing here,” I said.

She looked at me and smiled quickly. “Approve? Hardly. I'm a nurse. I believe in life.”

“Why did you stay, then?”

“I had no choice.”

“He would've killed you?” I said.

She nodded. “Without any qualms. For science. He'd kill anybody who threatened what he was doing.”

“We'll talk some more,” said Harrigan. He shut off the tape recorder. “Let's go, join the others. Jeanette do you know where Mr. Coyne's coat and other belongings are?”

“I'll get them,” she said.

Harrigan and I went into the living room. Howard was still sitting there watching his prisoners. McKibben and Cranston sat stoically, cuffed at the wrists, staring in opposite directions.

“Everything okay?” said Harrigan.

“Dandy,” said Howard.

Jeanette came into the room. She had my parka draped over her arms. “Here's your coat,” she said.

I took it from her. And then I saw the gun. My gun. She was holding my Smith & Wesson .38 Chiefs Special.

She went over to where Judson McKibben was sitting. “You turned me into a monster,” she said. “I'll never forgive you.”

He smiled up at her. “I turned you into a good scientist,” he said. “You should thank me.”

“I'll curse you forever.” She raised the gun, gripped it in both hands, and aimed it at McKibben's face.

“Jeanette,” said Harrigan quietly. “Please.”

She was glaring at McKibben. Her hands were trembling.

After a moment—it was probably just a few seconds, but it seemed like a long time—she lowered the gun and let it fall to the floor.

Howard went over and picked it up.

Harrigan put his arm around Jeanette's shoulders. “That would have been a very stupid thing to do.”

She shook her head. “I expect I'll forever regret not pulling the trigger.”

Right then a siren sounded outside, very close. A moment later two uniformed state troopers came bursting in, followed by a man in a suit who I assumed was a detective.

Harrigan talked with the detective for a few minutes. Then the state cops uncuffed McKibben and Cranston, recuffed them separately, and marched them out of the house.

The detective pulled out his cell phone and wandered into an adjoining room.

A minute later, Kayla came into the room. Four other young women shambled along behind her. They were rubbing their eyes and yawning and whispering to each other.

Harrigan swept his arm around the room, taking in the furniture and the girls. “Please sit down,” he said. “All of you. Sorry to bother your sleep. Kayla, you want to make some coffee? It looks like we're going to be up for a while here. We've got to talk with all of you.”

“Sure,” she said. She left the room. One of the other girls went with her. The other three found seats in the living room. They sat there primly, their knees pressed together, staring down at the floor. They showed no interest in me or Jeanette or Nate Harrigan or Howard.

It was going to be a long night.

“You mind if I make a call?” I said to Harrigan.

He shrugged. “Go ahead.”

I found a phone in the hallway. Evie answered on the first ring, and when I said, “Hi, honey,” she said, “Jesus Christ, Brady. Are you all right? What the hell is going on? You're such a bastard. I expected you to be home hours ago, and you didn't call, and all I could think….” And then she sobbed, and I realized she'd been crying from the beginning.

“I'm fine,” I said. “I'm sorry you were worried. Everything's all right. It's a long story. I'll tell you when I get home.”

I heard her blow out a quick, hard breath. “I imagined you driving off the side of a mountain in a blizzard,” she said. “It was very vivid. They didn't find you until springtime.”

“I imagined that, too,” I said. “But it didn't happen.”

“Where are you?”

“I'm still in Churchill.”

“You haven't even left yet?”

“I got kind of tied up here.”

“I admit,” she said, “I'm very angry with you. Before I was worried. Now I'm totally pissed. I know it's irrational. I can't help it. If you don't like it, tough.”

“I found out all about Dana Wetherbee,” I said.

“Tell me when you get home.”

“Okay.”

“When will that be?”

“Tomorrow,” I said. “I can't leave quite yet. But I'll be home tomorrow.”

“Do you promise?”

“I promise.”

“I intend to stay angry at least until you get here.”

“I understand.”

“Were you in danger?”

“A little,” I said.

“Did you get hurt?”

“I picked up a few bruises.”

“I knew it,” she said. “You almost died, right?”

“Let's not be dramatic about it.”

“Hereafter,” she said, “you've got to promise me you'll just take care of your clients and go fly fishing and stop snooping around and getting in trouble and nearly dying. Okay? Promise?”

“I don't know,” I said.

“Meaning no…right?”

“That's a hard promise to make, babe.”

“You could humor me, you know.”

“I respect you too much to try to humor you,” I said.

Evie didn't say anything.

“You planning to be angry for a while?” I said.

“Bet your ass.”

“Until I get home, huh?”

“At least.”

“Then you'll probably want to make love with me.”

“Yeah,” she said. “Probably.”

Writing a novel is a solitary, often lonely business, and when it's finished, the writer has nobody to blame but himself.

So blame me.

But insofar as this novel works for you, give credit to all those who, intentionally or inadvertently, helped me to make it the way it turned out. Specifically:

Fred Morris, my agent, who takes such good care of my business that I don't have to worry about it; Keith Kahla, my editor, whose astute editorial comments and suggestions on early drafts made all the difference; Vicki Stiefel, my wife, who, besides propping me up all along the way, helped me to work out this story's plot; my writing students at Clark University, whose enthusiasm and creativity continuously inspire me; my many writing friends, who help me keep it in perspective—the old pros who've been doing it for a living for a long time, the new pros who are just breaking in, and the beginners who are determined to succeed.

And, my readers all across the globe who care enough to write or e-mail me to share their feelings about my books. They remind me that writing novels is all about them.