The Prague Plot: The Cold War Meets the Jihad (Jeannine Ryan Series Book 3) (4 page)

Jeannine was on a roll.

“Hus-Kinetika used raw counts to compute the moving averages, so the number of cases in any given year is a whole number, and the sum over three years is a whole number too.”

Aileen understood.

“Before 2003 the decimals are .00, .33 or .67. They can occur with whole numbers divided by 3, but none of the decimals after 2002 are OK. Those results must be faked.”

Aileen fell silent.
Maybe
Peter is for real after all?

Jeannine stood up and waved an empty cup.

“That’s it. I’m going up to the kitchen. I need to make more coffee.”

But her mind refused to slow down.
Those decimals after 2002 are curious. Wait!

She was halfway up the stairs when she raced back down

“Aileen, I know how they did it. They saw that the averages after 2003 were high, so they divided them again by three.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because dividing twice by three is the same as dividing the original number by nine, and when you divide a whole number by nine, the remainder must be 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, or 8, and the fractions range from 0/9 to 8/9.”

Aileen quickly jotted down a table with the decimals.

After the year 2002, all of the decimals could occur after division by nine! She turned to see Jeannine typing vigorously on her laptop. Jeannine looked up and pointed. to the screen.

“If I’m right, this graph has the ‘real’ averages and there’s a big increase after 2002. Xolak has gone wrong like Peter said.”

Jeannine summarized.

“Here’s what we know so far. From 2003 onwards, none of the years are correct because they have
impossible
decimals. Moreover, these numbers
could
have been produced by division by nine. I think that when they saw the averages were too high, they divided them again by three. That’s the same as dividing by nine.”

“I get it, but Peter should know about this. I’ll call him.”

Aileen picked up the phone.

But two calls later, Aileen turned to Jeannine.

“Peter’s not at the hotel. He’s disappeared. He didn’t check out. No one saw him leave, but he’s gone. A woman in a nearby room thought she heard a commotion. The staff found his room empty. His keycard was on the dresser.”

“Did the hotel call the police?”

“What for? The woman wasn't sure, and they have the imprint of his credit card. It’s no problem for them.”

“Well it’s a problem for us! Call his clinic in Chicago.”

“I did. They thought he was still at the hotel.”

Aileen took a breath and added.

“Peter’s in trouble.”

In North Carolina, Jim Harrigan woke up early. He called the Duck Police Department.

“Terri, I’m not feeling well today. I asked Lou to take my shift. He’ll be there at eight.”

“All right Jim, I’ll tell the Chief. How bad is it? Will we see you tomorrow?

“Just a cough. I’ll probably be in tomorrow.”

Jim hung up.

There was no cough. Jim was fine, despite a restless sleep in which he had been disturbed by dreams featuring bloody car windows, jackets with bullet holes, and the evasions of a deceptive realtor.

Jim had done his duty. The van and jacket were in the hands of the Currituck County Sheriff. It was their case, but he could not let go.

Somewhere was a severely injured man, or a dead body.

He took a last sip of coffee, donned his jacket, and drove north to Corolla. He was sure that woman realtor knew more than she had let on.

Stretched on the couch in Anne’s rental in Corolla, Mila opened her eyes. The room was bright with light from the East. She stretched but felt a twinge in her back. The couch was not soft like her bed.

She sat up and looked about. All was quiet.

She went to the kitchen module and turned on the coffee maker. She looked across the counter to the dining table. Something was missing. Then she understood.

Anne’s laptop was not there. It had been on the table last night, open, its display dark. Now it was gone.

Mila went to Anne’s bedroom.

She stared in amazement. The bed was stripped. Anne’s linens were nowhere in sight. She slid back the folding door of the closet. Anne’s suitcases were gone!

Mila examined the bedroom doors where they opened onto the rear deck. There was no sign the catch had been forced. A stick was wedged in the slide to prevent its opening.

The stick was in the same spot Mila had lodged it the evening before.

Mila returned to the great room and stood in thought.

Someone had been in the house while she slept and removed Anne’s possessions. Mila shuddered at the thought of her own vulnerability.

Anne had a key. The thought that Anne might have removed her own things reassured her, but only for a moment.

Why are you sneaking around, Anne? It’s me, Mila! You can trust me.

But Anne had trusted her once, and things had gone horribly wrong.

A banging on the entrance door interrupted Mila’s thoughts.

Mila went down the stairs. The entrance was on the mid level facing the sound and had its own set of wooden stairs with no access to any of the decks that lined the house. The solid door had a peep hole. Through it Mila saw the distorted image of a man. He looked like that policeman from Duck.

A second later this was confirmed. A badge filled the circular field of vision. The holder knew her name.

“Miss Patekova, may I come in? I’m Jim Harrigan. I spoke with you yesterday.”

Mila pulled the door ajar. She frowned.

“What do you want?”

“I’d like to ask you a few questions. It’s unofficial. You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”

“What kind of questions?”

“First, why did you stay here last night? And where is your cousin? Has she contacted you?”

Mila did not like his tone.

“You’re from the Duck Police Department?”

“That’s right.”

“You can come in, but I have to call them first.”

He shrugged and stepped inside. He followed Mila up the stairs to the top level. His eyes swept the room while she spoke on the phone.

“Terri, this is Mila. One of your deputies is here with me. His name is Harrigan. He wants to ask me some questions. What can you tell me about him.”

Jim waited. Mila listened for almost a minute.

Finally, Mila spoke.

“Thanks, Terri. Thanks very much.”

She hung up and looked at Jim Harrigan with a wry smile.

“Apparently, you’ve had a quick recovery from your cold. No matter, Terri Miller says you are OK.”

“Thanks.”

Mila paused and stood still. Finally, she spoke.

“All right, Mr. Harrigan, Terri’s word is enough for me. I’m worried. I need help, and I think my cousin does too.”

Her decision taken, she reached into her purse, and handed him Vaclav’s passport.

Jim saw the reddish cover, and noted its provenance, the Czech Republic.

Mila pointed across the room.

“And there’s a gun under that cushion. I found it in the sand by the side of the house. I don’t know what to think. Anne never had a gun.”

Jim retrieved the weapon. It was Czech, a CZ-52. He knew it from his work overseas with the “Agency.” He had seen one also when he was with the Raleigh Police Department. The CZ-52 was a fairly common import.

The barrel was clogged with wet sand. He could not say if it had been fired.

Mila sat frozen. There was no turning back now.

Jim stared.
A Czech realtor, a Czech passport, a Czech handgun? What the hell is going on here?

Mila’s brow furrowed. She pointed to a comfortable chair across from her.

“Maybe you’d better sit down. This is going to take a while. I’ll tell you what I can.

Mila recounted how she had set up the meeting with Vaclav Pokorny whom Anne had known when she was a medical student of his father in Prague. How Vaclav felt guilty about his father’s sexual advances to Anne while she was his student, and even more so because Vaclav himself had tried to stop Anne from testifying before the university panel about the harassment.

At that point, Jim Harrigan broke into the narrative.

“Look Miss Patkoh ...”

She interrupted him in turn.

“Call me ‘Mila,’ it’s easier to say.”

“All right Mila, call me ‘Jim,’ but I must warn you. I’m a cop. I don’t know what Terri Miller told you about me, but I’m here to find out what happened. I can see you’re worried that your cousin did something bad to this Vaclav guy. You’re afraid for her, but you have to know that if she did something wrong, I won’t stop until I find her. I’m a cop, not a counselor.”

“I understand. But Jim, Anne doesn’t have a gun. That gun is someone else’s. She’s a grad student in philosophy and theology. She couldn’t harm anyone.”

“OK, I see you believe that. Tell me about Vaclav’s father.”

“He was a communist before the Velvet Revolution. Doubtless still is.”

“And Vaclav?”

“He’s a capitalist, like me. He and his father don’t agree on anything, but Vaclav loves his father even though his father won’t speak to him. Vaclav works for a pharmaceutical company, Hus-Kinetika, that his father despises: his father lost his appointment at Charles University because of that company.”

She started to add
“and because of my cousin’s testimony,”
but thought better of it.

At this point Jim’s cell phone vibrated. It was Terri Miller in the office.

“Jim, I just got a call from Irv at Dominion Power in Corolla. The night of the storm he was on the road to replace a blown transformer. He told me another van passed him near the spot where you found that Safari minivan. It was a Honda.”

Terri added.

“I thought you should know there were two vans, not one.”

A pause. Jim sensed Terri smiling at the phone.

“Jim, how do you like Mila now? Isn’t she neat!”

Jim coughed as Terri hung up. He turned towards Mila.

“What kind of car does your cousin drive? Is it a van?”

“Hardly, she has a Ford Focus.”

“Mila, I have some news that could help your cousin.”

Mila’s eyes brightened. For the first time, Jim realized they were lustrous brown.

In the Parklawn Building in Rockville, Maryland, Dr. Larry Hodges sat at his desk. Across from him was a desirable woman who routinely rebuffed his attempts to get personal.

Larry was conflicted. Jeannine Ryan had delivered her Xolak comments to him on time and in person. Ever hopeful, he was grateful for that, but the substance of her comments upset him. He could feel the rise of acid in his stomach.
Damn!

“Look, Jeannine. You don’t know that the increase in adverse reactions is the way you graphed it. It’s your guess that someone divided the numbers by nine. Give me a break. I’ve got a lot of pressure to approve this damned Xolak report.”

“No, Larry, you look. The guess that they divided the real numbers by nine is a good one. All the decimals are consistent with that possibility.”

She pressed on.

“But it does not matter. It’s not a guess that the numbers Hus-Kinetika presented
are
false. The decimals cannot occur after division of a whole number by three which is what they say they did. That alone is cause to reject their report. If I also have an explanation of
how
they faked the data by dividing by nine, that’s just a bonus.

The color rose in her cheeks.

“You wanted my comments and now you have them. If Hus-Kinetika is so great how come they ‘lost’ the data on that server. Wasn’t that too convenient? Didn’t that raise a red flag to you.”

Dr. Hodges shifted in his seat.

“I’m sorry. You’re right, of course. And I see your arguments. It’s just that this case is a major headache. The State Department is pushing the FDA to decide quickly.”

“Quickly? They want you to decide in favor of Hus-Kinetika!”

“That’s about it. There’s a political deal with the Czech Republic in the works. If they think that we are treating Hus-Kinetika unfairly, they could scratch the whole thing.”

“Spare me the politics, Larry. The FDA is supposed to protect Americans, and to make sure that medicines like Xolak are OK. Are you going to wait until people die before you act?”

Larry looked down at his desk. After a few moments, he picked up the folder with Jeannine’s critique.

“All right. I’ll delay the approval of the Xolak report, but you could help your case with more evidence, like personal testimony. What about that Dr. Zeleny?”

“I don’t know where he is, but I’ll try to find him.”

Larry stood up, unsmiling.

“I guess I’d better pass your comments on. Call me if you locate Zeleny.”

He nodded and left the office. Minutes later, Jeannine squeezed into a “down” elevator crowded with workers headed to the Parklawn Building’s main cafeteria.

She reflected. This meeting marked a “first.”

Larry had not asked her to lunch with him!