Syndrome

'I warned you, but you wouldn't fucking listen.' He was peering around the living room as though searching for clues to explain why nothing was going right.

'Like I said, I talked to Kristen yesterday.' Stone stood his ground. 'She's not a happy person.'

'If you bring her into this. .' Bartlett glared at him. 'I can't imagine what makes you think you can just run roughshod through my business and my life.'

'Here's how it is. You can abuse me, or you can use me. Keep in mind I'm accustomed to working for people who buy ink by the barrel. As I tried to explain before, if you won't let me get at the whole truth, I may end up spreading half-truths.'

Bartlett walked across the room and ran his fingers along the marble mantelpiece above the fireplace. 'You know,' he said, turning back, 'up until now you've never asked me for anything. I have to say I've always admired that, but I'm curious why.'

'Maybe I thought it was your place to come to me,' Stone said, puzzled by the left turn the conversation had suddenly taken. 'You know, I have a life of my own. I have an eleven-year-old daughter you've never seen or- apparently-care to see. I'm wondering what that says aboutyou. Your granddaughter's name, by the way, is-'

'Iknowher name. I know quite a bit about our blood ties, or lack of.'

'Well, I'd bet she'd be just thrilled by that. Incidentally, she doesn't know a goddam thing about you and I'd just as soon keep it that way.'

'I knew having this conversation was a fucking mistake. This is why I never had it. Any real son of mine has got to have some of my character, my stature. You're a bean counter.'

'Ifyouhad any character, you wouldn't be hiding behind all this secrecy. I try to tell the truth, as much and as often as I can. That's my take on character.'

'What we're doing at Gerex is going to change the history of the world. We're at the brink of things mankind has only dreamed about. And I've taken all the risks. In fact, I took the biggest risk of all personally. There's a lot going on that you don't know a damned thing about. We're on the edge of-'

'All the more reason you should want the whole story told,' Stone interjected. 'Yes, stem cell technology is going to change everything, but you can't just tell half the story. I want it to work, but I'm a truth seeker. I want to find out what, if anything, can go wrong too. You've been using people, first Kristen and now-I'm beginning to fear-Ally, to take your risksforyou. I mean, what's going on? Why did you send somebody down to obliterate all evidence of Kristen? And now Cindy, that girl downstairs? My God, she's somehow vanished too. Whatever happened to Kristen to make it come to this?'

'What may or may not have gone wrong is nothing that can't be made right. No great medical advance ever succeeded in a direct line.'

'I don't need the sales pitch,' Stone said. 'I agree it's going to revolutionize medicine. But you can't-'

'That's why you'll never be a son of mine. You always think small. This is about more than mere medicine. It's about doing the one thing mankind has never been able to do. I amthisclose. Nothing is going to be allowed to destroy this chance. Not even you, my own flesh and blood.'

'Am I that?' Stone asked, feeling an unexpected satisfaction. 'Your own 'flesh and blood'?'

'Thatis something,' Bartlett said, 'we are about to discover. Whether we are made of the same thing. The best way for you to understand what's going on here is to do what I've done. Have the Beta procedure. Show me you've got the balls.'

'The 'Beta procedure'? It might help if I knew what it is.'

'Why don't I just show you,' Bartlett said. 'You want to be on the inside, see everything up close? Fine. I think the time has come. You seem determined to stick your nose into what I'm doing. You weaseled your way into the institute, and now you show up here. So I guess it's time you were an insider all the way.'

'Good, maybe then I can start getting some answers. For example, was changing Kristen's name part of the NIH study?' Stone turned to face him. 'Or is it your way to hide one of your mistakes?'

'Quite frankly, that's none of your goddam business.'

'Well, let me tell you what is my business. Ally Hampton is a particular friend of mine. I damned well want to know whether she's scheduled to undergo the same procedure as Kristen. I don't know what you and Van de Vliet did to Kristen, but if you turn Ally into a zombie too, I'll personally-'

'I think we'll continue this discussion later.' He pulled his cell phone out of a jacket pocket, flipped it open, and punched a memory number.

'Ken, could you and Jake please come in. We have the problem I was afraid we had.' He flipped the phone shut and turned back to Stone. 'Karl entered Ms. Hampton and her mother into the clinical trials at the last minute, as a special favor. She's in no danger.'

Now Stone saw two men come through the front door. One was the tall Japanese man who had slugged him the day before.

Shit. I needthis? Is he going to work me over again?

The other guy was dressed in white, as though he were an orderly or nurse. Stone noticed he had a plastic syringe in his right hand.

'Ken, could you and Jake please take care of this. He'll be going with us.'

Stone examined the three of them. Well, he thought, I guess I'm going to be back inside the Dorian Institute after all.

'Look, there's no need for excessive violence here. We could just set some ground rules for this situation.'

The Japanese man named Ken walked over and seized him around the neck, while at the same time pulling his right arm around behind him, a decisive hammerlock.

'You fucker,' Stone choked out. 'Let-' The man Bartlett had called Jake, the one in white, shoved a needle into his arm.

'This could be the experience you've been looking for,' Bartlett said. 'You've been pursuing me like a dog chasing a car. Now we're about to see if you're man enough to handle the consequences when you've caught it.'

You're damned right I'll handle it, he tried to say. But he wasn't sure if he actually got it said, the void was closing in so fast.

Chapter 29

Thursday, April 9

10:33p.m.

'Grant, is that you?'

Ally squinted in the semi-dark of the room, finally making out the silhouette. He was sitting in a chair beside her bed, and his face was troubled, reminding her of when he'd had a bad day in high school.

Am I dreaming again?she puzzled. The clock on the wall told her that this was a late hour for whatever he was up to now.

'It's me,' he said, his voice low, just above a whisper. The door behind him, she noticed, was shut. 'Welcome back to the world. They moved you upstairs just for tonight. This is the first chance I've had to get near you.'

She was still wondering where she was, what day it was. The walls were an icy blue, illuminated only by the silver-and-green glow of the bank of CRT screens that now monitored her heart and her respiration. She lifted her head off the pillow and for a moment, looked past Grant, examining the screen of the heart monitor. It was a phonocardiogram.

She knew what to look for. Over the years she'd learned to interpret every irregular pulse, every errant amplitude, but now the sonic abnormalities that typically characterized her stenosis, the struggle of her heart's scarred valve to maintain adequate coronary output, were significantly damped.

There'd always been murmurs, abnormal heart sounds, as long as she could remember, so what did this