Vector

by Robin Cook

  Jack threw up his hands. “Well, that’s all we can do.”

  “Absolutely,” Chet said.

  Jack turned to his desk. In the center of his blotter was a slide tray with a Post-it attached. On it was a note from Maureen. The slides were the skin samples from Connie Davydov.

  After getting his microscope out, Jack slipped one of the slides under the objective and took a look. Now that he had the diagnosis of botulism, the slides were superfluous. He’d taken the slice of skin to make sure the woman’s swollen eye was from trauma and not infection, and that was what he saw.

  Putting Connie’s slides aside, he reached for David Jefferson’s folder. He thought he’d polish off the case a day early and surprise Calvin. While he worked, he happily anticipated the thought of spending an evening with Laurie and Lou after an invigorating pre-dinner run on the B-ball court.

  _________

  NINETEEN

  Wednesday, October 20

  5:05 P.M.

  “See you tomorrow!” Bob King called out as Curt emerged from the front of the firehouse.

  Curt responded to the rookie with a wave that was more a wave of dismissal than acknowledgment. They were going in opposite directions on Duane Street after the shift change. “Come mid-morning tomorrow, I’ll never have to see you again,” Curt mumbled under his breath.

  As the afternoon progressed, Curt had grown increasingly excited about Operation Wolverine. At last, all the planning and all the effort was about to pay off; the operation was now on the launch pad in the final countdown for a blastoff in less than twenty-four hours! The only remaining skirmish involved Jack Stapleton, and that snag was to be dealt with in the next hour or so.

  Curt glanced at his watch. Since it was after five, he fully expected the mission operatives would all be at the rendezvous in Pete’s bar. Steve had not called during the afternoon: a sure indication that everything had to have gone as planned.

  As Curt rounded the corner he saw a plain, dark blue van parked in a loading zone close to the bar. On the driver’s side door panel was stenciled the name of a Brooklyn plumber. Curt smiled. Undoubtedly it was the requisitioned vehicle.

  The bar was practically empty. The whining country music that had provided the background earlier had been replaced with the harsh sounds of a group called Armageddon. Curt smiled again. It seemed so fitting.

  The music was emanating from a boom box perched on a table in front of Carl Ryerson. In the smoky half-light of the bar, Carl’s crooked grin and the swastika on his forehead gave him a particularly satanic aura.

  “You like the sounds, Captain?” Carl asked. He’d caught Curt’s smile.

  Curt liked the troops to call him “captain”; it was appropriately respectful, and it promoted discipline. He squeezed into the booth and eyed his squadron. Carl was sitting directly opposite. Next to him was the redhead, Kevin Smith. Then there was the diminutive Clark Ebersol, followed by Mike Compisano. Steve was to Curt’s immediate right. Everyone was in T-shirts with their tattoos visible, except for Curt, who was still in his class B fireman’s uniform. The table was littered with a forest of beer bottles.

  “Let’s slow up on the drinking,” Curt said.

  “Hey, what else is there to do in a bar?” Kevin said. “We’ve been here for a good half hour.”

  “I didn’t want to be late,” Steve explained.

  “Is that the van out front?” Curt asked.

  “Yup,” Steve said. “Thanks to Clark.”

  “What about the ordnance?” Curt questioned.

  Steve leaned forward and lowered his voice. “There’s three Kalashnikovs and two Glocks in the truck. I figured that would be more than enough. Hell, if the guy is on a bicycle, all we have to do is run over him.”

  “But then we shoot him just to be sure,” Curt said.

  “Well, we certainly have more than enough firepower,” Steve said.

  “Where’s Yuri?” Curt asked. It was the first moment Curt realized the Russian wasn’t there.

  “I don’t know,” Steve said. “Maybe he got hung up in the traffic.”

  Curt looked at his watch. “We told the bastard to be here at five.”

  “Why don’t we use the time to set up tomorrow morning?” Steve suggested. “I mentioned to Mike we might need him for a quick mission.” Mike was the least enamored of the skinhead style and the most responsive to Curt’s urging to tame its outlandishness. Now that his blond hair had begun to grow out, compared to his fellow militiamen he could almost pass for normal.

  “Good idea,” Curt said, but before he could elaborate the waiter appeared to take his order. Curt ordered a Bud Light.

  “Listen up,” Curt said to Mike after Curt’s beer had arrived. He leaned forward. “We want you to put on business clothes in the morning: jacket, tie, the works. It’s got to be early because we want you in front of the Jacob Javits Federal Building on Worth Street no later than nine-fifteen.”

  “I’ll have to take off from work,” Mike said.

  Curt rolled his eyes. He reminded himself he needed patience when he talked to his troops. “Whatever,” he said with a wave of his hands. “The important thing is that you are there at nine-fifteen. This operation has to go like clockwork.”

  “So what do I do, just stand there?” Mike questioned.

  “No, you idiot,” Curt said loudly. Then he lowered his voice. “We’re going to give you a small smoke bomb that generates lots of smoke. It’s about the size of a large firecracker, and you’re to light it with a match. Most importantly it will not set off the metal detector when you go into the building.”

  “I have to go inside?” Mike questioned.

  “That’s right,” Curt said.

  “But won’t they ask me why?”

  “No! People are going in and out all day long.”

  Mike raised his eyebrows.

  “I’m serious,” Curt said. “You won’t have a problem as long as you look halfway decent. Hell, it probably wouldn’t matter even if you wore what you have on today.”

  “All right,” Mike said. “So I’m inside. What do I do with the smoke bomb?”

  “Get on the elevator and go up to the third floor,” Curt said. “When you get off, go to your right. About thirty feet down the hall is a men’s room. Got it?”

  Mike nodded.

  “Go inside the men’s room and make sure no one else is in there.”

  Mike continued to nod.

  “Actually, it probably doesn’t matter even if someone is in there,” Curt said. “Just get yourself in the last stall. There’s a vent in there against the back wall. Unscrew the cover with a coin, light the bomb, toss it inside the duct, then put the cover back on.”

  “Is that all?” Mike asked.

  “That’s it,” Jack said. “Then wander out of the building. The bomb’s going to set off a smoke detector in the HVAC system so there’ll be a fire alarm, but you just continue on your way. There also might be some confusion. After the alarm sounds, Steve and I will show up in minutes in our truck, and if you happen to see us, ignore us. That’s all you have to do.”

  Mike gave a short laugh. He glanced around at the others. “That’s a piece of cake.”

  “But it’s an important piece of cake,” Curt declared. “It’s an important mission for the PAA.”

  At that moment Curt saw Yuri come in through the front door. Curt raised his hand to get Yuri’s attention, and the Russian came over. “You’re late!” Curt snapped.

  “The traffic was bad getting into the Battery Tunnel,” Yuri explained.

  “Jack Stapleton better still be at his work,” Curt warned. He stood up and went to the bar to pay the tab.

  “All right, move out,” Curt said a few minutes later when he’d returned to the table. He had to take bottles away from Kevin and Carl, who thought they’d carry out their unfinished beers.

  Outside everyone piled into the van amid lots of excited laughter. With the promise of violence, the skinheads were workin
g themselves up to a fever pitch. Curt took the wheel and had Yuri ride shotgun because the Russian could most expediently identify the target. In the back there were some arguments about who was going to sit where among all the plumbing tools and lengths of pipe. Steve ended up having to decide.

  Curt made it a point to take Worth Street west in order to pass the Jacob Javits Federal Building. He wanted to show Mike where he was to enter the building in the morning. After doing so, Curt turned north on the Bowery with the plan of getting over to First Avenue via Houston Street.

  “I don’t want to take a lot of time,” Yuri said nervously. “I just want to point out Jack Stapleton, get out, and let you guys do what you have to do.”

  Curt took his eyes off the traffic for a moment to cast a questioning glance at Yuri. “We’ll have to see how things work out,” he said. “We’re kinda playing this operation by ear.”

  “What does that mean?” Yuri asked. He was holding on with both hands. Curt was driving aggressively in the traffic, especially now that they’d turned north on First Avenue.

  “It means we’ll be making things up as we go along,” Curt said. “But why the rush? I thought you’d want to be along for the whole mission.”

  “I have a lot of work to do to be ready for tomorrow,” Yuri explained.

  “Oh, right,” Curt said.

  In the back of the van, new arguments erupted about who was going to hold which weapon. Curt glanced in the rearview mirror and was horrified to see his troops struggling over the Kalashnikovs. “Get that ordnance out of sight,” he yelled. “Jesus Christ! We’ll have the cops pulling us over.”

  Amid grumbles, the weapons were placed on the floor.

  Curt caught Yuri casting anxious glances back at the troops. “They’re a little excited,” he explained. “They love this type of operation.”

  “They seem more than a little excited,” Yuri responded.

  “What was that address again?” Curt called back to Steve.

  Steve pulled Jack’s card out of his pocket. “Five-twenty

  First Avenue,” Steve said. “I imagine it’s up in the hospital neighborhood.”

  Curt began to slow down as they passed Bellevue Hospital on the right.

  “There it is,” Steve said while pointing to a glazed, blue brick building.

  Curt pulled to the left side of the road just beyond Thirtieth Street, stopped, and put on his emergency blinkers. They were on the opposite side of the street and catty-corner from the morgue’s First Avenue entrance. People were coming out of the building in clumps and either walking away or hailing taxis.

  Steve came up between the front bucket seats. He, Curt, and Yuri stared at the front of the building and watched the people exit. “Looks like the employees are getting off work.”

  In the back of the van the troops reopened the argument about who was going to hold the Kalashnikovs. Curt had to yell at them to shut up.

  “How are we going to know if he’s not already left?” Steve asked. “We could be here for hours for nothing.”

  “He better not have gone,” Curt said, glancing harshly at Yuri. “Let’s try to give him a call. Give me that direct number he put on his card.”

  While Steve got the card from his pocket, Curt pulled out his cellular phone. As Steve read out the number, Curt punched it into his keypad. Then he lifted the phone to his ear.

  It gave Jack a great sense of satisfaction to sign out yet another case. Marveling that he’d never been quite so caught up in his work since the day he’d been hired, he put the folder on top of the tottering completed pile. As he pulled his hand away, his phone rang.

  “Jack Stapleton here,” he said in his normal fashion. Instead of a voice, Jack heard a rushing noise, as if he was listening to a distant waterfall. Then there was the unmistakable honk of an automobile horn.

  “Hello, hello!” Jack said into the mouthpiece all the more loudly.

  Jack was treated to a click followed by a dial tone. He tossed the handset back into its cradle with a shrug.

  “What happened?” Chet asked without looking up from his work.

  “Who the hell knows?” Jack said. “I could hear traffic in the background but whoever called never said a word.”

  “Must have been an old girlfriend checking up on you,” Chet said.

  “Oh, yeah, right!” Jack said with as much sarcasm as he could manage. He looked at his diminutive stack of uncompleted files and debated whether to continue his marathon.

  Then Chet’s phone rang.

  “She must have had the wrong number,” Jack said with a laugh.

  Chet picked up his phone. He sat up straighter when he heard who it was. “Yes, I’m still here, Dr. Simsarian,” he said loud enough to be sure Jack could hear.

  Jack turned around to look at his officemate, who’d also turned to face him. Their eyes met. Chet was wide-eyed with disbelief. “Really!” he said. “I’m amazed, too.”

  “Amazed about what?” Jack demanded.

  Chet held up his hand toward Jack while continuing to talk into the phone: “Thanks for calling back, Dr. Simsarian. It’s fascinating, and we’ll be interested to hear the follow-up. I’ll be sure to tell Dr. Stapleton about the results and convey your gratitude.”

  Chet hung up his phone.

  “Don’t tell me the rats were positive for botulinum toxin!” Jack said.

  “You guessed it,” Chet said. “He was flabbergasted. I am, too. What really made you even consider the idea in the first place?”

  “Purely because it was the same neighborhood,” Jack said.

  “Connie Davydov must have eaten one of the rats,” Chet said with a sinister chuckle.

  Jack laughed, too, then commented that only two medical examiners could find such a concept laughable.

  “I wonder if an infected rat would put out the toxin in its feces?” Chet asked.

  “That’s even a more disgusting idea,” Jack said. “I suppose we could ask the veterinary epidemiologists. More realistically, I wonder if Connie Davydov put the rest of whatever it was she ate that was contaminated with the toxin down her disposal.”

  “Yeah, but enough to kill that many rats?” Chet questioned suspiciously.

  “I know it sounds far-fetched,” Jack admitted. “But you know how potent that stuff is supposed to be.”

  “Well, it will be interesting to hear if the vet epidemiologists can figure it out.”

  Jack got up and stretched. “I think I’ve had it for the night. I need the relaxation of a good hard game of B-ball.”

  “See you tomorrow,” Chet said.

  “Take care, sport,” Jack said. He grabbed his bomber jacket from behind the door. He slipped into it as he walked down to the elevator. Remembering the fabulous weather from his afternoon jaunt to Brighton Beach, he was again looking forward to a relaxing bike ride.

  “At least we know he’s still in there,” Steve said.

  “True,” Curt commented. “The question now is when is he going to come out? I don’t know how long the troops will keep away from each other’s throats.” Just after Curt had hung up from calling Jack, Carl, Clark, Kevin, and Mike had gotten into another heated argument about the guns that had almost ended in fisticuffs. Curt had had to collect the weapons; they were now all on the floor at Yuri’s feet.

  “That’s him on the bike!” Yuri shouted. He frantically pointed to Jack’s figure as the medical examiner rounded the corner of Thirtieth Street and powered his way up First Avenue.

  “Jesus, he’s moving!” Curt said. He snapped off the emergency brake and accelerated out into the traffic. The driver of a taxi the maneuver had cut off leaned on his horn in frustration.

  “Let me out!” Yuri urged.

  “Not now!” Curt cried. “I don’t want to lose the bastard.”

  Although the traffic was heavy, it was moving in sync and at a fairly rapid pace.

  “The guy’s a freaking dynamo,” Curt complained. He drove aggressively, knowing it was the onl
y way to close in on Jack. He was totally unconcerned about grazing other vehicles or having others run into his side or rear.

  “Holy shit!” Steve swore as Curt cut off another taxi and there was a dull thump followed by the screech of metal against metal down the side of the truck. In the back of the van the loose pipe lengths were bouncing around, making a terrible racket. The troops were busy fending off not only the pipes but also a minor blizzard of nuts, bolts, and PCB pipe fittings that were raining down from where they were stored in shelves along both sides of the vehicle’s interior. The inevitable New York City potholes were making the situation desperate.

  “Yuri, get out of the goddamned seat and let Steve sit there,” Curt yelled while fighting with the steering wheel.

  “While we’re moving?” Yuri questioned. He was holding on with white knuckles.

  “Of course while we’re moving,” Curt yelled.

  Yuri swallowed nervously and then tried to rotate off the seat. Steve had moved over to give him room. But at the same time, Curt saw the suggestion of an opening in the neighboring lane and swerved to take advantage of it. The movement threw Yuri into him. Curt responded by swearing and fending Yuri off with a forearm before struggling to retain control of the racing vehicle.

  While Yuri clawed his way into the back of the truck, Steve swung into the seat. Just ahead he could see Jack’s back. The medical examiner was pumping furiously. Jack was inching ahead between a speeding beer delivery truck and a Federal Express van.

  “God damn it!” Curt yelled, as he could see Jack was about to slip in front of the vehicles. Curt was directly behind the beer truck. He leaned on his horn in frustration.

  “Get a Glock!” Curt yelled to Steve. “I’m going to try to come alongside the bastard so you can nail him. The trouble is, I’m going to have to find a way to get around this truck.”

  “What is this guy?” Steve questioned as he picked up one of the automatics and snapped off the safety. “A professional bicycle racer? He’s going faster than the traffic!”