Nella let the cold flickering light of the screen strobe over her without registering what she was seeing. It had taken Frank almost an hour to convince Judge Hawkins to give them more time before publishing a warning to the City about the missing Recharge samples. They had agreed that she wouldn't meet the Judge, so that the sight of her injury wouldn't cause an immediate and irreversible call to the military governor. She didn't know what he had said to finally persuade Judge Hawkins to give them more time, but she didn't envy Frank. He'd had to walk a fine line in the narrow space between the truth and implicating his client. His nature was too open to enjoy any aspect of it. Nella shook her head. How had he become a lawyer in the first place?
They sat in her living room combing through the images on Dr. Pazzo's videos, looking for a shot of the closet door. Frank kept on, frame by frame, pausing and playing, rewinding and pausing. Nella had stopped paying attention. She didn't need any more proof. She'd been convinced as soon as she heard the lock click in Frank's bathroom. Her thoughts instead, stuttered and sparked and prickled. She bounced between wondering what Dr. Pazzo was waiting for and how he planned to release the bacteria. It never occurred to her to wonder whether he would release it.
"I can't believe it," Frank said, shattering the vague haze that surrounded Nella's thoughts. He was leaning forward, almost tilting himself off the chair in his excitement.
A still image of the closet door sat on the screen in brooding green. A single frame as Dr. Pazzo smashed the camera against the wall in his staged frenzy. He had been so careful, showing only the walls or his face, even the panel of the door at times, but never the knob. But he'd lost track of it. He wanted to be convincing in his fury, to appear truly infected, that he'd forgotten to hide the lock. It was a push button, just as Nella had thought. She watched Frank sink back into the cushions beside her, almost felt his certainty and confidence drain away.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"What do I do?"
"Stick with the plan. Maybe he'll admit to having the samples when you tell him we didn't find them. But if he doesn't- we've only got one shot to find them. Once he knows that we suspect him, he'll push up any plans he might have for the bacteria. You have to play dumb, Frank. Let him think he's got the power."
"You were right all along. You told me he was trying to establish himself as the dominant one, but I didn't believe you. How did I fall for his story?"
"It was a good story. He said it himself. We hate it when the bad guy gets away. I think he's mostly telling the truth actually. His version of events seems to be verified by the others. I don't think he was involved in releasing the original disease. I think he did argue against using a more resistant strain. The question is, why did he fake his infection? Why did he wait to recover the resistant samples? And what's he planning on using them for? Why hold onto them for all these years?"
Frank stood up. "I guess we'll find out. I've got a meeting scheduled with him in twenty minutes. Are you going to come too?"
"I'll come to the prison with you, but the meeting should just be between you two. He's more likely to make a mistake with you. I seem to put him on edge. I want to talk to Officer Kembrey. Dr. Pazzo had to get the samples into the prison somehow in order to keep them safe or start to revive them. I could ask the Warden, but I have a feeling that Kembrey knows everything that goes in and out of that place."
"Stan will keep his mouth shut too. Isn't it going to look weird if you just go to talk to him though?"
Nella waved Ann Connelly's medical record. "I can use Ann's test results as an excuse."
Frank looked grim. "Is there anything you can do? Is she going to get better?"
She sighed and shook her head. "No. In some cases, there is just residual swelling in the brain and we can treat that. Even with medieval methods. But Ann's brain- the bacteria was active for too long. People that were infected early and treated late have holes in their brain, where the bacteria has actually eaten away at it over time. I can't put back what's not there any more. She won't get worse and we might be able to build different pathways in her brain for some things, but she'll never be even close to what she once was."
"There just doesn't seem to be any good news these days, does there?"
Nella stood up and slid the medical record into her briefcase. She looked up with a small smile. "There's us," she said.
Frank immediately brightened up. He pulled her into a quick hug.
"Come on," she said gently, "we're going to be late."
Stan Kembrey
After the Cure Page 46