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by Michael Crichton

The question was whether a transgenic parrot would ever use the wordI unambiguously. And it seemed to Gail Bond that Gerard had just done exactly that.

  It was a good start.

  Her husband,Richard, showed little interest in the new arrival. His sole reaction was to shrug and say, “Don’t look for me to clean that cage.” Gail said she would not. Her son was more enthusiastic. Evan immediately began to play with Gerard, putting him on his finger, and later on his shoulder. As the weeks went on, it was Evan who spent time with the bird, who bonded with it, who kept it on his shoulder much of the time.

  And, it seemed, who got help from the bird.

  Gail set upthe video camera on a tripod, adjusted the frame, and turned the camera on. Some grey parrots were able to count, and there were claims that some had a rudimentary understanding of the concept of zero. But none was able to do arithmetic.

  Except Gerard.

  She had to work very hard to conceal her excitement. “Gerard,” she said, in her calmest voice, “I am going to show you a picture and I want you to tell me what it says.” She showed him one sheet from her son’s homework, folding it to reveal a single problem. She covered the answer with her thumb.

  “I did that already.”

  “But what does this say?” Gail asked, pointing to the problem. It was fifteen minus seven.

  “You have to say it.”

  “Can you look at this paper and tell me the answer?” she said.

  “You have to say it,” Gerard repeated. He was hopping from one leg to the other on his perch, getting irritable. He kept glancing at the camera. Gerard didn’t like to be embarrassed.

  Gail said, “It says fifteen take away seven.”

  “Eight,” the parrot replied, at once.

  Gail resistedthe temptation to turn to the camera and shriek with delight. Instead, she calmly turned the page to reveal another problem. “Now. What is twenty-three take away nine?”

  “Fourteen.”

  “Very good. And now…”

  “You promised me,” Gerard said.

  “I promised you?”

  “Yes, you promised me,” he said. “You know…”

  He meant the bath.

  “I’ll do that later,” she said. “For now…”

  “You promised me.” Sulky tone. “My bath.”

  “Gerard, I am going to show you this next problem. And ask you: What is twenty-nine take away eight?”

  “I hope they are watching,” he said, in an odd voice. “They’ll see. They’ll see and they’ll know and they’ll say, ‘Why, she wouldn’t even harm a fly.’”

  “Gerard. Now, please pay attention. What is twenty-nine take away eight?”

  Gerard opened his mouth. The front doorbell rang. Gail was close enough to the bird to know that Gerard himself had made the sound. He could imitate all sorts of sounds perfectly—doorbells, phone rings, toilet flushes.

  “Gerard, please…”

  The sound of footsteps. A click, and a creak as the front door opened.

  “You look good, baby, I’ve missed you,” Gerard said, imitating her husband’s voice.

  “Gerard,” she began.

  A woman’s voice: “Oh Richard, it’s been so long…”

  Silence. Sound of kissing.

  Gail froze, watching Gerard. The parrot continued, his beak hardly moving. He was like a tape recorder.

  The woman’s voice: “Are we alone?”

  “Yes,” her husband said. “Kid doesn’t come back until three.”

  “And what about, uh…”

  “Gail is at a conference in Geneva.”

  “Oh, so we have all day. Oh, God…”

  More kissing.

  Two pairs of footsteps. Crossing the room.

  Her husband: “You want something to drink?”

  “Maybe later, baby. Right now, all I want isyou. ”

  Gail turned, and switched the video off.

  Gerard said, “Now will you give me my bath?”

  She glared at him.

  The bedroom door slammed shut.

  Creaking of the bedsprings. A woman squealing, laughing. More creaking springs.

  “Stop it, Gerard,” Gail said.

  “I knew you would want to know,” he said.

  “I hate thatfucking bird,” her husband said, later that night. They were in the bedroom.

  “That’s not the point,” she said. “You’ll do what you want, Richard. But not in my house. Not in our bed.” She had already changed the sheets, but even so, she didn’t want to sit on the bed. Or go near it. She was standing on the other side of the room, by the window. Paris traffic outside.

  “It was just that one time,” he said.

  She hated it when he lied to her. “When I was in Geneva,” she said. “Do you want me to ask Gerard if there were other times?”

  “No. Leave the bird out of it.”

  “There were other times,” she said.

  “What do you want me to say, Gail. I’m sorry, all right? I’m sorry.”

  “I don’t want you to say anything,” she said. “I want you not to do it again. I want you to keep your fucking women out of this house.”

  “Right. Fine. I will do that. Can we drop it now?”

  “Yes,” she said. “We can drop it now.”

  “I hate that fucking bird.”

  She walked out of the room. “If you touch him,” she said, “I’ll kill you.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Out.”

  She metYoshi Tomizu at his apartment. They had begun their affair a year before and had resumed it again in Geneva. Yoshi had a wife and child in Tokyo, and he would be returning there in the fall. So it was just a friendship with privileges.

  “You feel tense,” he said, stroking her back. He had wonderful hands. “Did you argue with Richard?”

  “Not really. A bit.” She looked at the moonlight coming in through the window, surprisingly bright.

  “Then what is it?” Yoshi asked.

  “I’m worried about Gerard.”

  “Why?”

  “Richard hates him. Really hates him.”

  “Oh, he wouldn’t do anything. It’s such a valuable animal.”

  “He might,” she said. She sat up in bed. “Maybe I should go back.”

  Yoshi shrugged. “If you think…”

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  He kissed her lightly. “Do what you think is best.”

  Gail sighed. “You’re right,” she said. “I’m being silly.” She slid back down under the covers. “Tell me I am being silly. Please.”

  CH033

  Brad Gordonclicked off the TV and yelled, “It’s open. Come in.”

  It was noon. He was lounging in his third-floor apartment in Sherman Oaks, watching the ball game and waiting for the pizza delivery guy. But to his surprise, the door opened and in walked the best-looking woman he had ever seen in his life. She had elegance written all over her—thirtyish, tall, slim, European clothing, heels that were not too high. Sexy, but in control. Brad sat forward in his lounger chair and ran his hand over his chin, feeling the stubble.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t expect any visitors—”

  “Your uncle, Mr. Watson, sent me,” the woman said, walking directly toward him. He hastened to stand. “My name is Maria Gonzales.” She had a slight accent, but it didn’t sound Spanish. More German. “I’m involved with the firm that does your uncle’s investment work,” she said, shaking his hand.

  Brad nodded, inhaling her light perfume. He wasn’t surprised to hear she worked for Uncle Jack: the old guy surrounded himself with good-looking, extremely competent businesswomen. He said, “What can I do for you, Ms. Gonzales?”

  “Nothing for me,” she answered smoothly, looking around the apartment for a place to sit. She decided to remain standing. “But you can do something for your uncle.”

  “Well, sure. Anything.”

  “I don’t need to remind you that your uncle has
paid your bail, and will be assuming the cost of your legal defense. Since the charge involves sex with a minor, the defense will be difficult.”

  “But I was set up—”

  She raised her hand. “It’s none of my affair. The point is this: your uncle has helped you many times over the years. Now he needs your help—confidentially—in return.”

  “Uncle Jack needsmy help?”

  “He does.”

  “Okay. Sure.”

  “Instrict confidence.”

  “Right. Yes.”

  “You will discuss this with no one. Ever.”

  “Right. Understood.”

  “Word of this must never get out. If it did, you would lose your legal defense funding. You’d spend twenty years in prison as a child molester. You know what that means.”

  “Yes.” He wiped his hands on his trousers. “I understand.”

  “No screwups this time, Brad.”

  “Okay, okay. Just tell me what you want me to do.”

  “Your favorite company, BioGen, is about to announce an important new discovery—a gene that cures drug addiction. It’s the first step toward a huge commercial product, and it will attract a lot of financing. Your uncle currently holds a large position in the company, and he does not want his position diluted by additional investors. He wants them scared off.”

  “Yes…”

  “By some bad news coming out of BioGen.”

  “What kind of bad news?”

  “At the moment,” Maria Gonzales said, “BioGen’s most important commercial product consists of a cell line, the Burnet line, which the company bought from UCLA. The cell line produces cytokines, important in cancer treatment.”

  “Yeah…”

  “Contamination of those cell lines would be disastrous.”

  She reached into her purse and brought out a small plastic bottle of a well-known brand of eye drops. The bottle contained clear liquid. She unscrewed the cap and put a single drop of liquid on the tip of each finger of her other hand. “Got it?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “One drop on each finger. Let it dry.”

  “Okay.”

  “Go into BioGen. Your swipe cards still work. Check the database for storage locations and research lockers containing the Burnet line. The storage number is on this card.” She handed him a small card with the number BGOX6178990QD. “There are frozen samples and there are live in-vitro incubators. You go to each one and…just touch them.”

  “Just touch them?” Brad looked at the bottle. “What is that stuff?”

  “Nothing that will hurt you. But the cells won’t like it.”

  “The security cameras will record me. Card swipes are recorded. They’ll know who did it.”

  “Not if you go in between one and two a.m. The systems are down for backup.”

  “No, they’re not.”

  “Yes, they are. This week only.”

  Brad took the plastic bottle from her and turned it over in his hand.

  “You realize,” he said, “they have off-site storage for that cell line, too.”

  “Just do what your uncle asks,” she said. “And leave the rest to him.” She closed her purse. “And one final thing. Do not call or contact your uncle about this or any other matter. He wants no record ofany contact with you. Clear?”

  “Clear.”

  “Good luck. And on behalf of your uncle, thank you.” She shook his hand again and left.

  NO BLONDE EXTINCTION, AFTER ALL

  BBC Reported False Story Absent Fact Check

  No WHO Study, No German Study

  A Bad Blonde Joke for 150 Years

  The World Health Organization (WHO) today denied it had ever conducted or published any study predicting the extinction of the blonde hair gene. According to the UN group spokesman, “WHO has no knowledge of how these news reports originated but would like to stress that we have no opinion on the future existence of blondes.”

  According to theWashington Post, the BBC story stemmed from a German wire service account. That story, in turn, was based on an article published two years before in the German women’s magazineAllegra, which cited a WHO anthropologist as its source. But no record of the anthropologist exists.

  The story would never have run, said Georgetown media professor Len Euler, if even minimal fact-checking had been done by BBC editors. Some media observers noted that news organizations no longer check anything. “We just publish the press release and move on,” one reporter observed. Another reporter, speaking on condition of anonymity, said, “Let’s face it, it’s a good story. Accuracy would kill it.”

  Further inquiry by the urban legend site Snopes.com uncovered multiple versions of the extinct blonde story going back 150 years, to the time of Abraham Lincoln. In every instance, scientific validity was claimed to bolster the story’s credibility. A typical example dates from 1906:

  ·BLONDES DOOMED TO VANISH FROM EARTH ·

  Major Woodruff Sounds Their Deathknell—It’s Science

  The girl with the golden tresses is doomed, and within six hundred years blondes will be extinct. The fate of the blonde was foretold today by Major C. E. Woodruff in a lecture at the Association for the Advancement of Science at Columbia University…

  Clearly, blondes will not become extinct, but neither will the news stories that predict their demise, since the stories have been repeated for a century and a half with no basis whatsoever, said Professor Euler.

  CH034

  Henry Kendall’s wife,Lynn, designed web sites for a living, so she was usually at home during the day. Around three in the afternoon, she got an odd call. “This is Dr. Marty Roberts at Long Beach Memorial,” a voice said. “Is Henry there?”

  “He’s at a soccer game,” she said. “Can I take a message?”

  “I called his office, and I called his cell, but there was no answer.” Dr. Roberts’s tone made it sound urgent.

  “I’ll see Henry in an hour,” Lynn said. “Is he all right, Dr. Roberts?”

  “Oh sure, he’s fine.He’s perfectly fine. Just ask him to call me, would you?”

  Lynn said she would.

  Later, when Henry came home, she went into the kitchen, where he was getting cookies and milk for their eight-year-old son, Jamie. Lynn said, “Do you know somebody at Long Beach Memorial Hospital?”

  Henry blinked. “Did he call?”

  “This afternoon. Who is he?”

  “He’s a friend of mine from school. A pathologist. What did he say?”

  “Nothing. He wanted you to call him back.” She somehow managed not to ask her husband what it was all about.

  “Okay,” he said. “Thanks.”

  She saw Henry glance at the phone in the kitchen, then turn on his heel and walk into the little study that they both shared. He closed the door. She heard him speaking softly on the phone. She couldn’t make out the words.

  Jamie was eating his snack. Tracy, their thirteen-year-old, was playing her music very loud upstairs. Lynn yelled up the stairwell: “A little less noise, please!” Tracy didn’t hear her. There was nothing to do but go upstairs and tell her.

  When she came back down, Henry was in the living room, pacing. “I have to take a trip,” he said.

  “Okay. Where?”

  “I have to go to Bethesda.”

  “Something at the NIH?” The National Institutes of Health were in Bethesda. Henry went there a couple of times a year, for conferences.

  “Yes.”

  She watched him pace. “Henry,” she said, “are you going to tell me what this is about?”

  “I just have some research—I just have to check on something—I just—I’m not sure.”

  “You have to go to Bethesda but you’re not sure why?”

  “Well, of course I’m sure. It’s, um, it’s to do with Bellarmino.”

  Robert Bellarmino was the head of genetics at NIH, and no friend of her husband. “What about him?”

  “I have to, uh, deal with something he has
done.”