“What are you saying to me? That you're bored with me, and you need to see me on a beach somewhere to put a little spice into it again?” She turned around and looked at him and for a moment he wasn't sure how to answer. She was much closer to the truth than he would have dared to tell her.
“I just think it would be nice to get away from your father, and the kids, and our answering machine, and your board meetings, and even Vicotec. Even here, we're hounded constantly by the fax machine, or at least I am, it's like being in the office, with sand. I'd just like to go away with you somewhere, where there are no distractions and we can talk, and remind ourselves of what it was we were crazy about when we first met, or when we got married.”
She smiled at him then. She was beginning to understand. “I think you're having a midlife crisis. And what I really think is that you're nervous about the FDA hearings, and you want to run away, and you're using me to do it. Well, forget that, young man. You'll be fine. It'll all be over in a day, and we'll all be proud of you.” She was smiling as she said it, and he felt his heart sink. She didn't understand anything, least of all the fact that he needed something from her that he wasn't getting, nor that he had no intention of going to the FDA hearings. The only thing he was going to do was appear before Congress about pricing.
“This has nothing to do with the FDA,” he said firmly, trying to sound calm, and refusing to discuss the hearings with her again. He got enough of that from her father. “I'm talking about us, Kate. Not the FDA hearings.” But one of the boys interrupted them then. Mike wanted the keys to the car, and Patrick was downstairs with two friends, and needed to know if there were any more frozen pizzas hidden somewhere, they were starving.
“I was just going to the store!” She called down to them, and the opportunity was lost. She turned and looked at her husband over her shoulder as she left their bedroom. “Don't worry, everything will be fine.” And then she was gone, and he sat on their bed for a long time, feeling empty. At least he had tried. But he had gotten nowhere, which was small consolation. She had no idea what he was talking about, and the only thing she could focus on was her father, and the hearings.
Frank mentioned them to him again at the party. It was like listening to a broken record, and Peter did his best to change the subject. Frank had been telling him to be a “good guy” and “go along with things” for a while. He was sure that their research teams would find all the bugs long before Vicotec hit the market, and they would lose face, and important ground, if they backed out now on asking for early release from the FDA. In Frank's mind, it would be a red flag signalling to the industry that their product had serious problems.
“It could take us years to live that down. You know what it's like once that kind of talk gets started. It could taint Vicotec forever.”
“We have to take that chance, Frank,” Peter said, with a drink in his hand. It was a litany he knew by heart now, and the two men remained glued to their polarized positions from each other.
As soon as Peter could, he walked away from him, and a little while later he saw Frank talking to Katie. He could guess what about, and it depressed him watching them. It was obvious to him she was not discussing their proposed vacation. And he knew without a doubt that that little plan would never come to fruition. He didn't say anything more about it to her that night. And for the next two days, they were busy closing up the house. It had never been winterized, and they wouldn't be back until next summer.
On the drive back to town, the boys talked about going back to school. Paul was looking forward to seeing his friends at Andover, Patrick wanted to visit Choate and Groton that fall. And all Mike could talk about was Princeton. His grandfather had gone there, and all his life he had heard about eating clubs and reunions.
“Too bad you didn't go there, Dad. It sounds so great.” But a degree earned at night from the University of Chicago was hardly Princeton.
“I'm sure it is great, son, but if I had gone there, I would never have met your mother,” he said, remembering their first meeting at the University of Michigan.
“That's a point,” Mike said with a smile. He was planning on joining his grandfather's eating club as soon as they would let him. He had to wait a year, but he was going to talk to some fraternities in the meantime. He had everything planned, and everything worked out already. And he talked about it all the way back to New York, which left Peter feeling left out, and somehow lonely. It was strange, he'd been one of them for eighteen years, and yet sometimes he still felt like an outsider, even with his own kids now.
And as they drove south, and the others weren't speaking to him, his thoughts drifted to Olivia. He remembered their talks in Montmartre the first night, and walking on the beach with her in La Favière. There had been so much to say, so much to think about. He almost hit another car as he let himself daydream about her, and everyone in the car shouted as he veered to avoid a collision.
“God, what are you doing, Dad!” Mike couldn't believe what had just happened.
“Sorry!” he said, and drove on more carefully, but she had given him something no one else had. He remembered too her saying that what he had accomplished had been thanks to him, and not the Donovans, but that was hard to believe, especially for Peter. It was so obvious to him that Katie and her father had made it all happen.
But as his thoughts drifted back to Olivia again, he wondered where she was now, if the story about her being in a hospital was true. Everything about it had seemed phony. It sounded like one of those cover-ups for a separation, or an affair, or a facelift, and he knew that in her case, at least two of those were unlikely. He wondered suddenly if, in spite of Andy's bid for the presidency, she had left him. And it was just like Andy to say she had gone crazy.
And two days later, he realized he'd been right, when he got a postcard from her in the office. It was sitting on his desk when he got back from lunch. There was a drawing of a little fishing boat on it, and the postmark said La Favière.
It was written in her small, careful hand, and was somewhat cryptic. “I'm back here again. Writing. At last. I'm out of the running for good. I couldn't do it. Hope all is well with you. Don't forget how brave you are. It's all you. You've done it all. It takes more courage to do it, than to run away, as I have. But I'm happy. Take good care. Love always.” And she had signed it simply '?.” But along with her words, he felt what was between the lines. He could still remember the hoarseness in her voice when she said she loved him. And he knew she still did, just as he loved her. He would always love her. She would live in his heart, and his memories, forever.
He read the postcard again, thinking about it. She was so much stronger than she knew. It was leaving that had taken the real courage, not staying, as he had. He admired her. And he was glad for her that she had escaped the life she led. He hoped she was happy there, and peaceful. And he was sure that whatever she was writing would be brilliant. She was so brave about what she felt, so willing to be who she was, to say what she was thinking. She sliced through the mists like a knife, as she had with him. There was no hiding with her, no falsifying anything. She was a woman who lived by the truth, no matter what it cost her. She had made her compromises too, and she admitted that. But she wasn't now. Olivia was free now, and he envied her, as he put the postcard away, hoping no one else had seen it.
The test results came in on Vicotec the next day, and they were better than he'd hoped, but in terms of an early release of the drug, they were disastrous, and Peter knew it. He was becoming a pro at interpreting them now, and even he knew what these meant, and so did Katie's father. The two men had scheduled a meeting to discuss them at length on Friday, and they met in the conference room next to Frank's office at two o'clock. Frank was waiting for him with a stern expression, already anticipating what Peter would tell him. And they wasted no time on chitchat, except to talk about Mike. Peter and Katie were taking him to Princeton the next morning, and Frank was visibly proud of him. But the moment that subject h
ad been touched on, he turned back to serious business.
“We both know why we're here, don't we?” he said, looking deep into Peter's eyes. “And I know you don't agree with me,” he said carefully. His whole body seemed to be coiled with anticipated tension, he looked like a cobra about to spring. And Peter felt like his prey, as he prepared to defend himself, and the integrity of the company, but Frank had anticipated him, and he was prepared to pull rank if he had to. “I think you're just going to have to trust my judgment here. I've been through this before. I've been in this business for nearly fifty years, and you've got to believe me when I tell you I know what I'm doing. It's not wrong to go to them now. By the time we put this product on the market officially, we'll be ready. I wouldn't take a chance on this if I didn't think we can deliver.”
“And if you're wrong? If we kill somebody? Even one person …one man, woman, or child …what then? What do we say? How do we live with ourselves? How can we take that chance by asking for an early release date?” Peter was like the voice of his conscience, but Frank thought it was the voice of doom, and he accused him of being an old woman like “that idiot in Paris.” “Suchard knows these things, Frank. That's why we hired him, to tell us the truth. Even when it's bad news we have to listen. I know he's no longer an issue here, but we opened a Pandora's box we can't just ignore. And you know it.”
“I'd hardly call ten million dollars' worth of additional research in two months 'ignoring it,' Peter. And we've turned up nothing. Face it, he sent us on a witch-hunt …worse than that, it's a wild-goose chase. There's nothing there. We're talking about an element which 'could' react, or 'might' cause an extraordinarily rare series of circumstances on a million-to-one bet, on the off chance that everything lines up wrong and we wind up with a problem. Now for God's sake, you tell me, does that sound reasonable to you? Hell, you can take two aspirins with a drink and have that go sour on you. So what's the deal here?”
“Two aspirins and a drink won't kill you. Vicotec will if we're not careful.”
“But we are careful. That's the whole point. Every drug has its risks, its side effects, its downside. If we weren't willing to live with that, we'd have to close our doors and start selling cotton candy at the state fair. For chrissake, Peter, stop busting my chops on this, be sensible. I want you to understand I am going to override you on this. I'll go to the FDA myself if I have to, but I want you to know why. I want you to know that I truly believe Vicotec is safe, I'm willing to stake my life on it!” he said, and by the time he finished what he had to say, he was shouting at Peter. He was red in the face, and agitated, and his voice had gotten louder and louder as they sat in the conference room, and as Peter watched him, he suddenly saw that Frank was shaking. Frank was in a complete state over it, he was perspiring, and gray, and he stopped for a moment and had a sip of water.
“Are you all right?” Peter asked quietly, watching him. “This isn't worth staking your life on. That's really the whole point. We have to treat this clinically, and address it calmly. It's a product, Frank, that's all it is. I want it more than anyone, but in the end, it'll either work, or it won't, or it may work, but maybe it'll just take longer than we wanted to get it ready. Nobody wants to get it on the market more than I do. But not 'at all costs,' not as long as there's a single factor we're not sure of. There's a loose wire in here somewhere. We know that. We've seen signs of it. Until we find it, we can't let anyone use it. It's as simple as that.” He spoke concisely and clearly, and the more agitated Frank got, the calmer he was.
“No, Peter, no …it's not that simple!” Frank bellowed at him, provoked to even greater fury by his son-in-law's maddening coolness. “Forty-seven million dollars in four years is not 'simple' by any means. Just how much money do you think we're going to pour into this for chrissake? How much money do you think there is?” He was getting nasty, and Peter refused to rise to the bait as he addressed him.
“Enough to do it right, I hope, or kill the product. We always have that option.”
“The hell we do!” Frank was on his feet shouting at him. “Do you think I'm just going to throw nearly fifty million dollars out the window? Are you crazy! Whose money do you think it is? Yours? Well, think again, it's mine, and the company's, and Katie's, and I'll be goddamned if you're going to tell me anything. You wouldn't even be here today if I hadn't bought you, lock, stock, and barrel for my daughter.” His words hit Peter like a club and took his breath away, and suddenly all he could think of were his father's words eighteen years before when he had told him that he and Katie were getting married. 'I'll never be anything more than a hired hand, son …don't do it.“ But he had, and look what had happened. This was what they thought of him eighteen years later.
Peter was on his feet too by then, and if Frank Donovan had been even a few years younger, and a little less crazed, Peter would have hit him. “I'm not going to listen to this,” Peter said, feeling his whole body shake as he restrained himself from hitting him, but Frank wouldn't give it up. He grabbed Peter by the arm and went on shouting.
“You'll listen to anything I goddamn tell you, and you'll do whatever I want here. And don't give me that holier-than-thou look, you sonofabitch. She could have had anyone, and she wanted you, so I made you what you are today, so she wouldn't have to be embarrassed. But you're nothing, you hear me, you're nothing. You start this whole goddamn project here, you cost us millions, you make promises, you see rainbows, and then when there's a little problem that some French prick thinks he sees in a dark room, you stab us in the back and want to squeal like a little pig all the way to the FDA. Well, let me tell you something, I'll see you dead before I'll let you do it!” But as he said the words, he clutched his chest, and began to cough frantically. His face was so red it was almost purple, and it was obvious he couldn't breathe. He clutched both Peter's arms then, and Peter was supporting the older man's full weight as he began to fall, and Peter almost went with him. For an instant, he couldn't believe what had happened, and then he knew. He set him down quickly on the floor, and dialed 911 as fast as he could, and gave them the details. Frank was vomiting by then, and still coughing, and as soon as Peter set down the phone, he knelt next to him, turned him on his side and tried to support his weight, and keep his face out of his own vomit. He was still breathing, though with extreme difficulty, and he was barely conscious, but Peter was still reeling from everything the old man had said to him. He had never known he was capable of so much venom, so much that it may have killed him. And all Peter could think of as he crouched holding him was what Katie would say if he died. She would blame Peter for it, she would say it was his fault for being so difficult and challenging him on Vicotec. But she would never know what Peter had just heard, what her father had said to him, the unforgivable things he had just hurled at Peter. And he knew, just as the paramedics came, that no matter what happened afterwards, it would be impossible to forget, or forgive him. These were not just affronts conjured up in a fit of rage, these were deep, ugly weapons that he had been hiding for years, concealing from him, and keeping to use on him one day. They were hurtful daggers that had run him through, and Peter knew he would never forget them.
The paramedics were working on Frank by then, and Peter stood up and backed away. His own clothes were covered with vomit, and Frank's secretary was standing in the doorway in hysterics. Several people were in the hall, and one of the paramedics looked up at Peter and shook his head. His father-in-law had just stopped breathing. The other two paramedics took the defibrillator out, and ripped his shirt open, just as half a dozen firemen came through the doorway. It looked like a convention, and they all knelt, working on him for half an hour, while Peter watched them, wondering what he was going to tell Katie. He was just beginning to think there was no hope at all when the paramedics told the firemen to get the gurney. His heart was beating again, irregularly, but it was no longer in fibrillation, and he was breathing. Frank looked up at Peter blearily, with an oxygen mask on, but he didn't say an
ything, and Peter touched his hand as he went by him. They were carrying him to the ambulance, and Peter had had the secretary call his doctor. They were waiting for him at New York Hospital with a team of cardiologists. He had come within a hair of dying.
“I'll meet him there,” Peter told the paramedics and hurried to the men's room to see what he could do with his pants and jacket. He kept a clean shirt in a drawer, but the rest of him was a mess. Even his shoes were covered with what Frank had vomited on him. But even more than that, Peter still felt covered by the ooze of what he'd said to him just before that. The viciousness that he had hurled at him was so vile it had almost killed him.
And five minutes later, Peter emerged from the men's room in a clean shirt, pants that had been cleaned as best he could, a sweater, and clean shoes. He went to his office to call Katie. Luckily, she was still at home, she had been just about to go out and do some errands. And as she answered the phone, Peter almost choked on his own words. He didn't know how to tell her.
“Katie …I …I'm glad you're home.” She wanted to ask him why, he had been so strange with her lately, clingy in an odd way, and depressed. He had watched television a lot a few weeks before, and then not at all. He had been obsessed with CNN for a few days, and he had been so strange about wanting to take a vacation with her.
“Is something wrong?” She glanced at her watch. She still had a number of things to do for Mike before he left for Princeton in the morning. He needed a rug for his room, and she needed to get him a new bedspread. But she was suddenly caught short by the tone of her husband's voice when he answered.
“Yes …there is …Katie, he's all right now, but it's your father.” She almost stopped breathing when he said it. “He had a heart attack in the office.” He didn't tell her how close he'd come, or that his heart had actually stopped beating for a few seconds. The doctors could tell her that later. “They just took him to New York Hospital and I'm on my way there now. ? think you should come in as soon as you can. He's feeling pretty rocky.”
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