Corrupting Dr. Nice

by John Kessel

  "I don't believe I've had the pleasure."

  "It's early yet." She moved closer. "My name is Daphne Overdone."

  The name was vaguely familiar, but he couldn't place it.

  "I saw you with my mother earlier."

  "Yes. She was hoping to introduce us. I'm on the paleontology faculty here."

  "Really?" Owen was embarrassed that he didn't recognize her. Assuming she was a historical. "I'm afraid I'm not familiar with your work. When did you work?"

  "I was involved in some of the Hell Creek Formation discoveries in the 1980s." She took his hand, pulled him over to sit on the balustrade, secluded from the rest of the verandah by the shield of the magnolia. She put her hand on his chest.

  Owen slid away from her. "Did you work with Horner or Rigby?"

  "Bakker was my man. I like to take risks." Daphne slid still closer, and when he tried to retreat he found he had run out of railing. "I was particularly interested in the concentrations of baby teeth in sedimentary levels near the K/T boundary," she whispered, tugging at his tie. "It seemed to indicate that immature hadrosaurs would gather in particular areas to drink."

  =Boss, do you think this is the way to spend your evening?=

  Owen's body was reacting to pheromones, not dinosaur paleontology. "Makes some sense," he gasped.

  "I thought you might be able to give me first hand confirmation." She had unbuttoned his shirt and was reaching for his belt.

  "Ms.--uh--Dr?--Dr. Overdone, I don't think--"

  "Call me Daphne."

  "Daphne, this sort of thing might have been common in your own time, but ours is . . ." Her perfume was quite intoxicating. Her lips were inches from his, her eyes half lidded in the darkness. =Want some help, boss?=

  Owen grabbed her by the waist to swivel her away from him. He looked past her shoulder to find Emma Zume watching, a few feet away, with a curious expression on her face.

  "Ms. Zume!"

  "Daphne," Daphne whispered.

  Emma turned and rushed back into the hall. Owen abandoned Daphne and, frantically tucking his shirt into his trousers, ran after her. "Emma!"

  He caught up to her at the doorway from the lounge to the ballroom. He grabbed her arm, turned her to face him. She looked at his hand icily, and he drew it away. "I don't believe we have reached the stage of intimacy where you are free to call me by my first name."

  "Please. I don't even know that woman."

  "You were simply showing her your tattoo."

  Owen buttoned his shirt. "I don't have a tattoo."

  "I hope she wasn't disappointed."

  "She was just telling me about her work at Hell Creek."

  "The road to which, I am told, is paved with good intentions."

  "No, that's a paleontological dig."

  "Dr. Vannice, you don't need to justify your behavior. In fact, you merely confirm what I already knew about you and your class."

  "Please, Ms. Zume. That wasn't what it appeared to be."

  "Thank you for admitting that it appeared to be something."

  He drew her away from staring people. "I've been looking for you all evening. I so much wanted to talk to you."

  "And since you could not find me, you had to occupy yourself somehow."

  The Master of Ceremonies announced the next dance, a gallop. Owen remembered Jerusalem. "Please. May I have this dance?"

  She looked at him pityingly. Her eyes were so remarkably like Genevieve's. "All right," she said at last.

  Thrilled, he drew her onto the floor. The orchestra began, in lively 2/4 time. Owen threw himself into it.

  But it did not go as well as Jerusalem had. Emma did not follow his lead as well as Genevieve. In fact, they moved at cross purposes, fighting for the lead in a way that turned the dance into a subtle wrestling match. As they circled with the other couples he tried to explain.

  "It's a classic paleontological site--Hell Creek."

  "And there you were, without a paddle."

  "She's not accustomed to our society, she's a historical."

  "Which means anything goes?"

  Flustered, he missed a step, and jerked her sideways. "No, it's just that she was telling me about her initial research."

  "And conducting some at the same time." Emma pushed herself away, and executed a furious pirouette. She moved as if she were angry, and he supposed he couldn't blame her. Owen noticed that people around them on the dance floor shot them occasional stares and double takes. His tie had come loose, and one of his gloves was unbuttoned. Emma came back into his arms. He wondered if his fly was undone, but when he glanced down to take a peek, it seemed as if he was looking down Emma's dress. Her eyes locked on his. He missed another step, stumbled, stepped on her foot.

  "Ouch," she said quietly.

  Self-consciously, he held her farther away.

  "Sorry," he said.

  "That's one way to describe it."

  He felt beads of sweat running down both his armpits, and his collar choked him like a noose. In an effort to steer her to the side of the dance floor, where at least they would not be so conspicuous, he ran her across the feet of another couple. Emma tripped, and he fell forward in his attempt to catch her. She tried to get her feet under herself, backpedaling. Owen held on, yanked along, twisting to break her fall. They collapsed into a divan at the side of the floor with such force that a potted palm fell on top of them, just as, with a flourish, the music ended.

  The dancers applauded.

  Owen pushed palm fronds away from his face. Emma pulled herself off him.

  An older woman rushed over, limping. "Owen, that was wonderful! But how did you find the time to learn stumble dancing back in the Cretaceous?"

  Owen did not recognize her at first. Then he did. "Ms. Talikovna! How nice to see you again. How is your leg?"

  "Only hurts when it's going to rain. I hope you brought your umbrella tonight. Who's your partner?"

  "This is Emma Zume, from the Committee to Protect the Past. Emma, this is Ms. Talikovna. She used to be my dancing teacher."

  Emma smoothed her dress. "Charmed. What was he like before the lessons?"

  "His kinesthetic IQ was in the forties. But he seems to have learned a lot since then."

  "There are schools of thought."

  Owen was brushing potting soil off his tux when Bill broke in. =Love is money, trust naked poetry for details! I hate to interrupt, but Wilma is acting strangely.=

  "How, strangely?"

  =Beating her head against the walls of the greenhouse. I eat your bleeding dysfunctional god for breakfast!=

  "Excuse me," Owen said to Emma. "I need to get home."

  "It wasn't that bad, Dr. Vannice. I'm partially responsible."

  "No. Something's wrong with Wilma."

  Immediately Emma was all business. "I want to come with you."

  Although participation by the ComPP could lead to trouble, Owen was glad she'd be there. "Let's go."

  He hurried out of the building and summoned his car. While they waited, Emma asked him, "Do you always wear your hair like that?"

  "Like what?"

  "That sideways look."

  The car glided up in front of them. Owen caught his reflection in the dark window. The hair on the left side of his head was standing straight out to the side. It must have dried that way when he was driving to the dance with the window open.

  "Yes," he told Emma. "It was completely intentional."

  SIX: ADVENTURES IN MOVING

  Either Owen had forgotten a lot about dancing in the last year, or else Jerusalem had been an aberration. Genevieve got into Owen's BMW and they headed off to the Vannice estate. As he drove she watched him. He kept trying to plaster the wild hair against the side of his head with his hand.

  Gen didn't know what the wrestling match with the blonde was about, but she did not find Owen's fecklessness as amusing as she had the first time. Yet he drove with a dogged intensity that told her his mind was entirely with Wilma. It was hard to disli
ke him when he was so outside of himself. It was a kind of selflessness. A devotion to something besides money, or career, or sex.

  "What's wrong with Wilma?"

  "I'm not sure. But I'm convinced that someone has been tampering with her. What I can't figure out is how. The only person who ought to be able to enter the greenhouse is me."

  It did not take them long to reach Thornberry. Owen passed through gate security and drove directly to the greenhouse. The doors were unlocked. Owen rushed inside. The greenhouse was completely silent. "Wilma?" Owen called. Before they had passed halfway through the old portion of the enclosure, they found a huge hole broken in the glass wall. They pushed through to the outside. Owen turned on the exterior floodlights, which revealed dinosaur footprints leading off across the lawn. They ran along after them.

  "Could she have just gotten restless?" Gen asked.

  "Restlessness doesn't account for the unlocked door. Someone spooked her. We've got to get her back."

  Gen gestured behind them at the ten foot hole in the wall. "You're not going to be able to keep her here."

  Owen looked over his shoulder. "There’s a vacant vet school at my father’s college. They have all the facilities necessary; I was going to move Wilma there eventually and let my parents restore the grounds here."

  They followed the footprints to the tennis courts, where they found a new depression just beyond the service line. Wilma had scratched the green plywood backboard to flinders. Her footprints led through the burst chain-link fence to the pool. Water was splashed over the deck, and wet prints and tilted flagstones led to the hedge marking the border of the estate. Wilma had eaten part of the hedge, then broken through the perimeter fence.

  "I hope she stays out of town," Owen muttered.

  "If you find her, maybe we should take her directly to the college."

  "We'll need a truck. There's a rental place in Bridgeport." They ran back to the house and Owen called the rental office from a phone in the basement. After he hung up he told Gen, “They don’t send them out under programming at night. We’ll have to go pick it up.”

  They drove to the Bridgeport Redi-Haul. Owen sent the BMW home and they stepped into the office. It was after midnight, but there was a human being on duty: a kid with his feet up on a desktop, eyes closed, a pile of cheese fries within arm's reach and Ram Dash's "You Must Be Dead" blasting over the office's speakers. He did not know anyone had arrived until Owen pounded on the desktop with his fist.

  The kid's eyes popped open and he yanked his legs off the desk. "We called in a rental truck order," Owen said.

  The kid shook his head, pointing to his ears. He turned around and touched the gain on the stereo, but Gen did not notice any change in the volume. "HELP?" he shouted, swiveling back.

  "WE CALLED IN A RENTAL!" Owen bellowed.

  "BIG?"

  "THREE METRIC TONS!"

  "MONEY!" The kid held out his hand.

  Owen handed him an e-cash chip. The kid slid it into his reader, punched a key on the computer and a rental form emerged. "SIGN!"

  Gen watched over his shoulder as Owen filled out the name "John Smith" of 200 Sycamore Street, Bridgeport. He handed in the form. Bouncing to the music, the kid pulled a key off the board behind him and pointed out the window to the truck nearest them in the row outside.

  "THANKS!" Owen shouted.

  The kid turned off the music. "You are most welcome, sir," he said. "And though I am of course consumed with curiosity, and my experience in this firm's employ leads me to draw certain conclusions, I won't ask you whether the circumstances compelling you to rent a truck in the middle of the night, using cash, under a name like 'John Smith,' fall within the boundaries of those countenanced by Connecticut's legal system. But if I were you I'd get it back by dawn."

  "I'll do that," said Owen.

  "Nice haircut."

  Owen absently brushed his wild hair. They went out to the truck. "I'll drive," Gen said. "You navigate."

  The truck's guidance was able to get them to the bay, but from there Gen had to drive manually to Thornberry.

  "Let me off at the greenhouse," Owen said. "I'll get a projectile hypo and some sedative and follow her path off the estate. Meanwhile, you drive along the river road. Cruise slowly. Stop when you get to the old fairgrounds. If you spot her before I do, blow the horn three times."

  "Roger, Mr. Smith. Would it help if we brought something for her to eat?"

  "Good idea." At the greenhouse Owen hopped out and ran inside. He brought out a sack of food and loaded it into the back of the truck, then dashed off across the lawn, tripping over one of the lawn geese. The goose squawked away. Owen picked himself up and set off, tuxedo, wild hair, hypodermic pistol and determined look.

  Gen drove down past private woods occasionally broken by elaborate estates. It was three in the morning and the road was deserted. Fifty years ago this had been farmland, but had long since been abandoned to a renewed wildness. Gen peered out of the window but could make out nothing in the darkness.

  She was just turning back to the road from the side window when Wilma lurched into the headlights from the opposite side. Gen jerked the wheel, and the truck dove to a stop in the ditch. Wilma thundered off into the trees. Gen sat in the suddenly still cab, trying to catch her breath. She climbed out to survey the damage. From the bush came thrashing and Owen, muddy to his knees, burst into the roadway.

  "Are you all right?" he asked.

  "I'm fine. But Wilma looked like she wasn't coming back any time this century."

  "Let me get that feed out of the back," Owen said. "Maybe I can coax her, once she calms down."

  Owen hauled out the sack. "I should call a tow truck while she's gone," Gen said.

  Owen looked at her. "I suppose so. I'll go after her while you call, okay?"

  Owen shoved the hypo pistol into his tuxedo jacket, heaved the sack over his shoulder, turned on his flashlight and trudged off through the ditch into the woods. Gen used the truck's phone to call a local garage. She sat down on the back bumper and waited. The sky was clouding up.

  The tow truck showed up fifteen minutes later. The driver climbed out from behind the wheel, horse faced and laconic. "Not very practical work clothes," he remarked as he affixed a chain to the rental truck's axle and used the winch to tighten the slack.

  "I was going to a party."

  "Ayup." He turned on the winch, the chain snapped taut with a clink, and slowly the truck backed out of the ditch. When he had the front wheels back on the pavement, he unhooked the chain. He went around to the front and inspected the front end. "Look like you're all right. These old dinosaurs are indestructible."

  "Thanks." She fumbled with Owen's wallet. "Here's five hundred. Keep the change."

  "There isn't any change."

  "Then don't keep the change."

  The man got back into his tow truck. As he started the engine he said, "Just to keep you outa trouble, I called in a report to the State Police. Should be here in a coupla minutes."

  Gen ground her teeth. "How sweet of you. You deserve a tip."

  The garage man drove away.

  She paced the shoulder, hoping Owen would take long enough for her to brush the cop. But before she could do anything she spotted Owen's light bobbing in the darkness, and he came up to the road, Wilma surging behind him like a huge surreal cow, sniffing after Owen's trail of oats.

  "Owen," she said. "The police are coming. Do you think we should hurry up?"

  "Help me herd her into the truck." They got Wilma into the back, then slammed the doors.

  "Okay," Owen said. "One minute more. I dropped my hypo pistol back there." He hopped back over the ditch.

  "Owen, there's no time!" But he was already gone.

  Sure enough, as soon as Owen was out of sight a state trooper's car came around the bend and pulled to a stop on the shoulder. It sat for a moment, blue lights sweeping over its stainless steel surface.

  Finally a voice blared from the louds
peaker. "Officials Of The Connecticut Corporation Are Your Friends," the trooper said, voice distorted by his voder. "Do Not Move As I Exit The Vehicle. For Your Protection And Mine This Entire Transaction Is Being Monitored." The passenger door flipped open and the camouflage-armored trooper got out and strode forward. His pistol was holstered, but the riot gun strapped to his left forearm was trained on her. The servos in his power suit whined to a stop as he confronted her. In the mirrored face of his helmet she saw a convex reflection of herself in the ball gown.

  "What Seems To Be The Trouble?"

  "No trouble, officer," Gen said.

  "The Corporation Requests Your License," the cop droned.

  Gen let him tap into her wristward. Her phony identity as Emma Zume would pop up on the cop's helmet display. Beyond the ditch, Gen saw Owen's light moving toward them through the woods. The trooper heard rustling behind him and whipped around, inhumanly quick, pistol out as he peered into the dark. Owen struggled though the ditch and up to the shoulder. The top three buttons on his shirt were open, he had lost the cuff link on his left wrist, and his tuxedo was muddy to the knees. He had the remains of the feed bag over one shoulder, and the hypo pistol in his right hand. His hair still stuck out sideways. "Good evening, officer."

  The trooper did not lower his pistol. "Please Lay Down The Weapon."

  Owen looked befuddled. "Weapon? Oh, this--it's not a weapon, it's a hypodermic gun."

  "Which You Will Drop For Us Right Now."

  Owen bent over and placed the pistol on the ground. "Sorry, officer."

  Gen assumed the mood levelers he'd taken before his shift would keep the trooper from doing anything rash. He looked both of them over. "This Must Have Been Some Party. Hypodermic Gun?"

  Gen was going to have to get them out of this, at the risk of giving herself away. She stepped between Owen and the trooper. "Filled with animal sedative. You see--"

  Owen broke in. "These aren't clothes, they're uniforms."

  "Uniforms."

  "Elite Pet Stores. 'Let your next pet be an elite pet.'"

  The cop fixed on Owen. "You Look Familiar. Have We Met?"