Lab Notes: a novel

by Nelson, Gerrie

  She crept along Mechanic Street toward the hotel entrance wondering what she was doing there. What could her drive-by spying possibly accomplish? And what if David saw her? She shrugged. If he didn’t want to be followed, he should clean up his act… and get a nondescript gray car like hers.

  With a horse and buggy setting the pace, she passed the hotel entrance slower than she would have liked. A bellman was holding open one of the doors, so she had plenty of time to peer into the lobby “…where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey…”

  Inside, on the stairs, David Crowley was shaking hands with another gentleman—a perfectly harmless thing to do. Except that Diane was almost certain David had switched administrative call with Pete Sabedra for that day. He had told Pete he had Houston Symphony Sunday matinee tickets at the Jones Hall—fifty miles north of Galveston.

  μ CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN μ

  Diane unlocked Maxine’s office door, stepped inside and switched on the light. Her night raids were becoming a bad habit. But this time, she knew exactly where to look. She’d be out of there in ten minutes.

  Then a voice came from behind her.

  “You could have just asked me for whatever you needed.”

  Diane turned to face Maxine who stood in the doorway wearing a jogging suit and sneakers. “I didn’t know if I could trust you.” Immediately she wished she hadn’t said that.

  Maxine shot a glance at the master keys in Diane’s hand, then made eye contact and grinned.

  Red-faced, but struck by the irony, Diane returned a reluctant smile and pocketed the culprit keys. She moved to the center of the room, her mind casting about for some pretext for trespassing.

  Maxine stepped into her closet and emerged with the keys to the file cabinets. She held them out to Diane. “I guess you’ll need these. I won’t even ask what you’re looking for.”

  Diane bowed humbly. “Thank you,” she said. Dumbfounded by Maxine’s indulgence, she headed for a bottom drawer labeled Admin Call Schedules. She knelt on the floor studying the file, all the while wondering why Maxine had shown up there. Then, drumming fingers on the desk behind her broke the silence.

  “Amelia, my psychic, said you’d come back here tonight.”

  Diane stopped reading. She had a sudden respect for Amelia’s pronouncements.

  Maxine went on: “I knew you’d been in here the last time. You were on administrative call that night too. The scent of your hair conditioner was still strong in the closet the next morning. Cherry Almond Bark wasn’t it?”

  Diane carefully closed the bottom drawer, then sat on the floor and leaned back against the file cabinets. “Yes… it was.” Where was this going?

  “Amelia said if I caught you here, it would level the playing field. Then we could talk.”

  Diane felt like an interrogation lamp might switch on at any moment. “Okay… let’s talk.”

  Maxine stood up, walked around her desk and settled lotus-style on the floor across from Diane. “I’ll go first.” She cleared her throat. “I’m an animal rights activist. No one here knows that—except Colton, of course. He’s one of us. He likes to hang with animals more than with people. He says that the critters don’t look down their noses at him.

  “I came to work at BRI to keep an eye on the research animals. There were some problems here in the past; some of the macaque monkeys looked like they’d been tortured—burned in the butt—with a hot wire, possibly.

  “But after you arrived, everything seemed fine—until the break-in.”

  Maxine leaned forward, set her jaw and spoke through her teeth. “I want you to know that our group was not responsible for that. We did not break into BRI. And we did not set the chimps loose.

  “Sometimes we find it necessary to vandalize a laboratory or torch a fur store or throw some red paint on the symphony & opera crowds to make our point—it’s hard to believe that some people actually wear furs coats in subtropical Houston… Then on some very rare occasions we kidnap research animals. But we would never-ever turn animals loose in an environment where they might get hurt.”

  Diane’s face was frozen in neutral, but her insides jumped up and down shouting “Holy Crap!” Why was Maxine delivering this profile in activism to her? Scientists were considered natural enemies to those of Maxine’s ilk. Was she setting up to give her an ultimatum?

  Maxine continued. “There’s something scary going on around here—”

  “If it wasn’t your people, then who broke in here and took Vincent’s—ESPN’s—video camera?”

  Maxine turned her palms upward and slowly shook her head. “They stole my iPod, Raymond’s digital camera and Pete’s tablet computer too. Luckily, Pete’s stuff was backed up…. I know you’re looking for answers too. And I think we can help one another.” She raised her eyebrows in a question.

  Diane met Maxine’s gaze and measured it for a moment. Here was a person who closely followed the advice of a psychic (albeit one who was spot-on about her coming there tonight) and acted as a secret agent for the animal rights extremists. She asked herself: Can this girl be trusted? Her intuition responded immediately with an unqualified YES. She nodded slowly.

  “It’s your turn then.” Maxine said.

  Diane flexed her knees, hugged them to her and took a deep breath. Time to play Truth or Dare.

  “Vincent left me some notebooks that contain a lot of disjointed information—mostly about unethical practices in the biotech industry, BRI in particular. He wants me to track Peruvase. I’ll tell you how I know that over a beer sometime.

  “At first, I thought he wanted me to make sure Peruvase was brought to the marketplace. But that was only part of it. He feels—felt—that by following the Peruvase trail, Bellfort’s successful business model can be exposed for what it is—pure greed. Vincent wants me to track it down. Write it up. Publish it.

  “Tonight, I came here primarily to check on Leonard Everly. Vincent mentions him in his notes.”

  Maxine sat speechless for a moment, then untangled her legs, jumped up and held out her hand. “Let’s see those keys.”

  Diane tossed her the cabinet keys. Maxine retrieved Everly’s file, sat down—almost thigh to thigh with Diane—and opened it.

  Other than Everly’s address, phone number and social security number, the file wasn’t very informative. Maxine filled in some of the blanks: Dr. Leonard Everly had worked at BRI as a researcher and retired several years ago. But he continued to keep up with the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries and served as a consultant to Raymond Bellfort.

  Maxine had never met him. But Doreen in bookkeeping had been at BRI almost from the beginning and she knew him. As a matter of fact, Doreen had gone to his ranch down the Texas coast to get a puppy last year; Leonard Everly bred Rhodesian Ridgebacks.

  Raymond Bellfort had been upset when he learned that she had gone down there. He said that Everly preferred to be left alone. Doreen concurred that even when he worked at BRI Dr. Everly had kept to himself. Maxine promised Diane that she’d get more information from the bookkeeper.

  Diane thanked her profusely for her help, then said, “Now, what can I do for you?”

  Maxine scrambled to her knees and sat back on her haunches. She reached over and took Diane’s hand.

  It had been a while since Diane experienced intimate human contact; her initial instinct was to draw back. But Maxine’s distress was palpable. Diane stayed put.

  “I’d like to have the chimps sent back if you don’t need them. Or at least put a twenty-four hour guard on them. I’ve pleaded with Raymond, but he doesn’t think they’re in danger now.

  Diane patted Maxine’s hand. “I’ll make sure they’re safe,” she said firmly.

  “Yes!” Maxine shouted, fist in the air. “I knew we’d become friends after Vincent told me and David about how you rescued the research puppy from the lab when you were a graduate student.”

  Diane’s voice went weak. “He told you about that?”

  Maxine smil
ed and nodded. “He was proud of you for it.”

  Diane blinked back her memories, then said: “Do you like David?”

  “What’s not to like? Handsome. Funny. Animal advocate.”

  Diane forced a smile and nodded.

  Maxine extended her little finger toward Diane. “A pledge to our partnership.”

  Without hesitation, Diane raised her little finger. “To our partnership.”

  They locked pinkies

  μ CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT μ

  It was a beautiful day for a road trip. Diane felt her tensions lifting as she drove down Texas Route 35 past coastal bays and sleepy hamlets. Between towns, rows of corn and millet fanned by, reaching toward a vanishing point on the distant horizon. She had never been on a ranch before and was looking forward to the visit.

  On the telephone, Leonard Everly had sounded like a kindly gentleman, insisting that she call him by his first name. She had told him she found his Ridgeback website and she gave him her maiden name. Many professionals went by their maiden names, so she felt it wouldn’t be a problem if she decided to level with him about her identity. But that wasn’t going to happen unless he gave off extremely positive vibes. Maybe she should have brought Maxine’s psychic along.

  For Maxine’s part in the intrigue, she had remained true to her crossed pinky pledge and invited Doreen from bookkeeping to lunch where she inquired about Doreen’s Ridgeback, then shamelessly picked her brains regarding Leonard Everly.

  Doreen reported that, other than a tantrum she once witnessed (from outside Bellfort’s office door), Dr. Everly was a very nice man who was a dog breeder, a gentleman rancher and a semi-retired scientist. For his consulting services, BRI paid him a monthly stipend of ten thousand dollars. And yes, Doreen thought he might sometimes do some marketing for BRI. Why did Doreen think that? Because she had reimbursed him for airfare. To where? Moscow, Taipei, Seville, and frequent trips to Düsseldorf came to mind.

  Diane didn’t know what more she expected to discover from Everly. But she felt it was worth a leisurely drive down the coast to try and ferret out any connection between Peruvase, Leonard Everly’s name in Vincent’s notes, and Everly’s continued involvement with BRI.

  Everly had been to Taipei. Could Bellfort have been telling the truth about Peruvase being sold to a company in Taiwan? Maybe Tung Chen’s spies overlooked it.

  If Everly was indeed the catalyst for any of BRI’s intellectual property sales, his 10K per month income was laughable. Despite the fact that Peruvase was sold prematurely, she and Vincent had become what she considered wealthy, even after the university and BRI took their percentages. It seemed Raymond Bellfort was exploiting poor Leonard.

  Following Everly’s directions, Diane drove through the town of Blessing, little more than a church and a convenience store with a gas station. She had seen people live with a lot less, but in the jungle villages they didn’t have to shop for boots or tractor tires and they never had the urge for pralines n’ cream or a Big Mac.

  Diane followed the railroad tracks on her right for several miles until she came to the crossing marked with day-glo orange antlers—the rancher’s answer to pink lawn flamingos, she guessed. There were no warning lights at the crossing; she stopped, looked and listened. The tracks were clear to eternity in both directions.

  She bumped across them onto a gravel road on the other side. Ahead stood thick wooden crosspieces branded with the name “Dr. Leo’s Serengeti Ranch.” She was in the right place.

  The Suburban no sooner thrummed across the metal cattle guard when Diane spotted the “possible obstacles” Dr. Everly had mentioned.

  A herd of black cattle had gathered for a tête-à-tête on the road ahead. “Don’t drive off-road to get around them,” Everly had warned. “There are rocks and ditches that’ll mess up your tires and your shocks. Just slow to a crawl. They’ll move out of your way,” he assured her.

  Grateful for bringing Vincent’s SUV, Diane slowly approached the herd. And sure enough, the black sea parted as the animals ambled to both sides of the road to let her pass. They had been through this drill before.

  She inched along while curious black noses smudged the powdering of dust along the SUV’s sides. Looking down into the pool of large brown eyes, she felt the sudden urge to become a vegetarian.

  Once past the herd, Diane stepped down on the accelerator. Stones pelted the SUV’s chassis as she headed for the buildings on the horizon. The road plowed through wide-open land scattered with scrub grass and mesquite bushes and lots of oil pumps. In ten minutes she approached a white-pillared mansion that presided over an oasis of green grass and enormous shade trees. The Ponderosa it was not.

  Diane left the Suburban parked beside a golf cart and walked around the circular drive toward the house. She took a gulp of still, hot air. She was committed.

  A tall, slender man wearing sharply creased jeans, light denim shirt and a white cowboy hat stepped sideways down the front porch stairs. Diane felt like a greenhorn in her flowered blouse, black slacks and espadrilles.

  They met halfway up the drive. “Hello. You must be Diane McKee. I’m Leonard Everly.”

  She knew he was in his mid sixties, but he wore his years lightly. He had the dignified manner befitting a scientist turned gentleman rancher.

  Leonard’s smile seemed genuine enough. It extended all the way up to the tan creases beside his reflective sunglasses. But Diane hated it when she couldn’t see a person’s eyes. Maybe that was the cause of her urge to draw back when he offered his bear paw of a hand.

  As if on cue, a chorus of barks and yips arose from somewhere beyond the house. Everly inclined his head toward the commotion. “They’re looking forward to meeting you.” He pointed to the golf cart. “Ride or walk?” Diane chose to walk; she had been driving for almost three hours. Besides it gave her more time with Leonard.

  As they strolled around the side of the house and out toward the pens, Everly told her about the Ridgeback breed. He explained that they were not barkers by nature, but they were quite intuitive. They knew she might be taking one of them home with her.

  They arrived at the pens and watched the wiggling tan bodies with their bristly backs, enormous feet and worried brows, and Diane fell in love. But poor Huck was having a hard enough time getting her attention at home without added competition. There was no room for a puppy in her disaster of a life.

  Fortunately, as of that morning, all the males were spoken for, giving Diane an easy out. Leonard pointed to a pregnant female nicknamed Phoenix in the next pen. Diane said she’d wait for a male from her litter.

  After playing with the puppies for as long as she could bear without taking the whole litter home, Diane accepted Everly’s offer of iced tea.

  During the entire seven-minute walk to the front porch, he delivered a proud accounting of his Ridgebacks’ ribbons. Diane became certain the trip was going to be a dry haul.

  Leonard went inside and Diane settled onto the porch swing to one side of the stairs. She slowly took in the surroundings. Except for the occasional distant cattle lowing or a horsefly buzzing by, there wasn’t a sound. And other than the distant jack pumps, nothing moved out there. It was a bit creepy.

  Where was everyone? Housekeeper? Wife? Cow punchers? She suddenly felt vulnerable.

  Leonard Everly seemed perfectly charming. But she had always trusted her instincts, and right then they were screaming: Get up and leave, Diane. You don’t know this man. You don’t owe him any courtesy that goes against your better judgment.

  Just then Everly arrived with a smile and two frosty mugs. He was accompanied by a streamlined male Ridgeback whose chest came up to Diane’s knees.

  Leonard placed the tea and a napkin on a small table beside Diane while the dog sniffed her shoes and slacks.

  “He’s magnificent. What’s his name?”

  “He has a fancy registered name. But I call him Hunter. He’s the father of Phoenix’s litter.”

  Hunter permitted Diane to
scratch the ridge down his back while he leaned into her legs. Her paranoia dissolved. Puppies and tea. Nothing sinister here.

  Everly settled into a chair to her right, crossed his well-used boots out in front of her and looked admiringly at his dog. “Ridgebacks shed very infrequently. But Hunter’s going through a little shedding stage. Some hairs might show up on those slacks of yours.” Knowing he was the topic of conversation, Hunter abandoned Diane to step over and lean against his master’s legs.

  “It’s so peaceful here,” Diane said. “How lucky you are to live in such a paradise.”

  “I’m comfortable here. But I’ve noticed the solitude wears thin for city folk like yourself.”

  “I can’t imagine a person ever getting tired of it. Has this property been in your family for generations?”

  “Yes, you might say that.”

  “It must have been wonderful for a boy growing up here.”

  “I think I’ve given you the wrong impression. I never saw the inside of the big house,” he gestured toward the double-door entry, “until ten years ago, just before I bought the ranch.

  “My grandfather and my father were horse trainers here all their lives. So mine was not a childhood full of ridin’ horses and ropin’ calves and shootin’ dove for fun. I got to clean out the deer blinds and oil the guns and serve the barbeque during huntin’ season. And often I traveled with my dad when he took the horses to compete at rodeos.

  “Dad always had a wad of chew in his mouth, manure on his boots and ring dust everywhere else. So, he wasn’t permitted inside the owner’s travel trailer. We camped out with the Mexican immigrants who tended the horses.

  “My granddad and my dad trained champions, and they were proud of their accomplishments. But growing up watching them choke on the dust of a thousand rodeos, I vowed again and again that I would not follow in their bootsteps.”

  Everly looked out across his ranch toward the far horizon. His jaw tightened and he said, “I was born on the land but not to the land. Nevertheless, it’s always been in my blood. My desire to own this ranch has driven me to great successes in some areas of my life and to dismal failures in others…”