Lab Notes: a novel

by Nelson, Gerrie

  Moments passed, then he snapped his head toward Diane as if discovering, for the first time, that she was sitting there on the porch with him.

  “Sorry, I get long-winded at times. I don’t get a lot of visitors out here.”

  “It’s a fascinating story. Thank you for sharing it.”

  Everly leaned forward and studied her for several seconds. Suddenly ill at ease, not knowing exactly where Everly was looking, she drummed her fingers in her lap and strained to think of how to direct the conversation to the real reason for her visit.

  “You know, you’re real easy to talk to,” he said in a slow drawl.

  Diane acknowledged his compliment with a forced smile.

  Everly settled back in his chair and scratched behind Hunter’s ear. “There’s something you should know. The Ridgeback breed ain’t happy if they’re left at home alone. You a career lady?”

  Was it her imagination? Or had his speech slowed and acquired a cowboy drawl? But accent or not, he had given her a perfect opening; it was time to come clean. She moved her lips, but nothing came out.

  Blocked by an inner struggle, she tried reasoning with herself: He liked to talk about his dogs and his ranch; if she opened up a dialogue, maybe he’d tell the story about the Peruvase sale. She could act grateful for the sizable bonus she and Vincent had received. Then he might drop the name of a pharmaceutical company.

  Doreen was right; he was a nice guy. Go ahead. Tell him what you do for a living and where. Bellfort might be upset if he found out she’d talked with Dr. Everly. But she had the perfect cover. She and Huck were lonely. They wanted a puppy.

  Too much time had passed. The lines had crinkled at the corners of Leonard Everly’s eyes, but his lips weren’t smiling. His glance burned through his reflective lenses. He was scrutinizing her, hard.

  Diane feigned a cough, then said, “I work with plants.” If only she could see his eyes. She dabbed her mouth with the paper napkin. “I own a plant nursery. I can take a puppy to work with me. He’ll get a lot of attention.” Coward.

  Everly nodded; he seemed satisfied. He gestured toward her wedding ring. “What does your husband do?”

  Diane wasn’t sure, but she thought she flinched. “He’s a salesman, a boat salesman.” Her answer surprised her.

  “Good career. Keeps you near the water. I’ve always been torn between fishin’ and huntin.’ Down here I have the best of both worlds. I hunt on the ranch and fish down at the bay or out in the Gulf.”

  Diane spotted a dust cloud on the horizon and saw an opportunity to change the subject. “Is that one of those dust devils they talk about?”

  “No. That’s my ranch manager returning.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “Well, I’m expectin’ him to bring back my truck with some new tires on it. And anyone I can see drivin’ on any horizon, north, south, east or west, is on my land.”

  Diane pondered the enormity of the ranch while they both watched a four-door, gray pick-up truck approach in a brown cloud and pull around the driveway to the foot of the stairs. Like a lot of trucks she had seen on the road, the pick-up sported a shotgun on a rack across the back window.

  Everly stood and walked over to the stairs to greet his employee. A cowboy off a movie set stepped from the truck and tossed a set of keys toward the porch.

  Later, Diane would recall how the universe went into slow motion.

  The ball of keys arced high over the truck, then changed shape and descended, all askew, toward the waiting hand of Leonard Everly. They landed with a ka-ching at Diane’s eye level, everything neatly contained in Leonard Everly’s enormous palm. That is, everything except the large key ring pendant.

  Two brushed-gold hemispheres, connected by a wide black enamel band, adorned with pave’ diamonds, dangled over the side of Everly’s hand in flagrant display.

  At first, Diane thought how beautiful it would look on a chain around her neck. Then the pendant turned.

  At that precise moment, a spark of sunlight pierced through the trees and glinted off the gems. And in that nanosecond, Diane saw the dusting of diamonds spell out the name TekTranz.

  Her stunned gaze remained fixed on the dangling medallion—until Leonard jerked it into his palm with startling ferocity and concealed it inside a white-knuckled fist. Diane drew back and glanced up at him.

  Everly tore off his sunglasses and looked down at her with an icy blue stare, steady and analytical as though looking through a microscope—or a gun sight.

  Time to leave.

  Leonard Everly watched from the porch as the dark blue Suburban hurriedly backed out of the parking space.

  Earl, the ranch manager, stood with one boot resting on the bottom step. “She sure had a bee up her butt. Was it somethin’ I said?”

  Everly didn’t answer. His attention was fixed on the Suburban as the tires spun into drive in a hail of stones. Pensively, he tossed his keys a few inches into the air and caught them. Then he headed down the steps toward his truck.

  μ CHAPTER TWENTY NINE μ

  The stones were probably chipping the paint all to hell, even tearing up the SUV’s undercarriage, but she had no intention of slowing down—that was, until she spotted the herd congregated up ahead. “Dammit!”

  What attraction did the road hold for cattle? Did it arise from the same annoying urge that made people block laboratory doorways to have their conversations? Irritated, she rescinded her earlier vegan vow.

  Closing in on the herd, she remembered Everly’s earlier warning to stay on the ranch road. Screw that! She slowed slightly, switched into four-wheel drive and veered off to the right.

  The SUV took on the rough terrain like a tank as Diane steered a slalom course through the mesquite bushes. She cleared the last of the herd and bumped back onto the gravel road, renewing her resolve not to look in the rearview mirror until she reached civilization. What good would it do her now to know she was being pursued?

  Diane spotted the ranch’s exit at the same time she heard the train whistle. “Please God, no.”

  Maintaining her speed, she rumbled across the cattle guard and up over the railroad tracks with a half mile to spare between her and the oncoming engine.

  Diane drove through the town of Blessing flying low, then headed up Route 35. The pastoral scenes she had found so relaxing on the drive down, now only provided a sense of foreboding. Where was everyone?

  With no witnesses, Everly could easily run her off the road into a ditch. Or, he could just pull up and shoot her. She thought if she passed another empty farm or village, she’d scream. She needed people, crowds of people. But it seemed siesta time had invaded South Texas.

  Finally, Diane passed a gas station and barbeque stand. Up ahead, she saw a traffic light. She was on the outskirts of Bay City.

  She stopped at the red light and looked in the rearview mirror. A hay truck trundled up behind her. She took a spasmodic breath, then expelled it in a rush of relief. Had her hasty retreat been the result of an over-primed imagination? Her mind recapped the ranch scene and quickly came back with an unequivocal NO.

  Diane pulled into the McDonalds in Bay City. She immediately spotted three gray pick-up trucks. But there were also red trucks and black trucks and people walking and children laughing.

  She parked the SUV and headed for the restaurant door, her bladder screaming. She vowed she’d never leave the city again.

  Diane set the cruise control for the last leg of her trip home. By now she assumed Leonard Everly was not in hot pursuit. He had most likely calmed himself, concluding that he had gotten jittery over a harmless woman who loved puppies and pretty jewelry.

  Jittery? What an understatement. Everly’s reaction had been seismic. He had even tried to block her way when she stood up to leave. But when the ranch manager stepped to the foot of the stairs to say hello, Everly had to let her pass.

  Leonard Everly was obviously a man with something to hide. But what? If he had some covert relationship with TekTr
anz, why carry that pendant around?

  Perhaps he felt secure, even arrogant about TekTranz being hidden in plain sight—in the several diamond chips mounted at an angle to the others. To be sure, rare planetary forces had conspired to reveal them to her.

  Maybe Vincent had a hand in the serendipitous discovery. She’d like to think so.

  “…Chance favors the prepared mind.”

  TekTranz had been first on Vincent’s list of the biotech brokers he referred to as “fences.” He had checked their websites. TekTranz was located in Germany, which probably explained Leonard Everly’s frequent flights to Düsseldorf.

  The sudden meltdown of his gentlemanly façade strongly indicated she had blundered onto something more insidious than the name of a technology transfer company.

  However, even if Leonard Everly had been responsible for the sale of Peruvase or any other intellectual property—and despite Vincent’s assertions to the contrary—there was still no evidence of wrongdoing there.

  But absence of proof was not proof of absence.

  She hoped her friendship with Tung Chen could withstand another huge favor. She’d send an email tonight asking him to redo his Peruvase search—this time using the name “TekTranz.”

  Diane sat at a long red light, slowly sipping a coke, picking dog hairs off her slacks. But her mind raced on, mixing and matching information: BRI paid for Leonard Everly’s trips to Düsseldorf and Bellfort readily admitted he used brokers in some of his sales transactions. So Bellfort knew about TekTranz. And even though she felt he lied about not knowing who the customers were, she had to admit there was nothing underhanded about using a broker.

  But what did Bellfort mean on the night of the party when he muttered that the brokered deals needed “closer scrutiny?” Was he suspicious that Everly was double dealing?

  The traffic light turned green, but Diane’s foot remained on the brake. A hypothesis had begun forming in the dark regions of her brain. She grabbed her cell phone and punched in Maxine’s number.

  As the phone rang on the other end, the specter of a grim discovery crawled under her skin. She shuddered.

  μ CHAPTER THIRTY μ

  Diane backed into a parking space at the corner of 23rd and Mechanics Streets. She dug a small pair of binoculars out of her purse, placed them on the center console, then hunkered down in her seat.

  An Astros cap hid her reddish ringlets. Oversized sunglasses camouflaged most of her face. Denim Capri pants and a Galveston T-shirt declared her an official tourist. Except for the tightness in her throat and an intensifying case of heartburn, she was all set for her stakeout.

  In her past life, “investigations” usually involved a chromatography set-up, a spectrophotometer and a computer. But things had taken a dark turn. Now, all she required were binoculars and a fast getaway car. But mostly, she needed chutzpah.

  She picked up the binoculars and focused them about a quarter block down the street where a wedding party posed for photos aboard four horse drawn carriages, then dismounted and followed a path through the onlookers to the entrance of The Tremont House hotel. She dared not blink for fear that David Crowley would slip through the crowd unobserved.

  She was almost certain David was up to something. The BRI administrative call schedules had revealed he never took call on the first or third Sundays of the month. And if scheduled to do so, he changed with someone else. Not a big deal; but two weeks ago he had lied about his reasons for switching. And considering the negative report she had received from Jane Galvin at Texas A&M, plus Vincent’s suspicions about him… Granted, at this point, it only added up to an iron-clad inkling. But her intuition rarely failed her; David Crowley was somehow connected to the hidden forces orbiting BRI.

  Similar things happen under similar circumstances, so there was a good chance David would show up there this afternoon. If he did, she’d play it by ear. She needed some answers.

  Diane tapped her fingers on the steering wheel; this Mata Hari stuff was unnerving. She looked forward to her escape to the Caribbean next week for the conference and jungle trek with Olimpia, though she suspected it was going to be awkward seeing Gabriel Carrera while she was down there. Raymond Bellfort had told his cousin of her travel plans, and Gabriel emailed her inviting her to dinner.

  Just then someone knocked on the window beside her. Diane jumped and looked out. A very tall man wearing a plaid sport coat stood beside her car. He probably belonged to the sports car she had squeezed in on the other side of her. She lowered her window, tilted her baseball cap back and looked up—at David Crowley. Why is it I always get caught?

  “Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?” he chortled as he opened her car door and offered her his hand.

  Diane flushed. If David were in the midst of something nefarious, why would he march right up to her car and announce his presence? Her voice came out in a squeak. “Hello David. What brings you here?”

  “A meeting. Care to join me?”

  He didn’t look a bit uncomfortable. In fact, he seemed amused. She weighed the situation. It was the middle of the day in a very public place. What could possibly happen if she went with him?

  David hadn’t moved. “You’ve come this far,” he said.

  She shrugged, stepped from the car and walked with him to the hotel. Neither of them spoke.

  David led the way up the stairs through the sunlit atrium lobby. Two people entered the elevator with them, diluting the strain of their silence.

  Then, David said, “I saw you here two weeks ago. I figured you’d come back.”

  Diane stared straight ahead in silence. And at long last, the doors opened.

  David led her down a corridor to a door labeled “Abstracts.” He knocked. A man answered. David entered first.

  Several men and women sat around a conference table in the large room. They looked up at David and smiled. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said. “I’d like you to meet Dr. Diane Rose.” He turned and gestured for Diane to come forward.

  The group stood up and moved toward her. The first man to reach her was dressed as she was—in denims, a baseball cap and T-shirt. He held out his hand. Diane froze. “You,” she said accusingly.

  He was the man from the library—the one Vincent had caught stealing his research.

  At a luxury hotel, fifty miles to the north of Galveston, The Houston Society of Biopreneurs’ selection committee passed a box around a mahogany conference table, then returned it to the chairwoman. She unfolded the ballots, counted the votes and announced to the group that they had chosen Raymond Bellfort of Bayside Research as their “Person of the Year.” He would be the first non-scientist in Houston’s biotechnology community to have this honor conferred upon him. The award would be presented at the society’s annual banquet in December.

  “In 1991, the Office of Scientific Integrity (OSI) was formed by the National Institutes of Health to halt the rampant fraud discovered in research labs in the 1980’s. But OSI overreached themselves, using McCarthy-like tactics and bringing scandal and near-ruin to scores of ethical scientists while quite often the perpetrators of fraud went unnoticed.

  “Embittered, a group of reputable research scientists, victims of the overzealous purge, formed a secret society they called the Lab Rats to monitor their peers and expose unethical practices when appropriate.

  “Over the past two decades, our numbers have grown. And now our invitation-only membership includes working scientists and other well-placed individuals in the community who have agreed to assist in our investigations. But invitations are still rare. And they’re only extended after exhaustive vetting of credentials and character.”

  David Crowley swept his arm over the heads of those now seated around the large, oval table, and turned to Diane. “Dr. Rose, I give you the Houston-Galveston branch of the Lab Rats.”

  Diane had listened to David’s presentation with her mouth agape. Now she groped for words, but the only ones that came to mind were: Does everyone at BRI belong
to some sort of secret society?

  David came to her rescue. “You probably wonder why I invited you here.”

  Diane managed a nod.

  “Let me start at the beginning.” David stuffed his hands in his pockets and began pacing on the opposite side of the table.

  “More than a year ago, it came to the attention of the Lab Rats that a disgruntled former BRI scientist, by then working on the West Coast, accused Raymond Bellfort of selling his intellectual property prematurely to an undisclosed buyer. It was an inhalant to cure nicotine addiction.

  “The scientist had assigned his rights to BRI and was paid handsomely upon the sale. Then he was fired. And the product vanished.

  “The researcher believed it had been buried, possibly bought off the market by someone who would suffer great financial loss by its introduction into the marketplace.

  “At that same time, BRI was advertising for a staff veterinarian. I applied for the job to get a close look at the BRI organization. Bellfort is the only non-scientist our group has ever investigated.

  “Figuring he was a mere business man, I arrived on the scene thinking I’d finesse the inhalant information out of him and be on my way. Then Harry Lee and his technology disappeared.

  “I couldn’t help but wonder if Dr. Lee’s technology had traveled the same path to obscurity as the inhalant. Then Peruvase was gone.” His voice softened. “Then Vincent… I wish I had gotten to know him better.” He shook his head in disbelief.

  After a moment’s silence, David went on. “Even a blind hog finds an acorn now and then. But I haven’t uncovered much. Bellfort’s as secretive as the CIA.” David smirked at a woman two seats away from Diane

  Then his expression sobered, and he turned to Diane. We were planning to invite you to our next meeting, but here you are. And we’d like to ask for your help.”