Flashback (1988)

by Palmer, Michael

  “Frank, don’t move, honey, please. You feel so good. I want to do a little while you’re still inside me. Just a line. Okay?”

  Franks secretary, the blond one, was named Annette Dolan. She had moved with her child to live with her mother in Sterling, and had been working as a hostess in the Mountain Laurel Restaurant when Frank first spotted her and offered her a job. Her qualification for the position was, quite plainly, that she looked better in a sweater than any woman he had ever seen.

  She was a mediocre receptionist, and a far-worse-than-that secretary, but she was sweet and polite to everyone, and had proved a wonderful, undemanding diversion, especially on those occasions when he was able to indulge her passion for cocaine.

  “Go ahead, baby,” he said, running his thumbs over her nipples. “But hustle. I don’t have much time left.”

  For more than an hour, first on the oriental rug in his office, and then on the couch, Annette had screwed him as only she could—purely and passionately, without any of the head games he tolerated but hated in brighter women.

  He cradled her, breasts in his hands as she slipped one end of a straw into her nose and lowered the other onto the mirror that she had rested on his chest.

  “That’s it,” he whispered as she inhaled the dust. “Get it all, baby. Get it all.”

  He glanced across at the Lucite clock on his bookshelf. Twenty after eight. Less than an hour until Mainwaring was due. Less than an hour until the beginning of the end. Annette had been the perfect appetizer for that session. Now, however, it was time to pack her up and ship her home.

  Frank waited until she had wiped the last grains of powder off the mirror and onto her gums. Then he skimmed the mirror across the room and pulled her magnificent, glistening body close to his. Slowly, he toppled off the couch and on top of her on the rug.

  She was beautiful to the eye and to the touch, but after an hour and a hundred dollars worth of cocaine, she held little excitement for him. All that remained was the mechanical need to climax. He grabbed her corn-silk hair tightly in his fists, buried his chest against her breasts, and rammed himself into her again and again until, in less than a minute, it was over.

  If only Lisette knew how much he needed this sort of uncomplicated, unquestioning sex, everything would be much better for them, he thought. Much better.

  He took a minute to stroke the woman’s clit, her tight, flat stomach, and finally her perfect ass. Then he moved to the chair behind his desk and watched as she dressed. Once every week or two was perfect—just enough to keep the adventure fresh and the woman from becoming tiresome.

  Absently, he thumbed through the papers on his desk—papers that included the application of the surgeon who would be Mainwaring’s replacement. The whole business had gone down like clockwork, Frank mused, just as he had promised it would. He and Mainwaring had estimated two years, and precisely two years it had been.

  Now, there was less than an hour until the final phase of their project would start. Less than an hour until the beginning of the end, until the beginning of everything good for him.

  Frank wrapped up what was left of the cocaine and flipped the plastic bag across to the woman.

  “Here you go, baby,” he said. “Enjoy.”

  “You promised you would try some with me sometime, Frank. Remember?”

  “Sometime, maybe. For now, you just get on home and enjoy it,” he answered. “I don’t have much use for that shit. There are enough other things I get off on. Like you.”

  And, he was thinking, like a million dollars.

  Frank showered in the bathroom off his office, dressed, and cleaned up the last vestiges of his session with Annette Dolan. Then he settled in before the computer terminal on his desk. There were still twenty minutes before Mainwaring was due just enough time to check in with Mother.

  And, Frank noted, it was especially fitting that he should.

  For at a time when his back was to the wall, when the absence of $250,000 he had borrowed from the hospital accounts and then lost in that foolish land deal stared at him every day like a gaping, black hole of doom, Mother had provided him with the answer.

  Mother was UltraMA, the Ultramed mainframe computer housed in the home offices in Boston. She was the fiber that held the expanding Ultramed empire together, providing it with consistency, rapid exchange of information, and a seemingly endless pool of physicians.

  And in Franks darkest, most desperate hour, Mother had served up both Jack Pearl and Jason Mainwaring.

  Frank activated the terminal, dialed the network number, and flipped the toggle switch on his phone. In seconds, appeared on the screen.

  Good evening, welcome to UltraMA—

  Please enter access code

  Frank typed in the code and then, when requested, his own password. In a week or so his regional director would receive a printout of UltraMA users and would note on the appropriate evaluation form that at nine o’clock in the evening of that day, Frank had been hard at work in his office.

  Good evening, Mr. Iverson. We trust all is well in Sterling, New Hampshire. Do you wish to see your menu?

  Frank typed Y.

  Immediately, ADMINISTRATOR’S MENU flashed on, followed by a list:

  Changes in procedures and policies manual.

  Ultramed current staff physicians and salaries (your hospital only)

  Ultramed current staff physicians and salaries (your region only)

  Available physicians (by specialty)

  Promotions, reassignments, terminations (past 30 days)

  National health news of note

  Regional health news of note

  Preferred suppliers and services (your region only)

  Performance ratings (region)

  Performance ratings (nation)

  Golden Circle Administrators

  As he invariably did when communicating with Mother, Frank began by affirming his membership in the Golden Circle and his position as the leading administrator in the northeast region.

  Leading administrator. Golden Circle. It was laughable now to think of how close he had come to not even applying for the Ultramed-Davis job. But with his electronics firm going down the tubes, the Judge refusing to help him out, and Leigh Baron insisting that he would get serious consideration in the search process despite his lack of hospital experience, he really had nothing to lose.

  It had been a mild shock when he was finally offered the position. And although there could be no arguing his remarkable success with the corporation, it remained something of a mystery to him why Leigh had picked him over many more experienced candidates.

  Frank scanned the regional and national rankings and then returned to the Administrators Menu and summoned up item four.

  The physicians of possible interest to the Ultramed system were listed by specialty and subspecialty, along with a detailed but straightforward summary of their education and work experience.

  However, item four was hardly a typical employment bulletin board. Included with many of the names was a paragraph summarizing the professional and/or personal difficulties that had made that physician available.

  Drugs, alcohol, sexual entanglements, financial improprieties, professional misconduct of one sort or another—compiling the roster was the full-time job of an obsessively diligent investigator in the home office. Primary among her responsibilities was the weeding out of those physicians for whom there was little or no hope of rehabilitation. Those remaining on the list, many of them excellent practitioners, were of particular interest to the corporation. More often than not, they proved to be devoted employees, grateful for a second chance, totally loyal to the company and its policies, and willing to work for any salary that was reasonable.

  Steve Baumgarten in the emergency ward had been recruited through UltraMA’s unique bulletin board. So had Suzanne Cole, a real prize, who almost from the start had generated an income many times greater than her salary.

  But for Frank, it was the one-two parlay
of Jack Pearl and Jason Mainwaring that had made Mother worth her megabytes in gold.

  For at a time when Franks back was to the wall, when he was becoming so desperate about the $250,000 that he was actually considering approaching the Judge for help, Jack Pearls name appeared in item four.

  The description of Pearls problem, which Frank eventually had memorized, read:

  Holds patent on what he has claimed is revolutionary new general anesthetic. Texas license suspended pending investigation of alleged illegal clinical testing of the substance and falsification of information on experimental drug application. Physician with same name resigned 1984 from Wilkes Community Hospital, Akron, Ohio, because of alleged sexual involvement with a ten-year-old boy. Further information currently being sought.

  Mildly intrigued, Frank had made a note to do some checking on the man, but had not put much energy into the project until, not a month later, UltraMA served up a brief item on a professor of surgery from Baltimore. Jason Mainwaring had been found to be an officer and partner in a Georgia pharmaceutical house, and subsequently had resigned his position due to charges of conflict of interest and illegal use of an unapproved drug

  It had taken trips to Maryland, Georgia, Texas, and Ohio; an additional twenty thousand dollars in Ultramed-Davis funds to gather information and secure the cooperation of a certain politician in Akron; and finally, a series of the most delicate negotiations with both physicians. But in the end, Frank had forged the key to his future. And now, within the next two weeks, the rest was about to become history.

  For several minutes Frank scanned the electronic roster of physicians. He was amazed, as always, at how so many who held the ultimate ticket to success and prestige could have made such pathetic shambles of their Jives.

  A pediatrician from Hartford about to complete four months in an alcohol rehabilitation center; a gynecologist from D.C. who had resigned his hospital appointment amid a cloud of accusations that his examinations were too prolonged and included house calls; an oral surgeon facing revocation of his license for writing too many narcotic prescriptions for himself; Frank jotted down several names, along with a memo to himself to make some preliminary calls.

  Ultramed and its parent corporation had the clout to make any physicians background difficulties disappear to all but the most intensive investigation. However, its administrators had been well warned against using that service indiscriminately.

  Frank had just terminated with Mother when, with a discreet knock, Jason Mainwaring entered the office. He was dressed in a light cotton suit, monogrammed shirt, and white topsiders, and looked very much like the plantation owner he planned to become as soon as his pharmaceutical company had successfully produced and marketed Jack Pearls Serenyl.

  “Drink?” Mainwaring asked, setting his briefcase down and then striding directly to the small wet bar in Franks bookcase.

  “Sure,” Frank said, quietly resenting the way the man, as always, stepped into a room and took charge. “Bourbon’s fine.”

  The surgeon gestured at the huge aerial photo of the Ultramed-Davis complex.

  “Nice little operation y’all have here, Frank,” he said. “I think I’m actually going to miss it some. But home is where the heart is, right?”

  “Of course,” Frank countered. “Although I knew you had been up here too long when I heard a little Yankee accent creep into that drawl of yours the other day.”

  Mainwaring snorted a laugh as he scanned Franks collection of cassettes.

  “Mantovani, Mantovani, Mantovani,” he said disdainfully, tossing them aside one at a time. “You know, the closest thing you have here to Beethoven is Mantovani.”

  “I like Mantovani,” Frank said.

  “I know.”

  Mainwaring thought for a moment and then snapped open his briefcase, removed two cassettes, and flipped them onto Franks desk.

  “I know I’m prob’ly tossin pearls to a razorback,” he said, “but here are some examples of real music for you. It’s what! listen to in the O.R. Call em a good-bye present. This one’s Beethoven’s Third. It’s called the Eroica. And this one’s by an English composer named Vaughan Williams. It’s a fantasia on ‘Greensleeves.’ Listen to these two pieces, and I suspect even you will appreciate the difference between real music and the Burger King brand you’ve been listening to.”

  “Sure thing, Jase,” Frank said, dropping the tapes into his desk drawer. “I’ll start my reeducation first thing in the morning.”

  “I won’t hold my breath.” Mainwaring settled in on the sofa Frank and Annette Dolan had so recently vacated, and motioned Frank to take the easy chair opposite him.

  “I hate doin’ business with anyone across a desk,” he explained.

  Unless it’s yours, right? Frank thought. He hesitated, and then did as the man asked. There was no sense in making an issue of it at this stage of the game.

  “So, Jason,” he said. “I assume you’re still satisfied.”

  Mainwaring took a file from his briefcase and opened it.

  “With this kind of money involved,” he said, “I won’t be satisfied until our little anesthetic is in every operating room of every hospital in the world. But I am certainly pleased with the”—he consulted the file—“four hundred ninety-six cases Jack and I have completed. I must say, Frank, you’ve done all right. You promised me five hundred cases in two years, and you delivered.”

  “Like I told you when we first met, Jason, I know this town.”

  The key to the whole project had been the rapid takeover by Mainwaring of Guy Beaulieu’s practice. And only Frank, and to some extent, Mainwaring, knew how skillfully Frank had engineered that feat. Details: that’s what it all came down to. Attention to touches like the letter to Maureen Banas threatening his own position should she ever disclose to anyone, including him, what was being done to her. The sort of details he had neglected to attend to three years before.

  “Pity about ol’ Beaulieu,” Mainwaring said blandly.

  Frank could not tell if the man was being facetious or not. Again, he opted to avoid an altercation In the morning, Mainwaring would be gone And in a week or so he would be back to officially tender his resignation and to offer proof of a million dollars in Frank’s Cayman Islands account and half a million in Pearls, in exchange for the patent Frank now shared with Pearl and all future rights to Serenyl.

  And that, Frank knew, was what it was all about.

  He would, at last, have squared away the $250,000 shortfall in the Ultramed-Davis books, and there would be a nifty little bundle left over to build on.

  “Well,” he said dispassionately, “at least the old guy didn’t suffer. When my number comes up, I want to go the same way.… So, I assume you have everything you need to conclude this business with your company in Atlanta?”

  Mainwaring skimmed through his notes

  “It would appear so, Frank. Here’s that, ah, little agreement you insisted upon.”

  He passed the document over.

  Frank scanned the page to be certain it included Mainwaring’s admission to having illegally used Serenyl on five hundred patients. It was Frank’s insurance policy against any kind of deal being made behind his back. In the morning, the two of them would jointly place the confession, along with similar ones from Frank and Jack Pearl, in a safe deposit box at the Sterling National Bank, and upon Mainwaring’s return to town, the three of them would retrieve and destroy the documents together.

  “Remember, Frank,” Mainwaring warned, “I don’t have the final say in all this. My partners are still calculatin’ what it’s gonna cost us to go backward and do all the animal and clinical trials the FDA insists on, and—”

  Frank laughed out loud.

  “Jason, please,” he said. “It costs tens of millions to develop and test new drugs that you don’t even know are going to work, let alone work safely. You’ve got a gold mine here, and you know it, and I know it, and your partners know it, and even our little fairy friend Pearl kno
ws it.

  “After five hundred perfect cases without so much as one problem, the only money you’re going to spend is whatever it costs to grease a palm or two at the FDA and to put together a few folders of bogus animal and clinical trials. So don’t try to shit me, okay? It’s unbecoming for a man of your class.”

  Mainwaring shook his head ruefully.

  “There are a number of things I’m going to miss around here, Frank,” he said, perhaps purposely intensifying his drawl, “but I confess you won’t be among them. Be sure Jack has all the paperwork and formulas ready for me in the morning, y’hear? Assumin’ my partners and our chemists give their okay, I’ll be back in eight or ten days. Meanwhile, I shall assume that you or Jack’ll let me know if any problems crop up.”

  “Of course, Jason, old shoe,” Frank said. “But after two years and five hundred cases, I don’t think you have to camp by the phone waiting to hear from us. Next to birth, death, and taxes, Serenyl is as close as life gets to a sure thing.… And you know that, don’t you.”

  Mainwaring’s eyes narrowed.

  “What I know,” he said evenly, “is that this little tête-à-tête has gone on long enough.”

  Without offering his hand, the surgeon snapped up his briefcase and left.

  Not until the office door clicked shut did Franks smile become more natural. In the interests of their deal, he had allowed the pompous ass to walk over him any number of times during the past two years. The son of a bitch even tried to tell him what music to listen to. Now, with the work completed and so successful, there was no longer any reason to defer to him, and Frank felt exhilarated that he hadn’t.

  After years of operating in the shadows of men like Mainwaring and the Judge, it was time to start casting some shadows of his own. His life had finally turned the corner. He was a rising star in a powerful corporation, and soon he would have the independence and prestige that only money could bring.

  “God bless you, Serenyl,” he murmured.

  Softly at first, then louder and louder, the familiar chant worked its way into his thoughts.