Pingle smiles. “It’s enough,” he says. Then he sits silently, moving the glass of brandy slowly between his blotched hands. Again, Cone gets the impression of nervousness—or at least hesitancy.
“You wanted to talk to me about the Nu-Hope investigation, Mr. Pingle?”
“Well, in a way …” Pingle says in a low voice. “My son …” Then he looks up from his brandy glass to stare directly at the detective. “Lester is a good boy, and I love him wery much. He is our only child. We lost a daughter to meningitis when she was wery young. Lester is all we have, and we want his life to be happy. You can understand that, can’t you?”
“Sure.”
Pingle takes a deep breath. “You’ve got a closed mouth, Timothy? You can keep it shut?”
“I don’t blab,” Cone says.
“Good. My son is married. I have two adorable grandchildren, God bless them. But Lester’s wife, my daughter-in-law, Sarah, she is a problem. She suffers from shopitis. You know what shopitis is?”
“She likes to spend money?”
The old man claps a palm to his cheek. “Oy, does she like to spend money! And I’m not talking about a dress now and then, a new lamp, maybe a jar of caviar. I’m talking about a Rolls, a ski lodge in Vermont, a condo on the Costa del Sol, a summer place in East Hampton, investments in Broadway shows that close the first night. That’s the kind of money I’m talking about. It is a sad situation.”
“Why doesn’t your son clamp down on her?”
Pingle shrugs. “He loves her, or thinks he does—which is the same thing. Also, Lester is not the handsomest man in the world. But Sarah! What a beauty that woman is! A lovely face and a gorgeous figure. Lester is proud to be married to her. He will give her anything to keep her happy. He makes a good dollar—I see to that—but he is barely keeping his head above water. This is all confidential, you understand; I am trusting you.”
Cone nods.
“So now Lester wants us to take on this Nu-Hope Fertility Clinic. He is insistent about it. I know my son, and this deal is wery important to him. Why this particular deal? Why is he perspiry over it? I don’t know.”
“And you want me to find out?” Cone asks.
“If you can,” Ernest Pingle says humbly. “But only as part of your inwestigation into Nu-Hope. You’ll find out the truth, won’t you?”
“That’s what I get paid for.”
“Of course. I’m asking you this as a father: If you should find that my son is into something he shouldn’t be in, will you tell me first? I have a lot of money, Timothy; more than I can ever spend in my lifetime. Lester will get most of it anyway, but maybe if he got some of it now, it might save him from some foolishness that would disgrace him, and me, and his mother, and the company I worked so hard to build. I don’t want that.”
Cone makes no reply, but finishes his brandy and rises. The old man gets the parka from the closet and stands on tiptoes to help the detective shrug into it.
“Sometimes I wonder if I know my son,” Ernest Pingle says gloomily. “Sometimes I think he’s a stranger.”
“Thanks for the brandy,” Cone says. “I really appreciated it.”
“And you’ll let me know if you find out anything bad about Lester? I’ll take care of you.”
“That won’t be necessary,” Cone says. “You’re the client. Good night, Mr. Pingle. Better put your bottle back in the toilet tank.”
He taxies back home, slumped in the corner of a ratty gypsy cab with no heater. But the radiators in the loft are hissing and thumping away like crazy, so that’s a plus. The minus is that Cone is faced with the ancient axiom: “Beer, whiskey: rather risky. Whiskey, beer: have no fear.” So he has a beer.
He gives Cleo a dish of fresh water and finds a slab of old lasagna in the fridge. Cleo takes it happily under the bathtub.
Cone tries to read more about human birth by syringe, birth by needle and microscope, birth in laboratory dishes. And the genesis of life kept frozen in cryogenic tanks. Who do all those rigid sperm, eggs, and embryos belong to? What parents? What families?
But his thoughts keep returning to Ernest Pingle, a nice old geezer troubled by his natural son, fearful that his heir may be acting stupidly because he’s pussy-whipped by a beautiful and profligate wife.
Timothy Cone has no desire for children. No need or hope for immortality by siring a son who might beget a son, and that grandson beget, and that great grandson beget, and on and on, making the name Cone last for all time. Screw that.
“Cleo,” the Wall Street dick says aloud, “when you’re dead, you’re fucking dead.”
And he wonders if all the potential sons and daughters preserved in glass might not be better off remaining frozen forever.
The Nu-Hope Fertility Clinic occupies adjoining town-houses on East Seventy-first Street, a few doors east of Madison Avenue. The two buildings, designed by the same architect in 1928, are handsome structures of gray stone with red brick trim around bow windows on the second and third floors and mullioned windows on the top three floors. The entrances are elegant, and the heavy front doors can be opened to the public only from within, after visitors are inspected and questioned through a grilled judas. Patients are admitted only to the west wing, where examination rooms, treatment facilities, X-ray machines, a pharmacy, and recovery rooms are located. The east wing contains executive offices, computerized record storage, and the sterile research laboratories.
Walls have been broken through between the two buildings on the third floor, but the steel door of this passageway is kept locked, and only executives and a few research staff members are provided with keys. Both structures are equipped with elevators, large enough to accommodate only one gurney at a time. Each wing has a wide staircase rising to the sixth floor.
Friday mornings are set aside for staff meetings for all Nu-Hope personnel who are not busy treating patients. These gatherings are generally held in the fourth-floor Doctors’ Lounge in the west wing. It is a large, open chamber, painted a light green, looking somewhat like a factory canteen with steel tables, each set with four metal chairs. The walls are lined with machines (not coin-operated, but free) that vend everything from hot soup to plastic-wrapped wedges of apple pie.
On this particular Friday morning, the assembled staff listens to short speeches by the administrator who, as usual, urges frugality in the use of hospital supplies; by the head of data processing, who reels off the most recent statistics on new patients, sperm inseminations, and embryo transplants; and by Dr. Phoebe Trumball, who reports progress in determining the optimum time of ovulation by hormone analysis.
These mercifully brief reports concluded, Dr. Victor January stands to address his staff.
“If you can stay awake for just a few more minutes,” he says, grinning at his audience, “I’d like to bring you up-to-date on the project I revealed to you a few months ago: the proposed expansion of Nu-Hope into a nationwide chain of fertility clinics. And eventually perhaps all over the world. I don’t need to tell you what a marvelous opportunity this would be for all of us: an enormous increase in our caseload, our responsibilities and our income.
“I am pleased to say that the first step has been taken to make our dreams come true. We have approached Pingle Enterprises, a reputable venture capital firm, in an effort to obtain financing for our projected expansion. Their first reaction, I must tell you, was very favorable indeed. But naturally, before making a commitment, they want to know more about us.
“So I want to alert you that during the next few weeks you may see and meet several strangers wandering about the premises to size us up. These visitors will be attorneys, accountants, and private investigators from Haldering and Company, employed by Pingle Enterprises. Haldering is an organization specializing in corporate information and intelligence.
“Doctor Trumball and I will be able to handle most of their inquiries, I’m sure. But I want to make this perfectly clear: If you are questioned by any of the Haldering representatives, I wan
t you to speak freely and answer their questions truthfully. If you have any criticism of our operation, you’re completely at liberty to voice it. As far as I’m concerned, we have nothing to hide, and being absolutely honest is the best way to ensure that all our hopes become a reality. Thank you for your attention and cooperation. Now go back to work, you slaves!”
There is laughter and a spattering of applause. The lounge gradually empties out. Drs. January and Trumball, nodding and smiling at the staff, walk down to the third floor. January unlocks the steel door and they enter the east wing, going directly to his office. It is an austere, uncluttered room, with a private lavatory and small kitchen attached. He has a personal computer on his desk that can tap into the clinic’s big mainframe.
They sprawl on a leather couch, look at each other.
“I think it went well,” he says. “Don’t you?”
“It went all right,” Dr. Trumball acknowledges. “But you’re taking a chance telling them they can shoot off their mouths to the Haldering people.”
“What should I have told them—to clam up? That could put the quietus on the whole deal. We’ve got to project an open and honest image if this thing is to go through. Besides, none of these people know anything. I’m glad your crew wasn’t there.”
“They know enough to keep their mouths shut.”
He stares at her. “Now,” he says, somewhat bitterly.
“Yes,” she admits. “Now.”
“I hope so. How are we doing on the time, Phoebe?”
She glances at the chunky digital watch strapped tightly to her slender wrist. “It’s getting close. Where are we going to meet him?”
“In Central Park. Same place. I hate this cloak-and-dagger stuff.”
She shrugs. “It’s got to be done,” she says stonily. “He explained why we couldn’t get the grant. We were such innocents when we filed. We didn’t even consider the political implications. We’re lucky they’re doing it this way. Proves they’re definitely interested.”
“I guess so,” January says fretfully. “Well, let’s get going. It’s a nice day; we’ll walk over. Meet you downstairs.”
The city sparkles. Light dances in spins and spirals like a giant bejeweled whirligig. The sun is a diamond, sky turquoise, pearls of tiny clouds, and all of it scintillant. The air itself seems alive and dazzling. This brilliant world promises hope and conquest.
Victor January glances at the woman striding along at his side. She too brims with purpose and resolve.
Phoebe Trumball is a tall woman, lean and hard: a greyhound look, as swift and keen. She is as slender as he, and as pale. They could be brother and sister, these two, sharing a dancer’s grace. Her face is long, with wedge of chin, scimitar nose, and widely spaced dark eyes that look out at life with courage and contempt.
“One of these days I’m going to marry you,” he says, and she smiles and lets her swinging hand touch his knuckles.
“Tonight?” she asks.
“No,” he says. “Regretfully, no. Martha has family in from out of town. We’re feeding them before the theater. Some silly musical that’s been running for centuries. I’ve got to play the faithful hubby.”
“All right,” she says equably. “I’m not going to pout and stamp my foot.”
“You never have,” he says. “You don’t even make me feel guilty.”
“You?” she hoots. “Guilty? That’ll be the day!”
And they both laugh.
They find their man on the same park bench where they met before, on a narrow path northwest of the zoo. There are pedestrians, joggers, babies being pushed in prams, lovers, a professional dog-walker with six hounds on tangled leashes, and one old woman trying to sell licorice strips. But the man they seek sits quietly and alone on a slatted bench, motionless and serene.
He has introduced himself as J. Roger Gibby, and that is the name on the identification he offered, along with his photograph. They checked with his directorate, of course, and were told he was a bona fide employee. But January and Trumball know that could be a cover. J. Roger Gibby could be working for one of a dozen other agencies.
He is well and strongly built, not so dapper as to be vulgar, but he shrieks with understated elegance. It is his calm, gentle manner, the doctors agree, that convinces them of his probity. That and his deep gazelle eyes that seem to have seen everything and are still ready to understand and forgive.
He does not stand when they approach, nor offer to shake hands. They sit together on his right, a little removed, and when any of the three speaks, it is with a thousand-yard stare directly ahead.
“Well …” Mr. Gibby says, “how did it go?”
January gives a brief precis of their presentation to Pingle Enterprises. Trumball adds that Haldering & Co. has been retained to investigate the clinic.
“Haldering?” Gibby says. His voice is velvet. “I know them. Hiram Haldering is an ex-FBI man. If there are any problems, I’m sure he’ll be amenable to reason. During your discussion with the Pingles, was anything said about how the financing would be structured?”
“No,” January says, “we didn’t get into that.”
“We would prefer a public limited partnership,” Gibby says. “We can guarantee it would be totally subscribed. By our friends, of course. A private offering might prove more difficult, as would a bank line of credit. But first things first: The most important step right now is to get you approved by Pingle. I assure you the funding is there; it’s just a question of getting it funneled through legitimate sources so we’re completely out of the picture. Meanwhile your research is continuing?”
“As much as we can,” Trumball says. “The expenses are horrendous. Do you know what a healthy rhesus monkey costs, or a mature, virile chimp?”
“I can imagine,” Gibby says with a small smile, “although I haven’t bought any lately.”
“We may require some recombinant DNA workups,” Trumball says. “I hope you’re aware of that.”
“We are indeed, but genetic engineering is not your responsibility. As I told you, this project is being pursued on a number of fronts. Eventually it will all come together.”
“You’re very optimistic, professor,” January says.
“I believe that in the world of science, if it can be done, it will be done.”
“And I believe,” January adds, “that a life devoted to science is a life devoted to art. Are you predicting a masterpiece?”
“That’s exactly what I’m predicting,” Gibby says with his sweet smile. “Other people are working toward the same goal, you know. I’m sure you realize the consequences if their masterpiece is created before ours.”
They are silent then, staring out at skeleton trees sharp against a pellucid sky. All is clear, clean. It seems a washed world in late October, the final glimpse of bright before the darkness of winter.
“One other thing,” J. Roger Gibby says. “Did the Pingles tell you who Haldering is sending to investigate?”
“They mentioned a man named Timothy Cone,” January says. “Apparently he is not an attorney or an accountant. Just an investigator. A detective, I suppose you could call him. I promised complete cooperation.”
“Timothy Cone,” Gibby repeats. “A detective. Yes, by all means cooperate with him. Meanwhile I’ll do a little detecting on my own. I must leave now. Please wait a few minutes before you depart. I’ll be in touch through the usual channel. Nice to see you again. Be well.”
He rises and moves slowly away. The two doctors turn their heads to watch him go.
“Do you trust him?” January says.
“Do we have a choice?” Phoebe Trumball asks.
“No,” he says, sighing, “I guess not. But he’s so damned smooth, it worries me. He acts as if every problem can be solved.”
“Don’t you believe that?” she demands. “If not, we never should have started this thing in the first place.”
“I believe,” January says hastily. “Because I believe in you.”
She glances at him with an amused smile. “But you’ve got to go to the theater tonight with your wife.”
“Yes,” he says, “I do.”
“Tomorrow?”
“Oh, God, yes!” he cries. “Definitely tomorrow!”
Cone arrives at his office at nine-thirty—early for him—and over coffee and a bagel begins reviewing the legal PIE on Nu-Hope. Nothing in the report alerts him. Nu-Hope is legally chartered and licensed. No tax problems. No liens or lawsuits. No record of hearings before medical boards. The PIE goes into some detail on Nu-Hope’s past history as an abortion clinic. It was a legal enterprise, apparently efficiently run, with no history of malpractice suits.
The changeover from abortion to fertility clinic occurred four years ago after continued harassment of patients by antiabortion groups severely interrupted business. Personal threats against January and his staff had been reported to law enforcement agencies.
Nu-Hope is totally owned by Dr. January, although he has established a very generous pension, retirement, and profit-sharing plan for his employees. In brief, the clinic appears to be a legitimate, successful enterprise, much admired in the medical community for its profits, high pregnancy rate, and the quality of its research department, headed by Dr. Phoebe Trumball.
Cone tosses the report aside and pulls his phone forward. He calls Neal Davenport, the NYPD detective he met on the Clovis swindle. It takes three calls to locate the city dick, but he finally comes on the phone.
“Timothy Cone?” he says. “The financial Sherlock and Wall Street whiz? How’re you doing, buster?”
“Surviving. And you?”
“Likewise. How did you like those newspaper stories on the Clovis scam? Haldering got a nice plug—right?”
“Right,” Cone says. “The old man was flying.”
“And that’s why you’re calling—to thank me. Correct?”
“Not exactly.”
Davenport laughs. “I didn’t think so. What do you want?”
“I got two names for you. I thought you might run them through Records and see if either of them has a sheet.”
“Now why should I do that?”
Timothy Files Page 14