Deadly Science

by Ken Brigham

  “Did you learn any additional provenance for the gun? Where did the dealer procure it, for example?”

  Hardy wasn’t sure exactly what provenance meant and was relieved that Shane clarified his question.

  “Not much,” Hardy answered. “Said he got it from a dealer in Houston who specializes in very rare firearms.”

  “Did you get the name of this Houston dealer?”

  “Yes,” Hardy said. “Wrote it down.”

  He took his pad from a shirt pocket and thumbed through it.

  “Here it is,” he said. “Jergensen’s Rare Guns. I got a phone number and an address from the Internet. They have a pretty fancy web site.”

  “Why don’t you give those to me and I’ll follow up with the Houston folks while you pursue wee Jody in the hinterlands.”

  “Good plan.”

  Hardy smiled. While he didn’t relish the thought of probing at the soft underbelly of the music scene, he was starting to think that he was making progress with the case. It was possible that the pieces were starting to fit together. He liked that. He especially liked the idea that there might be a solution that made sense.

  Shane, too, thought that this was a lead that bore investigating. He recalled the Holmesian dictum that one arrived at the right answer by first eliminating all of the wrong ones. But when he remembered the fleeing person who must have been the culprit, the unusual gait, and what he had learned from his Internet search, he still harbored the possibility that the person they were looking for was a woman. It was not rare for a subtlety to trump the obvious as the complete story unfolded. Shane was forever suspicious of the obvious, the trail too cleanly made. In this Adventure of The Devil’s Foot revisited, time would tell.

  Katya was enjoying the fact that Beth Bartalak came to work less often, and when she did come in worked shorter days than had been her habit. But it was unusual behavior for Beth and Katya wondered about it. Maybe Beth had less to do as the studies of Cy’s drug wound down.

  The phase I-II studies were designed for only a six month follow up. Bonz Bagley was the first subject enrolled in the study and had completed the last follow up lab studies before his untimely death that had precluded Katya’s final clinical exam that would have completed the study protocol. It was those six month follow-up lab studies of Bagley’s that concerned Katya. If the information she had lifted from Beth’s computer was indeed from Bagley, which was almost certainly the case, Beth had some serious explaining to do. But identifying a study subject and linking the person’s identity unequivocally to the data wasn’t easy.

  When people volunteer to participate in the study of an experimental drug, they are guaranteed anonymity. There is a committee that reviews all such studies called the Institutional Review Board (inevitably known by its initials, IRB) and they must okay an agreement to be signed by the subject and an investigator responsible for the study that includes an explanation of the potential benefits and hazards as well as the guarantee that no data will be linked to the subject’s personal identity. Of course, the scientists doing the study know who the subjects are, but there is supposed to be a firewall that separates the data from personal information. A master key exists that links study numbers with identities, but that is supposed to be isolated from the investigators who are actually doing the study. It is usually the data analyst, a biostatistician, not directly involved in subject interactions, who is responsible for maintaining the firewall. For this study, that person was Beth Bartalak.

  It was in another Monday meeting with Cy that Katya broached the subject. Beth hadn’t been at these meetings recently, which gave Katya the opportunity to raise the issue with her boss. They met as usual in Cy’s opulent office. He enfolded in the big leather desk chair and she perched on the uncomfortable straight chair opposite him. She was fine with that. Cy’s intended symbolism of the seating arrangement had no effect on Katya. While she respected the fact that he was her boss, she felt that she was his equal in every other way. She was, in fact, quite confident of that.

  “Is Beth okay?” Katya approached the subject carefully; she did wonder if there was something wrong with Beth other than her excessive devotion to her husband and her obnoxious personality.

  “Why do you ask?” Cy leaned forward with his elbows resting on the desk and looked into Katya’s face.

  “Just wondering. She’s in the lab a lot less than usual. I just wondered if something was wrong.”

  “I don’t think so, although she has seemed a bit distracted recently,” Cy said.

  He had thought that Beth was acting a little strange but hadn’t pursued it.

  Although he was a psychiatrist, Bartalak studiously avoided trying to analyze the behavior of people he was close to. He thought that such a subjective business was hazardous because one couldn’t isolate the analytical process from the myriad other factors that influenced how one perceives another person. Beth was Beth as far as he was concerned. He felt no need to understand her beyond that.

  “Cy,” Katya said, “we really need to talk about the clinical data from this drug study.”

  She had decided to take this on head first and see where it went. Katya was used to putting all the cards on the table with nothing up her sleeve and felt most comfortable doing business that way. It was a style very different from how Cy went about things which, in his opinion, gave him the upper hand in most circumstances. He heaved a deep sigh and stood up and walked to the window.

  “Katya, Katya,” he said. “Why can’t you drop this? The study is done. The data are analyzed. We know the outcome and we’re ready to move forward with the drug. Why are you so determined to cause trouble? Let it be, for Christ’s sake.”

  Katya sat without responding as Cy returned to the chair behind his desk. Neither of them spoke for a few minutes and the tension was clear. Finally Katya spoke.

  “Cy,” she said, looking directly at him, “if there isn’t some explanation for the data I retrieved from Beth’s computer, there’s going to be really big trouble. Whether I’m the one who stirs it up or you leave it to the FDA auditors won’t matter in the long run. In fact, if what I suspect is true, you’d be better off discovering it internally and doing something proactive.”

  Bartalak realized that he was going to have to hear Katya out, although he had no intention of doing anything proactive that would queer the deal on this drug. There were always glitches in the process of getting a drug through the early phase testing. It would all get sorted out with the phase III studies and by then, he and the early investors could have cashed in their chips if things started looking doubtful. He’d done it before. He knew how to handle this process. Katya was hopelessly naive about how the real world works. He would hear her out and make whatever promises necessary to pacify her. But he was on a roll with this drug and nothing was going to stop that. He knew exactly what he was doing.

  “Okay, Katya,” Cy said. “Tell me exactly what’s troubling you.”

  Katya cleared her throat and thought for a moment about exactly how to say what she had to say as accurately and dispassionately as possible. She believed that she had credible evidence that at least some of the data from the study had been misrepresented in the analytical summaries that Bartalak had seen and used to hype the drug to current and potential investors. But this was not a time for histrionics. If there were some explanation, she just wanted it clearly stated so that everyone involved understood. If there wasn’t, there would be hell to pay no matter when it was discovered or who discovered it.

  “I was able to download some of the files of raw data from a couple of subjects in the drug study,” Katya started.

  “You had no business doing that,” Cy interrupted. “I told you to stay away from Beth’s computer and you deliberately disobeyed me.”

  “That’s true, Cy,” Katya responded. “But hear me out. You may even agree before this is over that the ends justified the means.”

  “Rarely true, Katya, my dear. Rarely true.”


  Ignoring him, Katya continued. “At least one of the files I have indicates a severe deterioration in cognitive function and a marked increase in the brain biomarker protein at the six month follow up. From the dates, I think this must have been subject number one, which we all know was Bonz Bagley. That would fit with my observations of him, and he is the only subject to have undergone the six month follow up tests. While he completed the laboratory tests a week or so before he died, he was killed the day before I would have seen him for the final clinical exam. But, I’ve seen no data like his lab tests in any of the summaries that we’ve reviewed.”

  There. She had said it.

  “So, let’s get some things straight here, Katya,” Cy said, folding his hands and resting them on the desk in front of him. “You’ve been after Beth ever since we moved here, haven’t you? Are you now telling me that she has fudged the data? I find that impossible to believe, and your antagonism toward her makes the accusation even more dubious. Beth has worked with me on drug studies in the past. She knows exactly what she’s doing. She knows how to deal with data. She’s the data expert, Katya, you’re not. And an accusation like this is not going to do anything positive for your career, you know. You’re a brilliant neurologist with a bright future, and something like this could derail things. You might find it difficult to recover from that.”

  The threat was thinly veiled. She hadn’t expected it, at least until Cy had looked into matters and had some credible way to defend Beth. His response showed little concern about whether or not what she had told him was true. He seemed only interested in defending his drug, his wife, and the process that got them where they were. It was hard for Katya to believe that a scientist, and Cy was a widely respected medical scientist, was more concerned about appearances than truth. But Cy Bartalak appeared incapable of telling the difference.

  “So,” Katya responded after enduring Bartalak’s diatribe and giving him a chance to settle down a little, “what are you going to do?”

  He stood again and assumed his familiar position profiled against the office window. Katya was again impressed at what an ugly man he was. He seemed to her at that moment even uglier than usual.

  “Katya,” he said, still looking out the window, “you have stated your suspicions, and I appreciate that. You were, of course, obligated to make me aware of your concerns.”

  He walked back to the desk and sat down, resuming his folded hands pose and looking directly into Katya’s eyes.

  “I will follow up on this information in the way I deem appropriate. You will turn over all of the data files that you have to me and forget about them. You are not to mention this to anyone else. You have done your duty and I will do mine. You’ll just have to trust me on that.”

  “What are you going to do?” Katya repeated.

  “My job,” Cy answered. “And I suggest you do yours.”

  He was right, of course. Katya knew that as well as he did. But the problem for her was that she didn’t trust him to do what she believed needed to be done. Talk about a conflict of interest! He was married to the person who’d done the cheating! There was a viper in his bosom that could very well prove fatal whether or not he was willing to believe it.

  Katya wasn’t happy with the outcome of this conversation, but she wasn’t sure what to do about it. She could, of course, lodge a formal charge of scientific misconduct against Beth. But that would trigger an investigation by the university. Those were never pretty sights. A charge against the wife and major collaborator of a department chairman with a national reputation who brought in God knows how much money to the institution would require some pretty incontrovertible evidence to stick. Regardless of the outcome, Katya wouldn’t emerge unscathed. She could very well be a victim of the process, no matter how things turned out.

  Well, for the time being, she would play by her chairman’s rules. She would wait to see what he did. She would give him the data files…..after making copies for herself.

  Chapter 12

  Hardy was tempted to take the back roads west from town out toward Hickman County

  where his information indicated former Grand Ole Opry star Little Jody Dakota was living out his waning years. Those roads wound through the low hills that rimmed the city. They wandered through the remnants of villages that had once thrived in a small farm economy and now were wasting away—storefronts abandoned, gas stations left with rusting hand-crank pumps that once fueled the internal combustion engines powering the machines that tilled the brown dirt and moved its tillers about the countryside. No longer.

  But Hardy had no connection with that past life. He was a city boy and he didn’t care to be reminded of his state’s decaying rural history. He was vaguely aware of that history, but it didn’t really concern him. He maneuvered the big car up the ramp onto the interstate and headed west.

  Hardy had called Jody Dakota’s home before heading out and the woman who answered the call gave him directions—an interstate exit number and the instructions for navigating the maze of two-lane roads leading to the locked gate behind which the former country music star had retreated from the world that promptly forgot him when it ceased to be amused by his antics. Hardy pulled his standard-issue black LTD up to the gate, got out of the car, and looked about.

  Sunlight filtering through the dense green leafy pall that shrouded the area scattered big white rings of light across the grassy expanse beyond the gate. Hardy was struck with the penetrating silence of the place. He couldn’t imagine living so far away from human activity. What would you do out here? Who would there be to talk to? Why in the world would an entertainer choose to hide away in such a remote place, so far removed from the babble and clatter of public life? Hardy recalled the few summers when he was sent away to an uncle’s North Carolina tobacco farm to work where the profound silence kept him awake nights. They weren’t pleasant memories. He didn’t get the appeal of the rural life. For one thing, it was hard work. Granted, the part of the city where he grew up had its flaws; it wasn’t an elegant upbringing. But it was real. At least that’s how Hardy remembered it. He didn’t understand the pull of naked land. Connecting with people was what made life worth living. Without those connections, what’s the point?

  On the way out of town, Hardy had stopped off at a Handy Pantry to pick up a cup of coffee for the trip and had yielded to the siren call of a pack of Camels that lay in wait behind the cashier. He had done pretty well with his latest effort to kick the habit over the past week, but the flesh was weak that afternoon. He took the pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket, carefully peeled away half of the foil top, and tapped the pack against his hand to summon one of the little beauties. He put it to his lips, flicked the red disposable lighter with Handy Pantry lettered in white on the side, and lit up. He rested a foot on the car bumper and drew the lovely warm smoke deep into his lungs, holding it there for a few seconds and then slowly exhaling. This would be his last pack, he thought to himself. He meant it this time.

  While he smoked, Hardy pondered the case. He was starting to have some second thoughts about involving Shane Hadley. While it made the process more interesting, Hardy feared that Shane was headed in the wrong direction. If there was any history that could be a motive, then Jody Dakota made a much more likely culprit for Bonz Bagley’s murder than Shane’s hypothetical young affluent athletic woman. And Jody’s historical penchant for violence, Bagley’s at least peripheral connections with the music world, and the fact that the two of them were of a similar vintage, certainly raised the possibility of a motive.

  The woman Hardy had spoken to on the phone told him to call when he was at the gate and someone would open it for him. He dropped the cigarette butt, ground it into the dirt with the heel of his comfortable policeman’s shoe, pulled his cell phone from an inside jacket pocket, and punched in the number. After a couple of rings, there was a loud buzz, a click, and a long low hum as the gate drifted slowly open. He closed the phone, got into the car, and wended his way along the r
utted dirt track up the short hill to the home of Little Jody Dakota and presumably the youngish sounding woman to whom Hardy had spoken on the phone.

  It was an unpretentious house, a one-story bungalow probably dating from the fifties when the style was popular. The house was brick with dark green shutters flanking the windows. The front door opened from a small concrete stoop shaded by a sloping roof. The door was painted an incongruous shade of robin’s egg blue that stood out from the house’s red brick façade and the surrounding greenery.

  As he approached the house, Hardy wondered whether he should have brought another officer with him. If this guy really was a murderer, Hardy might be taking more risk than he intended. He had the feeling that a person could disappear out here and nobody would be the wiser. But the woman on the phone had been amiable enough, gave him the directions and invited him to “come on out,” saying, “Jody’d be glad to talk with you.” And now Hardy was past the point of no return. Hardy knew that he was pushing the envelope. The Metro police had no jurisdiction outside of Davidson County, so Hardy thought it unwise to involve anyone else. In fact, he hadn’t told anyone about this little foray into the hinterlands. He was breaking some rules and was entirely on his own. He knew that.

  As he got out of the car and walked toward the door, Hardy patted his chest, feeling for the familiar contour of the 40 caliber Glock model 22 in his shoulder holster. It felt solid under his searching hand. He was OK. He had brought a friend that had served him well and could be relied on and wasn’t limited by territorial boundaries. He didn’t have many friends like that.

  To reach the front door, Hardy had to skirt the considerable bulk of an aging Mary Kay pink Cadillac parked directly in front of the entrance to the house. Just as he had a fist poised to knock on the door, it opened suddenly, jerked wide open by a young woman wearing cowboy boots and a red-checked gingham dress, the full skirt billowing up around her tan thighs in the breeze rushing through the opened door.