Shock

by Robin Cook

  Joanna tapped on Deborah’s shoulder. When Deborah turned, Joanna frantically pointed toward Spencer’s hunched figure.

  Deborah looked at Joanna and silently mouthed the question, “What should we do?”

  Joanna shrugged her shoulders. She had no idea, but then thought it best if they called out to the man. She gestured by touching her mouth and then pointing toward Spencer.

  Deborah nodded. She cleared her throat. “Dr. Wingate!” she called, but her voice was tentative, and it blended seamlessly with the chorus of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony emanating from the living room.

  “Dr. Wingate!” Joanna called more decisively and loud enough to compete with the music.

  Spencer’s head popped up and shot around. For a moment his tanned face blanched, and he stood up so quickly his desk chair tipped over with a crash.

  “We don’t mean to frighten you,” Deborah called out quickly. “We were hoping we could have a word with you.”

  Spencer recovered rapidly. He smiled with relief when he recognized the women, then waved for them to join him as he bent down to right his desk chair.

  The women started for the room. Both were acutely sensitive to Spencer’s reaction to their presence, which so far was auspicious. His initial fear had changed to surprise with a hint of reassuring delight. As they approached, he slicked back his silvered hair and adjusted his velvet smoking jacket. But as the women came into the light his expression changed to puzzlement.

  “What happened to you two?” Before the women could respond he asked: “How did you get in here?”

  Joanna started to explain about coming in through the basement while Deborah launched into a capsule of their evening.

  Spencer raised his hands. “Hold up! One at a time. But first, do either of you need anything? You look terrible.”

  For the first time since the ordeal started, the women looked at themselves and at each other. Their appearance brought expressions of embarrassment to their faces. Deborah had fared the worst with her minidress torn and tattered and abrasions on her thighs and shins from the lip of the iron lung. One of her dangling earrings was gone and her tiny heart necklace had lost all its rhinestones. Her hands were black from the elevator cable grease, and her hair was a tangled mess.

  Joanna still had on the doctor’s coat, which had protected her clothes to a large degree. But the coat itself was a soiled mess, particularly from crawling prostrate on the barn floor. A few stalks of hay protruded from the pockets.

  Deborah and Joanna then exchanged one of their knowing glances. The combination of their appearances and anxieties brought forth a fit of laughter which took them by surprise and a moment to recover. Even Spencer found himself smiling.

  “I wish I knew exactly what you women are laughing at,” Spencer said.

  “It’s a combination,” Deborah managed. “But probably mostly tension.”

  “I think it’s mostly relief,” Joanna said. “We were hoping you’d be here and unsure if you’d mind if we dropped by.”

  “I’m pleased you came by,” Spencer said. “What can I get you?”

  “Now that you ask, I could use a blanket,” Deborah said. “I’m freezing.”

  “How about some hot coffee?” Spencer said. “I could make it for you in a moment. Even something stronger if you’d like. I could also get you a sweater or a sweatshirt.”

  “Actually, we’d like to talk right away,” Joanna said. “There’s some urgency involved here.” She laughed nervously again.

  “This blanket right here will do,” Deborah said. She picked up a tartan throw from a velvet couch and tossed it around her shoulders.

  “Well, sit down,” Spencer said. He gestured toward the couch.

  The women sat. Spencer grabbed his desk chair and pulled it over. He sat across from them.

  “What’s the urgency?” Spencer asked. He leaned forward, glancing from one woman to the other.

  The women looked at each other.

  “Do you want to talk, or do you want me to?” Deborah said.

  “I don’t care,” Joanna responded. “It doesn’t really matter.”

  “I don’t care either,” Deborah said.

  “Of course you know the biology better than I,” Joanna said.

  “True, but you can explain about the computer files better.”

  “Wait, wait, wait!” Spencer said, holding up his hands. “It doesn’t matter who does the talking. Someone start.”

  Deborah pointed to herself, and Joanna nodded.

  “Okay,” Deborah said. She looked Spencer in the eye. “Do you remember last night when I asked you about the pregnant Nicaraguan ladies?”

  “I do,” Spencer said. Then he laughed self-consciously. “I might not remember too much else about last night, but I remember that.”

  “Well, we think we know why they are pregnant,” Deborah said. “We think it’s to produce eggs.”

  Spencer’s face clouded. “They’re pregnant to produce eggs? I think you have to explain.”

  Deborah took in a lungful of air and gave her explanation. Following that explanation which she admitted was supposition, she went on to say that the Wingate Clinic was definitely obtaining eggs by an even more unethical and even unlawful manner. She explained that the clinic was removing, without consent, the entire ovaries of unsuspecting women who thought they were only donating a few eggs. Finally Deborah said that at least two women had been murdered because both ovaries had been obtained, and the women had never been seen again.

  Spencer’s mouth had slowly dropped open during Deborah’s monologue. When she finished, he sat back, clearly horrified by what he’d heard.

  “How did you learn all this?” he asked with a raspy voice. His throat had gone dry. Before either woman could respond, he added: “I have to get a drink. Can I get anything for anyone else?”

  Both Deborah and Joanna shook their heads.

  Spencer stood up on mildly unsteady legs and got himself over to a built-in liquor cabinet. He opened it and poured himself a splash of neat scotch. He tossed off a portion of it before returning to his chair. The women watched him intently and noted the tremor in the hand holding the tumbler.

  “We’re sorry to have to tell you all this,” Joanna said, speaking up for the first time. “As the founder of this clinic to help infertile couples, it must be disturbing to hear what has been going on.”

  “ ‘Disturbing’ is putting it mildly,” Spencer said. “You have to understand that this clinic has been the culmination of my life’s work.”

  “Unfortunately there’s more you should know,” Deborah said. She went on to describe the cloning and how once again unsuspecting women were being exploited. Then she told in graphic detail about the chimeric infants being gestated in pigs in the farm which she and Joanna had just discovered. After this final piece of shocking information, Deborah fell silent.

  The women watched Spencer. He was clearly distraught, running his fingers repeatedly through his hair and unable for a time to make eye contact. He polished off the last of his scotch in a single toss and winced.

  “I appreciate your coming to me,” Spencer managed. “Thank you.”

  “Our motivation wasn’t entirely altruistic,” Joanna said. “We need your help.”

  Spencer lifted his face and stared at Joanna. “What can I do?”

  “You can get us out of here,” Joanna said. “The Wingate Security force is searching for us. They have been chasing us since we managed to get into the egg room. They have a pretty good idea what we know.”

  “You want me to get you off the premises,” Spencer said.

  “Exactly,” Joanna answered. “We’ve got to get out through the gate.”

  “That won’t be difficult,” Spencer said. “We’ll drive out in the Bentley.”

  “We want to make sure you understand exactly how much they want to catch us,” Deborah said. “I mean, this is a very serious situation. We cannot be seen. I’m sure they’d stop even you if they s
uspected.”

  “I imagine you are right,” Spencer said. “To make sure there will be no problem, you two can squeeze into the trunk. It’s not going to be comfortable by any stretch of the imagination, but it would only be for about five minutes, or ten at the most.”

  Joanna looked at Deborah. Deborah nodded. “I’ve always wanted to ride in a Bentley; I suppose the trunk will do.”

  Joanna rolled her eyes. She couldn’t understand Deborah’s motivation for joking at that point. “I could deal with being in the trunk. In fact, under the circumstances I’d probably feel safer in the trunk.”

  “When do you want to do it?” Spencer asked. “Sooner is probably better than later. I’ve been known to go out for late drives on occasion, but anything after two A.M. would be suspicious.”

  “I’m all for sooner,” Joanna said.

  “I’m ready right now,” Deborah added.

  “Let’s go,” Spencer said. He slapped his thighs as he got up.

  Spencer led the women back through the kitchen where he picked up his car keys off the countertop before entering the garage. He went directly behind the Bentley and keyed open the trunk.

  The women were surprised at the small size.

  “It’s because of the storage for the automatic convertible top,” Spencer explained.

  Deborah scratched her head. “I guess we’ll have to spoon.”

  Joanna nodded. “You’re biggest, so you get in first.”

  “Thanks a lot,” Deborah said. She climbed in headfirst and rolled onto her side. Joanna followed suit bending her body to fit in against Deborah’s. Spencer slowly closed the lid to make sure there was no problem with arms and knees, and then raised it again.

  “It’s actually more comfortable than the iron lung,” Deborah commented.

  “What iron lung?” Spencer asked.

  “That’s another story,” Deborah said. “Let’s get this current chapter over with.”

  “All right, let’s go!” Spencer said. “Now don’t panic. I’ll stop and let you out as soon as it’s reasonable. Okay?”

  “Button it up!” Deborah said cheerfully, trying to make the best of a bad situation.

  The trunk lid came down with a thud and an expensive-sounding click. Once again the women were thrust into darkness. The next thing they heard was the garage door retracting, followed by the car engine starting.

  “I guess we should have thought about coming to Spencer earlier,” Deborah said. “We could have saved ourselves some grief.”

  The women felt the car back out of the garage, do a three-point turn, and then motor down the driveway to the street.

  “This is an ignominious way to be leaving this place,” Joanna said.

  “At least we’re leaving.”

  “I felt rather bad for the good doctor,” Joanna said after they’d driven for a while.

  “What we told him certainly took him by surprise.”

  They drove in silence for the next few minutes while the women tried to guess where they were. Eventually they felt the car come to a stop with the engine still going.

  “We must be at the gate,” Deborah said.

  “Shush!” Joanna said.

  The trunk lid was so well insulated that the women couldn’t hear anything until the engine revved again, and even then it was more vibration than noise. After they’d driven a short distance they could tell they were on gravel. A few minutes later the car stopped again, only this time the engine was turned off.

  “You’d think he would have driven a bit farther away from the gatehouse,” Joanna said.

  “I was thinking the same thing,” Deborah said. “But hell, at least we’re outside the gate, so we might as well ride in style.”

  They heard the welcome sound of the key in the trunk lock, followed by a popping-up of the trunk cover. Joanna and Deborah looked up, and their hearts leaped in their chests. Spencer was nowhere to be seen. Instead they were looking up into the sneering faces of the Wingate security chief and his henchman.

  MAY 11, 2001

  9:35 A.M.

  SPENCER LOOKED OUT FROM

  his office window at the expansive, verdant lawn. Beyond were the spire of Bookford’s church and a handful of chimneys sticking up through the budding trees. It was a pleasant sight, and it helped to a degree to calm his roiling emotions. He couldn’t remember the last time he was quite so overwrought. To make it worse, he’d not slept in more than twenty-four hours and was still recovering from his recent alcoholic debauchery.

  Spencer cleared his throat. “What concerns me is not just what the women knew, but how they found out.” Spencer turned from the window and faced Paul Saunders and Sheila Donaldson, who were calmly sitting in armchairs in front of his desk. “I mean, I was blown away when those two women showed up inside my house, especially since you supposedly had a small army looking for them. If that doesn’t smack of incompetence, I don’t know what does. But more important, if those two could find out in one day everything that you people have been doing around here, so could someone else.”

  “Spencer, calm down,” Paul urged. “Everything is under control.”

  “ ‘Under control,’ “ Spencer repeated sarcastically. “If this is under control I can’t imagine what things would have to be like to be out of control.” He returned to his desk chair and sat down heavily.

  “We’re in full agreement,” Paul said calmly. “We know we must find out exactly how the women managed to find out what they did.”

  “They knew about gestating human clones in pigs,” Spencer said. “You didn’t tell me about that last night. For chrissake, what’s that about anyway?”

  “It’s to rid us of dependence on the Nicaraguan women,” Paul said. “As soon as we’ve perfected the technique, that will be a major source of new eggs apart from the oogonia cultures.”

  “Well, how the hell did they learn about it?” Spencer roared.

  “We’ll find out,” Paul said. “Trust me!”

  “How can you be so confident?” Spencer demanded. “Kurt Hermann and his bozos have been grilling those women down in the gatehouse since three A.M., and you admitted yourself five minutes ago, they’ve learned nothing.”

  “I beg to differ,” Sheila said. “I’ve been doing the debriefing so far, not Kurt, and it’s not true we’ve learned nothing.”

  “You’ve been talking with the women?” Spencer questioned.

  “Absolutely,” Sheila said. “It was under my specific orders that I be paged the moment they were apprehended. As we’re trying to tell you, we’re just as concerned as you about uncovering their methods. And we are making progress. For instance, we’ve learned that it was your access card which got them into both the server room and the egg room.”

  “Oh, I see,” Spencer said, glaring back at his two supposed subordinates. “So I’m to blame for this debacle.”

  “Allotting blame is not our intent in the slightest,” Paul said.

  “That’s not a lot of information after six hours,” Spencer said.

  “They are extremely intelligent women,” Sheila explained. “They recognize that the information they have is important. They are not pushovers by any stretch of the imagination, but I’m being patient.”

  “We’re using the good cop, bad cop routine,” Paul explained.

  “Exactly,” Sheila said. “Obviously, I’m the good cop. While we’re having our meeting, Kurt is having his first go at talking with them. He’s the bad cop. As soon as we finish here, I’ll go back down and intervene. I’m confident we’ll have all we need to know by noon at the latest.”

  “Once we have the information,” Paul said, “we’ll make the appropriate operational changes. We’ve already started in regard to computer security. From now on, access to the server room will be limited to Randy Porter alone.”

  “We should look at this whole unfortunate affair as a learning experience,” Sheila said.

  “Precisely!” Paul chimed in. “And we should look at it as a
further stimulus for us to move the entire clinic, research labs and all, offshore like we discussed last evening. By the way, Spencer: What did you think of the plans I gave you last evening for the Bahamian Center?”

  “The plans looked good,” Spencer admitted reluctantly.

  “And your response in general to the idea of moving offshore?” Paul asked.

  “I must admit I like it,” Spencer said. “I like the idea of having even less regulation than we’ve had to deal with here, even if that hasn’t been that much of a bother.”

  Spencer nodded. “Let’s get back to the women. What’s to happen them after their debriefing?”

  “I don’t know,” Paul answered.

  “What do you mean you don’t know?” Spencer demanded, feeling his ire rise again.

  “I don’t want to know,” Paul said. “I leave that kind of problem up to Kurt Hermann. That’s what we pay him for.”

  “You leave the problem to Kurt Hermann and yet retain the ovaries,” Spencer sneered. “Is that what you are telling me?”

  “Harvesting the ovaries was a mistake we made in the past,” Sheila interjected. “There’s no doubt we shouldn’t have done it. We realize it now, and it will not be repeated. As an explanation, it happened back when we were struggling with a critical egg shortage.”

  “A shortage which we no longer have,” Paul added. “With the Nicaraguan connection plus the progress we’ve made with our oogonia culture technique, we now have at our disposal an almost unlimited egg supply. Hell, we can probably supply the cloning needs for the whole country.”

  “Are you two trying to suggest to me that you are not disturbed by this episode?” Spencer asked.

  Paul and Sheila exchanged glances.

  “We certainly take it as a serious event,” Sheila said. “It’s a learning experience as we said. But it has been contained just like the episode involving the anesthetic catastrophe. Even if this episode with these two meddling women had not ended so auspiciously, we would have been able to cope.”