Van Klees bowed. “You’ve probably guessed, of course, at the cloning in Los Alamos. I could start with a single embryo, let it divide, then separate the unspecialized cells. By repeating the process again and again, I would have dozens of identical embryos, which I would store frozen. Again, easily available technology. An embryo can last for years, with an excellent chance of revival.
“Once I had a supply of wombs to nurture the embryos, the set-up was perfect. First, I had control specimens. Three embryos, untouched, brought to full-term. Identical triplets.”
“The boys,” Slater said.
Van Klees nodded. “Yes. Now nearly ten years old. Each additional embryo received a minor chromosome change, letting me compare the new results to the originals.”
Van Klees shrugged. “Some embryos self-destructed almost immediately. Others lasted well into gestation. Still others survived birth. I was able to judge quite closely the sections of the chromosome that dictate size, and I believe in future experiments, I will be able to produce some specimens to grow to nine, maybe ten feet at maturity.” He sipped more brandy. “One, a very interesting specimen, had extremely high adrenaline production. He was twice as strong as the control specimens. I may return to tweaking that section of the chromosome. Unfortunately, his temper literally killed him at the age of two when his heart exploded. I’ll need to find a way to solve that.”
“I can’t believe I’m hearing this,” Paige said.
“Don’t be barbaric,” Van Klees snorted. “Try to appreciate the difficulties I went through just to set up the logistics. Some scientists work on fruit flies. Much easier. Fruit flies replicate in far greater numbers, and their generations are measured in days. Human specimens gestate over nine months and take years to mature. I had to show extreme patience.”
“Why?” Slater said. “How can you justify this?”
“That isn’t obvious? For the good of the human species. Any genetic change you make in an embryo will be passed on to the next generation. I was laying the groundwork for future scientists to evolve us into superhumans. Hitler tried to do it by elimination of less desirable specimens. I’m doing it by producing superior specimens. Eventually, much like Homo sapiens took over the Neanderthals, Homo supersapiens will be a much better and dominant race. In the long run, we can mold the human species to our own vision.”
“For that,” Slater said through clenched teeth, “you drowned the boys.”
Van Klees arched an eyebrow. “Very good deduction. When there was no longer any use for a specimen, I didn’t care to risk any structural changes by injecting them with a poison before preserving them. Who knows how a contaminated specimen might compromise future research? And trust me, minute examination of each of those specimens would release realms of new data. My trouble was I simply didn’t have the time for that grunt work myself.”
“You are insane,” Paige hissed.
“A trite cliche. But fear not, I don’t expect better from you. Much closer to the truth is psychopath.” He smiled. “I can’t expect you to understand that such definitions are merely a way for the entire whining, snapping pack to try to impose their limitations on people such as me. And because packs can represent such danger, except for rare occasions like this, I hide my brilliance.”
“Psychopath bereft of conscience fits. If you had a conscience, you wouldn’t experiment on humans.”
“Again, my dear. Trite. Very trite. You, in the manner of so many other pathetic creatures, stubbornly cling to the quaint belief that humans have souls.”
“Love,” Slater said quietly. “Explain love.”
The question caught Van Klees off guard.
“There is no biological explanation for love,” Slater said. "No gland that dispenses it. And you talk about trillions of cells. Where in the fabric of all that complex protein would love come from if not from an invisible soul, given the miracle of life?”
“I refuse to be derailed into a discussion of such nonsense.”
Slater leaned forward. “Then I assume when you mentioned immortality, you meant an immortal body, that you are one of those too poor in spirit to understand an immortal soul.”
“Who cares about an immortal soul when you can have immortality through genetics?” Van Klees immediately began to glow with fervor. “Yes, we can clone embryos. The next step? Cloning from an already-mature specimen. Think of it! Every cell in the body contains all of the genetic information of the original cell. Skin cells, blood cells, each cell has the blueprint potential for the entire body. Enzymes, however – methylase enzymes – force the new cells to specialize to their various tasks. If you could stop a cell from differentiating...”
Van Klees paused for breath. He was pacing again. “I’ve been finding ways to repress the differentiation. Not just me. Other scientists. They’ve worked on frogs. It’s gone so far that TechnoGen can take a single cell from an adult frog and have it begin to develop all over again, now getting as far as the tadpole stage before breaking down.”
He opened his hands expansively. “Then apply the demethylase research to humans! I’ve been able to fool one of my own testicle cells into thinking it was as unspecialized as the embryo I once was. When I first began, I was only able to grow it from one cell to sixty-four cells before it self-destructed. Later, cells grew to the point where I could successfully implant them into the womb. One of my greatest triumphs reached the seventh week of gestation.”
Van Klees saw Slater shaking his head in disgust.
“Have you no vision?” Van Klees shouted. “Once I am able to clone myself, I will be able to replicate every single body part I need. Modern surgery makes transplantation a risk only when the body rejects the new organ. How can my body reject a duplicate of itself? Heart, lungs, kidneys, bone marrow, even arms and legs. That alone will double my life span. And within fifty years, I’m sure we will be able to do brain transplants. Imagine that! The greatest men on earth – the ones who have proven it by accumulating wealth and power – will be able to use that wealth and power to keep themselves alive. The poor and the useless wouldn’t ever be able to afford to clone themselves or the expensive transplants. Another way to raise the level of our species!”
“Is that what ‘Jack Tansworth’ promised to your military connections?” Slater asked. “Long life?”
“Of course. Retirement like none other in the history of the military. Or humankind. I would be able to raise clones for them. An eighty-year-old with the heart of a twelve-year-old would have little fear of death!”
“Have we heard enough, Paige?”
“Too much,” she told Slater.
Slater stood and unbuttoned the front of his shirt. It showed the taped wires of a recording unit.
Van Klees laughed. “Simpletons. You think I didn’t anticipate something like that?”
Van Klees reached into his back pocket. He pulled out a small plastic case, half the size of a garage-door opener. “Why do you think I hopped around the country using various identifications? Each identification was a safety parachute. Police stormed my New York office for John Hammond. They’ll never find him. Military people in Washington can send out their best bloodhounds for Jack Tansworth. He’s gone too, All along Josef Van Klees has been preparing for this day. Huge sums previously siphoned to Swiss banks. And this morning’s television publicity gave me enough warning to move the bulk of Hammond’s and Tansworth’s remaining funds to the same place.”
He pointed at his plastic control. “This is yet another fail-safe. On the slim – and in retrospect very real – chance you or someone else might appear here in Chicago before I was ready to leave for Europe tonight.”
He mocked them with another smile. “New identity there. Enough money to continue my research. You haven’t stopped me.”
Van Klees used his thumb to press a button on the plastic transmitter.
“Perhaps you noticed a van parked on the street? My round-the-clock surveillance crew. As I speak to you now, two men are r
unning to my door from the van. Not-very-nice men who are accustomed to killing people for an appropriate sum of money.”
Van Klees laughed again. “All right, boys and girls. Listen for the sound of the opening door. “
Five seconds later, the front door did indeed swing open. The sound of heavy boots on hardwood floor reached them all very clearly.
***
The man who stepped into the sitting room wore a full military uniform, ribbons and medals pinned regulation height on his broad chest. His cap covered a massive bald head. His scowl showed razor-sharp lines radiating from dark, intense eyes.
Van Klees dropped his brandy glass, splashing liquid against his trouser cuffs.
“Thank you, Mr. Ellis,” Gen. George Stanley said.
“Yes sir.” Slater used his cane to push himself upward.
“My aides have recorded everything. Mr. Ellis, as promised, the conversation will reach our president. You have my word that within the year, legal guidelines will be established and enforced for all genetics experiments.”
“And you have my word,” Slater replied, “that your involvement will not reach the media through us.”
General Stanley nodded, then turned his attention to Van Klees. “Jack – or should I call you Josef? – you seem surprised to see me. Your hired guns wisely decided my soldiers outside weren’t a good risk.”
Van Klees, probably unaware of it, was biting his lower lip.
“Our mutual friend here, Slater Ellis, visited me around noon in D.C.,” the general continued. “He showed me some computer disks with some interesting spreadsheets, bank account figures, and my name and my involvement. At the same time he asked me what I would do if I had three identities and two of those identities were wanted men, and how I might react knowing my third and much safer identity had access to millions of dollars in another part of the world. Funny thing is, I told him I’d probably make a run for it. What a coincidence. Seems you were thinking the same thing, Jack.” The general waved his hand as if brushing away a fly. “Or John. Or Josef.”
General Stanley unbuttoned his holster and withdrew his pistol. “Jack, Mr. Ellis didn’t come to me to make any blackmail money, although he knows and I know he probably could have named his price. He came to me because he thought if I had any blame in what had happened, perhaps I would also like the chance to undo as much of it as I could.”
With the pistol safely pointing at the floor, General Stanley slid back the bolt. “I’m dying of cancer, Jack. You know that, don’t you? Money means nothing to me. I can now understand deathbed confessions, the urge to die with a good conscience. Even if my soul rots in hell along with yours, I wanted a chance at death with honor, Jack. So Mr. Ellis and I, we made a trade. He got what he wanted. Me? I’ll get to try to salvage my honor.”
General Stanley lifted the pistol and pointed it directly at Van Klees’s head.
“Mr. Ellis, you have the necessary papers,” Stanley said without taking his gaze away from Van Klees.
“I do, sir.”
“Please hand them to the professorly looking type across the room who has just emptied his bladder in a very cowardly manner.”
Slater extended a pen, too, to Van Klees. “Darby had a pretty good record of your bank accounts. I have some money background of my own, and it didn’t take long to get these financial documents by fax. Sign at the Xs. This will discharge all the funds into my care. You should be happy knowing the money will be used to help all the women and children who survived your Los Alamos base.”
Van Klees signed without protest.
General Stanley lowered the pistol.
“Good-bye, General,” Slater said. He hobbled at Paige’s side as they began to leave the two men alone in the sitting room.
“Those papers will be useless,” Van Klees finally managed to say. “Any lawyer will prove they were signed under duress. I’ll be using that money to fight my legal battles.”
The general raised his gun again. Neither Slater nor Paige hesitated. They’d promised to give him privacy.
“Jack,” the general said as they reached the hallway. “You are forgetting that all I have left is my honor. There won’t be a legal battle. Not for you. Not for me.”
Paige closed the door behind them. They hadn’t reached the steps to the lawn before the first shot rang clear and loud behind them.
The second shot followed closely.
“Are you all right?” Slater asked her.
“I told you earlier,” she said. “I detest snakes.”
***
They were driving along Lake Shore Drive, the highrise apartments throwing long, evening shadows that almost reached the waters of Lake Michigan to their immediate left.
“That’s that?” Slater Finally said to break a long silence.
“That’s that,” she said.
More silence.
Slater figured maybe five more minutes before they reached the downtown loop and then the Eisenhower Expressway out to O’Hare. He figured on the expressway their departure would gain momentum, and she’d be out of his life.
“I’ve noticed a lot of women over thirty consider any guy who’s single, straight, has a steady job, doesn’t beat women, and keeps his fingernails clean a good catch.”
She turned her stare out toward the white sails cutting the horizon of the darkening lake. “You saying I look desperate to find a man?”
“I’m trying to be funny. Blame it on nerves.”
Finally she reacted. She turned away from the lake and gave him a smile. “You? Nerves?”
Slater braked for a traffic light. “In case you didn’t notice,” he said, “I’m throwing myself at your feet.”
He said it dryly, hoping the contrast between his exaggeration and tone would amuse her.
Strangely, her face seemed to grow bitter as she considered him. “I may be pregnant.”
He nodded and pursed his lips, like suddenly he understood. Although he didn’t. “Maybe we should pull over somewhere, grab a coffee,” he said.
The smile partially returned to her eyes. “I’m glad you said coffee,” she said, “not latté or cappuccino.”
***
“So, have you known the guy long?” Slater asked, fighting the sinking feeling in his heart.
“Which guy?” Paige hadn’t touched her coffee. To Slater, she looked great, her hair highlighted by the sun shining through the restaurant window at a low angle across her face.
“Which guy? The, um, father.”
“How can it matter? He’s dead.”
“Darby?”
Silence again. A tightness grew around her eyes. She stared directly at him and spoke without pinching. “No, not Darby. The guy the general just killed.”
Slater tried to comprehend.
“You know,” she said. “Hammond. Tansworth. Van Klees. Whatever name he decided to die under.”
Slater now did comprehend and didn’t like it. “You mean what he said about falling for Italian suits and obscene bank accounts...? You and he actually...?”
She giggled. “Slater, you should see the look on your face. Like you’re swallowing a cactus and trying to pretend it doesn’t hurt”
Just as suddenly as she had giggled, she became serious. “No,” she said, “not like that. It was when he had me in the operating room. Remember? When he was going to cut up my face if you didn’t tell him what he wanted.”
“Yeah,” he said. “I remember.”
“It happened then, Slater.”
His hands around his coffee cup tightened. She noticed and half smiled.
“Not like that,” she said. “He did it like a doctor, implanting an embryo the way they do it in hospitals when a women gets...,” Paige took a deep breath. She was not going to cry, “when a woman gets artificially inseminated.”
They let restaurant chatter around them fill their next silence. The waiter came with refills, gave them a dirty look because they’d decided not to order any food.
&nbs
p; “There’s a moderate chance he was successful. If I’m pregnant, I’m going to keep it.”
“Was it an embryo he experimented on?” Slater asked.
“From what he said, I don’t think so,” she answered. “But does that matter? The embryo is a baby. A human. Unless it develops in such a way that birth becomes impossible...”
Slater wisely just listened as she struggled with obviously powerful emotions.
“Look,” she finally said, “I didn’t really know I was going to keep it until I heard what you said today. I’d been telling myself I’m Christian and all that, but I thought this baby wouldn’t be mine, it was like I was raped, and surely I could excuse myself for considering not keeping it.”
“What did I say today?” Slater asked.
“Love. You said if you’re looking for proof of soul, don’t look further than love. And I realized ending this baby’s life puts me in the same state of mind that lets a scientist begin to think of embryos as some protein with interesting experimental possibilities. I want to be on the other end of the spectrum. Where life is a gift, something sacred from God. Those cells inside me are not only duplicating, but creating the machinery for a soul to live a lifetime of chances at giving and absorbing love.”
She was crying softly now.
Slater didn’t patronize her tears. She had good reason to cry, and he wasn’t going to trivialize it by patting her shoulder and telling her it would be all right.
When she finished, he had his next words ready. “I wouldn’t be afraid to try to help you raise the baby.”
She stared at him.
“I mean if we Fit together the way I think we do.” This woman did make him nervous. “I’m not proposing this second. I just don’t want you flying out of my life in the next hour.”
Paige softened and smiled.
“But I’ve got to tell you something first,” he continued, less nervous after her smile. “About why I was in New Mexico. Think of it as part two of my retirement story.”
She straightened.
“You get the short story, though. It’s about the brother who joined me in my investment firm and found creative ways to spend our clients’ money and make it look like my doing.”
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