The stuttering, thick speech and blinking were worsening.
"I can't believe Drew would be aware of what happened and not say anything."
"He . . . he was f-frightened of the c-onsequences if he confessed. . . . He . . . he asked me to help. I couldn't say no. He was my son. I saved his life—his . . . his career. I took care of what policemen I had to. . . . And— and then look what Andrew did: He has made me look like a fool! . . . All these years, a f-fool. And now, he is threatening to t-take everything from me—everything!"
LeMar's speech was intensely rushed and pressured now, and the slurring of his speech was more pronounced. He was still animated and speaking with his hands, but Gabe could see now that his right arm was not moving nearly as much as his left. In fact, it was barely moving at all.
"LeMar . . . ?"
"Later, I did what I c-could to be certain it didn't go too h-hard for you. . . . I-I got you the best lawyers. I-I talked to the judge on the case and h-helped him with a little matter. . . . I-I got you the minimum sentence possible."
His stroke was clearly evolving now, his speech thicker and more forced. His arm was hanging limp.
"Mr. Stoddard," Alison said urgently, racing to support the man before he fell over.
But LeMar Stoddard ranted on, making his tongue and his lips form thick, clumsy words, it seemed, by the sheer power of his will.
"I have proof. . . . I have proof what he did." He began fumbling with the brass zipper on the case, all the while muttering, "I have proof. . . . I have proof."
His leg gave way completely, so that Alison could no longer bear his weight. Gently, she lowered him to the floor. Gabe was out of his chair now, kneeling beside the man. He checked the pulses in LeMar's carotid arteries. Both were present.
"I think hemorrhage, not clot," he said to Alison. "But I guess it could still be either."
"The case . . . the case."
Gabe slid back the zipper and removed a large, sealed heavy plastic bag containing the steering wheel from a car—an old car. There were smudges of powder in various spots.
"From the accident?" he asked.
"The car you b-borrowed . . . only his fingerp-prints. . . . None yours. . . . Kept in a safe all these years."
LeMar Stoddard could speak no more. His eyes closed and his head lolled to one side. Spittle appeared at the corner of his mouth. Alison took her jacket and folded it between his ear and the floor. His breathing became deep and sonorous.
Gabe slipped the steering wheel back into its case and stood up painfully. Then he held Alison closely.
"I was so sure something had happened to you."
"Nothing that matters now," she said, stroking his hair away from his forehead.
"Do you want to call the cops?" he asked.
"Will you be all right?"
"For now. I've got to go downstairs and have a serious talk with the man in the bunker."
CHAPTER 64
Gabe only had to push the electronic buzzer by the bunker door once. In seconds a narrow panel in the center of the door slid open.
"Hey, Doc," the president said, fully awake with the immediacy and clarity of an emergency physician . . . or a head of state, "why so early?"
"We've had visitors, Drew. But it's okay now. The threat's over."
The heavy bolt on the inside slid open. In the dim light, it took several seconds for the extent of Gabe's injuries to register. Stoddard quickly helped him inside and into a chair.
"Were they after me?" Stoddard asked.
"Not really," Gabe replied. "They were after me. I knew too much."
"And I slept through the whole thing?"
"Probably just as well."
Stoddard, wearing cotton pajamas and a light robe, poured some water for each of them.
"Tell me," he said.
Uncertain how much longer he could remain upright, Gabe gave a terse, though complete, account of the attack on The Aerie by two killers, employed to protect the secrecy of a massive scientific facility exclusively owned and run by Drew's father.
"The two men are both dead."
"You did that?"
"I don't even want to think about it. Treat Griswold is dead, too."
The president looked surprised but not shocked.
"You again?"
"Alison. She was following him. He tried to kill her."
"I'm glad she's all right."
"No thanks to Griswold. He tortured her, but she escaped. We can talk more about that later. Turns out Griswold was the one we came here to get away from—the one with the transmitter. Your father had found a way to blackmail him into poisoning you. Griswold kidnapped young girls from Mexico and kept them for his pleasure."
"Treat and my father," Stoddard said. "Who can you trust?"
"Well, clearly not them."
"I wish I were more stunned to learn it was my father. Is he still alive?"
"For the moment. Initially there's no way to know with strokes, and his is a big one."
"Dad had that heliport built on the roof. The Aerie was so well constructed that almost no shoring up had to be done. I'll call rescue."
"Do that. Tell them they may have to make two trips."
"How bad are you hurt?"
"For someone who's been shot twice and bashed around, not so bad."
"Will LeMar make it?"
"He might. No matter what, his life as master of all he surveys is over. Given the best he'll have to look forward to, I think he would opt for a quick end."
"I'm sorry. No matter what, he's still my father."
"It doesn't seem like he ever had his priorities straight."
"Well, my friend, you certainly have gone above and beyond the Hippocratic oath in this one."
Gabe shifted in his seat to find a position he could handle for a few minutes more.
"Drew, I'm not sure how much longer I can remain upright. But before we go upstairs, I want you to have this."
He handed over LeMar's case and the president opened it, peered in at its contents, then slowly pulled the zipper closed.
"From Fairhaven?"
"Your father got ahold of it after the accident. He says your fingerprints are all over it. None of mine."
"I was going to speak to you about Fairhaven after this business—the election—was over," Stoddard said. "It's been hard for me."
"Drew, it's been hard for me!"
"I . . . I was so frightened of my father that night, of what might happen. Turns out he knew all the time."
"He said you petitioned him to keep you out of trouble."
"I . . . well, maybe I did. It's been a long time."
"Gee, it's been just that long since I was in prison and I remember every detail of every day I spent there, Drew. I remember my father being too ashamed to speak to me right up until the day he died. I remember going to AA meetings and lying to everyone by saying I was clean and sober when I couldn't stop popping pills all the time. You're fortunate that your blackout seems to have been more selective and lasted much longer than mine."
"I tried to make up for what I did by the way I conducted my life."
"The country is grateful to you. You've been a hell of a president."
"Are you going to go public with what I did? You know I won't have a prayer at getting reelected if you do."
"I don't know, Drew. Right now, I don't know anything except that I'm almost fifty-three years old and more than half my life has been lived under the cloud of two murders I didn't commit."
Stoddard crossed to where his jeans were hanging and from the pocket pulled an envelope folded in half.
"This letter reached me soon after I was elected four years ago. I was going to give it to you when I told you . . . about the accident. Then, right before I left for Camp David yesterday I took it with me."
Gabe took the envelope and extracted a single sheet of plain typing paper, written in pen in uneven print.
Mr. President,
Irina Kursova and I
were ready to get married when she was killed by a car you were in. My son Dimitri in her womb died also. I cannot find the man Singleton who was the driver with you that night. If I could I would kill him. I know you are protecting him, but if you send his address to Milton, care of 253 Nolan Street, Annapolis, 01409, I will do the rest.
"The man who tried to kill me—twice," Gabe said. "Someone must have showed him that article in the paper announcing I had joined your team. After all these years, suddenly there I was back in town."
"His name isn't Milton. It's Leon. Leon Uretsky. He works as a baker in Bowie. The address belongs to friends of his. The Secret Service found him pretty easily, but aside from a few threats, there wasn't anything they could do. I didn't know he had gone after you until you told me about the attempted shootings."
"You could have told me about this letter when you flew to Tyler, Drew," Gabe said wearily. "You could have told me a number of things that you chose not to."
"I'm sorry. Truly I am."
"More than thirty years. Such pain to want to kill even after thirty years. Did this man ever marry?"
"Not as far as I know."
"I want his contact information, Drew. I want it as soon as you can get it to me."
"Gabe, listen, I—"
"And you know what else I want? I want you to find him and go to him."
"But—"
"Tomorrow, Drew. I want you to find Leon Uretsky and go to him and tell him that it was you who was driving that night. Do that or I swear, you will have made the decision for me, and I'm going straight to the papers and anyone else who will listen."
"But you're going to see him, too?"
"Yes. If he'll let me. He and I need to talk. We need to talk about pain . . . and loss. We need to talk about you."
"It will finish me, Gabe. If this gets out, it will finish me and everything I have stood for."
"Maybe." Gabe pulled himself up and hobbled toward the door. "Maybe it will."
CHAPTER 65
It was the first time Gabe had been in Fairhaven, Maryland, since the accident. Working off a MapQuest printout, he removed his sling and negotiated the streets through a steady drizzle. His mood was as somber as the evening. In the trunk of his rented Honda, his bags were packed. In the early morning he would leave Alison in the hotel room they were sharing and head to the airport for the trip home to Wyoming.
Three days had passed since the nightmare at The Aerie. He had not returned to the White House, nor did he ever intend to enter the place again. He had spoken to the president only long enough to ensure that he had honored Gabe's demand to personally visit Leon Uretsky.
It had required more than an hour in the operating room to debride the wounds in Gabe's hip and shoulder. Gratefully, there was nothing critical to repair, and he left the hospital twelve hours later. After that, he had spent as much time as possible with Alison when he wasn't giving statements to the investigators from the Secret Service and police. What Alison's plans were after everything was cleared up remained uncertain, but he was hopeful they would somehow include him.
The shot that had brought down Treat Griswold, she told him—the improbable, remarkable shot—was one she had made over and over in her mind as she lay tied up, humiliated, and in continuous agony in the basement of the house on Beechtree Road. During those endless hours, what little hope she hung on to became focused in that shot. None of the hundreds she imagined ever missed its mark.
Several times during the nights they had spent together, Gabe held her and dried her tears at the notion of having taken a life the way she did—even one as monstrous as Treat Griswold's. The story she shared of her battles in L.A. to clear the name of a fellow nurse, and also her subsequent torture at the hands of Griswold, more than justified her actions in Gabe's eyes. But there were tears nonetheless.
Gabe's own reaction to having killed the men sent to kill him was far more tempered—certainly less anguished than on the two occasions in his life as a physician when his decisions, forced during raging medical emergencies, contributed to the death of a patient.
Pine Grove Cemetery.
With a heaviness in his heart, and even some trepidation, Gabe left his car on the street and entered the small cemetery through a wrought-iron arch, using a cane for support. In his other hand he carried a single rose. Through the gloom and the persistent drizzle, he could make out the silhouette of a man, standing motionless by one of the stones.
Thirty years.
The man, about Gabe's height but thinner, had his head bowed. He looked up as Gabe approached. His face was narrow, his posture proud.
"Singleton?"
"Gabe."
"All right. If you wish, Gabe. I accept you calling me Leon."
Uretsky spoke with just the hint of a Russian accent and Eastern European phrasing.
"Thank you for seeing me like this."
"I have twice tried to kill you. Meeting you seems the least I could do."
"I'm glad you weren't so good with your guns."
"The truth is, Doctor, I am quite good. I was a marksman in the Russian Army before I moved here at age twenty-five. The weapons I used those two times were mine, bought some years ago for target practice . . . to stay sharp. For all those years I thought about revenge. Then, at the last minute, both times, I just could not do it. Thirty years ago I could have, I believe. I tried to find you after you left prison, but I was a recent immigrant and had little means. Each trail took me no place and cost me money. Finally, I just gave up. But I never forgot. Then, when a friend showed me the article about you—"
He was unable to continue.
Gabe moved a step nearer to Uretsky, unsure whether the moisture on his own cheeks was from the drizzle or from his eyes. One thing was certain. In that instant, he felt an indescribable closeness to the man.
"You loved her very much," Gabe said.
"I was put on this earth to love her," Uretsky replied. He motioned to the headstone, which had both the names Irina Kursova and Dimitri Uretsky inscribed. "And I believed you took her from me. Her and my son."
"We had no right to drink like we did and no right to drink at all, then drive."
"No one does. You sent the president out to see me because you knew I'd never believe you if you told me he was the one."
"Do you believe me now?"
"I do."
"For thirty years I have had to live with Irina's and Dimitri's deaths if not as painfully as you have, then nearly so."
"Stoddard did you a deep wrong not to tell the truth from the beginning."
"I agree. I can't begin to tell you what getting kicked out of college and then spending a year in a maximum-security prison was like. In some ways, though, Leon, you have broken the spiral of tragedy by your unwillingness to take my life. There is nothing more wonderful you could have done for your Irina."
"Perhaps," Uretsky said. "Perhaps you are right. Are you still leaving as you said on the phone?"
"I am. First thing in the morning. I have had enough of Washington and politics."
"Do you think we should let the public know the secret of the man they have entrusted with their country?"
"I haven't really decided. You?"
"I need to think—to go back to baking my bread, and to think. Irina had only been in this country for six months when she died. She had already made great progress with her English."
"I think we should keep in touch, you and I—speak every week or two. I would like to get to know you better, and I wish to know what you decide. If you decide you need to go to the press, I will probably choose to support you."
"Andrew Stoddard has hurt us both."
"Badly. But for both of us there is still life. Now, I suppose, it is he who will suffer. Drew can be self-centered and callous, but he is also very human. Regardless of what we decide to do, he will suffer. Do we need revenge for what he has done? I don't know. I really don't know."
"Someone else can run the country."
"He's done a good job, I think, but yes. Someone else could run it and maybe do just as well."
"Maybe better. I need to think."
"I understand."
"I have the number you gave me in Wyoming. I promise to call."
"And I have yours."
"We need to talk some more—to share our feelings."
"I think so, Leon. I think we can be of help to each other."
"I could use that."
"So could I."
Gabe set the rose down at the base of the stone. He nodded toward Uretsky, acknowledging their bond, stood there for another silent minute, then finally turned and hobbled back toward the gate.
EPILOGUE
The scene might have been an oil by Frederic Remington or a photograph by Bert Greer Phillips. The barn . . . the cabin . . . smoke curling from the fieldstone chimney . . . the hitching rail . . . vapor rising from the nostrils of the three saddled horses . . . the pure white rime, covering the ground for as far as the eye could see . . . the slate-colored sky . . .
Midwinter on the high plains.
Bundled against the deep chill, Gabe burst out the back door of his ranch, purposely leaving it ajar. He mounted Condor with fluid, experienced grace, wincing just a little at the stretching of five-month-old scar tissue near his shoulder and his hip.
"Come on, you guys," he called out. "I want to be as far away from civilization as possible when the clock strikes ten."
"Hold your horses, my friend," a man's voice called back. "The lady is helping me get my boots on. Hey, hold your horses—that is very funny, no? You really are holding your horses."
Finally, Alison emerged into the cold in a leather rancher's coat with a heavy fleece collar and a western hat with a rattlesnake band and eight-inch feather.
Radiant, Gabe thought, as he did every time he saw her. Absolutely radiant.
The First Patient Page 34
