Flashback

by Gary Braver

  Jack clicked on a few terms and found himself getting lost in the details. After nearly an hour, he came to a cluster of links to more medically slanted sites concerned with the toxin and possible neurological problems. A few enumerated the venom of various species that were clearly dangerous to humans but which were being researched for potential medical application—all very scientific. Out of curiosity he explored some of the archival abstracts of papers published in obscure journals.

  Scrolling down a long list Jack came to a dead stop. For a long moment he stared at the screen in numbed disbelief:

  Sarkisian N., Nakao M., Sodaquist T. A novel protein toxin from the deadly Solakandji jellyfish. Biotechnology Today 66: 97—102, 1969.

  What nailed his attention was the name buried in the authors list: Sarkisian, N. Nevard, Armenian for “Rose.” Her professional name.

  His mother.

  The realization came to him in a stunning moment of awareness: She had coauthored an article about the toxins of the same jellyfish that had rendered him comatose. As if in autoreflex he read the beginning of the abstract, trying in a side pocket of his mind to put it all together:

  The deadly Solakandji jellyfish Chiropsalmus quadrigatus Mason is rare and distributed in the tropical Caribbean and equatorial Atlantic. Four fatal cases due to stings from this species have been officially reported. C. quadrigatus toxin-A (CqTX-A, 43kDa), a major proteinaceous toxin, was isolated for the first time from the nematocysts of C. quadrigatas … CqTX-A showed lethal toxicity to crayfish when administered via intraperitoneal injection (LD50=80 g/kg) and hemolytic activity toward 0.8% mice … .

  The arcane scientific language meant nothing to him. But it was his mother’s words, her fierce intelligence expressed in her adoptive language. The coincidence was almost too much to grapple with. And yet, he sensed a logic and some greater import, like watching a Polaroid photo slowly develop.

  He moved the cursor back to the search box, typed in “Solakandji N. Sarkisian,” and hit the Search button. Four articles came up listed under “Hydra Library”:

  Sarkisian, N.A., 1969. Isolation and determination of structure of a novel polypeptide extracted from marine organism Chiropsalmus quadrigatus Mason. Pure Appl Chem 14: 49.

  Sarkisian, N.A., 1970. The potent excitatory effect of a novel polypeptide, protopleurin-B, isolated from a rare jellyfish (Chiropsalmus quadrigatus Mason). J Pharmacol Exp Ther 14: 443—8.

  Sarkisian, N.A., 1972. Pharmacologically active toxin from a rare tropical jellyfish. Various neurological activities demonstrated in maze-patterned behavior in laboratory animals. J Pharmacol Exp Ther 17: 226—233.

  And there were others with her name and coauthors. From what he could determine, his mother had been involved with the identification of some properties in the jellyfish toxin that over time had been found to have some effect on lab animals with potential pharmacological implications.

  He then went back to the less technical sites, those of general information on the species, and looked up pages that gave its habitat. After scanning several articles about the creatures’ encounters with swimmers off various Caribbean islands, he got the hit he was looking for—an article written by a reporter for the Cape Cod Times: “Fish Out of (Home) Waters,” with the subheading : “Writer finds tropical fish in an unlikely place—Homer’s Island”

  For years scuba divers have reported seeing exotic strangers such as butterfly fish, triggerfish, and angelfish around the point of Buck’s Cove of Homer’s Island in late summer and early fall. They are not so much visitors as prisoners of the sea—swept north by the Gulf Stream when they’re the size of a button.For most of them, the journey is a one-way trip, and their time is limited. They’re doomed to die when the water temperature falls as winter approaches … .Among the visitors spotted by aquarists are cobia, black drum, and stingrays. Even a juvenile lionfish was captured two years ago … .But the most unusual finds in recent years were the meter-long Solakandji jellyfish, which are usually found in the Caribbean and Pacific …

  JACK WAS NOT CERTAIN WHAT HE had found, but what stood out in his mind was the fact that his mother had decided to publish under her maiden name and not her married name, Najarian. Had she gotten caught up in the woman’s liberation movement? Did she decide to distinguish her professional self from her married self? Or were she and his father so estranged?

  That last possibility sat festering in his brain as he left the library and headed home.

  Jack knew almost nothing about his biological father or his parents’ marriage. He had also never visited his father’s grave.

  So why all of a sudden was he calling ahead for the exact location? And why spend the better part of two hours driving to Cedar Lawn Cemetery in Cranston, Rhode Island?

  A little late to be showing respect for the man who had sired him, he told himself.

  Or do we smell the proverbial rat?

  THE CEMETERY OFFICIALLY CLOSED AT SUNSET.

  In his rental, Jack arrived an hour before that. The directions given to him by the administration office were perfect.

  LEO K. NAJARIAN

  There was no inscription. Just the incision of the Armenian cross and the dates.

  What Jack knew about his father was that he had come to this country from Beirut, Lebanon, and settled in Rhode Island, where he had relatives, all dead now. That was the Armenian immigrant pattern. But apparently the two sides of his family were not close; after his mother’s death Jack had almost no contact with the few people on his father’s side.

  Perhaps it was strictly a professional decision to use her maiden name. Perhaps their marriage was in trouble and she was receding from it. His aunt and uncle told him nothing about their relationship. And even if they had marital problems, what was the point of his knowing?

  He looked at the headstone, his eyes filling up as he took in the name of the father he had never known. The man who was just a name and a couple of faded photographs.

  For most of his life, Jack felt the absence of a real father the way amputees suffer phantom limbs. His uncle Kirk was a nice man, but too infirm and too distant to fill the void that left Jack wondering just what it would have been like to have had a real father to have done things with. “Hey, Dad, let’s play catch.”

  Who were you?

  Who am I?

  “Sorry, Dad,” he whispered, feeling a deep, searing guilt that he had ever entertained the hideous suspicions that the man buried here was the creature in the dream—the thing in the hood with the mallet.

  He put down the pot of flowers he’d bought and through the mist took in the headstone. It looked so stark. Only the years were listed: 1931—1972. No month and date—which seemed odd, since the surrounding headstones gave complete birth and death dates.

  Whatever, he had come and paid his respects, and now it was time to get back to the here and now. And he limped back to his car and drove home, thinking about calling René Ballard. She had some explaining to do.

  78

  NICK’S FUNERAL TOOK PLACE THAT SATURDAY morning at St. Athanasius Greek Orthodox Church in Arlington, Massachusetts. René was numb with grief.

  Hundreds of people had turned out, drawn from the greater medical and health-care community. She recognized several faces and joined Alice Gordon and staffers from Broadview, Morningside, and other nursing homes. In the front pews sat Nick’s wife of thirty years, Thalia, their two sons, and their grandchildren. He was always showing René his photos of them. Now they looked lost in disbelief that he was gone.

  From her aisle seat at the rear of the church she watched the mourners file in, recognizing several of the trial PIs and MGH people. She also spotted GEM Tech executives and scientists. Gavin Moy, in dark glasses, and some associates seated themselves in a pew ahead of her. Jordan Carr was with them. As he passed by, he stopped and gave her a squeeze of condolence on her shoulder. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered, then filed in beside Moy. René nodded and wept quietly.

  In a short tim
e, the vast interior of the church filled up, dozens of people standing ten-deep in the rear and pressing down the outer aisles under the stained-glass windows.

  The official story was that Nick had lost his balance—a combination of precarious footing, strong winds, and possibly vertigo. Rumor had it that Nick had been given to dizzy spells—and at the high elevation in early morning light he might have had a destabilizing experience for one fatal second. Park authorities had reported snow flurries during the night and early morning winds with gusts up to fifty miles an hour.

  All throughout the service, René was distracted by a small filament of uneasiness glowing in her gut. Every so often it would flare up, but she would close her eyes and will it away.

  Later, at the grave, where the priest in his robe and headpiece pronounced the final benediction, her eyes floated over the large crowd of mourners and came to rest on the entourage of GEM Tech people standing in close file around Gavin Moy—various executives, marketing people, physicians, lawyers, officials from the FDA, and other power brokers.

  Jordan Carr acknowledged her with a nod and a flat smile. Their collective somberness was appropriate, but it still could not dispel that little hot-wire sensation spoken earlier by one of the nurses in a whisper: How convenient was Nick’s death.

  79

  JACK HAD LEFT SEVERAL MESSAGES ON René Ballard’s cell phone and had nearly given up on her when she returned the call on Tuesday. She had taken some personal days following the death of a friend, she said.

  Because it was a bright, warm day, Jack suggested they meet at Fins, a seaside bistro in Portsmouth. René was waiting for him at a table on the deck under an umbrella. Behind her, the Atlantic spread out gloriously, the sun dancing off the surface as if covered with diamond dust. Jack ordered a sparkling water and under the table he slipped his briefcase with printouts of some of the material he had found online. When René removed her sunglasses, her eyes were red and tired-looking, her face drawn.

  “I’m sorry about your friend.”

  She nodded. “It just shouldn’t have happened. He was such a good person.” Her mouth began to quiver and she shook her head. “Sorry.”

  “Nothing to be sorry about.”

  The waiter arrived with Jack’s drink.

  René took a sip of her wine. “So, what did you want to show me?”

  She looked up at him, and for a brief moment he felt himself taken in by her eyes. The hard blue crystals were softened by her tears. He felt a warm rush in his chest and wanted to put his arms around her. But he pushed away those thoughts. “They’re gobbledygook to me,” he said, and laid before her what he had printed from the journal archives.

  René looked at them. “I found some of these myself when I first heard about you.”

  Jack lay his finger on the authors’ line. “That’s my biological mother. Her maiden name was Sarkisian. Koryan is from my adoptive uncle.”

  She looked at him in disbelief. “What?”

  “But it’s not so grand a coincidence when you put it together. Homer’s Island is one of the only places on the Northeast where these creatures ever show up, and she had rented the place specifically for that reason. She was a biochemist, and from what I gather … Well, you tell me.”

  While Jack sipped his water, René silently scanned the pages of the articles, occasionally nodding and humming recognition to herself. After a few minutes, she looked up. “This is incredible,” she began. “But I think your mother helped identify the biochemical structure of the toxin. Her name is listed first, which is protocol for principal investigators. And this one a year later links it to its neurological effects on cognition and memory.”

  “Which is why the last one she coauthored talks about lab mice and maze problems.”

  “Yes, which means … I don’t believe this … not only did she help identify the biochemical structure of the compound, but I think your mother discovered the neurological benefits of the toxin.”

  “You mean the Alzheimer’s drug?”

  “Yes.” She looked up at Jack in dismay. “You’re sure this is your mother?”

  “How many biologists from MIT named N. A. Sarkisian do you think there were?”

  René nodded. “Then she must have known Nick Mavros.”

  “Nick Mavros?”

  “My friend who just died.” She reached into her handbag and pulled out the obituary from the Boston Globe. The headline read “MGH Neurologist Falls to His Death in Utah.” “He was chief PI of the Memorine trials,” she said in dismay. “He also did the imaging work on you when they brought you into MGH. This is unbelievable.”

  Jack stared at the photo of Dr. Nicholas Mavros. “He came to visit me at Greendale.”

  “He did?”

  Jack felt a hole open up in his gut.

  “Just one more question, if you don’t mind.”

  “One of those standard memory test questions.”

  “He came to ask about my mother.” Jack stared at the obit photograph, then pulled up his briefcase and rifled through the papers until he found the photograph he had discovered in the old albums boxed in the cellar of his rented house. “Son of a bitch.” He turned the photograph so René could see it.

  “That’s Nick,” she said.

  Shot in front of an auto parts store, the photo was of a younger, leaner Nick Mavros with long, black, shoulder-length hair, smiling at the camera, his arm around the shoulder of Jack’s mother, who grinned happily, her head tilted toward Nick Mavros. They both wore white lab smocks. And they looked so together.

  “They must have been in the same research group as grad students.”

  Jack’s eyes were stuck on the image of Mavros. “He asked me twice if I remembered her.”

  “One of those standard memory test questions.”

  “What was your mother’s maiden name?”

  But they already knew that from Dr. Heller’s tests days earlier. Then Jack thought of something and fingered through the packet of articles until he found what he was looking for:

  “He even wrote about it with her,” he said and showed her the abstract.

  Sarkisian N. A., Mavros N. T., et, al. 1971. Neurotoxic activity on the sensory nerves from toxin of the deadly Solakandji tropical jellyfish Chiropsalmus quadrigatus Mason. Chem Pharm Bull 17: 1086—8, 1971.

  “My God, I found the abstract for this same article, except I didn’t know she was your mother.” Then she picked up another article and scanned the pages. “Listen. ‘Proteinaceous toxin from the nematocysts of C. quadrigatus found effective in facilitating attentional abilities and acquisition, storage and retrieval of information, and to attenuate the impairment of cognitive functions associated with age and age-related pathologies in mice.’”

  “Translating as what?”

  “That they were moving down the pipeline toward Memorine.” She looked at the other articles and abstracts he had printed up. “Nick’s name appears only on this one, but she’s on all these. The last with her name on it is from March 1975.”

  “Because she died in August that same year.” Jack was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “He was testing me.”

  “Testing you?”

  Jack could still see the shift in the man’s face. “I think he wanted to know how far back I could remember. Like early childhood. Like the night she disappeared.”

  René’s eyes seemed to veil over. “Jack, what are you trying to tell me?”

  “That he may have known something about her disappearance. That he may have been the visitor to the cottage that night. That maybe he’s the figure in those flashbacks. That maybe he killed her.”

  René’s head recoiled as if Jack had punched her. “That’s outrageous.” Her voice was scathing. “Nick was a wonderful and compassionate man.” Suddenly her face began to crumble. “How dare you say such things? He just died, for God’s sake.”

  “He knew her and never said anything. He never said, ‘I remember your mother.’”

  “Maybe he did
n’t know she was your mother. You have a different name.”

  “Then why did he ask her maiden name? Heller had already established that. He wasn’t there to check for brain damage. He wanted to hear it from me. Son of a bitch! I had a weird feeling about him the moment he showed up. He probably wanted to know if I remembered him from that night.”

  “Why would he want to kill her?”

  “I don’t know. I know nothing about him and practically nothing about her, except that they knew each other. And he wanted to know if I remembered her. You put it together.”

  “That’s absolutely insane.”

  “Then tell me why he was pussyfooting around, why he didn’t say he had been friends with her.” And he held up the photo.

  “I don’t know why. But he’s dead, and I don’t want to hear his name slandered, okay?” Her eyes blazed at him through her tears. She looked down at the photograph. “Besides, it’s been thirty years, for God’s sake. There’s no way to know what happened that night.”

  “Yes, there is.”

  For a moment she stared blankly at him.

  “It could take me back to that night.”

  “Christ! We’ve already been through this. I’m not stealing any Memorine. Period.”

  He expected that, of course. And she was probably right. The stuff can’t be fine-tuned. It’s unpredictable in its effects. It may not even work. But as he sat there under her angry glare, it crossed his mind that deep down where the sun didn’t shine maybe René didn’t want him to remember what he saw that night—and who was under that rain slicker.

  “This is the last I’m going to say about it, but I think you’re stuck on a foolish and sick idea just to satisfy some neurotic obsession.”