Elixir. Part 8

"It's not against the law to get rid of somebody who's not doing his job."

"But you've been doing your job. It's not your fault you can't get the G.o.dd.a.m.n stuff to yield. Is there anybody you can call? Somebody who knows new techniques?"

"I've tried them all. If it can be done, it's beyond me." He got his clothes together.

"You're the best they've got."

"Maybe that's the problem." Chris wiped the tears from her face and kissed her. Then he took his insulin shot, got dressed, and left.

Darby Pharms was located in a small complex of buildings fas.h.i.+oned in a red brick Tudor motif. The original building was once a private residence that had since been expanded over the years as the company grew to sixty employees, creating a series of buildings handsomely landscaped to look like a small English village.

At 8:20 Chris pulled into his slot. In the Executive area sat two cars: Ross Darby's big black Mercedes sedan and Quentin's gray 450 SL Coupe. The colors of power and wannabe power.

Chris went inside. The interior was eerily quiet, as if holding its breath. He could sense the tension from the foyer. He cut through the maze of offices. Quentin was at the door of Ross's office suite holding a coffee mug. He was dressed in jeans and a sweats.h.i.+rt and looked as if he'd been up all night.

"Have a seat," Darby said as Chris entered. He was also casually dressed-a blue s.h.i.+rt and black V-neck sweater. His face looked ashen and haggard. From their grim appearances, Chris was certain that this was his dismissal.

Quentin began. "Chris, we called you in because, quite frankly, we have something of a problem with your work here. You have been with us for fifteen years, and in those fifteen years we counted on you-"

Chris cut him off. "Quentin, if you're firing me, please just say it and save us a lot of trouble."

Quentin's face filled with blood. "I don't like your att.i.tude."

"And I don't like you calling me at seven o'clock on Sat.u.r.day morning without explanation."

"It's about your mice," Quentin said.

"We've been through this already."

"I want Ross to hear."

Ross got up. It took him a moment to straighten up. He walked to the coffee machine, stretched a kink out of his lower lumbar, then poured himself another cup. In spite of chronic back problems, he looked good for a man over seventy. He was tall and still quite trim, and his face usually radiated with a rich, healthy l.u.s.ter-the product of regular games of tennis. It was easy to imagine the das.h.i.+ng young quarterback from Eureka. Today Ross Darby looked his age. They had probably been up for hours mulling over the terms of dismissal.

"Chris, I want to apologize for all the mystery, but I preferred to talk with you in person. Quentin told me what you said, but I'd like to hear it firsthand if you don't mind."

Chris liked Darby because he was cla.s.sy at managing people. He always treated you with respect and patience, and never had to raise his voice. He made you feel that when you talked there was nothing else in the universe he wanted more to do than to listen. Unlike Quentin, he was never petty; if something bothered him, he never let on unless it was important. "As I explained, I tried to save us time by testing toxicity."

"We moved beyond animal testing over a year ago."

"I didn't want to see the animals die."

"So, for two years you played mouse doctor at our expense," Quentin said.

It was just like him to jawbone Chris about costs to impress Ross before announcing he was canned. When little men cast long shadows, you knew the sun was setting. "Yeah," Chris said.

"That's horses.h.i.+t."

"Quentin, get on with it," Darby said.

Quentin removed a packet of papers and handed it to Chris. "Look familiar?"

"An inventory of some sort?" Chris said.

"That's right, and you know of what?"

Darby cut in again. "Quentin, this isn't Perry Mason."

"It's an inventory of requisitions from your lab," Quentin continued. "And maybe you can explain a few items."

"Like what?"

"Like how over a five-year period from 1980 you placed orders for 582 exotic mutant mice at $170 each-five times the next most expensive mouse, I should add-for a grand total of $98,940. I called Jackson Labs and they told me that mus musculatus s.e.xtonis stock number JR 004134 is an albino mutant Amazonian agouti-whatever the h.e.l.l that is-with a lifespan of eleven months. What we'd like to know is what the h.e.l.l you were doing with $100,000 worth of short-lived mutant mice."

"I was doing life-cycle studies."

"Really? For nearly one fiftieth the price you could have gotten mice with twice the life span. What the h.e.l.l was the rush?"

"You're the one who insisted we couldn't depend on raw stock and needed to find a synthesis."

"Uh-huh. Then what about these chemical orders? You purchased organics that have nothing to do with apricots or any other interests of this lab. Like on September 23 five years ago, eighteen liters of acetonitrile."

"It's a solvent for extracting the toxogen out of the apricot pits."

"Is that right? Well, my chemistry's a little rusty, so I checked. And everybody and his brother said that the solvent of choice is ethanol, not acetonitrile-which, as you well know, is used in organic procedures." He adjusted his gla.s.ses, feeling very clever. "Then in December '84, seventy-five grams of L-N5 iminoethyl ornithine, and three months later a total of twenty liters of hexamethylphosphamide. And before you try and fudge up another answer, I checked and, lo and behold, n.o.body has a f.u.c.king clue why you'd need such fancy organics. In fact, HMPA is a G.o.dd.a.m.n carcinogenic which, by the way, cost us two thousand dollars." He slapped down the inventory. "In fact, you've been ordering some rather strange materials ever since we sent you to Papua New Guinea back in 1980. You want to tell us just what the h.e.l.l you've been doing in this lab for the last seven years while n.o.body was looking?"

They both stared at him for an explanation.

After a long moment, Chris said, "Nothing that matters." He got up to leave.

But Quentin continued. "Then what about that conference on neurology and gerontology at Yale last November? Two days you were supposedly taking as sick days?"

"You've been spying on me. I don't believe it."

"Believe it," Quentin said. "And believe it that misuse of company property and the misappropriation of funds is a criminal offense tantamount to stealing."

Chris moved to the door.

"Well, maybe this will tell me." Quentin was holding a black, bound ledger containing Chris's notes on the tabukari elixir and its effect on his animals all the way back to 1980. He had broken into locked files in Chris's office.

"And before you declare it's personal property, let me remind you of your contract which reads: 'All research material including equipment, animals, procedures, patents, inventions, discoveries, and notes are private property of Darby Pharmaceuticals.' Do I make myself clear?"

A photocopy of Chris's notes sat in front of Ross, who stared at Chris silently and without expression.

"And by the way," Quentin continued, his face all aglow, "that mouse that died horribly a few weeks ago? Well, I checked the files and found he was purchased over six years ago-I repeat, six years ago. Now, I don't know much about mice, but that struck me as unlikely, so I called Jackson and they confirmed that the original order of twenty such mice was placed in 1980. When I told them it was the same mouse, they said that was outright impossible because its life span was eleven months. There had to be some mistake because no mouse under the sun-no matter what breed or hybrid-lives six friggin' years."

They stared at him for an answer. "So what do you want?"

"What we want is for you to sit down and tell us all about your tabukari elixir."

7.

"Am I being fired or not?"

They had read everything in his log. The entire medical history of his mice was in those notes, including Methuselah's-six years of secret employment at Darby. If they wanted to, he could be out the door and facing charges of grand larceny.

"Fired?" Ross Darby stood up and came around his desk. "If you've developed something that's multiplied the lifespan of mice, I want to know what it could do for humans. And I want you to find out. In fact, I'd like you to work on it full time."

Christ! The genie was out of the lamp, and they wanted him to dance with it. "What about Veratox?"

"It's quite clear the synthesis won't work, and we've spent more than enough money to find out. We appreciate your efforts, but these things happen."

"We still have another s.h.i.+pment of raw stock coming, no?"

"I need not get into it, but we don't." Ross was being evasive.

That explained the stoical att.i.tude. Veratox was a bust, and Chris's elixir had fallen into their laps to make up the losses.

"So," Ross sang out, "what can it do for humans?"

Chris glanced at Quentin, who sat back waiting for him to spill. If he resisted or protested, they could still fire him, retaining his notes and the contents of his lab. Which would mean his genie would be dancing with someone else. "I don't know."

"Then how did you know about its longevity powers?"

"Rumors from New Guinea villagers."

"Such as?"

He measured his words. The exposure was too sudden. "That it can r.e.t.a.r.d the aging process."

But Chris said nothing about Iwati. Neither did his name appear in the notes nor speculations about how the stuff might double or triple human lifespan or more. Only pharmacological and biological history of his mice-dosages, procedures, vital signs, blood and tissue chemistry, neurophysiology, and so forth.

"Well, I'm curious why all the secrecy," Darby said. "You worked on it since 1980 and never breathed a word."

"It didn't strike me as profitable research given the limitations."

"Not while you were here, that is," Quentin said.

"Pardon me?"

Quentin's face had a look of cagey cleverness he used to impress Darby. "I'm just wondering if you kept everything under wraps so you could perfect the stuff, then jump s.h.i.+p with the patent to start your own company."

"Quentin, I'm a biologist, not a crackerjack entrepreneur like yourself."

"I'm not interested in motives," Ross interjected. "You've developed a compound that's multiplied the lifespan of mice. That's one h.e.l.l of a breakthrough. And that's what I'd like you to develop for us. Are you interested?"

To Chris, Ross Darby was the kind of businessman Ayn Rand would have swooned over. In less than twenty years he had taken his company out of his garage and into this multimillion-dollar complex. "Sure."

"You mentioned limitations."

"Accelerated senescence, rapid aging-what afflicted Methuselah."

"Then its elimination should be a prime objective," Ross said. "I have to admire you for pulling it off without notice. What bothers me is what that says about the quality of our bookkeeping." He glanced at Quentin. "I'd like to see these mice, if you don't mind."

Chris took them to the back lab and the cages of mice, each hooked up at the skull to supplies of tabulone.

"You've invested half a dozen years and increased the lifespan of mice by a factor of six, so you must see hope for the human race."

"Find the right chemicals," Chris said, "and there's no reason we can't extend our warranties without limit-like these guys."

Ross studied the mice as if he were glimpsing magical creatures. "An appealing prospect, especially when you're my age."

"We've got a huge baby boomer generation out there eating their oat bran and jogging their a.s.ses off," Quentin piped in. "We're talking about a billion-dollar molecule." His face glowed red at the prospect.

"What's the composition?" Ross asked.

Chris opened his log notes to a ring diagram he had drawn.

Ross studied it. "A steroidal structure, except the C and D rings are reversed. I've not seen anything like it before."

"I doubt anybody has," Chris said. What made the compound unique was the spiral ring system-two rings coming off a common carbon atom, something not found in steroidal structures.

"What's the plant?"

"A vine with small orchidlike flowers. I'm told it grows nowhere else in the world."

"That's what they said about the apricots," Ross muttered. He studied the diagram.

"Where did you get the elucidation and synthesis done?" Ross was concerned that outside labs could compromise Darby's exclusive patent on the compound, especially if the molecular profile got out. But Chris had antic.i.p.ated all that. Without revealing its potentials, he had gotten a.n.a.lyses done at MIT, Northeastern University, and private labs without incurring interest. In his favor was the fact that n.o.body did steroid research anymore.

Darby stared at the clear liquid in the feeder tubes. "You've discovered a molecule that puts the cellular clock for mice on slow-mo. If you make it work for human beings, you'll have the fountain of youth."

"The operative word is if. Disconnect those tubes, and they'll age to death before your eyes."

Ross eyed a mouse in the nearest cage, its skull sporting electrodes like a tiny diver's helmet. "How old is this one?"

"Chronologically, sixty-two months. Biologically, I haven't got a clue. Like most animals, mice don't age in any noticeable way. They just get bigger. And smarter. Their cognitive powers have measurably heightened."