The Art of Forgetting (41 page)

              Bender bent forward a bit. Lloyd saw his Adam’s apple rise above the collar of his shirt and disappear again. His eyes were darting around the room as if trying to make sense of what was happening. Lloyd opened the bottle of water he had taken out of his backpack and poured some in a cup. He pushed the cup in front of Bender, leaned over and said, “Here, have a drink.”

              Bender nodded and took a sip of water. “Thanks,” he whispered.

              “Dr. Kowalski, let me remind you that as a witness in these proceedings you’re presumed to be under oath and we expect you to be entirely truthful,” Feynman said.

              “So help me God,” Kowalski said. Townshend seemed to wince at the words.

              “Dr. Kowalski, did you perform the autopsy, report number A231556?” Feynman asked.

              “Well, no… and yes,” Kowalski said.

              “Do you think you can expand on your cryptic response?” Townshend asked with an edge to her voice.

              “The number A231556 is incorrect. It could not possibly be the correct number for this autopsy,” Kowalski said. “You see, the report number on an animal subject should start with VA for veterinary autopsy. But I did perform the autopsy on the mouse in question.”

              “How is that possible?” Lasko asked. “The autopsy report was signed by Dr. Todd English. Dr. Kowalski’s name is nowhere on the report.”

              “Which reminds me,” Kowalski said as he reached into a coat pocket, “I have another affidavit from Dr. English.”

              Fisk raised an eyebrow. “We talking about the same Dr. English as before?”

              “The one and only,” Kowalski said as he handed him an envelope.

              “Does this comply with the tribunal’s rules of evidence?” Lasko asked.

              Fisk opened the envelope and unfolded the paper with a jerk of the wrist. “Dr. Lasko, there are no rules of evidence. This judicial body will accept as evidence whatever it deems fit based on our better judgment.” He turned his head first to Townshend then to Feynman. “Y’all see this as fit?” Townshend and Feynman answered their yeses in near unison. “So do I. Great balls of fire! We’ve got us a consensus.” He read the affidavit before passing it to Feynman. “Says here, Dr. English didn’t do the autopsy. Well, keep going Dr. Copeland.”

              “Did you perform the autopsy on the mouse whose autopsy was erroneously reported under number A231556?” Lloyd asked Kowalski.

              “I sure did,” said Kowalski.

              “Did that mouse die of prion induced encephalopathy?”

              “No.” Kowalski leaned forward and faced the three judge panel. “The mouse died of heavy metal poisoning. Acute mercury toxicity to be precise.”

              Bender covered his mouth with his fist and tried to suppress a cough. He took another sip of water, sat back and exhaled heavily through pursed lips.

              “So that we don’t have to revisit this issue later,” Lloyd said, “the other mice that died, the ones I sent you more recently, what was their cause of death?”

              “Mercury poisoning.”

              “Mercury,” Lloyd said. “The same agent that murdered – and I do mean,
murdered
– my laboratory assistant, Kazimir Volkov.” Lloyd paused. He was short of breath. “Did any of the mice have signs of prion-induced disease?”

              “Definitely not,” Kowalski said.

              “Dr. Fisk, based on the testimony you just heard, I would like to request that the charge of animal cruelty filed against me be stricken.”

              A lanky man wearing a beige suit opened the door to the conference room. He looked around, locked eyes with Nick De Luca and held up a flash drive.

              “Mr. Murdock,” De Luca said, “what took you so long?”

              “Got lost,” the man said. “Please excuse me.” He walked around the table and sat next to De Luca.

              Fisk craned his head and turned as the man walked behind him to take his seat. Lloyd studied the expression on the surgeon’s face and wondered if he didn’t find it odd that one of De Luca’s security officers wasn’t wearing a uniform, didn’t have a hospital badge and got lost on the way to the Dean’s library. Mr. Murdock handed De Luca the flash drive and the security chief inserted it in the USB slot of the computer.

              “There’s one thing I don’t quite understand,” Townshend said, refocusing Fisk’s attention. “Where did
this
report come from?” She held up the autopsy report that Lasko had presented.

              Lloyd unzipped his backpack and pulled out a textbook with a dark blue cover. He stood up, walked over to Townshend and placed the book in front of her. “Page two-forty-three – bottom right hand column.”

              Townshend opened the book. She took a couple of minutes to read the relevant passage and compare it to the autopsy report. “Pretty similar wording,” she said pushing the book in front of Fisk.

              Fisk took less than a minute to read it. “They say there’s more than one way to skin a cat,” he said, “but in my experience, there’s only one good way. How else would you put these words together?”

              “To be clear,” Feynman said, “are you suggesting that the autopsy report was copied from this textbook?”

              “Oh no,” Lloyd said as Bender refilled his glass with water, a tremor in his wrist. “You see, that’s my personal copy of Perrin’s Atlas of Neuropathology, fifth edition.” He pulled another book out of his backpack, this one with a pale blue cover. “But let me show you the third edition.” Again, he handed the book to Townshend. “Page one-ninety-eight, top left corner. You’ll have no trouble finding it, it’s underlined in pencil.

              Townshend opened the book and Fisk pulled it over to himself. Townshend and Feynman huddled on his sides.  Fisk let out a whistle.

              “What’s astonishing to me is not so much what a brazen act of plagiarism this is, but just how lazy the plagiarizer was,” Feynman said.  “This is identical, word for word.”

              “It wasn’t laziness,” Townshend said. “It was insecurity. I bet this report was not written by a pathologist.”

              “Where did you get this book, Dr. Copeland?” Fisk asked.

              “Mr. De Luca gave it to me early this morning,” Lloyd said.

              Fisk turned to De Luca. “And may I ask where you got the book?”

              De Luca rubbed his hands together. “From a member of the housekeeping staff. She… found it in a doctor’s office. It had fallen on the floor, you see.”

              “There’s a name inside the front cover,” Lloyd said.

              Fisk slammed the book shut then slowly lifted the front cover. His eyes jerked up rapidly. Bender was staring out the window.

              “I have the video ready,” De Luca said.

              “At last,” Lasko said.

              “Just a minute, Mr. De Luca,” Fisk said. “Dr. Bender?”

              Bender seemed to flinch. He blinked and smiled. “You’re not suggesting that I had anything to do with that autopsy report simply because I own a copy of that text.”

              “The video is cued up,” De Luca said.

              “Not now,” Fisk said.

              “Oh, I think you’ll want to see this,” Lloyd said.

              Lloyd nodded and De Luca tapped a button on the computer keyboard. The television screen came alive with a view of the main corridor of the pathology department. Within seconds a man in a doctor’s coat came into view.

              “There. That’s Dr. English,” Lasko said leaning back in his chair.

              Another man came into view. “And I think you all recognize who that is,” Lloyd said. It was Martin Bender. Lasko narrowed his eyes. “Now look carefully,” Lloyd said.

              The video showed Bender pulling an envelope from his coat and handing it to Todd English, the exchange made all the more noticeable by the fact that De Luca had slowed the playback and stopped on a frame that froze Bender’s outstretched arm.

              “Notice the date on the upper right hand corner,” Lloyd said. “May 29, one day after the mouse, known in my lab as Wolfgang, passed away.”

              “Do you care to enlighten the tribunal as to what this is all about, Dr. Bender?” Feynman asked.

              “I’m not the one under investigation here,” Bender said.

              “Not yet,” Fisk said.

              “It’s clear what Dr. Copeland is attempting to do here,” Lasko said. “He’s creating a clever diversion to deflect attention away from himself.”

              Bender wiped his lips with the back of his hand after taking another sip of water. “My meeting with Dr. English had nothing to do with the matter in question,” he said.

              Kowalski cleared his voice. “Begging your pardon,” he pulled another envelope out from his coat pocket. “I have another affidavit from Dr. English.”

              “How many more of them affidavits are you hiding there?” Fisk asked.

              “This is the last one,” Kowalski said.

              Feynman took the envelope and read the document. “It claims that Dr. Bender gave Dr. English the autopsy report and ordered him to sign it under threat of exposure.”

              “The boy’s a liar,” Bender said. “Todd English can’t be trusted. He’s a liar and a cheat. That ungrateful bastard would have been expelled from medical school if it hadn’t been for me. He got caught cheating on his Psychiatry exam. I felt pity for him. I saved that wretched soul.”

              “You used him,” Lloyd said.

              “Lloyd, dear boy, listen to what you’re saying,” Bender said. “Did you forget the trouble you had in residency? I was the one who came to your aid. I’ve always protected you.”

              “Like you protected Todd English and who knows how many others – keeping us in subservient positions, always under your watch so that one day, if the need arose, we might pay you back, with interest. It wasn’t a fluke that I never received a promotion, was it? You’re the one who kept passing me up.”

              “That’s simply not true,” Bender said.

              “Really? Should we ask the Chief of Staff? He’s already under oath.”

              “This changes nothing,” Lasko said, raising his voice. “Even if the mice did die of mercury poisoning, it was Dr. Copeland’s reckless disregard for safety that killed them and his hapless laboratory assistant.”

              Lloyd felt his pulse quickening. He made an effort to speak softly. “We know that’s not true, don’t we Uncle Marty?” Lloyd said. “The first mouse, I figure you injected him just once with a toxic dose of mercury. After all, you knew how we named our research subjects and his name was clearly printed on his cage. All you needed was one death so that my application for trials on human subjects would be denied. But when I decided to continue my animal research, you were sort of stuck. You needed to keep proving that the prions were unsafe. You needed to keep killing off my research subjects. Problem was that Kaz and I stopped naming our mice so you didn’t know which ones to kill. But at this point it didn’t really matter. The tide had turned against me. My lab was under so much scrutiny that all you had to do was just pour a little more fuel on the fire. So you went for a shotgun approach.”

              “I have to protest the direction this meeting has taken,” Lasko said.

              “Oh, I’m liking this just fine,” said Fisk.

              “It took me a while to figure it out because the first time I tested the mouse feed and the water, everything checked out just fine,” Lloyd said. “But it was later that you poisoned the water supply. Isn’t that so?

              “Do you have any evidence to substantiate what you’re claiming?” asked Dr. Townshend.

              “I do,” Lloyd said. “I have a sample of the…” Lloyd froze, his mouth agape. “Oh, shit.”

              “What’s the matter, Dr. Copeland?” Feynman asked.

              “The water sample I brought from the lab – I’m sorry Uncle Marty, I accidentally poured it in your glass.

              Bender pushed back his chair and stared at the empty glass in front of him. There was absolute silence in the meeting room and no one moved.  Bender turned pale. He wiped his upper lip with a tremulous hand.

              “I’m so sorry,” Lloyd said in a flat voice. “It seems I’ve poisoned you.”

              “You poisoned yourself too,” Bender said.

              “I didn’t drink the water,” Lloyd said.

              “You stupid prick, dimethyl mercury passes through polyethylene. It gets absorbed through the skin,” Bender said.

              Lloyd held out his hands in front of him and surveyed his palms. “Huh, that’s funny. I don’t think Kowalski or I ever mentioned anything about
dimethyl
mercury. So how would you know?”

              Bender jumped to his feet and headed towards the door.