The Frankenstein Candidate (34 page)

“No!” Olivia bridged half the gap between her and Mardi with very small, tentative steps. Instinctively, she knew that a lunge from her could cause his forefinger to push inwards an inch and a brilliant life would end.

Mardi was left-handed. He made a motion to stop her, using his left hand, which also held the gun. Brendan’s strong grip swiftly encircled Mardi’s wrist; the revolver was wrenched free. The little black gun fell to the ground and rolled over once before Brendan kicked it hard, smashing it against the refrigerator and scraping the white paint. Mardi winced in pain as Brendan put him in an arm lock.

“Why, Dr. Tedman? Why?” Olivia was shocked, bewildered, and indignant all at the same time.

“That’s the question I have been asking myself for thirty-one years.” Slowly, the color began to come back into his face.

They settled him into an armchair after Brendan put handcuffs on him. Civilian arrest, Mr. Conway called it. A glass of cool water was sipped slowly, Olivia easing the glass to his mouth, her other hand wiping his brow.

Brendan stood, his gun cocked and pointed until Olivia motioned it down. Here was a little old man, seated and now in handcuffs. Brendan understood; the gun was put away.

“I really need to understand, Doctor…I really do.”

“I should have listened to Frank…he was my only true friend,” he murmured.

“Which Frank are we talking about?”

“Frank Stein. He knows all the answers by now.”

Minutes passed, and they seemed like hours. Olivia debated with Brendan, who wanted to call the cops. Somehow, she persuaded him to let her handle it. The shock of the week had turned her confusion into rage, and she had just witnessed the country’s best-known scientist become suicidal. Clarity alone could calm her down. Clarity, Dr. Joshy had told her, was the queen of the emotions. Somehow, her instincts suggested that the suicidal, brilliant man in front of her held the key to clarity. She was going to hold on to that thought—whether right or wrong, it offered her hope.

Olivia rang her close friend at Kingsmead Psychiatric, Dr. Bruce Rohl. They made a deal with Mardi. If she didn’t tell the police or the media straightway, Mardi would go there with them. As a former Secret Service agent, Brendan Conway was sworn to secrecy; his only job was to protect Olivia, whatever the cost.

Mardi was to be identified under a different name and kept under the direct and personal supervision of Dr. Rohl.

Olivia didn’t know Frank Stein directly, although she knew her staff could easily get hold of him. She returned to the suicidal source of her sought-after clarity.

“What specifically does Frank Stein know…about the cause of your pain?”

“The carbon apology is a manufactured world, Miss Allen, but they got ahead of themselves…I warned them…doing too much too fast could burst the bubble.”

He would say no more. They left him with Dr. Rohl. She organized for his apartment door to be fixed, and Brendan Conway left with Mardi’s gun in a plastic jacket. It had been loaded. There were no other guns in the apartment.

Larry Fox was waiting in the hospital lobby for Olivia when she arrived to see Victor. Clarity was slowly oozing through, and the serenity made her think fast on her feet.

“What did he say?” Larry asked.

“Who?” she replied, unperturbed by his possible discovery of where she had been.

“Dr. Mardi Tedman…didn’t you just go see him?”

“Nothing much. He was rushing out for a weekend and a bit in Ocean City. He is all right…just needs a break for a couple of weeks.”

“I see. He should have told his staff.”

“Larry, I really need to see Victor alone.”

“All right, but I am coming in with you. I need to pay my respects too, but I will leave early.”

Olivia’s glance told him she was becoming more and more of her own woman.

“I’m no fly on the wall, Miss Allen…I won’t stay for longer than ten minutes. I just want to wish the grand old man well, that’s all.” It was the very first time since they met that Larry had addressed Olivia as Miss Allen, and his voice had an apologetic, submissive tone.

When Larry and Olivia walked in to Victor’s room at the hospital, Olivia was holding the bouquet of flowers that Larry had brought with him.

“Thank you, Olivia…you needn’t have.” Victor was seated upright on an inclined bed.

“Larry organized it,” she acknowledged graciously.

“I should be out soon, two, maybe three days. The doctors told me they got rid of all the cancer. I wouldn’t want to miss your acceptance speech next week for the world.” Victor seemed quite cheerful.

Precisely ten minutes into the pleasantries, Olivia glanced sideways at Larry. He left within moments. It was good for her to get tough, he thought, the real campaign was going to get nasty and personal. Olivia’s tone changed after Larry left. For three insane seconds, she imagined she was carrying a loaded gun in her purse that she drew and shot Victor with. Her hand went inside her purse—there was no gun. Instead, she broke the silence with “Gary’s car was almost hit. It was way too close. You didn’t need a gunshot.”

“What? Excuse me, what the hell are you talking about?”

She ignored his remark. Feigning gratitude for his advice and his push to make her president, she baited him again after a few minutes; this time he fell for it.

“You have scared the pants off him though. He won’t do it again. I should be grateful,” she said.

“The important thing is no one got hurt. You should sort it out afterward.”

“I want to sort it out now.” Her eyes were a cold, icy blue.

“I can’t tell you how to run your marriage. But now is not a good time.”

“You always had a copy of Machiavelli’s
Prince
on your desk.”

He stiffened. “Did you come to wish me a recovery or to confront me?”

“Confrontation is pointless. I learned that from you. Oh no, I want you to recover completely. You need to be well enough to stand trial. Take your medicine. Don’t die on me now, Victor.”

“Get off your high horse, Olivia. Let’s not forget who put you there. He could have ruined everything. Just for a piece of ass…now he could be first gentleman, and you, my dear, take care to remember that the super delegates have not voted yet.”

“I don’t need their votes, Victor.”

“Oh yes you do.”

“You will see…I don’t. You will see.”

Olivia got up. She reached the door when she turned to face him again.

“Lest I forget, Victor, they didn’t get rid of all the cancer, did they?” She slammed the door behind her as she left.

Victor immediately began calling people. The evening nurse noticed how agitated he was. But all efforts to get him to rest were of no use. On his seventh call, Victor called Larry.

“She knows, Larry. She was threatening me.”

“I won’t ask how she knows,” Larry said. “It can blow up in her face too…you just need to remind her of that. I heard you have been calling people. If I may say so, the horse has bolted….it is much too late to change the super delegates’ vote now without drawing attention to certain matters.”

“She is getting out of control, Larry. We knew there was a risk she would find out before November, but her reaction worries me.”

“She is very ambitious, Victor…you should know, you infused her with it. But then, Ambition was always a horse you could tame.”

Olivia carefully covered her steps. She visited several hospitals, both publicly funded and private ones, over the next two days, to discuss the quality of medical care and invited medical practitioners to offer her proposals. Kingsmead Psychiatric was only on her schedule once, but she managed to go there four times over two days, for over an hour on each occasion.

Brendan Conway was only too happy not to ask too many questions. He looked forward to the day he could be restored in the Secret Service, and the more Olivia liked him, the better were his chances.

Mardi’s revelations were startling, but as the picture got clearer, the calmer and icier she became.

“It’s been going on for thirty years,” Mardi said. “It started well before my time. By the time I was somebody, I had to toe the line. Scientists who dissented from carbon alarmism had their funds cut off, their work pooh-poohed, and were labeled as Big Oil lackeys. Now, after three decades of brainwashing, almost everyone believes humans have corrupted the atmosphere.

“The bureaucrats at the American Centre for Climate Change love it. They travel first-class and stay in five-star hotels at Rio, Stockholm, Sydney, and Cannes—wherever it is that they and their allies organize the next global climate summit. Paper-pushers with accounting and political science degrees get to discuss the so-called great calamitous challenge of our times, hash out a new tax plan disguised as scarce emission credits, or set international targets that take weeks to agree on, all wonderfully funded by taxpayers. They get to take home CEO-style salaries and oversee a staff of fifty. It is the ultimate power trip.

“When NASA’s data showed global cooling, the space stations were either removed or moved to where the readings were more likely to be warmer. Respected Italian, British, Japanese, and of course, American scientists have seen research funds disappear for proposing a rigorous scientific investigation into climate change.

“The tales of scorn, ridicule, and marginalization of anyone who dared contest the man-made global warming fantasy are all true. It has got so savage and so unscientific that even earthquakes are now blamed on global warming, as if there were no natural disasters in the pre-industrial age.”

“But why?”

“I don’t know,” Mardi squeaked through his horn-rimmed glasses.

“You participated in the largest scientific fraud ever, and you say you don’t know?”

“Perhaps the second largest fraud, Miss Allen.”

“Spare me the economics for now; I have heard enough from Stein. Although I am beginning to believe that as well.”

“I was lonely, all my life I was lonely.”

“What?”

“You asked me why I participated.”

“Actually, you orchestrated this grand delusion, didn’t you?”

“Not at first. Anyway, now you know why I want to end it all.”

“You can’t go that way, Dr. Tedman. Reverse it all. It is reversible.”