Corrupting Dr. Nice Read online

  "You can't be, Dad. I can put one past him, but the two of us together would be too much."

  "I could change my appearance."

  "Now who's talking about things that aren't necessary? Lance will be my chaperone, and it will run smooth as a Massachusetts workhouse."

  "We'll be prepared," Lance said. "We're a well established public interest organization. We're just there to examine his dinosaur. If they question our credentials, they'll find out everything we're saying is the truth."

  "And if it comes down to it, Dad, I'll tell him the true truth."

  "Which is precisely my point," August said. "Once you start telling the truth, sooner or later it gets out of hand."

  THREE: TROUBLE IN PARADISE

  The compressor on the disinfectant blaster made it hard to hear anything anyway, so Owen had Bill play Schubert's Unfinished Symphony to cover the noise. He hummed along happily.

  Wilma's most recent bath had wrecked the swimming pool. Owen, pretending to be one of the Thornberry custodial staff, wore hooded coveralls, plastic gloves, a respirator and goggles as he cleaned the tiles. He'd asked the workmen to treat him like one of them. Under the coveralls, padding made him look thirty pounds heavier. To top it off he had incorporated a voder in the mask that lowered his voice half an octave.

  The Schubert had reached a passage that always, to Owen, sounded like a threat of dire events to come. Bill lowered the volume and said, =This isn't going to work.=

  "What? In this getup even mother wouldn't recognize me."

  =She's not your mother. The voder isn't going to disguise your accent=

  "I'll change my accent."

  =You're a master of deception. But the whole plan is hinky. What do you expect to accomplish?=

  "I expect to spy on her without her knowing it's me."

  =Why waste the time? It's the same woman, I tell you.=

  "Right. Just like you thought that girl scout was dealing designer drugs."

  Bill was silent for a moment, his version of disgruntlement. =I still say I never saw any cookies like that before.=

  Owen turned off the disinfectant blaster and ran his hand over the tiles. "What about her name? Emma Zume? Is that a Hopi name?"

  =Hopi. Spelled H-O-K-E-Y.=

  "You read the Saltimbanque file. All Genevieve Faison's aliases are upper crust; most of them are French. Once con artists establish a modus operandi they seldom vary."

  =Suddenly you're the expert on con artists.=

  "Turn the Schubert back up."

  During the last months Owen had compulsively replayed every minute he'd spent with Genevieve. Was any of what she had said to him genuine?

  ? When he considered that Gen's attraction for him had been real, his final minutes with her came back to torment him. He remembered her eyes brimming with tears. How cold he must have seemed. Sometimes late at night, waking from a dream, he would catch himself speaking aloud, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

  Then Bill would ask him what he was muttering about, and Owen would roll over and try to sleep.

  The credentials that Emma Zume had sent to him, under the electronic certification ciphers of the City of New York Identity Authority, described an entirely different woman. Born in Glenwood Springs, Colorado in 2036, a 2058 graduate of Berkeley in Public Pleading, living in Manhattan, private identity number, medical clearances.

  Still he was wary. Hence the disguise. He told Jeeves to greet the Committee to Protect the Past visitors, tell them that Dr. Vannice was delayed on business, lead them down to the south lawn and leave them unsupervised. He looked at his wristward. It was 3:10. He peeked over the edge of the pool.

  Jeeves appeared at the rear ground-level entrance, leading two people out of the house. The robot pointed toward the greenhouse, then retreated.

  One of the visitors was a homely man in a checked jacket. Beside him walked a young woman wearing a dark blue shirt open at the collar, a khaki skirt--culottes, actually--cut at mid-calf, fitted at the hips but loose below, white rolled stockings, and flat-heeled sturdy shoes. Her long hair was pinned up. She carried an electronic notebook.

  The man went down toward the greenhouse, but once they were in the shadow of the oaks the woman turned abruptly left and began poking around the grounds. She squinted up at the house, then followed some of Wilma's footprints in the turf to a clump of holly bushes. She reached for a branch of the holly, pricked her fingers and drew back, then leaned forward to examine the leaves. When she turned from the bush, she caught her skirt in the holly, took a step and stumbled. Her notebook slipped out of her hands, and she sprawled on her hands and knees.

  Owen came down from the pool. "You all right, ma'm?" he asked.

  The woman stood up, brushing off her skirt. There could be no mistake--it was Genevieve Faison. "Oh--hello," she said.

  Owen worked up a New England accent. "May I help you?"

  "I'm here to meet Dr. Vannice."

  "We were told he'd meet you at the greenhouse."

  She blushed. "I was doing some snooping. Please don't turn me in. I'm Emma Zume, from the Committee to Protect the Past."

  "Hello."

  "Gosh, that mask looks hot."

  "Can't take it off. Fumes."

  "Oh, certainly--I understand." She clutched her notebook. Her eyes--startling violet--flicked from Owen's to the ground.

  "What are you trying to find out? Maybe I can help."

  "We're here to inspect his dinosaur. Maybe you could tell me--if you don't think it would be a betrayal. How does he treat her?"

  "Dr. Vannice? He's completely responsible."

  "You're not just saying that because you work here?"

  "He couldn't pay me enough to lie."

  "I'm glad to hear that. I hope he doesn't lie to you."

  "He's actually quite a good employer."

  "How long have you been working for him?"

  "A long time. I'm like one of the family. Haven't you met him yet?"

  "No. I'm not eager to."

  "But you must have seen pix of him. He's become so famous."

  "I spoke to him over the phone. He was very tricky. I couldn't get a straight answer out of him, and--" she blushed again, "--he was so interested in meeting me in person that I got suspicious. Is he--" she looked down at the notebook, "--some sort of libertine?"

  "Oh, no! He's not like that."

  "Excuse me for saying this--how would you know? You're just his employee."

  "Employees know things. I see him every day."

  Emma Zume held the notebook in her crossed arms, over her chest. "I don't know you, Mr. . . ."

  "Oakley. Bill Oakley."

  "Mr. Oakley. But Dr. Vannice strikes me as an opportunist. Look at the notoriety this dinosaur's gotten him."

  "No, no. He's very much against time exploitation."

  "Right. He just happens to collect dinosaurs."

  "I don't think he's very proud of the contradiction."

  "Then he shouldn't base his scientific career on it. He's just an amateur anyway. Most real scientists are deeply skeptical about him."

  =Want me to deck her, boss?=

  Owen pulled off the mask and hood. "Good afternoon, Ms. Zume,"

  Her face went pale. "Dr. Vannice! Oh--excuse me. I didn't mean--I mean I didn't know--"

  "No, you didn't."

  "Oh, dear. I knew I should never have gone about the grounds without permission. I guess I'd better leave, now." She started to go, then stopped. She turned back to him. "Hey! That was a dirty trick!"

  "You were the one snooping around the grounds."

  "Maybe I need to snoop, if you're such a devious character as to spy on us!" Clutching her notebook with white knuckles, she stepped toward him, into one of Wilma's footprints, and fell forward. Owen caught her.

  She struggled out of his grasp.

  "Are you okay?" Owen asked.

  She picked up the notebook and checked to see that it was still working. "I suppose so." She looked back up a
t him. "Can we start this whole thing over again?"

  Owen was surprised by her forthrightness. He tried to stay mad, but she was so clumsy. "I won't trick you again."

  "I'm sorry I overstepped the bounds of your invitation. I hope I haven't ruined everything. Can we still see your dinosaur?"

  "Let's go."

  They walked toward the greenhouse, Owen stripping off his gloves, pulling the padding from out of the coveralls.

  =Well, what did that accomplish?=

  "She isn't acting much like Genevieve," Owen subvocalized.

  =She isn't? Women after money do God's own bicycle repair.=

  Owen kept quiet until they reached the greenhouse, where the homely man was peering through the glass. "That's Lance--Mr. Thrillkiller," Emma said. The man turned, and Emma introduced them.

  "Do you have any equipment?" Owen asked.

  Thrillkiller held up a camera. "At present it will be enough just to inspect Wilma and her accommodations," he said. "The reports we've had are unclear as to the nature of the experiment you are running."

  "It's no wonder, with the lies that have been broadcast. You'd think I intended to cut Wilma into steaks and barbecue her."

  "Could you tell us something about it in your own terms?" Thrillkiller asked.

  While Emma Zume took notes, Owen told them about his theory of altricial vs. precocial growth rates in sauropods. He was warming to his topic when Thrillkiller interrupted.

  "But aren't these sauropods social animals?"

  "Yes. They brood in nesting areas together, and migrate in herds. Back in the Cretaceous, Dr. Dunkenfield is plotting seasonal movements. The adolescents, actually, spend more time with the infants than--"

  "There are no other sauropods here. How do you expect her to develop in their absence? Leaving aside the emotional considerations--animals, like people, are remarkably sensitive to emotional factors--strictly from a scientific point of view, doesn't this mean your experiment is impossible to control? What validity are any results you arrive at going to have?"

  =Don't let him throw you.=

  "Uh--that's a good question. I conceive of this as a first order series. Later I intend to run other experiments--"

  "You intend to steal more of these creatures from their natural environment?" Emma Zume interrupted.

  "Ms. Zume, don't misunderstand. Wilma does not lack attention. I spend a great deal of time with her. The whole premise of this experiment was deliberately to alter the circumstances of her childhood, to see what the results would be."

  "And you don't care about how she feels," said Thrillkiller.

  "That's not a scientific way of looking at it."

  "The myth of scientific objectivity was exploded sixty years ago, Dr. Vannice."

  Owen looked to Emma for help, but met only a furrowed brow. "I don't deny subjective factors," Owen said. "And I love Wilma as if she were my own pet."

  "I see," Emma said quietly, making a note. "Your pet."

  Owen gestured toward the greenhouse door. "Look, let me just show you the measures I've taken to care for Wilma." He punched the security code and placed his hand against the telltale. The lock snapped open. "I had to get special permission from the State Police even to move Wilma over the public roads. In order to expand the greenhouse, I had to get a zoning variance. The zoning laws in this county are very strict."

  "That didn't seem to keep your neighbor from constructing that Statue of Liberty," Thrillkiller said.

  "That's a special case. We don't associate with them."

  There was no immediate sign of Wilma inside, but a bed of ferns had been trampled. The air seemed to be cooler than normal. From the other end of the greenhouse came a sharp thump, a crash of foliage, then another thump. He forgot Ms. Zume and Thrillkiller and rushed through the interior.

  At the other end, in the modern addition, Wilma was beating her head against the double doors to the paddock. "Wilma!"

  "What's wrong with her?" Thrillkiller asked.

  "I don't know." Owen tried to figure out how he was going to approach the dinosaur without getting hurt.

  "Maybe we can distract her?" Emma asked.

  "I'll do it," Owen said. "She's usually distracted by bright colors."

  Owen ran to the supply room and grabbed a red blanket from a shelf. He raced back and began waving it. Wilma turned. Her eyes were wild. She panted like a steam engine.

  =Don't get yourself between her and the door. I want room to operate if I have to.=

  Thrillkiller kept well back, but Emma stepped forward, cooing to the dinosaur.

  Wilma moved toward Owen's blanket, away from the door. She swayed, a little unsteady on her feet. It could be an oxygen overload. She took a couple of steps toward Owen, and he backed off, still waving the blanket. She was slowing down now. She dropped to her front knees, then sat down. Her wedge-shaped head swayed on her long neck. She chuffed out a great belch and lay down.

  Owen put aside the blanket. He reached out his hand, stroked the deep green markings on the top of Wilma's head. She blinked.

  "What can I do?" Emma asked.

  "There's a veterinary kit on the table in the office." Owen ran his hand down the front of her snout. Emma went off and came back in a minute with the kit. "Thanks."

  Thrillkiller was wary, but Emma crouched on the other side and laid her hand on Wilma's neck. Owen examined the Apatosaur's eyes. He took some tests. Her body temperature was normal, her blood count was fine. The arterial blood was bright red, highly oxygenated. He gave Wilma an injection of sedative. "Stay with her while I check the climate control," he told Emma and Thrillkiller.

  Owen opened the panel and checked the controls. The oxygen level in the greenhouse was a little high, but that shouldn't have caused such a reaction. Keeping Wilma confined so much probably wasn't helping her disposition.

  As he reset the system, Bill began a running commentary. =This is the same woman.=

  "Bill, shut up. I've got more important problems right now."

  =If you're worried about sabotage, this is the one who'd do it.=

  "If she's Gen, why would she look the same when she could just as easily twank herself into looking completely different? It doesn't make sense."

  =Twanking would be too obvious. This is more subtle.=

  "She sure doesn't act like Gen. She works for a non-profit organization, for god's sake!"

  =A non-profit organization that's after your dinosaur, just like that Faison woman. And what about this fiasco? It doesn't make you look very good. Something fishy is going on.=

  "Did you see any signs of trespass on the way in?"

  =My field of vision was restricted. You kept looking at this woman's legs.=

  "There isn't much to see, the way she's dressed. Which is another reason I don't think this is Genevieve Faison."

  =Reverse psychology. The oldest trick in the book.=

  "Bill, give it a rest."

  Thrillkiller came back to see Owen. "We're going to video the dinosaur," Thrillkiller said. "I'm sure you'll understand why we need to do this."

  "I guess. How long have you known Ms. Zume?" Owen asked.

  "Emma? She's been my assistant for three years."

  "Has she ever been on a vacation--say about a year ago--to the past? Ancient Jerusalem?"

  "Jerusalem?" He laughed. "It's all I can do to get her to take an afternoon off."

  Owen closed the panel on the climate control. "I don't see how it could be; she looks so exactly like--"

  Thrillkiller put his hand on Owen's arm. "You met a woman who looks like her."

  "How did you know?"

  The chrono protectionist glanced back toward the end of the greenhouse, drew Owen aside, lowered his voice. "I know all about this. This woman you met, did she go by the name of Celeste Parmenter?"

  "No."

  "Jean Harrington? Genevieve Faison?"

  "Yes, that's her!"

  "Traveling with an older man, her husband, or maybe her father?"
/>   "That's them! And this is her!"

  "Not by the remotest of chances. No, what you've run into is one of the vilest scams you could possibly encounter. Celeste Parmenter and her brother Alex are con artists."

  "But Ms. Zume looks exactly like her!"

  "You might better say that Celeste looks exactly like Emma. This Parmenter woman, or whatever her name is, has had herself twanked to look like Emma. She and her brother have been running scams on idealistic time travelers associated with the Protect the Past movement. It threatens to discredit our whole enterprise. Emma has been near despair trying to dissociate herself from their actions."

  "But the woman I met didn't call herself Emma Zume. And she didn't argue to protect the past--just the opposite, in fact."

  "I can't tell you what con game they were running. And I'd rather not know."

  "Can't you sue them?"

  "They have to be caught to be sued. No, it's just something we have to live with. I hope you won't burden Emma with it. Can you imagine what it's like to have a criminal assume your identity?"

  "I know it happens. But Genevieve Faison wasn't a criminal, really. She just--"

  "Not a criminal? She most definitely is."

  "But she didn't do anything illegal."

  "You must not have known her very long."

  Owen clutched Thrillkiller's arm. "Thanks for telling me this. It explains a lot."

  "Don't mention it." Thrillkiller's sincerity, his concern for his co-worker's feelings, was touching.

  Emma came back, pushing her way between two cycadellas. "Dr. Vannice, you'd better come back," she said. "She's gotten to her feet again."

  Owen hurried with Emma back to Wilma, who was placidly drinking from the little pond at the end of the greenhouse. He was relieved. "I think we're okay now."

  "What was wrong with her?"

  "I'm not sure. It could be some long-term effect of oxygen overload. The Cretaceous oxygen level was lower than today's. But I want to go down to the boathouse to look at some shingles that Wilma ate. They may contain some substance that's affecting her behavior."

  "I'm sure that keeping her cooped up in here is not good for her," Thrillkiller said. "I want to video the rest of these facilities."