The Common Lawyer (40 page)

Max was barking.

"I see them, boy," Paul Prescott said.

They had followed Jean Prescott home. A black Mercedes-Benz sedan now sat just outside the front gate. A dozen ostriches had gathered at the gate like palace guards; at four hundred pounds each, they presented quite an obstacle. Andy's father was sitting in a rocker on the front porch with the shotgun in his lap, an even bigger obstacle for a trespasser.

"Paul, are they coming for us?" Jessie asked.

"Honey, they'll have to get through the birds first, then this double-aught buckshot."

"Is that a no?"

His father smiled. "That's a no. They're not coming through that gate."

Not yet, anyway. But they might. So Andy called Russell Reeves.

"Hello, Andy."

"Your men chased me all over town."

"You ran."

"Are they okay, your guys that crashed?"

"They're fine. German cars."

"There's another German car parked outside our gate—what do you want, Russell?"

"I want to talk to Frankie."

"No."

"The DNA matched, Andy."

"It matched Frankie."

"Then tell her to get in the car. They'll bring her to me."

"No."

"I'll have you arrested for stealing my money."

"I'll tell them you're trying to kidnap Frankie."

"The privilege, Andy. My secrets are safe with you. You're my lawyer."

"Not anymore."

"You go public, you'll lose your law license. Besides, no one will believe you. Your word against mine."

"That's true, Russell, but you can't get your money back."

"I can sue you. I can file a complaint with the bar association, have you disbarred for stealing trust funds."

"No, you can't."

"Why not?"

"Because there's an exception to the attorney-client privilege. If the client sues the attorney or files an ethics complaint, the client is deemed to have waived the privilege."

"Which means?"

"Which means I can spill my guts, tell the world everything I know about you. Your secrets won't be safe."

"Who the hell made that up?"

"Lawyers. We make the rules to protect ourselves."

A deep sigh on the phone.

"I hate lawyers."

"Russell, I wired the money to Frankie's bank account."

"I know. Nine hundred forty-eight thousand and three dollars."

"You owe her that much."

"I'll pay her more, if she'll come in."

"Why?"

"Ask her, Andy. Ask her to tell you the truth."

Andy disconnected and went over to Frankie at the window.

"We've got to leave, Andy. Before they start shooting."

"They're not going to shoot. Russell wants you alive."

"What'd he say?"

"He said you know the truth."

"It doesn't involve you, Andy."

Andy pointed at the sedan out front.

"It sure as hell does, Frankie. I've been chased all over Austin and the Hill Country by Russell's men because he wants you. Because of you, those men are parked outside my parents' home."

"Because of you, those men found me."

She was right.

"We can't get out the front gate," he said, "and your car won't make it through the pasture to the back gate."

"Can your motorcycle ride the three of us?"

"You like camping out?"

They were in the barn loading the Slammer. Andy had packed a sleeping bag for Jessie. His mother gave Andy a hug and said, "I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault, Mom. They would've found her sooner or later."

She hugged Frankie and Jessie like they were her own children.

"Paul," Jessie said, "I want us to live here with you and Jean."

His father squeezed her shoulders.

"Honey, this is your home anytime you want to come back."

"We can't come back," Frankie said.

His father's eyes watered up.

"Andy, I can still shoot."

"Thanks, Dad, but it's best we leave."

Andy strapped the pack to the front handlebars and fired up the Slammer. Frankie and Jessie climbed on behind him. Andy drove out of the barn and down the trail leading to the back gate. They were invisible to the men at the front gate.

"I know a campground. Nice place, with cabins and a shower."

Andy circled back around town and headed west into the sunset. Twenty minutes later, they rode into the Blanco town square. Four blocks south of the square was the Blanco State Park, straddling the Blanco River. Andy stopped at the park store and paid for a cabin down by the river. They bought food and supplies for the night then drove down to the river and found their cabin. Andy unpacked their gear; Frankie and Jessie went to gather river rocks for the fire ring. When they returned fifteen minutes later, Jessie was giggling and Frankie was soaking wet and covered in mud.

"I fell in."

She went inside the cabin and returned wearing only a towel; she had nice legs. She hung her wet clothes over the railing of the cabin porch and sat down by the campfire. Andy was roasting hot dogs on wire hangers. She took a hanger, laid her underwear over it, and held it over the fire.

"I don't like wet undies."

They were black.

It was early November, and the park was vacant even though the temperature wouldn't drop below forty that night. Winter didn't come to Texas until January. They ate the dogs then Frankie stood.

"I need a shower."

She grabbed her undies—"All dry"—and the bar of soap and shampoo they had bought at the park store and walked over to the showers on the other side of the cabin. Andy watched her then turned to Jessie.

"You want another hot dog?"

"I'm stuffed."

"Why'd you pick 'Jessie James'?"

"Because we're outlaws on the run."

Andy impaled a wiener on the wire hanger and dangled it over the fire.

"You like camping out?"

"This is my first time."

"Really? I love sleeping outdoors."

"I never have."

"I got the cabin for you and your mom."

"Can I sleep out here?"

"If your mom says it's okay. But it's damp, so pull your sleeping bag close to the fire, so you don't catch a cold."

"I won't."

"That a girl."

"I heard you tell my mom I might have a cancer gene."

"Oh, honey, look, I was just worried and—"

"Don't worry. I don't have cancer. I never get sick."

"You're lucky."

She pulled up the right leg of her jeans.

"I can't get sick."

Andy nodded. "Just like trail biking. It's a mental game. You gotta believe you can't crash or you will for sure."

"No, I mean I
can't
get sick. Ever."

"You've never been sick?"

"No."

"You're eight?"

"Unh-huh. Ouch."

Her leg had a nasty bit of road rash.

"I fell at recess last week, scraped my leg. It's scabbing up now."

"So you've never been to a doctor?"

"Oh, I've been to lots of doctors."

She was picking at the scab.

"If you pick at it, it'll bleed."

"It is bleeding."

"So you were sick?"

"No, I was at a hospital."

She reached to her neck and held up a pendant on a silver chain. Andy's twelve years of Catholic school qualified him to identify it.

"Saint Aloysius, the patron saint of children."

"That was the name of the hospital."

"So you were really sick?"

"No, I wasn't sick."

"Then what were you doing in a hospital?"

"They were experimenting on me."

"Were those doctors called 'psychiatrists'?"

"I'm not crazy, Andy."

She was now digging in her mother's purse.

"But you weren't sick?"

"No."

"So why'd they put you in a hospital?"

"To study me."

"Why?"

"Because I can't get sick."

"You mean, like research?"

"Unh-huh. It was a research hospital."

She pulled something from the purse.

"And what did they find out?"

"I'm immune."

"To what?"

She secured a big Band-Aid over her scab—the same kind of Band-Aid Andy had found in their trash—then she looked up at him.

"Everything."

Andy yanked open the wood door to the shower. Frankie was wet and naked. She didn't flinch or try to cover up. She just stood there in the steam.

"That blood on the Band-Aid, it was hers. Russell's not after you. He's after her."

She turned off the water.

"My towel."

Andy tossed the towel to her.

"Why'd you lie, about the Band-Aid?"

"So you'd tell Reeves and he wouldn't take her."

"Why does he want her?"

"To save his son."

She dried off.

"How can she save his son?"

"Because she's immune to all known illnesses."

"She can't die?"

"No, she can die—of old age, or a crime, or a car accident, or if you kill us on your motorcycle. But she won't die of cancer or AIDS or the flu. She's Baby X … and I'm the Virgin Mary."

"The Virgin Mary?"

"The mother of the savior."

"The savior of what?"

"Mankind. They thought her stem cells would be the cure."

"For what?"

"Everything. Every disease known to man. They wanted to clone her, make a guinea pig out of her. I wanted her to live a normal life … be a regular kid."

"Russell thinks her stem cells can save Zach."

She nodded and pointed.

"My undies."

He tossed the black underwear at her, took once last look, and walked out.

"I was worried about her. I mean, she was five and had never been sick. Kids are supposed to get sick, right?"

Andy tossed another dry branch onto the fire. Jessie was sound asleep in the sleeping bag. Frankie was smoking a cigarette.

"One time, all her friends got strep throat, but not her. Then half her class went out with the flu, but not her. I started wondering if something was wrong with her."

"She's never been sick?"

"Not even a cold. So I took her to the pediatrician. He said he'd never had a five-year-old patient who'd never been sick, not an ear infection or pink eye or a runny nose. He asked if he could take blood samples, send them off to a friend, an immunologist at a research hospital in upstate New York. I said okay. I wish I hadn't."

"So what happened?"

"A few months later, the doctor called and asked me to bring her in. His friend was there."

"Mr. Doyle, Mrs. Doyle, this is Dr. Tony Falco."

They shook hands and sat around a small table, like when they had gone to the lawyer's office to sign their wills. Dr. Falco smiled at them.

"I'd like to study your daughter."

"Why?" Frankie said.

"Because she might be an anomaly."

"You mean a freak of nature?"

Mickey Doyle laughed. "Like Shaq, only smaller."

"Mr. Doyle, your daughter is far more special than any athlete. She could save the world."

"What are you talking about?" Frankie said.

"I'm talking about a perfect immune system. I'm talking about stem cells that might cure every disease. I'm talking about changing the world."

"You're talking about making her a guinea pig."

"No, ma'am. We just need to study her. And both of you. Have you ever been sick, Mrs. Doyle?"

"Yes."

"Mr. Doyle?"

"Hung over." He chuckled. "Yeah, I been sick."

"And after you test us … her, then what?"

"If she's what I think she is, we would use her stem cells to create a new line—"

"You mean, clone her?"

"Yes."

"No."

"Mrs. Doyle, the curative properties of her stem cells might be unlimited."

"But you don't really know? It's all just an experiment?"

"So was going to the moon, until we did it. Mrs. Doyle, imagine a world without disease. Without young children dying of leukemia and other childhood diseases. Without children in Africa dying of AIDS. Without pharmaceutical companies controlling who lives or dies. Your daughter can change all that."