The Shadow Box (66 page)

“Johnny . . .”

“You want to hear a statistic? Eighty percent of all new drugs that are available in this country—and
I'm
talking
miracle drugs now—were available in other countries an
average of six years earlier. How many people died wait
ing, Brendan? How many died not knowing about a drug
that could have kept them alive?”

This went on for most of the flight.

The part about how the FDA kills people took ten min
utes by itself. Boiled down, Johnny says that the FDA has
become a political rats' nest, self-perpetuating, secretive, a
powerful bully with standards that are considered absurdly
rigorous by every other developed country. We'd be no
where on AIDS if it wasn't for the French, nowhere on
the cancer that killed Rocco if it wasn't for the Japs.

“That Jap drug was there all the time, Brendan, and no
one would tell me. Do you hear what
I'm
saying?”

Doyle began to understand the dynamic here.

The FDA, Johnny went on, does not protect consumers.
It protects its own turf. The drug companies don't com
plain out loud, he says, because the FDA, which is fa
mously vindictive, can shut them down with a word. Or
they'll say, “You been talking to reporters? You been
bitching about us? Fine. You just bought another two years
before we let you sell that new Alzheimer's drug you're
so proud of.”

This, he says, is why the drug companies are moving
as much of their R&D as possible to Europe and lately to
China. The small biotechs have no choice but to do that
because they can no longer attract venture capital in this country. They can't afford the hundred grand that the FDA
charges everyone, big or small, just to make an
application.

All of this, clearly, had come as a recent revelation to
Johnny G. But it was hardly a surprise to Doyle. The FDA
is, after all, a government agency. It has absolute power
over a very rich industry. Regulators, by their nature, cling
to such power because once it's gone, they're virtually
unemployable in an industry that has grown to detest them.
The smart ones know that. They make it while they can and park it in accounts on Grand Cayman.

“Enough,” said Doyle at last. ”I want to know why
we're talking about this.”

“Because it makes me crazy. If you saw my father
…”

“Johnny, I did see your father. Cut to the chase here.”

He was silent for a moment.

Then, “You're looking to bring down AdChem. Find
another way, Brendan.”

“Another way than what?”

“You shorting their stock?”

“Yeah. Isn't Julie?”

“Big time. Now let me guess. You're going to sit down
with a congressman or two, cut them in, and when the
time is right they'll blow the whistle, call in the FDA who
will then shut down all of AdChem's North American operations and then lean on Germany to shut them down over there. The stock drops like a stone and you get rich.”

Doyle made a face. “You're way ahead of me,
Johnny.”

A snort. “Bullshit.”

“Hey! Fuck you, kid. It happens that I'm still on Jake
Fallon.
I'm
on who pays for Jake and after that I'm on
who pays for Arnie Aaronson.”

Johnny G. rubbed his chin. He sat back in his seat.
After a moment, he gave Doyle's arm a light punch. The
punch was a limited apology.

“Anyway,” said Johnny, “Michael won't like doing it
that way.”

“What way?”

“Starting a run on their stock. Too many people get
burned.”

“You know another way?”

“No.”

“You know a way to keep the FDA out? How do they
stay out?”

”I don't know. But there's something I want to try. Just
to see if I can do it.”

“Like what?”

“Parker did some bragging. Said he's got some FDA
people in his pocket. He named a few names.”

“And you want to take them down?”

”I want to take the whole thing down.”

Chapter    41

Michael found the car keys and the pistol near the sign that said No Clamming. Moon
had wrapped them
in a potato chips bag from the trash and buried them in the sand. Jake's Buick was in the Lighthouse Beach lot.
It was the only car still parked there. Michael thought that
was as good a place for it as any but Megan insisted on
moving it. She said there's been some vandalism lately.

She traded keys with him, told him she needed to stop
at the pharmacy first but then she'd park the Buick in back
of the Taylor House. Michael said he'd see her there. He
wanted to check in with Harold and Myra and make sure
all the guests were comfortable, especially Mrs. Mayfield.

Afterward, he would drive back out to the airport and
pick up Doyle and Giordano. If Megan wouldn't mind,
he'd like to talk to them alone. Later, perhaps, they could all grab some dinner together.

“He's really a gangster?” Megan asked him. “You
grew up with gangsters?”

“It's . . . more of a family business.”

“But the kids. Don't they ever, you know, decide they'd
rather go straight?’'

A shrug. ”I think Johnny's pretty straight.”

“In his way?”

He nodded. “In his way.”

Megan did stop at the pharmacy, but only so she
hadn't lied.

She bought a magazine in case she had to do more
waiting. After that, she opened the Buick's trunk and
found Moon's sock. It was tucked in the well of the spare
tire. She had to move four gasoline cans, three of them
empty, to get at the well. The touch of the gas cans caused
a montage of fires to flash through her mind. She closed
the trunk and, sock in hand, walked the short block down to the waterfront.

There were quite a few tourists there, some sipping
cocktails, enjoying the early evening. She found a fairly
private spot and sat on the edge of the jetty, her feet
dangling over the water, the sock held hidden between her
knees. She shook the cuff links out first. They barely made
a splash. The watch followed. The frame stayed wedged
in the sock.

She had promised herself that she would simply let it
go, sock and all, without looking at the photograph. She
knew all that she wanted to know about Bronwyn. That
Bronwyn was more talented than she is. More educated,
more worldly, more beautiful. But also that she never
loved Michael. And that the color of her eyes and her hair
were as false as she was.

Megan was sure of that. She felt it when she touched
the shirt that Bronwyn had bought for him and again when
she felt Bronwyn herself through Michael's body.

She was
almost
sure.

What she didn't need now was to let her skin touch that photograph. Even without that, even just holding the sock,
she was beginning to see visions of Michael making love
to Bronwyn, the two of them pumping up and down,
moaning and gasping, Bronwyn doing things to him that
she, Megan, couldn't bring herself to do quite yet and
doing them better than she ever would.

Megan . . . stop it, she scolded herself.

She knew that this was no psychic gift talking. It's just
herself. All she is, right now, is an ordinary, everyday
woman, jealous and insecure.

So act the part.

Drown the bitch, Megan. Let go of the sock.

She did.

She heard the splash and listened as a long line of bub
bles came belching to the surface. She almost smiled. She
stopped herself. A smile, all things considered, would be
unattractively smug. She smiled all the same.

Megan sat for a while, enjoying the evening panorama and the parade of big yachts, both sail and power, coming
in from all over. Out in the harbor, several were circling
looking for a place to drop anchor. On board, some were
already having cocktails. Others were hailing the town
launch to come ferry them ashore. Smaller boats sat in
line, their engines coughing, waiting for a space at the
public landing.

   
On one of them, a glitzy sport fisherman, a dark-skinned
man in a green jogging suit looked woefully seasick. He
was retching over the side. The others seemed disgusted
by him. Megan watched as the skipper of that boat finally
b¤mped his way into a space just aft of her ketch. It was
about to hit her transom when a tall, thin figure in a
hooded black slicker dashed forward to fend it off. Megan
recognized Parnel Minter. She groaned aloud.

Parnel, she realized, had spotted her boat and was hanging
around it, hoping to talk to her. It was always the same. She
had found no way to convince him that she doesn't do spirits.
They exist, or they don't, suit yourself. But they could be
having a convention here and she wouldn't know it. Nor
does she do readings for ghost-freak tourists even when they
offer Parnel fifty bucks for an introduction.