Medusa

CHAPTER 27

DOOLEY’S VINTAGE SINGLE-WIDE MOBILE HOME ON A PINE Island canal was no five-star hotel, but it had distinct advantages that would not be found at the Four Seasons.

Pine Island was several miles distant from Bonefish Key. The trailer had a water view. And it had Dooley Greene sitting in a deck chair at the end of a dilapidated dock, cigar stub clenched between his teeth, 16-gauge shotgun on his lap, keeping an eye peeled for trouble.

Relying on his deep knowledge of local waters, Dooley had earlier made a fast crossing to the mainland. He had kept his boat’s running lights turned off until he headed into a canal lined with mobile homes. As the boat coasted up to the dock and Dooley killed the motor, Gamay confronted Paul.

“Before I burst from curiosity, please tell me how you happened to dash from one coast to the other and arrive just in time to rescue the fair maidens in distress. You weren’t scheduled to arrive here for a couple of days.”

“Kurt called and said he might have unknowingly sent you into danger. I couldn’t reach you by phone, so I put the seminar on hold and flew standby to Florida.”

“How’d you hook up with Dooley?”

“More good luck: he hooked up with me,” Paul said. “I was at the Pine Island Marina looking for a ride to Bonefish Key, checking out boats and desperately hoping someone had left a key in the ignition, when Dooley saw me and asked what I was doing. When I mentioned your name, he jumped at the chance to take me to Bonefish. He then noticed that two kayaks were missing, and figured out where you might have gone.”

“Thanks, Dooley,” Gamay said. She gave him a peck on the cheek. “You’re probably wondering what all this is about.”

“You learn that it’s healthier to mind your own business around here, Dr. Gamay, but I’ll admit to being a little curious about what’s going on.”

“You’re not the only one.”

Gamay glanced at Song Lee, who had been huddled on a seat during the trip to the mainland.

Dooley tied up the boat and led the way to the trailer. He extracted a six-pack of Diet Coke from the refrigerator, passed three cans around along with a bag of Goldfish crackers. Without saying a word, he took his shotgun out of a locked cabinet. With the 16-gauge slung over one arm, he ambled out to the dock with the rest of the six-pack.

Song Lee and the Trouts went into the trailer and sat around a Formica-and-chrome kitchen table. She sipped her Coke like an automaton and stared into space.

Gamay sensed that Lee was in shock from the violence she had witnessed.

“It’s okay, Dr. Lee,” she said. “You’re safe now.”

Lee turned her head, and Gamay saw tears glistening in her eyes.

“I’m a doctor,” Lee said. “I’m supposed to save lives, not take them.”

“You saved our lives,” Gamay said. “That man and his friends would have killed us both.”

“I know that. Still . . .”

“Do you have any idea who they were?” Paul asked.

Lee wiped the tears away with the back of her hand.

“He said he had been watching me for days,” she said. “He was waiting for me where I had left the kayak and forced me to go to the house. We were waiting for people coming to take me away. I pleaded with him. We argued. That’s when I grabbed the knife and ran.”

Gamay put her hand on Lee’s forearm.

“I think you had better start at the beginning,” Gamay said.

Lee gulped down her Coke like a thirsty longshoreman, then began to tell her story.

She had been born in a rural part of China, excelled in science as a college student, and went to study in the U.S. on a grant from the Chinese government. She had seen firsthand the ravages of disease among the poorer citizens of China and wanted to do something about it. She specialized in immunology at Harvard Medical School, and did her residency at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Returning to China, she found a job with a government program targeting the health of slum dwellers. The work centered on prevention, making sure that people were immunized and eliminating the sources of disease in the water and air. Her success led to a position in a hospital, where she was working at the time the SARS epidemic broke out.

Finally, Lee told Gamay how she had been exiled to the countryside after questioning the government’s response to SARS, and about her redemption and assignment to Bonefish Key, to work on a vaccine, based on an ocean organism, for a new virus strain.

“The blue medusa?”

“That’s right.” She seemed surprised. “It’s related to the highly toxic sea wasp. How did you know about it?”

“I badgered Dr. Mayhew, and he showed me the research room.”

“I’m amazed that he allowed you to see it,” Lee said. She stared at Gamay as if she were seeing her for the first time. “I just realized that I really don’t know who you are.”

“I’m a marine biologist with NUMA. I came to Bonefish Key because I was interested in ocean biomedicine.”

“From the looks of it, you were more interested in me,” Lee said.

“Sometimes things just happen,” Gamay said.

Lee smiled.

“You sound like a Chinese philosopher, Dr. Trout. Anyway, I’m glad you were interested or I might not be here.”

“Dr. Mayhew said the blue medusa was a new species.”

“That’s right. Bigger and more aggressive than the sea wasp. After the work moved to the new lab, they were going to use genetic engineering to produce a more powerful toxin.”

“I wasn’t aware there was another lab,” Gamay said.

“It was secret. They called it Davy Jones’s Locker. Dr. Kane and Lois Mitchell, his assistant, left Bonefish Key and took a number of scientists and technicians with them. Dr. Mayhew and the remaining staff stayed on to make sure there were no flaws in the original research. I was charting the probable spread of the virus and how best to contain it.”

“How effective was the toxin-derived drug?” Paul said.

“It was limited at first,” Lee said. “The medusae toxin is incredibly unpredictable. Even a small amount could kill a human, and at first more lab animals died than were cured. Then we made a huge breakthrough in identifying the molecular makeup of the microbe that produces the toxin. We were on the verge of synthesis. And clinical tests would have been the next step.”

Song Lee’s eyelids had been drooping as she talked, and Gamay suggested she lie down on the sofa. Then she and Paul stepped out of the trailer into the warm Florida night.

“Thanks for coming to our rescue, Galahad,” Gamay said.

“Sorry if Sir Dooley and I cut it too close,” Paul said. “What’s your reaction to Song Lee’s story?”

“I know for a fact that she didn’t make up the man she killed or his trigger-happy pals, so I assume that everything else she said is true.”

“I’ll talk to Dooley. Maybe he can fill in the gaps.”

As Trout approached the dock, he smelled cigar smoke before he saw Dooley. Trout started to speak but Dooley shushed him. Trout listened, and he heard the murmur of an engine echoing off the canal. Dooley mashed his cigar out with his shoe, grabbed Trout, and pulled him down behind a pile of wooden fish boxes.

The engine sound came closer, and a boat nosed into the canal. It was moving at a crawl, its spotlight sweeping back and forth, until it came to the end of the canal, where it made a U-turn and headed back to open water.

Dooley’s 16-gauge followed the boat until the sound of its engine could no longer be heard. He lit up another cigar.

“I’ll keep watch, but I think maybe we’d better get Dr. Lee out of here,” he said.

“No argument there,” Trout agreed.

Trout went back to the trailer. As he was telling Gamay about the suspicious boat, his cell phone buzzed. He checked the caller ID. Austin was calling to check on Gamay.

“I’m in Florida now,” Trout said. “Gamay is all right. But we ran into trouble off Bonefish Key.”

“What sort of trouble?”

“Gamay was attacked along with a Bonefish Key scientist named Dr. Song Lee, who was working on something called the blue medusa.”

“I want to talk to Dr. Lee in person,” Austin said. “Call NUMA and have them send a plane down right away to pick you up. Joe and I will be leaving town in a few hours. Meet me at the airport.”

“I’ll get right on it.”

“Thanks. I’ve got another favor.” He gave Trout a phone number. “Call Cate Lyons, Joe’s friend at the FBI, and extend my apologies for cutting her off. Tell her I’m heading for the Good Luck Fortune Cookie factory in Falls Church. Got to go.”

Moments later, Trout relayed Austin’s message to Lyons, who thanked him and hung up. As he tapped out the number to connect him with NUMA’s transportation department, he said, “We’re flying back to Washington tonight. Kurt wants to talk to Song Lee as soon as possible.”

Gamay shook her head.

“Kurt’s instincts were right on the mark as usual,” she said. “He said to look for something funny on Bonefish Key.”

“This is about as funny as it gets,” Paul said.

Gamay glanced over at the slumbering Chinese woman, thinking of their close call in the abandoned boat, and then looked at the serious expression on her husband’s face.

“If it’s so funny,” she said, “why isn’t anybody laughing?”