René followed the aide and Christine down the hall and into the dayroom, where Mrs. Martinetti was sitting with Louis at a table. Louis was looking at black-and-white photographs. Old photos of the Martinettis in younger days.
“Good morning, Dad,” Christine said with a big smile, and she gave Louis a kiss on the forehead. “You look so handsome in that shirt.”
His white hair was still damp from the shower and his face had a bright sheen. And although the bright red polo shirt gave a youthful glow to his face, it could not mask the confusion in his expression as he looked at Christine, then back at René.
Christine pulled up a chair beside him. “So, what’s new? What’s been going on?”
Louis continued to glare at her in bewilderment. Finally he said, “Where’s … my other daughter?”
“What other daughter? You only have one daughter—me. Christine.”
Louis looked at René for help. “I have another daughter. Not her.”
Christine’s body slumped. “No, Dad, you only have me. You just forgot.”
“She’s not my daughter,” he insisted, looking at René. Then he lowered his voice. “She’s somebody else.”
“Dad, how can you forget? It’s me, Christine. You remember.”
The photos were of Louis and Marie posing with Christine when she was a girl. Louis’s face turned angry and red. “You’re somebody else. You’re an … imposter.” He again turned his face away, clapping his eyes on René for safety.
“I’m not an imposter. You’re just a little confused.”
René could hear the fracturing in her voice. It had only been a few days since Christine was last here. Remarkably, his scores had increased twenty percent since he had first entered the home eleven months ago.
René knelt down and took his hand. “Louis, you remember me, right?”
He looked at her at first with a disconcerting scowl. But then his face smoothed over. “Yeah, you’re the pharmacist woman.”
“That’s right. We’re friends—you can believe me. And this is Christine. Look at her, Louis. She’s your daughter, Christine.”
Louis did not look at Christine. But he shook his head. She asked him again to look at Christine, but he refused.
René got up and nodded to Christine to follow her. “We’ll be right back,” she said, and led Christine out of the dayroom and into the hall where Louis couldn’t see them.
“How can he not recognize me? I was here three days ago, and he was fine. He’s supposed to be getting better.” Tears puddled in her eyes.
“It might be that he’s remembering you from years ago—the old photos. That happens often. In fact, it’s called Capgras syndrome—when they think that loved ones are doubles or fakes.”
“Can’t you give him something? I means with all those meds you got?”
“He’s been treated with antipsychotics.”
“Maybe you can recommend they up the dosage or something.”
The nursing staff would give him Ativan or Haldol when he got seriously agitated or threatened to disrupt the ward. But they could not medicate back the recall every time he forgot his daughter. Ironically, Memorine was supposed to do that.
Christine looked distraught. Rene took her hand. “Let’s try this,” she said, and led her back into the dayroom. “Hey, Louis. Look who’s here. It’s Christine.”
Louis looked at her for a prolonged moment. Then his face brightened into a smile. “Where you been?”
“The traffic was bad.” Christine walked over and gave her father a big hug. “So what’s going on? How you been?”
They talked for a while. Then Louis glanced at René as she was about to leave them. “I couldn’t stop them,” he whispered. “I tried, but I couldn’t. I’m sorry.”
“You couldn’t stop who, Louis?”
“Sorry.” His eyes filled with tears.
“Dad, what are you talking about?”
But he disregarded Christine. “Louis, you’re getting confused,” René said. “What’s upsetting you? Tell us, please.”
He looked at Christine, then back to René. “Sorry about your brother.”
“Louis, I don’t have a brother.”
He nodded. Then his face tightened. “But I’m going to get them back some day, the fuckers.”
“Get who back?”
He nodded to himself as if he had just settled something. “They’ll know.”
35
“WELL, YOU GOT YOUR OUT-OF-COURT SETTLEMENT, and it cost me a friggin’ bundle,” said Gavin Moy.
“Two years from now, it’ll look like petty cash.” GEM Tech stocks that morning were up by twenty percent since last week over the rumors about the new Alzheimer’s drug. In a year Nick’s holdings would double several times over. And Jordan Carr would probably own an entire fleet of Ferraris.
It was a warm late October day, and Nick and Gavin were riding at thirty knots southward on Gavin’s boat in celebration of the settlement and Nick’s agreement to head up the clinical trials. When Gavin asked where he wanted to go, Nick said he had never been through the Cape Cod Canal. It would be the last run before Moy put the boat in dry dock.
A thirty-eight-foot Sea Ray sport cruiser with twin 350 horsepower Mer-Cruiser engines, the boat was long, sharp, and very fast; and it was named the Pillman Express, Moy’s punning homage to George Pullman, whose railroad car industry grew into a dynasty. Teddy drove while Nick and Gavin settled back at the stern.
According to Moy, Broadview Nursing Home had assumed full responsibility for negligence in the death of Edward Zuchowsky, while, behind the scenes, GEM Tech paid the lawyer fees and damages. The Zuchowsky family agreed to accept a settlement of $1.5 million as well as an apology from Broadview and a promise to upgrade the security system of Broadview and other homes in the network.
“So, to use your phrase, ‘God’s in His heaven, all’s right with the world, right?’”
“It’s actually Robert Browning.”
“Whatever. So how’s your colleague and former student doing?”
Nick let pass the sarcasm in Moy’s voice. “She’ll be relieved it’s all behind her.”
“Some things are better left forgotten,” Moy said.
“I guess.”
“By the way, we’re going to make an official announcement in a couple weeks—press release, video, you name it—the whole nine yards.”
Moy beamed at Nick as if he were Moses glimpsing the Promised Land. Nick nodded, thinking he would not spoil the moment by reminding him of the flashback issues that lay before them—the delusional seizures that had probably led to the killing of Eddie Zuchowsky and the death of one of Peter Habib’s patients, William Zett, on a playground slide.
No free lunch in pharmaceuticals. No magic bullet—or very few that don’t leave scars.
They had left Marina Bay at nine that Saturday morning, when the sea was like polished marble, and headed down the coast. A little before noon they passed through the canal and out into Buzzards Bay. They lunched at Woods Hole, then by two they headed deeper into the bay at Nick’s request.
On the right they passed Naushon and Pasque Islands and some of the others in the Elizabeth chain. Short of Cuttyhunk, Moy asked Teddy to turn the boat around because he wanted to catch the tide and the headwinds.
As they swung around, Nick nodded toward a low blue hump on the western horizon. “Isn’t that Homer’s Island?”
“Yup,” Moy said without even looking.
“You been out there recently?”
“Nope.” Then Moy waved at Teddy to head back.
Teddy leaned on the throttle, and the boat roared back up the ferryboat lane toward the canal which would take them back home.
“You remember that guy I was telling you about—the one who got caught out there in the jellies?”