_Sunday, April 5
3:19 P.M.
_
The afternoon was waning when Ally finally headed back downtown. Days
like today she couldn't help coining away buoyed, feeling her mom was
going to be cogent forever.
In fact, Ally was more worried about herself just now. About two
o'clock she'd started feeling that sensation in her chest again, but
she hadn't wanted her mother, or Maria, to know she was using
vasodilator medication. She casually said her farewells and got down to
the car and was sitting behind the wheel before she popped a nitro tab.
She immediately felt okay again, and as she drove down Broadway,
heading for her office, she reviewed all that had happened.
After their brunch of smoked fish and onion chutney and soda bread and
a pot of double-strength Earl Grey, she'd tried to sell her mother on a
trip to the Bahamas, with Maria joining them. Soon, maybe at the
beginning of summer. She wanted Nina to spend some time thinking about
it, but she didn't want to wait too long. Was this just going to be a
distraction at the end of Nina's life? God, she didn't want to think
so. She wanted to think of it as a rebonding.
Nina had always liked to revisit the Devonshire countryside of her
childhood in midsummer--when Arthur could take time off--always for just
a week, but it was as intensively planned as a major military campaign.
Her favorite thing was to trek among the hedgerows and stone fences,
making charcoal sketches on opened-out brown bags. In the evenings they
would dine _en famille_ at a country inn. They went with local
favorites, like kidney pie. Then they would stroll the country lanes in
the moonlight as a family. No TV, and she and Grant hated everything
about the trips. Booooring.
But that was long ago and far away, when she and Grant were still kids.
Now her mom would surely want something restful. And some guaranteed
sunshine wouldn't hurt either. Already she had an idea: why not rent a
house with a private pool, say on Paradise Island where Nina could
spend a couple of hours each afternoon in the casino? She'd always
loved casinos, and never missed a chance to hit the blackjack tables if
she was anywhere near one. Her loss limit was a hundred dollars, but
she actually beat the house more often than not. The teatime scotch
hadn't impaired her card-counting skills.
Nina appeared to like the idea, so Ally had started making up a
schedule in her head. The beginning of summer would be off-season in
the Caribbean and there should be some real bargains to be had. She
made a mental note to ask Glenda, her assertive, gum-chewing travel
agent at Empress, to start trolling for a package.
What was Ally really thinking, hoping? She was fantasizing she could
heal Nina all by herself. She so desperately wanted to, she had a
premonition she could will it to happen. When she saw her mom on good
days, she always found herself believing she could somehow make all her
days good. She was sure of it, against all odds.
What she wasn't sure about was what her mother really thought about
Grant's proposal to enroll her in this clinic in New Jersey. Was this
doctor's "miracle" stem cell cure based on a real medical advance, or
was he some kind of charlatan?
The first thing to do was to find out more about this supposed medical
magician, Karl Van de Vliet. The envelope Grant gave her was still
lying there on her breakfast bar, unopened. She told herself she'd read
it the minute she got home tonight, when the day's work was over and
she could concentrate....
The Sunday office. The interior-design job she had on her mind was
behind schedule and she was feeling a lot of pressure. It was for a
Norwegian couple in their mid-thirties. He was a software programmer
working in New York's restructured Silicon Alley, and she was teaching
at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Together they pulled down over
250 thou a year and they'd decided to stop throwing away money on
obscene New York rents.
They bought an entire floor, actually three small apartments, of what
was formerly a tenement in the West Fifties, an area once known as
Hell's Kitchen but now much gentrified and renamed Clinton. They had
dreams of an open-space loft of the kind made famous in SoHo when
artists took over abandoned factory buildings and gutted the space,
taking out all the walls.
Because they had combined three apartments, they had to file their
plans with the NYC Department of Buildings and modify the building's
Certificate of Occupancy to reflect the change in the number of
dwelling units.
So far so good, but then a woman who was the local member of the
District Council got wind of the project and sent someone from her
office to look over the place. The next day, the Department of
Buildings' approval of their plans was abruptly withdrawn.
It turned out that there was an obscure law on the books concerning
Clinton, one that even the Department of Buildings was only vaguely
aware of. It said that in order to preserve the "family character" of
the neighborhood, no renovation could alter the number of rooms in a
residential building. Not the number of apartments, mind you, just the
number of rooms.
That was when they showed up at CitiSpace in despair. They wanted Ally
to help them by doing some kind of design that would satisfy the law
and also give them the open, airy feeling they had set their hopes on.
On the face of it, their two goals seemed mutually contradictory and
impossible.
He was short and shy and she was plump and sassy and Ally liked them
both a lot. Sometimes in this business she sensed she was helping
people realize their dreams and that was a very rewarding feeling. Real
estate was an emotional thing. Your home was a part of you. She always
tried to get to know people before she did any designs for them.
Sometimes design was more psychology than anything else.
But this time she had to solve a problem before she could wax creative.
If their plan for open space could be stopped by some obscure local
provision that even the Department of Buildings was fuzzy about, then
maybe there was some other obscure law in the Housing Code that could
be used to fight back. The full code had recently been put on the NYC
Web site, so she wanted to go over every page and see what she could
come up with. And she wanted to do it in the office, undisturbed with
all the architectural plans close to hand.
The office was deserted when she cruised in and clicked on the lights.
She got on the expansive NYC Web site and started poring over the
Housing Code, though she was still obsessing about Nina. What if this
doctor in New Jersey actually could do something for her?
Finish here, she told herself, and then go home and read the guy's CV.
A pot of decaf coffee later, she came across a little-known fact, which
she now vaguely remembered from her days as a practicing architect. If
you installed a fifteen-inch drop across a ceiling, that was
technically a wall in the eyes of the NYC Department of Buildings. The
space on each side became a separate "room."
As they say in the movies, bingo.
In fact, why not do a honeycomb ceiling that would actually simulate
the industrial look they were seeking, anyway? The ceiling was over
eleven feet high; there was plenty of vertical space. Nobody would know
it was just a sneaky way to get around a funny local aberration in the
Building Code.
I'm brilliant, she thought. Yes! Dad would be proud.
She made some sketches, and by that time it was after six. Time to go
home.
Knickers was waiting by the door, and she gave Ally a dirty look and
some very disapproving barks. By way of penance, Ally took her on an
extra long walk, all the way up to Fourteenth Street and back. Then she
picked up some tuna salad and steamed veggies from a new deli on West
Tenth Street.
As she settled down to eat at the breakfast bar, she felt like a single
mom, always eating and doing everything on the run--and all she had to
worry about was a friendly dog. How did real working moms do it?
It was just past nine when she poured a glass of Chardonnay and picked
up Grant's envelope and took it into the living room, pausing to put
some Chopin ballades on the CD player.
The envelope contained a bound folder that was Dr. Karl Van de Vliet's
curriculum vitae, his resume. It was in fact a minibiography that
devoted a page to each of his career turns. His life story was
presented from a god's-eye view, as though it were a novel.
Karl Van de Vliet had done his undergraduate studies at the prestigious
University of Maastricht after which he'd migrated to the United States
and taken a Ph.D. in molecular genetics from the University of Chicago,
top of the class. Following that he went to Yale as a postdoctoral
fellow, again studying genetics.
From the beginning he focused his research on the mechanisms that
govern human cell reproduction. Along the way he'd become interested in
something known as the Hayflick limit--which concerned the number of
times a cell could divide before it became senescent and ceased to
replicate. This natural life span controlled the aging process of every
organism, and it seemed to be nature's device for nipping undesirable
(i.e. mutant) cells in the bud by never letting any cell, unhealthy or
healthy, just keep on replicating indefinitely.
However, there were "immortal cells" buried within us all, so-called
stem cells that could replicate forever, unchanged. They were present
at the very beginning of life and all our differing body tissue was
created from them. Some still lingered on in our body, as though to be
available for spare parts. If one could figure out how to transfer the
characteristics of those cells to other cells, then the possibility
existed that we could regenerate damaged or aging tissue in our vital
organs. The trick was to figure out the mechanism whereby stem cells
managed to cheat time.
His research, which was accompanied by a flurry of scientific papers,
was celebrated and encouraging. After three years he was lured away
from Yale to become a faculty member at Johns Hopkins, which offered to
double his laboratory budget. He was there for six years, during which
time he met Camille Buseine, a neurosurgeon finishing her residency.
She had a doctorate from a medical institute near Paris and she was
doing research that was similar to his, so the biography said. They
married and became a team, and when he was asked by Harvard Medical to
found a department for molecular genetics, she was immediately offered
a tenured position there too. Harvard considered it a double coup.
His research was zeroing in on the telomerase protein, an enzyme many
scientists believed was responsible for suppressing the aging process
in stem cells. Could it be used to regenerate tissue?
He was well along on the task of exploring that tantalizing possibility
when tragedy struck. Camille, who had worked around the clock during
her residency at Johns Hopkins, began feeling weak at Harvard and was
diagnosed with acquired aortic stenosis. After a 2 1/2-year struggle,
she died during a severe cardiac episode.
My God, Ally thought, that's what I have.
After Camille died, he left Harvard and its time-consuming academic
obligations and went to work full-time at a research institute
affiliated with Stanford University. He even formed a paper company to
structure the work, the Gerex Corporation. But then there came a second
strike against him. He was doing research using embryonic stem cells
obtained from the discarded embryos at fertility clinics. After two
years of harassment by right-wing political groups, Stanford decided
his research was too controversial and terminated his funding.
Three months later, Karl Van de Vliet merged his company with Bartlett
Medical Devices and moved his research staff east to New Jersey, to the
Dorian Institute. That was five years past, and now his research using
stem cells was in third-stage NIH clinical trials.
The official history ended there, though with a strong hint that the
final chapter was yet to be written. Then at the back there was a
bibliography of publications that extended for eight pages, and
included a summary of the most important papers. His work on stem cells
and the telomerase enzyme appeared to be at the forefront of the field.
Oddly, however, some of his writings also were philosophical, an
argument with himself whether his work could be misused to alter the
natural limitations life imposes. One of those papers, from a
conference presentation in Copenhagen, had a summary, and in it he
pondered whether the use of stem cells to rejuvenate the body might
someday give medical science godlike powers.
The Greeks, he declared, had a myth about the punishment reserved for
those who sought to defeat our natural life span. When the goddess of
the dawn, Aurora, fell in love with the beautiful youth Tithonus and
granted him immortality, it turned out to be a curse, since he still
reached the decrepitude of age but had to suffer on forever because he
could not have the release of death.
But, Van de Vliet pondered, if we could find a way to arrest the aging
process in our body's tissue, might we escape the process of aging? If
so, was this a good thing? Or might this be a step too far that would
bring on unintended, and as yet unknown, consequences?
_Well_, Ally thought, _I wouldn't mind having Mom's mind restored. Or
my own heart, for that matter.
_All in all, Karl Van de Vliet was clearly a genius. He also was a very
complex man. But might he be a very gifted huckster as well?
The inside back cover had a group photo, showing him surrounded by
members of his research staff, all in white lab coats. There were two
men and two women and each was identified, along with a list of his or
her academic credentials. They were standing on the porch of what
appeared to be a nineteenth-century mansion, which had large Doric
columns in Greek Revival style. The lettering in the marble above their
heads read THE DORIAN INSTITUTE.
She put down the folder and went into the kitchen and poured herself
another glass of wine, finishing off the botde. Her mind was chinning,
but not because of the words on the page. It was that photograph at the
back. It was dated less than two years ago.
His Ph.D. at the University of Chicago was granted in 1962. But even if
he was a genius and got his first doctorate in his early twenties, he'd
still have to be--what? At least sixty years old by now. Probably
halfway to seventy.
_But in the photo, he looks no more than forty, well, forty-five at
most. What the heck is going on?
_She went back into the living room and picked up the brochure and
stared at it. He had sandy hair that lay like a mane above his
elongated brow. He was tall and gaunt, with high cheeks and deep,
penetrating eyes. But no matter how you gauged him, the guy hadn't aged
a day since his forty-fifth birthday, tops.
So what's going on that isn't in the package?
She checked the digital clock on the side table--the hour was pushing
ten--and decided to give Grant a call.
Three chirps, and then, "Yo. Hampton here."
My God, she thought, he even does it at home. That synthetic bravado
was left over from his trader days: _You're the luckiest person alive,
just to have reached me. How can I further make your day?_ his tone
implied.
"Grant, it's me. I think it's time for that vital chat."
It took him a split second to recover, and then, "Hey, I was beginning
to wonder what happened to you. If you were going to stand me up or
what. Not call, like you said you would."
"Long day. I was up at Mom's this morning. You knew she was going to
tell me, right? About your little surprise visit and proposal?"
"I had a hunch the topic might arise." His voice seemed to shrug
nonchalantly. "I thought you should hear it from her instead of from
me. So what do you think?"
"What do I think? I think I'm wondering what you're up to."
"I'm not 'up to' anything, Ally, except exactly what I told her.
Trouble is, I don't know whether she got it. I wanted to see how she
was doing. You know, I'm thinking maybe Dr. Vee can do something for
her. But I had to see her first. She seemed pretty distant, but that
woman there--what was her name? Marie, Maria, whatever?--said she has
lucid moments. So who knows? He might possibly help her. I think I can
arrange to get her into his clinic. Bartlett gives me a few perks. It's
the least I can do for her, so..." His voice trailed off expectantly.
"Grant, I need to talk to you about this man. I read the stuff you gave
me and I still don't know the first thing about him." She paused, about
to speak words she never thought she would. "If you want to come over,
I'll stand you a drink."
"You serious?"
"For my sins."
"I'll grab a cab. See you in fifteen."
It's begun, she thought. I'm about to let Grant screw up my life one
more time.
No. This round, don't give him the chance. Stay ahead of him.
_Sunday, April 5
10:39 P.M.
_
"I didn't know if I should have brought a bodyguard" he was saying as
he strode in the door, a Master of the Universe with a leather jacket
slung over his shoulder. He looked stylish, but then he always did. He
casually tossed the jacket onto the gray couch, then gazed around.
Thankfully, he didn't try the New York cheek kiss. "I guess this is not
supposed to seem like old times, but somehow it does. Seeing you again.
Hey, we're still blood kin, right?"
"Don't push it, Grant." She'd killed the Chopin and put on a Bach
sonata. Clear, precise thinking was required not sentimentality.
Knickers had rushed to give Grant a hello nuzzle, happier to see him
than Ally was. "Whatever this is, it is definitely not old times."
He sauntered into her kitchen, looking around--trying to act cool, but
clearly ill at ease. "You've done a nice job on this place, sis." He
was looking over the rustic counter she'd installed. "You get a deal on
the space? A bank repo or something?"
"The people who had it wanted to sell fast and I made them an offer."
Not that it was any of his damned business. Why didn't she treat the
question with the scorn it deserved?
She had an old fifth of Dewar's in the cabinet. She poured him some,
over ice, then gave herself a shot of tequila _anejo_, neat, to sip.
She loved the pure agave flavor. The more she thought about the
situation, the more she was sure she needed it.
He picked up his scotch, then walked into the living room and helped
himself to the couch. "Ally, I know why you're ticked. And I don't
blame you. I feel crummy about Dad, I really do. I guess I share some
of the blame."
He was trying to sound contrite but the reading did not quite rise to
the minimal threshold of credibility.
"You 'share'... with whom, you self-centered prick? Nobody else was
involved. He mortgaged CitiSpace to the hilt and settled those fraud
suits to keep you from losing your license. Or worse. You destroyed his
business and his life all by yourself."
He looked as contrite as she'd ever seen him.
"Look, I thought the business plan I had would work out. I really did.
I was managing discretionary accounts, but the bond market hit a
downdraft when I was long. A few of my clients didn't have the balls to
ride it out. What do you want me to say? That I feel like a complete
cretin over what happened? That a day doesn't go by that I don't hate
myself for it?" His eyes went dead and he seemed to shrivel, his body
becoming visibly smaller. "Well, I do. More than you'll ever know."
"You didn't seem all that contrite at the time."
"I was operating in a high state of denial back then. But now I want to
take a shot at growing up. I want to start trying to make up for all
that, if you'll just cut me a little slack and give me a chance."
"Grant, you're working for Bartlett Enterprises, doing whatever it is
you do. Fine. That's your job. But now you want me to become a guinea
pig when this Dutch doctor needs one in a crunch. Or maybe Mom too, for
all I know. Maybe he needs her as well. Two guinea pigs. So don't try
to make this about me and her. Let's keep it honest. It's really about
you, just like always."
"Ally, a lot of things have gone on since Dad... passed away. I've
changed, in more ways than you could ever imagine." He was all
sincerity now, his demeanor rapidly evolving to fit the current vibes
of the scene. "I'm not like I used to be. I really mean that. I've
learned ... learned that I can't always just be thinking about myself."
"So ... what changed you?" The truth was, he did seem different. In
some way she couldn't quite understand. But he was always talking about
turning over a new leaf, especially whenever he'd just gotten himself
in trouble. That part hadn't changed at all.
"Ally, Dr. Van der Vliet... I don't know how much I should tell you,
but he's a miracle worker." He paused and looked down at his scotch.
One thing about him was definitely different, she thought. There was a
lot less bravado and swagger. "The thing is, what he's doing is so
powerful. I'm not sure which worries me most--that it's not true, that
it's just some placebo effect, or that it is true. When I think about
the implications . . ." His voice trailed off again.
"Go on." She could tell he was dead serious.
"It's not something I'm sure I should talk about." He reached over and
touched her hand. "But it's working, I swear. He's doing things that
shouldn't even be possible."
Uh-huh, she thought, pulling her hand away.
"Grant, please tell me exactly what you think he could do for Mom." She
wasn't sure she should be having this conversation. "You want her to go
out to the Dorian Institute, right? Where he does his 'research.' And I
take it that's where you want me to go too."
"It's in northern Jersey, about an hour's drive from the city, maybe
not even if traffic's light. But I'd only want Mom to go if you say
it's okay. I'm not trying to do anything behind your back."
She breathed a long sigh, trying to clear her brain. Every other word
he uttered was probably part of some hustle. But what was it?
"Why don't we start at the beginning, Grant? I read his CV, and believe
me I've got a lot of questions. For starters, how did he convince
Winston Bartlett to bankroll him?" She took another sip of her tequila,
then set it down. "You're his flunky now, so you should be able to
answer that question."
"You read the materials I left?"
"Just finished them."
"Then you know he lost his federal funding at Stanford a few years
back, when he was at a critical stage of his research using stem cells.
That's when he came to the Man and persuaded him to put up the money to
help him take everything private. The only way Bartlett would play ball
was if he could buy the Gerex Corporation and get three-quarter
interest in all the patents. Van de Vliet kept the other quarter, but
now they're both hoping to sell off forty-nine percent to a big
pharmaceutical company. Not American. I can't tell you any more than
that."
"Congratulations," she said. "Sounds like your job is secure."
"Yeah, right."
That twitch of nonchalance he had when something really mattered--even
as a child he would attempt (and fail) trying not to gloat over some
personal success. It was moments like this when she realized she'd
missed seeing him and talking to him. When you cut a family member off
from you, you also cut yourself off from them. After all, he was her
closest blood kin, even though he was an unreconstructed shit. At some
level she wished she could get past the bitterness she felt toward him.
Could it be he really had changed?
He didn't like the way the scene was going. What the hell was her
problem? He looked at his scotch longingly, then got up and went to the
kitchen and got another ice cube for it.
Go easy.
How was he going to get through to her? If word of the Beta screw-up
got out, the buyout was toast and Grant Hampton along with it. But if
Ally could be brought in . . .
"Grant," she was saying, "I want to start off by asking you if you've
ever taken a really good look at that guy Karl Van de Vliet. Does he
look anything like his picture? The one that came with that CV of his."
"Sure, that's him."
"And I assume you've actually read his resume?"
"Of course." Here it comes, he thought. The thing everybody asks.
"If those dates are right, then he has to be--what?--at least sixty years
old. But in the picture he doesn't look a day over forty-five. So
what's going on?"
"Ally, you're finally getting it." He rattled the ice in his Dewar's,
then finally took a deep sip. Maybe, he thought, it would help with the
courage. "He's a truly amazing human being."
"That's not an answer, Grant. It's a generality." She exhaled in
obvious exasperation. "But I want an honest answer about one thing,
dammit. Do you actually think he could help Mom's Alzheimer's? Maybe
even reverse it? Tell me the truth. Just once."
"Ally, I can't guarantee anything. But it's worth a shot."
Now, he thought hopefully, she was sounding like she was starting to
come around. Thank God. As for whether Dr. Vee could cure the old bird
who knew? But he'd overheard the nurses talking about how he and his
research staff had had some phenomenal luck with Alzheimer's. . . .
"By the way, what happened when you talked to Mom?" he went on. "Did
she seem like she understood anything I told her?"
"Grant, she probably understood a lot more than you wanted her to. The
bad part is, she let you give her some hope. Now, what's going to
happen if she goes out there and ends up being disappointed?"
It's a real possibility, he told himself. But it's probably the only
way I'll ever get you out there, and that's what really matters.
"Ally, we'll never know unless ... You should go too."
"Look, maybe I'll talk to Van de Vliet. But it's purely information-
gathering." She was staring at him. "So why not tell me? The whole
story. Are you doing this for Mom and me, or are we just being used
like lab animals?"
"I'm not sure you're going to believe anything I say." He sipped again
at his scotch, then walked over to the skylight
and looked up. Finally he turned back. "After Dad . . . and everything,
I had trouble sleeping. I know you didn't think it got to me, but it
was like some bad force had taken over my mind, haunting me. I became
obsessed with death. I took off two months and went to Colorado,
camping. Out there, under the stars, I did a lot of thinking. Dad had
died suddenly, but maybe that was a blessing in disguise. The rest of
us, we all die a little every day. Why does time do the things to us it
does? Why do we have to grow old and repulsive?"
He drew on his scotch again, then continued.
"When I came back, I started doing research on aging. That's when Karl
Van de Vliet's name popped up on the Internet. Some paper he'd given in
Vienna years ago. It was about the physiology of aging. But then Tanya
came along and I sort of forgot about him. Then when I went to work for
Winston Bartlett, there he was. The very same guy. It was weird, but it
was as though God had delivered him."
"Is this shaggy-dog story going to end up being about why he looks so
young?"
"I'm getting there." He smiled. "I kept wondering too, and then finally
I saw an opening in his schedule and took him to dinner here in the
city, down at Chanterelle. A social thing. Eventually, after a couple
of bottles of serious wine, it came out that once upon a time he had
done an unconventional experiment. On himself. It was sort of an
accident, something about melanoma research."
"So he--"
"You asked me why he looks so young. Well, some procedure he did
apparently stopped his skin from aging. But then he changed the subject
and wouldn't talk about it anymore. So do I think he's a miracle
worker? I'd say he's walking proof of something. That you can cheat
nature."
"And?"
"There is no 'and.' That's all I know." He came back and settled onto
the couch. His scotch glass was empty and he yearned for another, but
that small voice inside was urging discretion. This was the moment that
could be make or break.
"But to get back to you, Ally, you really should meet him. I
can't talk specifics about the actual clinical trials, but let me just
say they've been very positive. There's every reason to think he can
help you. And Mom too."
He studied her, trying to read her mind. He wondered if she could
detect the anxiety he felt lurking just beneath the surface. Was she
seeing through him, the way Nina, for all her mental debility, had
seemed to?
"Grant, has this doctor Van de Vliet gotten into some kind of medical
experiment that's turned into a Faustian bargain? Is his skin
rejuvenation a signal that this research has gone over into The
Twilight Zone'! When a sixty-something man looks forty-something,
there's got to be an unnatural act going on. What does it mean?"
"Maybe it means he's found the thing Ponce de Leon was looking for. The
Fountain of Youth or whatever."
"Then he'll probably have to pay for it some other way," she said
getting up. "Mother Nature doesn't give out freebies. Look, I've got to
give Knickers her midnight walk. That's your exit cue. I'll call him
tomorrow. I'll go that far."
"Don't blow this chance, Ally," he said setting down his empty scotch
glass and getting up. He felt hope and it bucked him up. "It could be
the biggest mistake of your life. And Mom's."
He was at the door before he turned back. It was time for the
insurance. The hedging of bets. Bartlett had authorized it.
"By the way, I almost forgot. Jesus, I'm going senile myself. W.B. told
me to tell you he'd like you to come over to his place on Gramercy Park
tomorrow morning around ten, if you can work it into your schedule."
"What for?"
"That job on his place that I told you about this morning, I guess. I
do know he's planning to renovate the ground floor. But just between
us, he's also got a massive renovation job in the wings, so maybe
that's what's really on and this is like an audition. Who knows? He
bought an old mansion on upper Park and he's planning to heavily redo
it and turn it into a museum for his incredible collection of Japanese
military stuff, swords and armor and shit. He's going to do over the
entire interior. It's part architecture and part design, so I gave him
your name. Who knows? But I was over at his place this afternoon and he
asked about you. He said he wanted to see you as soon as possible. He
even gave me one of his personal cards to give to you. Here. It has the
Gramercy Park address and his private cell phone."
"Just like that?" She looked skeptical but took the card.
"Winston Bartlett is not a man who dawdles. If he decides he wants to
do something, he just moves on it. All he asked was that you bring a
portfolio, to show him some of your work."
_Come on and do it,_ he thought as he headed out the door. _Go and see
the Man. Just fucking do it. If he can't close this frigging deal,
nobody can.
_