“Where is the author now?” Wendy asked.
“I couldn’t tell you,” Lester said.
“Obviously we dropped him from the staff immediately. Since then I understand he’s been indicted on drug charges. What eventually happened, I don’t know. I also don’t know where he currently is, but I do know one thing: he is not practicing pathology.”
“How would you suggest we find him?” Marissa asked.
“I’d still like to talk to him, especially since I have the condition he described. Of all the data he could have dreamed up, why did he pick something so unusual? What could he have hoped to gain?
It doesn’t make sense.”
“People do strange things for strange motives,” Lester said. He got to his feet.
“I hope this paper wasn’t the only reason you’ve come all the way to Australia.”
“We also thought we’d go out on the Great Barrier Reef,” Wendy said.
“A little work and a little play.”
“I trust your play will be more rewarding than your work,” Lester said.
“Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to get back to my own work.”
A few minutes later Marissa and Wendy found themselves standing by the front information desk again. The receptionist was calling them a taxi.
“That was rather abrupt,” Wendy said.
“One minute he was telling us he had the time, the next he was shooing us out of his office.”
“I don’t know what to make of all this,” Marissa agreed.
“But there is one thing I do know. I’d like to find that Tristan Williams just to wring his neck. Imagine the nerve of making up patients just to publish an article!”
“That old publish-or-perish mentality,” Wendy said.
“A taxi will be along directly,” the receptionist said as she hung up the receiver.
“I suggest you wait outside. The taxi queue is just up the street.”
The women left the FCA clinic, stepping into the glorious morning sunshine.
“So what does the tour director suggest we do now?” Wendy asked.
“I’m not sure,” Marissa said.
“Maybe we should go out to the University of Queensland and use the medical library.”
IS7
“Oh, boy!” Wendy said with obvious sarcasm.
“Now that sounds titillating!”
Charles Lester had not gone back to his work. Marissa and Wendy’s visit had disturbed him. It had been over a year since the last inquiry about that irritating paper by Williams. At the time he’d hoped it would be the last.
“Damn,” he said aloud, smacking a fist on his desk top. He had the uncomfortable premonition that there was trouble ahead. The fact that these meddlesome women had come all the way from Boston was upsetting to say the least. Most distressing of all was the possibility that their search for Williams might persist. That could spell disaster.
He decided it was time to confer with some of his associates.
After figuring the time difference, he picked up the phone and called Norman Wingate at home.
“Charles!” Dr. Wingate exclaimed with delight.
“Good to hear your voice. How’s everything Down Under?”
“It’s been better,” Lester said.
“I have to talk to you about something important.”
“Okay!” Dr. Wingate said.
“Let me get the extension.”
Lester could hear Dr. Wingate say something to his wife. In a few minutes he heard another phone being picked up.
“I’ve got it, luv,” Dr. Wingate said. Lester heard the other extension disconnect.
“What’s the problem?” Dr. Wingate said into the phone.
“Does the name Dr. Marissa Blumenthal mean anything to you?”
“Good Lord, yes,” Wingate said.
“Why do you ask?”
“She and a companion named Wendy Wilson just left my office. They came in here with that article about TB salpingitis.”
“My God!” Wingate said.
“I can’t believe they’re in Australia.
And we were so generous to them.” He related the details of the pair’s attempt to break into the Women’s Clinic’s computer record system.
“Did they get anything out of your computer?” Lester asked.
“We don’t believe so,” Wingate said.
“But those women are troublemakers. Something will have to be done.”
“I’m coming to the same conclusion,” Lester said.
“Thanks.”
Hanging up his phone, Lester pressed his intercom.
“Penny,” he said, “ring up Ned Kelly in security. Tell him to get his arse up here on the spot.”