When I joined Jerry and Tyler for breakfast, my husband held up the Star’s front page. The headline read: MIRACLE CANCER CURE UNCOVERED IN GERMANY!
Travis’s interviews and quotes gave a vivid picture of German cancer patients being treated with a powerful, new cancer-curing drug.
Jerry read Travis’s story out loud while I ate my breakfast. When he put the paper down, he said, “This ought to stir up a hornet’s nest.”
An understatement, I thought, but still very true.
Jerry took Tyler upstairs for a cleanup, and I reread Travis’s piece. I had already planned to stay home and review the journal I’d begun after my first meeting with Roanne Dalton. I wanted to revisit our thinking from early on and compare that to where we were now. Had we skipped over something, a person? I have always found this type of reflection a useful exercise whenever I moved deeply into a case.
Jerry returned with Tyler, who was reaching out for me to hold him. As I took my giggling son, I said to Jerry, “I was thinking about asking Roanne to join us on Scalawag this weekend.”
“Fine with me. From what I’ve heard and seen—”
“Down, boy. She’s not flaky enough for you.” I put Tyler into his crib, got him interested in his toys, and then sat with my husband.
“Can you imagine what must be going on in one hundred Senate offices this morning?” I said, reaching for the last piece of toast. “Want this?”
Jerry declined the toast. “No, I’m watching my figure.”
“Ha, ha, ha. Mine is doing very well, thank you.”
“You get no complaints from me.” He put the Business section down. “Where is Senator Dalton in all of this? Eh, not the toast, Tutoxtamen.”
“She wants it approved. She likes Barton’s plan of running hard-hitting prescription drug stories. It should gain enthusiasm for her cosponsored bill. Michael will like the pressure they create on Kelly and the pharmas.”
“And you?”
“My story on the conspiracy to dump Tutoxtamen is building, as we tie Kelly and Pembroke to Horowitz in bribery, corruption, and Mort’s killing.” I ate the last morsel of toast and chased it with coffee.
“Travis looking for a lost aunt was a bit of genius,” Jerry said. “Something you’d do.”
I smiled, puckered my lips, and blew him a kiss. “The beauty is I’m not openly involved. Travis has put a fresh face on it, and my cover is—”
Jerry interrupted. “There won’t be enough hotel or hospital beds in all of Germany for the hordes of Americans who will be flying there. Cancer patients with passports are probably making reservations, as we speak, while their doctors are calling the hospital. Do you think the Germans are manufacturing it?”
“No, Rogers is. That was what Rufus sort of told us, and probably why he flew to some island in the Caribbean last night. Rogers Pharmaceuticals probably supplied the Germans from their pre-not approvable stock. Harley had the Germans testing Tutox long before the FDA rejected its being manufactured here.”
“Do you know if Rogers’s new offshore operation is up and running?”
I shook my head.
“I mean, he’s going to have to restock awfully fast or . . .”
“Our discovery may not rest well with Rogers,” I said. “Although, who knows? This could all be part of his strategy. I’m sure Kelly and the pharmas believe it’s Rogers. The question now is what will they do about it?”