The Fountain of Youth

Chapter 14

“I want to know by the end of this business day,” Purdue told Dr. Cait. “But keep it professional.”

“Mr. Purdue, I had no idea that you did not know about Dr. Gould’s condition,” the medical scientist insisted. “Please, you have to believe that I was not deliberately keeping her cancer treatment from you. You were aware of the treatment we gave her, the tests, all that…”

“Yes, but that was for radiation poisoning, not lung cancer,” Purdue explained, seated on Dr. Cait’s office chair like a king taking charge. He was at the Orkney Institute in Kirkwall, looking for answers from his medical staff as to why he hadn’t been told about Nina’s illness.

“Mr. Purdue, the radiation she suffered was the catalyst to the contraction of her cancer malady. We assumed you knew that her treatment had been altered accordingly. Nobody here had any idea that you didn’t know. Only Evelyn knew that the statements were being sent to Dr. Gould for billing and she told me that this arrangement was at the request of the patient. We truly had no idea that you didn’t know. You know it would be absurd of us to deliberately withhold information from our employer!”

“Evelyn…she had a car accident, right?” Purdue asked.

“Yes, sir. She’d been sending the statements to Nina directly, as Nina requested,” Dr. Cait reiterated. “None of this was kept from you intentionally. It was just…miscommunication.”

Purdue felt sick. Not only did the revelation of Nina’s cancer rock him to the core, but the circumstances under which he’d found out made him feel betrayed by the few people he trusted. Yet, the more he considered the various factors involved, the more Dr. Cait’s explanation looked legitimate. The billionaire gave a long sigh, looking out the window of the doctor’s office at the stunning view of the countryside.

“Just keep your eyes and ears open for me, alright? I can’t help but feel this subterfuge was more than coincidental,” he told Dr. Cait.

“I shall. But I hope you’re wrong, Mr. Purdue. We’ve been such a good team thus far and I’d rather not think that someone here has been hiding anything.”

“So, there’s nothing you can do to reverse the effects? No cure for her?” Purdue asked.

The doctor shook his head with a somber look. “Not that we know of, short of reversing time back to before she contracted it.”

Purdue’s eyes widened, but he said nothing. At once he became completely preoccupied by something, but Dr. Cait knew well enough by now not to ask. The genius inventor always went into a daze of far-out ponderings when an idea came to him. “Thank you, Dr. Cait. I have to go back home to do some experiments.”

“Um, alrighty then, Mr. Purdue,” Dr. Cait replied. “Please drive carefully. This weather is terrible enough to entail building an Ark.”

Purdue chuckled dryly only out of courtesy, but his eyes were somewhere else, as was his mind. Dr. Cait knew that expression all too well. In the past, he’d learned that Dave Purdue got that look just before embarking on expeditions for the sole purpose of chasing relics reputed to be a farce.

As he drove off towards the south, Purdue received a phone call. He could hardly hear anything in the pouring rain, but he could tell that it was the Dundee Police precinct.

“Mr. Purdue, could you please drop in to see Lieutenant Campbell at your earliest convenience?” the officer on the phone asked. “The man who attacked you at Sinclair Medical Facility has died from his injuries and there are some details we need you to fill in for us.”

“Oh great,” Purdue moaned.

“Sir?” the officer asked.

“Nothing. Can’t this wait?” he asked.

“I’m afraid not, sir. Lieutenant Campbell has questions only you can help with and it’s imperative that he speak to you as soon as possible.”

“Alright. I’m on my way,” Purdue agreed reluctantly. He had to get back home. Something Dr. Cait had said had clarified a lot. Apart from the guilt of knowing that the radiation exposure had caused Nina’s increased risk for cancer, the doctor’s inadvertent advice during his jest held more weight that he could ever know.

“I have to reverse time. I have to un-make the progression of Nina’s sickness by reversing time,” he kept repeating as he braved the tempestuous mood of the skies in the car he’d rented from the local airport company. Through perilous bends of country road he rushed to get to the airstrip where his private jet awaited him. There were just too many places to be in too short a time; therefore, he’d elected to travel by air to get everything sorted out sooner. Nina’s time was running out and Purdue was not going to let her die, especially knowing that he was partly to blame for her contracting the illness.

Now he was frustrated with the added concerns surrounding the police investigation into the incident at Sinclair. All of these other matters felt heavy on Purdue’s soul. Even he, the normally fearless and cheery solver of problems, was now faced with things not even he could fix, and that made his heart weak with worry. Secondary to his personality seeing prospective failure as a challenge to excel, Purdue couldn’t help but feel like he needed a friend to talk to. Little did he know that a friend had already sent him a message that was slumbering away in his e-mail Inbox.

By the time Purdue landed in Dundee he’d already planned his experiments, those solutions he would have to construct to save Nina at all costs. As he quickened his pace on his long slender legs to skip the steps of the police station, Purdue continued filling his head with racing alternatives based on the knowledge imparted by his online contributors. They’d shared extensive knowledge with him about cancer and how it functioned on a base level.

But for now, he had to deal with criminal matters.

“Mr. Purdue!” Lieutenant Campbell exclaimed. “Thank you so much for coming so soon, especially in this horrendous piss-down.”

The men exchanged handshakes and Purdue followed the investigator to his office on the second floor from the precinct reception area. “Just to let you know, I’m in quite a hurry. So may I ask that we move this along as quickly as possible?”

“Does your life depend on it?” the police officer asked as they entered his office.

“Not mine. But a friend of mine is in trouble and she needs every second,” Purdue shared just enough to provide a reason. “So let’s get this sorted out. I hear the charlatan came to his end? How did he die? The gunshot wounds? I suppose I’m up for murder?”

“Culpable homicide, actually. But fear not, I’m trying to prove that your assailant did not die as a result of the gunshot wounds, but that his death resulted from murder while confined in hospital,” Lieutenant Campbell explained.

“I have an alibi,” was the first thing Purdue unintentionally uttered, evoking a good snicker from the investigator.

“We know, Mr. Purdue,” he smiled. “But I’ve reason to believe that Greg Reusch, your fake therapist, was murdered as part of a cover up for the botched hit on you.”

Purdue was intrigued after all. Even though he now had yet another thing to worry about — possibly being indicted — the case presented an interesting chain of events to investigate.

“So am I going to be arraigned soon?” Purdue asked, not to determine how much freedom he had left for himself, but for Nina.

“I’ve requested that they hold your indictment while I find proof of premeditated murder by someone who posed as a hospital visitor or staff member. If I can’t deliver this person, or reasonable doubt, you will unfortunately be tried for the indirect murder of the victim,” Lieutenant Campbell explained.

Purdue sighed, shrugging at his unbelievable bad luck of late.

“Why are you on my side in this?” he asked.

“Only because I distrust other people more than I distrust you, Mr. Purdue,” the officer joked. “Look, I concentrate on the evidence at a scene, and although the struggle and the presence of a murder weapon in your room at Sinclair was a bit difficult to blame on either party, the fact that the security camera had been disabled tells me that you weren’t the architect of the fake therapist’s attack. Another thing,” he cleared his throat to gesture the obviousness of the matter, “the therapist was an impostor of a dead man.”

“I understand,” Purdue said. “Forgive me for saying so, but it doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes to figure that out.”

“Too right, mate,” the officer slapped the desktop in agreement. “It’s a very clear-cut case. However, with our lack of a suspect and only circumstantial evidence on record, it is ironically the justice system standing in our way here. The law and its rigid rules are always a bitch to bend, even to cold, hard logic.”

“Just my luck,” Purdue replied. “The victim being charged for protecting himself.”

“Not to worry, Mr. Purdue. I have five days to prove that someone entered Hopkins Memorial for the explicit purpose of killing the victim to preserve anonymity,” the investigator told Purdue as thunder rumbled over the precinct. The flashing lightning that pulsed on the officer’s face gave the trouble Purdue was in an unnecessary nuance of horror.

“Now, as for the folder this bloke had on you,” Campbell said. “Can you tell me what it was he was effectively jotting down about you that looks like a long division nightmare? And please, explain it slowly, I’ve never been good at numbers.

Purdue sniffed and smiled. “Those numbers he recorded were not for mathematical use, Lieutenant. Regrettably, they were numeric codes that the so-called doctor…” Purdue halted to find the right words to explain the ludicrous theory, “…harvested from my brain.”

The two men sat staring at one another for several seconds while the storm raged outside the window. Chewing on his tongue before speaking, the lieutenant finally articulated his understanding. “So, he…downloaded…information from your brain in the form of number codes?” Then Campbell burst out laughing. “Oh my God, I’m sorry Mr. Purdue. I just sound insane, don’t I? But that’s what my comprehension told me you conveyed here.”

Purdue did not laugh. “You are not insane, sir. That is precisely what I was telling you. The mind, like a computer, functions on codes. We don’t know this consciously, but with the right kind of programming the human brain will follow orders to a fault when commanded with certain numerical sequences.”

The police officer gawked at Purdue as he continued to clarify. “During my apparent therapy, he removed that information from my mind and jotted down what commands were connected to which code strains. For that I am grateful to him, but those records are the Holy Grail for the Order of the Black Sun and therefore, Lieutenant Campbell, they have to be destroyed.”

“Holy Mary,” the officer said plainly, his eyes still reading Purdue’s to ascertain if the man was bullshitting him. “You’re dead serious, aren’t you?”

“I am. If you’re in possession of those medical reports, you have to make them disappear. If the people who did this to me, the people who killed their own scientist to cover this up, find this information, they can brainwash the entire world and use people like puppets to do their bidding.”

“Are you talking mass hypnosis?” Lieutenant Campbell asked in awe.

Purdue’s urgent expression convinced Campbell that he was involved in something huge. He leaned forward on his elbows and whispered, “I’m talking about the global domination by the fruit of the Nazi Party without even bothering with World War III.”