Gerrie Nelson - Lab Notes

Diane stood at the helm watching her husband tweak the sail trim, and her heart went out to him. She knew that Vincent loved sailing, but she sensed that he found his leisure overload tedious. She knew that the temporary ban on practicing his alchemy had placed a severe strain on Vincent’s patience. And it was weighing on him, demonstrated in part by his growing animosity toward Bellfort.

The erosion of his attitude was also evident in his less-than-burning interest in her achievements. Returning from successful business trips, she had to curb her enthusiasm to avoid the appearance that she was showing off.

So far she had signed agreements with each of the Central and South American countries she visited with Raymond Bellfort and his cousin Gabriel Carrera who had arranged the meetings. Gabriel pointed out that even pharmaceutical giants did not have her 100 percent success rate. He said that representatives of large American companies usually showed up looking impressive in their hand tailored suits and Rolex watches. But their “taco Spanish” was almost an insult, and the use of an interpreter stiffened discussions.

Gabriel attributed Diane’s success to her deft handling of the cultures and her amazing facility with the Spanish language. She communicated like a local wherever she went.

“And, of course, your looks do not hurt,” he had said.

There was a time when Diane would have found that comment offensive, allowing it to diminish her sense of accomplishment. Despite advanced degrees in biology and pharmacology, she always suspected her looks were considered her strongest credential. And early in her career she allowed her resentment to show.

But as she matured she accepted that some people (even within her profession) saw female scientists as anomalies. Eye-appeal could at least explain, to the skeptical, how a woman might have risen to such a position. And maybe they were right to some extent. If she had been hard to look at, would Vincent have become her mentor early on?

From the beginning, they were a team in the workplace as well as at home. But Vincent had always been in charge of their professional life. Now, she wondered if her singular success was producing stress cracks in the foundation of their marriage.

They both knew that their relationship (personal as well as professional) was being redefined. Last week Vincent had even bent to help her with her gardening. However, for a man who could calibrate sensitive laboratory equipment with one hand behind his back, he had shown a marked clumsiness with flower pots—but she adored him for the effort.

So, today she had dropped her trip-planning and ran to catch him at the dock. The boat was the last bastion of Vincent’s supremacy over her. Vincent had introduced her to the world of boats and water. And even though she had been a quick study, they both knew that Vincent was forevermore captain of the ship. And they both liked it that way.

With a hand slice across his throat, Vincent signaled Diane to cut the engine. There was plenty of wind to run on sail-power alone.

He stepped into the cockpit and settled into the starboard seat. Diane glanced over at her husband as he ran his hand admiringly over the varnished cockpit trim.

“You’ve done a beautiful job restoring her. She looks brand new.”

Vincent smiled, acknowledging the compliment, and turned his head, slowly examining the yacht from bow to stern.

“Do you think we should rename her?” Diane asked.

“What’s wrong with Woodwind ?”

“I love that name, but in another life she was owned by drug runners,” she said. “Maybe the wrong people will remember it.”

Vincent chuckled. “Now who’s acting paranoid?”

The phone in his pocket vibrated. He dug for it and looked at the screen. It was Raymond Bellfort. He frowned. “This can’t be good.” Bellfort had a habit of saving bad news until the staff left the premises. Then he’d call them on their mobile phones.

After wrestling with the temptation to ignore the ring, Vincent pressed the green button.

Bellfort sounded breathless. “Taking Diane out for some relaxation, I see. Good idea. You two work so hard.”

Bellfort was greasing him up for something.

“Our investors drive me crazy. Gotta have a ‘magic bullet.’ They won’t loosen their purse strings for a car that takes them half way up the hill. They don’t want palliation; they want a cure. But we were lucky this time.”

A shrimp boat chugged past on their port side, with a flock of laughing gulls in close pursuit. With all the commotion, Vincent could only catch every other word, enough though to give him the uneasy sense that he should prepare to do battle.

The boat and the birds moved on by, but Raymond’s litany droned on: “… eliminate the risk, the expense of the interminable FDA processes: Clinical Trials, approval committees and so forth. Just a me-too drug. So what if it has fewer side effects and costs a lot less to manufacture? It’s not a cure.”

Vincent had heard enough. He interrupted, shouting into the wind. “I’m having a hard time hearing you, Raymond. Can we get to the bottom line?”

“Bottom line. That’s what I like to hear. I knew you’d eventually get past that ‘for the greater good’ schlock and get with the program here. Ahh… Welcome to the business world, my man.”

Vincent cursed and tossed the phone onto the seat. He had strongly suspected there was no monetary shortfall at BRI. Now he knew that Bellfort withheld funding for the completion of Peruvase because he planned to sell it all along—probably even before he and Diane had signed on with BRI.

Infuriated, Vincent pounded his fist on the seat cushion beside him; the phone bounced onto the cockpit floor. He bent down to retrieve it and heard Bellfort’s voice still prattling on: “You’ll get a large bonus, of course, and a royalty. We’ll finally be able to order that new spectrophotometer and so forth—all the stuff that’s been sidelined. It was quite a coup, my man. We really put the pants on them.

“Wait ‘til you see what that Taiwanese pharmaceutical company paid up front for your Peruvase. ”

Bellfort studied his phone. The battery was fully charged. Signal strength was good. So, as he suspected, Vincent Rose had hung up on him.

The phone buzzed in his hand, and “Aaaa calling” came up on the screen. Bellfort rolled his eyes; the man had been dogging him since early that morning. He pressed the green button and grunted “Hello.”

“Did you talk to him?”

“Just a minute ago.”

“And?”

“He had a little bit of an attitude… but I think after he chews on it awhile, he’ll warm up to the idea.”

“Try to help him fast-track his attitude adjustment. We need some damage control here.”

Duh! “I’m on it. Believe me; I know what’s at stake.”

“Keep me apprised. If you’re not successful, maybe I can be more persuasive.”

Vincent merged onto Interstate 45 heading south. Diane sat in the passenger seat of the Suburban watching the lush spring foliage roll by.

Southeast Texas had been a surprise when she first arrived months before. She had expected more of a desert landscape. But it was a transitional place where live oaks and magnolias shared the land with prickly pear cactus and mesquite, a place where the South made room for the Southwest.

She looked over at Vincent. His intense focus on the road told her his mind had already jumped ahead to Galveston; he was a man on a mission. Diane smiled to herself. She had forgotten how resilient her husband could be. It was only four days since the sale of Peruvase , and already he had moved on to his next project.