"You bastard!"
"My-my!" he said, giving her a dose of her own medicine. "Is this the woman who swore she would never get emotionally tangled up with anyone ever again?"
"He's a good man and he didn't need any new patients! He had all he could handle already!"
"Then he's daft!"
Charles had expected a quick retort, but instead he faced silent uncertainty. Which meant he had struck a nerve. Sylvia herself had questions about Buhner's mental status. Yet she had taken him into her home. Charles realized with a pang he did not wish to acknowledge that her feelings for Bulmer must run deep. Quite a bit deeper than her feelings for him. He could not help but resent that.
"Do you love him? Or is he just another stray you've taken in?"
"No," she said with a sudden ethereal smile that bothered him more than anything else since she had sat down. "He's not just a stray."
Charles found the whole conversation unpleasant and wanted off the subject.
"Why don't we go up to my—"
He stopped in midsentence because he had suddenly noticed that the cafeteria had gone silent. He glanced around and saw that everyone in the room was staring at a point somewhere behind him. He turned to look.
Senator McCready had entered the cafeteria and was heading in their direction. His progress was slow, what with the way he had to lean against his cane, but there was no doubt that Charles' table was his destination.
When he reached the table, Charles stood up and shook his hand—a formal gesture for the sake of the rest of the people in the room. They spoke a few banal words of greeting, then McCready turned to Sylvia, his political twinkle in his eye.
"And who might this be?"
Charles introduced them and then the senator asked if he might join them for a few minutes. After he sat down, the normal buzz of the cafeteria returned, but at a higher volume than usual.
Charles was nearly struck dumb by McCready's appearance. Since the Foundation had bought this building, he had never—never!—shown his face in the staff cafeteria. And to show up in public in the afternoon when his strength was fading was unheard of! Charles knew the physical toll this was taking on him. What the bloody hell was he up to?
"Where are you from, Ms. Nash?" he asked, acting as if this were just another one of his routine daily visits to the caf.
"I'm one of your constituents, Senator," Sylvia said with her half smile that Charles knew to mean that she was amused but not impressed by McCready's presence. "I live in Monroe. Ever hear of it?"
"Of course! As a matter of fact, I remember reading a piece in Tuesday's paper about a house fire in Monroe. Said the place belonged to a Dr. Alan Bulmer. I wonder if that's the same Dr. Bulmer I know."
Sylvia's smile and insouciant manner evaporated. "You know Alan?"
"Well, I'm not sure. There was a Dr. Bulmer who testified before one of my committees a few months ago."
"That's him! He's the one!"
McCready shook his head and tsked. "A shame. Lightning is such a capricious thing."
"Oh, it wasn't lightning," Sylvia said, and launched into her story about the mob. When McCready professed to know nothing about Bulmer's publicity as a healer, she filled him in on what the press had been saying.
Charles folded his arms across his chest, trying to keep a self-satisfied smile off his face. It was all clear now. McCready was here to pump Sylvia about Bulmer. Charles had to admire the way the senator had broached the subject so gracefully without wasting as much as a second. The man was smooth.
"That really is too bad," McCready was saying with a slow, sympathetic shake of his head. "We were on opposite sides of the political fence at the committee hearings, but I deeply respected his integrity and obvious sincerity."
The lopsided smile was suddenly back on Sylvia's face. "Oh, I'm sure you did."
The senator rapped the tabletop with his knuckles as if he had just thought of something.
"I'll tell you what," he said. "If Dr. Bulmer is agreeable, I will put the resources of the Foundation at his disposal to investigate this power he is supposed to have."
Charles watched Sylvia blink in surprise. "You will?"
Charles wasn't the least bit surprised, however. This surely had been the senator's aim all along: Get this Bulmer chap here and see if he's for real. And now that Charles knew where the play was going, he leaned back and enjoyed the performance.
"Of course! The raison d'etre of the Foundation is research. What if Dr. Bulmer truly has some power of healing that is as yet unknown to medical science? We would be negligent of the very purpose of this institution if we did not at least attempt to subject his supposed power to the scientific method. If he has something—truly has something—then I will place my reputation and the full weight of the Foundation's prestige behind vindicating him to the world."
"Senator," Sylvia said, eyes bright, "that would be wonderful!"
She's really got it bad for Bulmer, Charles thought. Otherwise she'd never swallow this load of tripe.
"But be warned," the senator said, his voice turning stern and stentorian. "If we determine that he's a fake, we will publicly expose him as such and advise anyone who is sick, even if they suffer from but a runny nose, to have nothing to do with him. Ever!"
Sylvia was quiet for a moment, then she nodded. "Fair enough. I'll convey it to him in just those terms. And we'll let you know."
Charles felt his jaw clamping. We'll let you know. Already they were a team.
I've lost her, he thought. The realization brought a sharp stab of pain, surprising him with its intensity. He didn't want to let her go. Their relationship had atrophied, but it wasn't dead. He could still revive it.
"And I will assign Dr. Axford to oversee the investigation." He glanced pointedly at Charles. "Providing he agrees, of course."
Nothing could have made Charles refuse. He would take the greatest pleasure in exposing Alan Bulmer as a fraud. Then what would Sylvia think of him?
"Of course," he said without missing a beat. "I'd be delighted."
"Splendid! Let's see… today's Thursday. Most of the week is shot. But if he can come in tonight, we can start the work-up right away. Right, Charles?"
"Whatever you say, Senator."
"There's one more thing," Sylvia said slowly, as if measuring her words. "This power of Alan's is doing something to him."
Power corrupts, my dear, Charles wanted to say. Just look at the senator.
"If he agrees to come in, will you check out his memory?"
"Memory?" Charles' interest was suddenly piqued. "How so?"
"Well, he can recall things from his childhood clear as day. But by lunch he's forgotten what he had for breakfast."
"Interesting," he said, thinking how it could mean nothing, or could be something very serious. Very serious indeed.
___34.___
The Senator
"Front security just called, sir," said his secretary's voice through the intercom speaker. "He just arrived."
"Very good."
Finally!
McCready had been on edge for hours, wondering if Bulmer would really show. Now he could allow himself to relax.
Or could he?
He settled deeper into the thickly padded chair behind his desk and allowed his nearly useless muscles to rest. But his mind could not rest; not with the possibility of a cure so near at hand. To regain the strength of a normal man, to walk across the Capitol parking lot, to climb a single flight of stairs, to pursue a woman, to take part once again in the innumerable daily activities the average person took for granted. The prospect set his adrenaline flowing and his heart pumping.