“My opinion has been and will continue to be that it is morally wrong not to continue to investigate and then use HTSR to cure countless suffering human beings.”

“Your opinion has been recorded,” Ashley said. “But for the record, I would like to point out that Dr. Daniel Lowell has chosen not to answer the posed question.”

Ashley leaned back and looked to his right. “I have no further questions for this witness. Do any of my esteemed colleagues have any questions?”

Ashley’s eyes moved around to the faces of the senators seated at the dais.

“Very well,” Ashley said. “The Subcommittee on Health Policy would like to thank doctors Lowell and D’Agostino for their kind participation. And we’d like to call our next witness: Mr. Harold Mendes of the Right to Life organization.”

11:05 A.M., Thursday, February 21, 2002

Stephanie could see the taxi in the middle of the oncoming pack of cars, and she put up her hand expectantly. She and Daniel had followed a suggestion they’d been given by a security officer in the Senate Office Building and had walked over to Constitution Avenue in hopes of catching a cab, but they hadn’t had much luck. What had started out that morning as a reasonable day, weather-wise, had taken a turn for the worse. Dark, heavy clouds had blown in from the east, and with the temperature hovering in the lower thirties, there was a distinct possibility of snow. Apparently, under such conditions the demand for taxis far exceeded the supply.

“Here comes one,” Daniel snapped, as if Stephanie had something to do with the lack of cabs. “Don’t let it go by!”

“I see it,” Stephanie responded in an equally clipped manner.

After leaving the Senate hearing, neither had spoken much other than the minimum necessary to decide to take the suggestion to walk over to Constitution Avenue. Similar to the gathering clouds, their moods had darkened as the morning’s hearing had progressed.

“Damn!” Stephanie mumbled when the cab zipped by. It was as if the driver was wearing blinders. Stephanie had done everything save throwing herself in front of the speeding traffic.

“You let it go by,” Daniel complained.

“Let it go by?” Stephanie shouted. “I waved. I whistled. I even jumped up and down. I didn’t see you make any effort.”

“What the hell are we going to do?” Daniel demanded. “It’s colder than a witch’s tit out here.”

“Well, if you have any bright ideas, Einstein, let me know.”

“What? Is it my fault there are no cabs?”

“It’s not mine either,” Stephanie retorted.

Both hugged themselves in a vain attempt to keep warm but made it a point to keep away from each other. Neither had brought a true winter coat on the trip. They had thought that they wouldn’t need them, having flown four hundred miles south.

“Here comes another one,” Daniel stated.

“Your turn.”

With his hand raised, Daniel ventured as far out into the street as he thought safe. Almost immediately, he had to retreat when he caught sight of a pickup truck bearing down on him in the outermost lane. Daniel waved and shouted, but the cab went by in the knot of vehicles without slowing.

“Well done,” Stephanie commented.

“Shut up!”

Just when they were about to give up and begin walking west along Constitution Avenue, a cabbie beeped. He’d been waiting at the traffic light on First Street and Constitution, and had witnessed Daniel’s antics. When the light changed, he turned left and pulled over to the curb.

Stephanie and Daniel piled in and buckled their seat belts.

“Where to?” the driver questioned while looking at them in the rearview mirror. He was wearing a turban and was as tan as if he’d just spent a week in the Sahara Desert.

“The Four Seasons,” Stephanie said.

Stephanie and Daniel rode in silence while staring out their respective windows.

“I’d say that hearing was about as bad as it could have been,” Daniel complained at length.

“It was worse,” Stephanie responded.

“There’s no doubt the bastard Butler will vote out his bill, and when that happens, I’ve been assured by the Biotechnology Industry Organization that it will pass the full committee and the Senate itself.”

“So goodbye to CURE, Inc.”

“It’s a shame that in this country medical research is being held hostage by demagogic politics,” Daniel snapped. “I shouldn’t have even bothered coming down here to Washington.”

“Well, maybe you shouldn’t have. Maybe it would have been better if I’d come alone. You certainly didn’t help things by telling Ashley he was grandstanding and didn’t have an open mind.”

Daniel turned and stared at the back of Stephanie’s head. “Come again?” he sputtered.

“You shouldn’t have lost control.”

“I don’t believe this,” Daniel marveled. “Are you trying to imply that this crappy outcome is my fault?”

Stephanie turned to face Daniel. “Being sensitive about other people’s feelings is not one of your strong points. And this hearing is a case in point. Who knows what would have happened if you hadn’t lost your cool. Attacking him like you did was inappropriate because it stopped whatever dialogue you might have been able to maintain. That’s all I’m saying.”

Daniel’s pale face turned crimson. “That hearing was a goddamn farce!”

“Maybe so, but that doesn’t justify your saying as much to Butler’s face, because it nipped in the bud any chance of success we might have had, however small. I think his goal was to get you mad so you’d look bad, and it worked. It was his way of discrediting you as a witness.”

“You’re pissing me off.”

“Daniel, I’m as irritated about this outcome as you are.”

“Yeah, but you’re saying it’s my fault.”

“No, I’m saying that your behavior didn’t help things. There’s a difference.”

“Well, your behavior didn’t help things either. How come you never told me about your brother being indicted for racketeering? All you told me was that he was a qualified investor. Some qualifications! It was a fine time for me to learn about that little sordid tidbit.”

“It was after he was an investor, and it was in the Boston papers. So it’s not as if it was a secret, but it was something I felt I’d rather not talk about, at least at the time. I thought the reason you didn’t bring it up was that you were being considerate. But I should have known better.”

“You didn’t feel like talking about it?” Daniel questioned with exaggerated astonishment. “You know I don’t bother reading the stupid Boston rags. So how else would I have learned about it? And I would have had to know about it eventually because Butler was right. If we’d gone for an IPO, it would have had to be disclosed that we had a felon for an investor, and it would have held things up.”

“He has been indicted,” Stephanie said. “He’s not been convicted. Remember, in our system of justice you’re innocent until proven guilty.”

“That’s a rather lame excuse for not mentioning it to me,” Daniel snapped. “Is he going to be convicted?”

“I don’t know.” Stephanie’s voice had lost its edge as she coped with a tinge of guilt at not having been more forthright with Daniel about her brother. She’d thought about mentioning the indictment on occasion but had always put it off until a tomorrow that had never arrived.

“You have no idea whatsoever? That’s a little hard for me to believe.”

“I have had vague suspicions,” Stephanie admitted. “I had the same suspicions about my father, and Tony has essentially taken over my father’s businesses.”

“What are the businesses we’re talking about?”

“Real estate and a few restaurants, plus a restaurant and a café on Hanover Street.”

“Is that all?”

“That’s what I don’t know. As I said, I had vague suspicions with such things as people coming and going from our house at all hours of the day and night, and the women and children being sent out of the room at the end of extended family meals so the men could talk. In many ways, in retrospect it seemed to me we were the cliché of an Italian-American Mob family. Certainly it wasn’t on a scale like you’d see in gangster movies, but modestly similar. We females were expected to be consumed by the affairs of hearth and home and church without any interest or involvement in business whatsoever. To tell you the truth, it was an embarrassment for me, because we kids were treated differently in the neighborhood. I couldn’t wait to get away, and I was smart enough to recognize that the best way was by being a good student.”