The Ukrainian closed his reddened eyes and took a deep breath. “Did you know the Committee is not allowed to give a Nobel Prize to a dead man? I hope I don’t miss my chance.”
Craig stopped at a traffic signal, watched the trucks and cars bustling through the center of Aurora. Tall brick buildings lined the narrow main street, coffee shops and greasy-spoon cafés at street level; several blocks away from the downtown area, old suburban houses sat on broad, grassy lots.
“What about your graduate student, Mr. Bretti?” Craig asked, focusing on the case again. “Was he aware of these threats on your life? Did he feel himself in any danger for assisting you?”
Dumenco gave a wan smile. “No, Bretti would never have been a target. He is a big talker, and often indignant, but the truth is he has not managed to complete his thesis during the seven years he has assisted me, and I doubt he ever will.” He snorted. “I hope he is a better fisherman than a scientist, otherwise he will have a very disappointing vacation.”
Inside the Medical Center, Trish LeCroix met them like a mother hen, scolding Dumenco for leaving her. She helped Craig whisk him off to his hospital room. The old physicist endured her ministrations as she took his blood pressure, temperature, heart and respiratory rate, and prodded him into changing back into his hospital gown. She made a point of taking his street clothes, his keys, and his wallet, so she could put them in a hospital locker.
Dumenco seemed penitent. “Dr. LeCroix is a bossy woman, Agent Kreident. She seemed so nice when I knew her in the Ukraine.”
Craig smiled. “Trish doesn’t like to deal with anything unexpected.”
She made an indignant noise. “Listen, Georg-I’m here to help you, and I’m the best radiation-exposure physician you’re going to get. If you’d like, I can just let you back into the hands of a general practitioner.”
Dumenco actually chuckled as she herded him into the bed. He pulled the sheet up, but Trish kept his bare arm available. “You’re dehydrated. I’m hooking you up to a saline drip.” She looked at the physicist, then at Craig, placing her hands on her hips. “All right, I’ll leave you two to keep talking-but no more sightseeing!” Moving like a true professional, Trish hurried out of the room to fetch IV supplies and a bag of normal saline.
The Ukrainian rolled closer to the tray table that separated him from Craig. Someone had set out a small plastic chess set with magnetized pieces, all the chess men lined up in perfect ranks.
“Let’s have a game while we continue our conversation, kind sir,” Dumenco suggested. Craig noticed that the skin on his forehead was white and scaly. “Do you play?”
Craig looked down at the pieces as his thoughts spun. The man’s dying, and he wants to play chess? “Not with any skill,” he said. “I used to goof around with my dad, but don’t expect any championship strategy.”
Dumenco waved a swollen hand. “I just want to occupy my mind. It will take all of my concentration to keep my thoughts sharp and focused… until the very end.”
The scientist chose white and moved first, picking up the little plastic piece and sliding it across the squares. “For a game like this it seems we should be using a fine onyx and jade set, don’t you think?” Dumenco raised his eyebrows. “After all, I must savor the niceties of life, while I can.”
Craig moved a pawn. “I don’t suppose the hospital’s game chest has anything like that.”
Years ago, he had played with his father, more as an excuse to spend time together than through any passion for the game. Craig had never been terribly good at small talk, and the two had needed a catalyst for conversation-especially since Robert Kreident’s life revolved around the football, baseball, and hockey teams in the Bay Area. Craig’s interests in science and technology had diverged from his father’s interest in sports, but they could chat about chess moves and occasionally other things as they played.
Now, though, Craig focused his attention on the Ukrainian’s rambling speech, moving only defensively to counter Dumenco’s pieces.
“What kind of strategy do you call this?” the physicist said, watching Craig move a bishop to a seemingly pointless position.
“I told you I didn’t play often,” he answered. He looked at the chess pieces, then at his notes. “Explain to me why you were running experiments on a Sunday, and after dark.”
Dumenco glanced at the large round clock on the wall. “The hour of day makes no difference underground,” he said. “During an experimental run, the accelerator operates round the clock. Computers record the collisions, sample the daughter particles, and sort out anything worthwhile.” He shook his head. “Maybe I can reach some valuable conclusions before time grows too short… if Ms. Mitchell ever gets here with my results.”
“But you’re dying,” Craig said bluntly; Dumenco didn’t seem to mind. “Do you want to be looking at technical readouts during your last days?”
“I must!” He said with such vehemence that his reddened hand clenched into a fist. He winced at the pain, then lowered his voice. “My results, my theories are what I leave behind. My family is…” he paused uncomfortably, “… not with me, so my work is my legacy. I have cracked open the door to God’s mysteries, and I must make sense of my results to prop open that door, prepare it for the next person. If I die with my work unresolved, the door will slam shut again. All my thoughts-all my life-will be worthless.”
Craig tried to be soothing. “If you’re already up for the Nobel Prize, you’ve done plenty in your life. Your work will be carried on by others.”
“Consider it this way, sir,” Dumenco said. “If you were to leave this case, another agent could pick up the clues and perhaps solve my murder. Forgive my arrogance, but if I die now it will be many years before someone grasps this esoteric subset of particle physics to synthesize what I have done and take it to the next step.”
He moved his rook into position and scanned the board. Craig moved another piece, and Dumenco countered rapidly. “Check,” he said simply.
With sudden embarrassed alarm, Craig studied the board. He moved to counter the Ukrainian’s ploy.
“Are you a scientist, Agent Kreident?” Dumenco said.
“I have some training,” Craig said. It had been a long time since putting himself through Stanford, working for Elliot Lang’s PI agency… “I’ve got a physics undergraduate degree, and I went into patent law after law school-I thought that was where the money was, but it was boring.”
Dumenco moved his queen, calmly said, “Checkmate,” then leaned back into his pillow as if exhausted. He closed his eyes as Craig scrutinized the little magnetic chess pieces, trying to understand what the Ukrainian had done. He could find no last-ditch way out.
“Have you heard of the mathematician Fermat?” Dumenco asked.
Craig frowned. “Of course.”
The old man’s lips were swollen, and he spoke in a quiet whisper. “After his death, someone discovered a handwritten notation in one of his texts-Fermat claimed to have found an ‘elegant proof’ for one of the great mathematical mysteries. But he didn’t write down that proof, and mathematicians wracked their brains for centuries to rediscover it. Until just recently, Fermat’s Last Theorem remained unproven.” Dumenco finally opened his eyes again to look at Craig. “I don’t want to be the high-energy physics equivalent of Fermat.”
Craig swallowed a lump in his throat.
“Maybe this will help.” They both turned to see Paige Mitchell standing at the door to the intensive care room, a folder full of papers in her hand. But Trish LeCroix bustled up to block the way.
“You can’t go in there.” Trish looked sourly down at the sheaf of printouts. “Dr. Dumenco needs to rest and gather his energy. If you give him those papers, he won’t sleep a minute.”