The Immortality Plot

The Immortality Plot - chapter 24

The Ritz-Carlton, overlooking Kapalua Bay on Maui, Hawaii, was one of Herman Letski’s favorite hotels. Whenever he stayed there he booked an ocean view suite with its own verandah and steps down to the beach.

From here Letski could marvel at the dormant power of Haleakala, the volcano that dominated the island of Maui, and the miles of pristine bleached sands where sunbeams danced upon the breakers casting scintillas of diamond light high into the clear air. He also loved the nights here on Maui. If he travelled away from the resort area into the fringes of the Haleakala national park, all ambient light vanished and he could be alone in the most all-enveloping Stygian darkness. It was at moments such as these that Herman Letski felt the full power of the creative forces that he had spent his life attempting to harness. In his own small way he had succeeded. He had been responsible for sustaining and bequeathing skill, talent and abilities to future generations. And in the process, it had made him a billionaire.

It was a far cry from his earlier life at the University of Prague. The capital of the Czech Republic was a wonderful city and Letski still loved the place. But it was also where he had suffered the most ignominious and unjust treatment that had resulted in his expulsion from the Department of Genetics, part of the School of Biology. His name had not been Herman Letski then. He had been a newly appointed professor to the Department, full of revolutionary zeal and fresh ideas and a burning passion to make a contribution to the field. In particular, his new position allowed him time to develop a controversial new technique – the cloning of cancer cells. No one at the time believed it was possible or desirable. The reason for studying the cloning of cancer cells was the hope it would lead to better cancer treatment options. Letski was convinced it would.

Chemotherapy is toxic and hard for patients to bear. Radiation is poisonous to the body and surgery is equally tough. To Letski’s way of thinking, if he could find out more about the expression of the genetic material he might be able to use that control that expression in cancer cells.

At that time it was thought that only cancer cells could develop from the genetic material of other cancer cells. It was the perceived wisdom of the day. Letski showed that it was possible to get normal development from the genetic material of cancer cells.

He was so excited about his breakthrough that he forgot that jealousy and envy are bedfellows within the academic world. Letski was a junior professor. He was persuaded to publish his work jointly with his head of department. When the work was published, Letski’s name did not appear on the paper. Furious at being cheated and sidelined, Letski made public all his original work only to face accusations of plagiarism. His head of department accused him of stealing the very results he had spent years toiling and experimenting to achieve. Letski found out later that a significant number of senior members of the university department’s management committee, including his own department head, were members of an exclusive Masonic lodge in the city of Prague.

Such was the outcry that he was publicly humiliated and sacked. News of his disgrace spread throughout the academic network worldwide like wildfire. Letski would never be able to work in the field again, either in the academic or private sectors.

He had one man to thank for the final retribution that was visited upon the head of department; one man whom he had raised from humble beginnings to be his devoted henchman; the one in the front line; the one who organized the operational details of every project.: the one whom Letski had rewarded and made extremely wealthy. Claude Rattin would, like one of his other key operatives, Lucius Gynt, ultimately be surplus to requirements.

Why these thoughts entered his head here and now, looking out over Kapalua Bay on a perfect morning and one on which he was soon to become several million dollars richer, he had no idea. But the sore still festered, and no amount of money would salve it. Letski concentrated instead on all he had achieved since. He had carved a niche in the field of human reproduction that, unlike his work on cancer cells back in Prague, he did not want made public. He had begun to regret not preventing Lucius Gynt giving full rein to his sick and hideous imagination. But Gynt had proved an extremely effective assassin. He was a consummate professional who took no risks. As long as he could not be linked to Letski or his global network he had been useful. In a bizarre way, the notion of a serial killer with a religious fixation served to deflect attention away from Letski’s deliciously lucrative operation. However, Gynt had also come to the end of his usefulness.