“Let me tell you why I called,” Jack said quickly. He was afraid that if Mrs. Franconi became offended, she might not be receptive to his question. “You told the investigator that your son’s health had improved after a trip. Do you remember saying that?”

“Of course,” Imogene said.

“I was told you don’t know where he went,” Jack said. “Is there any way you could find out?”

“I don’t think so,” Imogene said. “He told me it had nothing to do with his work and that it was very private.”

“Do you remember when it was?” Jack asked.

“Not exactly,” Imogene said. “Maybe five or six weeks ago.”

“Was it in this country?” Jack asked.

“I don’t know,” Imogene said. “All he said was that it was very private.”

“If you find out where it was, would you give me a call back?” Jack asked.

“I suppose,” Imogene said.

“Thank you,” Jack said.

“Wait,” Imogene said. “I just remembered he did say something strange just before he left. He said that if he didn’t come back that he loved me very much.”

“Did that surprise you?” Jack asked.

“Well, yes,” Imogene said. “I thought that was a fine thing to say to your mother.”

Jack thanked Mrs. Franconi again and hung up the phone. Hardly had he had his hand off the receiver when it rang again. It was Ted Lynch.

“I think you’d better come up here,” Ted said.

“I’m on my way,” Jack said.

Jack found Ted sitting at his desk, literally scratching his head.

“If I didn’t know better I’d think you were trying to put one over on me,” Ted spat. “Sit down!”

Jack sat. Ted was holding a ream of computer-generated paper plus a number of sheets of developed film with hundreds of small dark bands. Ted reached over and dropped the mass into Jack’s lap.

“What the hell’s this?” Jack questioned. He picked up several of the celluloid sheets and held them up to the light.

Ted leaned over and with the eraser end of an old-fashioned wooden pencil pointed to the films. “These are the results of the DNA polymarker test.” He fingered the computer printout. “And this mass of data compares the nucleotide sequences of the DQ alpha regions of the MHC.”

“Come on, Ted!” Jack urged. “Talk English to me, would you please? You know I’m a babe in the woods when it comes to this stuff.”

“Fine,” Ted exclaimed as if vexed. “The polymarker test shows that Franconi’s DNA and the DNA of the liver tissue you found inside him could not be any more different.”

“Hey, that’s good news,” Jack said. “Then, it was a transplant.”

“I guess,” Ted said without conviction. “But the sequence with the DQ alpha is identical, right down to the last nucleotide.”

“What does that mean?” Jack asked.

Ted spread his hands like a supplicant and wrinkled his forehead. “I don’t know. I can’t explain it. Mathematically, it couldn’t happen. I mean the chances are so infinitesimally small, it’s beyond belief. We’re talking about an identical match of thousands upon thousands of base pairs even in areas of long repeats. Absolutely identical. That’s why we got the results that we did with the DQ alpha screen.”