“A good name is more desirable than great wealth”. Proverbs 22:1
Tuesdays are slow at Emma’s Bagel Café, and that afternoon, Lenny, the former shoe king of Niles, Illinois, and Edelman, the retired accountant, were served their lunches right away. They sat at their favorite booth next to the picture window, looking out into Skokie Boulevard. Dan Knobloch, an endocrinologist at the University of Chicago, arrived a few minutes later. Dan is about 60. He has a lot of dark wavy hair for his age and dresses well in short men’s clothes made in Italy. He smiled at his friends and walked to the booth, bringing his bagel, whitefish salad, and coffee. Lenny was finishing a story about an employee he “treated like family” who was discovered taking money from the cash register.
“What chutzpah”, Edelman said, looking up from his hastily eaten vegetable omelet.
Knobloch asked the group, “Did I ever tell you about my assistant named Tarkhan?”
The other elderly men had not, and they were interested in hearing more, so after a few bites of food and sips of coffee, the doctor told his story.
“Our first encounter was from an email he sent me in the Spring of 2015. Tarkhan wanted to connect because another trainee at his residency program suggested that he work with me on a research project. He called me the following week, making an instant positive impression. He spoke with a fine British secondary school inflection and told me about his many experiences with patients in his home country, where, due to limited resources, the practice of medicine is very different. Things we take for granted, such as antibiotics, sometimes just aren’t available. He spoke passionately about his decision to leave the country to become a doctor in the United States. He admitted that he had his eyes on a very prestigious University position after graduation. He explained that “ everyone knows that having research experience would help getting accepted at a big program,” but also wanted to delve into “the scientific mysteries of patient care”.
I should mention here that when I first met him, Tarkhan called himself Jambal. That was his original name, Jambal Tarkhan, his designated name since he was a baby. But when he viewed his career as taking off, he oddly reversed his first and last names and told everyone to call him Tarkhan Jambal, never explaining his reason for the name change.
It also became clear from our conversation that Jambal had studied my publications in great depth. He was especially knowledgeable about some of the complex research methods I developed and could cite the mathematical formulas that made them work. Unlike many residents joining the research team, Jambal had experience with high-power computing. As the call progressed, I was very excited by the thought of having such a talented person working on my projects. The plan was to have him start by volunteering with my group at the Research Foundation.
His appeal was even stronger during our first in-person meeting. Jambal was tall and athletically fit, with sandy brown hair tied back in a bun at the time. He was dressed better than most medical residents. I assumed that this was an indication of a wealthy family background. His program was at a small local hospital filled with foreign graduates, where only a few doctors were interested in research. Jambal was unable to find a worthwhile project. I wondered why he didn’t volunteer his skills to create new projects but decided not to ask. Jambal was aware that prior volunteers had successfully published papers with me, and getting his name published was one of his highest priorities.
Jambal joined the group as an unpaid volunteer and started on his first project in August. He usually came to work after rounds at the hospital. I set up a cubicle for him just outside my office at the Research Foundation. He was well-liked in the group and would assist some of the medical students with their projects. He was an impressively diligent worker. Jambal switched his name to Tarkhan when our first manuscript together was submitted to a prestigious medical journal with his name included as a co-author.
Nine months after joining my research group, Tarkhan took early graduation from his residency program. Because the starting date for specialty training was more than a year away, I secured funding from the Research Foundation that allowed Tarkhan to work as my primary research assistant. This also enabled him to stay in the US, because his visa required him to have a full-time job.
Soon after he started his new position, a grateful patient of mine donated funds for hiring another member of the group, this time a statistician, who quickly became Tarkhan’s friend and confidant. Tarkhan and the statistician’s cubicles were next to each other. They often had lunch together and joined a nearby gym to exercise after work. One of the research assistants from the second floor seemed to be part of their social group, but she soon left abruptly.”
Knobloch interrupted his story to pour himself more coffee from a stainless-steel container near the sushi station. The restaurant was beginning to empty. Some of the clients were watching the sky from the front windows and seemed to have decided to leave and not get caught in the upcoming rainstorm.
“The Research Foundation Building is on the corner of a block of open parking spaces and a downtown street with small shops and a local hotel. Tarkhan and the statistician liked to sit on a partially broken bench on this street during breaks, even in frigid weather. Sometimes, Tarkhan puffed heavily on self-rolled cigarettes. Watching them from the office window, I would see them talking to people who were walking past the building. In January, one of my students mentioned to me that she had overheard the two of them posing riddles and odd questions to random strangers.
We spent the first year focusing on completing a group of my unfinished projects. Between Tarkhan, the statistician, and me, our team was highly productive. As I tend to do, I listed Tarkhan as the first author of several important studies. Through my connections, he was able to present our research at a national meeting. During that year on my team, Tarkhan received an early career award from the American College of Cardiology.
Shortly afterward, I met Tarkhan’s parents, who were visiting Chicago for the first time. They invited my wife and me for dinner at an expensive restaurant outside the city. Tarkhan seemed surprisingly aloof at dinner, perhaps because of embarrassment over his parents’ language difficulties. After dinner, his father and I took a long, silent walk together along a street with manicured gardens filled with the fragrance of summer flowers, him holding my hand the entire time. I assumed that this gesture signified his gratitude for all I was doing for his son. I was surprised to learn of his father’s death shortly afterward and of Tarkhan’s decision not to attend the funeral.
At the beginning of January 2017, when Tarkhan had worked on my team for more than a year and a half, I had a bad fall, slipping on an icy sidewalk during a blustery Chicago winter day. Aside from several broken ribs, I required shoulder surgery and a short leave of absence from work for recovery. These injuries left me in excruciating pain. A few days after the fall, I learned that our statistician was transferring to the IT Department at our University and that behind my back, there had been a series of interviews for this position in my office on the days when I was working at another location. He gave a surprisingly short three-day notice of his departure while I was convalescing from my surgery. I was also informed that the statistician’s new position would not allow any time to help our team finish the projects that he was leaving behind. The donor was furious with me about this departure and threatened to shut down my research group.
On the day after my shoulder surgery, Tarkhan was tasked with submitting an electronic version of material for a lecture I was invited to give at an upcoming meeting in Miami. However, he never sent the material, and because of this, my talk was listed as “canceled” on the program. The chief of my department called me into her office shortly after I returned to work to express her displeasure about this cancellation and proceeded to question my ability to run a serious research group.
A few weeks later, Tarkhan was invited to join the Cardiology program at Harvard Medical School. The education director called to compliment me on the fine job that I had done in mentoring such a gifted clinician and researcher. The same day, I received his letter of resignation.
Having a trainee accepted at Harvard was a prestigious accomplishment for me. But Tarkhan never arrived at Harvard. It seemed that he decided to return to his country and trade his profession to work at a business started by a friend. I called to get more information about his sudden departure, but his phone was disconnected.”
When Knobloch finished this part of the story, Edelman felt compelled to ask, “So, did you ever hear anything more about Tarkhan?” The other men looked in fascination at Knobloch.
“Yes. About a year later, one of my students visited his family in Turkmenistan and thought he saw Tarkhan standing by the side of a river on a stormy day. Tarkhan was calling out to passengers in small boats, asking them to stop by to talk to him. His hair had now turned grey, and he wore a thick beard. Nearby pedestrians, walking quickly to avoid him, sometimes lost their step or even fell. Tarkhan seemed highly amused that he made these people afraid. Shortly afterward, three people nearly drowned near the same spot when their boat sank after hitting a rocky outcropping.
Last week, I received an email from Tarkhan, letting me know he was returning to work in Chicago and suggesting a meeting at the Lakeshore campus. Tarkhan said he looked forward to mending all the problems with our relationship. Yesterday, I saw Tarkhan while I was having lunch in downtown Evanston. Surprisingly, Tarkhan looked the same as he did before he went away. His hair was sandy colored and was still tied back in a bun as if no time had passed since our first meeting. He walked with his usual good posture, wore expensive clothes, and held an Armani briefcase. He seemed to be in a hurry and did not notice me sitting by the restaurant window.”
During the hour or so since the men had arrived at Emma’s, the sky had filled with dark grey uniform clouds. Outside the restaurant window, dry leaves were wafting across the half-filled parking lot, some piling up and blocking the windshield of an elderly couple trying to park their car.
Knobloch stood up, excused himself, and walked to a quieter part of the restaurant to answer a call from the hospital. When he returned to the table, he looked sweaty and pale.
“Tarkhan just called through the page operator to let me know that he changed his name back to Jambal. The crazy bastard wants to return to work for me. He believes he made a great discovery about a demon who makes people sick with diabetes by tricking their bodies into not recognizing their own insulin. He wants to meet me at the broken bench outside of the Research Foundation this afternoon to tell me how he figured it out.”
Knobloch reached over to grab the saltshaker from our table. He turned to his friends as he walked toward the door.
“Sometimes, it’s a good idea to put some salt in your pocket”, he said as the first drops of the storm began to fall.
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Eli Daniel Ehrenpreis, a physician, educator, and inventor, has published many scientific papers and six medical books. His creative writing focuses on health, psychology, Jewish themes, and the natural world. He has published poetry and short stories in Reapparition, Medicine and Meaning, Bright Flash, Of the Book, Hektoen International, Star 82 Review, and other literary magazines. He lives with his wife Ana and two small dogs.