"How—did things work out?" he asked.
It was the priest who spoke. "Perfectly, Jim. You're a national hero."
He glanced at Lois, who bent over Harker and clutched his hand. Hers seemed cold, Harker thought.
They left him after a while, and he lay back in the bed, thinking that it was good to be alive again. The sunlight was bright and warm in the room; it should be nearly August, he thought.
Some time later he was fed, and some time after that a nurse appeared bearing a thick stack of newspapers. "The Times since your operation, Mr. Harker. Your wife thought you'd like to see them."
He thanked her and reached hungrily for the topmost paper. It was today's—the latest edition. The banner headline was, Harker Out of Coma, and they had the picture of him that had been used for his campaign posters back in 2028.
He leafed back ... July 30, July 29, July 28 ...
At the bottom of the heap was the July 16 paper, with the account of his sensational submission to death. They described the event in detail: how, cheerful to the last, he had been wheeled into the operating room, anesthetized, killed. The operating room had then been cleared of all but the surgeons, who proceeded with the cardiac operation according to the papers. When the "operation" had been "successfully concluded," an hour later, the observers were called back. Thirty-eight people had watched his untroubled return to life.
He thumbed on through the papers. The suit of Klaus and Mitchison against Beller Laboratories had been thrown out of court on the 18th. The next day, the FBI had repeated its earlier statement exonerating the labs of any guilt in the matter of the death of Wayne Janson, and this time there was no further statement from Jonathan Bryant.
There were statements from various ranking government officials, though. They unanimously favored setting up a federal research grant project for studying further applications of the techniques of reanimation.