Pandemic Read online

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  _PANDEMIC_

  _BY J. F. BONE_

  _Generally, human beings don't do totally useless things consistently and widely. So--maybe there is something to it--_

  "We call it Thurston's Disease for two perfectly good reasons," Dr.Walter Kramer said. "He discovered it--and he was the first to die ofit." The doctor fumbled fruitlessly through the pockets of his lab coat."Now where the devil did I put those matches?"

  "Are these what you're looking for?" the trim blonde in the grayseersucker uniform asked. She picked a small box of wooden safetymatches from the littered lab table beside her and handed them to him.

  "Ah," Kramer said. "Thanks. Things have a habit of getting lost aroundhere."

  "I can believe that," she said as she eyed the frenzied disorder aroundher. Her boss wasn't much better than his laboratory, she decided as shewatched him strike a match against the side of the box and apply theflame to the charred bowl of his pipe. His long dark face became halfobscured behind a cloud of bluish smoke as he puffed furiously. Helooked like a lean untidy devil recently escaped from hell with histhick brows, green eyes and lank black hair highlighted intermittentlyby the leaping flame of the match. He certainly didn't look like apathologist. She wondered if she was going to like working with him, andshook her head imperceptibly. Possibly, but not probably. It might bedifficult being cooped up here with him day after day. Well, she couldalways quit if things got too tough. At least there was thatconsolation.

  He draped his lean body across a lab stool and leaned his elbows onits back. There was a faint smile on his face as he eyed herquizzically. "You're new," he said. "Not just to this lab but to theInstitute."

  ILLUSTRATED BY BARBERIS]

  She nodded. "I am, but how did you know?"

  "Thurston's Disease. Everyone in the Institute knows that name for theplague, but few outsiders do." He smiled sardonically. "Virus pneumonicplague--that's a better term for public use. After all, what good doesit do to advertise a doctor's stupidity?"

  She eyed him curiously. "_De mortuis?_" she asked.

  He nodded. "That's about it. We may condemn our own, but we don't likelaymen doing it. And besides, Thurston had good intentions. He neverdreamed this would happen."

  "The road to hell, so I hear, is paved with good intentions."

  "Undoubtedly," Kramer said dryly. "Incidentally, did you apply for thisjob or were you assigned?"

  "I applied."

  "Someone should have warned you I dislike cliches," he said. He paused amoment and eyed her curiously. "Just why did you apply?" he asked. "Whyare you imprisoning yourself in a sealed laboratory which you won'tleave as long as you work here. You know, of course, what the conditionsare. Unless you resign or are carried out feet first you will remainhere ... have you considered what such an imprisonment means?"

  "I considered it," she said, "and it doesn't make any difference. Ihave no ties outside and I thought I could help. I've had training. Iwas a nurse before I was married."

  "Divorced?"

  "Widowed."

  Kramer nodded. There were plenty of widows and widowers outside. Toomany. But it wasn't much worse than in the Institute where, despiteprecautions, Thurston's disease took its toll of life.

  "Did they tell you this place is called the suicide section?" he asked.

  She nodded.

  "Weren't you frightened?"

  "Of dying? Hardly. Too many people are doing it nowadays."

  He grimaced, looking more satanic than ever. "You have a point," headmitted, "but it isn't a good one. Young people should be afraid ofdying."

  "You're not."

  "I'm not young. I'm thirty-five, and besides, this is my business. I'vebeen looking at death for eleven years. I'm immune."

  "I haven't your experience," she admitted, "but I have your attitude."

  "What's your name?" Kramer said.

  "Barton, Mary Barton."

  "Hm-m-m. Well, Mary--I can't turn you down. I need you. But I could wishyou had taken some other job."

  "I'll survive."

  He looked at her with faint admiration in his greenish eyes. "Perhapsyou will," he said. "All right. As to your duties--you will be myassistant, which means you'll be a dishwasher, laboratory technician,secretary, junior pathologist, and coffee maker. I'll help you with allthe jobs except the last one. I make lousy coffee." Kramer grinned, histeeth a white flash across the darkness of his face. "You'll be on calltwenty-four hours a day, underpaid, overworked, and in constant dangeruntil we lick Thurston's virus. You'll be expected to handle the jobs ofthree people unless I can get more help--and I doubt that I can. Peoplestay away from here in droves. There's no future in it."

  Mary smiled wryly. "Literally or figuratively?" she asked.

  He chuckled. "You have a nice sense of graveyard humor," he said. "It'llhelp. But don't get careless. Assistants are hard to find."

  She shook her head. "I won't. While I'm not afraid of dying I don't wantto do it. And I have no illusions about the danger. I was briefed quitethoroughly."

  "They wanted you to work upstairs?"

  She nodded.

  * * * * *

  "I suppose they need help, too. Thurston's Disease has riddled themedical profession. Just don't forget that this place can be a deathtrap. One mistake and you've had it. Naturally, we take everyprecaution, but with a virus no protection is absolute. If you'recareless and make errors in procedure, sooner or later one of thosesubmicroscopic protein molecules will get into your system."

  "You're still alive."

  "So I am," Kramer said, "but I don't take chances. My predecessor, mysecretary, my lab technician, my junior pathologist, and my dishwasherall died of Thurston's Disease." He eyed her grimly. "Still want thejob?" he asked.

  "I lost a husband and a three-year old son," Mary said with equalgrimness. "That's why I'm here. I want to destroy the thing that killedmy family. I want to do something. I want to be useful."

  He nodded. "I think you can be," he said quietly.

  "Mind if I smoke?" she asked. "I need some defense against that pipe ofyours."

  "No--go ahead. Out here it's all right, but not in the securitysection."

  Mary took a package of cigarettes from her pocket, lit one and blew acloud of gray smoke to mingle with the blue haze from Kramer's pipe.

  "Comfortable?" Kramer asked.

  She nodded.

  He looked at his wrist watch. "We have half an hour before the roll tubecultures are ready for examination. That should be enough to tell youabout the modern Pasteur and his mutant virus. Since your duties willprimarily involve Thurston's Disease, you'd better know something aboutit." He settled himself more comfortably across the lab bench and wenton talking in a dry schoolmasterish voice. "Alan Thurston was animmunologist at Midwestern University Medical School. Like most men inthe teaching trade, he also had a research project. If it worked out,he'd be one of the great names in medicine; like Jenner, Pasteur, andSalk. The result was that he pushed it and wasn't too careful. He wantedto be famous."

  "He's well known now," Mary said, "at least within the profession."

  "Quite," Kramer said dryly. "He was working with gamma radiations onmicroorganisms, trying to produce a mutated strain of _Micrococcuspyogenes_ that would have enhanced antigenic properties."

  "Wait a minute, doctor. It's been four years since I was active innursing. Translation, please."

  Kramer chuckled. "He was trying to make a vaccine out of a commoninfectious organism. You may know it better as _Staphylococcus_. As youknow, it's a pus former that's made hospital life more dangerous than itshould be
because it develops resistance to antibiotics. What Thurstonwanted to do was to produce a strain that would stimulate resistance inthe patient without causing disease--something that would help patientsprotect themselves rather than rely upon doubtfully effectiveantibiotics."

  "That wasn't a bad idea."

  "There was nothing wrong with it. The only trouble was that