Jenny took Lisa's hand, and they, too, headed back to the inn.

Copperfield called out to her. “Doctor! Wait a moment. I want you with us. You were the first physician on the scene. If the condition of the corpses has changed, you're the one most likely to notice.”

Jenny looked at Lisa. “Want to come along?”

“Back to the bakery? No, thanks.” The girl shuddered.

Thinking of the eerily sweet, childlike voice that had come from the sink drain, Jenny said, “Don't go in the kitchen. And if you have to go to the bathroom, ask someone to go along with you.”

“Jenny, they're all guys!”

“I don't care. Ask Gordy. He can stand outside the stall with his back turned.”

“Jeez, that'd be embarrassing.”

“You want to go into that bathroom by yourself again?”

The color drained out of the girl's face, “No way.”

“Good. Keep close to the others. And I mean close. Not just in the same room. Stay in the same part of the room. Promise?”

“Promise.”

Jenny thought about the two telephone calls from Wargle this morning. She thought of the gross threats he'd made.

Although they had been the threats of a dead man and should have been meaningless, Jenny was frightened.

“You be careful, too,” Lisa said.

She kissed the girl on the cheek. “Now hurry and catch up with Gordy before he turns the corner.”

Lisa ran, calling ahead: “Gordy! Wait up!”

The tall young deputy stopped at the corner and looked back.

Watching Lisa sprint along the cobblestone sidewalk, Jenny felt her heart tightening.

She thought: What if, when I come back, she's gone? What if I never see her alive again?

Chapter 24

Cold Terror

Liebermann's Bakery.

Bryce, Tal, Frank, and Jenny entered the kitchen. General Copperfield and the nine scientists on his team followed closely, and four soldiers, toting submachine guns, brought up the rear.

The kitchen was crowded. Bryce felt uncomfortable. What if they were attacked while they were all jammed together?

What if they had to get out in a hurry?

The two heads were exactly where they had been last night: in the ovens, peering through the glass. On the worktable the severed hands still clutched the rolling pin.

Niven, one of the general's people, took several photographs of the kitchen from various angles, then about a dozen closeups of the heads and hands.

The others kept edging around the room to get out of Niven's way. The photographic record had to be completed before the forensic work could begin, which was not unlike the routine policemen followed at the scene of a crime.

As the spacesuited scientists moved, their rubberized clothing squeaked. Their heavy boots scraped noisily on the tile floor.

“You still think it looks like a simple incident of CBW?” Bryce asked Copperfield.

“Could be.”

“Really?”

Copperfield said, “Phil, you're the resident nerve gas specialist. Are you thinking what I'm thinking?”

The question was answered by the man whose helmet bore the name HOUK, “It's much too early to tell anything for certain, but it seems as if we could be dealing with a neuroleptic toxin. And there are some things about this — most notably, the extreme psychopathic violence — that lead me to wonder if we've got a case of T- 139.”

“Definitely a possibility,” Copperfield said, “Just what I thought when we walked in.”

Niven continued to snap photographs, and Bryce said, “So what's this T-139?”

“One of the primary nerve gases in the Russian arsenal,” the general said. “The full moniker is Timoshenko- 139. It's named after Ilya Timoshenko, the scientist who developed it.”

“What a lovely monument,” Tal said sarcastically.

“Most nerve gases cause death within thirty seconds to five minutes after skin contact,” Houk said, “But T- 139 isn't that merciful.”

“Merciful!” Frank Autry said, appalled.

“T-139 isn't just a killer,” Houk said, “That would be merciful by comparison. T-139 is what military strategists call a demoralizer.”

Copperfield said, “It passes through the skin and enters the bloodstream in ten seconds or less, then migrates to the brain and almost instantly causes irreparable damage to cerebral tissues.”

Houk said, “For a period of about four to six hours, the victim retains full use of his limbs and a hundred percent of his normal strength. At first, it's only his mind that suffers.”

“Dementia paranoides,” Copperfield said, “Intellectual confusion, fear, rage, loss of emotional control, and a very strongly held feeling that everyone is plotting against him. This is combined with a fierce compulsion to commit violent acts. In essence, Sheriff, T-139 turns people into mindless killing machines for four to six hours. They prey on one another and on unaffected people outside the area of the gas attack. You can see what an extremely demoralizing effect it would have on an enemy.”

“Extremely,” Bryce said, “And Dr. Paige theorized just such a disease last night, a mutant rabies that would kill some people while turning others into demented murderers.”

“T-139 isn't a disease,” Houk said quickly, “It's a nerve gas. And if I had my choice, I'd rather this was a nerve gas attack. Once gas has dissipated, the threat is over. A biological threat is considerably harder to contain.”

“If it was gas,” Copperfield said, “it'll have dissipated long ago, but there'll be traces of it on almost everything. Condensative residue. We'll be able to identify it in no time at all.”

They backed against a wall to make way for Niven and his camera.

Jenny said, “Dr. Houk, in regards to this T-139, you mentioned that the ambulatory stage lasts four to six hours. Then what?”

“Well,” Houk said, “the second stage is the terminal stage, too. It lasts anywhere from six to twelve hours. It begins with the deterioration of the efferent nerves and escalates to paralysis of the cardiac, vasomotor, and respiratory reflex centers in the brain.”

“Good God,” Jenny said.

Frank said, “Once more for us laymen.”

Jenny said, “It means that during the second stage of the illness, over a period of six to twelve hours, T-139 gradually reduces the brain's ability to regulate the automatic functions of the body — such as breathing, heartbeat, blood vessel dilation, organ function… The victim starts experiencing an irregular heartbeat, extreme difficulty in breathing, and the gradual collapse of every gland and organ. Twelve hours might not seem gradual to you, but it would seem like an eternity to the victim. There would be vomiting, diarrhea, uncontrollable urination, continuous and violent muscle spasms… And if only the efferent nerves were damaged, if the rest of the nervous system remained intact, there would be excruciating, unrelenting pain.”

“Six to twelve hours of hell,” Copperfield confirmed.

“Until the heart stops,” Houk said, “or until the victim simply stops breathing and suffocates.”

For long seconds, as Niven clicked the last of his photographs, no one spoke.

Finally, Jenny said, “I still don't think a nerve gas could've played any part in this, not even something like

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