Plague

Herbert Gaines lowered his eyes. 'Nicky,' he said, 'the helicopter only has room for one. You saw that it's a two-seater. I can't take anybody with me.'

Garunisch coughed. 'Couldn't we draw lots?' he said gruffly. 'Or maybe one of the ladies should go instead?'

'Listen,' said Gaines, almost desperate, 'it's up there now! It's waiting! It won't wait for ever!'

Garunisch examined the floor. 'You're an old man, Mr. Gaines,' he said harshly. 'You're an old man and you've had a long life. Now, supposing one of these young ladies went instead of you. Or what about Nicholas here? He's a good friend of yours. Don't you think enough of Nicholas to give up your place in that chopper, and let him live?'

Herbert Gaines stood up.

'They sent the helicopter for me,' he insisted. 'The only reason it's here is because of me. The party needs me, and that's why they've taken the risk. What do you think they're going to say if that thing flies all the way back to Washington with Nicky aboard? Do you think they've spent all that money, and wasted all that energy, just to educate a half-educated faggot who can't even cook?'

Nicholas stared open-mouthed at Herbert as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing.

Garunisch grunted. 'It that's how you feel, Mr. Gaines, perhaps you'd better just get the hell out. I don't think any of the rest of us would like to stand in the way of your cowardice, seeing as how it's so pressing.'

Gaines said, 'Look — as soon as I get to Washington — I'll make sure they send another helicopter back — a bigger one — for all of you — '

Garunisch flapped a hand at him. 'Don't bother. You might strain your brain trying to remember to do it, and we'd hate to see that happen.' Adelaide said, 'Mr. Gaines?'

Herbert Gaines was buttoning up his safari suit and making for the door. 'Yes?' he said.

Adelaide didn't answer at once. Not until Herbert Gaines had turned around and looked at her. 'I saw your movie once, Mr. Gaines.'

Herbert Gaines' mouth twitched. 'My dear, the helicopter's waiting — I really can't — '

Adelaide said, 'I like the line when Hannah Carson says to Captain Dashfoot: 'Oh, you brave, brave, honorable man, would the world were all like you.''

Gaines paused. In a quiet voice he said, 'My dear, you've got a regrettably good memory.'

He stood at the door, his hand on the latch, so obviously striking a tragic theatrical pose that Nicholas said, 'For Christ's sake, Herbert, just fuck off.'

Herbert Gaines lifted his lion-like head. 'I will send more helicopters,' he said, in his richest voice. 'I promise you that upon my life.' He opened the door.

He was so involved in his melodramatic pose that when the rats rushed at him, their heavy bodies thumping against the half-open door, he was taken completely by surprise. The rats leaped and jumped at him, and more of them scuttled into the apartment and disappeared under the makeshift beds and into the drapes. Dr. Petrie ran across the sitting-room and banged himself against the door so that it slammed shut. He crunched four or five rats in the door-jamb, and they squealed and writhed, with blood running out of their narrow noses. Adelaide and Esmeralda and Mrs. Garunisch, panting with fright, picked up cushions and brooms and chased after the rats that had managed to get into the apartment.

Herbert Gaines had a rat swinging from his sleeve. He flapped at it uselessly until Kenneth Garunisch picked up a heavy cigarette lighter from the table and knocked the rat away. Then he stepped on its head and killed it.

'Oh, Mother of God,' gasped Gaines. 'Oh, Mother of God!'

'Well, darling,' said Nicholas, turning to Herbert Gaines. 'So much for your helicopter now.'

Herbert Gaines was shaking. 'I'm still going!' he said. 'Don't think that a few rats can stop me!'

'A few?' said Dr. Petrie. 'Did you see how many there were? The whole building must be thick with them!'

Herbert Gaines said, 'It won't wait, you know! The helicopter won't wait!'

Kenneth Garunisch was helping his wife to corner the last stray rat and beat it to death. He came over to Herbert Gaines with blood on his hands. Behind him, Mrs. Garunisch had suddenly gone into a burst of hysterical weeping, and Esmeralda was trying to soothe her.

'Mr. Gaines,' he said, 'you're crazy. If you go out there, you won't last two minutes. Those rats are fierce and they're hungry. I've come up against them before, when I was a kid, and I've seen a man have half his nose bitten off. That was just one. There must be hundreds out there.'

Dr. Petrie looked at the old actor and said, 'It's no use, you know, Mr. Gaines. You might as well admit it.'

Herbert Gaines looked up at the ceiling. Just a few storeys above him, perched impatiently on the roof, was his means of escape, his way to a glittering political destiny.

Kenneth Garunisch said, 'Power's an attractive thing, Mr. Gaines, ain't it? You've tasted it now, haven't you, and wasn't that taste good?'

Herbert Gaines stared at him. 'I don't know what you mean. I have to go, that's all. They sent the helicopter and I have to go.'

He paced urgently across the room. Then he said, 'Fire! That's it! They don't like fire!'

'Mr. Gaines,' said Garunisch, 'what the hell are you talking about?'

'It's true!' said Gaines. 'You can always fight them with fire! It's in that movie — River Boat! Now, where's that Variety we brought down with us? Nicky — where is it?'

Nicholas, sulking, didn't even answer. Herbert Gaines fumbled around in his touzled bed until he found the paper. He rolled it up, and brandished it around. 'This, my friends, will be my salvation!' He picked up the table lighter that Garunisch had used to kill the rat, and he flicked it. Then he carefully applied the flame to the edge of Variety, until the paper was burning like a torch.

Dr. Petrie stepped forward, but Kenneth Garunisch reached out and held his arm.

'Let him go, doctor. Just help me make sure that no more rats get into the place. You can't stand between a man and his destiny, even if you think he's a shit.'

Dr. Petrie said, 'But it's insane! He won't last a minute out there!'

'That's his problem. He wants to go.' Nicholas, standing next to them, nodded his head. 'You're right, Mr. Garunisch. Herbert's a born martyr. You'd have to kill him to stop him killing himself.'

Herbert Gaines was making sure that the copy of Variety was well alight. Then he went to the door, and held it in front of him.

'You wait till they see this!' he said triumphantly. 'This'll sort them out!'

Dr. Petrie and Kenneth Garunisch positioned themselves behind the door so that they could slam it shut the second that Herbert Gaines had gone through. The room was already smokey and filled with black wisps of ash, but Herbert had his paper burning well now, and was ready to go.

He opened the door, waving the blazing Variety in a wide fluttering arc. The rats went for his legs like gray greasy torpedoes, but the flames were enough to keep them from jumping at his face and throat.

Kicking three or four rats away, Dr. Petrie shut the door again, and locked it.

Herbert had three flights of stairs to go to reach the roof. The first flight wasn't too bad, because he managed to knock most of the rats away from his legs, and his paper was still burning. Halfway up the second flight, with his heart pounding and his sixty-year-old lungs beginning to feel the strain, he started to falter. The flames abruptly went out, and he was left with nothing but a half-burned Variety to beat off the most vicious animals he had ever seen.

The third flight was the beginning of his Calvary. The rats were hanging on to his arms now, and biting into his back arid his sides. His legs were thick with them, and he could feel their teeth in his thighs. He kept his hands over his face and stumbled up blindly, but they still leaped up at him and bit into his fingers, until his hands were gloved in rats.

The agony of it was enormous. He couldn't even cry out, unless they bit into his mouth, and there was already a huge brown sewer rat dangling from the soft flesh under his chin. He tried to keep his mind above the pain, above this dreadful cloak of biting, squeaking creatures, and firmly concentrated on the roof — the roof — and his wonderful helicopter.

He had to take one hand away from his face to open the door to the roof. His arm seemed to weigh