fainted. The most seriously injured patient is a sixty-three year old woman; she has fractures to both legs and her pelvis. One man has a hairline fracture of the skull, two people have concussion and three more have various cuts and bruises, like this chap here.” Tremaine was suturing a cut over the eyebrow of a middle aged man dressed in dungarees.”
“Good, I feared it would be a lot worse.”
“I would have called you if it had been,” said Tremaine without looking away from his patient.
Saracen took Tremaine’s point and said good-night.
The flat was cold when Saracen got in but then it usually was. He lit the gas fire before he took his coat off and poured himself a drink before sitting down. He examined the whisky in the glass and considered for a moment that it might be playing an increasingly important role in his life but then pushed the thought to the back of his mind. It would have to wait its turn with the other problems.
He thought about Jill and Claire and felt annoyed that he could not think clearly. The last thing he needed at the moment were personal problems but he simply could not blot them out. Failure to do so made him angry. For God’s sake you’re not a teenager! he reminded himself. Until tonight he had almost convinced himself that he was over Marion and was falling in love with Jill Rawlings but tonight had brought new doubts. Even now the thought of Claire Tremaine’s thighs occupied his attention for some minutes. The telephone rang and startled him.
“Dr Saracen? It’s Malcolm Jamieson at A amp;E. The Police have just called an emergency red at Palmer’s Green.”
“What’s happened?” exclaimed Saracen. The emergency red code was used to alert hospitals to the occurrence of a major civil disaster like a plane or a train crash. incidents when casualties could be expected to run into double figures at least.
“It’s not clear yet,” said Jamieson. “Emergency red was called fifteen minutes ago and then rescinded almost immediately. A few moments ago it was called again. I thought I’d better inform you.”
“And you’ve no idea what’s wrong?” asked a puzzled Saracen.
“There was some talk of a gas leak at first but now there seems to be confusion. We’ve had no patients as yet.”
“I’m coming in. Call Tremaine out will you.”
“Will do.”
Saracen put down the phone. It rang again almost immediately. It was Saithe. “There’s chaos down on Palmer’s Green.”
“Jamieson just called me. What’s going on?”
“Apparently the Police were called to the flats after people failed to get in all day. They had to force an entry and found everyone inside dead, twenty eight people in all including the caretaker.”
“What in God’s name happened?” asked Saracen.
“At first the Police thought that it was a gas leak but when the ambulance-men got there they knew immediately that it wasn’t, the haemoglobin in the corpses hadn’t been carboxylated. The bodies weren’t pink… they were black.”
“Black!” exclaimed Saracen.
“Severe cyanosis in all cases.”
“Are you saying they all died of plague?” said Saracen, his mind reeling.
“That’s what it looks like though God knows how. Luckily the ambulance men had the presence of mind to radio back for instructions before they touched anything. The place has been sealed off to await medical confirmation.”
“From whom?” asked Saracen.
Saithe hesitated before saying, “That’s the thing actually…Dr MacQuillan will be going down of course but I think perhaps one of us should accompany him. I haven’t been able to get a hold of Braithwaite and I’m a bit tied up at the moment…I wondered perhaps if you?…”
“All right. What’s the arrangement?”
Saithe sounded relieved. “The Police have set up a mobile headquarters down at Palmer’s Green. You and Dr MacQuillan are to meet there. A squad car is taking down protective clothing for you.
“Understood.” Saracen put down the phone abruptly. He did not want to talk to Saithe any more. He went to the bathroom and sluiced cold water up into his face and then dried himself roughly. He felt quite sober but was aware that he had had quite a few drinks over the course of the evening.
MacQuillan was already sitting in the Police caravan when Saracen arrived. He smiled when he saw who had been sent. “How did you get the job?” he asked.
“I was always lucky,” replied Saracen.
“Your suits are ready gentlemen,” said one of the policemen, looking round the door. MacQuillan and Saracen followed him through to an adjoining room where they donned their white protective clothing. Before fitting their respirator masks MacQuillan gave instructions regarding their decontamination when he and Saracen came out of the building. Their suits were to be sprayed all over with the powerful disinfectant that had been brought down in the squad car with the suits.
“Ready?” asked MacQuillan.
Saracen nodded and made a final adjustment to his mask before following MacQuillan out of the door and across the courtyard. Saracen recalled the occasion on which he had last done this. It was on the night he had visited Timothy Archer to tell him about his wife. Would Archer be on of the dead? he wondered. It seemed almost certain.
Services to the building had been cut off after the initial gas alert so Saracen and MacQuillan carried powerful torches with them to use until such times as power was restored. There had been a certain reluctance on the part of the Police to reconnect services until it had been proved beyond all doubt that gas and toxic fumes were completely ruled out.
As MacQuillan pushed open the door to the building Saracen saw the damage to the smooth satin steel where the Police had been obliged to force it. He allowed the door to swing slowly shut behind them, cutting out the sounds of the night as it came to rest on its seal. It was dark and eerily silent inside the building, just like a tomb, thought Saracen but that’s exactly what it was according to reports. MacQuillan signalled that they should move to the right through the hall and Saracen signified that he had understood.
They stopped outside the door of the first flat and Saracen waited while MacQuillan found the pass key given him by the Police. He opened the door and they went inside. There were two bodies in the apartment, a man and a woman in their sixties. Both were in bed. The woman’s eyes were closed but her husband stared unseeingly at the ceiling through eyes that had turned to glass. MacQuillan pulled back the bedclothes to examine the bodies. The examination was perfunctory and swift. There was no doubt. It was plague.
Chapter Twelve
Saracen inspected the flats on the first floor while MacQuillan went on with the remaining apartments on the ground floor. The scene was much the same throughout the building, darkness, silence and death. Many of the dead were in bed like the first couple; they had obviously taken to their beds on feeling unwell and had not risen again. A few, like Timothy Archer, had died elsewhere. One man had collapsed over the bath. Saracen was looking at him when the electricity supply was restored. The bathroom light came on without warning and made him step back involuntarily at the spectre of vomited blood splashed over white enamel.
Archer had died in the arm chair he had been using when Saracen had come to see him. He had obviously tried to fight the effects of his illness with whisky and a bottle lay on its side where he had knocked it over in his death throes. The contents had formed a dark stain on the carpet. The smell reached Saracen through his respirator.
Saracen could see that Archer was holding something in his hand. He thought at first that it was a book but when he looked closer he could see that it was in fact a photograph, an old framed one. He freed it from Archer’s grip and recognised a younger, slimmer Timothy Archer and knew that the smiling girl on his arm, the girl who had
