An Affair Of Sorcerers

bat and yanked it off my thumb. It took all my willpower to hang on to the writhing animal, but I knew I had to keep my head. My entire body was quaking, oozing sweat, but I managed to walk across the room, turn on the light and examine the bat. It had worked one cold, skin-covered wing free and was flapping it against me in a mindless, disease-powered frenzy. Its body kept churning, and I could feel its tiny, clawed feet scratching against my palm and wrist. The maw with its tiny needle teeth was covered with froth and blood. The flesh on my right thumb where it had been chewing was shredded; blood and flecks of saliva covered my hand.

I gagged and tasted sour bile in the back of my throat. Desperately hoping that it was all a dream-within-a- dream, I screwed my eyes shut and waited to wake up. But I was awake. The tiny, muscular body squirmed; I could feel its soft, throbbing belly, wirelike veins, slimy feces lubricating my hand. In a few more seconds it would wriggle its way free.

Fighting off a strong compulsion to vomit, I staggered back across the room and used my free hand to remove the pillowcase from my pillow. I dropped the bat into it, then beat the shape to death with a shoe. Groaning and whimpering like a maniac, I kept pounding the stained pillowcase long after the creature inside it was dead.

I wrapped the package in plastic, washed off my hands with alcohol and bandaged my thumb as best I could. I tried to keep my mind off what I knew was inevitably before me as I dressed, picked up the plastic bag and went down to my car. I couldn't stop shaking. With the bundle on the seat beside me, I careened through the night streets of Manhattan to the university Medical Center. I didn't want to die that way, and I tried not to think of the deadly germs coursing through my system at that very moment, being carried by my bloodstream toward my brain.

Chapter 11

'It's rabid,' Joshua Greene said. 'I'm sure you suspected it.'

I gripped the edge of the examining table on which I was sitting, winced as pain streaked through my freshly cleansed and bandaged right thumb. I was in my shorts, and felt cold. 'Of course,' I said. 'Healthy bats don't normally make a habit of chewing on people's fingers.'

'You know what has to be done, don't you?'

'Yeah. I know. How many shots am I going to need?'

'I'm not sure. We'll start off with one a day, vary the dosage and take blood samples as we go along. Maybe we can get away with six or seven. I'll start you off, and your regular doctor can give you the rest.'

'My doctor's away for a month. I'd just as soon you took care of it, if you don't mind. I'm beginning to feel at home here. How's my little friend?'

'The same,' he said stiffly. 'My team of specialists is setting up a new battery of tests for this afternoon. Right now, let's concentrate on you.'

Greene asked me questions about my height and weight, then left the room for a few minutes. He returned with a hypodermic needle that looked at least nine inches long. He prepared the syringe and came toward me. I lay back on the examining table and stared at the ceiling.

'Antirabies serum is injected directly into the abdominal wall, Dr. Frederickson-'

'Yeah, yeah, I know all about it. If you're going to start sticking needles into my gut, you may as well start calling me Mongo.'

'Very well. And if you're going to continue an investigation on behalf of one of my patients, you may as well call me Joshua. Now that we've broken down the social barriers, let's get back to the matter at hand.'

He paused, narrowed his eyes and stared at me hard. 'There is no cure for rabies once the symptoms have appeared,' he continued. 'That can be anywhere from two to eight weeks, depending on how well the victim handles himself. No cure. I emphasize this because I suspect you could be a difficult patient.'

I sighed, shook my head. 'You've got to be kidding. Order a stool specimen, and I'll meekly ask you what color you'd like.'

'Good. You sound very cooperative. Since there's no cure for rabies, we use the classic Pasteur treatment. I'll be injecting a weakened rabies strain into you. Your system will then build up antibodies in time to defeat the main strain that the bat infected you with. The serum I'll be giving you is prepared from duck embryos. We have some synthetics, but I still consider this the best.'

'Lord love a duck.'

'Please listen,' Greene said evenly, but with absolute authority. I listened. 'The point is that you must rest in order to let your system build up the necessary antibodies. Do you understand?'

'I understand.'

'Good. You've probably heard that the shots you're going to get are painful. It's true. Besides pain, you'll probably experience nausea and extreme fatigue as a result of the injections. As I said, you should rest as much as possible if you want to get away with the minimum number of shots; but then, you'll probably be happy to. Here comes Number One.'

I put my hands behind my head, closed my eyes and clenched my teeth as Greene daubed on some local anesthetic, then slowly slid the tip of the needle into my abdominal wall. He worked slowly, expertly, negotiating the needle through the tough, striated muscles. When he had the needle properly inserted, he slowly pressed the plunger. My stomach felt as if it were being filled with hot metal. He finished, slowly removed the needle. When I started to get up, he put a hand firmly on my chest.

'Take it easy for a few minutes,' he said. 'You'll be able to contain the nausea if you eat small amounts, fairly often. If your stomach hurts, take aspirin.'

'What are the odds I could end up with rabies anyway?'

Greene shrugged. 'Very slim, since we've started the injections within hours of your being bitten. That's assuming you do as I tell you. Where did you manage to find a rabid bat?'

'In my bedroom,' I said, swallowing hard. My mouth tasted like something purple. 'A more interesting question is how it got there, and I've been giving that some thought. It occurs to me that the bat might be a small memento from the same people who put Kathy into a coma.'

Greene frowned. 'Are you serious?'

'I may be rabid, but I'm not paranoid. I live on the fourth floor of an apartment building. How many bats do you find flying around Manhattan?'

'They're here, and they're quick. Did you leave your window open at any time during the past few nights?'

It was true that I had-to air out the apartment after a particularly smoky party. Still, I wondered: I had a chain on my apartment door, but someone could have slipped the bolt lock, let the bat in, then closed the door again. It was a Wednesday morning, and in the past three days my name had undoubtedly been added to a few enemy lists. It was possible that a rabid bat had flown in through a window I'd left open over the weekend, but the potential relationship between being bitten by a bat and the occult business I'd been investigating was just too poetically neat to ignore.

'Have you eaten anything since last night?' Greene asked.

'Uh-uh. Seeing that little critter hanging off my thumb seems to have taken away my appetite.'

Joshua Greene smiled. It made him look quite handsome. 'You're pretty peppy for a guy who's just had his first antirabies shot. Would you like a lollipop or a cup of coffee?'

'Actually, Joshua,' I said, sitting up, 'I'd like some information.'

'Really?' he said quizzically. 'Are you thinking of becoming an M.D. in addition to your other accomplishments?'

'Only if the shots don't work and I end up howling at the moon. What's your opinion of healers?'

He gave me an amused grunt. 'You trade me in for a healer and you'll find yourself howling at the moon and frothing at the mouth in a very short time. Does that answer your question?'

'I'm not sure.'