50
“What the hell is going on?”
“Miss DeFrancesca, you’re going to have to calm down.”
“Don’t call me miss. What the hell is going on?”
Rubens placed his palms together before his chest, pressing them together as he relaxed his shoulders. He’d decided before the conversation started that he would be patient.
“There’s a possibility that you have been infected with a man-made bacteria,” Rubens told her.
“God damn it.” Lia paced on the screen, walking across the white linoleum. “I knew it.”
She and Dean had been evacuated to an American air base in Germany, where a set of trailers was equipped for medical isolation. The facilities were not quite as elaborate as Rubens had been told, but at this point they would have’to do.
“We are working on finding the cure,” added Rubens.
“You knew it all along,” she said, turning toward the camera.
“That’s not correct,” Rubens told her. “We only began to suspect recently.”
“How recently?”
“Recently.”
“You’re a bastard.”
“Such language, Lia, really. Did they teach you that in the Army?”
“Screw off.” She kicked at the linoleum on the floor, twisting away from the camera and then back. “Where’s the antidote? That’s what this is about, isn’t it? Kegan sold them the bacteria and promised to give them an antidote.”
“You’re jumping to conclusions. We don’t know that he sold them anything. We do believe, however, that he did have a cure for this disease. So we’re pursuing leads to that effect.”
“How?” she snapped.
“Mr. Karr is running it down as we speak.”
“I want to help him.”
“Not possible at the moment,” Rubens told her. He wondered what her reaction would be if he said that they weren’t even sure yet whom Kegan had been dealing with.
Lia looked down at the floor for a moment, then raised her eyes back at the video camera transmitting her image. The anger had vanished from her face — not a good sign, Rubens knew.
“I can get out of here, you know.”
“Lia, I’m sure you can.”
Not only were there four guards on each of the two windows, but there were a dozen men at the only door, and another six or seven milling around the sides. The outer fence ringing the trailers was surrounded by a company of soldiers, several machine gun-equipped Humvees, and at least one Mlal tank. But Rubens had no doubt Lia was correct.
“Dr. Lester is en route to examine you himself,” added Rubens in what he hoped was a conciliatory voice. “He should be there within a few hours.”
“Who’s Lester?”
“He’s with the CDC. There will be some blood tests, and the results should be pretty clear. Believe me, this has our top priority.”
“Oh, peachy.”
“As we speak, Johnny Bib and his team—”
“Oh, God, not
“Johnny’s team is tracking down the construction of the organism as well as this so-called antidote.” Rubens realized belatedly that the word
“What’s he going to do if he’s dead? You hear him in there?” Lia gestured to the other room. “He’s groaning.”
“Is his IV set up correctly?”
“You think I’m a nurse?”
“I was under the impression your background included extensive medic training.”
Lia growled and disappeared into the other room. Rubens understood that she would not be returning anytime soon.
“What do you think?” asked Telach.
“I think we’d better see if they can spare some more soldiers for the perimeter guard,” said Rubens.
51
“I thought we were looking for pigs,” Karr told the Art Room. “I have plenty of pigs.”
“We have new information,” said Chafetz. “Apparently, Dr. Kegan was investigating texts that concern ancient folk cures for rat-bite fever. The cures mention a particular type of fungus that grows on strangler figs.”
“Figs, not pigs?”
“It’s a type of tree. It grows around other trees. The fungus grows in the crack. But not every crack. I’m downloading information for your computer.”
Karr sighed and sat down in front of building one. Two of the men inside had been dead, hit by shrapnel or bullets as the assault started. The other three were sleeping, their hands and legs tightly bound, a few yards away. All were Burmese; there was no sign Kegan had ever been here.
“This still sounds suspiciously like a wild-goose chase,” he told Sandy. “More and more.”
“Can you look for those trees?”
“If I have to.”
“We have some experts who are going to come on the line and help,” she told him.
Karr unfolded himself from the spot and checked his watch. It was now getting close to 4:00 A.M. He had two hours, maybe a little more, before he’d have to leave for the rendezvous.
“Talking to yourself again?” asked Foster.
“Somebody’s got to. Do me a favor: go through building two again and see if you see any plant stuff.”
“Like marijuana?”
“No, more like a fungus kind of thing.”
“Mushrooms?” asked the Marine.
“Yeah. Here, hold on a second.” Karr took the computer and clicked into the pictures that were being downloaded. The fungus looked like crumbly brown rocks with white diamonds shot through, the top arching like a sawed-off mushroom. “Something like this. But hell, if you see anything close, let me know.”
Karr worked his way slowly through building one, listening as a pair of scientists began explaining what they were looking for and why.
“You can give me the abbreviated version,” he told them as they segued into cell skin barriers.
“Basically, we’re looking for something that is a natural penicillin,” said one of the scientists. “Penicillin interferes with the bacterial wall, and that causes all sorts of problems for them. This fungus is probably almost the same thing.”
“Well, different, but the same,” said the other expert.
“Oh sure, now I understand,” said Karr.
