Better in the Dark (12 page)

Harry looked puzzled, still breathing hard. “Jim, don’t you know what they’re doing? A couple of months, there’s going to be hell to pay. Doesn’t that bother you at all?”

“Thinning down the herd a bit, that’s all. Culling the weak ones. We’ll have a moderate epidemic, relieve the pressure a bit, give the government an idea of what they can expect elsewhere. We need this, Harry. Hate to say it, but it’s true. Got to be done sooner or later. You see that, don’t you?”

With all the control at his command, Harry began, as if to a foolish child, “Jim, one third of all vaccines are useless. One third. They have been for about five years now. This isn’t just a bad run of flu, Jim, this is major. We aren’t talking about just one disease—not just a smallpox epidemic or a cholera epidemic or a meningitis epidemic. This is a pandemic, Jim. It has something for everyone. For God’s sake, call whoever is in charge of this before it’s too late.”

“There’s enough vaccines stockpiled,” Jim Braemoore said reassuringly. “We can stop it if it gets out of hand. It won’t be like a pandemic at all. You’re letting yourself be railroaded, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”

“Damn right I’m afraid. Think, Jim...”

“Harry, this is a well-controlled experiment. You’ll see. It can’t turn out the way you think. Precautions have been taken. It’s quite safe.”

“Bullshit!”

Jim spread out his hand to Harry. “Tell you what: you get your kit and go along home. I’ll have a word with Wexford in the morning. You’ll be back on the job in no time, everything straightened out. That’s the ticket.”

“There isn’t time...”

Jim reached over and buzzed his door opener. “Glad you came to see me, Harry. Knew we could sort things out if you did. Just wait until the worst blows over. Wexford’ll take you back. Shouldn’t be more than two, three months. Make it the end of summer. Don’t let this bother you. It isn’t like you. You’re a sensible man. You use those months for a vacation.”

“Vacation? With all this...”

“See, there you go again. Can’t do that, Harry. Take a rest, let yourself unwind.” Pointing to the door, he said, “Glad we had this chat. Knew you’d understand once conditions were explained to you. Not natural you wouldn’t.”

“But, Jim, you don’t realize...” Harry was desperate now. His hands closed on the edge of Braemoore’s desk, his knuckles white.

“Hate to kick you out, Harry, but there’s a meeting in administration. Must run.” He was out the side door before Harry had a chance to speak. He stood in the empty door and felt his courage fail.

“What do we do now?” Natalie asked half an hour later as she sat in the desolation of her tiny office.

“We call for help,” Harry said, his face grim.

Stan Kooznetz turned from the window, worry making his long face even longer. “Where do we get help, Harry? We can’t very well ask Congress.”

Harry shook his head, looking from Stan to Natalie to Eric to Lisa. There were so few of them, and they were out in the cold.

“I called Inner City,” Natalie said. “They fired eight doctors over there. They wouldn’t say who.” She was very tired, and her feet hurt. “I could use ten hours’ sleep,” she remarked to no one in particular.

“Not Congress,” Harry said suddenly. “We call West Coast Control in L. A. They’re in control of the medical system from here to Denver. They’ll have to do something about this.”

Lisa Skye laughed cynically. “What makes you think so, Harry?”

“Look” he went on as he saw the doubt in the other faces. “If one or two of us said something, they wouldn’t pay any attention. But damn it, there are seventeen names on that list. And eight over at Inner City. Has anybody checked Strickland or County General?”

“They aren’t giving out that information,” Natalie said in a parody of the secretary’s voice.

“Then you can bet some of them are fired, too. That means we have real ammunition. Amanda is a recognized expert in pediatrics. That gives us clout. We can talk to Radick and ask him to add his evaluation in an official complaint. Once L.A. starts investigating, it’s all over. They’ll have to put a stop to this thing.”

Does he really believe that, Natalie asked herself as she watched Harry. She knew that they would not be allowed to contact anyone. If the situation was this far out of hand, there would be no chance to stop it now. “I don’t like to bring up unpleasant things, but we’ve been ordered to house arrest as of an hour ago,” she reminded him. “Do you imagine we’ll be allowed to contact L.A.?”

“She’s right,” Lisa said. “We won’t get the chance.”

“Then we’ll make the chance. What’s the matter with you people?” he demanded. His face was reddening and he could feel his pulse race. “You’re giving up, is that it?”

“Retreating,” Lisa amended. “We don’t have a lot of choice, anyway. We might as well give up.”

“And where would we go, assuming they let us out of our apartments?” Stan paced the floor. “We aren’t going to be allowed anywhere near a hospital, and we’ve got to operate from somewhere. But you know what the housing situation is like. There isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that we could find a place big enough and private enough...”

Suddenly Natalie looked up. “The Van Dreyter house!” she said, her face brightening. “We can take over the Van Dreyter house.”

“Oh, sure,” Stan agreed caustically. “They’ll hand over the biggest landmark in the city without a murmur.”

“You’re tilting at windmills,” Lisa agreed.

“Let her talk,” Harry said sharply. He sensed Natalie’s change of mind, and her awakening strength.

She set her jaw and went on. “In a couple of weeks it won’t matter what the city says. The house is sitting there, all thirty-six rooms of it. It’s furnished, it’s got all the utilities. We can take it over and use it like one of those old-fashioned co-ops. We could live there and work there. The house is central. Everyone knows about it. Word of mouth would do the rest.”

Lisa started to laugh, then sobered. “Okay. Call me Sancho. What makes you think it’ll work?” Natalie gathered up the remainder of her things.

“Because it
has
to.”

Harry felt the bus lurch as it went over the potholes. He tightened his grip on Natalie’s shoulder.

“You sure you don’t mind?” Natalie asked for the sixteenth time. “I could ask Carol if she’d mind if I stayed with her.”

“Jack Mendosa would love that, wouldn’t he?” Harry said cordially. “And with all that room they have: three rooms and a closet. A great bargain. One more should fit in somewhere. Maybe you could sleep in the bathtub.”

“All right,” she muttered. “But this will be awkward.” She stared past him out the window. Behind them the hospital was almost lost to sight, its seventeen white stories grimy with the foul air.

“Only until we move into the Van Dreyter house.”

She touched her valise. “How much room do you have?”

He grinned. “I’m lucky. I’m in one of the old apartment blocks. I’ve got four rooms, a kitchen and a bath. There’s lots of space. My brother and his wife used to share it with me, but they’ve moved to Phoenix, and the Housing Authority hasn’t evicted me yet. The rooms are good-sized, with nine-foot ceilings. You’ll like it, Natalie. You can have all the privacy you want.”

“House arrest,” she said bitterly. “On top of everything else.”

“It won’t last.”

The bus shuddered as it paused. The doors creaked open as passengers jostled each other and a few struggled out onto the pavement.

“One more stop,” Harry promised her. “We get off at the next one.”

A woman across the way began to cough, a thin, persistent noise that came through the susurrus of conversation.

“God, Harry,” Natalie said as the coughing grew worse. “There’s so little time.”

A
MECHANICAL VOICE INFORMED
Harry that his call could not be completed as dialed and advised him to try again when the lines were open. He slammed the receiver back into the cradle, swearing.

“No luck?” Natalie asked, knowing the answer.

“I can’t get through,” he said, coming back into the living room. The frustration he felt showed on his face. “I’ll try to get Denning again. He should be willing to listen if I can reach him.” Harry did not entirely trust Hall Denning, knowing that newsmen were a chancy lot, but he could think of no other possibilities.

“They won’t let you. We’re not going to talk to anyone until it’s too late.” She sat down, her head in her hands. “Besides, Denning is local. We need national attention on this. We might not be the only test area, you know. There might be others.”

Harry paused before sinking into the old chair opposite her. “Yes.” He studied the floor, a complicated parquetry of pine and oak that was once the pride of its first owners. Now some of the wood was gray with wear, some of the pieces missing altogether, the pattern patched with linoleum or old carpet.

“You tried to call the others?” she said when the silence between them had lengthened.

He nodded. “I can’t get through. They need official authorization. I haven’t got it.”

“Do you think we could sneak out?”

“There’re guards out there, remember?” he snapped, then relented. “I don’t know, Natalie. Maybe we could. But where would we go?” He wished she had an answer for that, but knew that she was as isolated as he.

“Did you hear the news this morning?” Natalie asked, changing the subject. Her hands were tightly laced together in her lap, and the tension increased as she waited for an answer.

“No.”

“They reported an outbreak of flu—a new variety, they said. They advised listeners to see their doctors if they became ill, and gave the usual warnings about avoiding public contact. You know the routine.”

“Yes.”

She stared out the window into the warm spring day where a gentle wind slid between the crowded buildings and tickled the river into ripples. Summer would be hot this year, and that would make it worse.

“What do you think about Senator Hammond? She might force the issue for us.” Harry said this hopefully.

“I tried to call her local office and they wouldn’t connect me. Besides, she’s in Washington right now. Congress is in session. I doubt we’ll see her back on this coast for a couple of months yet.” Natalie felt the deep fatigue of helplessness settle over her. For the last three days she had told herself that surely the hospital administration would call off the experiment by now, that they would realize what they had done and would attempt to reverse the pandemic. But she knew that this had not happened when she heard the news on the radio. By the time anyone could be convinced to help, it would be too late. It was too late now.

Harry rose from his chair, his hands swinging together and meeting in a blow. If he felt pain from this, he did not notice it. “We’re overlooking something. There’s got to be a way. I can’t simply sit here while the whole city dies.”

“And you think it’s easy for me?” Natalie demanded, stung.

“Well, you sure haven’t come up with any working alternative.” Quite suddenly he turned into the hall again and picked up the phone, dialing angrily. “Yes,” he said in a moment, “this is Dr. Smith. I would like to speak with Robert Craley...” He paused, and his expression grew thunderous. “No, no authorization.” In the next instant he had slammed the phone down. “No help from the Justice Department, either.” He walked slowly back into the living room, turning to Natalie again. “I’m sorry I snapped at you.”