The White Plague (37 page)

John looked away to the low scrub on his left, the rock wall covered with lichen patches here. How carefully Herity watched him. What was Herity seeking?

“Only the ones with a will to fight back are deserving of our tears,” Herity said. “Have you the will to fight back, John?”

John tried to swallow past a lump in his throat, then: “You see me here. I didn’t have to come.”

But I did have to come
, he thought.

Herity appeared curiously moved by John’s response. He patted John on the shoulder. “That you are. You’re here with the rest of us.”

And why are you here?

Herity shook his head, knowing he had to assume this was O’Neill, the Madman himself. And if he was O’Neill… Herity forced himself to face it.

The bomb we made killed his wife and wains. He fought back, damn his soul to hell!

Presently, Herity began humming a tune, then he sang:

“O my Dark Rosaleen!

Do not sigh, do not weep!

The priests are on the ocean green,

They march along the deep.”

He broke off and cast a probing stare at John beside him, that bald head outlined against the valley mist, the lean, bearded face without a change of expression in it.

With a sigh, Herity marched in silence for a time, then he picked up his pace, forcing John to quick step for a moment to keep up.

“There’s priests marching everywhere,” Herity said, nodding at the black-suited figure ahead of them. “And more than wine from a Royal Pope in their bags. Though I wish I had some Spanish ale this moment to give me hope and glad me heart.”

By now you know what earned my anger. Don’t question it! Remind yourselves often of the impenetrable ignorance of the Irish and the English, their mass perpetuation of mutual misery. Remember the bloody hand of Libya with its training camps for terrorists and the free weapons. How could I suffer such fools to live?

– John Roe O’Neill, Letter Two

M
OST OF
the Huddersfield’s top staff and researchers were being gathered in the Administration Building’s Executive Lounge for the morning meeting with Rupert Stonar. People trooped along the walks, their umbrellas pointed dangerously ahead, keeping to the covered passages where they could to avoid the light rain that had set in about daylight.

Stonar had arrived forty minutes early, requiring Wycombe-Finch to phone ahead to his assistants and to Beckett, then to dash back on foot from his working office. He arrived out of breath, his tweed jacket dark from the rain that had swept past his umbrella. Luckily, his assistants had laid on coffee and sweet rolls and there was a brief interlude with Stonar, both of them recalling old times in public school: Wye and Stoney.

Wycombe-Finch thought Stonar had not changed for the better since their upperclassman days when they were preparing to be the privileged carriers of civilization’s burdens. Stonar had been a chunky, ruddy-complexioned youth with unruly hair that tended toward dark-sandy. He’d had a rather blocky face with pale blue and coldly observant eyes. Stonar remained ruddy-faced, the sandy hair still unruly, although this now had more the look of a calculated effect. The eyes were even more chilly. Stonar’s childhood nickname fitted him even better now: the blockiness had hardened.

“We’re gathering people in the lounge, Stoney,” Wycombe-Finch said. “Should be there by now. I’ve spoken briefly to Bill Beckett and he should be along, too.”

“The American chap?” Stonar’s voice was a deep baritone, which showed the marks of special training.

“Quite a remarkable fellow really,” Wycombe-Finch said. “Good at making our work understandable to others.”

“Does he have anything definite to report?”

There it is!
Wycombe-Finch thought.

He sensed the sudden stillness of his assistants at the table with the coffee and sweet rolls. He said: “I’ll leave that to him.”

“Expected to find you here in your office when I arrived,” Stonar said.

“I’ve a working office in one of the lab buildings,” Wycombe-Finch said. “Morning’s a good time to get in my own contributions.”

“And what might your contribution be?” Stonar asked.

“I’m afraid this morning was rather taken up by a telephone conference with my opposite number in Ireland.”

“Doheny? Don’t trust the bastard!”

“Well, he did provide some interesting information this morning.” Wycombe-Finch proceeded to recount Doheny’s revelation about the suspected John Roe O’Neill.

“You give credence to that story?” Stonar demanded.

“The scientist always waits for the evidence,” Wycombe-Finch said. “Speaking of which, I think my people are all gathered now. Shall we go into the lounge?”

Wycombe-Finch nodded to an assistant, who led the way, opening the double doors ahead of the executives.

The lounge was a softly unobtrusive space modeled after the smoking room of a London club, but larger. Dark wainscoting with a maroon print on black cloth above it circled the room, broken only by four windows, now closed by matching draperies, and a large marble fireplace in which a real fire flickered. There were deep leather chairs of glowing red-brown, a long refectory table of glossy mahogany to one side of the fireplace, and stand ashtrays on heavy brass pedestals. Light came from four chandeliers, which staff joked had been modeled after the spaceship in
Close Encounters
, and from a perimeter of wall-sconce spotlights focused on the table where Beckett had seated himself behind three neatly stacked report folders. Most of the other staff already was seated in chairs away from the table, obviously choosing not to be at the center of action.

Word does get around,
Wycombe-Finch thought.

Beckett lifted himself easily from the chair as the party from the Executive Suite entered. There was some soft bustling around the room. A few throats were cleared.

Beckett looked like a pink-faced schoolboy this morning, Wycombe-Finch thought. Very deceptive appearance. There had been little time to brief him, but Wycombe-Finch thought Beckett understood the delicacy of the situation.

Wycombe-Finch performed the introduction. Stonar and Beckett shook hands briefly across the table. Chairs for Stonar and the director were brought unobtrusively by assistants, who retired into the farther reaches of the room.

Thirty-one others had been assembled here, Wycombe-Finch noted, counting silently. He made no move toward introductions. Later, perhaps. The curious were not gathering about this morning to meet with the powerful. He busied himself lighting the long-stemmed pipe while he took the chair beside Stonar. An ashtray appeared as though by magic, thrust forward by a hand from behind. Wycombe-Finch waved the assistant back, leaned his gold pipe lighter against the ashtray with grave deliberation, then:

“Well, Stoney, I don’t know how much you understand about our –”

“Wye, let’s not try the scientific-mystery approach, eh?” Stonar said.

Beckett leaned forward, his voice deceptively calm. “The director’s words were polite and to the point.”

Ahhhh
, Wycombe-Finch thought.
Beckett has an object for his anger. This should be interesting, to say the least.

“Really?” Stonar’s voice dripped ice chips.

“I would not have said it were it not real,” Beckett said. “Without knowing how much you understand about our work, we cannot begin to brief you. I will say at the outset that there’s nothing wrong with being ignorant about our work. Guilt should attach only to anyone who remains ignorant in the presence of an opportunity to learn.”

Well said, old boy!
Wycombe-Finch thought.

Stonar leaned back in his chair, his face blank, only a slight throbbing at the neck to reveal his emotion. “I’ve always heard Yankees were a cheeky and impetuous lot,” he said. “Do proceed to remove my ignorance.”

Beckett straightened.
The pontifical approach was what this bastard needed
, he thought.
Get him off balance and keep him there
. Wycombe-Finch had said the man was weak in science, only fair in math. Stonar would have feelings of inadequacy. Beckett took his time opening the folders and spreading papers before him.

“We’re currently focusing on the enzyme-inhibiting characteristics of the disease,” Beckett said. “You’ve no doubt heard about the Canadian team’s work. We’re particularly interested because the absence of an enzyme can lead to the absence of a particular amino acid, and a change in one amino acid out of some three hundred of them can result in a fatal condition. We’re certain O’Neill blocked certain amino acids by tying up the structures that make them.”

“I’ve read the Canadian report,” Stonar said.

But did you understand it?
Beckett wondered. He said: “Good. Then you’ll follow that we believe this plague causes a kind of premature aging, very swift, no time for many of the usual side manifestations. I call your attention to the white blotches on the extremities. Very suggestive.”

“Genes to control aging?” Stonar asked, a sudden intense curiosity in his voice.

“Action of a gene is concerned with formation of a particular enzyme, which is a protein,” Beckett said. “Genes control the amino acid makeup of specific proteins. Rendering certain DNA combinations incapable of producing particular amino acids can be a deadly disease.”

“I hear mention of RNA as well,” Stonar said.

“RNA and DNA relate to each other like a template and the finished product,” Beckett said. “Like a mold and the casting that comes from it. The infected host manufactures protein dictated by the RNA. When bacterial viruses infect bacteria, RNA is formed that resembles the virus DNA and not that of the host. The sequence of the nucleotides in the new RNA molecule is complementary to that of the RNA of the virus.”

“He transmitted this thing with a virus?” Stonar asked.

“He shaped new bacteria with a new virus. Very fine determinations in very fine structures. It was a superb accomplishment.”

“I don’t enjoy hearing praise for the man,” Stonar said, his voice flat.

Beckett shrugged. If the man didn’t understand, he didn’t understand. Beckett said: “O’Neill created subcellular organisms, plasmids, for their bonding characteristics, attaching them at key places in the recombinant process. Had it not taken such a twisted turn, his work would have qualified him for a Nobel. Pure genius but driven by the dark side of human motivations.”

Stonar let this pass. He said, “You mention nucleotides.”

“Nucleic acids are the molecules upon which the coding is written. They direct the manufacture of proteins and hold the keys to heredity. Like proteins, nucleic acids are heavy polymers.”

“I hear it rumored that you’re finding fault with something called ‘the zipper theory,’” Stonar said.

Wycombe-Finch shot a hard glance at Stonar. So the man did have his spies in the Huddersfield Establishment! Or on the telephone.

“DNA is a double molecule with one chain twined around the other in helical form,” Beckett said. “It is a flexed compound that turns and twists upon itself in a peculiar fashion. We think these flexings are extremely significant.”

“How is that?”

“Things that lock together do so according to their intrinsic shape. The twistings are a clue to that shape.”

“Clever,” Stonar said.

“We think the thing may lock together more like your winter waterproof,” Beckett said. “First one set of connections and then a second, overlapping set.”

“What kills this plague?” Stonar asked. “Besides fire, that is.”

“Intense concentrations of ozone seem to inhibit it. But the growth is explosive in both men and women. To say it is biologically active is to understate the case.”

Stonar pulled at his lower lip. “What necessary thing does it lock up?”

“We think it blocks vasopressin, among other things.”

“Essential to life, eh?”

Beckett nodded.

“Is it true the plague kills hermaphrodites?” Stonar said “hermaphrodite” as though it were a particularly foul thing.

“True hermaphrodites, yes,” Beckett said. “That’s very suggestive, isn’t it.”

“I was thinking that the resultant society could be very male and very female, the hermaphrodites mostly weeded out.” He cleared his throat. “This is all very interesting, but I hear nothing new really, nothing indicating a dramatic insight.”

“We’re still gathering data,” Beckett said. “For instance, we’re running a parallel line of inquiry into some plague symptoms that are similar to those in neutropenia.”

“Neutro… what?” Stonar asked.

Wycombe-Finch stared at Beckett. This was new!

“Neutropenia,” Beckett said, noting how Stonar’s eyelids lowered in a speculative squint. “Neutrophils are granular leukocytes having a nucleus of three to five lobes connected by chromatin and a cytoplasm containing very fine granules. They’re part of the body’s first line of defense against bacterial invasion. It’s a disease that can have a genetic origin.”

He’s being too technical for Stoney,
Wycombe-Finch thought, but the revelation was fascinating. He said: “You got that from the Foss autopsy?”

Beckett was silent for a moment, looking down at the papers in front of him but not seeing them, then: “Ariane provided us with quite a number of clues before she died.”

“This was Doctor Ariane Foss, who worked with Bill and the others before the plague killed her,” Wycombe-Finch explained to Stonar.

Stonar nodded, noting the pain in Beckett’s expression.

“Before she died, she gave us her own internal view of her symptoms,” Beckett said. “This plague kills with central nervous system breakdown and enzyme blockage. There is general degradation of functions and a final lapse into unconsciousness with death following quickly.”

“I’ve seen plague victims die,” Stonar said. His tone was brittle.

“The disease process does not extend long enough,” Beckett said, “for many symptoms to manifest. We’re forced to interpret from only the beginning traumata, but Ariane gave us a finely tuned assessment of those.”