The League of Grey-Eyed Women

by Julius Fast

  He shook his head. Oh, Christ, what a sentimental whirlpool! He grinned bitterly, suddenly remembering an evening with Clifford two weeks ago, before there had been any hint except the nagging pain. They had sat up half the night with a bottle of bourbon, stretched out in Clifford's leather chairs, smoking cigars, drinking and settling the state of the world.

  They had come past nuclear testing, the Common Market, beat literature and the theatre of the absurd and he had firmly skirted around the occult, Clifford's one great passion, but had compromised for existentialism. It came back to him now how he had crumpled up the cellophane of a fresh cigar, tossed it down on the rug for Pushkin the white cat to play with and then, holding his glass up and staring at the amber liquid, had announced, "I'm not afraid of death. It's how I go that bothers me."

  "You mean when you go."

  "No, how. The way I act when it comes. I want to die with a gag, Cliff, go out with one big punch line. That's how I want to go."

  What an affectation! He winced and shivered with the cold.

  How easy to talk then, and what a lie now. It mattered. "Why didn't I tell the truth," he muttered savagely. "Why didn't I know the truth? I'll die in terror, kicking and screaming to stay —there must be a way, some way—dear God, some way. I cannot end like this. I will not!"

  He came out of the park on Fifth Avenue at 72nd Street and stared around helplessly. Where now? Back to the apartment? Stop in at the office and mend his broken fences? But why? Just to have something to do for these last few months?

  He shook his head. No, he was damned if he'd give up like that, go on about his business patiently waiting for the end. Why take Turel's word for it? It was all right for him to say there was no chance, shrug off Krebiozin or any new research. It wasn't Turel's life; it was his.

  He looked at his watch again. The Academy of Medicine Library closed at five. He could spend a couple of hours there reading up on the literature. God knows, he had turned up leads on drugs often enough when medical directors, specialists in the field, had said there was nothing. That's what made a "creative copy chief in ethical drug advertising," at least according to Mills. Well, why take Turel's word now when his own life was at stake?

  He hailed a cab, suddenly alive again with something to do, some purpose and direction. But the sudden spurt of energy, the exhilaration died away. Journal after journal repeated what Turel had said. Final ... no answer ... we just don't know ... the answer lies in a deeper understanding of the life processes ... at the cellular level ... genetics holds some promise for the future ... measures that at best are only palliative ... a genetic tendency ... on the edge of a breakthrough.

  On the edge, on the edge. Turel had said twenty years, thirty, and he had a matter of months.

  He closed the past year's bound copy of the Journal of Cellular and Comparative Physiology, and he sat at the broad, cork-topped table. He was a fool to keep looking. Black was black, and you accepted that truth without hunting for a shred of grey.

  He frowned suddenly. A shred of grey. What was the name Turel had mentioned? Stiener and his work in DNA. He pulled the bound volume back and flipped the pages. He had seen something in the May issue. Stiener, Douthright, Goldberg and Haas, "Remission of Artificially Induced Tumors in White Rats."

  He read the article slowly, puzzling out the statistics and terminology. Stiener and his associates had used synthetic DNA to treat artificially induced tumors in white rats. The results were equivocal.

  Equivocal could mean anything, and this was over a year ago. Had Stiener published since? He hurried over to the Index Medicus, pulling out the months of the year and leafing through the author index swiftly. It was almost five o'clock.

  There was nothing in the beginning of the year, but in the last month an article by the same team of investigators had appeared. He copied the reference and was sorting through the current journals when the librarian, a bright-eyed, tiny woman past sixty, put her hand on his arm. "You won't have time. We're closing up now. I'm sorry."

  He stared at her in a frustrated fury that left him bewildered and a little frightened. If he had spoken then, he would have screamed or wept.

  "Was it very important?" she asked as he turned away.

  He nodded and she tucked her pencil behind her ear. "Well, let's find the journal and maybe we have a duplicate you can borrow. Here." She took the reference from his nerveless fingers and held it out at arm's length. "August. I believe I do have one extra, or even two, here." She bustled to the back room and he followed reluctantly, looking back at the pile.

  With a little triumphant smile she produced an extra copy. "There, I was sure we had one. So many people donate these current journals. No, don't bother signing for it. Just slip it in an envelope and mail it back when you're finished."

  As a matter of discipline he refused to read it or even open it till he had reached his apartment and taken his jacket and tie off. Then he poured a glass of beer and sat down at the table in the alcove off the kitchenette, opening the magazine slowly.

  He didn't know what he expected to find, but the article was hardly different from the earlier one. The series of rats was larger, the results "promised significant regression, but further experimentation was indicated...."

  He pushed the journal aside, a sour taste in his mouth, and he sat there for a long time. A handful of rats, and what connection could it possibly have?

  He fell asleep after midnight, after two quarts of beer and no food, and his sleep was heavy and dreamless. Then, at three thirty by the radiant dial of the alarm he came awake, alone and terrified in the darkness.

  There was some stale coffee left on the stove and he lit the burner under it and threw a blanket over his shoulders while it heated. The apartment was cold, even after he shut the two front windows; there'd be no heat for another couple of hours. He switched on a desk lamp and then, after pouring the coffee, he leaned back in the desk chair and cradled the cup in his hands as he drank, taking some of the heat in through his palms.

  At least two hours till morning, till the hour he could legitimately call morning, two hours alone.

  Sipping the coffee, he stared around the apartment, suddenly aware of how barren and empty it was. The lease had demanded carpeting, and he had put down a grey rug—the walls were white and bare of ornament. A three-quarter box spring doubled by day as a couch. There was a grey-painted office desk and chair and a heavy grey tweed club chair with a reading lamp behind it. An end table held the few books he was reading; he didn't collect books, feeling nothing for the empty shell once he had drained its contents.

  The dining alcove, off the kitchenette wall that housed stove, sink and refrigerator, had a maple table and two chairs. The entire apartment was large, though it was only one room, and the furniture seemed unable to fill it, either in shape or color. There was a monotony of grey and white that he had never noticed before, an emptiness. Why had he never hung pictures, never bothered to get some sort of throw for the bed, pillows or any touch of color? Even the windows had only white Venetian blinds controlling light and privacy.

  It wasn't because of money. After Carol's adoption, Anita had refused his support checks. He had built up a sizable bank balance with no real motivation. What was there to spend it on? Travel? Possessions? They seemed meaningless. Even clothes, he had bought no more than he needed, as he needed them.

  Now he could make a will, leave it to his daughter and secure her education. But there was no satisfaction in the thought. The child was a stranger.

  On a sudden compulsion he picked up the phone and fumbled through the book for Anita's number. Now what was the code for Westchester? He dialed awkwardly, his heart beginning to hammer, and he listened to the ringing at the other end till a sleep-blurred man's voice answered, "Yes?" Annoyance and anxiety struggling with each other.

  He wet his lips. "Is Anita there? Can I speak to her? This is Jack Freeman."

  There was a long pause. "At this hour?"

  "I'm
sorry..."

  "Just a minute." A hand over the mouthpiece and a muffled colloquy, then startled and breathless, Anita, and five years might never have existed.

  "Jack? What's wrong? Why on earth are you calling now, at this hour?"

  "I'm sorry, Anita. I ... I wanted to talk to you."

  "At four in the morning?"

  "I know, only..."

  "Is something wrong?"

  "No, just..."

  "Well, good Lord, Jack, why wake us up?" An almost visible moment of struggle and she had control. "Are you sober, Jack?"

  "Yes. Yes, of course. I just wanted..." His voice trailed off. / wanted to hear your voice, to hear a human talk. I am going to die, Anita, and I wanted to talk to someone I once loved. "I'm sorry."

  "You keep saying that, Jack. I think maybe you've had too much to drink." Such calm, such control. "Won't you call back in the morning." A light laugh. "The real morning. If there's any trouble..."

  "No, no trouble."

  "Then good night, Jack." And a final decisive click. Goodbye, you are out of my life. Stay out. Especially at 4 a.m. And he had never even asked about the child!

  He pulled the blanket over his shoulders and bent forward, his head on his arms across the desk. If he could cry, if he could only cry!

  He must have fallen asleep like that, because the sun was streaming in through the blinds when he lifted his head, but he had no memory of time passing. He showered and shaved and then picked up the medical journal again, rereading the article. Was it just his lack of familiarity with the field, or was there a general vagueness? Results appear to indicate ... seem to be statistically significant ... while the data are not conclusive ... perhaps ... maybe ... equivocal. Damn the weasel wording of scientific writing. What had they actually found out? How far ahead of this published paper were their real results? Or behind?

  He leafed back to the beginning of the article. Stiener was the senior investigator and the work came from McGill University in Montreal. There was one sure way to find out. He had nothing to do today, or tomorrow or the next day. He was damned if he would go back to the office, to that grey, blind maze, even if there was any job left after yesterday's performance.

  In spite of himself he smiled at the memory, the startled faces around the immaculate table. No, he wasn't going back, and a quick flight to Montreal was as easy as calling the nearest airline.

  He put in a call to McGill University for Dr. Stiener and after considerable routing and searching located him at the Stanton Foundation Laboratories. The doctor's voice, distorted by an awkward connection, crackled and sparkled, but carried an enthusiastic friendliness.

  Lying smoothly, Jack adopted a proven formula for opening medical doors. "I'm with the Bates and Mills Agency ...," a truth so far. "We publish a number of medical newspapers, publications slanted for the physician and distributed only to physicians. I'm going to be in Montreal this afternoon, and I'd like to speak to you about your cancer research, for a possible cover story in our Clinical Notes."

  The irresistible bait of publicity was cautiously nibbled. "I'm sure I can arrange the time." Then academic caution. "I'm flattered at your interest, but I don't think I'm familiar with the publication."

  He was on firm ground there. He had helped launch Clinical Notes, an eight-page feature paper subsidized by one of the big drug houses, and he had supervised the early issues. "We're geared to the average physician, no particular specialty. We cover basic research on all frontiers. We like to be sure of our facts to protect us as well as the investigator. We clear all our copy with the man we write about. That means you'll see the story to approve it before we print it. I'll bring a copy of the paper along."

  That apparently did it, and an appointment was set for three thirty. Jack put the phone down and stared at it for a long moment, then picked it up again and dialed Eastern Airlines. "When is your next available flight to Montreal?"

  Chapter Two

  From his hotel room in Montreal it was a comfortable walk to the University. He found the dean's office at two thirty and was directed to the Stanton Foundation Laboratories. He walked there slowly, almost reluctantly now that he was so close —to what? What did he hope to gain from Stiener? Turel had said that there was nothing, no hope, and the literature had confirmed it. Stiener's work was still in the animal stage. Still experimental. How thin a straw to grasp.

  A gust of wind caught a pile of leaves at the side of the walk and blew them in front of him and around him in a sudden whirlpool. The same wind sent the odor of burning leaves across the campus. He stopped, caught by the full fragrance of the odor, and stared around at the stuccoed building, tile-roofed and ungainly but made graceful by wide sweeps of lawn and tall sycamores. Below him, the hillside in terraced streets sank down to the city and the blue autumn haze in the distance. It was all so bright and clear and clean. Was it just this city or was he seeing everything with a sudden clarity? He swallowed uncomfortably and took out the scribbled directions he had gotten from the dean's office.

  The Stanton Foundation Laboratory, in spite of its grand name, was located in the rear half of a basement, ill-lit and terribly overcrowded. Dr. Stiener's office was large enough for a small desk and two chairs and not much more. Stiener himself was something of a surprise. Jack didn't know what he had expected, certainly someone well up in years, perhaps the comfort of academic stuffiness. Stiener, in fact, was in his early thirties with a baby face that made him look years younger. Dress him in jeans and a sweatshirt, Jack thought wonderingly, and he'll pass for a teenager. And this is the man I've been counting on. He felt deflated and overwhelmingly tired.

  He sat down and took out the pad and pencil he had brought along to further his story of being a medical journalist. In any case, he thought bitterly, I can always go through with it, write an actual story and peddle it to one of the magazines.

  "Well?" Stiener grinned, and Jack groaned inwardly. He could pass for a teenager without the jeans and sweatshirt. How old was the man?

  As if reading his thoughts, Stiener said, "I'm thirty-five, M.D., Ph.D., professor of virology. I graduated from Flower, took my postgraduate work at Columbia and came up here four years ago at the dean's beguiling invitation. Married, five children and devoted to skiing and horse racing. How does that do for vital statistics?"

  Jack, staring at his blank pad, smiled wanly. "You're way ahead of me. I see you've been interviewed before."

  "In depth, for Canadian M.D. and a few papers back in the States. Time even sent a man up, but they never used the story. Steve didn't like him and sent him packing." He leaned back and propped one foot up on the desk edge. "Actually you picked a good time to hit us. We're really on the edge of a breakthrough."

  Jack wet his lips. "Everyone is on the edge of a breakthrough." He had to fight back an unreasoning annoyance with the man.

  Stiener laughed. "I'll bet, and in every field. But virology, well, maybe because it's my own baby."

  Carefully Jack asked, "Virology? I thought your field was cancer research."

  Stiener chuckled, "Did you hear of the white mouse whose mother didn't want him to be an astronaut?"

  Staring at him, Jack shook his head. "No."

  "He told her, 'Would you rather I went in for cancer research?' " He looked at Jack expectantly. "Well, you can't win them all. I'll tell you about the work here. I suppose you want it in a nutshell, four years of research in one sentence? No?" He swept aside Jack's bewildered protests. "All you newspaper men are the same; I suppose you must be." But there was a good-natured edge to his words.

  "I'm really not a newspaper man. Our agency has done reporting on basic science, and I've handled the stories, but I'm an advertising man underneath, a journalist only when necessary."

  Stiener nodded. "What drug company backs your publication?"

  "Clinical Notes is our own property. We sell advertising to a number of clients. There's no one client."

  "I see." He picked up a plastic pen and balanc
ed it on the ball of his forefinger. "Well, our work has been in virology. You know the tie-in between cancer and viruses?"

  "Somewhat. They're associated with each other."

  "More than that. We feel, like many others, that viral activity is responsible for cancer, not an associated organism, but directly responsible. This virus is not unique in people who have cancer. We believe that many people carry the virus, but in most of them the virus is harmless. In a few people, for reasons we've never fully understood, the viruses become killers. That's it in a nutshell, and it's not a hell of an original idea. That's why I don't see that it would make any kind of a story."

  At Jack's protest, he held up his hand. "All right, wait a minute. I'll go along with it. Here, I've even got a good newspaper phrase for you. 'Hereditary Hitchhikers'—how is that for a title?"

  "Maybe you should write the article?"

  Stiener gave a mock shudder. "I dread writing even notes for the milkman, let alone articles. Dr. Stephanie Douthright does that. She'd rather write than research."

  "What about these hitchhikers?"

  "Well, where can I start? Do you know what a virus is?"

  "A life form smaller than a bacterium?"

  "That's well put. The bacteria have hereditary material inside them, arranged in chromosomes. All cells have this material, chromosomes. Take a chromosome out of a bacterium, or out of a cell and you have a virus—more or less. Hereditary material on the loose.

  "As the simplest form of life, we could call a virus a naked gene, if you like that term—actually a strip of naked genes that produce enzymes which can destroy cellular material. They can dissolve the cell and build their own structure out of the fragments—the most basic kind of pirate maneuver.

  "Viruses attack their hosts in a specific way. They enter the nucleus, the core of the cell, the hereditary material of the cell, and they disorganize it, shake it up into its basic components and rearrange it to suit themselves. One virus enters a cell, and a hundred emerge from the empty husk. The cell is exploded, dead."