The Judas Virus

by Don Donaldson

  They positioned this gurney so there’d be room for the other one, then returned to get it. While they did that, Chris went to the first body for a closer look.

  His hair was relatively long, but even so, Chris could see patches of scalp. She pinched a small number of hairs between her gloved fingers and pulled. They came out with less effort then it would take to pick an onion. She shifted position so she could get a better look at the man’s face, a self-imposed penance to fix in her mind the life that had been cut off through the chain of events she had started.

  A phone call to Michael . . .

  A conversation that lasted less than ten minutes the day her father reappeared.

  Such a small event. And as a result, five people were dead.

  Five.

  Three was horrible, but five was . . .

  Her mind suddenly rebelled against adding this one and the Druid Hills body to her tab. Because if she accepted these, she’d be acknowledging that there might be more.

  No.

  There mustn’t be more. These can’t belong to us.

  She reached down and took hold of the cadaver’s right arm, intending to fold it across the chest so she could see the hands better. But the body was in rigor and resisted, as though even in death the victim was holding a grudge.

  Unable to move the arm, she bent closer.

  And found hope.

  As Monroe and Michael emerged from the cold room with the second body, she crossed to the other side of the gurney bearing the male victim and examined his other hand.

  It was the same.

  The second gurney came to a stop, and Chris moved quickly toward it. Looking at the first victim’s face had been a mistake, so she made a point of not doing that this time. She also ignored this one’s hair and looked instead for the hands, but they had somehow become lodged under the cadaver’s thighs.

  “May I have some help here?” Chris said. “I want to see her hands, but they’re under her.”

  “And shouldn’t be,” Monroe said, irritation obvious in his voice.

  He looked at the two men. “You take her right shoulder,” he said to Ash. “And Dr. Boyer, her leg. When I say ‘lift,’ roll her up, and I’ll move her arm.”

  This body, being fresher than the other, was not yet in rigor, so the maneuver Monroe had outlined was easily accomplished. He folded the freed arm across the blue towel over the victim’s breasts, and the three men moved to the other side, where they repeated the procedure.

  In less than a minute, Chris had completed her examination, finding that, like the Dahlonega victim, this one’s lunulas were normal in color, not gray like those of the others who’d been infected.

  “That’s all I wanted.”

  “Should we put them back in the cold room?” Michael asked.

  “We’ve done enough,” Monroe said. “I’m going to have a tech prepare him anyway, so he’ll be going to an autopsy suite. If you all can find your own way out, I’m going to stay down here for a few minutes. Guess you’ll be wanting samples from these cases, too.”

  “Definitely,” Michael said.

  “I’d ask if I’ll be getting any more, but since you weren’t expecting these, there doesn’t seem much point.”

  “Please call me right away if there are more,” Michael said.

  Then they all left Monroe to his work

  “Took us longer to get dressed than it did to look at the bodies,” Ash muttered as they stripped off their disposables and dropped them in a big cardboard box in the little room between the hall and where they’d been.

  “What were you looking for?” Michael asked Chris.

  “Something . . . anything that would show us those deaths weren’t caused by our virus. And I did—”

  “C’mon, Chris,” Ash said. “The hair loss, sudden blindness . . . What are the chances it was something else? Let’s keep this in the real world.”

  Only a few minutes had passed since Chris had seen the new victims’ fingernails and been encouraged. But now, separated from those observations by even such a small interval, Ash’s remark made the normal color of their lunulas seem insignificant, so that the evidence pinning the new deaths on the transplant virus washed over her little sandcastle of hope.

  “You’re right,” she said. “It has to be the transplant virus. I just didn’t want it to be. But that means we’ve got to figure out how these people were exposed and whether they passed it to anyone.”

  “This is turning into a nightmare,” Michael groaned. “What do we do now?”

  Chris took a moment to think, then said, “Wayne’s transplant took place two weeks ago yesterday. He passed the virus to the two nurses the next night and after that became noninfectious. Assuming we’re right about the transmissibility window being only a few hours, these new cases must have come into contact with either the nurses or Dom Barroso while they were infectious.”

  “But Cummings went to bed early the night she was sick and wasn’t even aware she had any symptoms,” Michael said. “So didn’t we conclude that she couldn’t have passed it to anyone?”

  “Which leaves the other two.”

  “But according to what Ginny Barroso told us, she never left home the night she had symptoms. And neither did her husband.”

  “Well, there’s something wrong somewhere. We need to talk to relatives and friends of the two new victims and try to figure out where they were the week before last and whether they knew Mary Cummings or the Barrosos.”

  “But they wouldn’t have to know them,” Ash pointed out. “Suppose Dom Barroso just forgot that the night he had his cough, he ran to an E-Z Serve for a loaf of bread. While waiting to pay, he coughed on the bank teller, who was also in line.”

  “I didn’t say this was going to be easy,” Chris said. “But we have to make a start.”

  “And the bank teller could have coughed on someone, and that person could have done the same,” Michael moaned.

  “The next twenty-four to forty-eight hours are critical,” Chris said. “If we get through that period with no more cases, we may be in the clear. But meanwhile, we need to start charting the movements of the new victims. That may teach us something about transmissibility we don’t already know. And we certainly don’t know much. Let’s go upstairs and see what information they’ve got.”

  A few minutes later they all trooped into the main office and gathered at the desk of the secretary who’d been handling all their inquiries. She didn’t have any information yet on either case, but after she called downstairs, and they’d all stood around wasting time, a morgue tech appeared with the available facts. This included the full name, address, and phone number of both victims. There was no next of kin known for the bank teller, but they learned that Dan Gaynor’s wife was named Kelly.

  At Chris’s request, the secretary made copies of this material and handed them to Chris.

  Back in the car, she retrieved her handbag from under the seat, where she’d left it, and got out her cell phone. “I hate to do it this way, but Dahlonega is too far away for a personal visit.”

  She punched Kelly Gaynor’s number into her phone. “Hope she’s home. If she isn’t, I don’t— Hello, Mrs. Gaynor? This is Dr. Chris Collins. I’m an infectious disease physician in Atlanta. I am so sorry about your husband. I was hoping we could talk briefly about what happened . . . I know . . . it’s terrible timing, but there’s a chance your husband’s death may have been caused by an illness we know very little about. And others may be at risk. I understand that shortly before . . . it happened, your husband began losing his hair. You’re not experiencing that, are you?”

  Chris looked at Ash and then at Michael, shaking her head so they could follow what Kelly Gaynor was saying.

  “We think the incubation period for this illness is around twelve days
and that he may have acquired it by coming in contact with one of its earlier victims. Did he know a woman named Mary Beth Cummings?”

  Chris shook her head.

  “What about Virginia Barroso or her husband Dominic?”

  Again, Chris shook her head.

  “Had your husband been in Atlanta at all in the last twelve days?”

  From the shocked look that appeared on Chris’s face, Ash concluded that Kelly Gaynor had just said something important.

  “No, at this time I don’t think we could say that for sure,” Chris said. “But it’s a possibility to be considered. Mrs. Gaynor, I don’t want to bother you anymore, so I’m going to leave you alone now. Thanks for talking with me.”

  Chris looked at Ash and then at Michael, who was leaning over the seat, impatient to hear what she’d learned.

  “Twelve days ago Dan Gaynor was in Monteagle Hospital with pneumonia.”

  Chapter 17

  “HE CAME HOME from the hospital the day before he died,” Chris said.

  “So that’s where he got it,” Ash replied.

  “But how? We checked all the staff, and none of them got it. How could one patient become infected, but no one else?”

  “I’ll bet there was at least one more,” Ash said.

  “Of course . . . the other new case,” Chris said. “Michael, what’s the Monteagle main number?”

  Michael gave it to her, and she punched it into her phone.

  “Medical Records, please. This is Dr. Collins. Could you tell me if we’ve recently had a patient named Lucy Cowles, anytime in the last two weeks? I’ll wait.”

  “I’ll bet she was there,” Ash said.

  They all waited in silence for the verdict.

  Finally, it came. Chris repeated it for them.

  “She was there from April thirteenth to the twenty-first for evaluation and treatment of kidney stones and a kidney infection.” Then, to the clerk on the phone, “I’m away from the hospital just now but should be there in thirty minutes. When I arrive, I’d like to review all the records of that patient and those of Dan Gaynor from Dahlonega. He was an inpatient about the same time. If you’d have that material ready, I’d appreciate it.”

  “I JUST DON’T get it,” Chris said, closing the hospital files on Lucy Cowles. She and Michael were in his office next door to Monteagle in the Medical Arts Building. Ash had returned to the virology lab. “Her entire stay she was on the med-surg floor. Gaynor spent only his two last days there. For most of his confinement, he was in the ICU and the step-down ICU. If we’re right about the incubation period, they were on different floors from each other when they were infected and never on the same floor as the transplant iso ward. How did they come into contact with the virus?”

  “And why was it so selective?” Michael said. “The ICU and the step-down are open wards. Why didn’t it get any of the other patients in there with Gaynor?”

  “We can’t say yet that it didn’t. Who knows what we’ll see tomorrow? Someone needs to call every patient who was in any of those wards when Gaynor and Cowles were there and tell them they’re at risk. If they start losing their hair, they should come to the hospital immediately.”

  “We can’t set that in motion without clearing it with Norm Stewart.” He was referring to the hospital’s medical director.

  “Let’s find him then.”

  Michael picked up the phone and called Stewart’s office. “This is Dr. Boyer. Is Dr. Stewart available? It’s very important . . . Would you please page him then?” Michael gave his direct number and hung up. “He’s out of the office, but somewhere in the building.”

  “Every minute that passes without those calls being made could mean someone else dies,” Chris said.

  “I did what I could.”

  “I wasn’t criticizing you. I’m just feeling powerless.”

  They lapsed into a waiting silence where each second moved slower than continental drift. Two minutes slid into three, then four.

  “If he doesn’t call in the next two minutes,” Chris said. “I’m—”

  Her threat was interrupted by the phone.

  Michael snatched up the receiver. “This is Dr. Boyer . . . Norman, thanks for getting back to me. There’s something urgent Chris Collins and I need to speak with you about . . . Great . . . We’ll be right there.” He hung up and said, “We’re to meet him in his office.”

  The Monteagle administrative offices occupied most of the hospital’s top floor, where the terrazzo underfoot in the rest of the building was replaced with a rose Berber carpet. It was the first time Chris had ever been there, and she marveled at how far away the microbe wars on the floors below seemed.

  Across from the elevator, a large framed color photograph of the hospital hung over a French console bearing a fresh flower arrangement. To the left of the table, the names and office numbers of the administrators were listed on gold strips in a dark cherry frame. Chris noted that all the strips were removable, but the CEO’s name was etched on a gold plate at the top that looked like a permanent part of the directory.

  “He’s down here,” Michael said, striking out to the right.

  Stewart was a big enough fish to rate a secretary of his own. He’d chosen an elegant-looking young black woman for the job.

  “I’m Dr. Boyer. Dr. Stewart is expecting us.”

  “Go right in.”

  They found Stewart standing in front of a framed orange football jersey. There was an orange flag in the corner, and on the wall beside it, an orange University of Tennessee national championship pennant. Orange caps sat on the bookshelves, and orange pillows leaned against the walls. The carpet bore a huge orange UT logo. Stewart straightened the framed jersey and turned to face his visitors.

  “So,” he said. “The pig transplant program is in trouble.”

  Because a man of his age should have had at least a little gray in his dark hair, Chris thought he was probably coloring it, which, considering how badly he’d let his weight slip, seemed like trying to hide the county dump with a daffodil.

  Thinking that he was likely referring only to the three original deaths, Michael said, “More than you know.” He quickly explained the situation and told Stewart what they wanted.

  “Michael, do you have any idea what will happen to the reputation of this hospital if we do that?”

  “It’ll be worse if we don’t and more people die,” Chris said.

  “I can’t assume this responsibility myself. We need to take it to Scott.” He reached for the phone, entered four numbers, and conveyed the urgency of the matter clearly enough to Scott’s secretary that he was put through immediately. A few seconds later, they were all hustling along the rose Berber carpet to Scott’s office.

  It was now a few minutes after five o’clock, and they met Scott’s secretary, an older woman with her handbag over her shoulder, an umbrella in one hand, and a silver striped bag from one of Atlanta’s better clothing stores in the other, leaving for the day.

  “He’s waiting for you,” she said. “Just knock first.”

  Scott’s outer office was decorated in a southwestern theme: sand-colored walls, Indian carpets, big colorful paintings of cavalry columns and Indians in full regalia. They went to his closed office door, where Stewart tapped a few times to be polite and went in.

  The inner office was more of the same, but with a sizable collection of bronze horses—with and without riders—added to the mix. Scott was sitting in a big tan leather chair beside his desk, reading a stapled document on legal-sized paper. He flipped the pages back to the beginning, put the document on the rough-hewn trestle table beside him, and stood.

  “Well, this is quite a group. I have to tell you all that I’m damned upset over the deaths of those three people. I’m trying to keep this as quiet as possible, but it’
s a pot ready to blow.”

  “I’m afraid it’s even worse than we thought,” Stewart said. He looked at Michael.

  “There have been two more deaths,” Michael said. “Almost certainly caused by the transplant virus. And both victims were patients here around the time the two nurses became infected.”

  Scott’s face, already looking as though he’d received a mild sunburn, grew as crimson as the beaded band decorating the Indian headdress on a bronze bust behind him. Jaw set, he raised his hand and wiggled his fingers for more details.

  Michael laid it out for him.

  “Explain how this can be,” Scott said, when Michael finished. “These new cases weren’t anywhere near the isolation ward, and I can tell you the ventilation system couldn’t have been at fault. I went over the specs for them myself with the architect before it was installed.”

  “Maybe it was the phlebotomist who drew Wayne’s blood the night he was infectious,” Chris said. “I suppose that person could have become a carrier and passed it to the two new victims if he or she also drew their blood that night.”

  “But no one on the staff other than the nurses who died tested positive for virus,” Scott said.

  “Maybe it was carried on a blood kit.”

  “Is that reasonable?” Scott said, implying by his tone that he didn’t think so.

  “With this organism, who can say? It’s been a strange one from the start.”

  Scott shook his head. “I don’t believe the new victims were infected in the hospital. There must be some other explanation.”

  “What might that be?” Michael asked.

  “I don’t think the virus had anything to do with the transplant.” He looked at Chris. “Your father probably picked it up somewhere before he came here. Same with the others.”

  “It’s a pig virus,” Michael reminded him.

  “Coincidence.”

  “I’m afraid it isn’t,” Chris said. “When Ash tested the blood taken from my father before the transplant was made, there was no virus in it, so he didn’t arrive already infected.”