“Chloramphenicol,” the doctor finished it.
“Yes, that was it.”
“Tests indicate the… disease will respond to any of those drugs. But if the victim has already been exposed—already has the disease in his or her system, the success ratio is drastically reduced.”
“I see,” Ben said, shaking his head. “Suppose we initiated a crash program of inoculation—say, oh, tomorrow morning. How long would it take?”
“Weeks, if we’re lucky and have enough of the drugs. But… this is moving much too fast for any ordinary type of plague. Anyway we’re using streptomycin and chloramphenicol, together, in full therapeutic doses as the antibiotic. It isn’t stopping it if the victim has been exposed.”
“You saying that as if Jesus had suddenly lost the power to heal. What’s the matter with tetracycline?”
“Nothing. It’s a good antibiotic. It’s just that we wanted to really punch this disease out so we used the two I told you we were using. Should have stopped it cold. It didn’t. A hundred reported cases so far. Incredible!”
“In layman’s language, Harrison, please.”
The surgeon general rose from his seat to pace the carpet. He stopped, whirled around, and glared at Ben. “I’ll tell you what it means, Mr. President. It means we’ve got a stem-winding son of a bitch on our hands. If we had the drugs to pop everybody in America, and if we could somehow do it in a month—which is impossible. We’d still lose half the population—if we were lucky! One infected person can infect five hundred, a thousand others. One person on a bus, a plane, can infect 75 percent of the other passengers. They in turn infect everybody they come in contact with. And this is moving faster than anything I have ever seen. Three days from contact to death.”
Ben jumped to his feet. "Three days!"
“Three days, sir. First twelve hours brings a fever and coughing. Next twelve hours brings pneumonia, bloody phlegm spraying everybody close. Then huge sores in the groin and armpits, running with pus. High fever, blackouts. Unconsciousness—death.”
“You should have been a writer, doctor,” Ben told him. “I don’t recall anything quite so graphic.”
“Or deadly,” Harrison said.
Ben buzzed his secretary. “Cancel all appointments for the rest of the day. Tell the people I’m not feeling well. Get Cecil in here.”
“Mr. President? Where is the washroom? I’ve been up all night and my eyes feel like they are full of sand.”
Ben pointed. When the bathroom door had closed, he jerked up the phone and dialed the emergency number in the Tri-States. Somebody manned that constantly since Ben took over as president.
“Yes, sir?” the voice two thousand miles away said.
“This is General Raines. Don’t talk, just listen. Close the borders immediately. Start a rodent eradication program right now! But for God’s sake, be careful and don’t handle any of them. I don’t know how far a flea can jump, but I’m betting it’s two or three feet. I don’t want a panic; just tell Doctor Chase—within the hour—that the Middle Ages is upon us with all the blackness that period brought. You have ample supplies of vaccines in storage. He’ll know what to do. Tell him I’ll call him at 1800 hours, his time. You got all this?”
“On tape, sir.”
Ben hung up just as Doctor Lane walked into the room. Cecil opened the office door just as Lane was sitting down.
“Tell Cecil what you just told me,” Ben said. “I’ve got some calls to make from the outer office.”
The Joint Chiefs were meeting when Ben called. General Rimel was on the phone in seconds. “Yes, sir, Mr. President?”
Ben put it on the line for the men, knowing his voice was on the table speaker. “I want all airline flights canceled immediately. Ground every plane in America except military and emergency medical flights. Inoculate your people and have them cordon off the cities. Nobody gets through. Understood—nobody! I’ll have the state police in each state begin setting up roadblocks. I want the citizens to stay put. You people coordinate with the local police in this. I don’t want one word of this to leak out until your troops are in place. If we all pull together we can save maybe half the population—maybe more if we’re lucky. I want all interstate commerce halted by no later than 1200 hours today. No trucks, no buses, no cars, nothing. If I have to do it, I’ll impose martial law to keep people home.
“Get your people inoculated and have every available medic ready to go assist the private sector by 0600 in the morning.”
Then he told him about the bomb threat.
“Jesus fucking Christ!” General Franklin roared. “What kind of shit are these people trying to pull?”
“I don’t know what they want or what they represent,” Ben told the JCs. “And I don’t have time to worry about it. You people get rolling and stay in contact with this office.”
He hung up and walked back into his office. Cecil looked shaken by the news. Harrison looked up at Ben.
“I got a phone call, Mr. President. Six more cases confirmed in the past hour. So far it’s confined east of the Mississippi River.”
“Don’t count on it remaining so.”
“I’m not, sir.”
Ben told the men what he had ordered done.
“But…” Harrison sputtered. “I thought Congress had to be consulted before something like that was done?”
“I don’t have time to consult Congress and have them jaw about it for two weeks. Those people would blither and blather and waste precious time arguing about ten dozen things before they made up their minds to do anything about it.”
A doctor from the joint military hospital located just outside Richmond walked in.
“I called him,” Harrison said, responding to the unspoken questions in Ben’s eyes.
“Roll up your sleeves,” the doctor said. “This is going to hurt you more than it does me, I assure you.”
“You’re not related to Lamar Chase, are you?” Ben grinned.
PART FOUR
ONE
FROM SMOKE TO FIRE…
“I demand an explanation for this!” Senator Carlise burst into the crowded Oval Office. He was waving a piece of copy from the AP. “This is the most blatant violation of…”
“Sit down and shut up,” Ben told him. “If you’d been in your office this morning you’d have known I’ve called for an emergency session of Congress this evening to deal with this crisis.”
“What crisis?” the senator from Colorado yelled.
“You’ll know this evening,” Cecil said, trying to calm the man. He knew, as well as Ben, that as soon as the plague news touched the men and women of Congress it would hit the streets fast.
But for now, all they were trying to do was buy a little time. Time. Time to get the troops in place. Time to set up roadblocks. Time to airship the medicine all over the nation. Time to let the drug companies roll 24 hours a day, mass-producing the life-saving drugs.
But they all knew they were quickly running out of time.
More cases of the plague were cropping up. The press was screaming for information. Worse, the press was speculating, and the people were getting jumpy because of it.
The airlines were shrieking to the heavens about the money they were losing—same with the bus companies. A few wildcat truck drivers decided to ignore the presidential order and roll their rigs anyway.
After two had been killed while attempting to roll through a Marine roadblock and the rest of them tossed in jail, the truckers wisely decided it would be in their best interest not to fuck around with Ben Raines.
Man meant exactly what he said. No give to him at all.
Ben looked at Cecil. “Handle it for a few minutes, Cec. I’ve got to make a call.”
Cecil nodded. He knew who Ben was calling.
“How’s it looking, Lamar?” Ben asked over the long lines.
“We’re clean, Ben,” Doctor Chase said. “I’m shooting everyone with enough chloramphenicol and streptomycin to cause ears to
ring. A few cases of deafness, but I think it’s temporary—reaction to the drug. Have you been popped?”
“In both arms and the butt.” He told his friend what he was doing to combat the situation.
“It’ll save some, Ben. But I spoke with our man at the CDC and this stuff scares me.”
“Is there a vaccine for this, Lamar?”
“Yes, for the plague. Have to use it broadside, but it’s a puny weapon against this stuff. I would recommend staying with what we’re using. This isn’t ordinary plague, Ben. It’s moving much too fast for that. I believe it’s a… well, to keep it in language you’d understand, a wild mutant; probably undergone a forced genetic alteration from the bombings—taken this long to manifest. It’s incredibly fast. I think it gets into the body before our natural immune factors even know the body’s been penetrated. And it’s going to get much, much worse before it gets better. If it gets better.”
“I was afraid of that.”
“I’m leveling with you, Ben. No point in pulling any punches.”
“Jim Slater and Paul Green out there?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. You remember all that chlordane we had in storage?”
“Very well.”
“Have them gather up as many ag-pilots as they can and start spraying our borders and lay it on thick—use it all if you have to. Spray a strip a half-mile wide, all around the Tri-States. That will take care of any flea problem that might crop up.”
“As well as anything else that blunders into that area.”
“Can’t be helped, Lamar. You know as well as I our people will pull together and obey orders. I can’t speak for the rest of America.”
“I can,” the old doctor was firm. “Blind panic when the news breaks. You won’t have nearly enough troops to stem the tide of frightened humanity.
“You know, Ben, this will finish you in the White House? You won’t be given credit for the lives you’ve saved, only blamed for the deaths. You’ll have to declare martial law and you’ll be blamed for that. You’ll have to order troops to fire on civilians, and you’ll be blamed for that.”
“I know, Lamar. I’ve already made up my mind to see this thing through and then step down. I want to come home.”
“Good. I was wrong to push you into taking the job.”
“I don’t know. I wish I’d had more time.”
The doctor grunted in reply. “Jerre and Matt radioed in. They holed up in the high country. Matt got some pills and they’re both dosed as well as can be. I think they’ll make it.”
“I have a hunch I’ll be seeing you soon, Lamar.”
“Good. I’ll look forward to it. Take care.”
In the office, the news was no better.
“It broke, Ben,” Cecil said. “Some alert reporters put it all together and hit the air with it.”
“Goddamn it!” Ben slammed a hand on a desk top.
“And this, too,” Cecil said. “Two reporters, print and broadcast, entered an apartment this morning, here in Richmond. It was booby-trapped with a modified claymore. Blew their heads off.”
“What’s that got to do with me?”
“It was my apartment,” Rosita said.
Ben had not noticed the small woman sitting quietly in a chair.
“You want to explain? I thought you lived with Dawn?”
Rosita rose to face Ben. “I’ll make this as brief as possible, General. I am part of Gray’s Scouts. I was sent to Colonel Ramos’s command when it was learned he was moving to join you. Dan—Captain Gray—suspected a power play here in Richmond. He was right. General Altamont is working with Senator Carson to unseat you. They have quite a following, including some Secret Service men. They are the ones who have the atomic device; sent the note that General Altamont showed you. As to why those men broke into my apartment, I have no idea. Probably looking for a story; anything to hurt you. It’s all moot now, anyway, isn’t it, sir?”
“Yes,” Ben said.
“Goddamn!” Admiral Calland said. “This is 1988 all over again.”
General Rimel stood up. His face was very grim, the skin pulled tight, his anger just under control. “I will personally handle General Altamont.” He picked up a phone and jabbed at the buttons. He spoke briefly, then turned to Ben. “My men will pick him up, along with Senator Carson.” He looked at Rosita. “What about the White House agent?”
“He’s dead,” she replied softly. “And Altamont’s brother. I saw to that personally.”
“Do you know where the atomic device is located, Miss?” Rimel asked.
“No, sir.”
“I’ll find it,” the general said. He stalked from the room.
“Stick around,” Ben told Rosita.
“I intend to do just that, sir.”
Ben smiled at her. “Okay, gang. Let’s get back to the immediate problem.”
* * *
“Plague, Roanna?” Brighton asked, speaking from his offices in Chicago.
“Yes, sir. That’s definitely confirmed. And it’s bad.”
“And Raines knew it and was sitting on it? Keeping it from the public?”
“For the public’s good, Bob. You know that.”
“He’s ordered troops out?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Get on it. Bird-dog him and get the story.”
“Yes, sir.”
* * *
Senator William Carson was fleeing the city just as fast as he dared drive. The news of Representative Altamont’s death had stunned him, then shocked him into action. That crazy woman from Ben Raines’s troops had cold-bloodedly shot down two agents and Altamont. Just killed them without even blinking—so he had heard, and the old man didn’t doubt it for a minute.
No one knew about his little cabin on the James River. His little hideaway where all the plans had been worked out.
But they hadn’t worked out. Bad luck all the way around. And now this damnable plague business.
Carson skirted one roadblock, picked up a secondary blacktop road, then turned down a gravel road, finally pulling up in front of his cabin. In the background, the James rolled on. It was a comforting sound and the old man stood for a moment in the cold air, listening to the rush of water. He went inside and built a small fire in the fireplace and went back into the cold darkening air for his luggage.
Something bit him on the right ankle and he slapped at it, missing whatever it was. Late-blooming red bug, probably, he thought.
He heated a can of soup for his dinner and sat down in an overstuffed chair. Within minutes, he dozed off, his last thoughts before falling asleep was wondering what that slight odor was in the cabin.
Had he looked behind the wood box he would have found out. A dead rat. And now the fleas had found something live to bite in the bulk of Senator William Carson. Of Vermont. Soon to be the late Senator William Carson. The late Senator from Vermont.
* * *
Bert LaPoint and his cameraman sat in the NBC van and looked at the dead city of Memphis. Neither man had any inclination whatsoever to leave the safety of the van. Both men had seen the huge rats scampering over the carcass of a cow, and the ugly bastards had shown no signs of fear at the van’s approach.
They had not had a radio on all day. Knew nothing of the terrible situation about to grip the nation in a hot infected hand.
They knew only that neither of them was about to get out of the van with those big ugly rats swarming all around them.
Tim Lewisson shot his tape from behind closed and locked doors, shooting through the glass. He looked at Bert. “I’m through. Let’s get the hell out of here.”
But the van wouldn’t start.
“Oh, shit!” Bert said. He slapped at his ankles as something began biting his skin. He noticed Bert doing the same. They both had been scratching at their ankles for a couple of hours.
Ever since arriving on the outskirts of Memphis.
“Well, we got food and water with us,” Tim said. “We just wait it ou
t.”
They sure would.
Forever.
* * *
Jane Moore sat in her motel room in the now-deserted motel complex and wondered what her next move should be? Her Indian guide had not shown up that afternoon so she had elected to take a short nap. The nap had stretched into several hours. When she awakened, the motel was deserted.
It was… kind of eerie, she concluded.
She turned on the TV set and froze as the scenes and sounds reached her ears and eyes.
Plague.
Black Death.
And I am up here in Michigan chasing hobgoblins, she thought.
She sat down and listened to the solemn-faced commentator roll his tones off his tongue. When she had heard enough to convince her it all was true, she picked up the phone to call into Richmond.
But the phone was dead.
“Wonderful,” she muttered.
Well, she thought. I’m probably safer up here in the boondocks than I would be in the city, and I can’t get anywhere if there are roadblocks. So I guess I’m stuck.
She went into the cafe, fixed herself some dinner, and took it back to the room. She ate, watched TV for a while, then went to bed.
During the night, the fleas feasted.
* * *
“The White House is secure, sir,” Bob Mitchell informed Ben. “We flushed out two more rogue agents. Your people took them somewhere. I don’t know what they plan to do with them.”
“They’ve already done it,” Ben told him.
Mitchell decided he really didn’t want to know all the details.
He looked at Rosita. She smiled at him. Bob thought it wasn’t a very nice smile. He returned his gaze to the president. The man looked tired. Hell, no earthly reason why he shouldn’t look beat. He’d been going since about five o’clock this morning.
Ben glanced at his watch. Nine o’clock. And it was snowing, the flakes big and fat and wet and sticky. He was tired—weary to the bone. The tossing and turning of the previous night was telling on him. Dawn sat beside Rosita; Ben could not remember when she had arrived. After the crush of people in and out of his office all day and part of the evening, Ben could not adjust to the relative quiet that now prevailed around him.
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