Despite the glass wall separating them the little girl insisted they count out and eat all the yellow ones first. It had actually been a welcome reprieve—though a bit of a surreal one. One minute he was in a hot zone staring at twisted loops and ropes of virus, one of the deadliest viruses on earth, and the next minute he was eating Froot Loops with a five-year-old. He couldn't help thinking of Alice in Wonderland sitting down to tea with the Mad Hatter.
"So it's much worse," Janklow said suddenly without turning or looking at Platt. A good thing. His voice startled Platt back to attention. Strange as it might be, he'd give anything to be back with Mary Louise, playing the Mad Hatter and eating cereal with milk than here explaining any of this to Janklow.
"Yes, sir," he said. He figured Janklow was expecting a summary of Platt's strategy, so he started with the basics. " We still have the Keller-man home contained and under guard."
"Plainclothes guard?"
"Yes, sir. Construction crew with public-utility vehicles. CDC can handle contacting anyone who may have come in contact with the Kellermans. We can start administering the vaccine immediately. I ordered—"
"You haven't already contacted the CDC, have you?" Janklow spun all the way around to look at Platt.
"No, not yet."
The commander nodded and placed his hands behind his back. Platt recognized the gesture as guarded satisfaction. Janklow walked to his desk in the middle of the room, hands still clasped at his lower back, chin tucked down on his chest. Platt knew to wait. Janklow would instruct him to continue when he was ready again.
"Right now these four people you have here in the Slammer are the only ones we know of who have been exposed.Is that correct?"Janklow asked.
"Yes, sir."
"A mother, a child and two government employees, correct?"
"FBI Assistant Director Cunningham and one of his special agents."
"I understand the mother is in the final stages?"
Platt hated to admit it but said, "Yes, it looks that way. Her kidneys have begun to fail. We have her on—"
Janklow held up a hand to stop him. Platt hated the gesture but hesitated as ordered. "She won't make it," Janklow said as matter-of-factly as though they were talking about the stock market."Isn't that correct?"
Platt had spent the night doing everything possible. As a doctor he wasn't ready to admit failure.
"Most likely that's correct," he agreed. "However, I have seen cases—"
The hand went up again. This time Platt had to stifle a frustrated sigh.
Janklow paced from his desk to the window, hands clasped, chin still resting on his chest, perhaps his own version of Rodin's The Thinker. From what Platt knew of Janklow's career, this was bigger than anything he had faced and probably the most pivotal battle he'd ever face. The man didn't look panicked or tortured by the challenge. Instead, Platt thought he looked calm, too calm, like a man calculating whether to buy, sell or hold his investments.
"McCathy tells me that this virus jumps easily from host to host," Janklow said, continuing his leisurely pace without looking at Platt, almost as if he were presenting a lecture on the topic. "That it's been known to destroy entire villages in Africa."
So Platt's suspicions were correct. McCathy and Janklow had spent time chatting about all this. So much for chain of command.
"McCathy says it would take as little as a microscopic piece, preserved, sealed and delivered, perhaps even through the mail, to start an epidemic. Something like this," Janklow said, "could start a mass panic."
Platt didn't disagree and waited for what he expected to be instructions on media containment. He didn't, however, expect what Commander Janklow said next.
"What if they all disappeared?"
At first he wasn't sure he had heard the commander right.
"Excuse me?"
"There's only four now. Two are most likely doomed," Janklow said, stopping now in front of Platt. "You said so yourself that the mother won't make it. The daughter certainly couldn't have spent that many days in the same house and not have the virus."
Platt tried to conceal his surprise. Janklow mistook it for confusion, because he continued,"We make them comfortable, give them supportive care. Let the virus burn itself out."
"What about the vaccine?"
"It's never been proven to be a deterrent let alone a cure. Why risk it not working?"
"How can we afford not to take that risk, sir?"
"You're thinking like a doctor, Colonel Platt. When you must think like a soldier. Must I remind you your mission is to contain and isolate? Yo u let this virus burn itself out so there's no possibility of it lying dormant, hidden by the guise of a vaccine that may or may not work." He avoided looking at Platt when he added, "No one even knows they're here."
"We're talking about the FBI," Platt said, swallowing hard over a lump that seemed to appear inside his throat. He still couldn't believe what Janklow was suggesting. Platt was tired. The adrenaline rush had left his body drained and his mind foggy. Perhaps he misunderstood what the commander was proposing.
"The FBI," Janklow snorted like it made no difference. His chin was back on his chest in his best thinking spot. "FBI—they're government employees, same as us. Sometimes sacrifices have to be made…" He glanced back at Platt. "For the greater good. In war zones…and hot zones."
Then he marched to the window and took up his stance, exactly where and how Platt had found him.
Platt waited, hoping if he was patient enough Janklow would retract what he had just suggested. What he was suggesting was that they let the virus run its course inside Ms. Kellerman and her daughter as well as A.D. Cunningham and Agent O'Dell.
In other words, Commander Janklow was proposing they allow them all to crash and bleed out.
CHAPTER
44
Chicago
Saint Francis Hospital
It had been years since Dr. Claire Antonelli had scrubbed up alongside chief of surgery Dr. Jackson Miles. Ever since she started her own private practice her hospital visits were limited to visiting recovering patients and delivering a baby now and then. She wasn't a surgeon. She recognized her limitations and appreciated her strengths. An exploratory laparotomy was not one of her strengths.
Vera Schroder had not been pleased. Her husband had never had surgery in his life, had never spent a night in the hospital until now.
"Markus takes very good care of himself," she had told Claire, offering it as further reason that all of this had to be some horrible mistake.
"He has an infection somewhere in his body," Claire had tried to calmly explain to Vera while right next to them Markus stared out with red eyes and unblinking but droopy eyelids. In just two days his face had taken on an expressionless mask, the facial muscles drooped as if the tissue was disconnecting. There was little indication that he was listening to them. Claire worried that he had already started slipping away.
To make matters worse, Vera answered all the questions, not waiting for her husband. She touched his hand and swept his thin hair from his forehead, not expecting him to respond to the questions or to her touch. Claire had noticed early on that even when Markus had been alert and lucid this was the relationship between the two—Vera did the talking, the gesturing, the patting and caressing while Markus simply stood or sat by.
"There may be an inflammation or an abscess," Claire had persisted. "Perhaps even a perforation in the intestine that isn't showing up on our tests."
"You think it's cancer, don't you?" Vera had asked in a whisper.
Claire had never believed in being anything less than straightforward with her patients. She didn't want to alarm Vera Schroder, but she wouldn't sugarcoat it, either. She told her they weren't ruling out anything. They simply needed a better picture of what might be going on inside Markus. Finally Vera had no comeback. She wanted her husband back home. She wanted things back to normal.