“Oh,” said Joe, disgusted, “what difference does it make?”
The three of them left.
“He’s getting hard to handle,” Charley said.
“Wouldn’t you know,” said Joe. “There is only one of him and he has to be a moron. Or damn close to one.”
“There is no sign of any other?”
Joe shook his head. “Not the last time I talked with Washington. Yesterday, that was. They’re doing all they can, of course, but how do you go about it? A statistical approach is the only way. Try to spot an area where there is no disease and once you find it, if you ever find it, try to spot the one who’s responsible for it.”
“Another one like Ernie.”
“Yes, another one like Ernie. You know what? I don’t think there is another one like him. He’s a freak.”
“There might be another freak.”
“The odds, I’d think, would be very much against it. And even if there were, what are the chances they’ll find him? It was just dumb, blind luck that Ernie was located.”
“We’re going at this wrong.”
“Of course we’re going at it wrong. The right way, the scientific way is to find out what makes him the way he is. They tried that, remember? For damn near a year they tried. All sorts of tests and him bitching every minute. Wanting to go back to Susie and Joseph, the Baboon.”
“They might have quit just at the time when they might have found …”
Joe shook his head. “I don’t think so, Charley. I talked with Rosenmeir. He said it was hopeless. A thing has to get real bad for a man like Rosy to admit that it is hopeless. It took a lot of soul searching to decide to do what we are doing. He couldn’t be kept in Washington for further study when there was so little chance of learning anything. They had him. The next logical step was to make some use of him.”
“But the country is so big. There are so many cities. So many ghettos. So many pestholes. So much misery. We walk him down a few miles of street each day. We parade him past hospitals and old folks’ homes and …”
“And don’t forget. For every step he takes there may be a dozen people who are made well, another dozen people who won’t contract the ailments they would have gotten if it hadn’t been for him.”
“I don’t see how he can help but realize that. We’ve told him often enough. He should be glad of it, of a chance to help.”
Joe said, “I told you. The man’s a moron. A little selfish moron.”
“You have to see it his way, too, I suppose,” said Charley. “We jerked him away from home.”
“He never had a home. Sleeping in alleys and flophouses. Panhandling. Doing a little stealing when he had the chance. Shacking up with his Susie when he had a chance. Getting a free meal now and then from some soup kitchen. Raiding garbage cans.”
“Maybe he liked it that way.”
“Maybe he did. No responsibility. Living day to day, like an animal. But now he has a responsibility—perhaps as great a responsibility, as great an opportunity as any man ever did. There is such a thing as accepting a responsibility.”
“In your world, perhaps. In mine. Maybe not in his.”
“Damned if I know,” said Joe. “He has me beat. He’s a complete phony. This talk of his about a home is all phony, too. He was only there for four or five years.”
“Maybe if we let him stay in one place and brought people to him, on one pretext or another. Let him sit in a chair, without being noticeable, and parade them past him. Or take him to big meetings and conventions. Let him live it up a little. He might like it better.”
“This was all hashed out,” said Joe. “We can’t be noticed; we can’t stand publicity. Christ, can you imagine what might happen if this became public knowledge? He brags about it, of course. He probably was telling them all about it in that dive he stopped off at this afternoon. They paid no attention to him. The lawyer thought that he was crazy. He could stand on a rooftop and yell it to all the world and no one would pay attention. But let one hint come out of Washington …”
“I know,” said Charley. “I know.”
“It’s being done,” said Joe, “the only way it can be done. We’re exposing people to good health, just the way they are exposed to disease. And we’re doing it where the need of it is greatest.”
“I have a funny feeling, Joe.”
“What’s that?”
“We may be doing wrong. It sometimes doesn’t seem quite right to me.”
“You mean going blind. Doing something and not knowing what we are doing. Without understanding it.”
“I guess that’s it. I don’t know. I am all confused. I guess we’re helping people.”
“Ourselves included. The exposure we are getting to this guy, we should live forever.”
“Yes, there’s that,” said Charley.
They sat silent for a moment. Finally Charley asked, “You got any idea, Joe, when they’ll end this tour? It’s been going for a month. That’s the longest so far. The kids won’t know me when I get home if it isn’t soon.”
“I know,” said Joe. “It’s tough on a family man like you. Me, it doesn’t matter. And I guess it’s the same with Al. How’s it with Jack? I don’t know him well. He’s a man who never talks. Not about himself.”
“I guess he’s got a family somewhere. I don’t know anything about it, just that he has. Look, Joe, would you go for a drink? I have a bottle in my bag. I could go and get it.”
“A drink,” said Joe, “is not a bad idea.”
The telephone rang and Charley, who had started for the door, stopped and turned around.
“It might be for me,” he said. “I called home a while ago. Myrt wasn’t there. I asked little Charley to have her call. I gave both room numbers, just in case I was here.”
Joe picked up the phone and spoke into it. He shook his head at Charley. “It’s not Myrt. It’s Rosy.”
Charley started for the door.
Joe said, “Just a minute, Charley.”
He went on listening.
“Rosy,” he finally said, “you are sure of this?”
He listened some more. Then he said, “Thanks, Rosy. Thanks an awful lot. You stuck out your neck calling us.”
He hung up the phone and sat, staring at the wall.
“What’s the matter, Joe? What did Rosy want?”
“He called to warn us. There is a mistake. I don’t know how or why. A mistake is all.”
“What did we do wrong?”
“Not us. It’s Washington.”
“You mean about Ernie. His civil rights or something.”
“Not his civil rights. Charley, he isn’t curing people. He is killing them. He’s a carrier.”
“We know he is a carrier. Other people carry a disease, but he carries—”
“He carries a disease, too. They don’t know what it is.”
“But back there in his old neighborhood, he made all the people well. Everywhere he went. That is how they found him. They knew there must be someone or something. They hunted till they—”
“Charley, shut up. Let me tell you. Back in his old neighborhood they’re dying like flies. They started a couple of days ago and they still are dying. Healthy people dying. Nothing wrong with them, but they’re dying just the same. A whole neighborhood is dying.”
“Christ, it can’t be, Joe. There must be some mistake …”
“No mistake. It’s the very people he made well who are dying now.”
“But it doesn’t make sense.”
“Rosy thinks maybe it’s a new kind of virus. It kills all the rest of them, all the viruses and bacteria that make people sick. No competition, see? It kills off the competition, so it has each body to itself. Then it settles down to grow and the body is all right, because it doesn’t intentionally harm the body, but there comes a time …”