“How many of these violent seizures will it take before the government admits that something unusual is happening?”
“That’s a speculative question that I can hardly be expected to answer.”
“Then the Department of Health and Human Services has an official ‘no comment’?”
“I have not been appointed spokesperson for the department.”
“My call was put through to you.”
“I happened to be in my office when your call came in. My field is personnel administration.”
“All right, no official quotes. Do you have any private theories?
“I can think of one possibility. Mass hysteria.”
“You’re not serious.”
“Of course I’m serious. Do you remember a couple of years ago when we had the big AIDS panic?”
“As I recall, quite a few of those people who thought they had AIDS really did,” Corey said.
“My point is that a whole lot more people did not. Here we have a few isolated cases of aberrant behavior in scattered sections of the country. You people of the media scramble to report them, and immediately healthy individuals everywhere start feeling the symptoms. It’s called the medical students’ syndrome. Show them an exotic set of symptoms and immediately a good percentage will start suffering them. Mass hypochondria, if you like.”
“Is that for publication?”
“Absolutely not,” The suave tone of the assistant secretary wavered. “You asked me for a private opinion, and that’s it. As far as the Department of Health and Human Services is concerned, the situation has not officially been brought to our attention.”
“Goddamit, that’s what I’m trying to do,” Corey yelled into the phone. “If you’re not going to talk to me, then put on somebody who will.”
“I’ll give you back to the switchboard,” said the assistant secretary. “They’ll connect you with our chief of public relations.”
“Shit!” Corey banged the telephone back into the cradle and sat glaring at it like some loathsome animal.
“How’s it shaping up?” Doc Ingersoll wheeled a wooden swivel chair over next to Corey’s desk and dropped into it. He laid down another sheaf of wire copy, scattering a light coating of cigarette ash as he did so.
“Nobody will admit anything,” Corey said. “The victims who are still alive are in no condition to talk. Relatives and friends are bewildered. Hospital officials aren’t saying anything. The Department of Health and Human Services does not admit that a problem exists.”
“Sounds like you’re on to something.”
“Bet your ass I am.” Corey consulted his notes. “For some reason, people are going suddenly, violently insane. The only link I have so far is geographical. The victims are adults of both sexes, and all races, as near as I can make out.”
“Not quite true,” said Ingersoll. “What do you mean?”
The gaunt reporter leafed through the sheets he had brought with him, pulled out a page of AP copy, and handed it to Corey.
The story had a Long Island dateline. It told of an eight-year-old boy who was being kept in bed, suffering severe headaches. Suddenly and without warning, the child had run screaming into his parents’ bedroom and attacked his mother. By the time the father, with the help of several neighbors, could pull the child off, the woman had been blinded.
The boy was taken to a nearby hospital, where powerful sedatives proved ineffective. He was subsequently placed in restraints “for his own safety.” Doctors could offer no explanation for the attack. The father reported that the family had witnessed a berserk cabdriver plow into a crowd of pedestrians a week earlier, but the incident had not seemed to affect the boy.
Corey looked up at Doc Ingersoll. “Kids, too.”
“So it would appear.”
Corey yanked the plastic dust cover off his typewriter. “Let me know if anything else comes in.”
“Will do.” Ingersoll pushed himself up out of the chair, coughed, and headed back toward the wire-service room.
After a quick check of his notes Corey spun a sheet of copy paper into the machine and began to type. He was working on the third page when he heard a gurgling sound close to his ear. He turned his head and saw the overhanging stomach of Porter Uhlander.
“Didn’t expect to see you here so early, Corey,” the editor said.
“Why not? It’s a working day.”
“You aren’t due in until noon.”
“Doc Ingersoll got hold of me early,” Corey said without breaking the rhythm of his typing.
“Ingersoll?”
Corey nodded. He wished the man would go away and let him work.
“I, uh, was wondering if you’d decided about the Houston job.”
The clatter of the machine stopped. Corey looked up into the jowly face of the editor. “Houston? Are you kidding?”
“I’m not trying to rush you, Corey, but I’ll have to make some staff changes and — ”
“Porter, don’t you know what’s happening?”
“I don’t follow you.”
“The Stransky story. My story. It’s blowing up into something really big, and I’m sitting right on top of it.”
Uhlander looked pained. “Mr. Eichorn specifically said he didn’t want any more play of the Stransky thing.”
Corey grabbed a handful of wire copy and shoved it at the editor. “For Christ’s sake, read this.”
Uhlander took the sheets reluctantly and read for about fifteen seconds. “Well, um, it does look like there may be something here.”
“May be? May be? Porter, this story could make me. Make the Herald. By tomorrow it will be in every sheet in the country. And on TV. But we’ll own it, because we got it first. The rest of the world will come to the Herald to find out what’s going on. How does that grab you?”
“Don’t you think you’re making more of this than it is?”
“If I am, it will be forgotten in a week. But if I’m right, and this thing grows — Porter, I’ve been waiting a long time for this. Don’t try to slow me down.”
The editor returned the pages of wire copy to Corey’s desk. “Before I make any commitments, I want to talk to Mr. Eichorn about it.”
“You do that,” Corey said, resuming his attack on the typewriter. “In the meantime, you might get makeup to leave me a nice hole on page one.”
Porter Uhlander turned and walked heavily toward his office. His stomach rumbled.
Chapter 13
Dena Falkner spent an uneasy weekend. By Friday she was having second thoughts about her promise to Dr. Kitzmiller that she would say nothing about the accidental spraying from the Biotron helicopter and about what happened to Stuart Anderson. Kitzmiller’s forceful personality had blunted the resolve she had built up when she went in to see him, but once out of his aura, her doubts grew.
The night visit of Lloyd Bratz to her house was fresh in her memory. She could not forget the haunted look in his eyes or the appalling story he told of the events in the Biotron infirmary.
Hoping to give her nerves a rest, Dena left the office early Friday and drove north to Shawano Lake where she rented a cabin. There, with no radio and no newspaper, she tried to tune herself into nature and forget for a little while the world’s man-made troubles. Early Saturday morning, and again on Sunday, she had rowed out onto the lake and drifted there, watching the fishermen in the other boats.
Always in the past a mini-vacation like that at the lake had refreshed her. This time it did not work. By Sunday evening her nerves were strung tighter than ever.
Now, Monday morning, she walked into her office at the Biotron plant with a gnawing premonition that bad news awaited her. Things began to go wrong almost immediately.