look, and his grin was uncertain.
"Matthews is an incompetent," he said. "They could have had you, Doc.
That charter is so sloppy a man can prove anything by it, and building a
hospital here did bring in Earth rules. Wilson went out on a limb in
letting you go. But I guess we got away with it. Let's get out of here."
Doc climbed into the tractor more soberly. They had escaped this time.
But there would be another time, and he was pretty sure that would be
Chris' round. He had no intention of giving up his research.
VII
Plague
Dr. Feldman leaned back from his microscope and lighted another bracky
weed. He glanced about the room and sighed wearily. Maybe he'd been
better off when he had no friends and couldn't risk the safety of others
in an effort to do research that was the highest crime on two worlds.
The evidence of his work was hidden thirty feet beyond his former
laboratory in Jake's village, with a tunnel that led from another
root-cellar. The theory was the old one that the best place to avoid
discovery was where you had already been discovered. If their spies had
identified his former hangout, they'd never expect to have him set up
research nearby. It was a nice theory, but he wasn't sure of it.
Jake looked up from a cot where he'd been watching the improvised
culture incubator. "Stop tearing yourself to bits, Doc. We know the
danger and we're still darned glad to have you here working on this."
"I'm trying to put myself together into a whole man," Doc told him. "But
I seem to come out wholly a fool."
"Yeah, sure. Sometimes it takes a fool to get things done; wise men wait
too long for the right time. How's the bug hunt?"
Doc grunted in disgust and swung back to the microscope. Then he gave up
as his tired eyes refused to focus. "Why don't you people revolt?"
"They tried it twice. But they were just a bunch of pariahs shipped here
to live in peonage. They couldn't do much. The first time Earth cut off
shipments and starved them. Next time the villages had the answer to
that but the cities had to fight for Earth or starve, so they whipped
us. And there's always the threat that Earth could send over unmanned
war rockets loaded with fissionables."
"So it's hopeless?"
"So nothing! The Lobbies are poisoning themselves, like cutting off
Medical service until they cut themselves out of a job. It's just a
matter of time. Go back to the bugs, Doc."
Doc sighed and reached for his notes. "I wish I knew more Martian
history. I've been wondering whether this bug may not have been what
killed off the old Martians. Something had to do it, the way they
disappeared. I wish I knew enough to make an investigation of those
ruins out there."
"Durwood!" Jake had propped himself on an elbow, staring at Doc in
surprise.
Doc scowled. "Clive Durwood, you mean? The archeologist who dug up what
little we know about the ruins?"
"Yeah, before he went back to Earth and started living off his lectures.
He came here again three years ago and dropped dead in Edison on the way
to some other ruins. Heart failure, they called it, though it was more
like the two old farmers who ran themselves to death last month. I saw
him when they buried him. His face looked funny, and I think he had
those little specks, though I may remember wrong." He grimaced. "Mars is
tough, Doc; it has to be. Some of the plant seeds Durwood found in the
ruins grew! Maybe your bugs waited a million years till we came along."
"What about the farmers? Did they meet Durwood?"
Jake nodded. "Must have. He lived in their village most of the time."
Doc went through his notes. He'd asked for reports on all deaths, and he
finally found the account. The two old men had been nervous and fidgety
for weeks. They were twins, living by themselves, and nobody paid much
attention. Then one morning both were seen running wildly in circles.
The village managed to tie them up, but they died of exhaustion shortly
after.
It wasn't a pretty picture. The disease might have an incubation period
of nearly fifteen years, judging by the length of time it had taken to
hit Durwood. It must spread from person to person during an early
contagious stage, leaving widening circles behind Durwood and those
first infected. When matured, any other sickness would set it off, with
few symptoms of its own. But without help, it still killed its victims,
apparently driving them madly toward frenzied physical effort.
He studied the culture on a slide again. He'd tried Koch's method to get
a pure strain, splattering the bugs onto a native starchy root and
plucking off individual colonies. About twenty specimens had been
treated with every chemical he could find. So far he'd found a few
things that seemed to stop their growth, but nothing that killed them,
except stuff far too harsh to use in living tissue.
He had nearly forty cases of deaths that showed symptoms now, and he
went back over them, looking for anything in common that went back ten
to twenty years before death. There were no rashes nor blisters. A few
had had apparent colds, but such were too common to mean anything.
Only one thing appeared, about fourteen years before their deaths. The
people interviewed about the victims might be vague about most things,
but they remembered the time when "Jim had the jumping headache."
"Jake," Doc called, "what's jumping headache? Most people seem to have
it some time or other, but I haven't run across a case of it."
"Sure you have, Doc. Mamie Brander's little girl a few weeks ago. Feels
like your pulse is going to rip your skull off, right here. Can't eat
because chewing drives you crazy. Back of your head, neck and shoulders
swell up for about a week. Then it goes away."
Then it goes away--for fourteen years, until it comes back to kill!
Doc stared at his charts in sudden horror. It was a new disease--thought
to be some virus, but not considered dangerous. Selznik's migraine,
according to medical usage; you treated it with hot pads and anodyne,
and it went away easily enough.
He'd seen hundreds of such cases on Earth. There must be millions who
had been hit by it. The patent-medicine branch of the Lobby had even
brought out something called Nograine to use for self-treatment.
"Something important?" Jake wanted to know.
Feldman nodded. "How much weight do you swing in other villages, Jake?"
"People sort of do me favors when I ask," Jake admitted. "Like swiping
those medical journals from Northport for you, or like Molly Badger
getting that job as maid to spy on Chris Ryan. Name it and I'll do my
best."
Doc had a vague idea of village politics, but he had more important
things to think of. Most of his foul mood had disappeared with the clue
he'd stumbled on, and his chief worry now was to clinch the facts.
Feldman considered the problem. "I want a report on every case of
jumping headache in every village--who had it, when, and how old they
were. This place first, but every village you can reach. And I'll want
someone to take a letter to Chris Ryan."
Jake frowned at that, but went out to issue instructions. Doc sat down
at a battered old typewriter. Writing Chris might do no good, but some
warning had to be gotten through to Earth, where the vast resources of
Medical Lobby could be thrown into the task of finding the cause and
cure of the disease. The connection with Selznik's migraine had to be
reported. If something could blast the Lobby into action, it wouldn't
matter quite so much what they did to him. He wasn't foolish enough to
expect gratitude from them, but he was getting used to the idea that his
days were numbered. The plague was more important than what happened to
him.
The letter had been dispatched by the time Jake returned. "Here's the
dope for this village. Everybody accounted for except you."
"Never had it, Jake." Feldman went down the list. "Most of it fourteen
years ago. That fits. About the only exceptions are the kids who seem to
get it between the ages of two and three. Eighty-seven out of
ninety-one!"
He stared at the figures sickly. Most of the village not only had the
plague but must be near the end of the incubation period. It looked as
if most of the village would be dead before another year passed.
"Bad?" Jake asked.
"The first symptom of Martian fever."
The old man whistled, the lines around his eyes tightening. "Must be
me," he decided. "I'm the guy who must have brought it here, then. I
used to spend a lot of time with Durwood at his diggings!"
There was a constant commotion all that day and the next as runners went
out to the villages and came back with reports. The variation from
village to village was only slight. Most of Mars seemed to have advanced
cases of Martian fever.
Without animals for investigation and study, real research was
difficult. Doc also needed an electron microscope. He was reasonably
sure that the disease must travel through the nerves, but he had found
no proof beyond the hard lump at the base of the neck. There it was a
fair-sized organism. Elsewhere he could find nothing, until the black
specks developed.
His eyes ached from trying to see more than was visible in the
microscope. The tantalizing suggestions of filaments around the nuclei
might be the form of plague that was contagious. They might even be the
true form of the bug, with the bigger cell only a transition stage.
There were a number of diseases that involved complicated changes in the
organisms that caused them. But he couldn't be sure.
He finally buried his head in his hands, trying to do by pure thought
what he couldn't do in any other way. And even there, he lacked
training. He was a doctor, not a xenobiologist. Research training had
been taboo in school, except for a favored few.
The reports continued to come in, confirming the danger. They seemed to
have the worst plague on their hands in all human history; and nobody
who could do anything about it even knew of it.
"Molly reports that your letter got some results," Jake reported. "Chris
Ryan brought home one of the electron microscopes and a bunch of
equipment from the hospital pathology room. Think she'll get anywhere?"
Doc doubted it. Damn it, he hadn't meant for her to try it, though she
might have authority for routine experiments. But it was like her to
refuse to pass on the word without trying to prove her own suspicion of
him first.
He tried to comfort himself with the fact that some men were immune, or
seemed so; about three out of a hundred showed no signs. If that
immunity was hereditary, it might save the race. If not....
Jake came in at twilight with a grim face. "More news from Molly. The
Lobby is starting out to comb every village with a fault-finder,
starting here. And this hole will show up like a sore thumb. Better
start packing. We gotta be out of here in less than an hour!"
VIII
Fool
Three days later, Doc saw his first runner.
The tractor was churning through the sand just before sundown, heading
toward another one-night stand at a new village. Lou was driving, while
Doc and Jake brooded silently in the back, paying no attention to the
colors that were blazoned over the dunes. The cat-and-mouse game was
getting to Doc. There was no real assurance that the village they were
approaching might not be the target the Lobby had chosen for the next
investigation.
Lou braked the tractor to a sudden halt, and pointed.
A figure was running frantically over one of the low dunes with the
little red sun behind him. He seemed headed toward them, but as he drew
nearer they could see that he had no definite direction. He simply ran,
pumping his legs frantically as if all the devils of hell were after
him. His body swayed from side to side in exhaustion, but his arms and
legs pumped on.
"Stop him!" Jake ordered, and Lou swung the tractor. It halted squarely
in the runner's path, and the figure struck against it and toppled.
The legs went on pumping, digging into the dirt and gravel, but the man
was too far gone to rise. Jake and Lou shoved him through the doors into
the tractor and Doc yanked off his aspirator.
The man was giving vent to a kind of ululating cry, weakened now almost
to a whine that rose and fell with the motion of his legs. Sweat had
once streaked his haggard face, but it was dry and blanched to a pasty
gray.
Doc injected enough narcotic to quiet a maddened bull. It had no effect,
except to upset the rhythm of the arms and legs. It took five more
minutes for the man to die.
The specks were larger this time--the size of periods in twelve-point
type. The lump at the base of the skull was as big as a small hen's egg.
"From Edison, like the others so far. Jack Kooley," Jake answered Doc's
question. "Durwood spent a lot of time here on his first expedition, so
it's getting the worst of it."
Doc pulled the aspirator mask back over the man's face and they carried
him out and laid him on a low dune. They couldn't risk returning the
corpse to its people.
This was only the primary circle of infection, direct from Durwood. The
second circle could be ten times as large, as the infection spread from
one to a few to many. So far it was localized. But it wouldn't stay that
way.
Doc climbed slowly out of the tractor, lugging his small supplies of
equipment, while Jake made arrangements for them to spend the night in a
deserted house. But the figure of the runner and his own failures to
find more about the disease kept haunting Doc. He began setting up his
equipment grimly.
"Better get some sleep," Jake suggested. "You're a mite more tired than
you think. Anyhow, I thought you told me you couldn't do any more with
what you've got."
Feldman looked at the supplies he had spread out, and shook his head
wearily. He'd been over every chemical and combination a dozen times,
without results that showed in the limited magnification of the optical
mike.
He snapped the case shut and hit the rude table with the heel of his
hand. "There are other supplies. Jake, do you have any signal to get in
touch with Molly at the Ryan house?"
"Three raps on the rear left window. I'll get Lou."
"No!" Doc came to his feet, reaching for his jacket. "They're looking
for three men now. It's safer if I go alone--and I'm the only one who
knows what supplies are needed. With luck, I may even get the electron
mike. Got a gun I can borrow?"
Jake found one somewhere, an old revolver with a few loads. He began
protesting, but Doc overruled him sharply. Three men could no more fight
off the police than one, if they were spotted. He swung toward the
tractor.
"You'd better start spreading the word on everything we know. If people
realize they're already safe or doomed it'll be better than having them
going crazy to avoid contagion."
"Most of the villages know already," Jake told him. "And damn it, get
back here, Doc. If you can't make it, turn tail quick, and we'll think
of something else."
Southport seemed normal enough as Doc drove through its streets. The
stereo house was open, and the little shops were brightly lighted. He
stopped once to pull a copy of Southport's little newspaper from a
dispenser. All was quiet on its front page, too.
As usual, though, the facts were buried inside. The editorial was
pouring too much oil on the waters in its lauding of the role of
Medical Lobby on Mars for no apparent reason. The death notices no
longer listed the cause of death. Medical knew something was up, at
least, and was worried.
He parked the tractor behind Chris' house and slipped to the proper
window. Everything was seemingly quiet there. At his knock, the shade
was drawn back, and he caught a brief glimpse of Molly looking out. A
moment later she opened the rear lock to let him into the kitchen.
"Shh. She's still up, I think. What can I do, Doc?"
He tried to smile at her. "Hide me until it's safe to get into her
laboratory. I've got to--"
The inner kitchen was kicked open and Chris stood beyond it, holding a
cocked gun in her hand.
"It took longer than I expected, Dan," she said quietly. "But after your
letter, I knew you'd swallow the bait. You bloody fool! Did you really
believe I'd start doing research here just because of your imaginings?"
He slumped slowly back against the sink. "So this is a fool's errand,
then? There never was any equipment here?"
"The equipment's here--in my office. I guessed your spies would report
it, so it had to be here. But it won't help you now, pariah Feldman!"
He came from his braced position against the sink like a spring
uncoiling. He expected her to shoot, but hoped the surprise would ruin
her aim. Then it was too late, and his boot hit the gun savagely,
knocking it from her hand. Life in the villages had hardened him
surprisingly. She was comparatively helpless in his hands. A few minutes
later, he had her bound securely with surgical tape Molly brought him.
She raged furiously in the chair where he'd dumped her, then gave up.
"They'll get you, Daniel Feldman!" Surprisingly, there was no rage in
her voice now. "You won't get away from us. The planet isn't big
enough."
"I got away from your trial," he reminded her. "And I got away and lived
when you left me without a chance on the ground of the spaceport."
She laughed harshly. "_You_ got away then? You fool, who do you think
gave you the extra battery so you could live long enough to be helped at
the spaceport? Who hired a fool like Matthews so you wouldn't get the
death sentence you deserved? Who let you get away as an herb doctor for
months before you set yourself up as God and a traitor to mankind
again?"
It shook him, as it was probably intended to do. How had she known about
the extra battery? He'd always assumed that Ben had returned to give it
to him. But in that case, Chris couldn't know of it. Then he hardened
himself again. In the old days, she'd always had one trump card he
couldn't beat and hadn't expected. But too much was involved for games
now.
"Any police around, Molly?" he asked.
Molly came back a minute later to report that everything looked clear
and to show him where the equipment had been set up in Chris' office. It
was all there, including the electron mike--a beautiful little portable
model. There was even a small incubator with its own heat source into
which he immediately transferred the little bottles he'd been keeping
warm against his skin. Most of the equipment had never been unpacked,
which made loading it onto his tractor ridiculously easy.
"Better come with me now, Molly," he suggested at last. Then he turned
to Chris, who was watching him with almost no expression. "You can
wriggle your chair to the phone in half an hour, I guess. Knock the
phone off and yell for help. It's better than you deserve, unless you
really did leave me that battery."
"You won't get away with it," she told him again, calmly this time.
"No," he admitted. "Probably not. But maybe the human race will, if I
have time to find an answer to the plague you won't see under your nose.
But you won't get away with it, either. In the long run, your kind never
do."
Molly was sniffling as they drove away. It had probably been the best
life she'd known, Doc supposed. Chris could be kind to menials. But now
Molly's work was done, and she'd have to disappear into the villages. He
let her off at the first village and drove on alone. He was itching to
get to the microscope now, hardly able to wait through the long journey
back to Jake. His impatience grew with each mile.
Finally he gave up. He swung the tractor into a small gulley between
sand dunes, left the motor idling and pulled down the shades the
villagers used for blackout traveling. There was power enough for the
mike here, and the cab was big enough for what he had to do.
He mounted the mike on the tractor seat and began laying out the
collection of smears and cultures he had brought. It had been years
since he'd made a film for the electron mike, but he found it all came
back to him as he worked.
His hands were sweating with tension as he inserted the first film into
the chamber. He had the magnetic "lenses" set for twenty thousand power,
but a quick glance showed it was too weak. He raised the power to fifty
thousand.
The filaments were there, clear and distinct.
He turned on the little tape recorder that had been part of Chris'
equipment and set the microphone where he could dictate into it without
stopping to make clumsy notes. He readjusted the focus carefully,
carrying on a running commentary.
Then he gasped. Each of the little filaments carried three tiny darker
sections; each was a cell, complete in itself, with the typical Martian
triple nucleus.
He put a film with a tiny section of the nerve tissue from a corpse into
the chamber next, and again a quick glance at the screen was enough. The
filaments were there, thickly crowded among nerve cells. They _did_
travel along the nerves to reach the base of the brain before the larger
lump could form.
A specimen from one of the black specks was even more interesting. The
filaments were there, but some were changed or changing into tiny, round
cells, also with the triple dark spots of nuclei. Those must be the
final form that was released to infect others. Probably at first these
multiplied directly in epithelial tissue, so that there was a rapid
contagion of infection. Eventually, they must form the filaments that
invaded the nerves and caused the brief bodily reaction that was
Selznik's migraine. Then the body adapted to them and they began to
incubate slowly, developing into the large cells he had first seen. When
"ripe", the big cells broke apart into millions of the tiny round ones
that went back to the nerve endings, causing the black spots and killing
the host.
He knew his enemy now, at least.
He reached for the controls, increasing the magnification. He would lose
resolution, but he might find something more at the extreme limits of
the mike.
Something wet and cold gushed into his face. He jerked back, trying to
wipe it off, but it was already evaporating, and there was a thick,
acrid odor in the cab. He grabbed for his aspirator, then tried to reach
the airlock. But paralysis was already spreading through him, and he
toppled to the floor before he could escape.
When he came to, it was morning outside, and Chris was waiting inside
the cab with two big Lobby policemen. A hypo in her hand must have been
what revived him.
She touched the electron microscope with something like affection. "The
Lobby technicians did a good job on this, don't you think, Dan? I warned
you, but you wouldn't listen. And now we've even got your own taped
words to prove you were doing forbidden research. Fool!"
She shook her head pityingly as the tractor began moving with two others
toward Southport.
"You and your phony diseases. A little skin disorder, Selznik's
migraine, and a few cases of psychosis to make a new disease. Do you
think Medical Lobby can't check on such simple things? Or didn't you
expect us to hear of your open talk of revolt and realize you were
planning to create some new germ to wipe out the Earth forces. Maybe
those runners of yours were real, mass murderer!"
She drew out another hypo and shoved the needle into his arm.
Necrosynth--enough to keep him unconscious for twenty-four hours. He
started to curse her, but the drug acted before he could complete the
thought.
IX
Judgment
Doc woke to see sunlight shining through a heavily barred window that
must be in the official Southport jail. He waited a few minutes for his
head to clear and then sat up; necrosynth left no hangover, at least.
The sound of steps outside was followed by the squeak of a key in the
lock. "Fifteen minutes, Judge Wilson," a voice said.
"Thank you, officer." Wilson came into the cell, carrying a tray of
breakfast and a copy of the Northport _Gazette_. He began unloading
bracky weeds from his pocket while Doc attacked the breakfast.
"They tossed the book at you, Doc," he said. "You haven't got a chance,
and there's nothing the villages can do. Trial's set for tomorrow at
Northport, and it's in closed session. We can't get you off this time."
Doc nodded. "Thanks for coming, even if there's nothing you can do. I've
been living on borrowed time for a year, anyhow, so I have no right to
kick. But who's 'we'?"