A Man Without Love

by Beverly Bird

  She had to notify the CDC in Albuquerque. She intended to call them first, but then she hesitated.

  It had taken them as long as an hour to get a helicopter here when someone was dying. Now it was already past lunchtime. She knew as sure as she knew her name that they would tell her they’d send someone out to collect the droppings tomorrow. To them, it would just be another wild lead that needed investigating. She was only an extern; she doubted if they would take her idea too seriously. They would look into it, of course, but with no great urgency.

  But she knew. She was as sure as she had ever been about anything that the mice were spreading this thing through their feces. And while the CDC hemmed and hawed, millions of mice would be running all over the Res, leaving behind deadly little packages.

  Catherine’s head spun. When she thought of all those housewives cleaning under their beds, she considered it a major miracle that more people hadn’t fallen victim to Tah honeesgai so far.

  Her chin came up. The hell with authority and red tape, she decided. She was already in hot water with the Service and the AMA up to her cute Irish backside. She’d give them the droppings, but she decided she wasn’t going to put her feet up on the desk waiting for them to respond.

  She called Eddie Begay first. He seemed startled, then glad to hear from her. “Hey, you’re home now,” he said.

  Wherever that was. “You said I could borrow your Jeep,” she blurted. “It’s an emergency.”

  “Yeah, okay, sure. I get off at five o’clock.”

  “That won’t work. I need it now. I’ll pay you for your lost wages.” Four hundred dollars and counting.

  “Well, sure. Okay, I’ll be there as soon as I can. The clinic, right?”

  “Right—no!” Her thoughts galloped ahead. “Can you go to the old Ford first—the one I left in the wash? There’s a big box in the trunk with some books in it.”

  “Yeah, I saw that. They’re pretty messed up, though.”

  “That’s okay. Can you bring them here? Then I have something I need you to take to Albuquerque.” Eddie could do the running, she thought, while she did the work.

  She hung up and went to the window to look up at the mountain, then she sighed.

  Ellen and Jericho would get to the hospital first—she hoped. She could probably ask Eddie to have Jericho call her. This was important. He’d want to know everything that was going on.

  And that was just an excuse. She couldn’t do it to him. She couldn’t do it to herself. It was better to let him slip out of her life the way the wind stopped blowing...on a sigh, before she even realized it was happening.

  The way he had closed the door the previous night.

  But I love you. She closed her eyes, fighting the urge to cry again, then she squared her shoulders and went to look for the equipment she’d need.

  That damned mountain wouldn’t know a miracle from a mud pie anyway.

  Chapter 19

  Catherine’s textbooks were decidedly worse for the wear. The pages had swollen to twice their original size from the water, and the covers were warped. Some rodents had found the paper quite tasty—either that or the missing pieces were keeping their young snuggly and warm somewhere. If it had been deermice that had hauled them off to their nests, she supposed it would be an ironic twist indeed. Almost as if they were far more intelligent than they really were, protecting themselves, fighting back.

  But that was a spooky thought that led to things such as wolfmen, and there was no time for that now. She found her epidemiology books and spread them out on the counter in the third little clinic room which served as a lab. Then she leafed through a big tome that gave a little bit of space to almost every subject and found the part dealing with viral infections.

  She propped up the book, open to the page she needed, but then her mind wandered again. She glanced down at her watch, her throat tightening. Half past six. She knew Jericho had arrived at University by now; Lance had come back to report that he had found him and had passed along her message. Maybe he would call her of his own volition to find out what was going on.

  She groaned softly. He wouldn’t and she knew it. No matter what the organic cause proved to be, he’d still insist a wolfman’s spell was to blame.

  She settled herself on a wheeled stool in front of the counter, spreading the rest of the droppings carefully on a pallet. When she finally straightened again, it was to stretch and to rub the small of her back painfully. She looked at her watch again.

  Midnight. She smiled, a tight little grimace at first, but then it spread wearily. She had been right.

  She had found out what she needed to know. The thing was viral, carried in the cells of a host, in this case an animal. Of course, it had taken her the better part of an hour to catch the mouse. The droppings hadn’t been enough to work with so she had lured the tiny animal into a trap she had found in the storage closet, using some of Jericho’s chocolate coffee for bait.

  Don’t think about him. She stood up to go to the other room and get the phone. It was time to call the CDC.

  She had something now, something that would move them. She had managed to isolate the virion in the blood, but she didn’t have the equipment or the necessary textbook pages to break down its proteins or acids. They could do that in Albuquerque, she reasoned, as well as render the virion incapable of causing disease. From there, they could create a vaccine or interferon. She punched in the number, hoping that at least one of their doctors would still be at the hospital. After all, Ellen—their latest case—was there.

  She got Weatherly after a long delay. He had indeed been with Ellen.

  Catherine identified herself. “How is she?” she asked, hesitating in the last moment, almost afraid to know. She and Ellen would never be friends, but she still cared fervently about her condition.

  “Reaction time seems to make a difference with this thing,” Weatherly answered. “This makes three victims now you’ve managed to hold back from death’s door, including yourself. Good work.”

  Good work. How long since she had heard those sweet, sweet words? They filled her almost to the point of bursting. She had done something, something important, something worthwhile.

  Weatherly was still talking. She had to drag her attention back.

  “She’s not recovering as fast as you did, but I think she’ll make it.”

  Catherine found her voice. “Did you get the mouse droppings? A Navajo kid should have dropped them off.”

  “Mouse droppings?” He sounded genuinely perplexed. “No, but I’ve been with the patient all night. Perhaps they’re down the hall in the office.”

  “It doesn’t matter. You’ll need the blood, too. Can you send someone out here? I don’t have a vehicle.”

  “And I don’t have the vaguest idea what you’re talking about,” he said apologetically.

  “I’ve found it.”

  “What?”

  “The virion. The disease.”

  There was stunned silence. Catherine rushed on to explain. “Anyway, people rarely come in contact with mouse blood, so I figure it’s got to be in the droppings too, but I couldn’t break them down with the equipment I’ve got here. If it were just the blood, then the disease wouldn’t be able to strike with such frequency. But mice leave droppings everywhere. I haven’t proven it yet. I’m going to have to inject a sheep we’ve got outside, but—”

  Weatherly interrupted her. “I simply don’t believe this. Why didn’t we find it in the tissue of the victims?”

  “Well, I would imagine because you didn’t have any tissue. And maybe it didn’t show up in our blood samples because it mutates with communication, segues into something more harmless looking, something that wouldn’t have caught your eye.”

  “Of course we have tissue,” he said defensively.

  Catherine scowled. “What kind? What did you take from me?”

  “Not you. The victims we lost. We did thorough autopsies.”

  “But I thought Richard said the
Navajo wouldn’t allow autopsies.”

  “I don’t know who Richard is, but it’s not a matter of permission in a situation like this. The families don’t have a choice. It’s a plague, a threat to the general population. Autopsies are mandatory, required by federal law.”

  Catherine sat down carefully. “Mandatory,” she repeated. Maybe Richard had been misinformed about the autopsies, she thought. But a CDC doctor would know that ruling inside and out. Richard should have known.

  “That’s right,” Weatherly went on. “Listen, I don’t have any staff here at this hour. There’ll be a slight delay. You’re at the reservation clinic, aren’t you?”

  “The one south of Shiprock,” she supplied mechanically.

  “And you’re just an extern? I simply don’t believe this,” he repeated.

  “I finished school, I just—I didn’t take my final exams yet.” Her head was spinning, her thoughts grasping. “I’ve been living out here. That’s how I knew about the mice. Wait!” she said when he would have hung up. “You don’t know who Richard is?”

  “Should I?” the doctor asked.

  “He said he was...one of you. Richard Moss.”

  “I think someone’s been playing games with you, young lady. There was a Richard Moss with the CDC, but I can assure you he’s not been in Albuquerque—at least not recently. He died six months ago of heart failure. He was an older man who wouldn’t retire.”

  Her heart was pounding so hard she felt faint again for the first time in days. “But he was working on Louie. Louie Coldwater. In Gallup. I saw him at the boy’s bedside.”

  “Well, I don’t know who you saw. I wasn’t in Gallup for that case. But it certainly wasn’t Richard Moss.”

  “He brought me your files!”

  “I should hope not.”

  “They’re right here! They’re—” She fumbled with Ellen’s keys, yanking open the bottom drawer.

  They were gone. They certainly had mopped up their mess.

  She slid the door shut with numb fingers. “Never mind.”

  Weatherly seemed glad to drop the subject. “Go infect your sheep, since you’re on such a roll. We’ll need that, too, although you seem to be doing just fine on your own. I’ll send someone to pick everything up early in the morning.”

  “I’ll be here,” she said vacantly.

  He disconnected and she clutched the handset with white knuckles. Then she punched out another number. An emergency number. A very bland, very clonish voice answered.

  “My name is Catherine Landano, and I’ve been working with Horace Schilling on a case involving my ex-husband,” she said carefully. She had never chosen to call this number before—Schilling had told her it was for matters of life and death, manned twenty-four hours a day by a desk-duty agent. Now the voice on the other end of the line hesitated.

  “That case has been closed, Mrs. Landano.”

  She ignored that. “Schilling knew where I was. How?”

  “You’d have to discuss that with him.”

  “I can’t wait to discuss it with him. I need an answer now,” she grated. “I gave you guys everything you wanted—or I tried to. So cooperate with me. I just need one simple answer. Did you have someone out here tailing me, keeping an eye on me?”

  Again, he hesitated. “No,” he said finally. “We didn’t feel the situation warranted that kind of expense. It’s my knowledge that Mr. Schilling merely traced your calls.”

  “No one has been out here masquerading as a Richard Moss, a CDC doctor?”

  A hint of a smug smile came to the man’s voice. “We don’t masquerade, Mrs. Landano. We are simply there.”

  That was about what she had figured. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  She disconnected carefully, hugging herself, starting to tremble.

  Summoned back east by the powers that be. She had assumed—he had wanted her to assume—that he was talking about the CDC. You’re a very lucky woman, Lanie McDaniel. I would have hated to have seen you die.

  Victor had had someone out here, watching her, waiting for the word to take her out. And Richard Moss—or whoever he was—could have done it without her ever suspecting anything. Even Jericho and his bodyguards couldn’t have protected her from him, because she’d trusted him. She thought of the way he had appeared on the plane beside her nearly six weeks ago, so effortlessly infiltrating her world. She thought of the way he had so seamlessly stepped into the role of a CDC doctor, appearing in a patient’s room, removing their files. He had been good, damned good. He could have snuffed out her life in the blink of an eye, but the family had gotten to Victor first, and then they had called in his flunkies.

  Now it was over.

  Catherine considered how close she had come to dying and made her way shakily into the rest room, where she promptly threw up.

  * * *

  Dawn came and went before anyone appeared at the clinic, and then it was Shadow.

  The woman stopped dead in the door of the exam room, her eyes widening on the ewe that laid on the table, an oxygen mask jury-rigged over its nose, an IV tube stringing out from one of its forelegs. Catherine looked up at her grimly.

  “I had to infect her. I don’t have to let her die. I guess I’m glad the CDC is late, because no doubt they would. Can you hand me that syringe over there? I’m having no luck getting pills down her throat.”

  Shadow did so silently.

  “How’s Ellen?” Catherine asked, injecting the ewe with an antipyretic.

  “Uh, good. That wouldn’t be the sheep that Jericho wants me to take down to those people living south of here, would it?”

  Jericho. But then, she had known he wouldn’t come for the animal himself.

  “Sorry,” she answered tightly. “I had no choice.”

  “Too bad.” Shadow sighed. “They were counting on it.”

  “I’ll buy them another one. Even if she lives, she might not be breedable.” How much did sheep cost? Three hundred dollars and falling fast.

  Shadow shrugged. “Actually, that’s not why I came.”

  Catherine got the ewe stabilized. She stepped away from the table, bone weary. “You know, as far as sleep is concerned, this Res is worse than med school,” she muttered. Then she flinched, remembering the nights she had stayed awake voluntarily with Jericho.

  She couldn’t think about him. Each memory, each thought, was like a knife in her heart. Each time it happened her throat closed so hard she wondered if she would ever breathe again. She dragged in air painfully, motioning to the front room. Shadow watched her closely.

  “Let’s go out front,” she urged, looking at her watch again. “I need some coffee. Where the hell is the CDC? I expected them by nine at the latest.”

  “I don’t know where they are, but I know they’ve spoken to the Service trying to find out all about you,” Shadow answered, following her. “Jack caught up with me this morning at the coffee shop.”

  “Jack?” Catherine looked at her blankly as she brewed a pot of regular coffee. She had put the chocolate stuff away yesterday because she knew it would choke her now. Compromise. Oh, God, if only there was one.

  “Jack Keller,” Shadow was saying. “You know, my friend with the Service.”

  Catherine’s hands went still and guilt flushed her face. “Is he angry? I gave Louie that medication weeks ago. I sent them a letter explaining.”

  “Yeah, and it brought a world of wrath down on Kolkline’s head. They don’t keep very close tabs on the personnel in their clinics—they more or less work on an honor system. They had no idea that Kolkline was taking their money and literally doing nothing. And of course nobody on the Res was going to tell them. They never cared what Kolkline was doing as long as he wasn’t doing it to them.”

  Catherine nodded thoughtfully. “And they sure wouldn’t care if the Service was getting fleeced.”

  Shadow gave a fleeting grin. “Nope, they wouldn’t. So anyway, the Service is going to send Kolkline packing. They want you to stay
and take his place.”

  Catherine sputtered hot coffee. She wiped a shaky hand across her mouth, but could do nothing about the tears, hot and painful, that sprang to her eyes. “I can’t.”

  “Why? If you want an official offer, Jack’s going to call you later on today.”

  “I...it’s not that.” And surely Jack knew it. Catherine made her way to the desk and sat down carefully. “Shadow, I’m an extern. Externs don’t get paid, and I can’t remain one forever.”

  “But you finished school, right? Jericho told me what was going on.”

  Catherine managed a wry look. “I thought you people didn’t speak for others.”

  “We don’t. He didn’t tell me how you felt about it, just why you had to leave.”

  Catherine sighed. “I’ve finished school. Now I have, anyway. I needed to do this one last externship. And I have to go back and take final exams. And pass them. I was going to study while I was out here, but somehow I got sidetracked.” She laughed a little crazily. God, had she ever.

  “University gives the exams in May.” Shadow shrugged. “Just thought I’d check for you. Just in case.”

  “I didn’t go to University. I went to Tufts.”

  “Doesn’t matter. Your grades are transferable.”

  “Assuming any school would want me to transfer in. Assuming any hospital would want me for a resident. Shadow, I quit four years ago. That’s a long time. And each year, more and more grads come out, looking for positions....” She groaned and covered her face with her hands.

  “You’ve got a position,” Shadow interrupted. “Right here. Ellen relented a little, didn’t she? And you’re pretty high on her hero list at the moment. You sent Jericho to her before she had even figured out what was wrong with her. You’ve got people coming to see you now and Jack says the Service will give you a residency and pay you for it. Not as much as Kolkline was getting, but he had a résumé, such as it was. And it costs virtually nothing to live out here.”

  “Not unless you keep buying sheep and hiring mechanics away from their garage,” Catherine muttered.

  “Jack says you can even keep the trailer if you want to.”