The Virus Man

by Claire Rayner

  ‘That’s hardly just,’ Mrs Cloudesley said unexpectedly. ‘I’m a supporter of the RSPC A myself and I can understand what they feel. They acted wrongly of course, breaking into private property, stealing the animals, but all the same, you can’t blame them.’

  ‘Can’t blame them? Can’t blame … you’re trying to drop one of your own medical staff in the shit because of some sentimental half-baked rubbish to do with so-called animal welfare? I never heard of anything so … you’ve got children, Mrs Cloudesley, as I well know. Are you telling me that you didn’t have them immunized against polio, against whooping cough and all the rest of it? None of those would have been available without responsible animal research of the sort Ben has been doing, and now you go and try to ….’

  ‘I’m not trying to do anything.’ Mrs Cloudesley was getting white about the mouth now. ‘I’m just trying to ascertain the facts here, that’s all. And I’m as entitled to express an opinion as anyone else, and I tell you frankly if I’d had any idea, as senior administrator of this hospital, what you were doing there in the lab, Dr Pitman, I would have been most disturbed. Most disturbed.’

  ‘I never tried to hide what I was doing,’ Ben said. He sounded weary, and Jessie looked at him sharply. ‘I was pursuing some private research alongside my hospital work and I never used any hospital funds for what I was doing. I raised what little money I had from other sources.’

  ‘But I gather you were using material obtained from the hospital – from another department – to make your product.’ Mrs Cloudesley looked more owlish than ever. ‘I would have thought that was less than … well, I would have thought you could have discussed the cost of that material with my department and we would have reached some sort of arrangement.’

  ‘Material from the hospital?’ Ben said forcefully. ‘That is nonsense! I was asked to dispose of placentae from the maternity unit, as part of my department’s activity. I could have spent hospital money on running the incinerator, but instead, I took that waste and turned it to practical use for my research. I’m damned if I’m going to be told I’ve behaved in any way dishonestly over that. I saved money. I didn’t lose it for you.’

  ‘All this is a waste of time,’ Dan said and got to his feet. ‘And I’m buggered if I’m sitting here any longer when I’ve got so much to do. I’ve got to check every damned report from every damned GP in this town and I’ve got a session with Colindale to think of too. This is shaping up to be a hell of an epidemic – the local cases may have been comparatively few, but the pattern’s consistent. An initial spread, a lull, and then another crop of cases, all rather more ill. The bug’s probably becoming more virulent as it moves on from host to host. It could be a hell of a thing – especially now those goddammed animals are out. As vectors go, they’re going to be bloody efficient, if you ask me. But I’ve given my opinion and I’ll stand by it in a court of law. Ben has not misbehaved in any way, in his handling of his material or in his dealings with the hospital and its funds and equipment. He’s not like me – he’s got so much bloody probity it hurts. If anyone has to be blamed here it’s not Ben.’

  ‘I don’t want to delay you, Dr Stewart,’ Inspector Cahill said. ‘But there’s something here I’m not very clear about. As I understand it, you’re worried that these animals, if they have been released, will carry their germs with them to the population?’

  ‘You got it in one. Very quick of you, Inspector,’ Dan said, and the policeman glanced at him briefly but showed no awareness of the insulting tone in Stewart’s voice.

  ‘Then in that case, why is there already this mention of epidemics and so forth? Why are you checking on GPs’ reports and having sessions at Colindale? The animals were stolen last night and my understanding is that it takes a longer time than that for germs to be passed on.’

  There was a little silence and Jessie looked at him, feeling alert for the first time today. She had been trying to get her head clear, trying to sort out her own confused thinking all through the meeting, attending it only because Inspector Cahill had insisted she should as one who had been present in the lab during the break-in, although she would have been much happier to find a bed somewhere to crawl into. She ached with fatigue, for she had slept little in what remained of the night after the police had gone and Ben had returned to the hospital block, but that same question had been worrying her, at the back of her mind. Hearing it put into words by this flat-voiced policeman sharpened the sense of foreboding in her belly.

  ‘The thing is,’ Inspector Cahill went on stolidly, ‘is this epidemic you talk about the same one as the infection these animals were given? This 737 you talk about? If it isn’t, fair enough, it’s just a coincidence – though I have to tell you I don’t go much on coincidences. They don’t happen very often, in my experience. If it is the same infection, though, I want to know how it is that it’s already out and about. Last night’s break-in didn’t do it, surely?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Dan Stewart said unwillingly and threw a sharp glance at Ben. ‘I have to check on all the cases we’ve had so far ….’

  ‘I’ve been worrying myself stupid about it,’ Ben said, his head bent and his eyes fixed on the floor as he sat with his hands thrust deep into the pockets of his white coat. ‘All bloody night long – I just don’t know if it’s the same. I didn’t look for the organism when I did the post-mortems on those kids, but I suppose there were features which could have been linked with 737. A mild petechial rash – I put it down to a generalized virus infection, never thought it could be 737 – my own strain of 737, that is. Why should I?’ He looked up now at Dan, talking to him as though there were no one else present, just two doctors talking shop. ‘How could I have thought of the possibility? There’s no connection between the school and my lab, is there? No way it could have got out.’

  ‘Mrs Edna Laughton,’ Inspector Cahill said, reading from his notebook, his voice expressionless. ‘5a Wessex Street, East Minster. Worked here as a cleaner, part-time. Worked at Bluegates, as a kitchen hand, part-time ….’

  There was a stunned little silence and then Dan said slowly, ‘Oh, Christ. You’ve got to be kidding. A kitchen hand? You can’t be right about that.’

  ‘I saw Mrs Laughton this morning, acting on information received,’ Inspector Cahill looked up. ‘From Joe Lloyd of the Advertiser. He found it out. Interesting how that man finds out things, isn’t it? He was the only one knew there was to be a break-in here last night. We’re looking into him, of course. But he got it right. I saw her this morning.’ He looked reminiscent for a moment. ‘Fussed a bit, but she told me in the end. It’s the link, I imagine.’

  ‘Edna?’ Jessie said suddenly and they all turned and looked at her. ‘Nonsense. It can’t be.’

  ‘You know the woman?’ the Inspector said.

  ‘Of course I do. The cleaner – a rather stupid woman – lazy. Never did any more than she had to. Always fussing over every little job. But she never went into the animal rooms. It was my department and only mine. I did all the cleaning in there. She never had cause to go near them.’

  ‘May not have had cause, Madam, but I fear she did,’ Inspector Cahill said. ‘I had some trouble getting the information from her, but I managed it. Rather a sticky-fingered lady, I reckon. Helped herself to whatever was lying around. She keeps budgies, and now and again admitted to taking a handful of the rabbit food from your animal room for them.’

  ‘Budgies don’t eat rabbit food,’ Jessie said, aware as she made her objection how pointless and stupid it was but needing to say something.

  ‘Edna Laughton’s do,’ Inspector Cahill said dryly, ‘It’s my guess they take what they’re given and glad to get it. The point is, Madam, she got into your animal room.’

  ‘And then went to Bluegates School kitchen,’ Dan said. ‘Oh, shit. I feel sick.’

  ‘You’ll feel worse by the time all this is over,’ Mrs Cloudesley said with an air of triumph, and got to her feet. ‘Well, I don’t see that I need keep yo
u here any longer. I’ll get my report in and we’ll see where we go from there.’

  ‘But …’ Ben began and then stopped as they all heard it: the sound of voices raised in excitement and Mrs Cloudesley’s secretary crying, ‘No, sir, really, they’re having a very important meeting. I can’t disturb Mrs Cloudesley …’, and then the door opened and Lyall Davies was standing there, looking round at them with an air of barely suppressed excitement about him.

  ‘Is Dr Pitman here? Ah, there you are, m’boy! Been trying to get hold of you all morning – phoned your department over and over and at last found someone who had the wit to say you were over here. Morning, Mrs Cloudesley – damn near afternoon, isn’t it? Yes. Good afternoon. Now, I know you’ll forgive me because I have some very important news for you, for all of us. Very exciting it is, and likely to bring this hospital’s name into a lot of attention – papersil be full of it, television too, I don’t doubt.’ He looked sleek and happy and beamed at them with all the jollity of a well-paid Santa Claus.

  ‘We’ve had enough of that already,’ Mrs Cloudesley said. ‘Haven’t you seen the papers this morning already, Doctor? There isn’t one of them doesn’t have something about the break-in last night, not one.’

  ‘Break-in – what break-in? These damned louts after drugs again? Well, never mind them – they’re always being written about. No, this is something much better, much better! It’s the sort of thing we all like to see in public – does the profession good, does the hospital good, and it’ll do us good, Pitman, the pair of us.’

  Ben was staring at him, not really listening to what he was saying, and it was Jessie who suddenly realized why Lyall Davies was looking so pleased with himself. In all the hubbub of last night and this morning’s aftermath they had managed to forget what was happening on Ward Seven B.

  ‘Andrea,’ she said. ‘What’s happened? Is she responding?’

  The old man looked at her, his eyes almost lost in the creases round his eyes because he was grinning so broadly. ‘Is she responding? Well, you could say that!’

  ‘What’s happened?’ Ben was on his feet now, and standing over Lyall Davies. ‘Has her fever subsided? Is she holding on well?’

  ‘My dear chap, she’s doing all that and more! Little wretch is sitting up in bed over there demanding scrambled eggs. As I live and breathe, m’dear boy, scrambled eggs! Fully conscious, if weak, no signs of any brain damage, even after such long unconsciousness, breathing without the respirator, and asking for scrambled eggs!’

  ‘Oh, thank heavens,’ Jessie said, and leaned back in her chair, feeling her legs shaking too much to be able to hold her if she stood up. ‘Thank heavens and all the … it worked.’

  ‘What are you talking about, Dr Lyall Davies? If you please?’ Mrs Cloudesley’s tone was acid. ‘We were in the middle of an important meeting, and we find ourselves some what confused by all this ….’

  ‘Not going to apologize, m’dear lady,’ Lyall Davies said with great jocularity. ‘No apology needed, because this is the best thing that’s happened to this hospital since … well, the best thing ever! I told the boy to use his stuff, had to push him, and insist, but I had my way and now we’ve got as remarkable a cure as any I’ve ever seen. Scrambled eggs, would you believe, scrambled eggs!’

  ‘Is this the child on Seven B that was so ill?’ Stewart asked sharply. ‘The one who had the same infection as the others from Bluegates?’

  ‘Andrea Barnett,’ Lyall Davies said, still enjoying himself hugely. ‘That child’s name’ll go down in the annals, believe me it will, down in the annals!’

  ‘It’s your stuff, Ben?’ Stewart turned on Ben and stared at him. ‘The stuff you’ve been working on?’

  ‘Yes,’ Ben said and put both hands to his face and rubbed it as though it were numb and he was trying to bring it back to sensation. ‘My stuff.’

  ‘The same that you used for the rabbits you gave your 737 to?’

  ‘Of course the same. What else could it be?’

  ‘Then you blessed old idiot, we’re all right. Thank the Good God we’re all right! The bloody rabbits and their bugs may be out or they may not – but you’ve got the answer to the infection. So the problem’s over before it’s begun, isn’t it? We’ve no real worries at all ….’

  22

  It took several days for the excitement to reach a peak but once it did there was no holding it. Every paper pushed all other stories off the front page and ran the South Coast Plague for all it was worth. It led every radio news broadcast and made the main story on the national television news both on the BBC and on the independent network for days on end. The serious weeklies ran specially commissioned articles from Nobel prizewinners on the scientific background, the heavy newspapers went in for leaders ranging from the ponderous whither-science type to the starry eyed this-is-the-twenty-first-century rave, and the tabloids started funds to help the families of the children stricken by the disease, while simultaneously managing to make it clear that because of the great new British Wonder Drug Breakthrough they were all going to get well at once anyway.

  Hugh Worsley sat in the canteen at the poly reading his way through the headlines and wanting to explode with the frustration of it all. That bloody newspaper man had cocked it up completely. If he’d behaved as a responsible citizen should, he’d have alerted the police, had them there ready to arrest Graham and his idiots before they could do anything. As it was, Graham had been catapulted to a level of self-satisfaction that was galling to behold, and which had made Hugh sick with impotent rage. He squirmed now at the memory of the way the man had sat there beside his bed the day after the event, telling him all about it in glowing self-congratulatory detail. How they’d broken in with the minimum of fuss; how the woman who’d been there had been safely but firmly dealt with and prevented from raising the alarm; how the newspaper people had been enabled to get really good photographs, and Graham had managed delicately to imply that he had himself mobilized the press coverage – and Hugh had had to sit there and listen to him, able to say nothing to label him the lousy liar he was – and had then magnanimously told Hugh that he’d be welcome at the next meeting if he fancied dropping in and was well enough, but they could manage quite nicely without him, thanks all the same.

  ‘We took the animals out to the Nature Reserve heath,’ he said then. ‘Tracey, dear child, made a nice little ritual of it, letting each animal run free individually. It was really touching to see it, and off they went hopping, happy as Larry. So there you are, dear boy. Plan B, with my modifications, went ahead as smoothly as hot butter over a toasted crumpet. Such a pity you couldn’t be there to join in the fun.’ He had patted Hugh’s hand kindly. ‘But you must take care of your health first, of course – so you stay there until your little cold is better and don’t you worry about a thing. We’re getting on excellently well. We’ve already planned the next operation –there’s a place that breeds these laboratory animals over at Podgate, we’ve discovered. That’s our next target. I’ll run the operation of course. Got campaign experience, now, after all, so you can hardly expect anyone else to deal with it, can you? I’ve been in touch with the area organizer of the Brigade, of course – must be constitutional, mustn’t we? – and he fully agrees. I’m running the branch now, but I don’t suppose you’ll mind too much, being ill as you have been, and having your studies to think of and so forth.’

  And he had smiled triumphantly and gone away, and Hugh had got up and dressed and gone down to the poly to see what he could salvage out of the mess; maybe he could raise a few extra numbers, take over the branch again, get bloody Graham and his wets outnumbered. But no one had been particularly concerned. The political flavour of the month seemed to be raising Christmas money for the families of striking miners, and no one had much energy or interest for anything else. Perhaps, Hugh thought, I ought to change tack, start up a Trotskyist cell here. Now, that could be interesting: most of the students here were the wettest of wet liberals, and could do wit
h a bit of stirring up; it was clearly worth considering, and he had to consider something, that was for sure. Life was altogether too gloomy and boring at the moment, one way and another, because to cap it all he had that tickling feeling behind his nose that warned him he was about to get a real cold. And the way his luck was running at the moment, it’d probably be a stinker.

  Dorothy Cooper sat in her flat at the top of Bluegates and listened to the radio with her heart sinking ever more deeply. She’d had one offer only for the school as a going concern, and it was a poor one, but after all this there was no way even that offer would stand. It was odds on they’d withdraw it, and then where would she be? Every penny she had was tied up in the bloody place, and if she didn’t get it off her hands soon she could be in major financial trouble.

  Perhaps the answer was just to sell the building as suitable for institutional use? A nursing home, maybe: with a bit of judicious partitioning of the dormitories they could create a sizeable number of individual rooms – well, cubicles anyway – that would do nicely for elderly people. Or, if she couldn’t find a buyer for such a project, perhaps she could consider a change of use for the place on her own account? There was always a demand for homes for the old, wasn’t there? People wanted them off their hands, but wanted them well cared-for, so perhaps if she could find a trained nurse with a little money of her own they could convert the place, rename it, set up in a different line of business altogether? Old people couldn’t be any harder to deal with than those damned children had been, and any problems in old-age homes attracted much less fuss than things affecting children. People were so soppily sentimental about the young; if they knew them as well as I do, she thought bitterly, they’d be a bit less daft.