Plague

by Graham Masterton

The telephone began to ring, and Garunisch knew it would be Matty, with the same story.

  He held himself in close control. 'Who do we have at Fort Lauderdale? Maybe they could drive down and take a look-see.'

  'I had a call from Copes, out at Tampa. He said the Miami health people were being really cagey and uptight. They keep insisting it's nothing too serious, and that they've gotten it under control, but the evidence sure doesn't point that way. I think it's a bad one, Ken. I mean, it sounds like a real bad one.'

  Garunisch bowed his head. He was thinking, fast and hard. If there was an epidemic in Florida, his members were going to be right in the front line, and he was responsible for them.

  Eventually, he looked up. 'Okay, Dick. You'd better come in. Grab yourself a drink and something to eat, while I try to talk to those health department dummies down at Miami. Maybe I can get some sense out of this situation.'

  Garunisch turned back to his guests. 'Sorry about the interruption, folks, but it seems like some urgent union business has just come between me and my fun again. Just enjoy yourselves, and I'll join you in a moment.'

  Victor Blaufoot looked round. 'Is it the plague? Have you heard any news?'

  Kenneth Garunisch smiled. 'Don't concern yourself about that plague, Mr. Bloofer. Everything about the plague is well under control.'

  Edgar Paston first heard about the plague on the radio of his seven-year-old Mercury station wagon. He was driving back to Elizabeth, New Jersey, after picking up fifteen boxes of canned peaches from his wholesaler. It was growing dark, and he had just switched on his headlights.

  The radio newscaster was saying, 'Unconfirmed reports from Miami say that nearly forty people have fallen victim to an inexplicable epidemic disease. Health authorities say that the epidemic is well under control, and have warned Miami residents not to panic or react prematurely to what health chief Donald Firenza called "an unfortunate but containable outbreak."

  'Hospitals and police are working overtime to cope with suspected sufferers, and Miami Police Department, have reported that nine of the epidemic victims are police officers who were called out to assist with casualties. Specialists have been unable so far to identify the disease, but Mr. Firenza has likened it to Spanish influenza.

  'The mayor of Miami, John Becker, has sent personal messages of condolence to the families of the dead, and has called for a speedy containment of what he described as "this tragic mishap".

  'We'll have more reports about the epidemic later, but meanwhile here's the weather report for New York and Jersey City… '

  Paston switched the radio off. He reached across to the glove box, and found a peanut bar. Tearing the wrapper off with his teeth, he began to chew. He hadn't eaten since early this morning, when he had stopped for a cheese Woppa just outside Elizabeth.

  Edgar Paston was the owner and manager of Elizabeth's Save-U Super-mart. He had bought the premises ten years ago, at an auction, when they were nothing more than a dilapidated tire-fitting works on the outskirts of town. He had taken a risk, because in those days, zoning laws still prevented any residential development in that part of Elizabeth. Business, at first, had been hard, and the family ate cheap vegetable soup and corn biscuits at night, even though they served hams and chickens by day.

  A new housing policy changed all that, and overnight the area was designated suitable for a new suburb. The Save-U Super-mart attracted more and more customers as houses and streets went up all around it. What had once been a wilderness of truck stops and rough fields became a thriving cluster of chalet-style suburban houses, with neat gardens and kids on scooters. Now Edgar Paston had a healthy yearly profit, a four-bed-roomed chalet, and two cars.

  To look at, he was a supermarket manager and nothing else. Thirty-nine years old, with thinning hair, thick-lensed spectacles, a five o'clock shadow and a taste for plaid short-sleeved shirts.

  He finished the peanut bar and tucked the wrapper in his shirt pocket. He never littered. It was eight-fifteen. He would be back at the store in twenty minutes. That would just give him time to unload the peaches, lock everything up, and go home for his dinner. Today was his wife, Tammy's, half-day at the telephone company, and that meant a good hot supper with fresh-baked bread. Soon the wide lighted window of Save-U Super-mart appeared at the end of the block, and Edgar swung the station wagon off the road, over the car park, and pulled up outside. He-switched off the engine, and wearily climbed out.

  He opened the Mercury's tailgate, dragged out one-of the boxes of peaches, and walked quickly across to the supermarket entrance, and inside. The lights were bright in there, and he blinked. His assistant, Gerry, was standing by the cash-desk chewing a pencil.

  Edgar put down the box. 'What's the matter?' he said, half-stern and half-joking. 'Your mother not feeding you enough?'

  Gerry, a thin and serious boy of sixteen with a beaky nose and short blond hair, looked worried.

  'Hi, Mr. Paston. It's those kids again. They came in about ten minutes ago, and they're up to something, but I don't know what. I daren't leave the cash desk, and they've been down by the freezers for quite a while.'

  Paston peered down the length of the store, past the shelves filled with cereals and cookies and baby-foods. There were only a few late shoppers left now, trundling their carts around and picking up TV dinners and canned drinks. The freezers, where he kept the meat and the beer, were down at the far end.

  'Hold on, Gerry. I'll go and take a look.'

  When he reached the end of the supermarket, he saw exactly what was going on. Four or five teenage boys in denims and black leather jackets were sitting around on the floor, drinking beer from a six-pack they had taken from the fridge.

  'Okay,' said Edgar sharply. 'What the hell's happening here?'

  The kids looked at him, and then looked at each other. A couple of them giggled.

  'Come on, get your butts out of her, or I'll call the cops.'

  None of the kids moved. One of them took a mouthful of beer and sprayed it in the air, and the rest of them laughed.

  'All right,' said Edgar. 'I've warned you before. If that's the way you want it.'

  He turned away, and walked towards the telephone on the wall. He was just about to pick it up, when one of the boys called out, 'Paston!'

  He looked round. He had seen this kid before. He was tall for his age, with a tight black jacket decorated with zippers. He had a thin, foxy face, and greased-back hair.

  'Are you talking to me?' said Edgar, putting the phone back on the hook.

  'That's right, Paston,' said the kid. He came up closer and stood only a couple of feet away, his thumbs in his belt, chewing a large wad of gum with quick, noisy chews.

  'It's Mr. Paston to you,' said Edgar calmly. The kid nodded.

  'That's okay, Mr. Paston. And it's Mr. McManus to you.'

  Edgar adjusted his glasses. 'Are you going to leave the store now, or do I have to call the cops and get you thrown out?'

  McManus chewed, and looked Edgar up and down. 'Is that the way you talk to all your customers, Mr. Paston? It seems to me that me and my friends, we're just ordinary, law-abiding customers, and there ain't nothing you can do to get us out of here.' Edgar swallowed. The rest of the gang had now picked themselves up off the floor, and were lounging behind McManus in what they obviously considered were cool and threatening poses. One of them started cleaning his fingernails with a long-bladed knife.

  'You took beer.' said Edgar quietly. 'You took beer and you drank it.'

  McManus raised his eyebrows. 'Is there any law says you can't consume food and drink on the premises, provided you pay for it when you leave?'

  'Yes, there is. Until you've paid for it, the stuff belongs to me, and if you drink it, that's theft. Now, you've got ten seconds to get the hell out.'

  McManus didn't move. 'If you're saying I'm a thief, Mr. Paston, you'd better call yourself a cop and prove it.'

  Edgar looked around the loutish faces of McManus and his gang, and then nodded.
>
  'Okay,' he said tightly, and picked up the phone. The gang watched him with remote curiosity.

  He spoke to the police, and then laid the phone down again.

  'They said a couple of minutes,' he announced.

  McManus shrugged. 'Seems to me they take longer every time,' he said, and his cronies all giggled.

  It wasn't long before they heard the sound of a siren outside, and the crunch of car doors being slammed. Edgar looked towards the front of the store, and saw two police hats bobbing towards him behind one of the rows of shelves. Round the corner by the dog-food came Officer Marowitz, and his partner Officer Trent. They were big, weatherbeaten local patrolmen, and Edgar knew them well.

  'Hi, Mr. Paston,' said Marowitz. He had a broad, swarthy face and a drooping mustache. 'Looks like you got Shark trouble.'

  'Witty,' sneered one of the kids.

  Marowitz ignored him. 'McManus,' he snapped. 'Have you been bothering my friend Mr. Paston?'

  McManus grinned a foxy grin. 'Mr. Paston here says I'm a thief. I drank some beer in the store, and he says I stole it. Look, I got my money all ready to pay, and he says I stole it.'

  Marowitz sniffed. 'Do you want to bring a charge, Mr. Paston?'

  McManus said, 'I didn't steal it, man. The money's here. I was thirsty, and I opened a couple of cans, that's all.'

  'You shut your mouth, McManus. Do you want to bring a charge, Mr. Paston?' Marowitz repeated.

  Edgar Paston bit his lip, and then sighed. 'I guess not. Just get them out of here.'

  Marowitz shrugged. 'It's up to you, Mr. Paston. If you want to bring a charge, you can do so.'

  Edgar shook his head. 'For a few mouthfuls of beer, it isn't worth it. But if there's any more trouble, McManus, I know your face and I'm going to have the law on your tail so fast you won't know what's hit you.'

  McManus grinned, and saluted. 'Jawohl, mein Fuhrer,' he mocked.

  Marowitz closed his notebook. 'All right, you guys — scram. Next time you won't be so lucky.'

  Giggling and larking about, McManus and his gang shuffled out of the store, and then amused themselves for a few minutes by pressing their faces against the glass of the window, pulling grotesque faces.

  'They're only kids,' said Marowitz. 'Weren't you the same when you were a kid, Mr. Paston?'

  Edgar looked up at him. 'No,' he said quietly. 'I wasn't.'

  Marowitz grinned. 'Well, don't you worry. Different strokes for different folks. You have to remember these kids have got nothing to do in the evening around here. There's no dance halls, no movies, and most of them are banned from the hamburger joints. It's natural they're going to raise a little hell.'

  Edgar picked up the beer-cans that were strewn on the floor, and went to fetch a damp doth to wipe up the mess. 'You wouldn't happen to have one of those cans of beer going spare, would you?' Marowitz asked.

  Edgar stared at him. Marowitz said, grinning, 'It gets kind of dry, patrolling around all evening.'

  Edgar reached into the refrigerator and took out a six-pack of Old Milwaukee. He handed it over, and said flatly, 'That's one dollar and eighty-five cents. You can pay at the desk.'

  Marowitz took the pack without a word. He muttered to Trent, 'Come on, we got more friendly places to visit,' and walked out. Just by the cash desk, he banged his money down in front of Gerry, and called out loudly, 'Support your local police department!'

  Edgar watched them drive away, and then went out into the car park to fetch the rest of his canned peaches. The night was growing cooler now, and there was a soft wind from the east. A couple of trucks bellowed past on their way to Jersey City, and one or two cars, but mostly the roads were empty and silent.

  He didn't realize what had happened at first. But when he reached into the back of the car, he noticed how low down it seemed to be. He frowned, and looked around the side. All four tires had been slashed into black ribbons, and the Mercury was resting on its wheel hubs.

  Edgar stood there for a while, feeling utter frustration and despair. Then he slammed the tailgate angrily shut, locked it, and walked back to the supermarket.

  Gerry was just counting up the day's takings. 'What's wrong, Mr. Paston?' he asked.

  'Someone slashed my tires. I'll have to take the pick-up. Let's get this place closed down for the night, and leave it at that.'

  'Do you think it was Shark McManus?'

  'Is that what they call him? Shark?'

  'I guess it was after Jaws. He's a kind of a wild kid.'

  Edgar almost laughed. 'Wild? He's a goddamned maniac. I mean, what kind of a person goes around stealing beer and slashing tires? What the hell's it all for?'

  Gerry shrugged. 'I don't know, Mr. Paston. I guess they get kind of frustrated.'

  'Oh yeah? Well, I wish they wouldn't take their half-baked frustrations out on me.'

  He went to check the cold shelves and the meat, to make sure that everything was kept at the right temperature for overnight storage. Then he swept up the rubbish, while Gerry restocked some of the canned goods. He did everything quickly and superficially, because he wanted to get home. He could always get up early and dean the place more thoroughly tomorrow.

  He was almost finished when he thought he heard a tap on the store window. He looked up, frowning. There was another tap, louder. Then, right in front of his eyes, the huge plate-glass window smashed, and half-a-hundred-weight of glass dropped to the sidewalk with a shattering, pealing sound.

  Edgar ran to the front of the store and stared out into the night. It was silent, and dark. The wind blew fitfully into the store, making price tags flap on the shelves. He crunched across the sea of broken glass, still staring, still searching.

  In the distance, he thought he heard someone laugh. It could have been a dog barking, or a car starting up. But the sound of it was enough to make him shiver.

  Three

  Miami was always quiet in the small hours of the morning, but tonight that silence seemed to be sultry and threatening. As Dr. Leonard Petrie drove through echoing and deserted streets, he sensed in the air the beginning of something new and frightening and strange. Two or three cars and an ambulance passed him as he drove downtown. Out on the expressway, lines of traffic still shuttled backwards and forwards from the airport, and trucks and cars still traveled up and down US, heading north for Fort Lauderdale or south for the Keys. It could have been any night of any year in Miami. The radio was playing country music from Nashville, and the hotels along the Beach glittered with light.

  Dr. Petrie swung the Lincoln left on West Flagler and 17th. For the first time, he saw the spreading effects of the plague. There were four or five bodies lying on the sidewalk, sprawled-out and motionless in the light of a store window. They looked as if they were fast asleep. He drew the Lincoln into the kerb, and got out to take a look. It was a family. A father — middle-aged, with a small moustache; a middle-aged mother; and two small boys, aged about eight and ten. It was so unbelievably odd to see them here, on this warm and normal night, lying dead and pale on the sidewalk, that Dr. Petrie was moved to prod the father's body with his toe, to see if he were sleeping.

  The father's hand slipped across his silent chest, and rested on the concrete.

  A police-car came cruising up 17th in the opposite direction, and Dr. Petrie quickly stepped across the sidewalk to flag it down.

  The cop was wearing orange sunglasses, even though it was night-time, and a handkerchief over his mouth, bandit-style.

  'I'm a doctor,' Petrie said. 'I came around the block and saw those people. They're all dead, I'm afraid. I guess it's the plague.'

  The patrolman nodded. 'We're getting cases all over. Six or seven cops down with it already. Okay, doctor, I'll call headquarters and notify them about the dead people. Between you and me, though, I don't think they got enough ambulances to cope. It won't be long before it's garbage trucks.'

  'Garbage trucks?' said Dr. Petrie. He was appalled. He looked back across the street, and the family was lying
there, pale and still. The children must have died first, and the mother and father died while trying to nurse them. 'You mean — '

  The cop said, 'They don't have enough ambulances, doctor. It's either that, or we leave them to rot in the streets.'

  Dr. Petrie rubbed his face tiredly. 'Have you seen many like this?' he asked the cop.

  'A couple of dozen maybe.'

  'And what are you supposed to do about them?' The cop shrugged. His radio was blurting something about a traffic accident on the West Expressway. 'We have to report them, that's all. Those are the orders. Report them, but don't touch them.'

  'And that's all? No orders to stop people using the beaches, or leaving the city?' The cop shook his head. Dr. Petrie stood beside the police car for a moment, thinking. Then he said, 'Thanks,' and walked back to his Lincoln. He climbed in, gunned the engine, and drove off in the direction of Donald Firenza's house.

  The more he heard about the health chief's inactivity, the more worried and angry he grew. If one cop had seen two dozen cases, there must be at least a hundred sick people in the whole city, and that meant a plague epidemic of unprecedented scale. He drove fast and badly, but the streets were deserted, and it only took him five minutes to get out to Coral Gables.

  He had no trouble in picking out Donald Firenza's house. There were cars parked all the way up the street, including a television truck and a blue and white police car, and every window was alight. He pulled his Lincoln on to the sidewalk and switched off the engine. Over the soft rustling of palm trees and the chirrup of insects, he could hear voices raised in argument.

  He was greeted at the door by a fat uniformed cop with a red sweaty face.

  'I'm a doctor,' Petrie said. 'I just came up from the hospital. Is Mr. Firenza home?'

  The cop scrutinized Dr. Petrie's ID card. He was monotonously chewing gum. 'Guess Mr. Firenza's pretty tied up right now, but you can ask. Go ahead inside.'

  Dr. Petrie stepped through the door. The house was crowded with newspaper reporters and television cameramen, all lounging around with cardboard cups of coffee and cans of beer. It was one of those houses that in normal circumstances was guaranteed to make Dr. Petrie wince. There were coach lamps and sculptured carpets, wrought-iron banistairs and paintings of horses leaping through the foamy sea. On one wall was a print of a small girl with enormous eyes, out of which two fat sparkling tears were dropping.