NightScape Part 20

"You can't keep going like this," she said.

"No choice."

"Have you eaten?"

"A sandwich on the go. A cup of coffee here and there."

"Well, you're going to sit at the kitchen table. I'll heat up the chicken and dumplings I made for supper."

"Not hungry."

"You're not listening to what I said. You're going to sit at the kitchen table."

Bingaman laughed. "If you insist."

"And tomorrow I'm going with you. I should have done it today."

He suddenly became alert. "Marion, I'm not sure - "

"Well, I am. I'm a trained nurse, and I'm needed."

"But this is different from what you think it is. This is - "

"What?"

"One of our nurses collapsed today. She has all the symptoms."

"And the other nurses?"

"They're exhausted, but so far, they haven't gotten sick, thank G.o.d."

"Then the odds are in my favor."

"No. I don't want to lose you, Marion."

"I can't stay barricaded in this house. And what about you? Look at the risk you're taking. I don't want to lose you, either. But if you can take the risk, so can /."

Bingaman almost continued to argue with her, but he knew she was right. The townsfolk needed help, and neither of them would be able to bear the shame if they didn't fulfill their moral obligation. He'd seen amazing things today, people whom he had counted on to volunteer telling him that he was crazy if he thought they would risk their lives to help patients with the disease, others who never went to church or partic.i.p.ated in community functions showing up to help without needing to be asked. The idea had occurred to him that the epidemic was G.o.d's way of testing those who didn't die, of determining who was worthy to be redeemed.

The idea grew stronger after he ate the chicken and dumplings that Marion warmed up for him, his favorite meal, although he barely tasted it. He went upstairs, but instead of proceeding into the bedroom, he entered his study, sat wearily at his desk, and turned on the wireless radio.

"Jonas?"

"In a moment."

Hearing crackles and whines, he turned k.n.o.bs and watched dials. Periodically, he spoke into the microphone, identifying himself.

Finally he contacted another operator, this one in Boston, but as the operator described what was happening there - the three thousand new cases per day in Boston, a death toll so fierce that the city's 291 hea.r.s.es were kept constantly busy - Bingaman brooded again about G.o.d. According to the radio operator in Boston, there wasn't a community in the United States that hadn't been hit. From Minneapolis to New Orleans, from Seattle to Miami, from north to south and west to east and everywhere in between, people were dying at a sanity-threatening rate. In Canada and Mexico, in Argentina and Brazil, England and France, Germany and Russia, China and j.a.pan...Not an epidemic. A pandemic. It wasn't just in the United States. It was everywhere. Horrified, Bingaman thought about the bubonic plague known as the Black Death that had ravaged Europe in the Middle Ages, but what he was hearing about now was far more widespread than the Black Death had been, and if the mortality figures being given to him were accurate, the present scourge had the potential to be far more lethal. Lord, the cold weather hadn't arrived yet. What would happen when the worst of winter aggravated the symptoms of the disease? Bingaman had a nightmarish image of millions of frozen corpses strewn around the world with no one to bury them. Yes, the Spanish influenza was G.o.d's way of testing humanity, of judging how the survivors reacted, he thought. Then a further dismaying thought occurred to him, making him s.h.i.+ver. Or could it possibly be the end of the world?

"It appears to have started in Kansas," Bingaman told the medical team. They had agreed to meet every morning at eight in the nurses' rest area at the hospital to relay information and subdue rumors. After the meeting, they would disperse to inform volunteers about what had been discussed.

"Kansas?" Powell furrowed his brow in confusion. "I a.s.sumed it would have started somewhere more exotic."

"At Fort Riley," Bingaman continued. He had gotten only two hours' sleep the night before and was fighting to muster energy. His head throbbed. "That Army facility is one of the main training areas for the Allied Expeditionary Force. In March, it had a dust storm of unusual force."

" Dust," Talbot said." I've been formulating a theory that dust is the princ.i.p.al means by which the disease is carried over distances." He turned to the nurses. "We have to take extra precautions. Close every window. Eliminate the slightest dust."

" In this heat?" Elizabeth Keel said. As head nurse, she never failed to speak her mind, even to a doctor. "And with the patients' high temperatures? They won't be able to bear it."

Talbot's eyes flashed with annoyance that he'd been contradicted.

Before angry words could be exchanged, Bingaman distracted them. "There might be another agent responsible for the initial transmission. I spoke to a wireless operator in Kansas early this morning, and he told me the theory at the camp is that the dust storm, which turned the day into night for three hours, left not only several inches of dust over everything in the camp but also ashes from piles of burned manure."

Bennett's nostrils twitched. "Burned manure?"

Bingaman nodded. "I realize that it's an indelicate subject. My apologies to the ladies. But we can't stand on niceties during the present emergency. There's a considerable cavalry detachment at Fort Riley. Thousands of mules and horses. It's estimated that those animals deposit nine thousand tons of manure a month in the camp, an obvious hygiene problem that the fort's commander attempted to alleviate by ordering his men to burn the droppings. The smoke from the fires and then the ashes blown by the dust storm apparently spread infectious microbes throughout the entire camp. Subsequent to the storm, so many soldiers came down with influenza symptoms that the surgeon general for the fort was afraid they'd take up all three thousand beds in the fort's hospital. Fortunately, the outbreak abated after five weeks."

"And then?" Powell frowned. He seemed to have a premonition about what was coming.

"Two divisions were sent from the fort to join the rest of our expeditionary forces in Europe. Influenza broke out on the troop s.h.i.+ps. When the soldiers arrived in France, they spread it to our units and the British and the French. Presumably also to the Germans. At last count, the Royal Navy alone has over ten thousand cases of influenza. Of course, the civilian population has been affected, too. After that, the disease spread from Europe throughout Asia and Africa and everywhere else, including of course back to America. An alternate theory about the pandemic's origin is that it started among farm animals in China and was introduced into France by Chinese coolies whom the Allies used to dig trenches. Perhaps the true origin will never be known."

"But what about the death rate?" a nurse asked, obviously afraid of the answer.

"In three months, the flu has killed more people in Europe, soldiers and civilians, than have died in military operations on both sides during the entire four years of the war."

For several moments, the group was speechless.

"But you're talking about millions of deaths," Elizabeth Keel said.

"And many more millions who continue to suffer from the disease."

"Then..."

"Yes?" Bingaman turned to a visibly troubled nurse.

"There's no hope."

Bingaman shook his throbbing head." If we believe that, then there truly won't be any. We must hope."

The nurse raised a hand to her mouth and coughed. Everyone else in the room tensed and leaned away from her.

Bingaman helped finish admitting twenty-five new patients to the gymnasium that had been converted into a hospital. As he and Dr. Bennett left the s.p.a.cious building - which was rapidly being filled with occupied beds -they squinted from the brilliant September sunlight and noticed corpses being loaded onto horse-drawn wagons.

"How many died last night?"

"Fifteen."

"It keeps getting worse."

Bingaman faltered.

"What's the matter?" Kramer asked. "Aren't you feeling well?"

Bingaman didn't reply but instead took labored steps toward one of the wagons. The corpse of a woman in a nurse's uniform was being lifted aboard.

"But I saw her only yesterday. How could this have happened so quickly?"

" I've been hearing reports that the symptoms are taking less time to develop," Bennett said behind him. "From the slightest hint of having been infected, a person might suddenly have a full-blown case within twenty-four hours. I heard a story this morning about a man, apparently healthy, who left his home to go to work. He wasn't coughing. None of his family noticed a fever. He died on the street a block from the factory where he worked. I heard another story."

"Yes?"

"Four women were playing bridge last night. The game ended at eleven. None of them was alive in the morning."

Bingaman's chest felt heavy. His shoulders ached. His eyes hurt - from lack of sleep, he tried to a.s.sure himself. He removed his gauze mask from his pocket, having taken it off when he left the hospital. "From now on, I think we're going to have to wear our masks all the time, even when we're not with patients. Day or night. At home or on duty. Everywhere."

"At home? Isn't that a little extreme?" Kramer asked.

"Is it?" Bingaman gave the dead nurse, in her twenties with long brown hair, a final look as the wagon clattered away. So young, so much to live for, he thought." None of us is immune. The disease is all around us. There's no telling who might give it to us." He glanced at Kramer. "I keep remembering she was the nurse who coughed in the room with us yesterday."

"Don't touch me! Get away!"

The outburst made Bingaman look up from the patient he was examining. He was in the middle of a row of beds in the gymnasium, surrounded by determined activity as nurses and volunteers moved from patient to patient, giving them water, or soup if they were capable of eating, then rubbing their feverish brows with ice wrapped in towels. Another team of volunteers took care of the unsavory, hazardous problem of what to do with the bodily wastes from so many helpless people. A stench of excrement, sweat, and death filled the now hopelessly small area. Contrary to Dr. Talbot's theories about dust and closed windows, Bingaman had ordered that all the windows in the gymnasium be opened. Nonetheless, the foul odor inside the building made him nauseous.

"I told you, d.a.m.n it, get your filthy hands off me!"

The objectionable language attracted Bingaman's attention as much as the sense of outrage. The man responsible coughed hoa.r.s.ely. There, Bingaman saw. To the right. Three rows over. Nurses, volunteers, and those few patients with a modic.u.m of strength looked in that direction also.

"You b.i.t.c.h, if you touch me again - " The man's raspy voice disintegrated into a paroxysm of coughing.

Such language could absolutely not be tolerated. Bingaman left the patient he'd been examining, veered between beds, reached another row, and veered between other beds, approaching the commotion. Three men had evidently carried in a fourth, who was sprawled on a cot, resisting the attentions of a nurse. Bingaman's indignation intensified at the thought of a nurse being called such things, but what he heard next was even more appalling. His emotions made it difficult for him to breathe.

"You G.o.dd.a.m.n German!"

Marion. The nurse the patient shouted at was Bingaman's wife. The three men who had carried in the patient were pus.h.i.+ng her away.

Outraged, Bingaman reached the commotion. "Don't you touch her! What's going on here?"

The patient's face reddened from the fury with which he coughed. Spittle flew. Bingaman stepped back reflexively, making sure that he stayed protectively in front of Marion.

"Put these masks on. No one comes in here without one. What's the matter with you?"

"She's what's the matter," one man said. His voice was slurred. He was tall, wore work clothes, and had obviously been drinking." Lousy German."

"Watch what you're saying."

"Hun! Kraut!" a second man said, more beefy than the first." Yer not foolin' anybody." He, too, was obviously drunk. "Yer the one who did it! Made my friend sick! Gave everybody the influenza!"

"What kind of nonsense..."

"Spanish nothing." The man on the bed coughed again. He was losing strength. Despite his feverish cheeks, he had alarming black circles around his eyes. "It's the German influenza."

The first man took a tottering step toward Marion. "How much did the Kaiser pay you, Kraut?"

"Pay her?" the second man said. "Didn't need to pay the b.i.t.c.h. She's a German, ain't she? Germans love killing Americans."

"I've heard enough." Bingaman shook with rage. "Get out of this hospital. Now. I swear I'll send for a policeman."

"And leave her?" The third man pointed drunkenly past Bingaman toward Marion. "Leave her to kill more Americans? She's the one brought the influenza here. The German influenza. This is how the Kaiser thinks he's gonna win the war. d.a.m.ned murderous Kraut."

"I won't tell you again! Leave this instant or I'll - "

Bingaman stepped toward the men, urging them toward the door. The first man braced himself, muttered, "The Huns killed my son in France, you G.o.dd.a.m.n Kraut-lover," and struck the doctor's face.

Time seemed to stop. At once, it began again. Hearing exclamations around him, Bingaman lurched back, distantly aware of blood spewing from his lips beneath his mask. Then something struck his nose, and he saw double. Blood spurted from his nostrils. He lost control of his legs. He seemed to float. When he struck the floor, he heard faraway screaming.

Then everything was a blur. He had a vague sense of being lifted, carried. He heard distant, urgent voices. His mind reeled as he was set on something.

A cot. In a shadowy supply room at the rear of the gymnasium.

"Jonas, are you all right? Jonas?"

He recognized Marion's voice. Each anxious word sounded closer, as if she was leaning down.

"Jonas?"

"Yes. I think I'm all right."

"Let me get your mask off so you can breathe."

"No. Can't risk contamination. Leave it on."

She was wiping blood from his face. "I'll give you a clean one."

"Jonas?" A man's voice. Worried. Powell.

"I'm only dazed," Bingaman answered slowly. "Caught me by surprise." His words seemed to echo. "I'll be all right in a moment." He tried to sit up, but he felt as if he had ball bearings in his skull and they all rolled backward, forcing his head down. "Those men. Are they..."

"Gone."

"A policeman. Did you send for one?"

"What would be the point? When they closed the schools, the restaurants, and the stores, they also emptied the jail. There isn't any place to put those men."