He grabbed for the phone, hoping to hear from a more conciliatory Anna. "Hi," he breathed.
"Dr. Haldane?" the female voice said.
"Yes ..." He cleared his throat and tasted the staleness in his mouth. "Who is this?"
"Gwen Savard, Department of Homeland Security."
Haldane positioned the computer on the nightstand. "Sure. I remember. We met at that conference on the end of the world."
Savard laughed. "You were the only one claiming the end of the world was near."
"Isn't it?" Haldane wet his dry lips.
"I've been trying to find that out from you, but you're a hard man to track down."
"One of the drawbacks of being in remote China, I guess ... or maybe it's an advantage." Then he added, "Nothing personal, Dr. Savard."
"Gwen," she said. "None taken. I need to be unreachable for a month just to begin to catch up. Do you have a few minutes now?"
He looked at the clock, which read 10:18 P.M. He had the rest of the night. "What's on your mind, Gwen?"
"The Gansu Flu," she said.
He grimaced at the receiver. "Which genius came up with that name?"
"Some reporter," she said. "It's better than their other choice, the 'Killer Flu.' I don't know if you've noticed, but this virus is getting a lot of press coverage in the wake of SARS and the Bird Flu."
"Luckily, I'm also sheltered from most of the media, but I've seen some stories on the Internet," he said. "We call it Acute Respiratory Collapse Syndrome, or ARCS, because the syndrome was identified before the virus."
"What's it like, Noah?"
Haldane sighed, considering the question. "It's bad, Gwen."
"Worse than SARS?"
"Yes and no."
"Meaning?" She spoke with such confident authority that Haldane was grateful to share the privileged information with her, as if unloading a secret he didn't want to bear alone.
"The clinical syndrome is worse than SARS," he said. "Infected patients develop a sudden severe pneumonia often leading to multi-organ failure and death in a couple of days. Sometimes faster. And it's an ugly death, too. Not all that different from the philoviruses like Ebola, except without as much hemorrhaging. The mortality rate of ARCS is at least four or five times that of SARS."
She didn't reply for a moment. Haldane thought he heard the sound of her teeth tapping. "So how is it better than SARS?" she asked, her voice monotone.
"It's so damn fast. The incubation period is only a few days, maximum five. And once sick, the patients either die or recover fully in under a week."
Another pause, more tapping. "That doesn't sound so much better."
"From an epidemiological point of view, it's a big advantage," he said. "It makes for a much shorter quarantine period than with SARS. Five days versus twelve. And we don't have to worry about latent spread. Unless of course the virus mutates again."
"I suppose," Savard said, sounding unconvinced.
"But the biggest advantage is this bug's relatively low contagiousness," Haldane said. "Unlike SARS we've seen minimal spread to health-care workers. And if this were a common influenza strain, it would have escaped Gansu by now. We would never have been able to contain it."
"You have contained it?" she asked pointedly.
He didn't answer right away. "It seems to be contained in Jiayuguan City," he said, hedging. "There have not been any new case reports in over forty-eight hours. It's too early to tell about the more rural regions."
"That's great news, Noah."
"Maybe for you," Haldane said. "You haven't seen what it's like here."
"So tell me."
"The government set up a quarantine that looks more like a ghetto. They fenced in ten thousand people behind guns and barbed wire. So far 276 people have died, most of them young adults or children. It's like something out of a nightmare. Ambulances rush in, body bags are dragged out. The fear is so thick in the air you can almost touch it. It's awful."
"Sounds awful," Gwen said with genuine empathy. "But also necessary. Imagine those same ghettos in cities all over the world, if you hadn't stopped the spread in China."
Haldane grunted a laugh. "I didn't have much to do with it."
"Jean Nantal tells me otherwise." She forced the praise on him. "He says that you convinced the officials to sacrifice the local livestock. And he says that was the key to stopping this virus."
"I wish I were as confident as you." Haldane sighed. "I am not so sure we've seen the last of ARCS or the Gansu Flu or the Killer Flu or whatever the hell you want to call it."
"Why?" Savard asked.
"Maybe I'm just being dramatic." Haldane rubbed the rest of the sleep out of his face. "But we have been incredibly lucky not to see any spread beyond this province. Almost too lucky. You understand?"
"Not necessarily," she said. "Maybe the Chinese have learned from the SARS experience."
"Clearly." He stood up with his phone to his ear and stretched. "With the way they run the farms around here they're going to need to learn a lot more if they don't want to be responsible for Armageddon."
She swallowed. "Noah, my biggest concern lies in the potential for weaponizing this virus."
"I wouldn't recommend it."
She ignored the quip. "How easy do you think it would be for someone to get their hands on the virus."
"You mean from a lab?" he asked.
"From anywhere," she said.
"I don't imagine it would be too difficult," he said. "Who would want it? No. Don't answer that. I have enough trouble sleeping." He sighed. "Okay, your question would be better answered by our microbiologist Milly Yuen, but let me take a stab at it. This virus is more fastidious than most influenza, which explains the delay in identifying him. But at his core he is a member of the same family.. Influenza is easily incubated in chicken eggs or for that matter live animals like pigs and certain primates. I imagine you could use. the blood or other body fluid products of an infected patient to propagate the virus. From there ..."
She didn't comment, so Haldane added, "If it makes you feel any better, I haven't bumped into Osama bin Laden on the streets of Jiayuguan City."
"That's a big relief," she groaned. "When will you know for sure whether the virus is contained in Gansu?"
"If there are no new cases,
anywhere,
in the next week, then I will sleep a whole lot better."
"Me, too."
They said their good-byes, promising to touch base with updates and any new developments, but Haldane suspected that she no more intended than he did to follow up on their conversation.
After giving up on the prospect of sleep, Haldane headed down to the small dark bar in the lobby of the hotel. Someone was playing an Elton John tune passably enough on the baby grand piano, but he butchered the words in his heavily accented nasal voice.
Haldane saw Duncan McLeod sitting alone at the far booth, sipping from a highball glass with another empty glass on the table in front of him. As soon as McLeod spotted him, he hailed him over with a flailing arm. "Haldane, over here! Come listen to 'Someone Shaved My Wife Tonight' the way Sir Elton
meant
it to be played."
Haldane sat down across from McLeod. "Vodka on the rocks?" the Scotsman asked.
Haldane nodded. McLeod waved three fingers in the air until he caught the attention of their waiter.
"I'm a little behind," Haldane said, indicating the glasses on the table.
"I've no intention of letting you catch up, Haldane," McLeod said with a slight slur.
Haldane had never seen McLeod drink as heavily before. Normally, McLeod looked ten or fifteen years younger than his forty-seven years. Not tonight. The creases around his mouth and eyes seemed deeper. His red hair was even more askew than usual. And there was something melancholic behind his asymmetrical eyes.
"What's wrong, Duncan?"
"Don't know if you've noticed, but I've spent my last week trapped in the capital of Nowheresville, China. Home of the Grim Reaper."
"We're going home very soon."
"Maybe, maybe not." McLeod shrugged his whole upper body. "Doesn't matter much. I don't even remember what home looks like,"
The white-coated waiter arrived at their table. He picked up both of McLeod's glasses and replaced them with two fresh vodkas for McLeod and one for Haldane. "A man could die of thirst waiting for a second drink around here," McLeod explained away his simultaneous drinks with an unsteady finger.
"So you're homeless?" Haldane asked.
"In a manner of speaking." McLeod took a large sip from the first glass. "We've got a cute little hovel in Glasgow, but I'm hardly ever there. With this WHO job, I live out of a suitcase." He heaved a sigh. "Do you know I haven't seen my boys in almost three months?"
Haldane knew that McLeod had twin teenaged boys,. but he hardly ever spoke of them or any personal aspect of his life. "How old are they, Duncan?"
"Fourteen. Both in their 'O' levels. What you'd call high school. Smart kids, too." He shook his head as if their age surprised him. "Fourteen!"
"Do they look like Dad?"
"Christ, no! Thank God. I think the missus started sleeping around before the boys came along. Even if they got some of my genes, luckily they got her looks."
"That is lucky." Haldane tasted his drink for the first time.
McLeod glanced at Haldane askance. "You've never seen my wife."
"Doesn't matter."
McLeod howled with laughter and slapped the table. "Haldane, thank God you're on this miserable adventure with me." He took another long tug from his glass. "I spoke to Alistair tonight, but Cameron was too busy to speak to his old man."
Haldane nodded sympathetically. "Teenagers, huh?"
"Nab," McLeod sucked at the first empty glass, as if the ice cubes were hiding precious drops of vodka. "I can't blame them. Their old man hasn't been around much. Too busy chasing little bugs around the world. Now I'm not much more than a stranger to them. Like the dad from that 'Cat's in the Cradle' song."' McLeod turned to the piano player and yelled, "Hey, Elton, you know that song 'Dogs on the Table'?"
"You're still their dad," Haldane said.
McLeod shrugged. He turned his attention to the second glass on the table.
"When this is through, why don't you take some time off to catch up with your kids? Get to know them again," Haldane suggested. "No doubt the WHO owes you some vacation time."
McLeod stared at Haldane for a moment. Then he nodded slowly. "And the others all say you're dumb as a post." He nodded again. "Truth be told, I've been thinking about it. Maybe I will, Haldane. It's been too long since I've seen ugly old Glasgow. And for years now I've been talking about taking the family on a ski trip."
"Couldn't hurt," Haldane said.
"Apparently you haven't seen me sid," McLeod slurred. "And you, Haldane? You have to abandon your wee little one for long stretches, too."
Haldane took a bigger sip from his drink. "Too long."
"Ah, don't beat yourself up. It's not like she'll remember any of it at her age."
Haldane didn't want to talk about Chloe. "Duncan, how does your wife deal with all the time you spend away from home?"
"Fine." He shrugged. "Let's face it, Haldane. Maggie never liked me that much in the first place." His mischievous smile betrayed his obvious affection for his wife. He looked down and swirled the ice in his drink. "You know? Today's our anniversary."
"Congratulations."
"Great. And here I am in a little backwater Chinese wasteland, which Chairman Mao probably didn't even know existed, getting pissed by myself."
Haldane punched McLeod playfully on the shoulder. "You got me now, buddy."
"Fucking excellent, Haldane! But unlike those vacuous weak-kneed lasses back in Geneva, your movie-star looks are wasted on me." He burped. "I'd trade ten of you in a heartbeat for Maggie."
Haldane laughed. "How many years?"
"Twenty-four. We were just children, Haldane." McLeod looked over to him. "Still, no regrets. She's great, my Margaret. She raised the boys and put up with this"--he thumbed at his chest--"without ever complaining. And we can still laugh about it all. You can't ask for much more than that in a marriage."
Haldane shrugged.
"I can't anyway." McLeod squinted at Haldane, and then he pointed a swaying finger at him. "But you and your wife live the fairy tale, don't you?"
Haldane didn't reply. Instead, he reached for his glass.
"What?" McLeod's wild eyes went wider. "Trouble in Camelot?"
"Maybe," Haldane said noncommittally.