Plague Ship (10 page)

fifteen

“Breathe through your mouth,”
David instructed the nanny. “Take long, deep breaths.”

Juanita inhaled deeply, then exhaled slowly. She repeated the cycle twice before her cough kicked in. After swallowing back her sputum, she adjusted her N-95 mask and mumbled, “Sorry, Dr. Ballineau.”

“No problem,” David said and continued listening to her chest with a stethoscope. He heard some scattered, coarse rhonchi, but only a few wheezes. And again he noticed that her skin color was good. He put his stethoscope in his pocket and smiled at the nanny, who was dressed in a bathrobe and sitting on the edge of her bed. “Your lungs sound good.”

“I have the disease, don’t I?” Juanita asked, as if she already knew the answer.

“I’m not sure,” David told her. “It could be just a routine virus.”

“I have the disease,” Juanita repeated. “I am certain.”

“Oh?” David raised an eyebrow. “Which medical school did you graduate from?”

Juanita smiled weakly, then had another coughing spasm. She paused to catch her breath before saying, “You must not tell the Little One. It will cause her to worry and cry.”

“I will tell her it’s only a cold,” David proposed.

Juanita shook her head. “She will know you are not telling the truth. Like her mother before her, she will see right through you.”

David nodded at the veracity of Juanita’s words. He had always considered himself a good liar, but Marianne could always sense he was not telling the truth. She said she could read it in his eyes. And apparently so could Carolyn, and so could Kit. “I will say you have a cold, but there’s a possibility it’s the disease.”

“A half-truth,” Juanita sighed as she lay back on her pillow. “You will see to it that I am buried in Costa Rica.”

“You are not going to die so soon.”

“That’s for God to say, not you.”

“Well, God isn’t talking to us,” David groused. “He must be on vacation because He sure as hell isn’t aboard this ship.”

“Sacrilege!” Juanita raised her voice and made the sign of the cross.

David shrugged. “Whatever.”

Juanita began to cough again but, with effort, suppressed it. “I wish to be buried with my family in Cartago, which is just southeast of San José. You will remember?”

“I will remember.”

Juanita closed her eyes and said, “You should go look after the Little One.”

David left the cabin and hurried down the passageway, still wondering if Juanita really had avian influenza. She wasn’t nearly as sick as the others, and her lungs sounded relatively good. But, then again, she would be in the early stages of the disease, and all hell could still break loose. And if she had the killer virus, she most likely caught it from her close contact with Will, while chaperoning Kit. But if that were the case, why didn’t Kit have the disease? Once more he tried to come up with reasons why Kit was being spared. Was she lucky? Or somehow immune to it? Or was the goddamn virus incubating inside her, waiting to explode? The last thought sent a giant shiver through David. For a moment, he envisioned Kit’s face turning purple as the vicious virus destroyed her lungs and deprived her of oxygen. He shook his head and forced the awful image from his mind.

David came to Karen’s suite and, after taking a deep breath to compose himself, knocked on the door and entered. Kit and Karen were sitting on the sofa, thumbing through a fashion magazine. Kit’s raven hair had been braided into a ponytail, no doubt by Karen.
Women!
David mused to himself. They know how to push all the shit in life aside. That’s why they outlived men.

“Hi, Dad!” Kit jumped up and dashed over to give him a tight hug.

“Hi, sweetheart!” David hugged her back and gazed at her ponytail, as if giving it careful study. “Your new hairdo looks great!”

“Karen did it for me.”

“I figured.” David looked over at Karen and winked, then came back to Kit. “So tell me, how are you feeling?”

“I’m fine,” Kit replied brightly.

“No fever?”

“No fever.”

“No cough?”

“No cough.”

“Any scratchy—”

“Dad!” She interrupted, now becoming exasperated. “I feel fine. Really!”

“Just checking.”

Kit stared up at her father’s face and tried to read it. “You’re worried about Juanita, aren’t you?”

“It might only be a cold,” David said evenly.

“But you think she’s got the nasty virus, huh?”

“We’ll see.”

Kit studied his face even more intently, then tears welled up in her eyes. “Please don’t let anything bad happen to her, Dad. Please!”

“She’s doing okay so far,” David said, trying to comfort her, “and that’s a good sign.”

“But—but Will was okay too,” Kit countered. “At least he was at first.”

She’s so damn smart
, David thought before saying, “But his symptoms were different.”

Kit nodded slowly, only half-convinced. “Is Will feeling any better?”

David hesitated, not wanting to be the bearer of bad news. But Kit would learn of Will’s death from others soon enough, and it was better she heard it from him. “He didn’t make it, sweetheart. He passed away in his sleep.”

The tears gushed out. Kit rushed back into his arms and sobbed, “Daddy! Oh, Daddy!”

“He put up a brave fight,” David consoled softly, “but it was just too much for him.”

“Do—do you think he’ll go to heaven, Dad?” Kit cried.

“I’m sure of it,” David replied. “And I’ll bet God lets him take care of all the little animals up there.”

Kit sniffed back her tears and smiled faintly. “Do you really think
so?”

“I really think so,” David reassured, then slowly ran his hand through her hair. “Now we have to take extra precautions to make sure we don’t catch the virus. Okay?”

“Okay,” Kit said, wiping her runny nose with the back of her hand. “I’ll wear my mask all the time.”

“Good,” David encouraged. “And remember to take your Tamiflu pills and to stay in here unless you absolutely have to go out.”

“Should I check on Juanita?”

“Nah. She’ll be sleeping most of the time anyway.” David took her hand and led her to the bedroom. “Why don’t you lie down now and take a little nap. It’ll be good for you.”

Kit stepped into the bedroom, then abruptly turned and raced back into David’s arms. “I love you, Dad!”

“I love you too, sweetheart.” David hugged her and gently guided her toward the bedroom. “You have sweet dreams.”

David watched her climb into bed and bring her favorite teddy bear close, and for a moment all the world seemed right.

Quickly he turned and motioned Karen over to the door leading to the passageway. “Can you stay with her for a while?” he whispered.

“Sure,” Karen whispered back. “But won’t you need me in the sick bay?”

“I’ll let you know once I’m down there.”

Karen glanced over her shoulder to make certain Kit wasn’t within earshot. “What about Juanita? Do you think she’s got the avian flu?”

David shrugged. “I can’t be sure. But chances are she does.”

“If she does, only God knows what it will do to Kit.”

David nodded somberly, knowing that Juanita’s death would shatter the child. Juanita was Kit’s mother-figure, and her death would mean Kit had lost two mothers in her short life, which was two too many. Sighing to himself, he said, “Let’s hope for the best.”

Karen put her arms around David’s neck and brought him close. “If we don’t get out of this mess alive, I want you to know that I never stopped loving you.”

“I know,” David said quietly.

Karen pecked his cheek and said, “Work some of your magic, David. Get us through this nightmare.”

David disengaged from her embrace and hurried down the passageway, which was now completely deserted. All the doors were closed and there were no sounds coming from within. It was as silent as a cemetery, he thought just as the ventilation system clicked on and the air began to move. Again David wondered if the ventilation ducts were spreading the deadly virus to every corner of the
Grand Atlantic
. But the system couldn’t be shut off because the ship would become unbearably hot, particularly for the elderly and those feverish from the flu. But at this point, did it really matter? The virus didn’t need a ventilation system to spread. It was doing very well on its own.

David took the elevator down, all the while trying to think of additional measures to protect Kit. But there weren’t any. The only sure way to avoid the virus was to get off the ship. But that was impossible. They were stuck out in the Atlantic Ocean, hundreds and hundreds of miles from the mainland, and the CDC would make sure they remained there.

The elevator jerked to a halt, and David exited on the G level. As he approached the sick bay, he could see the crowd of people stacked up outside the reception area. A few were standing; some were sitting in chairs; most were sprawled out on the floor. There had to be at least a dozen patients waiting to be seen, and all of them seemed to be coughing. Half didn’t have their N-95 masks on.
Shit!
David grumbled. Things were going from bad to worse.

He made his way through the mass of humanity, stepping over bodies and trying to avoid their outstretched arms and legs. The reception area was packed as well. People were lying on the floor side by side, squeezed in like sardines. Finally he reached the examining tables. Sol Wyman was on one, Will Harrison on the other. Marilyn was still crying over her dead son’s body. Off in a corner, Arthur Maggio was slumped down on a metal stool, his eyes closed, his arms hanging down by his sides. David couldn’t tell if he was sick or simply asleep.

Carolyn hurried up to his side. “It’s a madhouse down here! It’s turned into absolute bedlam.”

“So I see,” David said, now noticing more sick people sitting on the floor beside the examining tables. “Couldn’t you move any of these people back to their rooms?”

“It’s the goddamn crew!” Carolyn erupted disgustedly. “They won’t help transport the patients back to their cabins. They’re afraid to even touch the gurneys and wheelchairs.”

“Did you tell them that if they’re masked and gloved, they’d be safe?”

“I tried, but they wouldn’t listen,” Carolyn said wearily. “They see death coming, and they want to stay as far away from it as possible. And there’s a definite mean streak running through them as well.”

“I’ll try to come up with a way to change their minds,” David said, remembering a basic tenet in mob control. Find their leader and persuade him. The others will follow. “Is there a member that the others seem to listen to?”

Carolyn nodded. “A tough-looking Asian, with angry eyes and big muscles. I’ll bet he spends a lot of time working out.”

“I’ll talk to him.” David’s gaze drifted over to Sol Wyman, whose skin color looked good despite his noisy respirations. “How is Sol doing?”

“He seems to be holding his own, but that probably won’t last,” Carolyn replied, then shook her head sadly. “Every time Sol coughs, poor Marilyn says she wants to die with him.”

“The way things are going, she’ll soon have her wish.” David gestured with his head toward the elderly ship’s doctor, who was asleep on a metal stool. “And what about Maggio?”

“I think he’s drunk.”

David grumbled under his breath. Now the old man would be in the way and totally useless.

The air was suddenly filled with a loud cacophony of coughs and groans and moans. Someone had a throat full of sputum, and it seemed to take forever for him to clear it. Again David noticed that over half the patients either weren’t wearing their N-95 masks or had them on improperly.

“Let me see if I can move this crowd out,” he said and walked to the space between the reception area and the examining room. Raising his voice so that it would carry into the passageway, David addressed the ever-growing group. “Let me have your attention, please! My name is David Ballineau and, for better or worse, I’m the lead physician down here. Now you must follow my instructions or I won’t be able to look after you, and you’ll continue to just lie on the floor, which can’t be very comfortable.”

“We need to be in a hospital,” a hoarse voice cried out.

“We don’t have a hospital, so we’re going to have to make do,” David said firmly. “Now I want you to do exactly as I tell you. All of you must return to your cabins immediately. When you leave, give us your name and cabin number, and we’ll arrange for someone to come by and examine you. That way, you’ll all be seen much quicker and be given medicines to ease your symptoms.”

The coughing started once more and seemed even louder than before. Gradually it subsided and some of the sick struggled to their feet and staggered down the passageway. But most of the patients
stayed in place, either unwilling or unable to walk back to their cab
ins.

Carolyn came up alongside David and said in a low voice, “I’ll bet they’d leave if we had deckhands to help them into wheelchairs and gurneys.”

“Yeah, but we don’t.”

“So what do we do?”

“Pass out Motrin and Tylenol pills and keep reminding them of the soft mattresses awaiting them in their cabins,” David advised. “They’ll eventually become tired of lying on a hard floor.”

“God!” Carolyn breathed. “They must be absolutely terrified.”

“So are we,” David said. “It’s just that we know how to hide it.”

Marilyn Wyman’s sobs grew louder. She kept repeating, “No,
God! Please, no!” The sick people on the floor around her didn’t appear to notice the grief-stricken woman or, if they did, they didn’t
seem to care. Every person for themselves, David thought. It was always that way when it came to survival. Except for mothers. They would kill for their young, and die for them if necessary.

David sighed deeply and, stepping over people, moved to Marilyn’s side. He placed a hand on her shoulder and waited for her to look up. “In a little while, we’ll move Will to his cabin, if it’s all right with you.”

Marilyn nodded, her eyes puffy and bloodshot above the N-95 mask she wore. “I’ll want to go with him.”