Taji's Syndrome (27 page)

“Just a moment, Missus Ross,” said the operator at the medical center when Susan had identified herself.

“This is long distance!” Susan barked.

“Just a moment,” the operator reiterated.

By the time Harper picked up the phone three minutes later, Susan had worked herself into a thunderous rage.

“Susan? Is anything wro—”

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, sending that two-faced bugger down here?” She was shocked by her scream and she made herself speak more evenly. “If this is your idea of being a good father, then you have real problems, Harper.”

“Jeff Taji was there?” Harper said.

“You signed the papers for him: you know damn well he was here. What are you playing at, Harper? Isn’t it enough that we’ve lost one son? You’re like one of those neurotics who pick open a wound as soon as it scabs over, and make it bigger and bigger and bigger each time. Let Kevin rest in peace and let us get on with our lives. Keep out of that cesspool.”

“Is that how you see it?” Harper asked, pain in his voice.

“That’s what it is,” she corrected him sternly.

“Susan, I know you don’t believe this, but there is nothing I want more than for us to be able to put Kevin’s death behind us, and for the family to get on. I swear to God that’s what I want.”

“Liar.”

He paused, making himself ignore her accusation. “We can’t get on with our lives with this hanging over us. We need to get questions answered or they’ll haunt us forever.”

“You’re not convincing me, Professor,” she said with deliberate malice. “You’re playing Sherlock-Holmes-meets-Jonas-Salk. You’re exploiting Kevin and the rest of us.”

“I don’t mean to do that,” said Harper, afraid that outright denial would close the door. “I don’t want TS to claim any more victims. It’s had too many already. I have to do something to help stop it, or I’ll never forgive myself. I wish you could believe that, Susan.”

“It’s a touching justification,” she said sarcastically. “I thought for years that I knew you. I used to think how lucky I was to have a husband I could understand. But it wasn’t so. You’re a stranger, Harper. You’re some foreigner who wandered into my life in my husband’s skin and I don’t know what to do about it.”

Harper remembered how he had felt in the one serious accident he had had in college, when his motorcycle careened off a center divider and flung him into a lightpole. The anguish in him now was more inescapable, more intense than the broken femur and three broken ribs had been. “Susan, please.”

“They tell me you’re going to do a test series again. Don’t you get tired of it?” She hung up before he could say anything more, but the surge of victory eluded her, and she wandered back to the living room to watch the gardeners wrestle with the roses.

—Corwen Blair and Maximillian Klausen—

Whenever Corwen Blair sensed he was at a loss, he would stand in front of the wall where his autographed photographs and sealed testimonials were displayed. He stood there now, his shoulders squared and his jaw firm as he faced his unwelcome visitor. “You don’t know how impossible that is.”

“No, I don’t,” said Max, coughing once. “I only give up on impossible things. I’m not giving up on this.”

“We can’t possibly issue such an order.”

“You saw Aaron Post last night. You heard what half the country heard. You know that we’re”—he interrupted himself—“Do you mind if I sit down? I’m running on five hours’ sleep for the last thirty-six and I’m tired.”

“Of course, of course,” said Corwen unctuously. “The chair by the window is the most comfortable.”

“Thanks.” Max slumped into it. “Aaron Post has about six weeks left, assuming he follows the usual curve. You say that you don’t want a panic in your schools, and that there is no guarantee of cooperation from other states.” He cleared his throat. “There’s no guarantee of non-cooperation, either.”

“Doctor Klausen, you’re behaving as if I were the enemy, not the disease. I am only trying to discharge my responsibilities to the best of my ability and with the greatest good served.” He rocked back on his heels. “I have to answer to Governor Cooper as I am sure you are aware. The Governor has always put public safety as his highest concern. I can’t help but think that I would be remiss if I contributed to the sense of panic that has already begun. I think it would be best if we took a moderate course during this time.”

“Which says a shitload of nothing,” Max responded in his most polite tone of voice.

“That’s offensive,” said Blair.

“It was meant to be.
You’re
offensive. You stink, Doctor Blair. We’re in the middle of a disease outbreak that might well be potentially as damaging as AIDS, and you’re thinking politics as usual. Well, it won’t fadge, Blair. You have work to do and whether or not you want to do it, you will.” He broke off, his hand over his mouth. When he spoke again, his voice was low. “My wife died of TS. Died of it, Doctor Blair. One of my oldest friends and his wife died of it. You have less than six quarantine beds left in the State of Idaho, and you don’t want to contribute to panic.” He laced his hands together. “Oh. One more thing. I have TS. It isn’t at the critical state yet, but I have it, and unless we achieve a major breakthrough, I’ll be dead before August.”

“A-a-a-hg,” went Blair.

“You’re one who has said that since the disease is triggered by the environment, it isn’t communicable in the accepted sense and therefore there is nothing to worry’ about. I have that right, don’t I?”

Blair had taken a step back and smacked his shoulders into the wall. “Don’t you think you’re being unwise?” he asked in an effort to regain his position with Max.

“How do you mean?” Max inquired innocently.

“In your condition, you ought to be under care, not running around, possibly increasing the risk of others.” He put his hand to his throat, a curiously feminine gesture.

“I’m doing this because it’s all I can do. There aren’t any more quarantine beds in Oregon, even if I wanted one. We’re asking the military to let us use two of their hospitals, but so far no luck.” He stared calmly at Blair. “So what is it going to be? Are you going to help me? Are you going to contact the Departments of Health in Utah, Wyoming, Nevada and Montana, or are you going to sit on your ass?”

“I haven’t the authority . . . I—”

“But you’ve said you have authority. Or is it that you have it when you refuse to use it, but don’t when you do use it?” He let his smile widen. “Do you enjoy your impotence?”

Blair straightened up once more. “I refuse to become embroiled in a multi-state dispute. If you are truly as concerned as you imply—”

“I’m as concerned as I can be and still be alive,” interjected Max.

“—then you’ll bend your efforts toward a change in national policy instead of this . . . this piecemeal approach to the problem.” He had the satisfaction of feeling indignant.

“We’re working on a national change,” said Max evenly. “But that takes time. We haven’t got that. So we’re working on our own as well. By the way, did you know that there have been over one hundred new cases of TS reported in Idaho in the last seven days?”

“ . . . I . . . over one hundred?”

“I think it’s one hundred eight, but I could be mistaken.” He leaned back, his gaze directed now to the patterned ceiling. “We’re asking the Canadians to help us. They’re pretty upset about the cases in Alberta and Saskatchewan. I don’t blame them.”

“But surely there’s no link . . . This is an environmental disease. The SPSBS show that. It makes no sense that the . . . that anyone would think that—”

“We’ve assumed all along that the disease was environmental, either cumulative or having an environmental/biological trigger. In either case, it fell under the environmental division. But it doesn’t change the fact that something is transmitting the disease and that the vast majority of the cases are in the western half of the United States, and that more than sixty percent of those cases are on the West Coast.” He paused and then reminded Blair: “Neither Alberta nor Saskatchewan are in the United States, nor are they on the West Coast. That might be called indicative. Given the pattern we’ve seen.”

“Given the pattern we’ve seen,” Blair said with ponderous emphasis to make his point, “this is an almost classic outbreak of environmental toxic disease. The areas of outbreak are specific and limited, the spread beyond the area of contamination is slow and the disease is more properly a syndrome, in this case one that disrupts blood and brain chemistry. Now you say that you have doubts and you think there might be other factors.”

“Yes,” Max said, determined not to be distracted from his purpose by Blair’s condescending attitude.

“You mean that the trigger is communicative,” said Blair at his surliest.

“That seems likely,” said Max. “The ironic thing is,” he went on in a distant, amused tone, “that from the first we’ve quarantined the patients with TS, not for our safety, but for
their
safety. We didn’t want to introduce anything that might make the disease worse. Could be that the precaution was as much for us as for them.”

“You’re looking for explanations for your own disease. Why is it impossible that you have reached the level of toxin necessary to trigger the disease?” Blair folded his arms and watched Max without sympathy. “I am sorry for your misfortune, but I will not be party to the kind of deception you propose.”

Max turned on Blair, no longer willing to keep his temper. “That is the most self-serving, the
shittiest
thing I’ve heard all week! Jesus H. Christ! You don’t get it, do you? You won’t let yourself see it.”

“If you mean that I refuse to box with shadows, then I agree. I don’t like your attitude or your choice of words and I am not going to give in to either.” His voice had got louder.

“You’re irresponsible and dangerous, and I am going to stop that. I can’t permit you to continue this way, Doctor Blair. You’re indulging your ego at the cost of human lives: that’s going to end.” He strode to the door, his big, knobby hands seizing the knob as if to crush the brass. “You are placing the people of your state at risk, and I won’t allow that.”

Blair stared at him. “You’re overreacting.”

“The hell I am!” Max shouted as he flung out of the room and crashed the door closed behind him. He hastened down the hall toward the office occupied by Dien Paniagua. He was breathing hard; his ears rang and he felt lightheaded. For an instant he fought down the dread that TS was catching up with him sooner than he had thought it would. He put out his hand and braced himself in the open doorway, forcing himself to calm down, to breathe normally, to put Corwen Blair out of his thoughts.

“Doctor Klausen,” said Dien as she came out of her office. She sounded hoarse and her eyes showed fatigue and worry but she did her best to make him welcome. “I wasn’t sure you were here.”

“Until tomorrow, then on to Boise.” He disguised his panting with a breathless laugh. “When I was in college there was a foreign student—from Belgium—who wanted to have a look at the U.S. So he got one of those bus tickets and rode around for two weeks. He said the strangest place he found was Boise, which he pronounced
bwahs,
as if it were French.”

Dien dutifully joined his laughter, but it did not reach her wary eyes. “You’ve had a call from a Doctor Picknor in Dallas. It has to do with the TS investigation. He asked that you return his call as soon as possible.”

“Picknor?” Max repeated, trying to place the name. He was more in control of himself now and he indicated her office. “Did he say what he wants?”

“He said he’s working with one of the survivors of TS. He wanted to get some information on your investigation from you. He mentioned he has already spoken with Doctor Taji.” She stood aside so that he could enter the office. “If you want to be private, I have some work to do in the lab downstairs. I’ll be back in the next hour.”

“Thank you,” Max said, gratefully sinking into her chair and steadying himself with his arms on her desk. He let the shivering pass through him before he attempted to concentrate. They were becoming more frequent, he realized, those moments of sudden weakness and chill, like the onset of the flu. A week ago it had happened only twice; now it occurred at least four times daily. He thrust these depressing thoughts from his mind. “Note, note, note,” he whispered as he examined the various stacks of paper on Dien’s desk, while trying not to pry.

The note was on the top of a stack of printouts, and he read it as if deciphering code. “Doctor Paniagua?” he called, but received no answer. He picked up the note and reached for the telephone, dialing the 214 area code as soon as he got the tone for an outside line.

Ten minutes later, Wendell Picknor was talking to him. “Well, yes,” he said when Max introduced himself. “I’ve been hoping you’d reach me before suppertime, Klausen. I see from the records transmitted from there that a Coach James Jackson appears to have survived TS. What do you know about him?”

“I haven’t checked,” said Max honestly.

“Well, I would appreciate anything you can tell me. So far, my only patient to survive is Missus Channing, and there are some rather . . . surprising developments in her case.” His voice had taken on a note of caution.

“How do you mean, surprising developments?” Max had heard the rumors that TS could cure anything from warts to heart disease if you survived it; he had expected something of the sort and so was not annoyed at these myths.

“I mean that Missus Channing is . . . How secure is that line?”

“About average, I would say,” Max said, intrigued and irritated at the secrecy that Picknor showed.

“Not safe enough,” Picknor muttered. “All right, hang up and go to the sixth floor of that building and request to use Doctor Dawson’s office. I’ll arrange it. Sybil owes me one.” With this cryptic comment, he hung up.

Max sighed as he put the phone down. Slowly he stood and made his way to the elevators. He wanted to get some sleep, he wanted to feel some strength in his body again. As he rode to the sixth floor, he tried to decide what Doctor Wendell Picknor wanted of him that required some kind of increased security.