|jft had been a jarring revelation. Palardy never thought imself as a criminal, couldn’t have felt more differ- from Quiros. And to realize they had that in corn- realize they would go to equal lengths to protect 5lves… Jarring as hell.
|l^alardy was aware he was the only link between En Quiros and Roger Gordian. Eliminate him, and the would be cut. This had come to him right there in ^cruise ship terminal parking lot. Before parting ways
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with Quiros, he’d raised his fears indirectly and asked how he was supposed to know that exposure to the contents of the ampule wouldn’t have some terrible effect on him. And Quiros had spent several minutes explaining that the liquid was harmless in itself, the final ingredient of a biological recipe unique to the individual being dosed. Without every one of the other precise ingredients in your makeup, there was nothing to fear. You could consume a gallon of the stuff, and it wouldn’t have any effect.
Palardy had no trouble grasping the general concept. He’d followed developments in genetic research in the news, read plenty of magazine articles. Moreover, UpLink International had owned one of the major gene- tech firms until its downsizing maybe a year ago, still retaining a stake in the company, and Palardy had been chummy with some of the people who worked there. So he was knowledgeable enough about their research to understand that Quiros’s reassurances had been worthless. Because the recipe was only as unique as the person brewing it up chose for it to be. Imagine he wanted to get rid of everybody with brown hair, or some other feature shared by an untold number of people. What would that do to the mortality rate of those exposed to his “final ingredient”? Wouldn’t that make it more of a final solution?
And there was another part of Quiros’s explanation that Palardy had sensed was intentionally misleading. If he wanted to talk about the agent being tailored to a person’s inherited traits, fine. But how was Palardy to be sure Quiros hadn’t had somebody get hold of his genetic diagram for that very purpose? Pluck a few hairs from his comb, some dead skin from his shower floor?
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into his apartment and contaminate his orange bottled water, or cold cuts with a few millimeters trigger formulated especially for the genetic cake called Don Palardy? How was he to be sure?
iy sank back against the sofa cushions and lis- to the sound of his own labored breathing. This ning, when he’d phoned in sick to work, his inten- had been to call the doctor next. But the thoughts ling around his brain had made him decide against : him petrified of doing it, in fact. If he’d caught linary bug, it would eventually run its course. Yet ; symptoms were being caused by a virus or bacteria Rented in a laboratory, some microbe the doctors i’t identify, his sole hope of staying alive would i reveal what he knew about it. And even assuming tcould figure out some way to withhold how he knew : he did, when his disease was found to be the same f, Roger Gordian had contracted, it would inevitably to questions he’d be unable to slip. Then he’d be cated in a murder, the first of its kind, his name up somewhere in infamy with Lee Harvey Oswald. i he’d be as dead as Oswald, too.
face pale and sweaty, his body aching, Palardy his eyes. There had to be something he could Bge. Something he could do to get back at Quiros in he’d been duped. Used and discarded. Maybe he getting carried away with himself, and everything i turn out okay. But just in case, just in case, there 1 to be something … nd then, suddenly, it crossed his mind that there was.
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SIXTEEN
VARIOUS LOCALES NOVEMBER 15, 2001
when roger gordian’s personal physician, dr.
Elliot Lieberman, reviewed his case report Tuesday morning, he was left puzzled and dismayed.
Gordian was undoubtedly a sick man, but the cause of his illness was a mystery. The flulike symptoms that hospitalized him Sunday afternoon had shown an appreciable improvement soon after his admission, continued along that positive trend throughout Monday, and then had taken a sharp, unexpected downturn over the past several hours. At around midnight he’d called the duty nurse to his room because of renewed difficulty breathing, chills, and a stabbing headache severe enough to have awakened him from sleep. His temperature had spiked to 103ø, its highest since his arrival in the ER, and at last reading hadn’t dropped from that elevated mark. And although his respiratory distress was relieved by oxygen given through a face mask, Lieberman had heard a threadiness in his exhalations during a stethoscopic exam he’d performed a couple of hours ago, and
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liately ordered an X-ray series, which showed onary shadows that hadn’t been evident in radio- die images taken the previous day-a typical sign buildup in the lungs. Lieberman asked for ad- pictures at twice-daily intervals and regular upon Gordian’s condition, thinking that any further i would likely require his patient be transferred to Btensive care unit. Then he had retreated to his of- jito examine the charts and laboratory results.
bewildering thing was that the early suspicion of nza had been ruled out, as had its most serious lication, viral pneumonia. A rapid-culture nasal test to detect A and B type flu antigens-molec- ‘ components of the viral strains that stimulated de- ive reactions by the body-had shown the ens to be negative. A second type of quick di- tic on a mucus sample from Gordian’s throat pro- identical results within twenty minutes. Both is were considered 99 percent reliable, an analytiScertainty for all intents and purposes.
ing with frustration, Lieberman sat leafing l the papers on his desk for the third time, seeking !?clues he might have missed. His grandmother, rest soul, could have catalogued Gordian’s symptoms a touch to his forehead and a look down his inI, blistered throat with a flashlight, instructing him en wide in Yiddish. And despite the framed sheep- and certificates on his office wall, Lieberman’s ent insight into his condition went little deeper than . Examination of Gordian’s blood under a microscope t eliminated the common bacterial pneumonias-priily pneumococcal, but also staphylococcal, and the rarer Legionella strains responsible for Legion247
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naires’ disease. There was no sign of related chlamydial and mycoplasmal organisms. The serological workup had shown a raised level of lymphocytes, the white helper cells in the bloodstream that responded to an attack by foreign microbes. This was basically confirmation of Grandma’s home diagnostic method-clinical evidence that infection was present and the immune system was sending out scent hounds to scout for antigens, just as the swab tests had done. But while the lymphocytes were evidence that a virus was breeding inside Gordian, they would do nothing to establish its identity.
Lieberman had checked San Jose Mercy’s databases for similar undiagnosed cases reported within the last forty-eight hours and found none. An expansion of his computer search to include the past week, then the past month, also drew blanks. He had next contacted associates at nearby hospitals by phone to see whether they might have recently encountered anything that resembled Gordian’s illness. Again, nothing. However, something had to be done to find out what Gordian was up against. His body was at war with a stealth invader and clearly nagging in its battle. Unless and until its identity was specified, an effective course of medical treatment to aid him would be impossible.
Lieberman inhaled, exhaled. He ought to know what he was confronting here, and he did not. That alarmed him tremendously. He needed to consult with someone who could provide some guidance and specialized expertise.
Lieberman lifted the receiver off his phone to get the chair of the virology department on the line but then decided that call could wait a bit and hung up without punching in his extension. There was another person he
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to speak to first. One of his oldest friends and agues, Eric Oh was an epidemiologist with the Cal- health department who had performed some of principal research on molecular methods for the itification of unrecognized and emerging pathogens been a celebrated virus hunter for the Centers for : Control in Atlanta before marrying a hometown I who’d insisted he stop fiddling with BL4 pathogens, I move back West to settle down. It was a downright ch of protocol to involve Eric before consulting with iiior departmental head in this hospital. And the cri- i that would normally warrant contacting government cials-a cluster of reported cases distinguished by ams akin to Gordian’s or data suggesting a full- (e outbreak of an infectious disease in the commu- -were absent. A single patient with an ailment that stumped his humble general practitioner for less forty-eight hours did not constitute a public health i, even if that patient was somebody of Roger Gor- i’s prominence. Jut Lieberman was getting gut radar signals. The kind grew to credit more and more with age and expe- And insofar as he was concerned, an informal ng of the minds with Eric could hardly be consid- reproachful professional conduct. |His lips compressed to a barely visible stitch on his careworn face, Lieberman retrieved Eric’s phone from his pocket organizer and once again ched for the telephone.