The Brain Eaters, page 11
Some of the names Corey recognized. They were men he had laughed with, drunk beer with, and argued sports with. Two of them had bowled on the tavern team. One had gone to pieces while digging in the garden and had attacked neighbors with a shovel. The other had started screaming suddenly at the dinner table. While his horrified family watched, he picked up his two-year-old daughter and threw her against the wall. The man was being held in the violent ward of the Milwaukee county jail. The little girl was in critical condition, with possible brain damage.
“Damn, damn, damn!” Corey said under his breath.
“Pretty bad,” Doc Ingersoll agreed.
Corey rose and started for the city room. “I’ve got to get busy.”
Doc Ingersoll glanced down at the scattered wire copy. “Somebody you know?”
“What? Oh, yeah, slightly.”
“Sorry,” Doc said. “You going out to see them?”
“Later,” Corey said. “I’ve got to get on the phone now.”
Ingersoll took a deep drag and coughed for several seconds. “I presume you’re not calling to comfort the widows and orphans.”
Corey threw a look back over his shoulder. “You want to be Mother Teresa, you go ahead. I’m a working reporter, and this is a story, Doc. This is a capital-S story, and it’s right in my lap.”
The older reporter watched through a curtain of smoke from his smoldering butt as Corey hurried out.
• • •
At his desk in the city room, Corey matched the names of the victims that were mentioned in the wire stories against the telephone book and came up with a list of numbers. He also noted the names of the hospitals where they were taken and added the police and any government agency he thought might be involved. When he was through, he had a pageful of telephone numbers.
He started with the families and friends of the victims. Few of them were willing to talk to the press, but those who were told chillingly similar stories. The victims had shown no abnormal traits in the past. They were usually healthy and in the prime of life. Only during the past week had they displayed any symptoms of illness. Those included a rash or mild infection of some sore on the skin, a brief flulike period of low fever and aching joints, and finally the headache.
Corey scribbled rapid notes as he talked, coaxing answers out of bewildered, grief-stricken people. All part of the job, he reminded himself. At least he wasn’t jamming a microphone into their faces.
When he came to a break in his list, he dashed back to the wire room for late input and took a few minutes to plot the reported cases on a map of the United States. It was clear that the attacks were clustered around three population centers — Milwaukee, New York, and Seattle. There were stories of scattered incidents in other parts of the country, including the wild man on the airliner. That one, however, could be counted as New York, since that was the originating point of the flight.
Next Corey went after the hospitals. From them he got little information. Victims who were not killed during their violent seizure had to be put under restraints. No, the patients were not in any condition to be interviewed. No, the hospital authorities were not prepared to offer any theories on what had happened to the people. No, they did not want to talk to him later.
Probably waiting until a camera crew showed up so they could be on television, Corey thought irritably.
Without much hope, he went on to the last batch of numbers on his list — the various governmental health agencies. He got only brusque negatives from the city, county, and state. Finally, he was put through to a U.S. assistant secretary of Health and Human Services in Washington.
“Yes, I’ve heard the reports,” the assistant secretary told Corey when the connection was finally made.
“I’d like your comment,” Corey said.
“I don’t see that there’s anything to comment on at this point in time.”
“We are talking about the same thing, aren’t we? The sudden violent attacks on people here in Milwaukee and on both coasts?”
“Well, now, we’re not convinced that there is anything statistically abnormal in the situation.”
“I have the reports right here in front of me,” Corey said, fighting to control his rising irritation. “There are at least twenty reported cases so far, and more coming in every hour.”
“Twenty hardly seems to be excessive. Over any given twenty-four-hour period I can show you figures that would suggest a raging epidemic of anything from measles to bone cancer.”
“We’re not talking measles here,” Corey said. “We’re talking about perfectly healthy people who suddenly go crazy. Do you know how many dead there are?”
“I’ve heard reports. Unconfirmed, I hasten to add.”
“You said epidemic a minute ago. Are you willing to call this an epidemic?”
“Nothing of the sort,” the assistant secretary said quickly. “I was merely using the analogy to make my point.”
“Which is?”
“That the data we have is insufficient basis for any conclusions.”
“At this point in time,” Corey said sarcastically.
“Exactly,” said the assistant secretary, missing the inflection.
“How many of these violent seizures will it take before the government admits that something unusual is happening?”
“That’s a speculative question that I can hardly be expected to answer.”
“Then the Department of Health and Human Services has an official ‘no comment’?”
“I have not been appointed spokesperson for the department.”
“My call was put through to you.”
“I happened to be in my office when your call came in. My field is personnel administration.”
“All right, no official quotes. Do you have any private theories?
“I can think of one possibility. Mass hysteria.”
“You’re not serious.”
“Of course I’m serious. Do you remember a couple of years ago when we had the big AIDS panic?”
“As I recall, quite a few of those people who thought they had AIDS really did,” Corey said.
“My point is that a whole lot more people did not. Here we have a few isolated cases of aberrant behavior in scattered sections of the country. You people of the media scramble to report them, and immediately healthy individuals everywhere start feeling the symptoms. It’s called the medical students’ syndrome. Show them an exotic set of symptoms and immediately a good percentage will start suffering them. Mass hypochondria, if you like.”
“Is that for publication?”
“Absolutely not,” The suave tone of the assistant secretary wavered. “You asked me for a private opinion, and that’s it. As far as the Department of Health and Human Services is concerned, the situation has not officially been brought to our attention.”
“Goddamit, that’s what I’m trying to do,” Corey yelled into the phone. “If you’re not going to talk to me, then put on somebody who will.”
“I’ll give you back to the switchboard,” said the assistant secretary. “They’ll connect you with our chief of public relations.”
“Shit!” Corey banged the telephone back into the cradle and sat glaring at it like some loathsome animal.
• • •
“How’s it shaping up?” Doc Ingersoll wheeled a wooden swivel chair over next to Corey’s desk and dropped into it. He laid down another sheaf of wire copy, scattering a light coating of cigarette ash as he did so.
“Nobody will admit anything,” Corey said. “The victims who are still alive are in no condition to talk. Relatives and friends are bewildered. Hospital officials aren’t saying anything. The Department of Health and Human Services does not admit that a problem exists.”
“Sounds like you’re on to something.”
“Bet your ass I am.” Corey consulted his notes. “For some reason, people are going suddenly, violently insane. The only link I have so far is geographical. The victims are adults of both sexes, and all races, as near as I can make out.”
“Not quite true,” said Ingersoll. “What do you mean?”
The gaunt reporter leafed through the sheets he had brought with him, pulled out a page of AP copy, and handed it to Corey.
The story had a Long Island dateline. It told of an eight-year-old boy who was being kept in bed, suffering severe headaches. Suddenly and without warning, the child had run screaming into his parents’ bedroom and attacked his mother. By the time the father, with the help of several neighbors, could pull the child off, the woman had been blinded.
The boy was taken to a nearby hospital, where powerful sedatives proved ineffective. He was subsequently placed in restraints “for his own safety.” Doctors could offer no explanation for the attack. The father reported that the family had witnessed a berserk cabdriver plow into a crowd of pedestrians a week earlier, but the incident had not seemed to affect the boy.
Corey looked up at Doc Ingersoll. “Kids, too.”
“So it would appear.”
Corey yanked the plastic dust cover off his typewriter. “Let me know if anything else comes in.”
“Will do.” Ingersoll pushed himself up out of the chair, coughed, and headed back toward the wire-service room.
After a quick check of his notes Corey spun a sheet of copy paper into the machine and began to type. He was working on the third page when he heard a gurgling sound close to his ear. He turned his head and saw the overhanging stomach of Porter Uhlander.
“Didn’t expect to see you here so early, Corey,” the editor said.
“Why not? It’s a working day.”
“You aren’t due in until noon.”
“Doc Ingersoll got hold of me early,” Corey said without breaking the rhythm of his typing.
“Ingersoll?”
Corey nodded. He wished the man would go away and let him work.
“I, uh, was wondering if you’d decided about the Houston job.”
The clatter of the machine stopped. Corey looked up into the jowly face of the editor. “Houston? Are you kidding?”
“I’m not trying to rush you, Corey, but I’ll have to make some staff changes and — ”
“Porter, don’t you know what’s happening?”
“I don’t follow you.”
“The Stransky story. My story. It’s blowing up into something really big, and I’m sitting right on top of it.”
Uhlander looked pained. “Mr. Eichorn specifically said he didn’t want any more play of the Stransky thing.”
Corey grabbed a handful of wire copy and shoved it at the editor. “For Christ’s sake, read this.”
Uhlander took the sheets reluctantly and read for about fifteen seconds. “Well, um, it does look like there may be something here.”
“May be? May be? Porter, this story could make me. Make the Herald. By tomorrow it will be in every sheet in the country. And on TV. But we’ll own it, because we got it first. The rest of the world will come to the Herald to find out what’s going on. How does that grab you?”
“Don’t you think you’re making more of this than it is?”
“If I am, it will be forgotten in a week. But if I’m right, and this thing grows — Porter, I’ve been waiting a long time for this. Don’t try to slow me down.”
The editor returned the pages of wire copy to Corey’s desk. “Before I make any commitments, I want to talk to Mr. Eichorn about it.”
“You do that,” Corey said, resuming his attack on the typewriter. “In the meantime, you might get makeup to leave me a nice hole on page one.”
Porter Uhlander turned and walked heavily toward his office. His stomach rumbled.
Chapter 13
Dena Falkner spent an uneasy weekend. By Friday she was having second thoughts about her promise to Dr. Kitzmiller that she would say nothing about the accidental spraying from the Biotron helicopter and about what happened to Stuart Anderson. Kitzmiller’s forceful personality had blunted the resolve she had built up when she went in to see him, but once out of his aura, her doubts grew.
The night visit of Lloyd Bratz to her house was fresh in her memory. She could not forget the haunted look in his eyes or the appalling story he told of the events in the Biotron infirmary.
Hoping to give her nerves a rest, Dena left the office early Friday and drove north to Shawano Lake where she rented a cabin. There, with no radio and no newspaper, she tried to tune herself into nature and forget for a little while the world’s man-made troubles. Early Saturday morning, and again on Sunday, she had rowed out onto the lake and drifted there, watching the fishermen in the other boats.
Always in the past a mini-vacation like that at the lake had refreshed her. This time it did not work. By Sunday evening her nerves were strung tighter than ever.
Now, Monday morning, she walked into her office at the Biotron plant with a gnawing premonition that bad news awaited her. Things began to go wrong almost immediately.
The first thing she noticed was that the agenda for the Monday meeting was not on her desk. The Monday meeting was a ritual at Biotron, with representatives from all operational departments taking part. The agenda was always waiting on the desks of the participants when they came in on Monday. Not this Monday.
The point was not that the meeting was so vitally important. Seldom was anything discussed that could not be handled in the normal course of daily business, but the meeting gave a certain structure to the week, and it allowed the participants to clear away the weekend’s cobwebs before tackling new problems.
Dena picked up the phone to call Jimmy Lohnes, the division PR man who usually brightened the meetings with his sardonic humor. She punched out Jimmy’s three-digit extension and heard nothing but the crackle of static for a full fifteen seconds before there was a click and an unfamiliar voice answered.
“Switchboard.”
“I was trying to get five-three-one.”
“Sorry, but there’s a glitch in the PBX, and we have to route the calls manually. It would happen on the day we’re shorthanded for technicians.”
“Isn’t that always the way,” Dena commented.
“Murphy’s law. What was that number again?”
“Five-three-one.”
The instrument buzzed in her ear, and the voice of Jimmy’s secretary answered.
“Mr. Lohnes’s office.”
“Hi, Adele, is Jimmy in yet?”
“Oh, hi, Dena. No, he called in sick this morning. Flu or something. Anything I can answer for you?”
“I just wondered if he got his meeting agenda. Mine wasn’t delivered.”
“Uh-uh,” said the secretary. “The messenger hasn’t been around yet. Some problem in the mail room, I guess.”
“Typical Monday. Thanks, Adele.”
Dena hung up and doodled aimlessly on her calendar pad. No big deal. They would have the meeting without an agenda; that was all. It wouldn’t matter much, but the small break in routine troubled her for some reason she could not name. It was like an itch that was just out of her reach.
Carol Denker, with whom Dena shared the small office, had not come in yet. Carol was never late. It was yet another deviation from the normal day. As the junior in their section, Carol did not have to attend the meetings, but she and Dena habitually took coffee breaks together, swapping complaints about the quality of the company coffee and anything else that popped into their heads. Now Dena would have to have her first cup of the morning alone. It was one more small annoyance.
She walked out of her office and through the open bay to the coffee machine. She dropped in her quarter and walked back with the plastic cup of steaming brew. She thought the office seemed unusually quiet. The muted jiggety-jiggety of the Selectric typewriters was softer than usual, and the voices of the young Biotron employees who sat out in the bay were subdued.
Dena went back in and sat down at her desk. She sipped gingerly at the hot coffee and idly scanned the desks outside through her glass partition. She frowned, put down the plastic coffee cup, and leaned forward.
No wonder it was quieter that day. There were a lot of people missing out there. One desk of four was unoccupied.
A chilling thought hit her. She picked up the phone and punched out the extension for personnel. After another delay through the manual switchboard, she heard Personnel Manager Ian McCollough answer the phone himself.
“Hello, McCollough here.”
“Hi. Dena Falkner.”
“Hi. How are you? Excuse the confusion, but I’m all alone here. Secretary and receptionist both out sick. Must be something going around.”
“That’s what I was wondering. Are there a lot of people out today?”
“About twenty-five to thirty percent absenteeism,” McCollough said. “Every department’s understaffed. Have you heard if we’re having the Monday meeting?”
“I don’t know,” Dena said. “Did you get your agenda?”
“Negative. I’ll have to miss it anyway, with no one to answer the phone here. Look, I’ve got to go. All my lines are flashing.”
Dena slowly hung up the instrument. Now she was getting worried. The unusual absenteeism that morning might be a coincidence, but she did not think so. It was time for another talk with Dr. Kitzmiller. This time she would not let him put her off the track.
She picked up the phone once more, listened to sixty seconds of crackles and beeps, and dropped it back into the cradle. It would be better handled in person, anyway. She walked out of her cubicle and left the building, heading for Kitzmiller’s office. Not the “friendly” office but the spartan quarters back by the laboratories, where he did his real work.
A security guard sat at the receptionist’s desk outside the unmarked office door. He stood up when Dena approached and moved casually between her and the closed door.
“Can I help you?”
“I’d like to see Dr. Kitzmiller.”
“Sorry, the doctor’s not available.”
“Would you tell him I’m here, please? Dr. Dena Falkner.”
“Sorry, Dr. K was very explicit. He’s not available to anybody.”
Dena looked at the closed door, then back at the impassive guard. “He is in there?”
