I winced.
He said, ‘An ugly word, and not just terminology. Yet when you’ve seen them… it is a word that caught on quite easily, amongst the guards and attendants, at first… until even the doctors use it. I use it. You…’ He looked at me with a hint of a smile. ‘You, no doubt, will use it in your story…’
‘You know who I am, then?’
‘… if you ever get to write it.’
No threat was intended in his words — no threat from him. I puffed and smoke flowed laterally across the table, crossing the lamp like clouds shredding before the face of the moon.
I said, ‘How soon must the antidote be administered?’
Larsen looked as if he didn’t understand the question. His thin lips drew back from his teeth and he snapped the light off. From the sudden shadows, he said, ‘Not my field… I only know we have to have them before the damned thing takes effect. And…’ he looked at his watch. ‘I don’t guess we’re going to do it.’
He stood up and moved around the end of the table.
‘I have things to arrange,’ he told me. ‘Will you wait here? They may bring a few more in before it’s too late.’
‘Of course,’ I said.
He nodded and walked out. The guard saluted. I heard his footsteps drum hollow down the corridor and I didn’t envy him his task… the arrangements he must make.
My pipe had gone out.
I struck a match and relit it and, as if that flare had been a signal, the guard on the door turned and stepped into the room. I had supposed he was there to make sure I didn’t leave but, with proper deference, he said, ‘What’s going to happen next, sir?’
I gaped at him and he blushed. He was quite young.
‘Oh, I realise I’m not cleared for classified information, sir, but… you know how it is… a man can’t work in a place like this without getting a pretty good idea of what’s going on. And my wife will be worried, I haven’t been able to call her… I just wanted some idea of how long we’d be quarantined…’
I realised that Larsen and I had come in with such a flurry of haste that he had not explained the situation to the guard — or perhaps disdained informing a subordinate of anything. The young man obviously thought I was one of them. It was a natural enough mistake. Larsen and I had been collaborating as equals and he had even deferred to me on deciding which of the men brought in had been infected. The guard probably thought me an expert in detecting symptoms of the disease before they became apparent to others. It was too good a chance to pass up.
I said, ‘I can’t tell you that,’ trying to sound just curt enough to be authoritative without discouraging him.
‘I’m sorry sir.’
He started to turn away.
‘A bad business,’ I said.
‘Yes, sir. Very bad.’
‘I just arrived… from the other laboratory…’ I said. He showed no signs of disbelief. ‘I’ve been in such a rush, I haven’t had time to get the details. How did the first… subject… escape, do you know? The one who broke through the fence?’ I held my breath. He didn’t doubt me at all.
‘Oh, Jefferson,’ he said. ‘Why, he broke the restraining straps. He’d been taken to the laboratory for an examination or something and someone slipped up; didn’t use the reinforced straps, I guess.’
‘Damned inefficiency.’
He blinked at me; said, ‘Worse than inefficiency, if you’ll pardon my saying so, sir. I guess maybe you don’t know about Duncan?’ I shook my head. ‘Johnny Duncan. Friend of mind. Hell of a nice guy, Duncan. He was on the door, tried to stop the ghoul. Jefferson, I mean, sir. Only it’s hard to call one of them by their name… by the name they had when they were human, you know? Makes it seem worse, somehow. Anyway, Duncan tried to stop him and the… and Jefferson tore his arm damn near off. It was just hanging there by a few ropes of tendon. Right arm, it was. Poor Duncan, he was right-handed; had to use his left hand when he shot himself. ’
‘Shot himself?’
‘Lefthanded.’
He seemed to think this sinistral suicide more deplorable than had it been dextral; thus had morality been compromised and mutated in this place.
‘Funny, you know… I was there by that time; I felt as if I ought to stop him from shooting himself, but he just looked at me and I couldn’t do a thing. Even if it meant I got in trouble over it… couldn’t do a thing. He put the gun to his head. He was in terrible pain, what with his arm torn off like that, but it wasn’t the pain… it was knowing he was gonna turn ghoul. Hell of a guy. He said goodbye to me; made me feel awful. Then he blew his brains out. Wasn’t married, Duncan; that’s one thing.’
‘But… the antidote…’
‘Oh, you don’t have to tell me that, sir.’ He looked shy… maybe sly. He said, ‘I know there’s no antidote.’
I looked down at my glowing pipe and pretended that the alarm passing over my face was due to a congested stem. Slowly, I said, ‘These subjects… the ones I was able to identify, and the nurse… how are they being… treated?’
‘Oh, it’s painless, sir. No need to worry about that. One of the docs gives ‘em an injection, it’s over in a few seconds.’ He smiled at me. He was really quite young, his cheeks fuzzy, an innocent young man assuring me that murder was done efficiently and painlessly.
He said, ‘That’s what you meant when you said, antidote, huh? Funny how you scientists always use words that mean less than they ought. Meaning no offence, sir. Euphemism, is it? Well, anyhow, I guess that Duncan figured a bullet was just as painless as a shot in the arm, and a whole lot quicker. Or maybe he was afraid they wouldn’t give him the shot, come to think of it; that they’d let him turn ghoul and study him in place of Jefferson…’
‘Yes,’ I said. I felt a band of sickness tighten across my diaphragm. I had just condemned, with a nod, three men to death. And yet, if I hadn’t… it was mercy killing, benevolent condemnation, I could justify it… and yet —
The guard was saying, ‘Maybe they would of, too, far as that goes. Of course, that was before all these other guys got infected. Got more ghouls than they know what to do with, now; can’t study all of them. I don’t know about the other lab… the one you come from… fact is, I didn’t even know there was another one. But we only got three cells here strong enough to hold ‘em and you can’t put ‘em in together or they’ll eat each other. Guess they never reckoned on having more than three at once. So the only humane thing to do… but you know about that, sir.’
On abrupt impulse, I stood up. Yes, I knew about that… now; the knowledge was stalking around like a footpad in my soul.
‘It seems to me that you know a good deal more than you’re cleared for,’ I said, jaws tight.
The guard looked frightened.
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ he said, blanching.
I pointed at him with my pipestem, paused, then sighed.
‘Where is Elston now?’ I asked.