But the telephone rang as he walked down the hallway to go upstairs. Wearily, he unhooked the ear piece and leaned toward the microphone.
"Hello." He listened. "Oh." His voice dropped. "Oh." His tone became somber. "I'm on my way."
"An emergency?" Marion asked.
Bingaman felt pressure in his chest. "Joey Carter is dead."
Marion turned pale. "Dear Lord."
"With oxygen, I thought he had a chance to…How terrible." He felt paralyzed and struggled to rouse himself. "I'd better go see the parents."
But after Bingaman put on his suit coat and reached for his black bag, the telephone rang again. He answered, listened, and when he replaced the ear piece, he felt older and more tired.
"What is it?" Marion touched his arm.
"That was the hospital again. Joey's father just collapsed with a hundred-and-two fever. He's coughing. His glands are swollen. The two boys Joey went swimming with now have Joey's symptoms, also. Their parents just brought them into the emergency ward."
"If it was only Joey's two friends, I'd say, yes, they might all have gotten sick from swimming in Larrabee's creek," Bingaman told Dr.
Powell, who had returned to the hospital in response to Bingaman's urgent summons. It was midnight. They sat across from each other in Powell's office, a pale desk lamp making their faces look sallow. "The trouble is, Joey's father didn't go anywhere near that creek, and he's got the infection, too."
"You're still thinking of River ton."
"It's the only answer that makes sense. Joey probably got infected at the midway. Maybe a worker sneezed on him. Maybe it was a passenger on the Ferris wheel. However it happened, he then passed the infection on to his father and his two friends. They showed symptoms a day after he did because they'd been infected later than Joey was."
"Infected by Joey. It's logical except for one thing." "What's that?"
" Why hasn't Joey's mother -? "
Someone knocked on the door. Without waiting for an answer, a nurse rushed in. "I'm sorry to disturb you, but I was certain you'd want to know. Mrs. Carter just collapsed with the same symptoms as her son and husband."
Both doctors sprang to their feet.
"We'll have to implement quarantine precautions." Bingaman rushed from the office.
"Yes." Powell hurried next to him. "No visitors. Mandatory gauze masks for medical personnel, anybody who goes into those rooms. The emergency ward should be disinfected."
"Good idea." Bingaman moved faster. "And the room where Joey died. The nurses who treated him had better scrub down. They'd better put on clean uniforms in case they've been contaminated."
"But we still don't know how to treat this, aside from what we've already tried."
"And that didn't work." Bingaman's chest felt hollow. "If you're right about how the infection started, why haven't there been cases in Riverton?" Powell sounded out of breath.
"I don't know. In fact, there's almost nothing I do know. When do we get the results from Joey Carter's autopsy?"
The stoop-shouldered man peeled off his rubber gloves, dropped them into a medical waste bin, then took off his gauze mask, and leaned against a locker. His name was Peter Talbot. A surgeon, he also functioned as Elmdale's medical examiner. He glanced from Bingaman to Powell and said, "The lungs were completely filled with fluid. It would have been impossible for the boy to breathe."
Bingaman stepped closer. "Could the fluid have accumulated subsequent to his death?"
"What are you suggesting?"
"Another cause of death. Did you examine the brain?"
"Of course."
"Was there any sign of – "
"What exactly are you looking for?"
"Could the cause of death have been something as highly contagious as meningitis?"
"No. No sign of meningitis. What killed this boy attacked his lungs."
"Pneumonia," Powell said. "There's no reason to discount the initial diagnosis."
"Except that pneumonia doesn't normally spread this fast."
"Spread this fast?" Talbot straightened. "You have other cases?"
"Four since the boy died."
"Good Lord."
"I know. This sounds like the start of an epidemic."
"But caused by what?" Bingaman rubbed his forehead.
"I'll try to find out." Talbot pointed toward a table. "I have tissue samples ready to be cultured. I'll do my best to identify the microorganism responsible. What else can we – "
Bingaman started toward the door. "I think it's time to make another telephone call to the Riverton hospital."
Blood drained from Bingaman's face as he listened to the doctor in charge of the emergency room at the Riverton hospital.
"But I asked your chief of staff to get in touch with me if any cases were reported." Damn him, Bingaman thought. "Too busy? No time? Yes. And I'm very much afraid we're all going to get a lot busier."
As he turned from the telephone, he couldn't help noticing the apprehension on Powell's face.
"How many cases do they have?"
"Twelve," Bingaman answered.
"Twelve?"
"They were all admitted within the past few hours. Two of the patients have died."
He parked his Model T in his driveway and extinguished the headlights. The time was after three a.m., and he had hoped that the chug-chug, rattle-rattle of the automobile would not waken his wife, but he saw a pale yellow glow appear in the window of the master bedroom, and he shook his head, discouraged, wishing he still owned a horse and buggy. The air had a foul odor from the car's exhaust fumes. Too many inventions. Too many complications. Even so, he thought, there's one invention you do wish for-a drug that eliminates infectious microbes.
Exhausted, he got out of the car. Marion had the front door open, waiting for him, as he climbed the steps onto the porch.
"You look awful." She took his bag and put an arm around him, guiding him into the house.
"It's been that kind of night." Bingaman explained what was happening at the hospital, the new patients he'd examined and the treatment he'd prescribed. "In addition to aspirin, we're using quinine to control the fever. We're rubbing camphor oil on the patients' chests and having them breathe through strips of cloth soaked in it, to try to keep their bronchial passages open."
"Is that working?"
"We don't know yet. I'm so tired I can hardly think straight."
"Let me put you to bed."
"Marion…"
"What?"
"I'm not sure how to say this."
"Just go ahead and say it."
"If this disease is as contagious as it appears to be…"
"Say it."
"I've been exposed to the infection. Maybe you ought to keep a distance from me. Maybe we shouldn't sleep in the same bed."
"After twenty-five years? I don't intend to stop sleeping with you now."
"I love you."
The patient, Robert Wilson, was a forty-two-year-old, blue-eyed carpenter who worked with Edward Carter. The man had swollen glands and congested lungs. He complained of a headache and soreness in his muscles. His temperature was a hundred and one.
"I'm afraid I'm going to have to send you to the hospital," Bingaman said.
"Hospital?" Wilson coughed.
Bingaman stepped back.
"But I can't afford the time off work," the heavyset carpenter said. "Can't you just give me a pill or something?"
Don't I wish, Bingaman thought, saying, "Not in this case."