The room grew dark. No overhead light, no lamp. But I could hear a faint chugging that must be a gasoline-power generator, and light spilled from the first-floor windows and the barn.
Whereas I owned nothing in the way of technology except my phone. I took it out of my pocket and switched it on, idly, just to see the phosphorescence of the screen.
Then I had another thought.
* * * * *
"Simon?" Silence. "Simon, is that you? Can you hear me?"
Silence. Then a tinny, digitized voice:
"You nearly scared the life out of me. I thought this thing was broken."
"Only during daylight."
Solar noise had washed out transmissions from the high-altitude aerostats. But now the Earth was shielding us from the sun. Maybe the 'stats had sustained some damage—the signal sounded low-band and staticky—but the bounce was good enough for now.
"I'm sorry about what happened," he said, "but I warned you."
"Where are you? The barn or the house?"
Pause. "The house."
"I've been looking all day and I haven't seen Condon's wife or Sorley's wife and kids. Or Mclsaac or his family. What happened to them?"
"They left."
"Are you sure of that?"
"Am I sure? Of course I'm sure. Diane wasn't the only one to get sick. Only the latest. Teddy Mclsaac's little girl took ill first. Then his son, then Teddy himself. When it looked like his kids were—well, you know, obviously really sick, sick and not getting better, well, that was when he put them in his truck and drove away. Pastor Dan's wife went along."
"When did this happen?"
"Couple of months ago. Aaron's wife and kids took off by themselves not long after. Their faith failed them. Plus they were worried about catching something."
"You saw them leave? You're certain about that?"
"Yes, why wouldn't I be?"
"Trench by the barn looks a lot like something's buried there."
"Oh, that! Well, you're right, something is buried there— the bad cattle."
"Excuse me?"
"A man named Boswell Geller had a big ranch up in the Sierra Bonita. Friend of Jordan Tabernacle before the shake-up. Friend of Pastor Dan. He was breeding red heifers, but the Department of Agriculture started an investigation late last year. Just when he was making progress! Boswell and Pastor Dan wanted to breed together all the red cattle varieties of the world, because that would represent the conversion of the Gentiles. Pastor Dan says that's what Numbers nineteen is all about—a pure red heifer born at the end of time, from breeds on every continent, everywhere the Gospel's been preached. The sacrifice is literal and symbolic, both. In the biblical sacrifice the ashes of the heifer have the power to clean a defiled person. But at the end of the world the sun consumes the heifer and the ashes are scattered to the four compass points, cleansing the whole Earth, cleansing it of death. That's what's happening now. Hebrews nine—'For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?' So of course—"
"You kept those cattle here?"
"Only a few. Fifteen breeders smuggled out before the Department of Agriculture could claim them."
"That's when people started getting sick?"
"Not just people. The cattle, too. We dug that trench by the barn to bury them in, all but three of the original stock."
"Weakness, unsteady gait, weight loss preceding death?"
"Yes, mostly—how did you know?"
"Those are the symptoms of CVWS. The cows were carriers. That's what's wrong with Diane."
There was a long ensuing silence. Then Simon said, "I can't have this conversation with you."
I said, "I'm upstairs in the back bedroom—"
"I know where you are."
"Then come and unlock this door."
"I can't."
"Why? Is somebody watching you?"
"I can't just set you free. I shouldn't even be talking to you. I'm busy, Tyler. I'm making dinner for Diane."
"She's still strong enough to eat?"
"A little… if I help her."
"Let me out. No one has to know."
"I can't."
"She needs a doctor."
"I couldn't let you out if I wanted to. Brother Aaron carries the keys."
I thought about that. I said, "Then when you take dinner to her, leave the phone with her—your phone. You said she wanted to talk to me, right?"
"Half the time she says things she doesn't mean."
"You think that was one of them?"
"I can't talk anymore."
"Just leave her the phone, Simon. Simon?"
Dead air.
* * * * *
I went to the window, watched and waited.
I saw Pastor Dan carry two empty buckets from the barn to the house and travel back with the buckets full and steaming. A few minutes later Aaron Sorley crossed the gap to join him.
Which left only Simon and Diane in the house. Maybe he was giving her dinner. Feeding her.
I itched to use the phone but I had resolved to wait, let things settle a little more, let the heat go out of the night.
I watched the barn. Bright light spilled through the slat walls as if someone had installed a rack of industrial lights. Condon had been back and forth all day. Something was happening in the barn. Simon hadn't said what.
The small luminosity of my watch counted off an hour.
Then I heard, faintly, a sound that might have been a closing door, footsteps on the stairs; and a moment later I saw Simon cross to the barn.
He didn't look up.
Nor did he leave the barn once he'd arrived there. He was inside with Sorley and Condon, and if he was still carrying the phone, and if he'd been idiotic enough to set it for an audible ring, calling him now might put him in jeopardy. Not that I was especially concerned for Simon's welfare.
But if he had left the phone with Diane, now was the hour.
I pecked out the number.
"Yes," she said—it was Diane who answered—and then, inflection rising, a question, "Yes?"
Her voice was breathless and faint. Those two syllables were enough to beg a diagnosis.
I said, "Diane. It's me. It's Tyler."
Trying to control my own raging pulse, as if a door had opened in my chest.
"Tyler," she said. "Ty… Simon said you might call."
I had to strain to make out the words. There was no force behind them; they were all throat and tongue, no chest. Which was consistent with the etiology of CVWS. The disease affects the lungs first, then the heart, in a coordinated attack of near-military efficiency. Scarred and foamy lung tissue passes less oxygen to the blood; the heart, oxygen-starved, pumps blood less efficiently; the CVWS bacteria exploit both weaknesses, digging deeper into the body with every laborious breath.
"I'm not far away," I said. "I'm real close, Diane."
"Close. Can I see you?"
I wanted to tear a hole in the wall. "Soon. I promise. We need to get you out of here. Get you some help. Fix you up."
I listened to the sound of more agonized inhalations and wondered if I'd lost her attention. Then she said, "I thought I saw the sun…"
"It's not the end of the world. Not yet, anyway."
"It's not?"
"No."
"Simon," she said.
"What about him?"
"He'll be so disappointed."
"You have CVWS, Diane. That's almost certainly what McIsaac's family had. They were smart to get help. It's a curable disease." I did not add, Up to a certain point or As long as it hasn't progressed to the terminal stage. "But we have to get you out of here."