"The way I see it," said Singing Rock, "we have to convince Misquamacus somehow that he's in a hopeless situation, which he is. Although he is very powerful, he's an anachronism. Magic and sorcery may be dangerous, but in a world where people don't believe in it, they have very limited uses. Even if Misquamacus kills all of us — even if he kills everyone in this hospital — what's he going to do in the outside world? He's physically crippled, he's completely unversed in contemporary culture and science, and one way or another, he will just be overwhelmed. Even if it doesn't happen right here, somebody's going to put a bullet in him sooner or later."
"But how are you going to convince him?" I asked Singing Rock.
"I guess the only way is to tell him," said Singing Rock. "One of us will have to open up his mind to Misquamacus, and give him a mental tour of what the modern world is really like."
"Won't he think that's just a magical trap? A bluff?" asked Dr. Hughes.
"Possibly. But I don't see what else we can do."
"Wait a minute," said Dr. Hughes, turning to me. "Something just occurred to me. You remember when you told me about Karen Tandy's dream, Harry — the one about the ship and the coast and all that stuff?"
"Yes, of course."
"Well, what strikes me about that dream is that there was so much fear in it. Misquamacus was afraid of something. And it was obviously something that was terrifying enough to make him risk this whole business of swallowing burning oil and being reborn. Now, what do you think he could have been afraid of?"
"That's a good point," I said. "What do you think, Singing Rock?"
"I don't know," said the Sioux. "He might simply have been afraid of death at the hands of the Dutch. Just because their manitou go on living in limbo after death, that doesn't mean that medicine men aren't concerned about being killed. And there are ways of killing medicine men so that their manitous can never return to the earth. Maybe the Dutchmen knew how to do it, and threatened him."
"That still doesn't make sense," said Dr. Hughes.
"We've seen already how Misquamacus can defend himself. No Dutchman could have gotten close enough to harm him. Yet he was still frightened. Now, why? What did the Dutch have in the seventeenth century that could have terrified a medicine man like Misquamacus?"
"I guess they had guns," said Wolf "The Indians didn't have guns, did they?"
"That wouldn't fit," replied Singing Rock. "Misquamacus is powerful enough to resist guns. You saw what he did to Harry's friends, with the lightning-that-sees. You would only have to point a gun at him, and he could blow it up in your hand."
"The Dutch were Christians," I suggested. "Do you think there's anything in the Christian religion which could have exorcised Misquamacus' demons and manitous?
"No way," Singing Rock said. "There is nothing in Christianity to equal the power of the old Indian spirits."
Dr. Hughes was frowning deeply, as though he were trying to remember something he'd heard about years and years ago. Then suddenly he snapped his fingers.
"I know, " he said. "There was something very important which the Dutch settlers had which the Indians didn't Something which threatened the Indians, and which they had never come across before, and couldn't fight."
"What was that?"
"Disease, " said Jack Hughes. "The Dutchmen brought all kinds of viruses that were unknown on the North American continent. Especially influenza viruses. Whole tribes were wiped out by European diseases, because they had no antibodies, and couldn't resist even the simplest colds and flu. And the medicine men couldn't help them, because they had no sorcery which could work against something they knew nothing at all about. Invisible, deadly, and quick. If you ask me, that's what Misquamacus was afraid of. The Dutch were destroying his tribe with a medicine he couldn't see or understand."
Singing Rock looked excited. "That's inspired, Dr. Hughes. That is really inspired."
"One thing, though," I interjected. "Surely Misquamacus would now be immune to influenza? If he's been born in anything like the way a normal baby is born, he would have gotten antibodies from Karen Tandy's bloodstream."
"No, I don't think so," said Dr. Hughes. "His nervous system was intertwined with Karen's, but their bloodstreams weren't connected in the same way that a fetus is connected to its mother. The energy he was drawing from her was electrical energy from her brain cells and spinal system. There was no actual intermingling in the usual physical sense."
"That means," said Singing Rock, "that we could give our medicine man a dose of the grippe. Or threaten to."
"Certainly," said Dr. Hughes. "Hold on just a moment."
He went to the wall telephone and dialed quickly.
"Put me through to Dr. Winsome," he said, when the switchboard answered.
Singing Rock took a look at the silent shape of Misquamacus, hunched and sinister on the floor of Karen Tandy's blood-smeared room. Somehow the thought of giving this creature the influenza didn't seem like a very effective answer. But, apart from Singing Rock's sorcery, we didn't have very much else to turn to.
"Dr. Winsome?" said Jack Hughes. "Look, I'm sorry to wake you up, but I have an urgent problem here, and I badly need some virus samples."
There was a pause while Dr. Hughes listened to the tinny voice on the other end of the phone.
"Yes, I know it's four o'clock in the morning, Dr. Winsome, but I wouldn't have called you if it hadn't been desperate. That's right. I need influenza virus. Well, how soon can you get down here?"
He listened some more, and then hung up the phone.
"Dr. Winsome is coming right away. He has enough influenza virus in his laboratory to bring down the whole population of Cleveland, Ohio."
"Maybe he ought to try it sometime," said Singing Rock, with unexpected humor.
It was now four-oh-five, and Misquamacus hadn't stirred. All four of us stayed in the corridor, keeping a close watch on his dark, troll-like body, although we were all exhausted by now, and the stench of Michael's corpse was almost overpowering.
"What's it like outside?" I asked Dr. Hughes.
"Cold. Snowing again," he told me. "I hope Dr. Winsome doesn't have any trouble getting here."
Another half hour passed. It would soon be dawn. We sat huddled on our chairs, wearily rubbing our eyes and smoking to keep ourselves awake. Only sheer nervous tension kept me from nodding off. I hadn't slept since Sunday night, and then I had only had four or five hours.
At four-forty-five, we heard a rustling noise from inside Karen Tandy's room. We looked up quickly. Misquamacus still had his eyes closed, but he appeared to be stirring. Singing Rock got to his feet and picked up his bones and powders.
"I think he's waking" he said. There was a shake in his voice. This time, he knew that the ancient wonder-worker would have almost all his sorcerer's powers restored. He stepped softly into Karen Tandy's room, and we followed him, and stood behind him to give him support.
Slowly, Misquamacus stretched his hard muscular arms, scarred with magical patterns. He raised his head, with his eyes still shut, so that it was facing directly at us.
"Is he awake?" whispered Jack Hughes.
"I don't know," said Singing Rock. "But he will be soon."
Suddenly, we heard a breathy noise from the bed. The blue-white lips of Karen Tandy's body seemed to be moving, and air was hissing in and out of them.
"She's still alive, " said Wolf.
"No," said Singing Rock. "Misquamacus is doing that. I think he's going to speak to us through her, like he did before. He's using her like a microphone, so that he can talk to us in our own language."