Executive orders - Tom Clancy [482]
The bedroom was a bedroom and nothing more. No plants there, they saw.
Some article of clothing? Leather? Quinn asked. Anthrax can-
Ebola can't. It's too delicate. We know the organism we're dealing with. It can't survive in this environment. It just can't, the professor insisted. They didn't know much about the little bastard, but one of the things they did at CDC was to establish the environmental parameters, how long the virus could survive in a whole series of conditions. Chicago at this time of year was as inhospitable to that sort of virus as a blast furnace. Orlando, some place in the South, maybe. But Chicago? We got nothing, he concluded in frustration.
Maybe the plants?
You know how hard it is to get a plant through customs?
I've never tried.
I have, tried to bring some wild orchids back from Venezuela once He looked around some more. There's nothing here, Joe.
Is her prognosis as bad as-
Yeah. A pair of gloved hands rubbed against the scrub pants. Inside the latex rubber, his hands were sweating now. If we can't determine where it came from if we can't explain it He looked at his younger, taller colleague. I have to get back. I want to take another look at that structure.
HELLO, GUS LORENZ said. He checked his clock. What the hell?
Gus? the voice asked.
Yes, who's this?
Mark Klein in Chicago.
Something wrong? Lorenz asked groggily. The reply opened his eyes all the way.
I think-no, Gus, I know I have an Ebola case up here.
How can you be sure?
I have the crook. I micrographed it myself. It's the Shepherd's Crook, and no mistake, Gus. I wish it were.
Where's he been?
It's a she, and she hasn't been anywhere special. Klein summarized what he knew in less than a minute. There is no immediately apparent explanation for this.
Lorenz could have objected that this was not possible, but the medical community is an intimate one at its higher levels; he knew Mark Klein was a full professor at one of the world's finest medical schools. Just one case?
They all start with one, Gus, Klein reminded his friend. A thousand miles away, Lorenz swung his legs off the bed and onto the floor.
Okay. I need a specimen.
I have a courier on the way to O'Hare now. He'll catch the first flight down. I can e-mail you the micrographs right now.
Give me about forty minutes to get in.
Gus?
Yes?
Is there anything on the treatment side that I don't know? We have a very sick patient here, Klein said, hoping that for once maybe he wasn't fully up to speed on something in his field.
'Fraid not, Mark. Nothing new that I know about.
Damn. Okay, we'll do what we can here. Call me when you get there. I'm in my office.
Lorenz went into the bathroom and ran some water to splash in his face, proving to himself that this wasn't a dream. No, he thought. Nightmare.
THIS PRESIDENTIAL PERK was one even the press respected. Ryan walked down the steps first, saluted the USAF sergeant at the bottom, and walked the fifty yards to the helicopter. Inside, he promptly buckled his belt and went back to sleep. Fifteen minutes later he was roused from his seat again, walked down another set of stairs, saluted a Marine this time, and headed into the White House. Ten minutes after that, he was in a sleeping place that didn't move.
Good trip? Cathy asked, one eye partly open.
Long one, her husband reported, falling back to sleep.
THE FIRST FLIGHT from Chicago to Atlanta left the gate at 6:15 A.M., Central Time. Before then, Lorenz was in his office, on his computer terminal, dialed into the Internet and on the phone at the same time.
I'm downloading the image now.
As the older man watched, the micrograph grew from top to bottom, one line at a time, faster than a fax would come out of a machine, and far more detailed.
Tell me I'm wrong, Gus, Klein said, no hope in his voice