Fever Dream - Douglas Preston [107]
“Sherry?”
She dropped her briefcase on the sofa and settled down beside it. “No thanks. Not my kind of drink.”
“Anything else? Beer? Tea? A martini?”
She glanced at Maurice, not wanting to put him out but exhausted by her travel. “Tea. Hot and strong, with milk and sugar, please.”
With a decline of his head, the servant withdrew.
Pendergast settled back down, throwing one leg over the other. “How was your trip to Siesta Key and St. Francisville?” he asked.
“Productive. But first, how’s Vinnie?”
“Doing quite well. The move to the private hospital was accomplished without incident. And the second operation, replacing the valve in his aorta with a pig valve, went beautifully and he is on the road to recovery.”
She eased back, feeling a huge weight lifted. “Thank God. I want to see him.”
“As I mentioned before, that would be unwise. Even calling him might be a bad idea. We seem to be dealing with a very clever killer—who, I believe, has some inside source of information about us.” Pendergast took a sip of his sherry. “In any case, I just received the lab report about the feathers I purloined from Oakley Plantation. The birds were indeed infected with an avian influenza virus, but the very small sample I was able to obtain was simply too degraded to cultivate. Nevertheless, the researcher I employed made an important observation. The virus is neuroinvasive.”
Hayward sighed. “You’re going to have to explain that.”
“It hides in the human nervous system. It’s highly neurovirulent. And that, Captain, is the final piece of the puzzle.”
The tea came and Maurice poured out a cup. “Go on.”
Pendergast rose and paced before the fire. “The parrot virus makes you sick, just like any flu virus. And like many viruses, it hides in the nervous system as a way of avoiding the bloodstream and thus the human immune system. But that’s where the similarities end. Because this virus also has an effect on the nervous system. And that effect is most unusual: it enhances brain activity, triggers a flowering of the intellect. My researcher—an exceedingly clever fellow—tells me that this could be caused by a simple loosening of neural pathways. You see, the virus makes the nerve endings slightly more sensitive—making them fire more quickly, more easily, with less stimuli. Trigger-happy nerves, as it were. But the virus also inhibits production of acetylcholine in the brain. And it seems this combination of effects ultimately unbalances the system, eventually overwhelming the victim with sensory input.”
Hayward frowned. This seemed like a reach, even for Pendergast. “Are you sure about this?”
“Additional research would be needed to confirm the theory, but it’s the only answer that fits.” He paused. “Think of yourself for a moment, Captain Hayward. You are sitting on a couch. You are aware of the pressure of the leather against your back. You are aware of the warmth of the teacup in your hand. You can smell the roast saddle of lamb that we will be having for dinner. You can hear a variety of sounds: crickets, songbirds in the trees, the fire in the fireplace, Maurice in the kitchen.”
“Of course,” Hayward said. “What’s your point?”
“You are aware of those sensations and probably a hundred more, if you were to stop and take note of them. But that’s the point: you don’t take note. A part of your brain—the thalamus, to be exact—is acting as a traffic cop, making sure you are only aware of the sensations that are important at the moment. Imagine what it would be like if there were no traffic cop? You would be continually bombarded by sensation, unable to ignore any of it. While it might in the short run enhance cognitive function and creativity, in the long run it would drive you mad. Literally. That is what happened to Audubon. And it happened to the Doane family—only much more rapidly and powerfully. We already suspected the madness shared by Audubon and