Assignment- Death Ship Read online

They avoided the obvious topic, aware that Nelson could hear them over their intercom. They didn’t want to say anything that might panic him. The looks they exchanged were enough to express their deep worry.

  “What about the woman?” Durell asked. “If a disease is involved, can she spread it?”

  “Possibly.”

  “Even if she doesn’t get sick herself?”

  “It’s highly unlikely, but she could be a carrier. We mustn’t take chances,” Maj. Miller said. “She’ll have to be isolated. Same for Nelson.”

  “I heard that. I’m all right,” Nelson interjected.

  At that moment Durell caught a flicker of movement in the shadows of a doorway, then saw Nelson emerge with the woman held firmly by her upper arm.

  “Here they come. Bitch!” Maj. Miller said.

  She looked dazed and drawn, and her walk was unsteady. She was thin and pretty, with wide-set brown eyes and a mane of thick, copper-red hair parted on the side and falling freely in loose curls. Durell guessed her age at twenty-five. She wore a knit sweater and pleated skirt printed boldly in shades of red, white, and violet. She had lost her shoes.

  “I’ll take her,” Durell said. “Get your shots.” He motioned to Maj. Miller.

  “I feel perfectly fine,” Nelson insisted. But there was a plea for reassurance in his tone. He held out his arm.

  “Sit down. This will have to go into the thigh,” Maj. Miller told him. He didn’t waste any time, but jabbed the needle of a disposable syringe right through the bio-chem suit. “There’s some more,” Durell heard him say.

  Durell called for the decontamination module to be lowered to the deck. It would be left behind to go down with the Sun Rover.

  The woman screamed.

  It was a primordial, gut-wringing howl that turned Durell’s spine to ice. She whirled on him, flailing with her fists, and Durell got her in a bear hug. pinning her arms against her sides. She struggled with the unnatural fury of madness, baring teeth in a contorted face. Then she stopped as abruptly as she had begun.

  Maj. Miller was guiding the big fiberglass module onto the deck, troubled somewhat by freshening breezes, and Durell felt it thump down, saw the lines fall, pushed the girl toward it. “You’ll have to undress,” he told her.

  “What?”

  “I’m sorry.” She really comprehended nothing. He would have to do it for her.

  Nelson’s voice stopped him. It was suddenly frightened. “I—I’m sick. . . .”

  Durell and Maj. Miller turned toward him and saw him clutch himself and drop to his knees. They looked at each other helplessly.

  Nelson started to say something, but his words were cut off by retching, and Durell heard the growl of vomit as it was ejected from the man’s mouth. Durell released the woman and knelt beside him, looking for some way to comfort him. “Take it easy,” he said.

  The technician at the vital-signs monitor broke in. “Vital signs unstable on Blue Three . . . vital signs unstable!”

  The woman started screaming again, her eyes big and crazy.

  “We’re aware of Blue Three’s situation,” Durell told the technician. “Discontinue reports.” More of that wouldn’t help Nelson.

  Nelson lay on his side, his body jerking as cramps ripped through his viscera. He was curled in a ball of pain. “Ooohhuuugh! Ow!” The sounds seemed torn from his throat.

  Durell looked up at Maj. Miller. The scientist just shook his head.

  The woman was quiet again. She stood rigidly, fists tight at her sides, as the helicopter racketed above them, spinning currents of air to batter the deck.

  Durell glimpsed the Henry beyond the ship’s railing, where it rode with its death crew.

  A sense of helpless outrage goaded him, but there was nothing to vent it against.

  Then he heard a frenzied, sucking sound that was Nelson’s death rattle.

  After a momentary silence, he rose from Nelson’s still form, stood over it briefly, then turned to Maj. Miller. “Let’s get in the decontamination capsule; we’ll have to put the lady through the shower.”

  “Bitch,” the officer spat.

  Durell didn’t like that, but he let it pass.

  “What about Nelson—Nelson’s body?” Maj. Miller asked.

  “It’ll go to the bottom with the rest.” He read his timepiece. A submarine would torpedo both vessels within the hour.

  As they entered the decontamination chamber, he gave a glance to Nelson; his eyes roamed darkly over the corpses scattered across the deck. Next time, he thought, the bodies might lie on city streets, mile after mile.

  His feelings of urgency and dread were like two hands, choking him. . . .

  Chapter 2

  “Mr. Durell? I’m Dr. Levin. We’ve found the bug. I’m supposed to fill you in.” He did not offer his hand. He had the red-rimmed, serious eyes of a student and he was K Section’s chief of medical research. “Come with me, please,” he said.

  Durell followed him down a featureless corridor. It was as quiet as a vault. Every room was locked and soundproofed, making for some patients a redoubt, for others a prison. It was where a nuclear physicist from Los Alamos could safely have a nervous collapse. Or a Soviet spy could spill his guts.

  Its designation was Building No. 5 at “the Farm,” K Section’s training and research center in the Maryland countryside. Four hours previously, Durell had arrived there with the sedated woman, since identified as Nydia Duka, a twenty-four-year-old dancer with the New York City Ballet.

  “It’s a variant Escherichia coli bacterium,” Dr. Levin said, inserting a plastic card into an electronic scanner. A door popped open. They entered. The still form of Miss Duka lay under smooth sheets, as if dead, beyond the glass wall of an isolation chamber.

  “So it was a germ, not a chemical,” Durell mused.

  “A very special germ. We’re calling it X. coli. E. coli is a common laboratory microbe, used in all sorts of research. Its natural habitat is the gut of human beings and other warmblooded animals. Normally it doesn’t cause any harm. These new bacteria, however—”

  “New, doctor?”

  Dr. Levin looked tired. “They are new; they’ve never been seen before. . . .”

  “Are you sure?”

  Dr. Levin seemed shocked by the question. “Of course I’m sure. You must have heard of recombinant DNA research. It involves manipulating the characteristics of deoxyribonucleic acid, which is made of molecules that contain the genetic blueprints for all living things. Gene splicing? Genetic engineering?”

  “I’ve heard of it,” Durell said.

  “That, I have little doubt, is how X. coli originated. The chances of it occurring spontaneously, and in the concentrations we have seen, are astronomically high.”

  Durell’s face was grave. “So they’re man-made.”

  “Almost certainly.”

  “Designed to kill.”

  “They do it efficiently.”

  It was almost too horrible to grasp. New life, created in the laboratory as an invisible monster. Durell nodded toward Miss Duka. “But it didn’t kill her. Why not?” he asked.

  “The answer to that is simple: She’s been vaccinated,” Dr. Levin said.

  “Vaccinated?” Durell stared at the woman, his eyes narrowing. “Then she must have had something to do with what happened to the Sun Rover. How long until she wakes up?” he growled.

  “It shouldn’t be long. Any questions before I go?”

  “Yes,” Durell said. “If they have a vaccine, why can’t we get one?”

  “We could, given the time,” Dr. Levin said. “It’s no simple matter. Lots of brilliant work went into X. coli and its vaccine, and it can’t be reproduced overnight. We’ll put everything we’ve got into trying.” He looked gloomy.

  Durell regarded the Duka woman thoughtfully. She offered the best hope. For now, the only hope. What if she wouldn’t talk? What if he couldn’t make her?

  As if reading Durell’s thoughts, Dr. Levin said, “I don’t env
y you your job. Those madmen are still loose out there, somewhere, and their weapon is several hundred times more potent a killer than botulism.”

  The door unlocked behind Durell and a white-garbed attendant entered. The bulge of a revolver showed under his jacket. “Phone, sir.” He plugged a jack into the wall and handed Durell a phone without a dial—the Farm was a world unto itself, where outbound calls were discouraged, the simple reason being that every one constituted a potential hole in its massive security dike.

  Durell cut his eyes toward Dr. Levin. “I’m leaving,” Dr. Levin said.

  The man on the other end of the line was General Dickinson McFee, the small, gray chief of K Section. “We’ve had developments, Samuel,” he said. “We’ve received a note, but it may not be as important as something else. We’ve learned that a certain Dr. Peter Plettner has been missing for six days. He’s a microbiologist. A Nobel prize winner.” A touch of excitement hushed McFee’s normally reserved voice to a whisper. “His home and laboratory are in Puerto Rico, Samuel.”

  “Then he could be our man,” Durell said.

  “Or he could have been kidnapped and his work used by others. We know he’s been working in genetic engineering for a Geneva pharmaceutical company, Caske, S.A. Either way, his trail is the one to follow for now.” McFee took a breath. Durell envisioned his boss attired in his habitual gray suit, seated straight-backed behind his desk in the innocuous-looking building at No. 20 Annapolis Street. Close at hand would be his diabolical blackthorn walking stick with its poison dart, concealed thermite bomb, and other lethal fixtures dreamed up in K Section’s lab. “What I want, Samuel”—no one else called Durell that—“is for you and Maj Miller to bring back whatever can be found in Plettner’s laboratory about a vaccine. Maj. Miller will pick you up at the farm.”

  “Yes, sir. You mentioned a note?”

  “Yes. Containing the demands.”

  “What group? I gather Plettner didn’t sign it himself.”

  “Anonymous.” There was a pause. “They want a billion dollars. If they don’t get it, they say they’ll do to New York City what they did to the Sun Rover."

  Durell maintained a shocked silence.

  “Evacuation is impossible. Where would the people go? How could we prevent panic?” McFee’s voice turned resigned. “Besides, the note says the germs will be released immediately if we try to alert the people.”

  “What can we do but pay?” Durell asked. “When’s the deadline?"

  “No deadline. They’ll give us word soon; that’s all they said. The devils. They’re giving us time to mull over the consequences if we refuse. Time to sweat.” McFee groaned. “But we can’t pay. The president hasn’t got a billion dollars; he can’t ask Congress for it. Word would be all over the country within hours; there would be mass hysteria.”

  “They tell me the woman was vaccinated,” Durell said.

  “The note refers to that: Miss Duka was used merely to prove the efficacy of their vaccine. She’s innocent.”

  Durell felt a letdown; he’d counted on her to furnish lots of information. Now it might not amount to much. “Has her history been checked?” he asked.

  “Our first thought. She’s clean, Samuel. They must have lured her away from the crowd and drugged her. The Sun Rover spent last night in San Juan harbor.

  “All right,” Durell said reluctantly, “but what’s the point? They’re not selling the vaccine.”

  “In a way, they are,” McFee told him. “For our billion they’ll exchange the technology and vaccine they’ve used.

  They say it’s a reasonable price for a major new weapon. Of course, we couldn’t use it anyhow; we’re signatory to the Biological Weapons Convention. It’s just a sauce they hope will make the outrage of murder and extortion go down easier. Meanwhile, they’re telling us that if they must start an epidemic, they also can stop it when the money comes—but then it will cost more!”

  “I’ll get through here as fast as I can,” Durell said.

  “She may give us something. You’ll fly back to Puerto Rico tonight. Maj. Miller will supply particulars. And Samuel . . .”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “You have Q clearance—anything goes.”

  Durell waited another half-hour; it was as if the cold wind beyond the sealed window were blowing through him.

  He wore a dark blue worsted-wool suit. He might have been mistaken for a stockbroker but for a hard and haunted look about the eyes. It was the eyes that made others step aside. Now they stared at the pretty face lying on the hospital pillow.

  “Miss Duka?”

  She did not stir. Purple snow blew in the twilight. The clear sky sat on the world like a block of ice, holding the brooding colors of dusk.

  The sunny Caribbean came back into his thoughts. He looked at his watch: How many hours had passed? How many were left. . . ?

  The Sun Rover lay on the bottom now, with all its passengers.

  All but one.

  She’d have to be hidden until it was safe to let out the true story. Which might mean forever.

  For now, to her family, to everyone she knew, she was as dead as the others.

  He shook her gently. “Miss Duka?”

  Her eyes opened, their brown irises glassy; slowly they focused on him and she frowned. Her body stiffened, as if with fright. He hoped she was rational—there was no guarantee. “Don’t be afraid,” he told her.

  “Where. . . ?” She looked around in confusion.

  “In a U.S. government facility near Washington.” He gave her time, as she regarded him dazedly. At least she wasn’t hysterical. “I’m Sam Durell,” he said. “I’m not going to harm you; I’m here to ask you some questions.”

  She stared at him. “I can’t believe this,” she said. “Is it a dream?"

  “No. We need your help, Miss Duka.”

  “Help?” Her eyes went slowly around the room. He saw that she was trying to piece together what had happened. He offered her a glass of water; she took it and drained the glass, then let her head fall back on the pillow. She closed her eyes, and her hands trembled on the white sheets. She clenched them together and lay very still. The room was silent as he watched her. She might have been made of wax. Finally, she spoke again. “What happened to the ship?”

  “It sank.”

  “The others?”

  “All gone. Dead. I’m sorry.”

  “Shirley? Jill?” Her voice rose. “Mrs. Dodson? Jim. . . ?” Durell placed a firm but gentle hand on her shoulder. “Calm down,” he said. “Hold on to yourself.”

  She relaxed; she seemed too full of shock and misery to weep. “Why didn’t I die, too?” she asked.

  “Don’t you know?” he asked.

  “The last thing I remember, people were sick all over the ship. Shirley and Jill were helping Mrs. Dodson in our stateroom, then Shirley got sick, and I went to look for Jim—he was a man I’d met on the cruise. People were running through the corridors; some had fallen and lay there praying and moaning. I heard names. . . a jumble of names . . . people calling . . . so scared . . . called Jim. . . .” Durell waited.

  “He was dead,” she said. “I found him. That’s the last I remember. Oh, lord!”

  “It’s all over now,” Durell told her. He gave her another minute. “The doctors tell us you were inoculated,” he said. She blinked unbelievingly. “How. . . ?”

  “You remember nothing of it?”

  “No.” Her tone was emphatic, defensive.

  “It could have happened in San Juan.”

  “Why? Why me?”

  “As an example. Your friends were murdered. The people who did it wanted to prove they had a vaccine. You were just lucky they picked you.”

  “Lucky? Yes, but I don’t deserve it; surely many were more deserving than I. . . .”

  “That had nothing to do with it—it was pure chance,” Durell said. “Tell me about San Juan,” he said.

  “There’s nothing to tell.” She swung her feet to the floor
, “i want to see my parents.”

  “They aren’t here,” he said.

  “Then I’m going home.”

  “I can’t allow that.”

  She glared at him, bewildered.

  “The nightmare isn’t over, Miss Duka, but we’re all in it now. You, me, the whole world.”

  “What do you mean?” Her voice rose again. “How can you keep me here? What do you want of me?”

  “I told you—San Juan. Somebody inoculated you.” He tried to sound reasonable. “What are you hiding?”

  “What are you hiding, making me a prisoner here?”

  Her righteous look made him feel tired. “The government,” he said, “is trying to hide the fact that a madman or madmen killed over a thousand people this morning and is threatening to do the same to much of our urban population, unless—”

  “This is crazy!”

  “Unless we pay them a billion dollars.” He held her shoulders.

  “I can’t go home?” Her face showed fear as plainly as a child’s.

  “To let the public find out what’s happening could be devastating. We can’t risk turning you loose,” he said.

  “Is . . . is it really that awful?” She was beginning to comprehend.

  “I’m afraid so. Tomorrow all the papers will carry stories about a collision that sank the Sun Rover and a Coast Guard cutter. Most of the story will be speculation, and speculation will breed controversy. There may be calls for an investigation— it could end up before a congressional committee.” He watched for her reaction. “Can you imagine the chaos if it came out that your friends were killed by a disease that hit them like a bomb? Think of the panic if the public suddenly found out that the whole country is being threatened, and there’s no known defense.”

  “I—I understand. But I’d keep the secret,” she cried.

  “How long? Remember, you’re the only survivor. How long could you keep the secret, hounded by reporters and dragged before one committee after another?”

  She turned her face away for a long moment. He didn’t press her; he sensed that he had swayed her. She sat quietly, as if trying to read answers in the twilight beyond the window where frost had etched false shatter-streaks. He heard the distant, muted thump of wind gusting against glass. Finally, she turned back to him. There were tears on her cheeks. “We made love,” she said, “last night. I met him in the Parque de Las Palomas, above the harbor. He’d followed me from the waterfront, but I wasn’t scared. I spent the night with him. Maybe he put something in my drink. I-I didn’t want to tell you, but I see I have to. His name was Luis Alegra.”