Robin Cook - Fever

“I want a container,” gasped Charles, ignoring Cathryn’s reaction.

Gina appeared at the door to the dining room, her face reflecting terror. Chuck materialized behind her, then pushed past to gain access to the kitchen. He stepped between Charles and Cathryn. He didn’t care if his father was bigger than he was.

Charles’s breathing was labored. After a few seconds, he was able to repeat his request.

“A container?” asked Cathryn who’d regained some of her composure. “What kind of a container?”

“Glass,” said Charles. “Glass with a tight top.”

“What for?” asked Cathryn. It seemed like an absurd request.

“For pond water,” said Charles.

Jean Paul appeared beside Gina who stuck out her arm to keep him from entering the kitchen.

“Why do you want pond water?” asked Cathryn.

“Christ!” managed Charles. “Is this an interrogation?” He started for the refrigerator.

Chuck tried to step in his way, but Charles merely swept the boy out of his path. Chuck stumbled, and Cathryn grabbed his arm, keeping him from falling.

Charles turned at the commotion and saw Cathryn restraining his son. “What the hell is going on here?” he demanded.

Chuck struggled for an instant, glaring at his father.

Charles looked from one face to another. Gina and Jean Paul looked shocked; Chuck, furious; and Cathryn, frightened. But no one spoke. It was as if the scene was a freeze frame in a motion picture. Charles shook his head in disbelief and turned his attention to the refrigerator.

He pulled out a jar of apple juice and closed the door. Without a moment’s hesitation he dumped the remaining contents down the sink, rinsed the jar thoroughly, and yanked his sheepskin coat off its hook. At the door he turned to glance at his family. No one had moved. Charles had no idea what was happening but since he knew what he wanted to do, he left, closing the door on the strange scene.

Releasing her hold on Chuck, Cathryn stared blankly at the door, her mind going over the disturbing discussion she’d had with Dr. Keitzman and Dr. Wiley. She’d thought their questions about Charles’s emotions had been ridiculous, but now she wasn’t so sure. Certainly, flying out of the house in anger in the dead of winter without a coat, only to return a half hour later in great excitement, looking for a container for pond water, was curious at best.

“I’d never let him hurt you,” said Chuck. He pushed back his hair with a nervous hand.

“Hurt me?” said Cathryn, taken by surprise. “Your father’s not going to hurt me!”

“I’m afraid he’s let in the devil,” said Gina. “Once he’s done that, you can’t tell what he’s going to do.”

“Mother, please!” cried Cathryn.

“Is Charles going to have a nervous breakdown?” teased Jean Paul from the doorway.

“He’s already had one,” answered Chuck.

“That’s enough of that,” said Cathryn sternly. “I don’t want to hear any disrespect for your father. Michelle’s illness has upset him terribly.”

Cathryn directed her attention to the broken dish. Was Charles having a nervous breakdown? Cathryn decided she’d discuss the possibility with Dr. Wiley in the morning. It was a terrifying thought.

Gingerly crossing the partially frozen mud, Charles approached the water’s edge, then filled the jar. He screwed the cap on tightly before running back to the house.

Although the suddenness of his arrival surprised Cathryn, it had nowhere near the effect of his previous entrance. By the time Charles got to the refrigerator, Cathryn could react, and she reached out and grasped his arm.

“Charles, tell me what you are doing.”

“There’s benzene in the pond,” hissed Charles, shaking off her grasp. He put the jar of pond water in the refrigerator. “And you can smell it in the playhouse.”

Charles whirled back to the door. Cathryn ran after him, managing to get hold of his coat. “Charles, where are you going? What’s the matter with you?”

With unnecessary force, Charles wrenched his coat free. “I’m going to Recycle, Ltd. That’s where the goddamn benzene is coming from. I’m sure of it.”

Charles pulled the red Pinto off Main Street and stopped in front of the gate in the hurricane fence surrounding Recycle, Ltd. The gate was unlocked and opened easily. He stepped back into his car and drove into the factory’s parking area.

The evening shift couldn’t have been too large because there were only a half dozen or so beat-up cars near the entrance to the old brick mill building. To the left of the factory, the huge piles of discarded tires rose up like miniature snowcapped mountains. Between the used tires and the building were smaller heaps of plastic and vinyl debris. To the right of the factory was a rubbish-strewn, empty lot bisected by the hurricane fence that ran down to the Pawtomack River. Beyond the fence the deserted mill buildings stretched for a quarter of a mile to the north.

As soon as Charles got out of his car, he was enveloped by the same stench that had assaulted his house that morning. It amazed him that people could live to the immediate west of town, the direction of the prevailing winds. Locking the car, he started toward the entrance, an unimposing aluminum storm door. Above it,

was written in block letters. Taped to the inside of the glass was a cardboard sign which said: INQUIRIES, followed by a local telephone number.

Charles tried the door, which was unlocked. If he had thought the odor bad outside, inside it was far worse. He found himself choking on the heavy, chemical-laden air in a small office of sorts. It was a plywood-veneer paneled room with a beat-up Formica counter that held a wire letter basket and a stainless steel bell, the kind you hit with the palm of your hand. Charles did just that, but the noise was swallowed up by the hisses and rumbles coming from within the factory proper.

Charles decided to try the inner door. At first it wouldn’t open but when he pulled more forcibly it swung inward. As soon as it opened, Charles saw why it was insulated. It was as if it were a portal into hell itself. The combination of stench and noise was overpowering.

Charles entered a huge two-story-high room, poorly lit and dominated by a row of gigantic pressure-cooker-type apparatus. Metal ladders and catwalks ascended and crisscrossed in bewildering confusion. Large, clanking conveyor belts brought in piles of plastic and vinyl debris mixed with all sorts of disagreeable trash. The first people Charles saw were a pair of sweating men in sleeveless undershirts, with black-smudged faces like coal miners, sorting out the glass, wooden objects, and empty cans from the plastic.

“Is there a manager here?” yelled Charles, trying to be heard over the din.

One of the men looked up for an instant, indicated that he couldn’t hear, then went back to his sorting. Apparently the conveyor belt didn’t stop and they had to keep up with it. At the end of the belt was a large hopper which, when full, would rise up, position itself over an available pressure cooker, and dump its contents of plastic scrap. Charles saw a man with a large, scimitarlike knife up on the catwalk slit open two bags of chemicals, one white, the other black. With what appeared like great effort he dumped the two bags into the ovens in a great cloud of dust. For a moment the man disappeared from view. When he reappeared, he had closed the hatch and activated the steam, sending a fresh mixture of smoke, odor, and noise into the room.

Although Charles couldn’t get anyone’s attention, no one asked him to leave, either. Boldly he skirted the conveyor belts, keeping his eyes on the floor which was strewn with trash and puddles of oil and grease. He passed a cinder-block wall housing the automated machinery bringing in the tires to be melted down. It was from this area that the smell that Charles associated with the factory originated. Up close it was far more powerful.