Robin Cook - Contagion

Beth Holderness had stayed late to get all the throat cultures of the hospital employees planted. The evening crew had come in at the usual time, but at that moment they were down in the cafeteria having their dinner. Even Richard had disappeared, although Beth wasn’t sure if he’d left for the day or not.

Since the micro section of the lab was deserted except for her, Beth thought that if she were to do any clandestine searching, this was as good a time as any. Sliding off her stool, she walked over to the door to the main part of the lab. She didn’t see a soul, which encouraged her further.

Turning back to microbiology, Beth headed over to the insulated doors. She wasn’t sure she should be doing what she was doing, but having said she would, she felt some obligation. She was confused about Dr. Jack Stapleton, but she was even more confused about her own boss, Dr. Martin Cheveau. He’d always been temperamental, but lately that moodiness had reached ridiculous proportions.

That afternoon he’d stormed in after Dr. Stapleton had left, demanding to know what she had told the medical examiner. Beth had tried to say that she’d told him nothing of consequence and had tried to get him to leave, but Dr. Cheveau wouldn’t listen. He even threatened to fire Beth for willfully disobeying him. His ranting had brought her close to tears.

After he’d left Beth had thought about Dr. Stapleton’s comment that people at the hospital, including her boss, had been acting defensively. Considering Dr. Cheveau’s behavior, she’d thought Dr. Stapleton might be right. It made her even more willing to follow up on Dr. Stapleton’s request.

Beth stood in front of the two insulated doors. The one on the left was the walk-in freezer, the other the walk-in incubator. She debated which one to search first. Since she’d been in and out of the incubator all day with the throat cultures, she decided to tackle that first. After all, there was only a small area in the incubator where the contents were unfamiliar to her.

Beth pulled open the door and entered. Immediately she was enveloped by the moist, warm air. The temperature was kept close to body temperature, at 98.6° Fahrenheit. Many bacteria and viruses, especially those that affected humans, had understandably evolved to grow best at human body temperature.

The door behind Beth closed automatically to seal in the heat. The compartment was about eight by ten. The lighting came from two bulbs covered with wire mesh mounted on the ceiling. The shelving was perforated stainless steel. It extended floor to ceiling on both walls, along the back, and down the center, creating two narrow aisles.

Beth made her way to the rear of the compartment. There were stainless-steel boxes back there that she’d seen on numerous occasions but had never examined.

Grasping one of the boxes with both hands, Beth slid it out from its shelf and put it on the floor. It was about the size of a shoe box. When she tried to open it, she realized it had a latch that was secured with a miniature padlock!

Beth was amazed and instantly suspicious. Few things in the lab were kept under lock and key. Picking the box up, Beth slid it back into place. Moving along the shelf, she reached around each box in turn. Every one of them had the same type of lock.

Bending down, Beth did the same on the lower shelf. The condition of the fifth box was different. As Beth stuck her hand around its back, she could feel that the padlock’s clasp had not been closed.

Insinuating her fingers between the unlocked box and its neighbors, Beth was able to slide it out. As she lifted it, she could tell it wasn’t quite as heavy as the first locked box; she feared it would be empty. But it wasn’t. As she lifted its cover, she saw that it contained a few petri dishes. She also noted that the petri dishes did not bear the customary label that was used in the lab. Instead they only had grease-pencil alphanumeric designators.

Beth gingerly reached into the box and lifted out a petri dish labeled A-81. She lifted the top and looked in at expanding bacterial colonies. They were transparent and mucoid and they were growing on a medium she recognized as chocolate agar.

A sharp mechanical click of the insulated door opening startled Beth. Her pulse raced. Like a child caught in a forbidden act, she frantically tried to get the petri dish back in the box and the box back on the shelf before whoever was entering saw what she was doing.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough time. She’d only had a chance to close the box and pick it up before she found herself face-to-face with Dr. Martin Cheveau. Ironically, he was at that moment carrying a box identical to the one she was holding.

“What are you doing?” he snarled.

“I’m…” Beth voiced, but that was all she could say. Under the pressure of the circumstance, no potential explanation came to mind.

Dr. Cheveau noisily stashed his box on one of the shelves, then grabbed Beth’s away from her. He looked at the open latch.

“Where’s the lock?” he growled.

Beth extended her hand and then opened it. In her palm was the open padlock. Martin snatched it and examined it.

“How did you get it open?” he demanded.

“It was open,” Beth asserted.

“You’re lying,” Martin snapped.

“I’m not,” Beth said. “Honest. It was open and it made me curious.”

“Likely story,” Martin yelled. His voice reverberated around the confined space.

“I didn’t disturb anything,” Beth said.

“How do you know you didn’t disturb anything?” Martin said. He opened the box and glanced inside. Seemingly satisfied, he closed it and locked it. He tested the lock. It held.

“I only lifted the cover and looked at one culture dish,” Beth said. She was beginning to regain some composure, although her pulse was still racing.

Martin slipped the box into its position. Then he counted them all. When he was finished, he ordered her out of the incubator.

“I’m sorry,” Beth said after Martin had closed the insulated door behind them. “I didn’t know that I wasn’t supposed to touch those boxes.”

At that moment Richard appeared in the doorway. Martin ordered him over, then angrily related how he’d caught Beth handling his research cultures.

Richard acted as upset as Martin when he heard. Turning to Beth, he demanded to know why she would do such a thing. He wondered whether they weren’t giving her enough work to do.

“No one told me not to touch them,” Beth protested. She was again close to tears. She hated confrontations and had already weathered a previous one only hours earlier.

“No one told you to handle them either,” Richard snapped.

“Did that Dr. Stapleton put you up to this?” Martin demanded.

Beth hesitated, not knowing how to respond. As far as Martin was concerned her hesitation was incriminating. “I thought as much,” he snapped. “He probably even told you about his preposterous idea that the plague cases and the others were started on purpose.”

“I told him I wasn’t supposed to talk with him,” Beth cried.

“But talk he did,” Martin said. “And obviously you listened. Well, I’m not going to stand for it. You are fired, Miss Holderness. Take your things and get out. I don’t want to see your face again.”

Beth sputtered a protest and with it came tears.

“Crying is not going to get you anywhere,” Martin spat out. “Nor are excuses. You made your choice, now live with the consequences. Get out.”

Twin reached across the scarred desk and hung up the phone. His real name was Marvin Thomas. He’d gotten the nickname “Twin” because he’d had an identical twin. No one had been able to tell the two of them apart until one of them got killed in a protracted disagreement between the Black Kings and a gang from the East Village over crack territories.