Robin Cook - Contagion

“We wish!” Igor said with a laugh. “I’m sure that strain would be popular with researchers. No, we don’t have it, but we have some that are probably similar, like the strain of the ’76 swine-flu scare. It’s generally believed that the 1918 strain was a permutation of H1N1, but exactly what, no one knows.”

“My next question concerns plague and tularemia,” Jack said.

“We carry both,” Igor said.

“I’m aware of that,” Jack said. “What I would like to know is who has ordered either of those two cultures in the last few months.”

“I’m afraid we don’t usually give that information out,” Igor said.

“I can understand that,” Jack said. For a moment Jack feared he would have to get Lou Soldano involved just to get the information he wanted. But then he thought he could possibly talk Igor into giving it to him. After all, Igor had been careful to say that such information wasn’t “usually” given out.

“Perhaps you’d like to talk to our president,” Igor suggested.

“Let me tell you why I want to know,” Jack said. “As a medical examiner I’ve seen a couple of deaths recently with these pathogens. We’d just like to know which labs we should warn. Our interest is preventing any more accidents.”

“And the deaths were due to our cultures?” Igor asked.

“That was why I wanted the probes,” Jack said. “We suspected as much but needed proof.”

“Hmm,” Igor said. “I don’t know if that should make me feel more or less inclined to give out information.”

“It’s just an issue of safety,” Jack said.

“Well, that sounds reasonable,” Igor said. “It’s not as if it’s a secret. We share our customer lists with several equipment manufacturers. Let me see what I can find here at my workstation.”

“To make it easier for you, narrow the field to labs in the New York metropolitan area,” Jack said.

“Fair enough,” Igor said. Jack could hear the man typing on his keyboard. “We’ll try tularemia first. Here we go.”

There was a pause.

“Okay,” Igor said. “We have sent tularemia to the National Health hospital and to the Manhattan General Hospital. That’s it; at least for the last couple of months.”

Jack sat more upright, especially knowing that National Health was the major competitor of AmeriCare. “Can you tell me when these cultures went out?”

“I think so,” Igor said. Jack could hear more typing. “Okay, here we are. The National Health shipment went out on the twenty-second of this month, and the Manhattan General shipment went out on the fifteenth.”

Jack’s enthusiasm waned slightly. By the twenty-second he’d already made the diagnosis of tularemia in Susanne Hard. That eliminated National Health for the time being. “Does it show who the receiver was on the Manhattan General shipment?” Jack asked. “Or was it just the lab itself?”

“Hold on,” Igor said as he switched screens again. “It says that the consignee was a Dr. Martin Cheveau.”

Jack’s pulse quickened. He was uncovering information that very few people would know could be discoverable. He doubted that even Martin Cheveau was aware that National Biologicals phage-typed their cultures.

“What about plague?” Jack asked.

“Just a moment,” Igor said while he made the proper entries.

There was another pause. Jack could hear Igor’s breathing.

“Okay, here it is,” Igor said. “Plague’s not a common item ordered on the East Coast outside of academic or reference labs. But there was one shipment that went out on the eighth. It went to Frazer Labs.”

“I’ve never heard of them,” Jack said. “Do you have an address?”

“Five-fifty Broome Street,” Igor said.

“How about a consignee?” Jack asked as he wrote down the address.

“Just the lab itself,” Igor said.

“Do you do much business with them?” Jack asked.

“I don’t know,” Igor said. He made another entry. “They send us orders now and then. It must be a small diagnostic lab. But there’s one thing strange.”

“What’s that?” Jack asked.

“They always pay with a cashier’s check,” Igor said. “I’ve never seen that before. It’s okay, of course, but customers usually have established credit.”

“Is there a telephone number?” Jack asked.

“Just the address,” Igor said, which he repeated.

Jack thanked Igor for his help and hung up the phone. Taking out the phone directory, he looked up Frazer Labs. There was no listing. He tried information but had the same luck.

Jack sat back. Once again he’d gotten information he didn’t expect. He now had two sources of the offending bacteria. Since he already knew something about the lab at the Manhattan General, he thought he’d better visit Frazer Labs. If there was some way he could establish an association with the two labs or with Martin Cheveau personally, he’d turn everything over to Lou Soldano.

The first problem was the concern about being followed. The previous evening he’d thought he’d been so clever but had been humbled by Shawn Magoginal. Yet to give himself credit, he had to remember that Shawn was an expert. The Black Kings certainly weren’t. But to make up for their lack of expertise, the Black Kings were ruthless. Jack knew he’d have to lose a potential tail rapidly since they had clearly demonstrated a total lack of compunction about attacking him in public.

There was also the collateral worry about Warren and his gang. Jack didn’t know what to think about them. He had no idea of Warren’s state of mind. It was something Jack would have to face in the near future.

To lose any tail Jack wanted a crowded location with multiple entrances and exits. Immediately Grand Central Terminal and the Port Authority Bus Terminal came to mind. He decided on the former since it was closer.

Jack wished there were some underground way of getting over to the NYU Medical Center to help him get away from the office, but there wasn’t. Instead he settled on a radio-dispatched taxi service. He directed the dispatcher to have the car pick him up at the receiving bay of the morgue.

Everything seemed to work perfectly. The car came quickly. Jack slipped in from the bay. They managed to hit the light at First Avenue; at no time was Jack a sitting duck in a motionless car. Still, he hunched low in his seat, out of view, sparking the driver’s curiosity. The cabbie kept stealing looks at Jack in his rearview mirror.

As they drove up First Avenue, Jack raised himself up and watched out the back. He saw nothing suspicious. No cars suddenly pulled into the traffic. No one ran out to flag a cab.

They turned left on Forty-second Street. Jack had the driver pull up directly in front of Grand Central. The moment the car came to a stop, Jack was out and running. He dashed through the entrance and merged quickly with the crowd. To be absolutely sure he was not being followed, he descended into the subway and boarded the Forty-second Street shuttle.

When the train was about to leave and the doors had started to close, Jack impeded their closing and jumped off the train. He ran up into the station proper and exited back onto Forty-second Street through a different entrance than he used when he arrived.

Feeling confident, Jack hailed a taxi. At first he told the driver to take him to the World Trade Center. During the trip down Fifth Avenue he watched to see if any cars, taxis, or trucks could have been following. When none seemed to be doing so, Jack told the driver to take him to 550 Broome Street.

Jack finally began to relax. He sat back in the seat and put his hands to his temples. The headache he’d awakened with in the overheated hotel room had never completely gone away. He’d been ascribing the lingering throb to anxiety, but now there were new symptoms. He had a vague sore throat accompanied by mild coryza. There was still a chance it was all psychosomatic, but he was still worried.