Jody Shields - The Winter Station

“Wrong.” The Baron kept his patience. “We can discuss theories about how this plague spreads, but nothing is yet proven. We’re guessing. But it’s urgent to protect the uninfected to break the chain of infection. Let’s start with this room. We—the medical staff—need masks, gloves, and disinfectants in order to work.”

Mesny made a show of dismissal, tapping his fingers. “A mask won’t protect anyone from the bites of infected fleas.”

The Baron waited to discover if he had any allies besides Messonier, who finally broke the silence.

“Even if rats spread plague—and that is pure conjecture—it’s possible our epidemic isn’t bubonic. As you know, there’s more than one type of plague. Or perhaps it’s an outbreak of septicemia. There isn’t enough information. The bacteriologists must analyze how plague attacks the system. How it kills. But regardless of its type, preventing it from spreading is crucial.” Messonier nodded at the Baron.

Zabolotny was exasperated. “It is a matter of terrible urgency. The plague must be stopped before it reaches the Great Wall at Shanhaiguan. It could then strike Beijing and spread to Japan, Korea, and Russia. Millions could die—”

“Meanwhile, all our patients are dying here,” Dr. Maria Lebedev interrupted.

Wu ignored her to argue with Mesny. “There’s no proof that the plague here is the same type you previously encountered in Tongshan, Dr. Mesny. You said it was bubonic plague spread by rats and their fleas. However, not one of the patients I’ve examined have swollen glands or buboes in their armpits or groins. Where is your medical evidence? Your proof?” The young doctor’s arrogant confidence didn’t make it easy for the other doctors to accept him.

Mesny angrily answered Wu’s challenge. “I am totally confident of my analysis. Dr. Wu, I’ve worked as a doctor practically since you were born. You’re twenty-nine, thirty years old? You’re the novice here. You have no expertise. You’ll do better to listen and observe. That’s the way we work in the Russian hospital. What can you tell us about plague tests?”

With little enthusiasm, the translator repeated Mesny’s words in Chinese, his tone of voice clearly expressing his opinion. Tempers simmered while they waited for him to finish. How long before Wu interrupted this endless posturing? No one would take advice, respect another opinion, unless it was based on fact. But there were few facts.

Wu’s anger was subtle. He’d studied bacteriology and his reply was easy. “Let’s not debate expertise. A patient’s sputum was recently cultured and analyzed in a laboratory here. The sputum was placed on a thin layer of agar jelly, inserted in a glass tube, sealed with cotton wool and paraffin. After twenty-four hours in an incubator, a thin crust of live plague grew on the jelly. Billions of bacilli. Highly infectious. That small glass container held the most dangerous thing in the world.” Wu’s posture relaxed slightly, confident the debate was closed. The autopsy performed on the Japanese woman wasn’t mentioned. “Several government officials also viewed the bacilli through a microscope.”

“As if government officials knew what they were doing,” Mesny muttered.

The Baron studied their faces. Surely some of the doctors were aware Wu had obtained the plague bacilli sample from the secret autopsy on the Japanese woman. Who had collaborated with him, used a scalpel on her body? The doctors had traded sentences with each other, back and forth, like cards laid on the table, each with a different value. Wu had no allies.

Wu caught the Baron’s sympathetic look and frowned. “I met with the consuls general of France, the United States, Great Britain, and Japan yesterday. They fully support my decisions. Now, let’s continue.” His expression betrayed the slightest anger as he waited for the translator to catch up. “I need to be briefed about what steps have already been taken to control the outbreak.”

The doctors were silent until Zabolotny responded. “We’ve closed a public bathhouse. Six people possibly infected with plague are now under strict surveillance. There are also five patients at the Russian hospital, isolated in a special ward, and there’s room to accommodate a few more. Dr. Lebedev and Dr. Mesny are in charge.”

Wu asked if the patients had all been tested for plague.

Lebedev answered that she was a doctor, not a microbiologist. She turned to Zabolotny for an answer.

Wu ignored her pointed gesture. “Tests will be ordered immediately. Let’s agree this outbreak has been unquestionably identified as plague. But there’s still the crucial question of how it’s transmitted. Our strategy hinges on how the infection spreads.”

The Baron continued the discussion. “What do the infected have in common? Are they related? Did they share a bed or a meal? Is there something that makes them susceptible to the plague? How contagious is it? What’s the incubation period? Bear with me for a moment. I say we don’t know the face of our enemy. It’s as if we’re trying to identify something while blindfolded. We feel the presence of heat but cannot identify the source. Bonfire, stove, samovar?”

“Exactly.” Messonier acknowledged the Baron. “We must work around the gaps in our information.” He addressed Maria Lebedev. “Dr. Lebedev, were you able to interview your patients? Any clue about incubation time before their symptoms developed? How they were infected?”

She opened a thin file on the table, her posture as rigid as her blond braids. “I apologize, but the few patients I’ve treated were either too unstable to speak clearly or refused to speak. Language is a problem, since there’s no Chinese translator in the hospital. I suspect patients withhold their names and addresses to protect their families.”

“Wouldn’t give their names? And they’re in our hospital? Extraordinary.” Mesny sat back in his chair.

She leaned forward and locked eyes with him. “The Chinese patients were forcibly brought to the hospital. I think,” she said slowly for emphasis, “it isn’t unexpected that they wouldn’t cooperate. They fear that their families will be taken and imprisoned. Why would they trust us? Our patients’ mortality rate is one hundred percent. Some patients die immediately. Others linger for a day or two.”

“I’ve never heard of an illness that’s one hundred percent fatal,” Mesny answered. “No, that cannot be correct. It’s the doctor’s skills that are at fault. Poor treatment.”

“You should apologize to Dr. Lebedev for that statement.” Messonier sat straight up in his chair and glared at Mesny.

Voices were raised in protest and repeated more loudly by the translator. Mesny pushed his chair back as if to leave the table.

“Gentlemen. And Dr. Lebedev.” Wu’s quiet words calmed the room.

The Baron regretted the doctors’ abrasiveness; it was a sad lesson for the young medical staff observing them. “Everyone shares the same goal, Dr. Mesny.”

It was impossible to dissolve Maria Lebedev’s composure and she continued as if there had been no interruption. “I could make suggestions about how to improve conditions for patients.”

Zabolotny insisted the patients must be made to talk. “We have an explosion of infections and you’re concerned about the patients’ comfort? What kind of treatment is this? Everyone infected must be hunted down.”

Messonier spoke up for her. “Give us your analysis of the illness, Dr. Lebedev.”

“There are several types of plague, as we know. Our plague may be a type of virulent pneumonia. The lungs are affected. At its last stages, the patients have high fever, rapid pulse. Cyanosis. Breathing is labored. Coughing fits with considerable bloody sputum. Death is quick.”