Walker Percy - The Thanatos Syndrome

“Right. And where in the river does it come from?”

“Well, there’s an intake around here. Between here and Baton Rouge.”

“Right here.” She puts a pencil point on a westerly loop of the river. “This is the Ratliff intake installed five years ago to be above the chemicals — you know, it’s the Ruhr Valley from here to New Orleans. It supplies most of western Feliciana and the northeast sector of Baton Rouge. Now watch closely, I’m going to show you something.”

“I’m watching.”

“Okay. Now what we’re looking at is the distribution of all known positives for heavy sodium or chloride, right?”

“Right.”

“Take a good look and remember the distribution — for example, here in northeast Baton Rouge, running across here in most of the smaller towns and countryside back of the lake. With clear areas here, here, and along the lake. Okay?

“Okay. Now I’m going to show you another graphic. Another brainstorm!” She rubs her hands together, pleased with herself, “I got this from the S and WB.”

“What’s that?”

“The state Sewerage and Water Board. All I had to do was ask them for a graphic showing the areas supplied by Ratliff number one, that’s what they call it. Now watch this.”

She hits a key. A pretty map rolls out, a Miró watercolor of red swatches, bands, and blocks. “You got it? You oriented?”

“I think.”

“Now watch.” She hits keys, back and forth from twinkling star-clustered Feliciana to Miró-red Feliciana. “What do you see?”

“They’re roughly the same.”

“Roughly, my foot. They’re almost exactly the same. Look. Same clear areas. Lakefront, small enclaves here, here, a town here and here. I don’t know why.”

I say slowly, “The lakefront condos and high-rises use treated lake water. These clear areas are large new developments with their own deep wells. Towns like these, Covington, Kentwood, Abita Springs, have their own deep wells.” I look at her curiously. “What do you drink here?”

“Would you believe cistern water?”

“Cistern? I knew this place had an old cistern, but—”

“Carrie and Vergil swear by it. Carrie says it’s softer and Vergil says it’s healthier. No metal ions. He had it analyzed. What about you?”

I recollect. “Ellen is a nut on bottled water. Abita Springs water for ordinary use and Perrier for parties. Wait a minute.”

“Yes?”

“You’re saying that stuff got into the main water supply.”

“Got into it or was put into it.”

“Put into it.” We look at each other.

“I think I’ll fix us some coffee,” says Lucy.

We drink black coffee from old cups the size of small soup bowls. The coffee is chicoried and strong as Turkish.

“Look,” I say at last. “Here’s what we’re going to do.”

“What?”

“Put Feliciana back up there.”

“All right.”

“Now here we are here. A mile or so from the old river.”

“Right.”

“Here’s the Grand Mer facility on Tunica Island.”

“Right, and here’s the Ratliff intake here.”

“Not a mile from Grand Mer.”

“Right.”

“Lucy, you’re telling me that the drinking water from here is contaminated by heavy-sodium ions.”

“Obviously.”

“And I’m telling you that this facility here at Grand Mer has a heavy-sodium reactor.”

“I know.”

“Then clearly there is a leak from this source here to this intake here.”

“A leak or something.”

“Or something. Here’s what we’re going to do.”

“What?”

“If you can spare Vergil, he and I will go take a look.”

“And I. I’ll fix you some breakfast and—”

“Call in sick.”

“Call in sick. Let’s go back to bed. I’ll wake you at nine.”

I go back to bed dressed. I go back to ordinary sleep, as if I had dreamed the whole thing, panzers, nukes, bad water, Alice Pratt — but not Lucy.

5. BREAKFAST IN THE OLD dining room is a meal of quail, grits, beaten biscuits, fried apple rings, and the same bowl-size cups of chicoried coffee. I don’t know whether Lucy or the uncle or Carrie Bon cooked it. The uncle is proud of the quail— they’re his, he’s got a freezerful — half a dozen hot little heart-shaped morsels per plate, six tender-spicy, gamy-gladdening mouthfuls.

Lucy is half finished. She gives me a single quick look, head down, through her eyebrows. She and the uncle watch in silence while I eat. I am starved! Lucy smiles, smokes, and drinks her coffee. Satisfied, the uncle leaves.

We move to the other end of the table, where Lucy spreads out a geodetic survey map, weights the corners with cups and cellars. She summons Vergil.

When she stands, I see she’s wearing jeans too, worn and gray and soft as velvet. They fit her admirably. She sits at the head, Vergil and I flanking her; Vergil, arms folded on the table, eyes fixed on the map.

“I think we got trouble,” says Lucy, plucking tobacco from her tongue. “I think there’s been a Grade Two incident at Grand Mer. Either a spill or a leak. Vergil knows the plumbing — maybe he can help us. What I can’t understand is how in the hell it could get into the Ratliffe intake upriver. In any case, it’s my business. When people get sick, etiology unknown, it becomes my business. What do you think?”

Vergil and I look at each other, “One question, Lucy,” I say.

“What?”

“You know those queries you made of the data banks last night?” “Yes?”

“Do they know they’ve been queried by you?”

“Why?” She looks at me strangely.

“Just curious.”

“It’s routine epidemiology. I’m entitled. They wouldn’t red-flag it — as they might if the query were suspicious, some hacker fishing around. They know me. I did the same thing with the Jap encephalitis, though not on such a grand scale as last night.”

“I see. Lucy, are you going to notify the feds, EPA or NRC?”

“Of course. This is heavy-duty stuff — and you found it. We found it. We’ll both report it, okay? But before the stampede of bureaucrats, I’d like to have a look for myself. Want to come? I think you better come. You’re the guy that blew the whistle. I should think you’d be interested.”

“I’m interested.” She’s forgotten it is my idea.

“Vergil’s going to come. He knows the territory and the technology. He’s our resource person. Okay, Vergil?”

“Sure,” says Vergil without looking up.

“Okay, now look.” Lucy weights the map with more crystal goblets and salt cellars. “Here we are at Pantherburn. Here’s old Grand Mer, now a blind loop of the river, a lake. Up here is Angola, the state pen, a plantation with ten thousand inmates — which incidentally is supplied by the Ratliff number-one water district. Here’s Fedville—”

“Is that in the water district?” I ask.

“No, it’s not. They’ve got their own intake half a mile upriver.”

“I see.”

“You see what?”

“Nothing.”

“Here’s Tunica Island, not really an island, as you see, but part of the great Tunica Swamp. Here’s the Grand Mer facility, reactor and cooling tower. Here’s Raccourci Chute, the New River, and here upriver, less than a mile from the facility, is the Ratliff intake. And next to it, over the levee, is the pumping station which supplies the area of the occurrence of your syndrome. Here, not three hundred yards upriver, is Ratliff number-two intake, which supplies all of Fedville. Now here’s the question. You already know, don’t you?” She cocks an eye at me.

“Sure. The question is how what you call an incident can affect number-one intake, which is upriver, and not affect number two.”

“Right,” she says, eyeing me. “Why do you say ‘what you call an incident’?”