Christopher Moore - Island of the Sequined Love Nun

“What epidemic? I haven’t heard anything about this?”

“Encephalitis. It’s a rare strain, airborne and very contagious. We don’t let anyone off island who’s been exposed.”

Jefferson Pardee exhaled a deep sigh of relief. So this was the big story. Of course he’d promise not to say a word, but Time magazine would kill for this. He’d leave out the part about being taken prisoner in his flying piggy boxers. “And the guards?”

“World Health Organization. They’ve also given us an aircraft and lab equipment, as I’m sure you’ve seen.”

He’d seen an awful lot of lab equipment as he was led through the little hospital, but the aircraft was still a rumor. He decided to go for the facts. “You have a new Learjet, is that correct?”

“Yes.” She seemed genuinely taken aback by his comment. “How did you know?”

“I have my sources,” Pardee said, wishing he wore glasses so he could take them off in a meaningful way.

“I’m sure you do. Information is like a virus sometimes, and the only way to find a cure is to trace it to the source. Who told you about the jet?”

Pardee wasn’t giving anything for free. “How long have you known about the encephalitis?”

For the first time Pardee noticed that Beth Curtis had been holding her right hand behind her back the entire time they had been talking. He noticed because when the hand appeared, it was holding a syringe. “Mr. Pardee, this syringe contains a vaccine that my husband and I have developed with the help of the World Health Organization. Because you took it on yourself to sneak onto Alualu, you have exposed yourself to a deadly virus that at-tacks the nervous system. The vaccine seems to work even after exposure to the disease, but only if administered in the first few hours. I want to give you this vaccine, I really do. But if you insist on drawing out this little game of liar’s poker, then I can’t guarantee that you won’t contract the disease and die a horrible and painful death. So, that said, who told you about the jet?”

Pardee felt the sweat rising again. She hadn’t raised her voice, there wasn’t even a detectable note of anger there, but he felt as if she was holding a knife to his throat. Okay, to hell with the adventurous journalist. He could still get a byline based on what she’d already told him. “I talked to a pilot who passed through Truk a few months ago.”

“A few months ago? Not more recently?”

“No. He said he was going to fly a jet for some missionaries on Alualu. I came out to check it out.”

“And that was all you heard? Just that we had a jet?”

“Yes, it’s pretty unusual for a missionary clinic to have money for a jet, wouldn’t you say?”

She smiled. “I guess it is. So how did you plan to get off the island after you got your story?”

“The Micro Spirit was going to pick me up on the other side of the island. That’s it. I was just curious. It’s an occupational hazard.”

“Who knows you’re here, besides the crew of the Spirit ?”

Pardee considered her question; what would be the best answer. Surely she wouldn’t let him die of some dreaded disease, but how stupid would he have been to come out here without telling anyone? “The people who work for me at the Star and a friend of mine at AP who I called for some background before I left.”

“Oh, that’s good,” she said, still smiling. Pardee couldn’t help but feel pleased with himself. It had been a long time since he’d gotten any approval—or attention for that matter—from a beautiful woman.

She uncapped the syringe. “Now, before I give you the vaccine, a few medical questions, okay?”

“Sure. Shoot.”

“You smoke and drink to excess, correct?”

“I indulge from time to time. Another occupational hazard.”

“I see,” she said. “And have you ever had a test for HIV?”

“A month ago. Clean as a whistle.” This was true. He’d been motivated to take the test by a creepy rash on his stomach that turned out to be caused by skin-burrowing mites. The medic with the Navy CAT team had given him an ointment that cleared it up in a few days.

“Have you ever had hepatitis, cancer, or kidney disease?”

“Nope.”

“How about your family? Anyone with a history of kidney disease or cancer?”

“Not last time I heard. I haven’t talked with my family in twenty-five years.”

She seemed especially pleased at that. “And you’re not married? No children?”

“No.”

“Very good,” she said. She plunged the needle into his shoulder and pushed the plunger.

“Ouch. Hey, you could have warned me. Aren’t you supposed to swab that with alcohol first or something?”

She stepped to the door and smiled again. “I don’t think infec tion is going to be a problem, Mr. Pardee. Now don’t panic, but in a minute or so you are going to go to sleep. I can’t believe you bought that bit about the encephalitis. People get stupid living in the tropics, don’t you think?”

She went out of focus and the lines of the room started to heave as if the entire structure was breathing. “What was in…?” His tongue was too heavy; the words wouldn’t come.

“You don’t have a staff and you didn’t call anyone at AP, Mr. Pardee. That was a stupid lie. We’ll have to put ‘self-importance’ down under cause of death.”

Pardee tried to stand, but his legs wouldn’t obey him. He slid off the chair and his legs splayed straight out in front of him.

Beth Curtis bent over him, pushed her lips into a pout, and baby-talked. “Oh, are his wittle wegs all wobbly?” She stood up straight and put her hands on her hips. To Pardee her face floated like the moon through clouds.

She said, “You’re probably thinking that I’m being unusually cruel to tease a dying man, but you see, you’re not dying right now. Soon, but not right now.”

Pardee tried to form a question, but the room seemed to go liquid and crash over him like a black wave.

Sebastian Curtis walked down the dock to where the crew of the Micro Spirit was unloading fuel drums from a longboat. He was wearing his white lab coat over Bermuda shorts and a Hawaiian shirt, a stethoscope hung from his neck like a medallion of power.

The Micro Spirit ’s first mate, who was drinking a Coke while supervising the unloading, jumped up on the dock to meet the doctor. “Good morning.”

“Good morning,” Curtis said. “Are you in charge here?”

“I’m the first mate.”

Curtis regarded the tattooed Tongan. “Mr. Pardee will be staying with us for a while. He’s asked me to tell you not to wait for him.”

“That don’t bother you?” the mate asked. It seemed strange to him after the effort Pardee had made to sneak onto the island.

“No, of course not. In fact, we’ve offered to fly Mr. Pardee to Hawaii when he finishes his work.”

The mate had never heard Pardee’s name in the same sentence as the word “work.” It didn’t sound right. Still, he had his job to do

and the doctor was paying double freight for these barrels. He said, “Is he going to pay his fare?”

Curtis smiled and pulled a wad of bills out of the pocket of his shorts. “Of course. He asked me to give you the money. How much is it?”

“From Truk, one way, is three hundred.”

The doctor counted out a stack of twenties and held it out to the mate. “Here’s six hundred. Mr. Pardee asked me to pay the round-trip fare, since that’s what he originally contracted for.”

The mate stared at the stack of bills. He had known Jefferson Pardee for ten years and had never even known the man to buy a beer; now he was just giving him three hundred extra dollars? Three hundred dollars that the company and the captain didn’t know about. “Okay,” he said. He snatched the money out of the doctor’s hand and shoved it into his pocket before the crew could see.