CHAPTER 3

The sloop bucked a little as the bow chopped into a wave and fell a few points off course. The steady chugging of the small marine engine pushed her on, sidling up over the low rollers and sliding down the other side joyfully like a little kid on a playground coaster. The wind was cool and gentle, the sun bright in the southeast. We were running north, close to the coast, with Bowen Island and Gibsons already far astern. At that time of year, and in the middle of the week, traffic was light. The nearest ship was only a smudge on the horizon. I bent a line around the tiller and went below.

In the starboard bunk Pat lay sleeping quietly. A light breeze from the port floated a wisp of hair and dropped it back on her forehead with each lift of the bow. I bent over and kissed her gently on the mouth. She smiled faintly in her sleep and her arms came up around my neck as she began to wake up. I disengaged them gently.

"Go back to sleep darling. It's not time for your watch yet."

I straightened the covers over her, and went into the tiny galley.

The coffee was hot and the eggs I had set on the stove previously were boiling. I sat down to eat. The benzedrine I had taken to keep me going all through the night was wearing off. I could feel the faint quivering of fatigue in my arms and legs. My eyes were dry and burning a little. In two or three hours I could wake Pat and get some sleep myself. In the meantime all I had to do was to steer the sloop north, towards one of our favorite islands, a small, uninhabited, rock and tree covered hump where we could be alone to rest and relax.

And as I ate quickly and quietly, as I cleaned up the dishes and went back on deck, the words of Dr. Hallam kept running through my head like a squirrel through a maze, darting and searching for the answer. "Only the Chinese are dying as individuals, but I fear we are dying--as a nation!"

I had sat there, flabbergasted, my mouth open like a moron, the incredible statement echoing through the suddenly empty chambers of my brain.

"The ferret...." Pat spoke through the horror-stiffened fingers that clawed at her mouth. Her eyes stared widely at the deliberately composed features of the director.

"Yes, my dear ... the ferret."

"Oh, no.... Oh, God no ... not now!" It was not a cry of anguish for the world but something personal, deeper, a cry of despair.

"What's all the fuss about?" I said crossly. "I don't get it." I turned to Pat. "What're you having a hissy about?"

Hallam looked at me with patient resignation.

"If you were a woman you'd be having a hissy too, as you call it."

"That's her word for it sir," I said. "If you two are all up in the air because a ferret has an abortion I can't see why. There are plenty of diseases that affect animals differently to man. What about undulant fever? It causes abortion in cattle but doesn't affect pregnant women any more than many other serious diseases do. So a ferret drops its kittens! So it might have done it equally with any other high fever."

"You're quite right John," Hallam said, "but remember, this is no ordinary disease. This is a secret weapon and, if it does cause miscarriages and perhaps permanent damage to the ovaries, the result will be a catastrophe for the West."

"Doggone it, Chief, if you'll pardon my saying so, you're getting positively paranoid about this whole business. We haven't a shred of real evidence so far."

"Again you're right, but this is one time where intuition and a high index of suspicion should prevail over cool scientific detachment. We haven't got time for a series of controlled experiments. We've got to guess, and guess right!"

"He's right, John!"

"OK Pat, OK! Trot out your woman's intuition and we'll all fly off into the wild blue yonder. I only hope we don't come down with a dull thud."

"All the ferrets are snuffling with the flu," Hallam said. "It's unfortunate that only one was pregnant, otherwise we might have had confirmation of our hunch by now."

"I haven't heard of any increase in miscarriages among pregnant women who got the flu," I said. "To me that's pretty good evidence that the bug doesn't affect human beings that way. For that matter, there were more reports of testicular involvement than of ovarian disease."

"If it does affect pregnant women, maybe it affects the fetus. Maybe children will be born deformed like the cases of German measles in early pregnancy," Pat said.

"That's a gruesome thought," I said. "You two give me the creeps this morning." I looked at my watch. "Lord it's five o'clock! This has been a rough session."

"And not finished yet," groaned Hallam, pushing up out of his chair. "Only the ferrets are sick so far. We'll sacrifice a few females ... and some males too. Send them down to Smith for examination. He has a doctor and technicians on twenty-four hour duty and they can get cracking right away. Tell him to concentrate on glandular tissues, with first priority for the sex glands. And get cultures from the usual tissues before you send them down."

"Will do," I said, and left the room.

I was back in half an hour. Both Pat and Dr. Hallam came into the living room shortly afterwards.

"None of the other animals show any sign of illness yet," Pat said. "We'll have to wait a little longer."

"Look, I don't think anything will happen for the next twenty-four hours," the chief said. "Why don't you two buzz off. Relax all you can. There's a busy time coming and you won't be able to get out again for a while. It's early ... you could get down to the boat and go for a sail. Keep away from people; I don't want you catching the flu. Come back early tomorrow morning so nobody will be around."

"What about you?" Pat and I said it together.

"I'll get some sleep now and then putter around and read until I hear from Smith."

"Smith was there himself. He said he would do some frozen sections as well as the usual paraffin."

"In that case I shall have some more toast and coffee and wait up for the reports. But you had better go now. It will be six o'clock before you get out of the building. Any later and there will be too many people about."

So here we were, running up the coast and running away from the world's troubles, if we could, for one bright day. I went below and woke Pat.

* * * * *

The sudden quietness as the motor died aroused me with a start. I sat up and looked through the porthole to see trees and rocks gliding slowly by. I recognized the little patch of brown sand set between two large green lichen-covered boulders. The anchor went down. We were at our island.

There were still two or three hours until sunset. The air was warm and the water calm in the sheltered cove. I yawned my way up on deck to see Pat, in a low cut bathing suit, spreading a large blanket for a sunbath.

We sat down on the blanket and she leaned over to pass me a cigarette. I took it, being careful not to look directly at her. There was much too much to see and my blood pressure was already high enough.

We smoked in silence for a while, watching the seagulls preen themselves on the rocks to which they had returned when the boat stopped moving.

"John, do you really believe the virus is a natural mutation?"

"I don't know, Baby, I just don't know."

"Then why do you keep arguing with Dr. Hallam about it?"

"I'm not arguing, Baby. I'm trying to keep this thing within the bounds of reason. We haven't a single bit of evidence yet to prove it isn't a natural disease, so why go overboard?"

"The structure of the virus isn't normal."

"So far, that seems to be so, but that doesn't prove it's synthetic either."

"But what if it does cause permanent damage to the ovaries?"

"Then, Toots, this old continent of North America is in one hell of a fix."

"I can't imagine how I'd feel if I got a disease and knew I could never have children."

"There are plenty of people that way now."

"Not millions of them, and not me! I always wanted babies but my husband wanted to wait. He was too busy making money ... and having a good time."

"A good time with whom?"

"That's the question that finally broke it up. It's just as well there were no children, I suppose." She leaned over towards me and put her hands on mine. "If I ever marry again, I want a man who wants children."

This time I looked straight at her, and the hell with my blood pressure.

"I want your kids," I said, and pulled her down into my arms.

She broke loose after a while, though I could feel her quivering. It was always the same. I had never been able to break down that last little bit of resistance, that fear of being hurt again. Maybe I never would. I sighed resignedly and sat up.

"Might as well go fishing," I said and I went to lay out the lines and hoist the mainsail.

* * * * *

The wall of fog had been moving towards us over the empty sea like a great, flat-topped Antarctic iceberg, shining whitely in the gold light of the Western sun. Beside me, the mainsail hung slackly from the mast, the edge flipping idly in a stray puff of wind. Slowly the white cliff approached, and as slowly changed to an amoeboid mass of vapor, tumbling lazily, sending out streamers that twisted and vanished as they reached too far from the cool mother mist. One, stronger than the rest, waved a filmy pseudopod over my head and, for an instant, the gold light whitened. Another came, and another, and then we were gone, into the soft wet coolness of the seaborne cloud. The light faded, both from the fog blanket and from the setting of the sun. I hauled in the fishing lines and stowed them. I lit the running lights. I was shivering as I secured the sail, checked the gear and went below.

In the little triangular cabin, tucked under the forepart of the sloop, Pat was busy. The hissing of the pressure lamp and the crackling of hamburgers on the stove made a pleasant, home-like sound. It was cosy and warm here, in contrast to the fog-chill above. The smell of onions and beef drifted back to where I stood and I sniffed hungrily. She'd be a good wife, I thought as I watched her, and a good mistress too. She was still wearing her bathing suit and, as I looked from her full brown thighs up over the curving hip-line to the small breasts pushing against the thin bra, I felt the slow pounding pulse and deep excitement of desire. Quietly I came close behind her. She started as my cold hands touched her, the instant of realization passed, and then she came back hard against me and her eyes were on mine as she turned her lips for my kiss. For a moment only she stayed, then, with a backward shove of her body, she tried to push me away.

"Look, darling, this is all very nice, but the hamburgers are burning."

"Let them," I whispered, my hands roving a bit. "I'm burning too."

"That can wait." Her eyes seemed to promise me as she brushed at a stray brown curl with the back of her hand. The spatula, waving above her head, flashed in the flickering gas light. I let her go.

"Why don't you fix us a drink? There's time before we eat."

"If I drink too much I won't want you or the hamburgers either," I complained, but I went to the cooler and pulled out the gin and vermouth. "Someday," I thought morosely, "someday, she must give in."

I put her drink in the shelf where she could reach it as she worked and squeezed between the bench seat and the folding table while I watched her toss a salad. As a medical technician she was good, and the same thoroughness and skill went into her cooking; into everything she did for that matter.

The drink was good and the salad sat before me in its green crispness. Pat was lifting the hamburgers off the fire and, as the cracking ceased, I felt a low, insistent, base rumble rise above the hissing of the lamp. The night was quiet, no foghorns because there were no ships near enough. We had drifted fairly close to the mainland, behind some small islands, off the usual channels. The auxiliary motor was still shut down and for a moment I wondered if the currents had carried us in towards the rocks; but the noise was not the splash of waves on shore, it was too steady. Now Pat was standing, frying pan and spatula in either hand, and her straight dark eyebrows down in a frown of concentration.

"Do you hear it too?"

She nodded.

"Keep the hamburgers warm, I'm going up to have a look."

She moved back to the stove as I climbed up into the cockpit.

* * * * *

In a rising breeze the mist was swirling and, from the east, as the fog patches thinned out, the lighter cloud showed where a full moon lay hidden. The noise was louder now, and coming fast, a beat of engines rising above the splash of wavelets against the bow of the sloop. I couldn't see where the ship was. There was no foghorn; neither the doleful groaning of the deep sea ships nor the sharp cough of the coastal steamer, bouncing its sound waves off the island hills, told me where it lay.

"The stupid oaf," I muttered to myself. "What's he doing in this deserted channel, and why doesn't he signal?"

There was no time to wonder. I jumped to the stern and grasped the tiller while I pushed down firmly on the starter button. The engine was cold and coughed reluctantly in the foggy air. I was still prodding the starter and working the throttle when the fog bank broke apart.

Above, to the east, the mottled moon, pale grey and blue like a Danish cheese, had risen over the Coast Range. Across the waters of the channel ran a rippling bar of light, cutting in half the white-walled arena of fog as the late afternoon sun pierces the dust of a Mexican corrida. Charging out of the misty north, like a Miura bull from the gate, came a black, high-prowed ship, moving fast through its phosphorescent bow wave. It came on, straight for us, and the sputtering motor still did not respond. I stood up and worked the tiller back and forth, trying to scull with the rudder and swing our bow to starboard.

"Pat, Pat, for God's sake get on deck! It's a collision!"

I was still yelling when the thick black mass rose over me and the bowsprit of the sloop splintered and buckled. The jolt threw me to my knees but I held the rudder hard over and we slid by, bumping and scraping along the port side of the vessel.

It was not a big ship, but bigger than a halibut boat. It seemed about the size and shape of those floating canneries I'd seen in Hokkaido when I'd worked with the Japanese National Police in 1952. I don't know whether that thought was first in my mind or whether it came later but I do know, in the middle of all the confusion I heard a command screamed out in Japanese, and the answering "_Hai_" barked back as only the Japs can say it. I thought I must have been mistaken when, a moment later, I saw the man. The moon was full on his face as he leaned out over the side, near the stern. For an instant we were quite close as I stood up, cursing the stupid so-and-so's who were ruining the beautiful woodwork of my boat. He was fair-haired, with a short brush cut. The eyes were deep set and shadowed too much to see the color. His face was broad, with high cheek bones, and the mouth wide and heavy under a short nose. I couldn't tell his height, but he looked strong and stocky. His hands, gripping the rail, seemed powerful even in that light. As we passed, the moonlight caught them and was reflected in a dull red glow from some large stone, a ring I presumed, on the back of his left hand. He didn't move or speak and I lost sight of him a second later when the pitching of the yacht in the stern wash threw me again to the deck. By the time I recovered, the steamer was across the open space and plunging back into the fog. In the swirling mist of its passage the flag at the stern fluttered out straight. It looked like a red ball on a white field.

"The hamburgers! My God, the hamburgers are on fire!"

I turned around, still dazed, to see Pat unscramble herself in the cockpit and drop back into the galley. I left her to it while I checked the wreckage of the port side fittings. We weren't holed, thank Goodness, so we could run for home under our own power. I steered in close to the shore of one of the islands where the fog had lifted, and dropped anchor. Then I went below. Pat was at the stove again. A new batch of hamburgers was under way and only a stain on the floor showed what had happened to the first lot.

"Mix us a drink, a big drink," was all she said, then.

* * * * *

The hamburgers were gone and we sat over our coffee. I was drowsy from the warmth and the hot sweetness of the Drambuie felt good as I took it slowly. Pat was rolling hers around the liqueur glass and watching the oily liquid slide back to the bottom. A quiet woman ordinarily, she was extremely so this night.

"Why so quiet, darling?" I reached for her hand. She looked at me and said nothing.

"Is it that damned ferret again?"

She nodded.

"Don't let it worry you so much, sweet. It's only a hunch and I don't think he's right."

"What if he is right, what then?" She went on without waiting for an answer. "I want children, I don't want to be sterile."

"Well you aren't, or at least I don't suppose so. Probably you won't be."

She looked at me scornfully. "What chance have I of avoiding the flu when millions of others are getting it?"

"Oh Lord, you women! Can't you see there's absolutely no evidence for this silly fear of yours? Damn Hallam and his wild ideas! Why don't you forget it?"

"Because I think he's right, that's why." She stood up abruptly. "Let's go on deck."

I followed her out into the cockpit. We were still at anchor, intending to start back after a few hours sleep. The sloop was as quiet as a resting seabird in the black shadow of a rocky point. It was cold. In a few minutes Pat shivered and came close to me, her arms about my waist. The keen air had awakened me, and, as I caressed her, smoothing away the little pebbles of gooseflesh on her shoulders and back, her warm body against mine stirred again the desire I had felt before the collision. She must have known. Slowly her arms came up and around my neck. Her head, cushioned on my chest, lifted and her full lips brushed mine lightly. For a moment I hesitated. Through the thin suit she felt naked under my hands, trembling with cold and excitement.

"I can't take much more of this, Pat," I whispered. "Either you quit right now or you go down to bed."

Her eyes opened. She looked straight at me for a long moment.

"Will your bunk hold both of us?" she asked as her lips closed hard on mine.