The Puppet Masters

Chapter 31

The worst of it was, he meant it. I tried to correct matters by going limp on him, but it did not work. A top-level conference was called late that afternoon; I was notified but I stayed away. Shortly a very polite little WAC came to tell me that the commanding officer was waiting and would I please come at once?

So I went-and tried to stay out of the discussion. But my father has a way of conducting any meeting he is in, even if he is not in the chair, by looking expectantly at the one he wants to hear from. It's a subtle trick, as the group does not know that it is being led.

But I knew. With every eye in the room on you, it is easier to voice an opinion than to keep quiet. Particularly as I found that I had opinions.

The meeting was largely given over to moaning and groaning about the utter impossibility of using nineday fever against the slugs. Admitted that it would kill slugs-it would even kill Venerians who can be chopped in two and still survive. But it was sure death to any human-or almost any human; I was married to one who had survived-death to the enormous majority. Seven to ten days after exposure, then curtains.

"Yes, Mr. Nivens?" It was the commanding general, addressing me. I hadn't said anything but Dad's eyes were on me, waiting.

"I think there has been a lot of despair voiced at this session," I said, "and a lot of opinions given that were based on assumptions. The assumptions may not be correct."

"Yes?"

I did not have an instance in mind; I had been shooting from the hip. I continued to do so. "Well . . . for example-I hear constant reference to nine-day fever as if the 'nine-day' part were an absolute fact. It's not."

The boss brass shrugged impatiently. "It's a convenient tag-it averages nine days."

"Yes-but how do you know it lasts nine days-for a slug?"

By the murmur with which it was received I knew that I had hit the jackpot again.

A few minutes later I was being invited to explain why I thought the fever might run a different time in slugs and, if so, why it mattered. I began to feel like the after-dinner speaker who wishes he had not gotten up in the first place. But I bulled on ahead. "As to the first point," I said, "according to the record I saw this morning in the only case we know about the slug did die in less than nine days-quite a lot less. Those of you who have seen the records on my wife-and I gather that entirely too many of you have-are aware that her parasite left her, presumably dropped off and died, long before the eighth-day crisis. One datum does not fair a curve, but if it is true and experiments show it to be, then the problem is very different. A man infected with the fever might be rid of his slug in-oh, call it four days. That gives you five days to catch him and cure him."

The general whistled. "That's a pretty heroic solution, Mr. Nivens. How do you propose to cure him? For that matter, how do you propose to catch him? I mean to say, suppose we do plant an epidemic of nineday fever in Zone Red, it would take some incredibly fast footwork-in the face of stubborn resistance, remember-to locate and treat more than fifty million people before they died of the fever."

It was a hot potato, so I slung it right back. I wondered as I did so how many "experts" made their names by passing the buck. "As to the second question, that is a logistical and tactical problem-your problem, not mine. As to the first, there is your expert." I pointed to Dr. Hazelhurst. "Ask him."

Hazelhurst huffed and puffed and I knew how he felt. Insufficient former art . . . more research needed . . . experiments would be required . . . he seemed to recall that some work had been done toward an antitoxin treatment but the vaccine for immunizing had proven so successful that he was not sure the antitoxin had ever been perfected. Anyway, everyone who went to Venus nowadays was immunized before leaving. He concluded lamely by saying that the study of the exotic diseases of Venus was necessarily still in its infancy.

The general interrupted him as he was finishing. "This antitoxin business-how soon can you find out about it?"

Hazelhurst said he would get after it at once, there was a man at the Sorbonne he wanted to phone.

"Do so," his commanding officer said. "You are excused."

Hazelhurst came buzzing at our door before breakfast the next morning. I was annoyed but tried not to show it when I stepped out into the passage to see him. "Sorry to wake you," he said, "but you were right about that antitoxin matter."

"Huh?"

"They are sending me some from Paris; it should arrive any minute now. I do hope it's still potent."

"And if it isn't?"

"Well, we have the means to make it. We'll have to make it, of course, if this wild scheme is used-millions of units of it."

"Thanks for telling me," I said. "I know the general will be pleased." I started to turn away; he stopped me.

"Uh, Mr. Nivens-"

"Yes?"

"About the matter of vectors-"

"Vectors?" At the moment all the word meant to me was little arrows pointing in various directions.

"Disease vectors. We can't use rats or mice or anything like that. Do you happen to know how the fever is transmitted on Venus? By a little flying rotifer, the Venerian equivalent of an insect-but we don't have such here and that is the only way it can be carried."

"Do you mean to say you couldn't give it to me if you tried? Even with a jugful of live culture?"

"Oh, yes-I could inject you with it. But I can't picture a million paratroopers dropping into Zone Red and asking the parasite-ridden population to hold still while they gave them injections." He spread his hands helplessly.

Something started turning slowly over in my brain . . . a million men, in a single drop. "Why ask me?" I said. "It seems to be a medical problem."

"Uh, yes, it is of course. I just thought-Well, you seemed to have a ready grasp-" He paused.

"Thanks." My mind was struggling with two problems at once and beginning to have traffic problems. How many people were there in Zone Red? "Let me get this straight: suppose you had the fever and I didn't; I could not catch it from you?" The drop could not be medical men; there weren't that many.

"Not very easily. If I took a live smear from my throat and placed it in your throat, you might contract it. If I opened a vein of mine and made a trace transfusion to your veins, you would be sure to be infected with it."

"Direct contact, eh?" How many people could one paratrooper service? Ten? Twenty? Thirty? Or more? "If that is what it takes, you don't have any problem."

"Eh?"

"What's the first thing one slug does when he runs across another slug he hasn't seen lately?"

"Conjugation!"

" 'Direct conference', I've always called it-but then I use the sloppy old slug language for it. Do you think that would pass on the disease?"

"Think so? I'm sure of it! We have demonstrated, right here in this laboratory, that there is actual exchange of living protein during conjugation. They could not possibly escape direct transmission; we can infect the whole colony as if it were one body. Now why didn't I think of that?"

His words roused out a horrid memory, something about, "Would that my subjects had but one neck-" But I refrained from quoting it. "Don't go off half cocked," I said. "Better try it first. But I suspect that it will work."

"It will, it will!" He started to go, then stopped. "Oh, Mr. Nivens, would you mind very much-I know it's a great deal to ask-"

"What is? Speak up; I'm getting hungry." Actually I was anxious to work out the rest of the other problem.

"Well, would you consider permitting me to announce this method of vectoring in my report this morning? I'll give you full credit, but the general expects so much and this is just what I need to make my report complete." He looked so anxious that I almost laughed.

"Not at all," I said. "It's your department."

"That's decent of you. I'll try to return the favor." He turned away feeling happy and I turned back feeling the same way. I was beginning to like being a "genius".

I waited before reopening the door to our cubicle until I had straightened out in my mind all the main features of the big drop. Then I went in. Mary opened her eyes when I came in and gave me that long heavenly smile. I reached down and smoothed her hair. "Howdy, flame top, did you know that your husband is a genius?"

"Yes."

"You did? You never said so."

"You never asked me."

Hazelhurst gave credit all right; he referred to it as the "Nivens vector". I suppose it was natural that I should be asked to comment, though Dad looked my way first.

"I agree with Dr. Hazelhurst," I started out, "subject to experimental confirmation as outlined. However, he has properly left open for discussion certain aspects which are tactical rather than medical. While it is true that the entire body of titans might be infected from one contact, important considerations of timing-crucial, I should say-" I had worked out my whole opening speech, even to the hesitations, while eating breakfast. Mary does not chatter at breakfast, thank goodness!

"-require vectoring from many focal points. If we are to save a nominal hundred percent of the population of Zone Red, it is necessary that all the parasites be infected at as nearly the same time as possible in order that rescue squads may enter Zone Red after the slugs are no longer dangerous and before any host has passed the point where antitoxin can save him. The problem is susceptible to mathematical analysis-" Sam boy, I said to myself, you old phony, you could not solve it with an electronic integrator and twenty years of sweat. "-and should be turned over to your analytical section. However, let me sketch out the factors. Call the number of vector origins 'X'; call the number of rescue workers who much be dropped 'Y'. There will be an indefinitely large number of simultaneous solutions, with the optimum solution depending on logistic factors. Speaking in advance of rigorous mathematical treatment-" I had done my very damndest with a slipstick, but I did not mention that. "-and basing my opinions on my own unfortunately-too-intimate knowledge of their habits, I would estimate that-"

They let me go right ahead. You could have heard a pin drop, if anybody in that bare-skinned crew had had a pin. The general interrupted me once when I placed a rather low estimate on "X"; "Mr. Nivens. I think we can assure you of any number of volunteers for vectoring."

I shook my head. "You can't accept volunteers, General."

"I think I see your objection. The disease would have to be given time to establish itself in the volunteer and the timing might be dangerously close for his safety. But I think we could get around that-a gelatin capsule with the antitoxin embedded in tissue, or something of the sort. I'm sure the staff could work it out."

I thought they could, too, but I did not say that my real objection was a deep-rooted aversion to any additional human soul having to be possessed by a slug. "You must not use human volunteers, sir. The slug will know everything that his host knows-and he simply will not go into direct conference; he'll warn the others by word of mouth instead." I did not know that I was right but it sounded plausible. "No, sir, we will use animals-apes, dogs, anything large enough to carry a slug but incapable of human speech, and in sufficient quantities to infect the whole group before any slug knows that it is sick."

I went on to give a fast sketch of the final drop, Schedule Mercy, as I visualized it. "We can assume that the first drop-Schedule Fever-can start as soon as we are sure that we will have enough units of antitoxin for the second drop. In less than a week thereafter there should be no slug left alive on this continent."

They did not applaud, but it felt that way. The general adjourned the meeting and hurried away to call Air Marshal Rexton, then sent his aide back to invite me to lunch. I sent word that I would be pleased provided the invitation included my wife, otherwise I would be unable to accept.

Dad waited for me outside the conference room. "Well, how did I do?" I asked him, more anxiously than I tried to sound.

He shook his head. "Sam, you wowed 'em. You have the makings of a politician. No, I think I'll sign you up for twenty-six weeks of stereo instead."

I tried not to show how much I was pleased. I had gotten through the whole performance without once stammering; I felt like a new man.