Prologue

7:14 pm, Friday, October 10

Boston, Massachusetts

Mario Dublin stumbled along the busy downtown street, a dollar bill clutched in his shaking hand. With the intense purpose of a man who knew exactly where he was going, the homeless derelict swayed as he walked and slapped at his head with the hand that was not clutching the dollar. He reeled inside a cut-rate drug store with discount signs plastered across both front windows.

Shaking, he shoved the dollar across the counter to the clerk. "Advil. Aspirin kills my stomach. I needs Advil."

The clerk curled his lip at the unshaved man in the ragged remnants of an army uniform. Still, business was business. He reached behind to a shelf of analgesics and held out the smallest box of Advil. "You’d better have three more dollars to go with that one."

Dublin dropped the single bill onto the counter and reached for the box.

The clerk pulled it back. "You heard me, buddy. Three more bucks. No ticky, no shirty."

"On’y got a dollar . . . my head’s breakin’ open." With amazing speed, Dublin lurched across the counter and grabbed the small box.

The clerk tried to pull it back, but Dublin hung on. They struggled, knocking over a jar of candy bars and crashing a display of vitamins to the floor.

"Let it go, Eddie!" the pharmacist shouted from the rear. He reached for the telephone. "Let him have it!"

As the pharmacist dialed, the clerk let go.

Frantic, Dublin tore at the sealed cardboard, fumbled with the safety cap, and dumped the tablets into his hand. Some flew across the floor. He shoved the tablets into his mouth, choked as he tried to swallow all at once, and slumped to the floor, weak from pain. He pressed the heels of his hands to his temples and sobbed.

Moments later a patrol car pulled up outside the shop. The pharmacist waved the policemen to come inside. He pointed to Mario Dublin, curled up on the floor in the old army uniform. "Get that stinking bum out of here! Look what he did to my place. I intend to press charges of assault and robbery!"

The policemen pulled out their night sticks. They noted the minor damage and the strewn pills, but they smelled alcohol, too.

The younger one heaved Dublin up to his feet. "Okay, Mario, let’s take a ride."

The second patrolman took Dublin’s other arm. They walked the unresisting drunk out to their patrol car. But as the second officer opened the door, the younger one pushed down on Dublin’s head to guide him inside.

Dublin screamed and lashed out, twisting away from the hand on his throbbing head.

"Grab him, Manny!" the younger cop yelled.

Manny tried to grip Dublin, but the drunk wrenched free. The younger cop tackled him. The older one swung his nightstick and knocked Dublin down. Dublin screamed. His body shook, and he rolled on the pavement.

The two policemen blanched and stared at each other.

Manny protested, "I didn’t hit him that hard."

The younger bent to help Dublin up. "Jesus. He’s burning up!"

"Get him in the car!"

Terrified of accusations of excessive force, they picked up the gasping Dublin and dumped him onto the car’s rear seat. Manny raced the squad car, its siren wailing, through the night streets. As soon as he screeched it to a stop at the emergency room, Manny flung open his door and tore inside the hospital, shouting for help.

The other officer sprinted around the car to open Dublin’s door.

When the doctors and nurses arrived with a gurney, the younger cop seemed paralyzed, staring into the car’s rear where Mario Dublin lay unconscious in blood that had pooled on the seat and spilled onto the floor.

The doctor inhaled sharply. Then he climbed inside, felt for a pulse, listened to the man’s chest, and backed outside, shaking his head.

"He’s dead."

"No way!" The older cop’s voice rose. "We barely touched the son-of-a-bitch! They ain’t gonna lay this one on us. "

***

Because the police were involved, only four hours later the medical examiner prepared for the autopsy of the late Mario Dublin, address unknown, in the morgue on the basement level of the hospital.

The double doors of the suite flung wide. "Walter! Don’t open him!"

Dr. Walter Pecjic looked up. "What’s wrong, Andy?"

"Maybe nothing," Dr. Andrew Wilks said nervously, "but all that blood in the patrol car scares the hell out of me. Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome shouldn’t lead to blood from the mouth. I’ve only seen that kind of blood from a hemorrhagic fever I helped treat when I was in the Peace Corps in Africa. This guy was carrying a Disabled American Vets card. Maybe he was stationed in Somalia or somewhere else in Africa."

Dr. Pecjic stared down at the dead man he was about to cut open. Then he returned the scalpel to the tray. "Maybe we’d better call the director."

"And call Infectious Diseases, too," Dr. Wilks said.

Dr. Pecjic nodded, the fear naked in his eyes.

***

7:55 pm, Atlanta, Georgia

Packed inside the high school auditorium, the audience of parents and friends was hushed. Up on the bright stage, a beautiful teenage girl stood in front of scenery intended to depict the restaurant in William Inge’s Bus Stop. Her movements were awkward, and her words, ordinarily free and open, were stiff.

None of that bothered the stout, motherly woman in the first row. She wore a silver-gray dress of the kind the bride’s mother at a formal wedding would choose, topped by a celebratory corsage of roses. She beamed up at the girl, and when the scene ended to polite applause, her clapping rang resoundingly.

At the final curtain, she leaped to her feet to applaud. She went around to the stage door to wait as the cast emerged in twos and threes to meet parents, boyfriends, and girlfriends. This was the last performance of the annual school play, and they were flushed with triumph, eager for the cast party that would last long into the night.

"I wish your father could’ve been here to see you tonight, Billie Jo," the proud mother said as the high school beauty climbed into the car.

"So do I, Mom. Let’s go home."

"Home?" The motherly woman was confused.

"I just need to lie down for a while. Then I’ll change for the party, okay?"

"You sound bad." Her mother studied her then turned the car into traffic. Billie Jo had been snuffling and coughing for more than a week but had insisted on performing anyway.

"It’s just a cold, mother," the girl said irritably.

By the time they reached the house, she was rubbing her eyes and groaning. Two red fever spots showed on her cheeks. Frantic, her terrified mother unlocked the front door and raced inside to dial 911. The police told her to leave the girl in the car and keep her warm and quiet. The paramedics arrived in three minutes.

In the ambulance, as the siren screamed through the Atlanta streets, the girl moaned and writhed on the gurney, struggling for breath. The mother wiped her daughter’s fevered face and broke into despairing tears.

At the hospital emergency room, a nurse held the mother’s hand. "We’ll do everything necessary, Mrs. Pickett. I’m sure she’ll be better soon."

Two hours later, blood gushed from Billie Jo Pickett’s mouth, and she died.

***

5:15 PM, Fort Irwin, Barstow, California

The California high desert in early October was as uncertain and changeable as the orders of a new second lieutenant with his first platoon. This particular day had been clear and sunny, and by the time Phyllis Anderson began preparing dinner in the kitchen of their pleasant two-story house in the best section of the National Training Center’s family housing, she was feeling optimistic. It had been a hot day and her husband, Keith, had taken a good nap. He had been fighting a heavy cold for two weeks, and she hoped the sun and warmth would clear it up once and for all.

Outside the kitchen windows, the lawn sprinklers were at work in the afternoon’s long shadows. Her flower beds bloomed with late summer flowers that defied the harsh wilderness of thorny gray-green mesquite, yucca, creosote, and cacti growing among the black rocks of the beige desert.

Mrs. Anderson hummed to herself as she put macaroni into the microwave. She listened for the footsteps of her husband coming down the stairs. The major had night operations tonight. But the stumbling clatter sounded more like Keith, Jr., sliding and bumping his way down, excited about the movie she planned to take both children to while their father was working. After all, it was Friday night.

She shouted, "Jay-Jay, stop that!"

But it was not Keith, Jr. Her husband, partially dressed in desert camouflage, staggered into the warm kitchen. He was dripping with sweat, and his hands squeezed his head as if to keep it from exploding.

He gasped, ". . . hospital . . . help . . . "

In front of her horrified eyes, the major collapsed on the kitchen floor, his chest heaving as he strained to breathe.

Shocked, Phyllis stared then moved with the speed and purpose of a soldier’s wife. She tore out of the kitchen. Without knocking, she yanked open the side door of the house next to theirs and burst into the kitchen.

Capt. Paul Novak and his wife, Judy, gaped.

"Phyllis?" Novak stood up. "What’s wrong, Phyllis?"

The major’s wife did not waste a word. "Paul, I need you. Judy, come watch the kids. Hurry!"

She whirled and ran. Captain Novak and his wife were right behind. When called to action, a soldier learns to ask no questions. In the kitchen of the Anderson house, the Novaks took in the scene instantly.

"911?" Judy Novak reached for the telephone.

"No time!" Novak cried.

"Our car!" Phyllis shouted.

Judy Novak ran up the stairs to where the two children were in their bedrooms getting ready to enjoy an evening out. Phyllis Anderson and Novak picked up the gasping major. Blood trickled from his nose. He was semiconscious, moaning, unable to speak. Carrying him, they rushed across the lawn to the parked car.

Novak took the wheel, and Phyllis climbed into the rear beside her husband. Fighting back sobs, she cradled the major’s head on her shoulder and held him close. His eyes stared up at her in agony as he fought for air. Novak sped through the base, blasting the car’s horn. Traffic parted like an infantry company with the tanks coming through. But by the time they reached the Weed Army Community Hospital, Major Keith Anderson was unconscious.

Three hours later he was dead.

In the case of sudden, unexplained death in the State of California, an autopsy was mandated. Because of the unusual circumstances of the death, the major was rushed to the morgue. But as soon as the army pathologist opened the chest cavity, massive quantities of blood erupted, spraying him.

His face turned chalk white. He jumped to his feet, snapped off his rubber gloves, and ran out of the autopsy chamber to his office.

He grabbed the phone. "Get me the Pentagon and USAMRIID. Now! Priority!"

PART ONE

Chapter One

3:55 pm, Sunday, October 12

London, England

A cold October rain slanted down on Knightsbridge where Brompton Road intersected Sloan Street. The steady stream of honking cars, taxis, and red double-decker buses turned south and made their halting way toward Sloan Square and Chelsea. Neither the rain nor the fact that business and government offices were closed for the weekend lessened the crush. The world economy was good, the shops were full, and New Labor was rocking no one’s boat. Now the tourists came to London at all times of the year, and the traffic this Sunday afternoon continued to move at a snail’s pace.

Impatient, US Army Lt. Col. Jonathan ("Jon") Smith, MD, stepped lightly from the slow-moving old-style No. 19 bus two streets before his destination. The rain was letting up at last. He trotted a few quick steps beside the bus on the wet pavement then hurried onward, leaving the bus behind.

A tall, trim, athletic man in his early forties, Smith had dark hair worn smoothly back and a high-planed face with navy-blue eyes that automatically surveyed vehicles and pedestrians. There was nothing unusual about him as he strode along in his tweed jacket, cotton trousers, and trenchcoat. Still, women turned to look, and he occasionally noticed and smiled, but continued on his way.

He left the drizzle at Wilbraham Place and entered the foyer of the genteel Wilbraham Hotel where he took a room every time USAMRIID sent him to a medical conference in London. Inside the old hostelry, he climbed the stairs two at a time to his second-floor room. There he rummaged through his suitcases, searching for the field reports of an outbreak of high fever among US troops stationed in Manilla. He had promised to show it to Dr. Chandra Uttam of the Viral Diseases Branch of the World Health Organization.

Finally he found it under a pile of dirty clothes tossed into the larger suitcase. He sighed and grinned at himself-–he had never lost the messy habits acquired from his years in the field living in tents, focusing on one crisis or another.

As he rushed downstairs to return to the WHO epidemiology conference, the desk clerk called out to him.

"Colonel? There’s a letter for you. It’s marked ‘Urgent.’"

"A letter?" Who would mail him here? He looked at his wristwatch, which told him not only the hour but reminded him of the day. "On a Sunday?"

"It came by hand."

Suddenly worried, Smith took the envelope and ripped it open. It was a single sheet of white printer paper, no letterhead or return address:

Smithy,

Meet me Rock Creek Park , Pierce Mill picnic grounds, midnight Monday. Urgent. Tell no one.

Smith’s chest contracted. There was only one person who called him Smithy–Bill Griffin. He had met Bill in third grade at Hoover elementary school in Council Bluffs, Iowa. Fast friends from then on, they’d gone to high school together, college at the University of Iowa, and on to grad school at UCLA. Only after Smith had gotten his MD and Bill his PhD in psychology had they taken different paths. They had both fulfilled boyhood dreams by joining the military, with Bill going into military intelligence work. Through all their distant assignments and postings, they’d kept in touch, but they hadn’t actually seen one another in more than a decade.

Frowning, Smith stood motionless in the stately lobby and stared down at the cryptic words.

"Anything wrong, sir?" the desk clerk inquired politely.

Smith looked around. "Nothing. Nothing at all. Well, better be on my way if I want to catch the next seminar."

He stuffed the note into his trenchcoat pocket and strode out into the soggy afternoon. How had Bill known he was in London? At this particular secluded hotel? And why all the cloak-and-dagger, even to using Bill’s private boyhood name for him?

No return address or phone number.

Only an initial to identify the sender.

Why midnight?

Smith liked to think of himself as a simple man, but he knew the truth was far from that. His career showed the reality. He had been a military doctor in MASH units and was now a research scientist. He had also for a short time worked for military intelligence. And then there was the stint commanding troops. He wore his restlessness like another man wore his skin--so much a part of him he hardly noticed.

Yet in the past year he had discovered a happiness that had given him focus, a concentration he had never before achieved. Not only did he find his work at USAMRIID challenging and exciting, the confirmed bachelor was in love. Really in love. No more of that high-school stuff of women coming and going through his life in a revolving door of drama. Sophia Russell was everything to him–fellow scientist, research partner, and blond beauty.

There were moments when he would take his eyes from his electron microscope to just stare at her. How all that fragile loveliness could conceal so much intelligence and steely will constantly intrigued him. Just thinking about her made him miss her all over again. He was scheduled to fly out of Heathrow tomorrow morning, which would give him just enough time to drive home to Maryland and meet Sophia for breakfast before they had to go into the lab.

But now he had this disturbing message from Bill Griffin.

All his internal alarms were ringing. At the same time, it was an opportunity. He smiled wryly at himself. Apparently his restlessness still was not tamed.

As he hailed a taxi, he made plans.

He would change his flight tickets to Monday night and meet Bill Griffin at midnight. He and Bill went too far back for him to do otherwise. This meant he wouldn’t get into work until Tuesday, a day late. Which would make Kielburger, the general who directed USAMRIID, see red. To put it mildly, the general found Smith and his free-wheeling, field-operations way of doing things aggravating.

Not a problem. Smith would do an end run.

Early yesterday morning he had phoned Sophia just to hear her voice. But in the middle of their conversation, a message had cut in ordering her to go immediately to the lab because some virus had arrived from California to be identified. She could easily work the next sixteen or twenty-four hours nonstop. In fact, she might be at the lab so late tonight she would not even be up tomorrow morning when he had been planning to share breakfast. He sighed, disappointed. The only good thing was she would be too busy to worry about him.

He might as well just leave a message on their answering machine at home that he would arrive a day late and she should not be concerned. She could tell General Kielburger or not, her call.

That was where the payoff came in. Instead of leaving London tomorrow morning, he would take a night flight. A few hours difference, but a world to him: Tom Sheringham was leading the UK Microbiological Research Establishment team that was working on a potential vaccine against all hantaviruses. Tonight he would not only be able to attend Tom’s presentation, he would twist Tom’s arm to join him for a late dinner and drinks. Then he would pry out all the inside, cutting-edge details Tom was not ready to make public, and he would wangle an invitation to visit Porton Down tomorrow before he had to catch his night flight.

Nodding to himself and almost smiling, Smith leaped over a puddle and yanked open the back door of the black-beetled taxi that had stopped in the street. He told the cabbie the address of the WHO conference.

But as he sank into the seat, his smile disappeared. He pulled out the letter from Bill Griffin and reread it, hoping to find some clue he had missed. What was most noteworthy was what was not said. The furrow between his brows deepened. He thought back over the years, trying to figure out what could have happened to make Bill suddenly contact him this way.

If Bill wanted scientific help or some kind of assistance from USAMRIID, he would go through official government channels. Bill was an FBI special agent now and proud of it. Like any agent, he would request Smith’s services from the director of USAMRIID.

On the other hand, if it were simply personal, there would have been no cloak-and-dagger. Instead, a phone message would have been waiting at the hotel with Bill’s number so Smith could call back.

In the chilly cab, Smith shrugged uneasily under his trenchcoat. This meeting was not only unofficial, it was secret. Very secret. Which meant Bill was going behind the FBI. Behind USAMRIID. Behind all government entities . . . all apparently in the hopes of involving him, too, in something clandestine.

Chapter Two

8:37 am, Sunday, October 12

Fort Detrick, Maryland

Located in Frederick, a small city surrounded by western Maryland’s green, rolling landscape, Fort Detrick was the home of the United States Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases. Known by its initials, USAMRIID, or simply as the Institute, it was a magnet for violent protest in the 1960s when it was an infamous government factory for developing and testing chemical and biological weapons. When President Nixon ordered an end to those programs in 1969, USAMRIID disappeared from the spotlight to become a center for science and healing.

Then came 1989. The highly communicable Ebola virus appeared to have infected monkeys dying at a primate quarantine unit in Reston, Virginia. USAMRIID’s doctors and veterinarians, both military and civilian, were rushed to contain what could erupt into a tragic human epidemic.

But better than containment, they proved the Reston virus to be a genetic millimeter different from the extremely lethal strains of Ebola Zaire and Ebola Sudan. Most important was that the virus was harmless to people. That exciting discovery skyrocketed USAMRIID scientists into headlines across the nation. Suddenly, Fort Detrick was again on people’s minds, but this time as America’s foremost military medical research facility.

In her USAMRIID office, Dr. Sophia Russell was thinking about these claims to fame, hoping for inspiration, as she waited impatiently for her telephone call to reach a man who might have some answers to help resolve a crisis she feared could erupt into a serious epidemic.

Sophia was a PhD scientist in cell and molecular biology. She was a leading cog in the worldwide wheels set in motion by the death of Major Keith Anderson. She had been at USAMRIID four years, and like the scientists in 1989, she was fighting a medical emergency involving an unknown virus. Already she and her contemporaries were in a far more precarious position: This virus was fatal to humans. There were three victims–the army major and two civilians–all who had apparently died abruptly of Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) within hours of one another.

It was not the timing of the deaths or the ARDS itself that had riveted USAMRIID; millions died of ARDS each year around the planet.

But not young people. Not healthy people. Not without a history of respiratory problems or other contributing factors, and not with violent headaches and blood-filled chest cavities.

Now three cases in a single day had died with identical symptoms, each in a different part of the country–-the major in California, a teenage girl in Georgia, and a homeless man in Massachusetts.

The director of USAMRIID–-Brig. Gen. Calvin Kielburger–-was reluctant to declare a worldwide alert on the basis of three cases they had been handed only yesterday. He hated rocking the boat or sounding like a weak alarmist. Even more, he hated sharing credit with other Level Four labs, especially USAMRIID’s biggest rival, Atlanta’s CDC.

Meanwhile, tension at USAMRIID was palpable, and Sophia, leading a team of scientists, kept working.

She had received the first of the blood samples by 3:00 am Saturday and had immediately headed to her Level Four lab to begin testing. In the small locker room, she had removed her clothes, watch, and the ring Jon Smith gave her when she agreed to marry him. She paused just a moment to smile down at the ring and think about Jon. His handsome face flashed into her mind–the almost American Indian features with the high cheekbones but very dark blue eyes. Those eyes had intrigued her from the beginning, and sometimes she had imagined how much fun it would be to fall into their depths. She loved the liquid way he moved, like a jungle animal who was domesticated only by choice. She loved the way he made love–the fire and excitement. But most of all, she just simply, irrevocably, passionately loved him.

She had had to interrupt their phone conversation to rush here. "Darling, I have to go. It was the lab on the other line. An emergency."

"At this hour? Can’t it wait until morning? You need your rest."

She chuckled. "You called me. I was resting, in fact sleeping, until the phone rang."

"I knew you’d want to talk to me. You can’t resist me."

She laughed. "Absolutely. I want to talk to you at all hours of the day and night. I miss you every moment you’re in London. I’m glad you woke me up out of sound sleep so I could tell you that."

It was his turn to laugh. "I love you, too, darling."

In the USAMRIID locker room, she sighed. Closed her eyes. Then she put Jon from her mind. She had work to do. An emergency.

She quickly dressed in sterile green surgical scrubs. Barefoot, she labored to open the door to Bio-Safety Level Two against the negative pressure that kept contaminants inside Levels Two, Three, and Four. Finally inside, she trotted past a dry shower stall and into a bathroom where clean white socks were kept.

Socks on, she hurried into the Level Three staging area. She snapped on latex rubber surgical gloves then taped the gloves to the sleeves to create a seal. She repeated the procedure with her socks and the legs of the scrubs. That done, she dressed in her personal bright-blue plastic biological space suit, which smelled faintly like the inside of a plastic bucket. She carefully checked it for pinholes. She lowered the flexible plastic helmet over her head, closed the plastic zipper that ensured her suit and helmet were sealed, and pulled a yellow air hose from the wall.

She plugged the hose into her suit. With a quiet hiss, the air adjusted in the massive space suit. Almost finished, she unplugged the air hose and lumbered through a stainless steel door into the air lock of Level Four, which was lined with nozzles for water and chemicals for the decontamination shower.

At last she pulled open the door into Level Four. The Hot Zone.

There was no way she could rush anything now. As she advanced each step in the cautious chain of protective layers, she had to take more care. Her one weapon was efficient motion. The more efficient she was, the more speed she could eke out. So instead of struggling into the pair of heavy yellow rubber boots, she expertly bent first one foot, angled it just right, and slid it in. Then she did the same with the other.

She waddled as fast as she could along narrow cinder-block corridors into her lab. There she slipped on a third pair of latex gloves, carefully removed the samples of blood and tissue from the refrigerated container, and went to work isolating the virus.

Over the next twenty-six hours, she forgot to eat or sleep. She lived in the lab, studying the virus with the electron microscope. To her amazement, she and her team ruled out Ebola, Marburg, and any other filovirus. It had the usual furry-ball shape of most viruses. Once she had seen it, given the ARDS cause of death, her first thought was a hantavirus like the one that had killed the young athletes on the Navajo reservation in 1993. USAMRIID was expert on hantaviruses. One of its legends, Karl Johnson, had been a discoverer of the first hantavirus to be isolated and identified back in the 1970s.

With that in mind, she had used immunoblotting to test the unknown pathogen against USAMRIID’s frozen bank of blood samples of previous victims of various hantaviruses from around the world. It reacted to none. Puzzled, she ran a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to get a bit of DNA sequence from the virus. It resembled no known hantavirus, but for future reference she assembled a preliminary restriction map anyway. That was when she wished most fervently Jon was with her, not far away at the WHO conference in London.

Frustrated because she still had no definitive answer, she had forced herself to leave the lab. She had already sent the team off to sleep, and now she went through the exiting procedure, too, peeling away her space suit, going through decontamination procedures, and dressing again in her civilian clothes.

After a four-hour onsite nap–that was all she needed, she told herself firmly– she had hurried to her office to study the tests’ notes. As the other team members awakened, she sent them back to their labs.

Her head ached, and her throat was dry. She took a bottle of water from her office mini refrigerator and returned to her desk. On the wall hung three framed photos. She drank and leaned forward to contemplate them, drawn like a moth to comforting light. One showed Jon and herself in bathing suits last summer in Barbados. What fun they had had on their one and only vacation. The second was of Jon in his dress uniform the day he’d made lieutenant colonel. The last pictured a younger captain with wild black hair, a dirty face, and piercing blue eyes in a dusty field uniform outside a Fifth MASH tent somewhere in the Iraqi desert.

Missing him, needing him in the lab with her, she had reached for the phone to call him in London-–and stopped. The general had sent him to London. For the general, everything was by the book, and every assignment had to be finished. Not a day late, not a day early. Jon was not due for several hours. Then she realized he was probably aloft now anyway, but she wouldn’t be at his house, waiting for him. She dismissed her disappointment.

She had devoted herself to science, and somewhere along the way she had gotten extremely lucky. She had never expected to marry. Fall in love, perhaps. But marry? No. Few men wanted a wife obsessed with her work. But Jon understood. In fact, it excited him that she could look at a cell and discuss it in graphic, colorful detail with him. In turn, she had found his endless curiosity invigorating. Like two children at a kindergarten party, they had found their favorite playmates in each other–well suited not only professionally but temperamentally. Dedicated, compassionate, and as in love with life as with each other.

She had never known such happiness, and she had Jon to thank for it.

With an impatient shake of her head, she turned on her computer to examine the lab notes for anything she might have missed. She found nothing of any significance.

Then, as more DNA sequence data was arriving, and she continued to review in her mind all the clinical data so far on the virus, she had a strange feeling–

She had seen this virus–or one that was incredibly similar–somewhere.

She wracked her brain. Dug through her memory. Rooted through her past.

Nothing came to mind. Finally she read a report from one of her team that suggested the new virus might be related to Machupo, one of the first discovered hemorrhagic fevers, again by Karl Johnson.

Africa didn’t push any of her buttons. But Bolivia . . . ?

Peru!

Her student anthropology field trip, and–

Victor Tremont.

Yes, that had been his name. A biologist on a field trip to Peru to collect plants and dirts for potential medicinals for . . . what company? A pharmaceutical firm . . . Blanchard Pharmaceuticals! She turned back to her computer, quickly entered the Internet , and searched for Blanchard. She found it almost at once–in Long Lake, N.Y. And Victor Tremont was President and Chief Operating Officer now! She reached for her phone and dialed the number.

It was Sunday morning, but giant corporations sometimes kept their telephones open all weekend for important calls. Blanchard did. A human voice answered, and when she asked for Victor Tremont, the voice told her to wait. She drummed her fingers on the desk, trying to control her worried impatience.

At last a series of clicks and silences on the far end of the line were interrupted by another human voice. This time it was neutral, toneless: "May I ask your name and business with Doctor Tremont?"

"Sophia Russell. Tell him it’s about a trip to Peru where we met."

"Please hold." More silence. Then "Mr. Tremont will speak with you now."

"Ms. . . . Russell?" Obviously he was consulting her name handed to him on a pad. "What can I do for you?" His voice was low and pleasant but commanding. A man clearly accustomed to being in charge.

She said mildly, "Actually, it’s Doctor Russell now. You don’t remember my name, Doctor Tremont?"

"Can’t say I do. But you mentioned Peru, and I do remember Peru. Twelve or thirteen years ago, wasn’t it?" He was acknowledging why he was talking to her, but giving nothing away in case she was a job seeker or it was all some hoax.

"Thirteen, and I certainly remember you." She was trying to keep it light. "What I’m interested in is that time on the Caraibo River. I was with a group of anthropology undergrads on a field trip from Syracuse while you were collecting potential medicinal materials. I’m calling to ask about the virus you found in those remote tribesmen, the natives the others called the Monkey Blood Drinkers."

In his large corner office at the other end of the line, Victor Tremont felt a jolt of fear. Just as quickly he repressed it. He swivelled in his desk chair to stare out at the lake, which was shimmering like mercury in the early morning light. On the far side, a thick pine forest stretched and climbed to the high mountains in the distance.

Annoyed that she had surprised him with such a potentially devastating memory, Tremont continued to swivel. He kept his voice friendly. "Now I remember you. The eager blond young lady dazzled by science. I wondered whether you’d go on to become an anthropologist. Did you?"

"No, I ended up with a doctorate in cell and molecular biology. That’s why I need your help. I’m working at the army’s infectious diseases research center at Fort Detrick. We’ve come across a virus that sounds a lot like the one in Peru–an unknown type causing headaches, fever, and acute respiratory distress syndrome that can kill otherwise healthy people within hours and produce a violent hemorrhage in the lungs. Does that ring a bell, Doctor Tremont?"

"Call me Victor, and I seem to recall your first name is Susan . . . Sally. . . something like . . . ?"

"Sophia."

"Of course. Sophia Russell. Fort Detrick," he said, as if writing it down. "I’m glad to hear you remained in science. Sometimes I wish I’d stayed in the lab instead of jumping to the front office. But that’s water over a long-ago dam, eh?" He laughed.

She asked, "Do you recall the virus?"

"No. Can’t say I do. I went into sales and management soon after Peru, and probably that’s why the incident escapes me. As I said, it was a long time ago. But from what I recall of my molecular biology, the scenario you suggest is unlikely. You must be thinking of a series of different viruses we heard about on that trip. There was no shortage. I remember that much."

She dug the phone into her ear, frustrated. "No, I’m certain there was this one single agent that came from working with the Monkey Blood people. I didn’t pay a lot of attention at the time. But then, I never expected to end up in biology, much less cell and molecular. Still, the oddness of it stuck with me."

"‘The Monkey Blood people?’ How bizarre. I’m sure I’d recall a tribe with such a colorful name as that."

Urgency filled her voice. "Doctor Tremont, listen. Please. This is vital. Critical We’ve just received three cases of a virus that reminds me of it. Those natives had a cure that worked almost eighty percent of the time-–drinking the blood of a certain monkey. As I recall, that’s what astonished you."

"And still would," Tremont agreed. The accuracy of her memory was unnerving. "Primitive Indians with a cure for a fatal virus? But I know nothing about it," he lied smoothly. "The way you describe what happened, I’m certain I’d remember. What do your colleagues say? Surely some worked in Peru, too."

She sighed. "I wanted to check with you first. We have enough false alarms, and it’s been a long time since Peru for me, too. But if you don’t remember . . ." Her voice trailed off. She was terribly disappointed. "I’m certain there was a virus. Perhaps I’ll contact Peru. They must have a record of unusual cures among the Indians."

Victor Tremont’s voice rose slightly. That was not what he needed. "That may not be necessary. I kept a journal of my trips back then. Notes on the plants and potential pharmaceuticals. Perhaps I jotted down something about your virus as well."

Sophia leaped at the suggestion. "I’d appreciate your looking. Right away."

"Whoa." Tremont gave a warm chuckle. He had her. "The notebooks are stored somewhere in my house. Probably the attic. Maybe the basement. I’ll have to get back to you tomorrow."

"I owe you, Victor. Maybe the world will. First thing tomorrow, please. You have no idea how important this could be." She gave him her phone number.

"Oh, I think I know," Tremont assured her. "Tomorrow morning at the latest."

He hung up and rotated once more to gaze out at the brightening lake and the high mountains that suddenly seemed to loom close and ominous. He stood up and walked to the window. He was a tall man of medium build, with a distinctive face on which nature had played one of her more kindly tricks: From a youth’s oversized nose, gawky ears, and thin cheeks, he’d grown into a good-looking man. Now in his fifties, his features had filled out. His face was aquiline, smooth, and aristocratic. The nose was the perfect size–straight and strong, a fitting centerpiece for his very English face. With his tan skin and thick, iron-gray hair, he drew attention wherever he went. But he knew it was not his dignity and attractiveness that people found so appealing. It was his self-confidence. He radiated power, and less-assured people found that compelling.

Despite what he’d told Sophia Russell, Victor Tremont made no move to go home to his secluded estate. Instead, he stared unseeing at the mountains and fought off tension. He was angry . . . and annoyed.

Sophia Russell. My God, Sophia Russell!

Who would’ve thought? He hadn’t recognized even her name. In fact, still wouldn’t recognize any of the names of that insignificant little student group. And he doubted any would recall his. But Russell had. What kind of brain retained such detail? Obviously the trivial was too important to her. He shook his head, disgusted. In truth, she was not a problem. Just a nuisance. Still, she must be dealt with. He unlocked the secret drawer in his carved desk and took out a cell phone and dialed.

An emotionless voice with a faint accent answered. "Yes?"

"I need to talk to you," Victor Tremont ordered. "My office. Ten minutes." He hung up, returned the cell phone to the locked drawer, and picked up his regular office phone. "Muriel? Get me General Caspar in Washington."