The Devil's Alphabet

Chapter 21

“MAYOR?” ESTHER SAID. “A couple of them stormtroopers to see you.” The charlie woman looked nervous. Until a few days ago she’d been just the elementary school’s cook, and then Rhonda had promoted her to administrative assistant to the mayor. Mostly that meant answering the phones.

“Just a second, Esther,” Rhonda said. She loaded another ream of paper into the photocopier and slammed the door. Full circle, she thought. Here it was the crack o’ dawn and she was working the copy machine like she’d never stopped being church secretary. Harlan never used to write his sermons until the last minute—couldn’t even tell her the scripture he’d be using until Saturday night—so she used to have to come in early on Sundays to type up the programs and run them off.

Rhonda had commandeered the elementary school for her quarantine headquarters because it had the most phones, computers, and photocopiers—and because nobody was using it. School had been canceled because almost all the teachers lived outside of Switchcreek. She’d have to do something about that, eventually. Idle children equaled insane parents.

Rhonda picked up one of the finished copies and turned to Doctor Fraelich, who was tapping at a computer. “You’re sure Dr. Preisswerk got this to the newspaper?” Rhonda asked.

“Eric met with them yesterday—it’s definitely going out this morning.” The doctor looked haggard from lack of sleep. Well, join the club, Rhonda thought.

“Let ’em in,” Rhonda said to Esther. The woman moved aside and two National Guard soldiers in breathing masks stepped into the room. Rhonda thought she recognized the lead one as an assistant to Colonel Duveen, but she wasn’t sure.

Rhonda said, “You know, it would really help us if y’all wore name tags.”

“Likewise,” the assistant said.

“Young man,” Rhonda said sharply. “Do not mess with me.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He looked at the other soldier. “Colonel Duveen would like to see you—as soon as possible.”

“I bet he would,” Rhonda said. She took a few more copies of the document and tucked them into her bag. “Esther, keep running those. Make sure you hand one to whoever wants one, and make sure everyone has one of the blue sheets.” She nodded to the light blue, half-size instruction sheets stacked on the table next to Dr. Fraelich. Rhonda took an inch off the top of one stack and put those in her bag too.

“Good luck,” the doctor said.

Rhonda followed the Guardsmen outside. It was not yet full light, and the cold breeze teased at her fortress of hair. Everett stood beside the Cadillac, waiting. “I’ll take my own car,” she told the soldiers.

Evidently this was permissible. The soldiers got into the Humvee and Everett held open the Caddy’s passenger door for her.

“Did you get any sleep?” Rhonda asked him. He’d been on duty nonstop since the quarantine began, and last night she’d sent him out to the car to take a nap.

“You’re the one who should be resting, Aunt Rhonda,” the boy said. “You can’t keep burning the candle at both ends.”

“I’ll rest a little easier after today,” she said.

Everett followed the Humvee the three blocks to the Cherokee Hotel, which the Guard had commandeered as their headquarters. He hopped out to open her door. “You want me inside?” he asked.

“I’ll be fine,” she said. “Just keep the phone on in case the newspeople call.”

The soldiers were holding the door for her. Oh so polite. Rhonda walked up the front steps, patted the shiny, much-rubbed cheek of the wooden Indian by the door, and went inside.

The renovation project had been proceeding on and off for three years, whenever Rhonda had extra money to pour into it. When it was done it would be the world’s first hotel that could accommodate all three clades—and skips in wheelchairs to boot. The new ceilings were high enough for argos, the doors broad enough for charlies. For the betas she’d specified that the women’s restrooms outnumbered the men’s four-to-one. Before Babahoyo, people thought it was a waste of money—everyone who could use the new features were already residents in Switchcreek. But she’d always intended it as a model for the outside world to follow, and if not that then a political statement. And now that there’d been a second outbreak Rhonda looked like a visionary. Someday Ecuadorian clades would visit.

Colonel Duveen had made his office in the banquet room. The walls had been stripped to the studs, but the wiring was all in place and bare bulbs lit the big room. His desk was at one end of the room, ten yards from the desk of any assistant. Duct-taped cables snaked across the bare wooden floor.

The colonel didn’t look up from his papers until she was almost on top of him. Typical power gesture—she’d used it herself. She said, “It’s awful early for a meeting, don’t you think?”

He smiled and removed his glasses. “I appreciate you making time for me,” he said. In defiance of his own regulations, he wore no breather mask. His voice was soft, and his boyish haircut and earnest eyes gave him the look of a Mormon missionary. She’d found it hard to believe he’d served two tours in Iraq and one in Afghanistan—until she started working with him. He permitted no bullshit. She respected his competence and liked him because he didn’t underestimate her.

“Rumor has it,” he said, “you have something planned for this morning.”

“Oh, Colonel, I would have told you sooner, but it’s all been decided in such a rush.” She opened her bag and gave him one of the blue instruction sheets. “The march starts at eight-thirty a.m. Or oh-eight-thirty for you military types.”

He frowned at the sheet. “You want to walk all the way down to the north gate?”

“We’re putting in two little crosses there,” Rhonda said. “It’s a tradition around here—when someone dies in an accident, they put up a little white cross to mark the spot.”

“Those are for car accidents, aren’t they?”

“An accident is an accident,” Rhonda said.

“That’s it? Two crosses?”

“Two little crosses. As well as eight little flags—one for every fallen soldier.”

“Interesting touch.”

“It’s the Christian thing to do.”

He took a breath, then shook his head with a nicely calibrated display of regret. “I’m sorry, no.”

“Excuse me?”

“It’s too dangerous. Emotions are running too high.”

“Among your soldiers or my people?”

“Both. I’m surprised at you, Mayor. We’ve talked about the need for calm.”

“My people will have firm instructions.” She nodded at the blue sheet. “They won’t do anything to your men, not look at them, not talk to them. This is a silent march—no one will even speak until we get to the checkpoint, at which point Reverend Hooke will say a prayer. You’re not against prayer, are you?”

“Mayor, it’s already abundantly clear that the argos cannot be controlled.”

“The same could be said for your soldiers.” A moment passed, and then Rhonda changed tactics. “Colonel, my people need this.” She let the weariness surface in her voice. “They need to express their grief. If you make it impossible for them to let off steam, this town will explode.”

“Mobs don’t let off steam, Mayor, they generate it.”

“The anger’s already there. My people know that this quarantine is a sham. And after today, the world will know it.” She brought out the document she’d copied this morning. “This will be coming out in The New York Times today. It’ll be on every news channel by the time we march.”

He put on his glasses and peered at the first page. “Why don’t you tell me what I’m looking at?”

“That’s a leaked CDC report, Colonel. The report was suppressed, but a few scientists are blowing the whistle. The rationale for this quarantine is full of holes. Not only has no one found a transmission method that would let these plasmid thingies hop from body to body, but it turns out—and this may come as a surprise to you, it certainly did to me—that all those cases the president talked about on TV, those cases of TDS plasmids showing up in unaffected people? Not one has panned out.”

“You don’t say,” the colonel said.

“No, sir, not a one. In fact, the only people who seem to have them, in Switchcreek or in Ecuador, are people who already have TDS.” Rhonda shook her head as if marveling at the impossibility of it all. “Isn’t that something? They’re an effect, not a cause.”

“The government’s never said that plasmids definitely caused TDS,” the colonel said. “Only that it couldn’t be ruled out. Besides, this is just the opinion of a couple of scientists. Other scientists say differently.”

“Yes, yes, the government managed to find their own scientists—and their own lawyers too—to give them a pretext for isolating us. But the jury can’t be out forever.”

“This won’t change anything,” the colonel said.

“Oh, I have no illusions that a couple of leaked reports are going to change the government’s position. I fully expect this quarantine to go on for as long as the public is petrified of getting TDS. But sooner or later, as the evidence keeps coming out, the public will realize that this quarantine isn’t protecting them, that it’s never going to.

“Hell, even if you killed every last charlie, beta, and argo in Ecuador, Tennessee, and across the planet, TDS is going to spread. Someday, I’m betting soon, we’ll turn on our TVs and there will be another outbreak. Then another one. And another. A new world is coming, Colonel Duveen. And then do you know where you’re going to be?”

“In a war zone?”

“Worse than that.” She leaned forward. “You’re going to be on the wrong side of history.”

He took off his glasses and set them on the desk. “That may be so,” he said. “But that doesn’t change this morning. No march, Rhonda, silent or otherwise. No service at the checkpoint.”

“Oh, hon, there’s going to be a march whether you want one or not. Your only decision is to figure out how you’re going to respond to it.” She glanced at her watch. “Well, I better get going. Oh, and afterward we’re having a breakfast at the church. You like biscuits and gravy, don’t you?”

“Are you inviting me?”

“You and as many of your men as you want.”

He chuckled. “I don’t think so. It’s a little difficult to eat through those breathers.”

“Well, we’ll think of something else, then. Maybe a softball game? If we’re going to keep our people from killing each other, I figure they should get to know each other.”