Whisker Of Evil

29

While everyone else returned to work on Monday, Fair Haristeen, who’d been on call during the weekend, was still working. Fortunately, he loved his work, but this afternoon he was tired.

Priscilla Freidberg and her daughter, Dharam, had saved a lovely thoroughbred mare from the killers. So many good animals wound up on the knacker’s wagon to be hauled to the slaughterhouse because people could no longer afford them if they couldn’t run. Thoroughbred, standardbred, and quarter-horse racing, while exciting, led to heartbreak back at the shed row. Horses were run too young in America, the fault of punitive taxes and rising prices. Few could afford to keep a horse until three to run him. The youngsters would go out as two-year-olds. The people in Washington, responsible for much of this, would then turn around and consider passing legislation to protect the animals at the end of their careers. If they’d considered how very different and difficult raising stock was, this would never happen in the first place. The suffering should be laid at Congress’s door.

Fair, like most large-animal practitioners, honed his contempt for government over the years. What would a bunch of urban politicos know about country life? Nor did they care. The votes were in the big cities.

The rescued mare suffered a high bowed tendon, which turnout in the pasture would cure in six months or more. A low bow usually had a better prognosis, but this mare would be fine. Bowed tendons occur on the back side of a horse’s foreleg: Hemorrhage and inflammation cause swelling and adhesions to develop between the tendon and its sheath. The swelling is visible to the human eye and warm to the touch.

“Pasture rest. She’ll be fine in six months. Call me back then, just before you start her in work.”

People like Priscilla and Dharam saved what animals they could working with thoroughbred-rescue operations. This mare, a typey bay who could have stepped out of a George Stubbs’s painting, might have been a touch slow on the track, plus she bowed in heavy going, but she had a winning attitude.

“Dr. Haristeen, I’m thinking about vet school after I graduate,” Dharam said.

“You see wonderful things and terrible things in this business. And you see wonderful and terrible people, but all in all, I wouldn’t trade one minute of my life as a vet. Not one.” He cleared his throat and turned as the white Jeep with the county seal drove down the gravel drive. “Well, maybe this one.” He sighed. “Better go get your paperwork. All your rabies paperwork, Priscilla. Jerome is on a major tear.”

Without a word, Priscilla dashed into the small office in the barn as her daughter’s eyebrows raised. The sight of Jerome slamming the door of the county car provoked no comment. They’d talk plenty after he left.

“Jerome, I can’t get away from you.” Fair smiled, as he’d encountered Jerome twice over the weekend.

It seemed Jerome wasn’t taking the weekend off.

“Fair, had a thought since yesterday.”

“Only one?” Fair’s lips curled slightly.

Jerome ignored this and asked, “Could you lie about giving rabies shots?”

This took Fair by surprise, so he thought a moment. “Sure. But what would be the point?”

“Money.”

“Money. How could I make money faking the paperwork?”

“Easy. You don’t put out for the vaccine. You’d pocket the cash for the paperwork, right? How would your patient know whether they were actually getting the vaccine or just a placebo?”

“Hopefully by my reputation,” Fair replied evenly.

“Oh, I don’t mean you personally. But it’s possible?”

“It’s possible, but first let me explain that even the small-animal veterinarians aren’t getting rich off rabies shots. An equine vet pays two dollars per large animal dose. They pay for the syringe and needles. The first shot usually costs the customer about fifteen dollars, here in central Virginia. Figure in the gas cost to drive to the various farms, too. Don’t forget taxes. Even if a vet managed to give one hundred rabies shots a week, which is extremely doubtful, he’d pocket seven hundred fifty dollars at best. Only a fool would risk his practice for a piddling sum like that. And more to the point, Jerome, I think I can speak for every veterinarian in Virginia. Rabies is a matter of public health, human health, not just cats, dogs, horses, cattle. Who would be that irresponsible? That would be criminal.”

Jerome scuffed the dirt with his boot. “Well, Fair, I’m heading that way. This is criminal.”

“What do you mean?”

“Barry and Sugar. What if a doctor gave them a shot of live virus, not killed?”

Fair’s eyes widened. “That’s monstrous.”

“All a doctor or some smart person would have to do is put saliva from a rabid animal into a syringe and shoot it into someone, not even into their bloodstream. I’ve been doing my reading. Just shoot it into the muscle. It would get to the nerve endings soon enough and start that long journey to the brain.”

Fair shook his head. “The victims would remember getting a shot.”

“Barry couldn’t tell anyone anything. As for Sugar, his mind was going, wasn’t it? And it’s not like he would have known. He might have thought he was getting a flu shot or that Lyme-disease shot that’s questionable. Some say it works and some say it don’t. Bill Langston, Hayden McIntire, a nurse friend—anyone could give a flu shot.”

Dharam and Priscilla walked over. “Jerome, I believe you want our rabies certificates.”

Jerome grunted. “Thanks.” He rifled through the sheets of paper. “What about your cats and dogs?”

“Uh, I’ve got those up at the house. I’ll be right back.” Priscilla knew from her friends that Jerome was being a stickler about all this.

“I’ll get it, Mom.”

“We’ll both go.” Priscilla had noted the intense conversation between the two men.

Jerome returned to his subject. “The other thing about a needle. If those guys thought they were getting a flu shot, by the time the rabies showed up there’s no needle mark. Slick.”

“Tell you what. Why don’t you come to my office Wednesday? Let’s sit down and go over this and I’ll help you. I’m not saying your thesis is wrong. I suppose it could be done. Have you asked other vets?”

“Every single one I see.”

“Well, what have you heard?”

“Like you, they wondered about getting a live virus, but when I talked about saliva they listened. No one outright said it wouldn’t work, although everyone thought it was”—he paused—“far-fetched.”

“I guess what keeps crossing my mind is, why?”

“That’s easy. Rabies is one hundred percent fatal.”

“I know that.” Fair tried not to be irritated. “But surely there are easier ways to kill someone, if we even knew that those two men were killed. There’s no reason to think Sugar was murdered.”

“You don’t know that.”

“You’re right, I don’t,” Fair conceded.

“See, what I think is that this is a fine way to get rid of someone. They wouldn’t know what hit them and they’d never think of their flu shot or whatever carrying rabies. They’d die long after their shot.”

“Jesus, it’d be a lot more humane to pull the trigger.” Fair whistled.

“This ain’t about being humane.”

“No, no, it isn’t.” Fair watched the two tall women, folders in hands, emerge from the back door of the house. “Now you’ve got me wondering. Well, look, I’ll see you Wednesday and that will give me time to make a couple of calls. My old professor at Auburn ought to have some thoughts about this.”

“Talked to Hayden McIntire, Bill Langston, Tavener, Dr. Flynn, Dr. Cowles, all the vets. Kinda got them interested, too.” Jerome puffed out his chest. “And Sheriff Shaw. See, Fair, I see the bottom of the barrel, a lot. I know how those people think.”

“People who mistreat animals aren’t necessarily killers. I know they’re the bottom of the barrel, but killers, I don’t know.”

“People who disrespect living things or disrespect the law, I know how they think. We got a situation here.” Jerome’s eyes blazed.