Doomsday Book

She frowned. "There's a good deal of difference between being ready for a bit of a walk and being ready to go home." She adjusted the drip. "You don't want to overdo."

She went out, and after a few minutes Colin came in with Finch and the book Dunworthy had given him for Christmas. "I thought perhaps you'd need this for costumes and things." He dumped it on Dunworthy's legs. "I'll just go fetch Badri." He dashed out.

"You're looking a good deal better, sir," Finch said. "I'm so glad. I'm afraid you're badly needed at Balliol. It's Mrs. Gaddson. She's accused Balliol of undermining William's health. She says the combined strain of the epidemic and reading Petrarch has broken his health. She's threatening to go to the Head of the History Faculty with it."

"Tell her she's more than welcome to try. Basingame's in Scotland somewhere," Dunworthy said. "I need you to find how long in advance of exposure an inoculation against bubonic plague needs to be given, and I need the laboratory readied for a drop."

"We're using it for storage just now," Finch said. "We've had several shipments of supplies from London, though none of lavatory paper, even though I specifically requested — "

"Move them into the hall," Dunworthy said. "I want the net ready as soon as possible."

Colin opened the door with his elbow and wheeled Badri in, using his other arm and a knee. "I had to sneak him past the ward sister," he said breathlessly. He pushed the wheelchair up to the bed.

"I want — " Dunworthy said, and stopped, looking at Badri. The thing was impossible. Badri was in no condition to run the net. He looked exhausted by the mere effort of having been brought from the ward, and he was fumbling at the pocket of his robe as he had at his sash.

"We'll need two RTN's, a light measure, and a gateway," Badri said, and his voice sounded exhausted, too, but the despair had gone out of it. "And we'll need authorizations for both drop and pickup."

"What about the protesters who were at Brasenose?" Dunworthy asked. "Will they try to prevent the drop?"

"No," Colin said. "They're over at the National Trust Headquarters. They're trying to shut down the dig."

Good, Dunworthy thought. Montoya will be too occupied with trying to defend her churchyard against picketers to interfere. Too occupied to look for Kivrin's corder.

"What else will you need?" he asked Badri.

"An insular memory and redundant for the backup." He pulled a sheet of paper from the pocket and looked at it. "And a remote hookup so I can run parameter checks."

He handed the list to Dunworthy, who handed it to Finch. "We'll also need med support for Kivrin," Dunworthy said, "and I want a telephone installed in this room."

Finch was frowning at the list.

"And don't tell me we're out of any of these," Dunworthy said before he could protest. "Beg, borrow, or steal them." He turned back to Badri. "Will you need anything else?"

"To be discharged," Badri said, "which, I'm afraid will be the greatest obstacle."

"He's right," Colin said. "Sister will never let him out. I had to sneak him in here."

"Who's your doctor?" Dunworthy asked.

"Dr. Gates," Badri said, "but — "

"Surely we can explain the situation," Dunworthy inter- rupted, "explain that it's an emergency."

Badri shook his head. "The last thing we can do is tell him the circumstances. I persuaded him to discharge me to open the net while you were ill. He didn't think I was well enough, but he allowed it, and then when I had the relapse…"

Dunworthy looked anxiously at him. "Are you certain you're capable of ru

"There isn't time," Badri said. "And it was my fault. I want to run the net. Perhaps Mr. Finch can find another doctor."

"Yes," Dunworthy said. "And tell mine I need to speak with him." He reached for Colin's book.

"I'll need a costume." He flipped through the pages, looking for an illustration of mediaeval clothing. "No strips, no zippers, no buttons." He found a picture of Boccaccio and showed it to Finch. "I doubt we'll have anything in Twentieth Century. Telephone the Dramatic Society and see if they've got something."

"I'll do my best, sir," Finch said, frowning doubtfully at the illustration.

The door crashed open, and the sister rattled in, enraged. "Mr. Dunworthy, this is utterly irresponsible," she said in a tone that had no doubt caused casualties from the Second Falklands War terrors. "If you will not take care of your own health, you might at the least not endanger that of the other patients." She fixed her gaze on Finch. "Mr. Dunworthy is to have no more visitors."

She glared at Colin and then snatched the wheelchair handles from him. "What can you have been thinking of, Mr. Chaudhuri?" she said, whipping the wheelchair round so smartly Badri's head snapped back. "You have already had one relapse. I have no intention of allowing you to have another." She pushed him out.

"I told you we'd never get him out," Colin said.

She flung the door open again. "No visitors," she said to Colin.

"I'll be back," Colin whispered and ducked past her.

She fixed him with her ancient eye. "Not if I have anything to say about it."

She apparently had something to say about it. Colin didn't return till after she'd gone off-duty, and then only to bring the remote hookup to Badri and report to Dunworthy on plague inoculations. Finch had telephoned the NHS. It took two weeks for the inoculation to confer full immunity, and seven days before partial. "And Mr. Finch wants to know if you shouldn't also be inoculated against cholera and typhoid."

"There isn't time," he said. There wasn't time for a plague inoculation either. Kivrin had already been there over three weeks, and every day lowered her chances of survival. And he was no closer to being discharged.

As soon as Colin left, he rang William's nurse and told her he wanted to see his doctor. "I'm ready to be discharged," he said.

She laughed.

"I'm completely recovered," he said. "I did ten laps in the corridor this morning."

She shook her head. "The incidence of relapse in this virus has been extremely high. I simply can't take the risk." She smiled at him. "Where is it you're so determined to go? Surely whatever it is can survive another week without you."

"It's the start of term," he said, and realized that was true. "Please tell my doctor I wish to see him."

"Dr. Warden will only tell you what I've told you," she said, but she apparently relayed the message because he tottered in after tea.

He had obviously been hauled out of a senile retirement to help with the epidemic. He told a long and pointless story about medical conditions during the Pandemic and then pronounced creakily, "In my day we kept people in hospital till they were fully recovered."

Dunworthy didn't try to argue with him. He waited until he and the sister had hobbled down the corridor, sharing reminiscences from the Hundred Years' War, and then strapped on his portable drip and walked to the public phone near Casualties to get a progress report from Finch.

"The sister won't allow a phone in your room," Finch said, "but I've good news about the plague. A course of streptomycin injections along with gamma globulin and T-cell enhancement will confer temporary immunity and can be started as little as twelve hours before exposure."

"Good," Dunworthy said, "Find me a doctor who'll give them and authorize my discharge. A young doctor. And send Colin over. Is the net ready?"

"Very nearly, sir. I've obtained the necessary drop and pickup authorizations and I've located a remote hookup. I was just going to fetch it now."

He rang off, and Dunworthy walked back to the room. He hadn't lied to the nurse. He was feeling stronger with each passing moment, though there was a tightness around his lower ribs by the time he made it back to his room. Mrs. Gaddson was there, searching eagerly through her Bible for murrains and agues and emerods.