All Fall Down. Mark Edwards

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СКАЧАТЬ say that kind of thing – walls have ears, ha ha! But take haemorrhagic viruses, for example, my primary area of expertise. My partner, Dr Isaac Larter – some of you may have heard of him, he’s extremely well-known in his field – and I have been studying one particularly virulent strain for years, the Watoto virus, which is similar to Ebola but airborne, making it easier to transmit. Its origins are natural – the word Watoto means “child” in Swahili, as its first victims tend to be children – and there have been several breakouts in West Africa. Fortunately these have been restricted to remote and contained areas, but we always have to be on the lookout for shifts in its genetic make-up. And you may have heard of the recent case in which two sets of researchers found a way to make bird flu infectious through airborne transmission – which could ultimately wipe out half the human race. Because of the fear of bioterrorists stealing the virus, or the new strain escaping from a lab, the researchers agreed to stop research …’

      Kate Maddox looked out at the now rapt, if slightly blurry faces in front of her. She intentionally never wore her glasses to give lectures, as a means of not allowing herself to get intimidated by her audience – public speaking had never been her strong suit, although she knew it came with the territory. She hadn’t needed her specs, though, to discern that they’d been rapidly losing interest up until this point.

      Phew, she thought. Got ’em back again. A mention of the threat of global annihilation usually did the trick. This lecture was proving hard work, though. She wished she could be back in the lab in Oxford, bantering with Isaac – her ‘work husband’ as Paul referred to him, without rancour, for Isaac was a good friend to Paul as well as to Kate. We must have him and Shelley round soon, Kate thought, as she talked through the grisly symptoms of Influenza A virus, subtype H1N1. It’s our turn to cook them dinner. Isaac was in the US at the moment, at the big immunology conference, rubbing shoulders with many of the top researchers in the field. Kate was supposed to be there too – had even booked her ticket – but last week Jack, ironically, had come down with chickenpox. He was fine now, just a bit spotty. He’d been lucky and hadn’t suffered too much, but Kate hadn’t wanted to leave him.

      She spoke for another half an hour, until her voice became croaky and her legs ached with the tension. Isaac can bloody well do the next one, she thought, and next time I’ll be the one who gets to swan off to a conference in California.

      The university was a four-hour journey from her home in Oxfordshire, and she was glad she’d had the foresight to ask them to book her into the local Travelodge. She was looking forward to a large drink and to kicking off the high heels that were making her feet cramp up.

      ‘Well,’ she said briskly, ‘we’re out of time, so I will leave you all to start building your bunkers and never venturing outside again without face masks and biohazard suits on.’

      Polite laughter ensued, and the same short, hirsute professor who’d introduced her shambled back on to the stage to thank her and lead a half-hearted round of applause.

      As the students filed out, Kate started putting away her laptop. The professor sidled up to her, scratching his beard. He was a full head shorter than her, and seemed to address his comments to her briefcase. Kate thought he looked as though he lived in Middle Earth.

      ‘Wondered if you would like to, er, come for a coffee, Dr Maddox? I would love to discuss your research into the Watoto virus in more detail. It’s absolutely fascinating. I could give you a lift?’

      Kate had a brief image of them getting on the back of a donkey tethered to the railings outside, the professor with all his possessions tied in a handkerchief to a knotted ash stave that he carried over his shoulder.

      ‘Thank you so much for having me, but I’m actually really tired – and anyway my car is – oh!’

      Her hand flew to her mouth as she suddenly recognised the remaining person in the lecture theatre, a stocky man in a baseball cap and tatty suede jacket. For a moment she thought her legs were going to give way, and a multitude of emotions and memories flooded through her: this man had been there as she’d looked through the porthole door of the lab and seen the bodies of Stephen and Dr Gaunt locked in there, writhing and dissolving into a pool of black blood on the floor before her eyes, instant victims of Pandora, one of the most deadly viruses on the planet. Then the despair of knowing that the one vial of antivirus that could save her son was also in the same room …

      What on earth was he doing here now?

      2

      ‘You remember me, don’t you, Kate?’ asked Harley, holding out his hand. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to shock you. But I wondered if we could have a word, if you’re not busy.’

      Although outwardly she retained her composure, Kate had turned pale. She shook his hand, and he felt the smooth contact of her skin. ‘Yes, of course I remember you. I’m terrible with names, though …?’

      ‘Jason Harley,’ he said, holding her hand a second too long. The professor looked distinctly annoyed.

      ‘Is everything all right, Dr Maddox?’

      ‘Thank you, Professor, it’s fine. This gentleman is an, um, old colleague of mine. And thank you again for hosting the lecture. I do hope your students enjoyed it.’ She turned back to Harley, somewhat reluctantly. ‘Let’s go for a drink, then.’

      They drove in convoy out of the campus, Harley following Kate in her shabby red Golf. He could see her eyes darting anxious glimpses at him in the rear-view mirror when they stopped at traffic lights, and felt sorry for her. She pulled into the car park of the nearest pub, and he parked next to her.

      ‘I can’t stay long,’ she said as she got out and locked the door. It was still raining, more persistently now.

      ‘I won’t keep you.’

      Once they were sitting across from one another on slippery leather sofas in a deserted corner, a glass of Scotch in front of each of them, Harley opened his mouth to explain.

      Kate interrupted him before he got the words out. ‘Are you here to give me a warning because I mentioned the threat of bioterrorism? I mean, I didn’t think that would contravene the Official Secrets Act, I’m really sorry, but everyone knows that it’s a danger, look at the anthrax attacks, it’s common knowledge—’

      He held up a hand. ‘That’s not why I’m here. Although it’s a good thing you didn’t mention Gaunt, or the Pandora virus – as you know, we prefer that those particular topics don’t become common knowledge …’ He didn’t want to let on to her that his colleagues had kept her and Paul under surveillance for the past two years, and they would certainly have known about it had either of them ever let anything slip.

      ‘Oh. Good. I don’t ever. Trust me. So why are you here?’

      ‘I’ll tell you, if you’ll let me.’ He smiled as he said it, trying to put her at ease. A strand of slightly damp hair twisted down below her collarbone, and he felt an urge to reach out and tweak it, before upbraiding himself for behaving like a lovelorn schoolboy. It was clearly too long since he’d had a girlfriend.

      ‘We need your help.’

      ‘Me?’ She looked away, but her instant reluctance was imprinted all over her features. You’d make a lousy spy, Dr Maddox, thought Harley, amused.

      ‘A situation has arisen in the US. California, to be precise. A new strain of virus that we СКАЧАТЬ