The Stand:BOOK I(38)

"She's in bed today," Peter said. "She finally agreed to let Tom Edmonton take a look at her."

"Has he been yet?"

"He just left. He thinks she's got the flu."

"Oh, Lord," Frannie said, closing her eyes. "That's no joke for a woman her age."

"No, it isn't." He paused. "I told him everything, Frannie. About the baby, about the fight you and Carla had. Tom's taken care of you since you were a baby yourself, and he keeps his lip buttoned. I wanted to know if that could have caused this. He said no. Flu is flu."

"Flu made who," Fran said bleakly.

"Pardon?"

"Never mind," Fran said. Her father was amazingly broadminded, but an AC/DC fan he was not. "Go on."

"Well, there's not much further to go, hon. He said there's a lot of it around. A particularly nasty breed. It seems to have migrated out of the south, and New York is swamped with it."

"But sleeping in the parlor all night-" she began doubtfully.

"Actually, he said being in an upright position was probably better for her lungs and her bronchial tubes. He didn't say anything else, but Alberta Edmonton belongs to all the organizations Carla belongs to, so he didn't have to. Both of us knew she's been inviting something like this, Fran. She's president of the Town Historical Committee, she's spending twenty hours a week in the library, she's secretary of the Women's Club and the Lovers of Literature Club, she's been running the March of Dimes here in town since before Fred died, and last winter she took on the Heart Fund, for good measure. On top of all that she's been trying to drum up interest in a Southern Maine Genealogical Society. She's run down, worn out. And that's part of the reason she blew up at you. All Edmonton said was that she had the welcome mat out for the first evil germ that passed her way. That's all he had to say. Frannie, she's getting old and she doesn't want to. She's been working harder than I have."

"How sick is she, Daddy?"

"She's in bed, drinking juice and taking the pills that Tom prescribed. I took the day off, and Mrs. Halliday is going to come in and sit with her tomorrow. She wants Mrs. Halliday so they can work out an agenda for the July meeting of the Historical Society." He sighed windily and lightning scratched the wire again. "I sometimes think she wants to die in harness."

Timidly, Fran said: "Do you think she'd mind if I-"

"Right now she would. But give her time, Fran. She'll come around."

Now, four hours later, tying her rain scarf over her hair, she wondered if her mother would come around. Maybe if she gave up the baby, no one in town would ever get wind of it. That was unlikely, though. In small towns people scent the wind with noses of uncommon keenness. And of course if she kept the baby …  but she wasn't really thinking of that, was she? Was she?

She could feel guilt working in her as she pulled on her light coat. Her mother was run down, of course she was. Fran had seen that when she came home from college and the two of them exchanged kisses on the cheek. Carla had bags under her eyes, her skin looked too yellow, and the gray in her hair, which was always beauty-shop-neat, had progressed visibly in spite of the thirty-dollar rinses. But still …

She had been hysterical, absolutely hysterical. And Frannie was left asking herself exactly how she was going to assess responsibility if her mother's flu developed into pneumonia, or if she had some kind of breakdown. Or even died. God, what an awful thought. That couldn't happen, please God no, of course not. The drugs she was taking would knock it out, and once Frannie was out of her line of visibility and incubating her little stranger quietly in Somersworth, her mother would recover from the knock she had been forced to take. She would-

The phone began to ring.

She looked at it blankly for a moment, and outside more lightning flickered, followed by a clap of thunder so close and vicious that she jumped, wincing.

Jangle, jangle, jangle.

But she had had her three calls, who else could it be? Debbie wouldn't need to call her back, and she didn't think Jess would, either. Maybe it was "Dialing for Dollars." Or a Saladmaster salesman. Maybe it was Jess after all, giving it the old college try.

As she went to pick it up, she felt sure it was her father and that the news would be worse. It's a pie, she told herself. Responsibility is a pie. Some of the responsibility goes with all the charity work she does, but you're only kidding if you think you're not going to have to cut a big, juicy, bitter piece for yourself. And eat every bite.

"Hello?"

There was nothing but silence for a moment and she frowned, puzzled, and said hello again.

Then her father said, "Fran?" and made a strange, gulping sound. "Frannie?" That gulping sound again and Fran realized with dawning horror that her father was fighting back tears. One of her hands crept to her throat and clutched at the knot where the rain scarf was tied.

"Daddy? What is it? Is it Mom?"

"Frannie, I'll have to pick you up. I'll …  just swing by and pick you up. That's what I'll do."

"Is Mom all right?" she screamed into the phone. Thunder whacked over the Harborside again and frightened her and she began to cry. "Tell me, Daddy!"

"She got worse, that's all I know," Peter said. "About an hour after I talked to you she got worse. Her fever went up. She started to rave. I tried to get Tom …  and Rachel said he was out, that a lot of people were really sick …  so I called the Sanford Hospital and they said their ambulances were out on calls, both of them, but they'd add Carla to the list. The list, Frannie, what the hell is this list, all of a sudden? I know Jim Warrington, he drives one of the Sanford ambulances, and unless there's a car wreck on 95 he sits around and plays gin rummy all day. What's this list?" He was nearly screaming.

"Calm down, Daddy. Calm down. Calm down." She burst into tears again and her hand left the knot in her scarf and went to her eyes. "If she's still there, you better take her yourself."

"No …  no, they came about fifteen minutes ago. And Christ, Frannie, there were six people in the back of that ambulance. One of them was Will Ronson, the man who runs the drugstore. And Carla …  your mother …  she came out of it a little as they put her in and she just kept saying, ‘I can't catch my breath, Peter, I can't catch my breath, why can't I breathe?' Oh, Christ," he finished in a breaking, childish voice that frightened her.

"Can you drive, Daddy? Can you drive over here?"

"Yes," he said. "Yes, sure." He seemed to be pulling himself together.

"I'll be on the front porch."

She hung up and went down the stairs quickly, her knees trembling. On the porch she saw that, although it was still raining, the clouds of this latest thundershower were already breaking up and late afternoon sun was beaming through. She looked automatically for the rainbow and saw it, far out over the water, a misty and mystic crescent. Guilt gnawed and worried at her, furry bodies inside her belly, in where that other thing was, and she began to cry again.

Eat your pie, she told herself as she waited for her father to come. It tastes terrible, so eat your pie. You can have seconds, even thirds. Eat your pie, Frannie, eat every bite.

                       
       
           



       Chapter 21

Stu Redman was frightened.

He looked out the barred window of his new room in Stovington, Vermont, and what he saw was a small town far below, miniature gas station signs, some sort of mill, a main street, a river, the turnpike, and beyond the turnpike the granite backbone of far western New England-the Green Mountains.

He was frightened because this was more like a jail cell than a hospital room. He was frightened because Denninger was gone. He hadn't seen Denninger since the whole crazy three-ring circus moved from Atlanta to here. Deitz was gone, too. Stu thought that maybe Denninger and Deitz were sick, perhaps dead already.

Somebody had slipped. Either that, or the disease that Charles D. Campion had brought to Arnette was a lot more communicable than anyone had guessed. Either way, the integrity of the Atlanta Plague Center had been breached, and Stu thought that everyone who had been there was now getting a chance to do a little firsthand research on the virus they called A-Prime or the superflu.

They still did tests on him here, but they seemed desultory. The schedule had become slipshod. Results were scrawled down and he had a suspicion that someone looked at them cursorily, shook his head, and dumped them in the nearest shredder.

That wasn't the worst, though. The worst was the guns. The nurses who came in to take blood or spit or urine were now always accompanied by a soldier in a white-suit, and the soldier had a gun in a plastic Baggie. The Baggie was fastened over the wrist of the soldier's right gauntlet. The gun was an army-issue .45, and Stu had no doubt that, if he tried any of the games he had tried with Deitz, the .45 would tear the end of the Baggie into smoking, burning shreds and Stu Redman would become a Golden Oldie.

If they were just going through the motions now, then he had become expendable. Being under detention was bad. Being under detention and being expendable …  that was very bad.