"Could I have a drink?"
"Sure. Here."
He poured her a glass of water, raised her, and held it to her lips. Soon he would contract it himself, he knew. It couldn't be otherwise. Too much exposure. .
"Where's Fred?" she asked after she had drunk.
"Sleeping."
Then she closed her perspiration-ringed eyes, and he lowered her and moved on to another.
"How long has she got?" asked Miss Akers, all in white.
"A day or two," he replied.
"Then there's a chance, if the serum comes?"
"Yes. If the serum comes."
"You don't think it will?"
"No. It's too far, too much. The odds are too great."
"I think it will."
"Good," he said. "A true believer." Then, "I'm sorry, Karen. I didn't mean that. I'm tired."
"I know. You haven't slept for two nights, have you?"
"I got a nap a little while ago."
"An hour doesn't mean much when the fatigue factor is so high."
"True. But I'm sorry."
"There's a chance," she said. "You may not think so, but my brother is a driver. He thinks the Alley can be run."
"Both ways? In time? I don't. It would take an awful lot of luck, and the best drivers they've got. And we don't really know if they still have the serum, even. I think this is it."
"Maybe."
He slapped his clipboard against his thigh.
"Why speculate?" he said. "That girl could be saved. Very easily. Just get me some Haffikine, and I can start treating her. Otherwise, we're just keeping score."
"I know. It'll come, though."
"I hope so."
He stopped to take a pulse.
"Okay."
They moved along the corridor, and she touched his arm.
"Don't hurt," she said, all in white.
"It's not a thing that can be helped. Nobody's to blame, but there's nothing that can be done."
"Room one-thirty-six is empty," she said.
He stood very still for a moment, then nodded.
She was right, and as they lay there he thought of the Alley and its ways, but did not say aloud what he felt.
"Soon," she told him. "Soon. Don't worry so much."
He stroked her shoulder.
"Do you remember the Three Days?" he asked.
"No."
"I do," he said. "We put people on the moon and Mars and Titan. We conquered space. We lost time. We had a United Nations. But what happened? Three lousy days, that's what, and everything went to hell. I was there when the rockets came down, Karen. I was there, and I listened to the radio until it stopped. They threw them all over the place. New York is a Hot Spot. So are most of the big cities. Maybe only the islands made it: the Caribbean, Hawaii, Japan, the Greek isles. They kept broadcasting for a long time, you know, after the others quit. Maybe there are still people alive in Japan and the Mediterranean. We know there are some in the Caribbean. I don't know. But I was there when it happened. It was terribly like this, the feeling of doom. I thought for a while recently that we might make it, though. I wonder if the people on Mars are still alive? Or Titan? Will they ever come back? I doubt they could. I think we're already dead, Karen. I think it's time for everybody to lie down and admit it. If we haven't screwed everything up, it's not because we didn't try. If the sky ever purges itself, I wonder if there'll be anyone left to know it? Maybe there will, on some island, or the West Coast. But I doubt it. If we make it, there'll be even more freaks than there are now. Man may cease beifig man, for God's sake!"
"We'll make it," she said. "People always screw up. But there are so many. Some will live."
"I hope you're right."
"Listen to the bells," she said. "Each one signifies death. They used to ring them on festival days too, signifying life. Some man will come, and he'll run the Alley, I think. But if he doesn't, we won't all die. The Three Days were bad. I know. I've heard about them. Don't give up, though, on that accoUnt."
"I can't help it. I feel…lost."
Then she touched him and said, "All you can do is what you're doing. The only other thing is how you feel about it. I don't remember the Three Days, but even that wasn't final. Remember that. We're still here, come everything."
He kissed her then, and the room was dark and antiseptic around them. "You're the kind of people we need," he said, and she shook her head.
"I'm just a nurse. Why don't you sleep now? I'll make the rounds for you. You rest. Maybe tomorrow . .
"Yeah. Maybe tomorrow," he said. "I don't believe it, but thanks."
After a while she heard him snore, and she rose up from the bed. She departed Room 136, all in white, and made his rounds for him.
The bells shattered the air about her, for the clinic was near to three churches, but she made the rounds, taking pulses and temperatures, pouring water, smiling; and although she did not remember the Three Days, she knew that she lived in them still, each time that she entered a ward.
But she smiled, which was man's last weapon, perhaps.