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said Dr. McGady. "The men die-every one of them. And so do the children."
"How many are there of the men and children?" asked Ruth, eyeing the bottle
dubiously.
"Too many," said the doctor, "Unless we cut the dosage way down. And then it
might not work. We'd be advised to stick to the original dosage until we find
out for sure."
"We can't cold-bloodedly pick people to die or to live," said Thiela. "What
shall we do?"
"We don't even know if it will work on men and children," reminded Ruth. "Or
if it will work on anyone this early in the game."
"And if you two need more medication?" suggested the doctor.
"There's always Suspension," said Thiela, smiling faintly. "Until
jack-o'-lantern time again."
"Well, let's start by measuring what we do have and subtracting one spoonful
for the lab to get started on," said Dr. McGady. "Then at least we'll know how
much we have to go on."
"There's not enough!" cried Ruth the next morning, "There's not enough for
everyone. How can we decide?" Her fingers scraped distractedly back through
her front hair.
Dr. McGady reached over the bed table and crossed two more names off the list
that Ruth had crumpled and smoothed again. "It's closer by two more," he said,
"than it was last night. How far is it off now?"
"So close-so very close!" Thiela flexed the bottom edge of the paper. "It
would be so much easier if there were twice too many people for Aunt
Sophronia. Then we could just draw a line across the paper and say, `Thus far
it'll go and no farther!" But it's so close!"
"Just delay another day or so, then the problem will solve itself," suggested
Dr. McGady.
"Just-wait-to let some more die?" Thiela pushed the list from her and gathered
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up the bottle and spoon. "No. I'm going now."
"How will you choose?" asked Ruth, rocking her head in her hands.
"I won't," said Thiela from the doorway. "You and Dr. McGady are going to be
praying in here and I'll be praying in there and the choice will be made."
The two, left behind, exchanged startled looks. Then Ruth dropped her face
into her hands, her fingers spread across her scalp under her hair, and Dr.
McGady, looking most uncomfortable, sank back in his chair and contemplated
the upper corner of the room with considerable intensity.
All of the stricken were in wards, segregated men, women and children. Thiela
hesitated at the door of the children's ward, memory loosening her still fluid
knees and making the weight of the green bottle burdensome. Her own three
children had died in just such sobbing, burning suffering. Her own had cried
out for cooling that didn't come short of death. The ghosty fingers of her own
clung, hot and bony thin, to her wrists. She shuddered and stepped into the
ward.
She took the wrist of the first child, a silent, large-eyed girl whose face
seemed sunken in the mass of her disordered hair. Thiela smiled at her, folded
her hand back against the scarcely lifting chest and went on to the next.
Again she lifted a wrist, but this time she dropped it and poured a carefully
huge spoonful of Aunt Sophronia and, lifting the furnace-hot child, she
carefully poured the concoction into her mouth. The indignant, sputtering
gurgle of the child as the awful taste penetrated, sprayed Thiela's face
thoroughly. She mopped off the worst of it and, releasing the child, moved on
to the next one.
Minutes later, she stood at the door of the ward and looked at the children.
Every one that had fought and gurgled against Aunt Sophronia was sleeping,
deeply, quietly. Every one she had passed by after lifting a hot wrist, lay
moaning and crying, all but the first one. They had taken Thiela went back to
her room, her face coagulating where the medicine had sprayed. "You can relax
a minute now," she said as she closed the door behind her and carefully
deposited the big green bottle on the dresser. "I've got to wash Aunt
Sophronia off me. If there should be a difference between adult and child
dosage, there is," she caller back from the bathroom. "Every child spewed like
a fountain when it tasted the horrible stuff."
"You know," said Dr. McGady, eyes shining as he limbered his stiff neck. "It's
been rather amazing! I never tried this aspect of prayer before and I
experienced the most -"
"How did you choose?" interrupted Ruth, leaning back on her pillows. "How
could you possibly-"
"I touched them," said Thiela, coming back into the room, drying her hands as
she came. "I took each one's wrist like this," she lifted Ruth's arm. "The
ones I-skipped-I could tell just by the touch. It was like holding a limp
plastic hose that had hours of hot water poured through. All limp and lax and
spent. The others felt as though there was a steel spring inside that was
still twanging against the fever. Once-" she swallowed with an effort, her
eyes closing, "once I felt the spring go out, right while I was holding: a
wrist. Just-go-out. Just like that! Poor child!" She dropped Ruth's arm and
blinked to clear her eyes. She gathered up the bottle and spoon again. "To
stations, me!, Forward!" And she marched out, robe swishing her ankle as the
two in the room resumed their prayerful positions.
Thiela closed the door carefully behind her and leaned against it, her head
drooping, her shoulders sagging. "Just like that!" she whispered. "Oh, Ruth,
the spring went out, just like that!" Then she backhanded the tears from her
eyes, almost stabbing herself with the spoon, and started briskly down the
hall the other way.
By now the word had spread and there were people by the door of the men's
ward.
"The general's in there," said someone.
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"The whole staff of our department," insisted another.
"The most brilliant mathematician," urged another.
"Don't tell me anything," said Thiela, shaking her hear:. "I don't want to
know. I'm not equipped to decide who's important and who's not. They're all.
sick. I'll get to all I can."
"But such a brilliant career to be cut short-" insisted someone.
"Maybe the brilliance is spent," said Thiela. "Maybe someone else is to shine
now. I don't decide. Please-" She pulled the door open and went in.
The bottle poured almost empty. Two more curtained cubicles to visit. Thiela
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