Part 2
"It isn't that type," said Shield. "Which is another factor in its not being noticed. The early symptoms are dysentery, not violent, but definitely weakening. The secondary symptoms are similar to influenza in a mild form. The whole thing just takes all the energy out of the system and leaves you weaker than a kitten for about twenty days. After which you can get up and go again, though somewhat rockily. It's a one-shot affair, luckily. The body builds up an immunity to the bug, and once you go through with it, you're safe from then on--though upon re-exposure, you can act as a carrier."
"O.K., doctor. I was just wondering because I was rather close to it."
"You didn't catch it?"
"Nope. Not yet, anyway."
"And you were in the plague area?" demanded Dr. Shield.
"For several days with Commissario Hohmann."
"Then I'd like a sample of your blood," said the doctor, reaching for his sterile cabinet. "Maybe you are carrying the normal antibody in quantity already. I'd like to check it."
Franklen bared his arm and the doctor extracted thirty or forty CC of Jim's venous blood. "Thanks," said Dr. Shield. "We'll also see if you have any other bugs running around loose in here," he smiled, holding up the vial.
"O.K., doctor," returned Franklen. "And if you do, just drop 'em a shot or something to pacify 'em until I get back and can take care of 'em again."
They parted on a laugh. And once outside of the doctor's door, Jim Franklen was met by an official messenger.
* * * * *
It was a personally written note from Edvard Hohmann:
Dear Mr. Franklen:
This is informal, because I believe that formality between friends is both stuffy and unreal. Also I count you among my friends despite the fact that our political beliefs differ.
However, in an effort to convince you of my sincerity, I am inviting you to be present as a guest of my party when the Central Power meets the French Chamber of Deputies. This will occur on August 8th, which is but a week hence.
It is to be an auspicious occasion, this meeting. Plans and forms have been drawn up, a compromise between the democratic government of France and the autocratic Central Power. We shall show the world and humanity that a meeting of minds is always possible between men of high purpose. True, both France and the Central Power must part with certain factors, but we both believe that departing slightly from our previous course by will and agreement is far better than going on as we have, and ultimately arriving at antipodal types of rule.
Will you attend? Will you come, even to scoff? For you will remain to wonder, and the approval of your Council will mean much to all of us. Be a witness to History in the Making!
Sincerely, Edvard Hohmann, Your friend and Commissario of the Central Power.
He stared at the letter, wondering. Hohmann's actions seemed logical enough; doubtless if he, Jim Franklen, were in Hohmann's shoes, he'd accept whatever the fates offered and reject whatever trouble he could. Hohmann's ambitions were normal for any ruler of Central Europe, and he was not, at least, killing millions. Yet--
Franklen smacked his fist into the palm of his hand. He turned into Winter's office again and said: "I've got it!"
Winter looked up, wondering.
"Hohmann is using biological warfare," said Franklen. "It's logical, it's sensible, and it gets him what he wants, intact. He's soon to be running France, and not a shot has been fired nor a building damaged. Were he to strike an unfriendly country--or when he makes his final break, Hohmann can take over without resistance. No soldier can serve a weapon when he's prostrate with that combination of dysentery and influenza."
"But biological warfare is not considered practical."
"No?" snorted Franklen. "Well, if used properly, it can be better than atomics. Why blast a city you hope to add to your list? Why bother? You have to rebuild it. But if you just move in, you're in and you can use the same paper and pencils and desks and even the same clerks."
"May I point out the difficulty of proving such a thing?" asked Winter.
"In the first place, Dr. Shield told me that the ailment was a single-time illness. Your own troops can have it in a mild form before the invasion. Thereafter they are immune. But they are also vicious carriers, and while they're working among the stricken people, they're spreading it among those few who haven't caught it yet."
Winter sighed deeply. "Yes, and even better for Hohmann is the fact that we can prove nothing. You can make enough germ culture in an apartment house to innoculate a city--contrasting, the separation plants of the atomic era. And, Franklen, can you or anybody else make Hohmann admit that his latest acquisitions happened by any other means than an Act of God? A pandemic is considered such."
"I'll get the proof," said Franklen.
"Just stop Hohmann," said Winter. "Then we can all rest!"
* * * * *
Franklen never went to Hohmann's great historic meeting. Three days before it opened, the same plague struck Mexico, and the United States sent its doctors and its nurses and its aids to the stricken neighbor. A good many of them came down with it themselves, but just as it had run in France, it ran itself out in three long, hot, Mexican weeks. American wealth was poured in, and American effort and American efficiency, and Mexico rallied and was grateful. Franklen was a busy man, during those days, and he spent another week in the area after the plague was stopped and the populace well on the road to recovery.
Then he returned to his office, to see Thomas Winter.
"Warfare--or happenstance?" asked Winter.
"I'll never know," said Franklen wearily. "Why would they--Winter! You know something!"
Winter nodded slowly. He handed Franklen a teletyped page, which Franklen read aloud:
"The State of Sonora, Mexico, today voted to secede from Mexico in favor of joining the United States by a vote of almost three to one. If this is accepted, Sonora would become the fifty-first State of the Union. There is some doubt--"
"Winter--what is this?"
"A fragment of the International News Service report," replied Winter. "And here is a text of President Halstead's reply:
"The United States of America feels gratified that she is deemed so high by the residents of Sonora, Mexico. An act of this sort, however, must be made with the full consent of the Mexican Government."
"So we've got ourselves a Border Incident?" muttered Franklen.
Winter shook his head. "Worse than that. Here's the topper-offer," and he handed Franklen a sheet of paper. Franklen read it silently and then whistled explosively.
"So the Government of Mexico offers complete annexation of all the states of Mexico to the United States of America in exchange for certain provisos and considerations in the way of civil government of the new territory?"
Winter nodded. "And from what they tell me of the Mexican demands, the United States would be imbecilic not to accede to their request."
Franklen shook his head widely and slowly. "Madness!" he said quietly. "If we do, we're legally guilty of the same offense as Hohmann. If we do not, we're fools. How can the pot call the kettle black and still retain a moral sense of values?"
"Can't," grumbled Winter. "And we've got ourselves another twenty million citizens, three quarters of a million square miles, and something like a total of eighty United States of America!"
Winter stood up, his face bitter. "United Nations Weapon Council," he growled. "Preserve the future peace. Stop aggression and territorial expansion. Hell!"
He picked up a brass inkwell and hurled it through the door glass. His secretary peered in, wondering.
* * * * *
That was only the beginning. Just the start of a long series of similar events that came crowding in on one another so fast that it made one's head spin. Five years passed in this same mad whirl. Five years of the same crazy pattern.
And then the Central Power, which was now calling itself the European Power, faced the United States of The Americas across the Atlantic Ocean. From Ellsmere Island to Cape Horn lay the United States of The Americas, and from Spitzbergen to the Cape of Good Hope lay the European Power, all and both combined.
And as before, Jim Franklen, now an older but still struggling Franklen, was still working on the same question; and Thomas Winter, also older and more resigned, urged Franklen on.
"Hindsight," said Franklen sourly, "is infinitely superior to foresight, or at least it is better accomplished."
Winter nodded. "This is what we might have expected," he said. "Years and years ago when Hohmann started this last war. Now we're all in a position where strife might well break out at any moment. And the question is whether to break out in open strife at once, or wait it out and hope for the best. We can no longer move leisurely. Hohmann has seen to it that for every advance he has made, we've made a greater one. But now he is fresh out of available land to spread out across, and he's looking at us. We've been dragged and dragged by his indirectness into this situation, where the United States as it was is no longer just we folks, but encompasses a myriad of peoples, types, and governmental ideas. True, Washington is still the seat of government, but that makes it seem as though we were to blame for our own expansion."
"I may be able to help," said Franklen at last. "I think I've got the answer, finally."
* * * * *
He said no more about it, but he was gone, somewhere for three months, after which he returned long enough to pick up Dr. Shield and fly with him to Europe. He gained audience with Edvard Hohmann within a few hours.
"My American friend," exclaimed Hohmann, taking Franklen's hand. "And this?"
"This is Dr. Shield," said Jim. "He's been instrumental in tracking down some of the many plagues that have hit the world."
"Perhaps he can tell us where so many different illnesses come from," said Hohmann, interestedly. "A kind Providence, that offers both myself and your government the chance, to become great--it is kind, and I say right that we have prospered--seldom seems in existence at the proper time."
"Sometimes illnesses emerge from the common welter of human frailties only because they have been eclipsed by more common ailments," said Shield. "There is one other way in which an illness can suddenly break out. Mutations. If you recall, the photographic industry nearly went out of business when atomic power came in, because there were radioactive atoms everywhere--even in the emulsions and the films themselves. That has been largely abated, but only by special methods. The world, right now, is bathed in many many more kinds of radiation than ever before. Where once only alpha particles were, now are protons and neutrons and both positive and negative electrons, and gamma from here to there in wave length. Illness comes from bugs, Commissario Hohmann, and bugs as well as humans can evolve. The possibilities are limitless, it requires only a diligent search--"
"Diligent search?" asked Hohmann. "You sound as though you believed that someone might have been seeking such illnesses."
"Only academically, perhaps, just as we are," replied Shield. "Just to know what possible mutations might take place, and perhaps give us a bit of warning, we have been operating a radiation-biological laboratory."
"Indeed?" said Hohmann.
"Oh yes. And we've come up with some of the most peculiar cultures. Pure laws of chance, because most mutants die. We've got a violent one that affects the calcium exchange in the body--your bones, you know, are in a constant state of equilibrium, the matter changes, new comes in to replace old going out--so that only the outgoing side is working. The bones jellify. We've licked that one by antibodies and partial immunities. But the more recent ones have rather peculiar effects. One of them strikes the nerves in the semicircular canals of the ear. During the two months of its run, the patient cannot stand, or cannot retain any balance at all. He cannot even lift his hands as he desires, because he ... well, he might think he was standing on his head, but he can't even accept a delusion as to his position, for all position-sense is gone, completely. After two months, the average body recovers, and the patient is well again. We've feared that, and we've learned how to prevent it. That's a good thing, too, for it strikes within a few minutes after exposure to any carrier."
"A rather terrible possibility," smiled Hohmann. "I've always been proud of my sense of balance." He laughed nervously and stood upon one foot for a few seconds.
"We were thinking that it might be well to combine our laboratories," said Franklen. "We can pool our findings and collectively advance so that this wave of mutated bugs can be prevented."
"That is an excellent idea," said Hohmann--
At which point he fell flat on his face!
* * * * *
The world's stockpiles of atomic weapons is rusting and unused--as such. Gradually, they are being broken down and the high-grade fissionables are being taken and used to light the fires of humanity. Jim Franklen is an old man, no longer an agent of the United Nations, but just a citizen of United Terra.
And the rattle of the saber is gone, and the storm of atomic bombs is no longer expected.
For the last Global War was fought with weapons that seldom killed, never maimed, and always left the cities of the world intact for the next generation.
THE END.