Eutopia: A Novel of Terrible Optimism

Andrew Waggoner blinked and coughed. The boy—Jason—Jason Thistledown—was in his room again. He had left the room at some point, but Andrew was not clear on exactly when or why, or on the things that had come after. Now he was back and he was talking. Or whispering. His mouth was moving, anyhow.

Andrew worked his lips, which felt numb, and blinked, and as he did, things started falling into place. Jason leaned closer, and Andrew became aware that the boy had his hands on his shoulder and was talking, somehow more clearly now.

“Dr. Waggoner, you have to wake up now. You’re in very bad trouble. You have to walk out of here, because I cannot carry you and the things I’ve got for you.”

Andrew licked his lips. “Wha—”

He tried again. “What are you talking about, Jason? What things?”

Jason looked relieved. “Good. I thought they might have already got you. Why’re you like that?”

“Bergstrom gave me a needle of something,” said Andrew. He looked at the window, the purple-orange sky outside it. “What time is it?”

“Quarter past seven,” said Jason.

Andrew let out a slow whistle, counting hours until he got to ten. What had Bergstrom put in that needle? It wasn’t morphine. Veronal, perhaps? Put enough of Emil Fischer’s hypnotic drug into a hypodermic, and it could knock a man out for a day. Put a drop too much, and it’d kill him.

“You were saying something about the trouble I was in. I may have missed the beginning of it,” said Andrew.

Jason took a breath, and started over again. By the time he was finished, Andrew was fully awake, alert—and convinced. He had to get out of that hospital room. There would be no stopping at his house for things. There would be no dallying here waiting until his wits were all returned to him. He had to get away from Eliada. And he had to do it now.

§

A few moments prior to eight, they were out the back door of the hospital. Andrew wore a pair of workman’s trousers and boots, and an oversized woollen coat—one big enough to admit his splinted arm and still let him move. Jason carried the doctor’s bag and another satchel containing food and a knife, a canteen for water and what other things a man might need on foot in the wilderness.

There was no gun in the kit, an omission for which Jason apologized several times, but as he explained: “Aunt Germaine keeps a close watch on both our guns and would miss them. Then you’d be done for.”

I may be done for anyhow, thought Andrew as he and Jason made a wide circuit around the quarantine, towards the tree-line. Whatever Dr. Bergstrom had put in him that had knocked him out, seemed to have the effect of numbing the pain enough for him to move right now. But he knew enough about anaesthetic to know that would only purchase him so much time, before all that pain came back at him. He would have to pace himself—and then rely on some good luck to get him through the next couple of nights.

For now, though, he kept on moving. The going got tougher the closer they got to the trees, and finally, maybe a dozen yards into the thin woods—out of direct sight of the hospital but still in good view of the quarantine—they stopped. Andrew sat down on a log. Jason handed him the doctor’s bag, and the other bag that could be thrown over a shoulder.

They sat still and quiet for a bit. Then Jason spoke, his voice soft and quavering.

“Why would they lock me in with that thing?”

“I don’t know.” Andrew squinted at him. “You sure you won’t come with me? I’m not sure this is a safe place for you right now.”

Jason shook his head. “Sam Green said: I go, it points straight back to him.”

“Ah,” said Andrew. “I don’t know about that. There’s a game going on here. Has to do with Mister Juke. Harper. Bergstrom. Sam Green now. And I wonder how your aunt’s involved.”

Jason hunched his shoulders. “I wonder that myself.” He looked right at Andrew Waggoner. “Sometimes, I wonder if it wouldn’t have been better I just got left alone back in Montana, my aunt never showed up. Or maybe if that germ had took me—”

Andrew stopped him. “That is not something to wonder about.”

“I know.” Jason sighed. “You better get moving. I’m sure sorry I couldn’t get you a gun.”

“Don’t apologize. I’m not much good with a gun right now anyway.”

“Well—” Jason stood up, and cleared his throat. “Well, it would still be a greater help to you than that knife. I hope this goes a little ways towards repaying you for helping me last night.”

“That is no debt,” he said. “Helping a boy who’s hurt in the night is a doctor’s work. I am sorry that we won’t be able to learn more about Maryanne Leonard, and those things inside her.”

“You can,” said Jason. He put his hand on the bag. “I wrapped the specimen jar with those eggs in it in cloth. You get back to someplace with an eyeglass, you can have a look at them and see what’s what.”

Andrew smiled. “Thank you,” he said.

Then Jason’s expression, something in the tilt of his shoulders, shifted. He finally looked Andrew in the eye.