Pandemic

Veronica Mathews had grown up three miles from the picturesque Hampstead Heath — an oasis of natural park-land in the middle of London's urban sprawl — at the corner of which the Royal Free Hospital stands. She had played in the heath often as a child. Since moving to New York, whenever she visited London the twenty-nine-year old former model always found time to return for a stroll or jog with one of her childhood friends. She had planned to bring her two girls to the heath on this trip, had the November rain ever lifted. But none of them would be visiting it this November. Alyssa might never see Hampstead Heath, or any other park, again.

Mathews felt another stab of guilt at how her thoughts had drifted from Alyssa to a patch of grassy moorland. Guilt had plagued her ever since Alyssa had been rushed to hospital. Veronica could not forgive herself for dragging the girls back to London in the middle of flu season, with people everywhere — on the plane, in the underground, and at the tourist attractions — hacking and sneezing all around them. The trip was Veronica's idea, a pathetic attempt to salvage her marriage to her twenty-year older disinterested banker husband. Aside from saving face by proving to the world that she wasn't just another trophy wife, what was the point of even having tried? she wondered bitterly. No marriage was worth risking her daughters' health for, least of all hers.

Veronica didn't understand most of the readouts and displays that flashed numbers and colored graphics on a large monitor at the head of her daughter's bed. The one number that she fixated on was the oxygen saturation. A doctor had explained how the oxygen saturation, which normally ranged from ninety-five to one-hundred percent in healthy people, reflected her daughter's lungs' ability to absorb oxygen and pass it on to the tissue. In Alyssa's case, even with the help of the jet ventilator and high flow oxygen she was barely able to maintain the number in the high sixties. Despite Veronica's constant monitoring and her endless promises and threats to a God to whom she hadn't prayed since childhood, the number refused to budge.

My baby can't die, the thought repeated like a loop of tape in her head. It's not possible! Only the week before Veronica had marveled at how big and independent Alyssa had grown, but now nestled in all the machinery she looked as tiny as a doll and even more helpless. "Please God," Veronica implored aloud, "take me instead!"

The oxygen saturation dropped a percentage point to sixty-six.

HARGEYSA, SOMALIA

Like most things Kabaal touched, he had managed to infuse opulence into the once-utilitarian room, which had become his office, on the complex's second floor. Ornate Moroccan rugs hung from the freshly painted walls. Even larger rugs adorned the floors. The massive antique oak desk behind which he sat had been shipped in pieces from France and painstakingly reassembled to perfection.

Like the six-hundred-dollar shoes he wore in the desert hideaway, he believed these material comforts brought with them a soothing constancy that enabled him to better focus on his sacred mission.

He flipped open his laptop computer and waited for it to link up to the satellite. Once he saw the little blue interlocking computers icon in the comer of the screen, he tapped a button and the new mail message downloaded. Moments later, it popped up on the screen. Written in English, it read:

Dear Tonya,

Arrived in London with all our baggage. Dropped off the present. Everyone was surprised. We had a lovely time, but we couldn't stay. I'll be in touch soon.

Love, Sherri

Kabaal felt a rush of joy, tempered by bittersweet melancholy. It was the second such message "Sherri" had sent. The only difference being that the first one had been written from Hong Kong. Otherwise the wording was identical. He wasn't surprised. After all, he had composed the message himself.

The e-mails indicated that the operation had proceeded without complication in two cities on two different continents. He could only infer one conclusion from the good fortune required for such flawless execution: God had to be on their side.

Now it was time to wait and see whether the virus claimed a beachhead.

The cosmopolitan cities were not chosen at random. Political retribution, expedience, and necessity all factored into the choice. But the superiority of the health-care systems and, in the case of Hong Kong, recent experience with the SARS epidemic, were the overriding factors. For now, Kabaal wanted cities that would react swiftly to an outbreak.

The e-mails also implied that his female couriers were already dead, fallen by bullets from their brothers' guns; their bodies safely disposed of. Kabaal was saddened by the loss of the Hong Kong courier, but Khalila Jahal's death hit him much harder. As inevitable as it was, the confirmation of her death still evoked an unexpected sense of loss.