Crocodile Farm

24.

The girl who sat across from her was teenage in body, but she had the penetrating gaze and the rigid posture of someone much older. Defiant eyes, long-lashed, with hooded eyelids. Lucy found her stare unnerving. She was lanky and tall, all skinny arms and legs stretched out in front of her. Lucy felt dwarfed, felt like she did not take up enough space, in a way which she never felt with the male patients.

It had been her idea to begin by interviewing everyone. What was your life like before you left America? Did you ever see anyone with the Flu, or did you just cut and run before it reached your home town? Their questions were specific, leading: designed to segregate the patients into those who might have immunity, and those who had never been in contact with infected people. So far, the majority of patients had not even seen any infected people; had cut and run before the virus reached their town. Friends and family had called them crazy, but they had been right. Their foresight or anxiety had saved them, and now they were here, washed up on Australian shores, safe from the virus but locked away, at least for the time being.

"Belle Perlman," Lucy said, her voice warm, her bedside manner immaculate. She'd always been good at this. It was the reason she'd thought – she still thought, actually – that she might go into Psych, try to drill down into people's problems by nothing more aggressive than talking. There was a certain magic to getting people to open before you, to unfold them, complexity be damned, like origami.

"Tell me about your life in America," she said, the standard beginning.

"There's nothing to tell. I don't think it's so different to here."

"I mean. Where are your parents?"

"Dad was just a little boy when his parents were killed. Shot, down an alleyway. He was basically raised by the butler. They were wealthy, but he never knew love. The town he grew up in was just full of criminals, violence, everything you could imagine. Dad knew what he had to do. He decided to dedicate his life to fighting crime."

Lucy wasn't familiar with comic books, but she'd seen enough television to recognise the origin story of Batman.

"Interesting," she said. "I thought your surname was Perlman, not Wayne."

There wasn't even a flicker on Belle's face. Lucy did not annoy her, nor had she passed any kind of test. What was the story with this girl? Why was she being so obtrusive? Lucy decided to try a different tack.

"Belle. I can see you're a smart girl. The reason I'm interviewing everyone is that we're trying to work out where this thing started, and how it's spread."

"So you can euthanise those of us who've been exposed?"

Lucy was shocked. "No, we'd never do something like that. This is Australia, not Nazi Germany."

Belle didn't make eye contact, focused on a speck on the table. She slid her fingernail over it, a repetitive motion. Lucy waited.

Eventually she said, "They did that, in Michigan, Detroit, Milwaukee. They started to euthanise people who had been exposed. Because the contagion rate is so high. They thought that might contain it. Whole cities, towns of people, willingly sacrificed themselves for the greater good."

"Is that where you're from?" Lucy asked, making a note on her pad. "Are you from Michigan, Detroit, Milwaukee?"

Belle smiled a faraway smile. "I'm from Gotham."

After day three of interviewing, Lucy waited in the staff canteen with Doctor Singh and one of the other doctors, Natassja Grigorieva. The fourth medico on staff, Rowan Melchett, was late for their rendezvous: Ayesha and Natassja sat opposite one another, not yet comparing notes out of respect for the absent party. Lucy stood at the counter, making instant coffee for them all. It was likely to be a long night of work, but she didn't mind that, it reminded her of her graduate exams. The adrenalin, her insistent heartbeat: it was all so familiar and comforting because of that. She had always worked well under pressure. And she knew that no one would want to wait till morning: now that they'd started on their task, they'd keep working until they succeeded. This was what doctors were like, she thought: single-minded, precise, focussed. The traits which made them a disaster in interpersonal relationships were the saving grace in times of high pressure or crisis.

She poured boiling water over the granules of International Roast in four identical heavy mugs, stirred with a rusty teaspoon to dissolve the coffee. She sniffed the milk out of habit before pouring it into each cup. The liquid turned soft beige in each tiny whirlpool, specks of coffee grinds floating in the top.

There was a clatter at the doorway and Rowan came rushing in, his polished shoes (he always wore polished shoes) skidding on the lino floor.

"I've worked it out." His face was red, his eyes dancing as though he'd already nailed the cure.

"You've worked what out?" Natassja's accent added a throatiness to everything she said. "You've solved it, have you? Everyone can go home, Doctor Melchett has saved us?"

Ayesha put out a hand to silence her sarcasm. "What is it, Doctor?" she said.

"It's children," he said, breathlessly. "Some of the children have immunity. It seems that the virus only attacks the cerebral cortex once it is fully developed. Around age fifteen, or sixteen. We need to look at the children."

Lucy's heart beat fast, and with an absolute clarity she realised that he was right. A mental check of her interviews thus far confirmed it: no adults who had come into contact with the virus had made it to Australia, whereas some of the children had parents who had succumbed. Of course, not all children were immune: the reports from America were that the Flu had swept through schools and day care centres at an alarming rate. But this did slot in with the data she had collected so far.

"Has anyone encountered any evidence to contradict this theory?" Ayesha asked.

The look on Natassja's face told Lucy that she, like herself, wished she'd made the connection first. She held out her hand to shake Rowan's: the first time Lucy had seen her show friendliness in the three weeks she had known her.

"We'll proceed with this theory," Ayesha said, looking around the table. "Tomorrow, we'll continue the interviewing, but focus on the children."

Therewas a wave of excitement; this lead had come much faster than they hadexpected. It felt like they were well on the way. Lucy had expected it wouldtake weeks before they discerned a pattern, and here they were, with adirection to head in just a couple of days in. The coffee cups were leftabandoned on the table.