dealing with, the
disease jumped from the hospital to the college, and from the college to
the city, and from the city to--"

"Yes, I know that part of it. It's all over the world now--killing
people by the millions."

* * * * *

"Well," Kramer said, "at least it's solved the population explosion." He
blew a cloud of blue smoke in Mary's direction. "And it did make
Thurston famous. His name won't be quickly forgotten."

She coughed. "I doubt if it ever will be," she said, "but it won't be
remembered the way he intended."

He looked at her suspiciously. "That cough--"

"No, it's not Thurston's Disease. It's that pipe. It's rancid."

"It helps me think," Kramer said.

"You could try cigarettes--or candy," she suggested.

"I'd rather smoke a pipe."

"There's cancer of the lip and tongue," she said helpfully.

"Don't quote Ochsner. I don't agree with him. And besides, you smoke
cigarettes, which are infinitely worse."

"Only four or five a day. I don't saturate my system with nicotine."

"In another generation," Kramer observed, "you'd have run through the
streets of the city brandishing an ax smashing saloons. You're a lineal
descendent of Carrie Nation." He puffed quietly until his head was
surrounded by a nimbus of smoke. "Stop trying to reform me," he added.
"You haven't been here long enough."

"Not even God could do that, according to the reports I've heard," she
said.

He laughed. "I suppose my reputation gets around."

"It does. You're an opinionated slave driver, a bully, an intellectual
tyrant, and the best pathologist in this center."

"The last part of that sentence makes up for unflattering honesty of the
first," Kramer said. "At any rate, once we realized the situation we
went to work to correct it. Institutes like this were established
everywhere the disease appeared for the sole purpose of examining,
treating, and experimenting with the hope of finding a cure. This
section exists for the evaluation of treatment. We check the human
cases, and the primates in the experimental laboratories. It is our
duty to find out if anything the boys upstairs try shows any promise. We
were a pretty big section once, but Thurston's virus has whittled us
down. Right now there is just you and me. But there's still enough work
to keep us busy. The experiments are still going on, and there are still
human cases, even though the virus has killed off most of the
susceptibles. We