World without Cats (17 page)

I have wronged you

I ask your forgiveness

I will understand if it is not forthcoming

I love you very much

Vera

Angelo had arranged the meeting with Noah and Vera for Wednesday afternoon in Noah’s office. As it happened, Noah had received Vera’s e-mail that morning. Vera arrived early and walked in the open door. Neither of them said a word. Vera felt her pulse racing. She moved haltingly toward Noah but feared he was through with her.

Finally, Noah glanced at the note on his computer screen and said with a smile, “‘Now is the winter of our discontent’? It’s almost summer!” He walked around the desk, faced Vera, and recited:

Doubt thou the stars are fire;

Doubt that the sun doth move;

Doubt truth to be a liar;

But never doubt I love.

Tears welled in her eyes. Vera and Noah enfolded each other tenderly. Eventually, Vera whispered, “I love you so much.” She kissed him and said, “Leave it to you to find just the right quotation from Shakespeare. It’s from Hamlet’s letter to Ophelia, isn’t it?”

“Uh huh.”

At that moment, Angelo appeared, and, with his tactful clearing of throat, the two backed away from each other.

“I had to go through a picket line outside,” noted Angelo. “They are picketing the institute because they think you started the disease?”

“That’s right,” Noah replied.

“Scandaloose! I will attend to that shortly, but first I want to talk about this disease. Here’s the teery—the zoo woman told me that the three cats that died there had bacterial or viral infections. That may be, but the CDC lab has found the new viruses in the tissues from those cats. So the zoo cats had a disease much like the one in Camarillo, yes?”

Noah and Vera nodded.

“But the CDC lab did immunology analyses of the viruses, and they are not all the same. Interesting, no?

“I think the disease started when an endogenous leukemia virogene in the lion mutated and became virulent. This must have happened last summer. The lion then came down with leukemia. This virus could not be FeLV, as we find it in
Felis catus
, because FeLV is not found in lions.”

“That’s right,” Vera agreed. “It’s not found in any of the large cats.”

“No. But did you know there are sequences in rat DNA that are identical to portions of FeLV? Perhaps rats are implicated … I don’t know.” Angelo jotted down something on his tablet and shook his head. “So what happened next? This lion virus infected a jungle cat,
Felis chaus
, in the same zoo. Maybe the virus was carried to the jungle cat by a zookeeper or a fly—who knows? Then the jungle cat came down with leukemia. Now the jungle cat is known to carry Type-C FeLV virogenes on its chromosomes. So I think that the lion leukemia chromosome combined with the FeLV in the jungle cat to form a virus chromosome with new properties.

“This new leukemia virus then infected the European wildcat, and maybe again recombination took place. The European wildcat is also known to carry Type-C genes, you see …”

Noah interrupted, “I don’t understand why the disease seemed to originate in Camarillo.”

“Aha! Now we bring into the story the famous cat called Clyde. The new virus, having undergone several genetic changes—first by mutation, and then recombination—now infected Clyde. I think Clyde was harboring an asymptomatic feline AIDS infection and the genome of the new FeLV virus, recombined with FIV, to make a virus with even more new properties.

“At some point, the virus also acquired some Ebola genes. The docent lady at the zoo told me that a chimpanzee had died there of unknown causes about the time this virus was jumping from cat to cat. I suspect that it died from Ebola.”

Vera shook her head. “This is incredible—frightening!”

“Finally, Clyde was brought to Camarillo by the farmer Wingate. So what we have here is a new virus disease, a highly virulent form of leukemia/FIV/Ebola, whose primary effects are immunosuppression and bleeding. The cats die of bacterial infection and hemorrhage long before the effects of leukemia show themselves. I propose to name the new disease FHF,” Angelo announced with a touch of self-congratulation, “Feline Hemorrhagic Fever.”

Noah and Vera took a few minutes to absorb all this while Angelo sat, arms folded, self-satisfied grin on his face. Finally, Vera declared, “We must start a crash program to immunize cats with FeLV vaccine.”

“I am sorry,” said Angelo, “but that would be useless. FHF virus is not FeLV. The lab report says that there is very little cross reaction between the FHF virus and FeLV or FIV antibodies.”

Noah offered, “Then a vaccine must be prepared from the new virus.”

“That’s convincing,” said Angelo. “The CDC laboratory is now at work on this project. They are trying to find the best way to grow the virus in large quantity, using feline cell cultures. They are also examining the mode of transmission of FHF. We should have a report in about two weeks.”

“Meanwhile,” said Vera, “this FHF is spreading and spreading. I read that it’s appeared in Louisiana and several cities in Mexico, including Mexico City. Half the cats in the country could be dead by the time we learn how to prepare a vaccine.”

The epizootic spread rapidly. By June it had been spotted in San Francisco and San Diego, and was spreading eastward from Reno. On Monday, the eighth of June, the stock of Iams parent Proctor and Gamble was off nine points. It leveled off at thirteen a few days later. Stock prices of Mars Inc. and Nestle, both which owned cat-food subsidiaries, also plunged. As always, investors tended to overreact to negative news. Cat food accounted for less than 20 percent of these companies’ revenues.

14
 

The Ventura County Star
published an editorial entitled “Incrimination by Circumstantial Evidence.” The piece described Angelo’s theory of the origin of FHF. It explicitly exonerated Noah and included an apology. Noah sat at his laptop, openmouthed.
The nightmare is really over,
he realized.

At Angelo’s suggestion, Dorothy hosted a small weekend party to celebrate Noah’s public vindication. Angelo tended the barbeque, and Lowell Stanaland made sure that everyone had a drink. Noah and Gary enthusiastically discussed the resumption of their experiments.

“What’s the point of working with MEFA if there are no cats to experiment on?” Vera asked. “Why don’t you two work on FHF? You have a state-of-the-art laboratory, and you’re already set up to do that kind of research. Why not see if you can develop an immunizing agent?”

“I don’t know anything about infectious diseases,” said Noah. “We can’t just stop everything we’re doing and start a new project.”

“You’ve already stopped everything,” Vera cried, “even if it was against your will. Anyway, you don’t have any cats, and you aren’t likely to get any for a long time.”

Noah felt his stomach do a flip. He took a long swig of beer. “There are quite a few things we can do without cats, you know. Right now, we’re just trying to get the globin gene to function in
E. coli.
We don’t need cats until we get that gene to work. Besides, there are qualified people at the CDC working on a vaccine. Why should I butt in?”

Lowell Stanaland had been standing nearby. “Excuse me, Noah, I couldn’t help overhearing. I think Dr. Barnett has a point. Shouldn’t you use your skills where they are most needed at the moment? I think the institute could come up with funds to support such a diversion in your research.”

“You too?” cried Noah.

“Well, it’s something to think about,” said Stanaland.

To Noah’s relief, the conversation was interrupted by Dorothy’s announcement that the food was ready. Talk turned to Angelo’s upcoming trip back to Atlanta and Dorothy’s attempt to sell her home.

“You mean you’re going to leave Camarillo?” asked Vera.

“Of course,” replied Dorothy, “unless the government agrees to move the CDC to Camarillo.” She turned to Angelo and gave him a playful wink. “At our age,” she added, “we don’t want to lose what remains of our time together.”

“One thing I don’t understand:” Noah stated, changing the subject; “why does this FHF virus spread so rapidly and so devastatingly compared to, say, ordinary FeLV or FIV?”

“Ah,” said Angelo, “I have a theory about that.”

“You have a ‘teery’ about everything,” said Dorothy teasingly.

“Absolut!” agreed Angelo. “First, to understand how the FHF virus is different from the feline leukemia virus, you have to realize that the normal FeLV actually requires two viruses for the infection to be successful. It needs virus genes carried on the cat chromosomes—we call that the endogenous virus—and it needs an …”

Dorothy interrupted. “Are you saying that all normal cats carry genes of the leukemia virus?”

“That is correct. The domestic cat carries these genes. So do several species of wild cats. But, in addition to those endogenous virogenes, a successful infection requires introduction of an infecting virus from an external source such as another infected cat. I believe that FHF, either by mutation or recombination with virus genes in the Seattle Zoo cats, has lost the need for the endogenous virus genes. So all the infecting viruses are now able to invade and start the disease by themselves. We don’t know how the virogenes interact with the exogenous virus. I think that if this interaction were no longer necessary, the exogenous FHF would be more likely to mount a successful infection.”

“Yeah, that would make sense,” Noah remarked.

“Then,” Angelo continued, “somehow the altered FeLV picked up genes from FIV, the feline AIDS virus. My guess is that FIV and FeLV have some base sequences in common that make recombination between the two possible.”

“That all seems plausible,” said Vera, “but there must have been still another step in the evolution of FHF. It could have picked up some Ebola genes at the zoo. That would explain the bleeding as well as the strange morphology, right?”

“Yes, that is how I see it,” Angelo replied.

Angelo hated leaving Dorothy behind, but he had a job to do. The gray walls of the CDC offered him little comfort. He tried to concentrate on the FHF report, but it seemed anticlimactic. When Carlson appeared at his office door to tell him that Bronkowski wanted to see him, Angelo welcomed the distraction.

They chatted about his experiences on the west coast and Angelo told Bronkowski of his marriage plans.

“Congratulations, Angelo. That’s great. By the way, are you aware that your name is all over the major web news sites and in magazines?”

“What? Why? Where …?”

Bronkowski burst out laughing. “You taking a journalism course or something? You left out when and who.” He pulled a print copy of
The Journal-Constitution
from under a pile of papers. “Look at the front page.”

Angelo first saw his photo, followed by the headline “CDC epidemiologist discovers cause of cat disease.”
The byline was that of Sandra McNally. Below was a lengthy article with a continuation. He looked up at Bronkowski, open-mouthed.

“What’s the matter, Angelo? Cat got your tongue?” Bronkowski laughed at his own choice of words. “Seriously, how would you like to go on television?”

“Television? Why do you ask?”

“We’ve had a request from the producers of Rita Kenyon’s show for an expert to discuss FHF.”

“Rita Kenyon? I watch her show sometimes at night. She’s a very funny lady. She wants someone from the CDC to be on her show? She usually has people like the Secretary of State, or Ryan Gosling, or Dakota Fanning. You want me to go on Rita Kenyon’s show?” Angelo could not conceal his uneasiness.

“Sure,” answered Bronkowski. “Of all the people here, you are the most knowledgeable about the disease. You’re not afraid are you?”

“Afraid? Scandaloose! I … well … maybe a little.”

When he arrived at the studio, Angelo was met by an officious assistant director who briefed him on on-air protocols—no profanity, don’t interrupt Ms. Kenyon when she is speaking, and so forth. Angelo was a bit put off by the fellow, but he was enchanted by Rita Kenyon herself. She was even more attractive in person than she appeared on TV. Tonight, she was wearing white slacks topped by a white, silk
blouse. Her auburn hair was cut short as usual. Kenyon quickly put Angelo at ease.

“I’m just going to let you do the talking,” she said. “I’m sure our viewers want to hear what you’ve learned about this terrible disease.”

Angelo was not Kenyon’s first guest. He was preceded by a buxom young actress he had never heard of. He waited patiently off camera while the overly made-up blonde in an orange jumpsuit touted her latest movie. As he waited in the green room, Angelo became increasingly nervous. The longer he had to wait, the more anxious he became. When Angelo was finally led on camera, his throat was dry. He was introduced as the epidemiologist who had discovered the cause of feline hemorrhagic fever. He sat down between Kenyon and the well-filled orange jumpsuit.