Phantoms

said.
    “Yes. But after what we found in the autopsies and in all pathology tests…” The geneticist shrugged and handed the sheaf of green papers to Jenny. “Here. It’s all in the results. General Copperfield thought you’d like to see them. If you have any questions, I’ll explain. Meanwhile, all the men are up at the field lab, changing out of their decon suits, and I’m itching to do the same. And I do mean itching .” She smiled and scratched her neck. Her gloved fingers left faint red marks on her porcelain-smooth skin. “Is there some way I could wash?”
    Jenny said, “We’ve got soap, towels, and a washbasin set up in one corner of the kitchen. It doesn’t offer much privacy, but we’re willing to sacrifice a little privacy rather than be alone.”
    Dr. Yamaguchi nodded. “Understandable. How do I get to this washbasin?”
    Lisa jumped up from her chair, casting aside the crossword puzzle. “I’ll show you. And I’ll make sure the guys who’re working in the kitchen keep their backs turned and their eyes to themselves.”
     
    The pale green papers were computer print-outs that had been cut into eleven-inch pages, numbered, and clipped together along the left-hand margin with plastic pressure binding.
    With Bryce looking over her shoulder, Jenny leafed through the first section of the report, which was a computer transcription of Seth Goldstein’s autopsy notes. Goldstein noted indications of possible suffocation, as well as even more evident signs of severe allergic reaction to an unidentified substance, but he could not fix a cause of death.
    Then her attention came to rest on one of the first pathology tests. It was a light microscopy examination of unstained bacteria in a long series of hanging-drop preparations that had been contaminated by tissue and fluid samples from Gary Wechlas’s body; darkfield illumination had been used to identify even the smallest microorganisms. They had been searching for bacteria that were still thriving in the cadaver. What they found was startling.
     
    HANGING-DROP PREPARATIONS
    AUTO SCAN - MEDANACOMP
    EYE VERIFICATION - BETTENBY
    FREQUENCY OF EYE VERIFICATION - 20% OF
    SAMPLES
    PRINT
     
    SAMPLE 1
    ESCHERICHIA GENUS
    FORMS PRESENT:
    NO FORMS PRESENT
    NOTE: ABNORMAL DATA.
    NOTE: IMPOSSIBLE VARIANT - NO ANIMATE E.
    COLI IN BOWEL - CONTAMINATE SAMPLE.
    ↓
     
    CLOSTRIDIUM GENUS
    FORMS PRESENT:
    NO FORMS PRESENT
    NOTE: ABNORMAL DATA.
    NOTE: IMPROBABLE VARIANT - NO ANIMATE C.
    WELCHII IN BOWEL - CONTAMINATE SAMPLE.
    ↓
     
    PROTEUS GENUS
    FORMS PRESENT:
    NO FORMS PRESENT
    NOTE: ABNORMAL DATA.
    NOTE: IMPROBABLE VARIANT - NO ANIMATE P.
    VULGARIS IN BOWEL - CONTAMINATE SAMPLE.
     
    The print-out continued to list bacteria for which the computer and Dr. Bettenby had searched, all with the same results.
    Jenny remembered what Dr. Yamaguchi had said, the statement that she had wondered about and about which she had wanted to inquire: neither benign bacteria nor otherwise . And here was the data, every bit as abnormal as the computer said it was.
    “Strange,” Jenny said.
    Bryce said, “It doesn’t mean a thing to me. Translation?”
    “Well, you see, a cadaver is an excellent breeding ground for all sorts of bacteria—at least for the short run. This many hours after death, Gary Wechlas’s corpse ought to be teeming with Clostridium welchii , which is associated with gas gangrene.”
    “And it isn’t?”
    “They couldn’t find even one lonely, living C. welchii in the water droplet that had been contaminated with bowel material. And that is precisely the sample that ought to be swimming with it. It should be teeming with Proteus vulgaris , too, which is a saprophytic bacterium.”
    “Translation?” he asked patiently.
    “Sorry. Saprophytic means it flourishes in dead or decaying matter.”
    “And Wechlas is unquestionably dead.”
    “Unquestionably. Yet there’s no P. vulgaris . There should be other bacteria, too. Maybe Micrococcus albus and Bacillus mesentericus . Anyway, there aren’t any of the microorganisms that’re associated with decomposition, not any of the forms you’d expect to find. Even stranger, there’s no living Escherichia coli in the body. Now, damn it, that would’ve been there, thriving, even before Wechlas was killed. And it should be there now, still thriving. E. coli inhabits the colon. Yours, mine, Gary Wechlas’s, everyone’s. As long as it’s contained within the bowel, it’s generally a benign