“But the U.S. military does,” Alana says.

“Even their capacity is limited. Besides, the plague vaccine is notoriously unreliable, with post-exposure immunity rates of only seventy-four percent. It would leave roughly three out of ten people unprotected.”

“Better than ten out of ten,” Alana points out.

“Also, the vaccine doesn’t offer any proven protection against exposure to the pneumonic plague. Only post-exposure antibiotics are effective. And they must be given within twenty-four hours.”

“Nonetheless,” Byron says. “We will expedite access to the vaccine, prioritizing the health care workers on the front line and in the lab. Meantime, we need to focus on aggressive contact-chasing. Find anyone and everyone who might’ve been within a stone’s throw of a plague victim.”

Dr. Sansa nods gravely. “We have been doing little else. Around-the-clock.”

“Good,” Byron says. “There is one other vital aspect we need to agree upon. Communications. It’s a miracle this story hasn’t hit the mainstream media. But it will. And soon.”

Sansa exhales. “Our office received several calls this morning.”

“It’s essential we get ahead of the media and control the message, rather than vice versa. To that end, I’ll turn to our communications specialist, Yvette Allaire, to review the fundamentals.”

“Thank you, Byron,” says a painfully thin Frenchwoman at the far end of the table. Alana has the mental image of her holding a martini glass in one hand and a cigarette in the other. “As we all know, the biggest immediate risk facing Genoa is not so much the outbreak as the overreaction that will inevitably follow . . .”

While Alana agrees that mass panic will only compound the problems, she doubts it’s the plague’s most imminent threat. She feels the vibration of Nico’s cell phone against her leg.

“Excuse me,” he says, rising from the table.

Instinctively, she follows him.

Nico speaks into the phone at first in a whisper, but his voice rises sharply even before he clears the door. By the time Alana catches up with him in the hallway, his pupils are wide and he is barking into the receiver in a machine-gun staccato.

“What is it?” she asks, grabbing his arm.

Nico pulls the phone away from his ear. “Two new patients. One of them is a doctor. He’s one of my best friends.”

Chapter

Eleven

Today is the first day of February.

It is not for me to interpret the vagaries of fate, but I cannot help but wonder the same as the Archbishop did. Why have I been spared? To be left behind is more a burden than a mercy.

I write by candlelight now. I have only just now returned home from an arduous trek up to the San Giovanni Monastery. I had not anticipated the extent of the suffering I would encounter there.

The plain stone and brick buildings of the monastery stand humbly in relation to the palace of the Archbishop. But what the monastery lacks in color or charm is compensated for by the abbot himself. Don Marco greeted me at the doors with the affection of a man chancing upon a friend at a tavern, rather than welcoming a near-stranger to the plague-stricken commune.