Damn it, Jake, that could mean
letting people die!"
"Yeah." Jake sighed softly. "It could mean letting people begin to
think about getting rid of the Lobby, too. Well, I gotta help harvest
the bracky. Take it easy on operating for a while, will you, Doc?"
"All right, Jake. But stop keeping the serious cases a secret. Two men
died last month because you wouldn't call me for surgery. I've broken
all my oaths already. It doesn't matter anymore."
"It matters, boy. We've been lucky, but some day one case will go to the
hospital and they'll find your former work. Then they'll really be after
you. The less you do the better."
Doc watched Jake slump off, then turned down into the little root cellar
and back toward the room concealed behind it, where his crude laboratory
lay. For the moment, he was free to work on the mystery of the black
spots.
He kept running into them--always on the body of someone who died of
something that seemed like a normal disease. Without a microscope, he
was almost helpless, but he had taken specimens and tried to culture
them. Some of his cultures had grown, though they might be nothing but
unknown Martian fungi or bacteria. Mars was dry and almost devoid of
air, but plants and a few smaller insects had survived and adapted. It
wasn't by any means lifeless.
Without a microscope, he could do little but depend on his files of
cases.
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