ly,
were negative."

"Well--are you going to keep on with it?"

"I have to." Kramer rubbed his eyes. "It won't let me sleep. I'm sure
we're on the right track. Something an adult gets gives him resistance
or immunity." He shrugged. "Tell you what. You run those bloods out and
I'll go take another look at the data." He reached into his lab coat and
produced a pipe. "I'll give it another try."

"Sometimes I wish you'd read without puffing on that thing," Mary said.

"Your delicate nose will be the death of me yet--" Kramer said.

"It's my lungs I'm worried about," Mary said. "They'll probably look
like two pieces of well-tanned leather if I associate with you for
another year."

"Stop complaining. You've gotten me to wear clean lab coats. Be
satisfied with a limited victory," Kramer said absently, his eyes
staring unseeingly at a row of reagent bottles on the bench. Abruptly he
nodded. "Fantastic," he muttered, "but it's worth a check." He left the
room, slamming the door behind him in his hurry.

* * * * *

"That man!" Mary murmured. "He'd drive a saint out of his mind. If I
wasn't so fond of him I'd quit. If anyone told me I'd fall in love
with a pathologist, I'd have said they were crazy. I wish--" Whatever
the wish was, it wasn't uttered. Mary gasped and coughed rackingly.
Carefully she moved back from the bench, opened a drawer and found a
thermometer. She put it in her mouth. Then she drew a drop of blood from
her forefinger and filled a red and white cell pipette, and made a smear
of the remainder.

She was interrupted by another spasm of coughing, but she waited until
the paroxysm passed and went methodically back to her self-appointed
task. She had done this many times before. It was routine procedure to
check on anything that might be Thurston's Disease. A cold, a sore
throat, a slight difficulty in breathing--all demanded the diagnostic
check. It was as much a habit as breathing. This was probably the result
of that cold she'd gotten last week, but there was nothing like being
sure. Now let's see--temperature 99.5 degrees, red cell count 4-1/2
million. White cell count ... oh! 2500 ... leukopenia! The differential
showed a virtual absence of polymorphs, lymphocytes and monocytes. The
whole slide didn't have two hundred. Eosinophils and basophils way
up--twenty and fifteen per cent respectively--a relative rise rather
than an absolute one--leukopenia, no doubt about it.