where painkiller would take time to get for most people
here, but would then be used generously.

Precisely at nine in the morning, Chris began to inject Swanee and Doc
with plasma.

Now there was no thought of cards. They waited, trying to talk, but with
most of their attention on the clock. Doc had estimated that an hour
should be enough to show results, but it was hard to remember that an
hour was the guess as to the minimum time.

He winced as Chris took a tiny bit of flesh from his neck. She went to
the other men, and then submitted to his work on herself. Then she began
preparing the slides.

"Feldman," she read the name of the slide as she inserted it into the
microscope. Then her breath caught sharply. "Only dead cells!"

It was the same for Swanee and Tom. Each had to look at his own slide
and have it explained before the results could be believed. But at last
Chris bent over her own slide. A minute later she glanced up, nodding.
"What it should be. It checks."

Tom whooped and went out the door to notify Jake. There was only plasma
for some two hundred injections, but that should yield sufficient proof.
Once salvation was offered, there should be no trouble convincing the
people that blood donations from their children were worthwhile.

Later, when the last of the plasma had been used, they could finally
relax. Chris slipped off her smock and dropped onto the cot. A tired
smile came onto her lips. "You're forgiven, Dan," she said. A moment
later she was obviously asleep. Doc meant to join her, but it was too
much effort. He leaned his head forward onto his arms, vaguely wondering
why she was calling off the feud.

It was night outside when he awoke, and he was lying on the cot, though
he still felt cramped and strained. He stirred, groaning, and finally
realized that a hand was on his shoulder shaking him. He looked up to
see Jake above him. Chris was busy with the coffee maker.

Jake slumped onto the cot beside Doc. "We took Southport," he announced.

That knocked the sleep out of Doc's system. "You what?"

"We took it, lock, stock and barrel. I figured the news of your cure
would put guts into the men, and it did. But we'd probably have taken it
anyhow. There wasn't anything to fight for there after Earth pulled out
and the plague really hit. Wilson mistook last-minute panic for fighting
spirit. The poor devils didn't have anything to fight about, once the
Lobby stopped goading them."

Doc tri