WASHINGTON, D.C.
Velma Carter wiped her bloodshot eyes and couldn’t look at Platt.
“We were already short two people,” Carter explained. “I couldn’t call in sick another day.” She sunk her chin into her chest and shook her head. “Those poor babies. All my fault. I didn’t mean to make them sick.”
“But you didn’t think about that when you took off your gloves.” Roger Bix’s rage was brutal. He had been looking for someone to shred and now he believed he had found the culprit.
“Roger,” Platt tried to interrupt him.
“We’ll need to test you.” Bix was unrelenting. “See just what the hell you’ve been spreading.”
The woman started sobbing again. When Detective Racine brought her in the small office, the woman’s face was already red and blotchy. Racine hadn’t left and no one suggested she do so. She stood quietly aside, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. Platt didn’t think she was comfortable with Bix’s approach, either.
“What the hell were you thinking,” Bix continued and this time Platt stepped in between the two.
“Ms. Carter, I’m Dr. Benjamin Platt.” He left out the “colonel.” No sense in putting this poor woman more on edge. “We’ll need to take a couple of test samples from you. Is that okay?” They’d need both blood and stool samples, but he’d tell her that later.
She pulled a tissue from somewhere up her sleeve and blew her nose. He could hear the rattle inside her chest. But it sounded like typical cold or flu symptoms. Nothing that would give almost seventy children such immediate nausea and diarrhea.
Platt didn’t look at Bix. He wanted him to know he was cutting him off, but from the corner of his eye he could see that the man’s face was as bright as his orange hair. Platt couldn’t help wondering what had Bix wound so tight, much too tight. He was treating this woman like a terrorist with a bomb strapped to her chest. Yet last night when Platt had suggested a kitchen worker might be the culprit, Bix had dismissed the idea.
“I’m going to have someone come and take a few samples. Is that all right with you, Ms. Carter?” Platt waited for the woman to nod.
“Hell, I’ll take the samples myself.” Bix was at it again.
“No, Mr. Bix,” Platt said, leaning into Bix until the man had to look him in the eye. “We’ll send someone in.” He looked over at Racine. “I saw some paramedics earlier. Are they still here?”
“I’ll go check.”
“We’ll be right back, Ms. Carter. Can I get you anything?”
She shook her head as Platt grabbed Bix by the elbow and escorted him out of the room. He kept walking, pulling Bix along until they were halfway down the hall.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Platt asked. “Last night you told me this could not be a norovirus from improper food handling. You implied it had to already be in the food. Now you unload on that poor woman like she planted the bacteria in every lunch she served. What aren’t you telling me?”
“Doesn’t it make you a little mad when food handlers are so negligent?”
“So you feel better now after lecturing her? Because we both know that unless she has some highly contagious virus or sprayed contaminated body fluids over seventy kids’ meals, she did not cause this.”
Bix shoved at Platt’s hand, though Platt wasn’t even holding on to him anymore. He stood up straight, threw back his shoulders, stretched his neck, and stared at the ceiling. Then he released a sigh and looked at Platt. But still there appeared to be no urgency to explain.
Platt just shook his head. “You’re going to tell me later whether you want to or not. Right now we should start retrieving whatever we can. Before it’s gone.”
“Except we don’t know what we’re looking for at this point.”
“Yes, we do. Undoubtedly, these kids got sick after having lunch in the cafeteria. So let’s go see what we can find of today’s meal even if it means scraping it off the hallway floor and the bathroom stalls.”