I picked up the paper to read the lead as he spoke again.
"That was a week ago. For three days the cases rose to a peak and then eased off. We've been working on it and I think we've isolated the virus." He looked up at me. "Didn't you know about it?"
"Chief," I said reproachfully, "You don't think I'd have stayed away if I'd known."
"No ... no, of course not. I haven't had time to think much about it. But we could have used you and Pat. I'm damned glad you're back."
"We ... ah ... I didn't look at a paper for the whole time. Went for a trip in my boat. I even turned off the television."
"You must have had interesting company." He grinned at me slyly.
"Yeah, I had a good crew," I said and changed the subject. "But what about this epidemic?"
The fun died out of his eyes. "We've been expecting the second wave to hit anytime. Judging by the headlines we have it ... and it's a corker. The Department of Health tells me it's spreading faster than a dirty story both north and south of the border."
"You say you have isolated it?"
He picked out several of the photographs and passed them across to me. I looked at them for a moment.