By now the Chinese had admitted that thousands were dying in the big cities of Peiping and Shanghai, while panic had disrupted communications to the interior. The first frightened reports were in from India, where efforts to block the Himalayan passes were too late and refugees had spread the deadly "measlepox", as it was now called, to Assam and Upper Bengal. There were rumors of flu in Texas and the Rangers had redoubled their efforts to keep the Mexican "wetbacks" from sneaking across the Rio Grande. All trans-Pacific air travel was cancelled. About that time, the Intercom lit up again. "Are you there, George?" It was Dr. Smith. "Yes. What have you found?" "We have the reports on thirty sperm counts taken today from professional personnel in this hospital. They are all negative." "You mean normal, I hope." "I mean negative for sperm. Three are from doctors who are just over the fever. They show a few abnormal forms in the secretion but no live ones. All the others are several days convalescent and show nothing but epithelial cells, a few polymorphs and more lymphocytes." "What about the biopsies?" "We have half a dozen that we rushed through. The slides aren't the best but it's perfectly obvious that something serious is happening. The spermatogonia are degenerating. The Sertoli cells seem all right and the interstitial cells are apparently untouched." "What's he mean?" Pat whispered to me. "He means the cells that form the sperm are dying but the ones that give a man his masculinity are intact." "How many more biopsies have you?" said the Chief. "About fifty." "That's not enough. We're going to need at least several hundred. There must be absolutely no doubt in anyone's mind that this is a national emergency when we present the facts to the Government. I know that the statisticians can prove that this present number is highly significant but a politician is much more impressed with a lot of people than with a small group." Joe Armstrong came on the line. "George, I'm convinced now that this virus does have serious after-effects. Let me talk to the other hospitals. We can get enough specimens in another twenty-four hours to prove your point." He paused, obviously considering his words. "I can't go along with this secret weapon idea yet.... I don't think there's enough evidence. What do you say?" "There isn't any evidence for the weapon theory," Hallam admitted, "but Gordon is well on the way to showing that the structure of the virus is synthetic. What I mean is that it looks more like a crazy mixture of mumps and flu than like any of the natural viruses or their known mutations." "I still don't think we'd better let that story get out. There'll be enough hell raised as it is." "All right ... just as long as we stop this thing." "How do you suggest we go about it?"