"Only by the way it acts clinically. It fits the flu syndrome better than any other disease we can think of. Odd thing about this stuff," he mused, "as you can see, these first electron pictures don't look like flu and the Biochemistry Section also reports some unusual components in its chemical structure." He stopped to light his pipe. "You remember how I broke up those simple plant viruses a few years ago and tried putting different pieces of them back together to make new ones?" He mumbled around his pipestem, blowing a little cloud of blue smoke with each word. I hadn't been at the Civic at that time but I nodded in affirmation, not wanting to interrupt his train of thought. "Well, this virus isn't the same of course, but it seems to be a relatively simple one and of such a peculiar composition it makes me wonder. Certainly, so far, it doesn't fit in with any of the natural viruses I've handled." "Maybe it's an exotic variety brought in from overseas," I ventured. "Vancouver does handle a lot of foreign shipping. Or maybe it's a wild mutation from some ordinary flu virus. Look what happened in 1957 with that A prime mutation. Perhaps this thing has gone even farther away from the family tree." "I thought of that, but I'm not convinced." He shook his head in exasperation. "Damn it, man, there's something queer in this whole thing ... and I can't put my finger on it!" "What does the bug do to people, aside from the usual stuff?" "They all get a sharp attack of the flu, lasting three or four days. The picture is typical as a rule, but on the mild side. Some of them act as if they had the mumps too." "H'm, that's nice," I said. "Has there been much orchitis in the male patients?" "Who else could get it?" he gibed. "Now that you mention it, I believe there have been some cases," he said drily, "but I've been more concerned with organic chemistry than with organs. By the way, how was your holiday?" "The sly old dog," I thought. "He probably figures I've been having myself a time with Pat." Out loud I answered, "Just fine, Sir." I turned to go out. "Guess I'd better get started back to work. At least I got a good rest." "Really, John, you call that a rest?" He was still chuckling as I shut the door behind me. * * * * * I changed to a white coat in my own small office. There was no definite job assigned to me now and I had no classes to teach this semester. I rambled around the office for a while, straightened out my desk and then decided to go down to Records and look up the case histories of the flu patients. It was partly idle curiosity but I knew that, sooner or later, the Old Man would have me working on it. The girls in Records were full of questions about my vacation. That Pat and I were practically engaged was no secret, and the fact that someone had seen us together on my sloop was providing plenty of gossip.