Let Them Eat Tea

She breathes in slowly and deeply, looking at Baldwin steadily. "You want me to do this?" she asks. "You want the government of St. Lucy to foot the bill for distributing this cure to big gatherings of rich American right wing fanatics, sort of a free soup kitchen for the rich, paid for by the not-so-rich?"

  He looks back at her steadily, and nods.

  She takes a deep breath, and exhales heavily.

  "We're all in this together," he says at last. "That's why I do this, to answer your earlier question. Epidemics don't see national boundaries. They don't see class boundaries, or ethnic boundaries. If this is widespread in North America, it will affect the islands. Maybe give rise to another mutation that won't be so easy to cure. We need to stop disease of any kind wherever it is, before it spreads." He moves as if to rise from the stool, but he hears her ask him another question.

  "Are sporadic treatments really going to help?" She asks. "Is one spaghetti dinner going to do anything?"

  He shrugs. "Maybe, if the person was just recently infected, yes, it could be enough. However," he adds, "I think we have another idea." He looks around at the others. He had noticed their reactions to the idea of a spaghetti sauce cannery.

  "And that is?" she asks.

  "Your nickname, Kat, is very convenient for appealing to cat lovers," Baldwin observes, as if it were unrelated to the subject at hand. Then he clarifies the point. "It would be good as part of a brand name for an exotic brand of spaghetti sauce imported from the islands. We could put a high price on it, so the food snobs can think they're getting something good. Certainly it'll be rare. Who knows, we might even be able to charge enough to cover our costs. Have Doug contact me if you talk to him. Tell him his father's dream is about to come true: He's going to start his own business. He's going to be a spaghetti sauce magnate. Kat's spaghet-TEA sauce, with a secret mixture of herbs and spices, distributed exclusively at rallies and fund-raisers."

  "Think about this, Kat," Baldwin concludes. "Suppose this guy who's running for president really is infected. Imagine if you can cure him. Imagine you could cure just that one guy. Do you see the difference that could make?"

  As unlikely as it seems on a Skype connection, their eyes seem to meet.